Chapter Three
Trail of Tears After crossing the murky waters of Lake Pontchartrain, and arriving on the north shore, Steven suddenly realized he had not made living arrangements for Sarah and himself, for their stay. He mentioned this briefly and both Ashley and Matt offered their apartments as havens for the couple.
“We couldn’t impose like that guys. We’ll probably get a hotel,” Sarah said, but Ashley cut her off abruptly.
“Are you kidding?” Ashley asked. “You guys are not staying at a hotel.”
“If push came to shove, I guess we could stay at Mom and Dad’s house,” Steven finally ventured, surprised that he even suggested it.
“That might not be a good idea,” said Sarah, nudging him gently.
“Have you been to the house?” he asked Ashley.
“No,” she said. “I haven’t been.”
Their conversation drifted off, again, into a lapse of silence and they finally stopped at Ashley’s apartment, where they unloaded, showered and made a quick lunch.
Steven climbed out of the shower and found Sarah standing in front of Ashley’s bathroom mirror, brushing her teeth.
“So what’s the plan?” she asked.
“Seeing as how Ashley has done absolutely nothing at all, I guess I start at the police station,” he said.
Sarah raised her eyes at him, as if to tell him to lower his voice some and then began to speak.
“Look,” she said. “Try not to go so hard on her.”
“But she didn’t do anything,” Steven said. “Not a single phone call to anyone except to me. She hasn’t spoken to the funeral home. Oh yeah that’s right, the police can’t release their bodies until they’ve been identified.”
“Whoa,” Sarah said. “Look. This isn’t going to be easy. Not for either of you. But you have to remember, until now she’s been alone. I think we should heed your friend Matt’s advice. We work together, which is what I wanted to ask you about now.”
“Go ahead,” Steven said.
“Do you want or need me to go with you to the police station?” she asked him. “There seems to be a little tension between you and your sister right now. She might respond better to me, a semi-stranger right now. But if you really need me to go with you…”
“No, I was thinking the same thing,” Steven said. “Matt volunteered to go with me to the police station. But there’s so much to do.” Eventually, we are going to have to go to their house, my parent’s house. It’s not like we can just avoid it. All my parents phone numbers are in their address book there.”
“Is this something you want Ashley and me to handle?” Sarah asked.
“No,” Steven said.
“We’ll play it by ear, honey,” Sarah said, and she took him into her arms and kissed him. “We’ll get through this.”
Matt paused for a moment, hesitant, as he and Steven were about to enter the sheriff’s office sub-station. Since the accident had occurred outside city limits, the sheriff’s office had jurisdiction.
“What is it?” Steven asked him.
“Just a thought,” said Matt with a slight laugh. “I don’t think I’ve ever just voluntarily walked into a police station. The last time I was here it was for DWI number two.”
“Lovely,” Steven said.
They walked into the bottom floor of the sub-station and it was vacant, except for a small telephone with a sign that read, “Lift phone for service.”
Steven did and he was directed by a dispatcher to take the elevator up to the third floor. He and Matt climbed into the elevator and he felt a slight feeling of vertigo as the elevator plunged upwards. They stepped out into a busy room. Off to the left was a help desk and Steven approached and told them who he was and why he was there.
A short woman then picked up her phone and spoke lowly into the receiver and then hung it up.
“Someone will be with you in a moment,” she advised him.
A few moments later a large red-headed officer in street clothes approached him
“Well, well, well,” the man said. “If it isn’t the local boy done good, Mr. Pulitzer Prize himself.”
Steven looked at the man for a moment and tried to place him. He was familiar, but Steven couldn’t quite pin the name.
“You don’t even remember me do you?” the cop asked.
“Faciane,” Steven said. “Miles Faciane.”
“Bingo,” the man said, extending his hand and shaking Steven’s hand. “Long time no see. What’s it been, since high school?”
“Must be,” Steven said. “This is Matt, friend of the family.”
“Oh this one I know,” the cop said. “Guess maybe I ought to run his name while he’s here, just to make sure he has no warrants.”
