Read Even Steven for Free Online Page B

wasn’t lost. He was gone.
    “William!” she screamed. “William, where’s Justin?” She bolted back into the living room, panic boiling hot in her belly.
    William hadn’t moved. He still stared at the blue light, studiously avoiding eye contact.
    “Goddamn you, William, talk to me. Where is Justin?” She reached out to strike him, but quickly retracted her hand. She’d never seen him like this before. She worried what emotions might accompany the stare.
    As his eyes finally came around—only one of them would open all the way—she noticed the tears, and her legs buckled. Sagging to the floor, she covered her mouth with her hands and gasped, “Oh, God, is he dead? Please tell me he’s not dead.”
    William shook his head, just a barely perceptible movement, but she understood it for what it was. “He’s not dead. At least, I don’t think he is.”
    “Tell me!”
    William winced against her scream, looked as if he might cry. He waved his hands in an odd, circular motion, as if to draw the words out of his body, but nothing came.
    April changed tacks. She put her hand on his forearm and gently squeezed it. “Tell me,” she said again, much softer this time. “Just tell me what happened. Don’t worry about the right words, just tell me what happened to Justin.”
    He took a deep breath and finally made that subtle nodding movement again. “They took him.”
    The words cut like razors. “Who took him? What are you talking about? Who would take Justin?”
    “Two men. Cops. They beat me up really bad.”
    “Why! Goddammit, William, stop with the mystery and tell me what happened.”
    “I don’t know!” William blurted. “They pulled me over while I was driving Justin over to Wilson’s and—”
    “You were taking a two-year-old to a bar?”
    For just an instant, the grief disappeared from William’s face, replaced with a flash of anger, which just as quickly went away. “I don’t know why I was doing that. I know it’s wrong, but I was being a piece of shit, okay? I did it. Or I tried to do it.”
    April realized that she really had no interest in Wilson’s or the fact that her boy would be taken there. “Okay,” she coaxed. “You were on your way to Wilson’s and what happened?”
    “They pulled me over. These two cops in an unmarked car. I was over there off of Tyson Boulevard, you know, in that stretch where everything’s boarded up after five?”
    It was a good half mile out of the way, but April didn’t bother to ask why he was over there. Tyson’s dead-ended about a block from Wilson’s, and by going that way, he avoided any breathalyzer traps that the cops might have laid. “I know where it is. What happened?”
    “Well, they flashed their lights at me and pulled me over, and then when they came to the window, the big one just dragged me out of the car and started beating on me. I swear to God they broke my jaw.” His S ’s slurred into a sloppy, juicy sound, making swear sound like shwear. “When I got up, they had Justin, and they were taking him back to their car. I tried to stop them, but they just kept going. Honest to God, April, I swear I don’t know why. They just came out of nowhere.”
    April’s brain raced to piece together the puzzle. “The police don’t do this sort of thing, William.”
    “Well, these did.”
    “Then we need to call some more. Jesus, you haven’t done that yet?”
    He shook his head. “No, I thought—”
    “William! We’ve got to call the police.”
    “No. I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
    There was that look again. This time it wasn’t anger, but fear. As if he’d been caught at something. Suddenly, she knew he was sandbagging. He knew more than he was telling her.
    “What?” she demanded. “What’s the rest of it?”
    The hurt face returned. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
    “You’re lying,” she yelled. Suddenly, the .25 appeared in her hand, and his pretend fear became very, very real. “Tell