Thirteen Million Dollar Pop

4

Behr sat down at the kitchen table before 7:00 A.M. and appreciated the morning light coming through the window in a slanted shaft. He hadn’t gone to bed until near 4:00, and hadn’t slept much before waking unrested but automatically around 6:00 to a day that could easily have never come for him. He couldn’t help but savor his coffee, the sweet sugar underneath the slight bitterness of the roast.

It hadn’t been a single team that had arrived in the garage late the night before but a wave of Caro boys who flooded in after the call had gone out and word spread.

To do what? Behr wondered. It wasn’t clear. To help with the investigation, perhaps. To herd up and feel the numbers of the organization standing strong against an outside threat. Or maybe it was simply to tack man-hours onto Kolodnik’s bill. Behr had caught a ride with one of them to his car, which was parked back at Kolodnik’s office, and had then driven home.

“Hi,” Susan had said when he’d walked in, looking up from the body pillow she hugged, aware of how late it was. The television was on in the bedroom.

“What’s this?” he asked. She often fell asleep to the TV, and she’d been sleeping not watching, but a glance gave her the answer.

“Women Behind Bars. Mostly wives who killed their husbands.”

Susan was a fan of true crime and reality shows. “You thinking about bumping me off?” Behr asked. “Studying where they slipped up?”

“We’d have to be married first for that,” she said.

“Right.”

“Why are you so late?” she asked.

He’d sat down on the edge of the bed and after catching a look at the large swell of her belly beneath the bedsheets, told her everything, trying to make it sound as routine as possible, which it wasn’t, and she knew it.

Behr went for his second cup of coffee. His shoulders and neck and his knees and wrists felt raw this morning. It wasn’t a question of injury, but as if all the adrenaline that had fired through his system, the absolute tensing of every muscle, had an effect similar to a full body workout. He didn’t mind it. He didn’t have a problem with anything that reminded him he wasn’t dead right about now.

He looked down at the morning paper to find they had the story. But they’d missed most of the details due to how late the deal had gone down. No names of the players were mentioned, just that two men had been fired upon in a downtown parking garage, that the shooter or shooters had gotten away, that no one had been killed.

Susan entered the kitchen and looked at him, noticing his shirt and tie, and the suit jacket hanging over the back of his chair.

“You’re going in to the office?” she asked, surprised.

“Yeah, sure,” he said. “What else am I gonna do?”

“No workout today?” she wondered. Almost every morning around 5:30 or so he’d be at it-running or weights, various other types of strength training, hitting the heavy bag or rolling Brazilian jujitsu. Not today though. After last night, there was something about it that seemed superfluous.

“I took a holiday on account of being alive,” he said, smiling, trying to sound light.

“Seems like a good reason,” she said, going to get a mug for the one cup of coffee a day her obstetrician allowed. “I didn’t even hear you get up. I’m sleeping like someone dropped a cinder block on my head these days.” Susan was complaining a lot about how tired she was, which was unusual for her-both the complaining and the fatigue. Her customary state was one of vivacious energy. “Have I mentioned that being pregnant isn’t much fun?”

“You might’ve, once or twice,” he said. “A couple more weeks, then it’s lounging around and bonbon time,” he said, alluding to the start of her upcoming maternity leave.

“Yeah, I’ve heard newborns are easy,” she said. “You want to go look at that place over on Guilford after work?” They’d given up Susan’s apartment three months back. It was nicer than his but small, while his had the extra bedroom that, though currently serving as a storage space, could be set up for the baby. But since his steady Caro money had been rolling in, they’d been seriously considering moving somewhere nicer. There were some new town houses over in Broad Ripple that would be a clean, fresh place to raise a child.

“Sure,” he said, “shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll let you know if they’re going to keep me late.”