Matt just glared at the guy with an aloof smile and Faciane just laughed.
“Just giving you a hard time,” he said, and then to Steven, “Sorry about this. Let’s go to my office. Can I get you guys something, coffee or a cold drink?”
“No,” Steven said. “We’re okay.”
Inside Faciane’s office, they each took a seat.
“You’ll have to excuse the mess,” Faciane said.
“So where do we start?” asked Steven. “Do we have to go to the morgue or something?”
“Thanks to the wonders of modem technology, families don’t have to go through that any more,” Faciane said. “It’s all done by computer, via remote cameras. I guess that’s as good a place as any to start. Matt, is it?”
“Yeah,” Matt said.
“You mind waiting here for a second?” Faciane asked.
“No, I’m good,” Matt said.
Faciane and Steven exited the room. Faciane led Steven to a small room with several cameras and laptop computers set up. A few moments later, both of them returned to Faciane’s office. “I’m sorry man,” Faciane said.
Steven just waived his hand. “It’s okay,” he said, taking a sip of a Coke. “I actually expected a lot worse. I thought it would be more graphic.”
That was true. Over the video monitor, he’d seen both his mother and father’s faces. Everything from the neck down had, thankfully, remained covered.
“Ain’t no need to see all that,” Faciane had said. “All you really gotta see to make positive identity in most cases is the faces.”
Both his mother and father had suffered head injuries, which, at this point was believed to be the cause of death. Thankfully, though, even those injuries were relatively clean, in sight.
“Can you tell me what happened now?” Steven asked.
“We got the call a little after midnight on Monday morning, Sunday night,” Faciane said.
“Call?” Steven asked.
“Yeah, a driver called to report a car had run off the road,” Faciane said.
“Where did this happen?” Steven asked.
“Out near the Rigolets,” Faciane said. “You know where Old Spanish Trail ends and the Rigolets road intersects?”
“Yeah,” Steven said. “I know the area.”
It was a popular area renown for traffic fatalities like the death of actress Jane Mansfield in the late 1960’s.
“Looks like they misjudged the turn,” Faciane said. “Actually happens out there a lot. They need some more lights out that way. Which, I guess is my question for you. Do you have any idea why they were out there? It’s not exactly on the beaten path, if you know what I mean. If they were coming home from New Orleans it would have made more sense for them to come home I-10 or even on Highway 11.”
“No,” Steven said, cursing himself for not checking the message his mother had left on his answering machine back in New England. He didn’t divulge this fact, that he had a message, to Faciane.
“I have another question for you too,” Faciane said. “This one might not be as pleasant.”
“Go ahead,” said Steven.
“Are either of your parents heavy drinkers?” Faciane asked.
“What?” Steven asked, caught off guard.
“Did either of them drink a lot?” Faciane asked.
“A little,” Steven said. “Mom drank wine on occasion, martinis for Dad sometimes. But I wouldn’t consider either of them to be drinkers. I don’t think I’ve ever seen either one of them drunk before. Why do you ask?”
“Well, the EMT’s found an empty bottle of Jack Daniels in the front seat with them, when their bodies were removed from the wreck,” Faciane said. “We’ve done the autopsy, but toxicology reports will take a few weeks.”
“That doesn’t make sense to me,” Steven said. “Jack Daniels? I can say with certainty that neither of them drank whiskey.”
“Look, it might be something. It’s probably nothing though,” Faciane said. “Like I
said, we’ll know more when the toxicology report comes back. Seeing as how it was a single vehicle accident and no one else was hurt, I’m not sure it really matters one way or another.”
“Was anything else retrieved from their car?” Steven asked.
“Not to my knowledge,” Faciane said. “Only reason they took the alcohol was because it was up front with them. Car’s at the salvage yard now. They have it sealed off until you get there to collect personal effects.”
“What happens if their toxicology reports come back clean?” Steven asked.
“Nothing I imagine,” Faciane said. “Look the bottle could have come from anywhere. There could be a hundred possible reasons, logical reasons why it was there. I just wanted you to know about it, is all. I don’t know if it’s something you want to tell your sister about or not. That’s up to you.”
