Page 67 of Lone Wolf

“When were you gonna inform us?” Bri was suddenly on her feet, fist pressed to a hip.

“Dunno.”

Bri’s stare swiveled from Andre to Evan. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Because,” Evan said, “it’s none of my business.”

“None of your business? None of your business?” She shook her head. “It’s who you are.”

No. No, it’s not.

Sofia hadn’t moved. She was looking at Evan. “Really? You and Dad … you’re…?”

Evan hesitated. Then gave a brief nod.

“What’s that make us?” Sofia said.

Jack wasn’t Evan’s father but was the closest thing he’d ever had. Jacob Baridon was his biological father but nothing else. His mother hadn’t been a presence in his life; only in her final days had they forged a few delicate threads of kinship. Evan had barely gotten his head around his relation to Andre, and now he felt the mess of this broken family pulling at him. Sofia’s words stirred in his mind: Dad doesn’t have a whole lot else. This wasn’t a language he spoke. There was no Commandment to address this. It was a kind of responsibility he wanted no part of. More important, he wanted it to be no part of him.

“I don’t know,” Evan said.

Sofia looked crestfallen. In his peripheral hearing, Evan heard Bri exhale as if in pain, some kind of maternal response he couldn’t translate.

From his pants: DONCHA WISH YER GIRLFRIEND WUZ HAAAWT LIKE ME?!

The text alert, too. Cursing Joey, he tugged out his RoamZone.

A message from Luke Devine: Allman has a window tonight. 6:00pm.

And then an address and cell number.

Evan had to prepare for the meeting. He had to find some fresh air. He had to get away from these people and their peculiar needs of him.

He stood abruptly. “I have to go.”

Andre was looking at him, a bruised stare, his head turned away from the heat of Brianna’s judgment. Evan had no idea what to make of all this, why it constituted a betrayal, the stakes. Why did they care? Why should any of this involve him?

“I’m sorry, Bri,” Andre said softly. “I shoulda told you.” His head still ducked, he found Evan’s gaze. “We shoulda told you.”

Brianna said, “He doesn’t think that.” She looked at her daughter, her brow furled with—with something. Like she was feeling her child’s pain for her, letting it move through her. “Look at him. He doesn’t care.”

Andre was still watching Evan. His hands were laced at the fingers but parted, and Evan could see the sheen of sweat on the palms, his pleading eyes. “People are unpredictable,” Andre said. “You never know when they’ll surprise you.”

A heat bloomed beneath the surface of Evan’s face. Anger. He was using Evan to talk about himself, and Evan didn’t appreciate having whatever Andre was driving at put on his own shoulders, too.

Andre kept talking: “You can’t count ’em out. Not ever.”

Sofia remained on the couch, not moving. Her legs dangled over her backpack, zipped together, tiny kneecaps side by side, and she was hugging herself around the stomach as if it hurt.

Evan said, “I’ll find your dog.”

And then he left.

34

Home, Sweet Home

Allman lived in a gated equestrian community at the edge of the west valley. Evan pulled up to the guard station in a Hertz rental befitting a Harvard professor who’d flown in for research and gave his fake name and ID to the guard. After a quick call up to the house, the guard waved him through.