The Man Who Killed His Brother Read Free

coffee, toast, vitamin pills of all kinds. She’s a vitamin freak—carries whole bottles in her purse, along with her .357. She even got me shaved. But it was close to nine before I was in any condition to go anywhere. All that time she didn’t say a word. And I didn’t ask any questions. I was too sick.
    I was going to be sicker. Already I wanted a drink so bad it brought tears to my eyes—and this was just the beginning. Shame is an awkward thing to live with, and having Ginny there, having her see me like this, made me ashamed on top of all the other remorse and responsibility. And there aren’t many cures for it. Sometimes work is one of them. But the only one you can actually count on is alcohol,
    But Alathea was missing. When Ginny asked me if I was ready to go, I didn’t answer right away. I went over to the dresser in the bedroom half of the apartment and got out my gun, a .45 automatic, which is about the only gun I’ve ever found that doesn’t feel like a toy in my hand. I checked it over, made sure it was loaded, then strapped on the shoulder holster and put the .45 under my left arm. Then I looked Ginny in the eye as steadily as I could and said, “Alathea
is my niece. My brother’s daughter. She’s thirteen years old, and beside the fact she’s one of those cute kids that makes you happy just to look at her, she also happens to like me. For some reason, Lona has never told her exactly what happened to her father. She thinks I’m just her nice old Uncle Brew. And besides that, she’s solid as a rock. Half the time these days when things get too much for Lona, Alathea carries her—which is one hell of a job for a thirteen-year-old—and she does it beautifully. It doesn’t matter whether I’m ready or not. Let’s go.”
    For a second there, Ginny almost smiled. The lines of worry around her eyes faded. She seemed to shake herself, and then it was as if she hadn’t been up most of the night taking care of me. She didn’t look tired anymore. “That’s more like it,” she said, mostly to herself. She handed me a jacket, and a minute later I was walking down the stairs.
    Talk is cheap. I wasn’t ready, and it showed. I almost didn’t make it down the stairs. My knees felt like mush, and the stairwell kept trying to stand on edge. There was a little voice in the back on my head saying, You need a drink you need a drink you need a drink. It wasn’t easy to ignore, even with Ginny watching me.
    But I didn’t figure out why she was acting so much like she was worried about me until she took my arm to steer me toward her car. Of course she knew all about the connection between me and Alathea. Now she thought something serious had happened to my niece. She was afraid of what knowing that would do to me. She knew killing Richard had pushed me right to the edge. She was afraid whatever happened to Alathea would push me over.
    I wanted to ask her about that. Ask, hell! I wanted to drag it out of her. But I put it off. Just climbing into her Olds left me weak as an old man. And I’d forgotten my sunglasses. Already the sun was beating down on the streets like bricks out of the dry thin blue sky. Made my eyes hurt. If it hadn’t been for the tinted glass in the Olds, I might not have survived as far as Lona’s house.
     
     

    Lona Axbrewder, my brother’s widow. I wasn’t exactly her favorite person. There was one question I had to ask. When we parked in front of the house, I stayed where I was for a minute, trying not to hold my head in my hands. Then I said, “Why did she call you? You know how she feels about me.”
    “Ask her yourself,” Ginny said. “I’m not a mind reader.” But her voice was stiff, and I’d heard that stiffness before. It meant she knew the answer and didn’t want to tell me.
    “Maybe,” I muttered to myself. Maybe I would ask her. I was in no condition to know what I was going to do. I had enough problems just getting the door open and climbing out onto the