“There’s nothing logical about any of this,” Steven said. “It’s not logical that they were out in the middle of nowhere when they crashed. And it’s certainly not logical that they would have an empty whiskey bottle in their car when they barely drank. I’m at a big disadvantage here, because I’ve been in New England for two years. I talked to my parents on occasion, but I don’t know much about their lives, or what they’ve been up to since I’ve been gone.”
“I understand that,” Faciane said. “Look we do have effects, like wallet and purse that we recovered from your parents. If you’d like to give us credit card numbers and things like that we can check to see when and where transactions were made, at least to establish some sort of timeline. Sometimes, not knowing is the worst thing in a case like this. I’d be happy to help you.”
“I don’t really have a problem with that,” Steven said. “But let me check with our family attorney before I give you those numbers. I mean, no offense, but..”
“None taken,” Faciane said. “I understand.”
An hour later, Steven arrived at the salvage yard with a printed ticket in his hand.
The guy at the desk, an older gentleman wearing greasy overalls, looked at the ticket
and said, “Oh yeah, come on. It’s out here.”
The salvage man, who introduced himself as Gus, led Steven to a section of the junkyard off to the right of the office. He led Steven and Matt to a wrecked navy blue Sentra.
“Wait a minute,” Steven said. “This is a mistake. This isn’t my parents car.”
“It’s the right car all right,” Gus said. “It’s a rental, though.”
The front end of the car was severely dented inwards, looking as if it had left little to no room between the steering wheel, which was bent inwards, and the driver’s seat. The front windshield was cracked and driver’s door was dented. It also looked as if the driver’s side airbag had been released.
“Can I check it out?” Steven asked.
“Go ahead,” Gus told him. “It hasn’t been cleaned up yet. The rental company wants to come get it but I told them not before you came to collect any belongings.”
Steven nodded and gave a precursory look from the passenger side, which was the least damaged. In the back seat was a brief case, his fathers, and he removed it. There we blood stains on the interior, some heavier than others, on both the driver and passenger
sides.
The trunk was popped too, but Steven found nothing save for his father’s brief case. If nothing else, the fact that the car was a rental explained the empty whiskey bottle. It could have easily been jammed under the seat, only to have been shaken loose by the impact of the crash.
A few quick calls filled in the rest of the details. His father had rented the Sentra after the transmission went out on his own car, the Camry. Steven called the family mechanic and found that the car was ready to be picked up and had been dropped off in the middle of the week before.
Steven asked if there was a charge and Ralph, the mechanic, said that under the circumstances he would totally waive any cost.
“I’m sorry to hear about it,” Ralph told him over the phone. “Your parents were good people. This is just a damned shame. You have enough to worry about now, don’t worry about the bill. It’s on me.”
“Ralph, are you sure?” Steven asked. “A new transmission is a big job.”
“I said don’t worry about,” said Ralph. “You can come on by and pick it up whenever you’re ready.”
An hour later, Steven collapsed on the sofa at Matt’s apartment, with the bag of his parents personal effects and his dad’s brief case sitting on the coffee table in front of him.
“You want something to drink man?” Matt asked him, as he sat down next to him.
“No,” Steven replied. “Not now.”
He carefully emptied the contents of the evidence bag out on the coffee table. His father’s wallet, his mother’s purse, a few twenties, tens and a five, some change and a small piece of white paper. He picked up the piece of paper first and then inspected it. It was a receipt from a restaurant, Delveccio’s, dated Sunday night. He scanned the paper and then sighed.
“What was Sunday’s date?” he asked Matt.
“The 17th I think,” Matt said.
“It makes sense now,” Steven said. “February 17th was their reconciliation date ”
“Say what?” Matt asked.
“Sort of like a second anniversary date for them,” Steven began to explain. “When I was around 10 or 11 and Ashley was around 5, my parents separated for a short time. I don’t know, maybe nine or ten months. Dad took Mom to Delveccio’s when they got back together. It’s over near Chalmette, which explains why they took the back way.”
