Bad Men

“Just the two of you?” asked the black woman.

Bill nodded hard, then stopped suddenly as he considered the possibility that the action might get his head blown off. The pretty boy stayed by the half-open door while Bill was forced back into the living room. Je

And then he heard the front door closing, and footsteps coming along the hallway. Two people, thought Bill. The pretty boy and-

Moloch entered the living room. “Billy boy!” said Moloch. His eyes flicked toward the woman, then back again. “I see you haven’t changed a bit.”

“Aw, Jesus, no,” said Bill. “Not you.”

Moloch moved closer to him, reached up to Bill’s face, and grasped his hollow cheeks in the fingers of his right hand.

“Now, Billy boy,” said Moloch. “Is that any way to greet your brother-in-law?”

Dupree nodded approvingly.

“The house looks good,” said Joe. “You’ve done a lot with it in the last year.”

He was holding the glass as delicately as he could while she showed him around her home. To Maria

“I wanted to put our own stamp on it, and Jack didn’t object. He helped us out some, when he could.”

“He’s a good man. There’s been no more trouble, has there? Like before?”

“You mean drinking? No, none that I’ve seen. Da

“And you?”

“He’s okay, I guess. Lousy painter, though.”

Joe laughed. “He has a distinctive style, I’ll give him that.”

“But he was friendly, right from the start, and I’m grateful to him. It was kind of hard when we got here. People seem a little…suspicious of strangers, I guess.”

“It’s an island community. People here tend to stick pretty close together. You can’t force your way in. You have to wait for them to loosen up, get to know you. Plus, the island’s changed some recently. It’s not quite a suburb of Portland, but it’s getting there, with people commuting to the mainland for work. Then you have rich folks coming in, buying waterfront properties, forcing up prices so that families that have lived here for generations can’t afford to help their kids set up homes. The assessments for waterfront properties out here are based on one sale made last year, and the assessor in that case only went back three months to make his valuation. Lot prices increased one hundred percent because of it, almost overnight. It was all legal, but that didn’t make it right. Island communities are dying. You know, a hundred years ago there were three hundred island communities in Maine. Now there are sixteen, including this one. Islanders feel under siege and that makes them draw closer together in order to survive, so outsiders find it harder to gain a foothold. Each group is wary of the other, and never the twain shall meet.”

He drew a breath. “Sorry, I’m ranting now. The island matters to me. The people here matter to me. All of them,” he added.

She felt the tension again, and luxuriated in it for a moment.

“But working in the store, that’s a good way to start,” he continued. “Folks get to know you, to trust you. After that, it’s just plain sailing.”

Maria

Joe wasn’t like her husband, not by a long shot.

Moloch sat in one of the overstuffed armchairs and sipped a beer.

“Fooling around, Billy boy?” he said. “Out with the old, in with the new?”

Bill had stopped weeping. He’d had to. Moloch had threatened to shoot him if he didn’t.

Bill didn’t reply.

“Where is she?” asked Moloch.

Bill still said nothing.

Moloch swallowed, then winced, as if he had just swallowed a tack.

“Queer beer,” he said. “I haven’t had a beer in more than three years, and this stuff still tastes like shit. I’ll ask you one more time, Bill. Where is your wife?”

“I don’t know,” said Bill.

Moloch looked at Dexter and nodded.

Dexter gri

“No-o-o,” she said. “Please don’t.”

She looked to Bill for help, but the only help Bill could offer was to sell out his own wife.

“She works late tonight.” The words came out in a rush. “Down at the mall.” He finished speaking and appeared about ready to retch at what he had just done.

Moloch nodded. “What time does she finish?”

Bill looked at the clock on the mantel.

“About another hour.”

Moloch looked at Dexter, who had paused by the doorway of the bedroom.

“Well?” Moloch said. “What are you waiting for? You have an hour.”

Dexter’s grin widened. He drew Je

“I told you,” said Bill. “I told you where she was.”

“And I appreciate that, Billy boy,” said Moloch. “Now you just sit tight.”

“Please,” said Bill. “Don’t let him do anything to her.”

Moloch looked puzzled.

“Why?” he asked. “It’s not as if she’s your wife.”

Joe helped her put the glasses away.

“I have to ask you something,” he said.

She dried her hands.

“Sure.”

“It’s just-” He stopped, seemingly struggling to find the right words. “I have to know about the folks who come to the island. Like I said, it’s a small, close-knit community. Anything happens, then I need to know why it’s happening. You understand?”

“Not really. Do you mean you want to know something about me?”

“Yes.”

“Such as?”

“Da

“Da

“What was his name?”

She had prepared for this very moment. “His name was Server, Lee Server.”

“You were married?”

“No.”

“When did he die?”

“Fall of ninety-nine. There was a car accident outside Tampa.”

That was true. A man named Lee Server had been killed when his pickup was hit by a delivery truck on the interstate. The newspaper reports had said that he had no surviving relatives. Server had been drinking, and the reports indicated that he had a string of previous DUIs. There weren’t too many people fighting for space by Lee Server’s graveside when they laid him down.

“I had to ask,” said Joe.

“Did you?”

He didn’t reply, but the lines around his eyes and mouth appeared to deepen.

“Look, if you want to back out of tomorrow night, I’ll understand.”