Page 48 of Book of Night
She went to the closet next. Most of the stuff in there was hers, but he had a winter coat and a pair of boots shoved deep in on the left side. She wriggled her hands into the pockets and took out two receipts. One for gas, another for milk, bread, and eggs. Both paid in cash.
Peering into the darkness, she noticed an empty-looking black duffel bag on the floor, past the boots. She dragged it out and unzipped it.
At the bottom she found a metal disc about the size of a nickel, and a driver’s license. She turned the bag over and shook everything onto the floor, but nothing else fell out.
She picked up the small metal disc. It was thick and heavier than she expected, almost like a watch battery, but without any markings. A part to something electronic? A piece in a game? She tucked it into her pocket.
Then she looked at the driver’s license. The picture was of a younger Vincent, smiling wide, with neatly barbered hair that someone had used product on, a collared shirt just visible along the bottom of the image. An address in Springfield, with an apartment number. And over the state capital, an entirely different name.
Edmund Vincent Carver.
For a dizzying moment, she thought she was looking at a fake ID. But the card had uniform edges and bended right, and when she held it to the light, the tell-tale metallized kinegram shone over his picture.
Lionel Salt’s grandson. The one who’d stolen theLiber Noctem. The one who was supposed to be dead.
Lionel Salt’s heir, lying beside her in the dark.
Charlie found it hard to catch her breath. She was pretty sure this was a full-blown panic attack, and that if she kept inhaling so quickly and shallowly, she’d bruise her lungs.
She took out her phone and snapped a picture of his license, amazed to find that she could manage it. Everything seemed to be happening too fast. But she still made herself go to her laptop and open her search engine. She typed “Edmund Carver” and “Springfield.”
The first hit was an article that came up from last summer, printed inThe Republican:
SPRINGFIELD—The burnt remains of two bodies were discovered in a car two blocks from the MGM casino in the downtown area in the early-morning hours of Monday.
Police have identified one as belonging to Edmund “Remy” Carver, 27, socialite and grandson of Lionel Salt. The other was Rose Allaband, 23, who had been reported missing after disappearing from her apartment in Worcester four months ago. Early forensics suggest a murder-suicide.
The sheriff’s office is not looking for additional suspects at this time.
Charlie’s heart sped.
A few more clicks and she found Vince’s picture with a dozen other young, broad-shouldered men on the New York University fencing team. He wore a collared white bodysuit, arms folded across his chest, hair shorter than on the license, faded close to his scalp on the sides. He looked like he was in a costume, except for the way he was smiling at the camera, as though he believed the world was made for people like him.
Vince didn’t smile like that.
Of course, back then he’d called himselfRemyand been wealthy and happy. He hadn’t killed somebody or faked his own death. He wasn’t working an under-the-table job cleaning up corpses or shacking up with some broke girl to have a place to sleep.
She remembered the sweat trickling between her shoulder blades in the crowded bar the night they met, the taste of gin and tonic made with well liquor because she’d wanted to get drunk on the cheap, her friend dipping out early, how Vince had stood like a wall between her and getting shoved into the fire door.
If she’d known he was filthy fucking rich, would she have taken him home when she was feeling self-destructive and foolish? No way. Of course, she’d never have believed him either. She’d have thought it was the world’s worst line.Oh, the grandson of a billionaire, you say? Well, I only get down with bajillionaires. Just your luck.
If he’d convinced her, though? Never. Not a guy who’d graduated from a prestigious university, a guy with a trust fund and a future ahead of him. No chance she would have brought him back to her rental house, so he could sneer at how she lived, so he could look down on her for her job, her lack of education, and all her choices.
And if she’d known he was related to Salt, she would have broken a bottle over his head.
Charlie tried to focus, to imagine whathe’dbeen thinking that night. Probably worried that hedidn’thave a future, right? He’d stolen theLiber Noctem,and then something had gone wrong. Something to do with the girl? Something that had resulted in two dead bodies and a need to fake his own death?
He’d gotten that fake Minnesota driver’s license somehow, one good enough for Charlie not to question it. Of course, she’d never seen a real Minnesota license, or taken his out of the plastic sleeve to inspect it, and she supposed very few other people had either. But he had no credit card and no credit. No social security number. Just a gruesome job cleaning hotel rooms under the table.
Enter Charlie. Probably saw her drinking alone and figured her for an easy mark. A sad girl, ready to take him straight to bed. Desperate enough not to ask too many questions. That’s what good con artists did. They didn’t need to convince you of anything, because you were too busy convincing yourself.
Then nearly a year later, Vince walks into Rapture and finds his grandfather’s hired gun standing there. If Hermes spots him, he’ll be in more trouble than ever. So Hermes has to go. He hadn’t done it to save Charlie.
She felt a little light-headed, a little dizzy.
“Did you mean to leave—” Posey leaned against the doorframe, hand stillon the knob. Her eyes widened slightly at the mattress shoved up against the wall, the dumped-out drawers, then her gaze went to Charlie sitting on the floor. “Did you know you left thirty bucks in singles in those clothes you tossed in the trash?”
“Shit,” Charlie said. Her tips for the night. She was losing it. Seriously losing it.