“I never knew your mom and dad were separated,” Matt said.
“Yeah, it wasn’t a huge deal,” Steven said. “I’m not even sure what was going on or why they did. Dad was gone a lot at the time, with work, and I just think Mom was a little overwhelmed with two kids and little help. He changed jobs, though, and told her he wanted to make it work.”
Again, Steven sighed, but this time with relief.
“You okay,” Matt asked.
“I’m just glad it all makes sense now,” Steven said. “I was worried at first; the
whiskey bottle, the wrong car. It all makes sense now though. That’s a relief. Their being dead is hard enough. I don’t think I could have handled having to deal with weird circumstances.”
Steven looked at the piece of paper one more time and then placed it, along with the rest of the stuff, back into the bag.
“I think I’ll take that drink now,” he said to Matt.
Although there had been a time in his life when he did drink, and drank heavily, Steven had sworn off booze for the most part about a year or two before he moved to New England. Instead, he had picked up working out at the gym as a healthier way of life.
Because of this, the three rum and cokes he drank while relaxing at Matt’s caught him off guard. While he wasn’t drunk, he certainly could feel the effects of the alcohol and, quite honestly, he didn’t totally enjoy the feelings it left him with.
A creeping sense of melancholy seemed to overtake him as he used the time to catch up with his old friend, before taking the trip to his parent’s house that he knew he would have to do before the end of the day.
He’d called Sarah earlier, to check in with her and to tell her what he had discovered about the accident. Sarah had asked him if Ashley knew about his parents early separation and he was hard pressed to remember if she did.
“I don’t know, she was pretty young when it happened,” he’d told Sarah. “I don’t want to withhold facts from her, but by the same token I don’t want to make this any harder for her, or me, than it already is. I have to go to the house soon, to get their
address book. I guess I need to contact the funeral home too and our attorney. There’s so much to do. I’m not sure where to begin.*’
“Well, we’ve started a list,” Sarah said. “It’s a master list of things to do. Have they been released yet?”
“Yeah they should be at the funeral home by now,” he said. “I guess that’s my next stop.”
Steven contacted the family’s attorney, Scott Ridley, and told him what had happened.
“Oh my god,” was Ridley’s stunned reaction. “Your father and I just played golf together last week. This is awful.”
“I need help,” Steven conceded. “I don’t know what their financial situation was, or if they had insurance or wills drawn. I’m not even sure who to call to….”
“Don’t say another word Steven,” Ridley said. “I’ll get hold of your dad’s boss, Ted. He plays golf with us too. Where are your parents now?”
“They should be at the funeral home by now,” Steven said, “I was just on my way down there.”
“Say no more,” replied Ridley. “I can meet you there in a half hour.”
It was dark when they arrived at the funeral home.
Steven and Matt walked in and found Ridley already there, commandeering the situation, barking orders in a civil, but aggressive manner which attorneys seem so adept at.
“Steven,” Ridley exclaimed, as he rushed toward him and hugged him.
“I’m okay, I’m okay, right now I just need guidance more than anything,” Steven told him. “There are so many details. I just don’t want to forget anything.”
Ridley steered him into a small anteroom, out of earshot from some of the funeral home workers who were milling about.
“This should come s no surprise to you, seeing as how your dad was such a big advocate of being prepared, but everything is more or less taken care of,” Ridley said.
“What do you mean taken care of?” Steven asked.
“Both your mother and father’s funeral arrangements have been paid for already,” Ridley said. “Eleven years ago, in fact. When the time came, your parents didn’t want you two to have to deal with it. It’s all taken care of.”
Matt drove Steven to his parents house after they finished at the funeral home.
Even at night, Steven could tell the yard was neatly manicured. There were some newspapers piled up in the driveway, but barring that, there was nothing else there to indicate that the house was empty, or that its owners had been killed in a car accident.
Matt pulled his car into the driveway and killed the engine. They both sat in silence for a while and finally Matt opened his ashtray and removed a small, thinly-rolled joint.
“Look man, I know you’re like all health conscious these days, but if you want,” Matt began.
“Light it up,” Steven said. “I might not take much, but it’s okay if you do. I don’t mind.”
Matt lit the joint and took a few big drags. The heavy odor of marijuana permeated the air. Steven took the joint from Matt and took a few hits, almost coughing immediately.
“That’s harsh,” he said to Matt. “I don’t want much.”
“I don’t blame you,” Matt muttered.
Matt took another hit from the joint and handed it to Steven, who took a small drag before extinguishing it back in the ash tray.
Together, they made their way to the front door. Out of habit, Steven reached into the mailbox, under the carport and grabbed a stack of mail. He then fumbled in his pocket and removed his keys, which he had not used in over two years, maybe even longer. The simple fact of the matter was that Steven could not remember the last time he walked into his parents house and this realization depressed the living hell out of him.
“I can’t even remember the last time I was here,” Steven said out loud, as if he were confessing or seeking some sort of absolution.
“There will be time for regret later on dude,” Matt said. “Let’s just do what we came here to do.”
The door swung open and Steven fumbled for a light, first turning on the outdoor porch light and then the light switch that illuminated the entranceway and living room of
his parent’s home.
The house was neither cold nor hot. Steven figured his mother or father had probably set the thermostat to mid-range before they left for dinner on Sunday. The house still smelled like Pine-Sol and potpourri.
What did you expect, he mused to himself, cobwebs and the smell of decay? No. Everywhere he looked, as he made his way to the kitchen, there were signs of life. If there was any indication at all that his parents knew they would never return home alive again, Steven didn’t see it. His mom’s cell phone was still on the charger. On the fridge was a small board with a list of things to be done, which included “Call Ralph about car” and “Pick up air conditioner filters.”
The latter made him grin because southern Louisiana was perhaps the
only place on the face of the earth where people worried about buying air conditioner filters in November.
“Address book and clothes,” Steven said aloud, remembering verbally what he had come to pick up.
“What clothes are you going to get?” Matt asked him.
“Fuck if I know,” Steven said. “What they wanted to be buried in wasn’t exactly something I talked to them about on a regular basis.
“Maybe that’s something Sarah and Ashley should do,” Matt said.
“I’ll be lucky to even get Ashley in here, but yeah, Sarah would be good at that sort of thing,” Steven admitted.
Steven looked on the microwave, near the telephone, for his mom’s address book but didn’t see it there. As he did this, Matt opened the refrigerator and peered inside thoughtfully.
“What are you doing?” Steven asked him. “Get out of there.”
Matt shut the door.
A flood of memories caught Steven off guard and he held back a sob, but then let it go…it seemed for an instant as if his lungs were going to explode and a sharp, cold stabbing feeling hit him in the abdomen, causing his entire body to recoil and then freeze…
“It’s okay man,” Matt said. “You okay?”
Suddenly shadows seemed to play out of the comers of his eyes and he felt, for a moment as if there was someone, or something, in his parent’s house with him. He spun
around, and scanned the room.
“What is it?” Matt asked.
“Just jumpy,” Steven said, wondering what the hell had just happened to him.
His eyes fell to the small digital clock on the kitchen CD player, which was mounted underneath the cabinets. The clock blinked on and off at the time 3:15, which made him do a double take.
“That’s weird,” Steven said, nodding at the blinking clock.
“Not really,” Matt said. “We’ve had a bunch of pretty bad rain storms this past week. I lost electric at my apartment a couple of times.”
They began to walk to the back of the house toward the bedrooms. Steven turned on the hall light, remembering how, as a kid, the hallway had always sort of creeped him out as a kid. When having to navigate the hallways then, he’d start, one by one, turning the lights on as he made his way down it, leaving himself a trail of light. This is what he did now as well, although he felt a little foolish for being spooked. Still, he knew what he felt back in the kitchen. It felt as if someone had been there watching.
The first bedroom to the right, which had been Ashley’s, had since been turned into a day room. His room, however, had remained untouched. He walked into his parent’s room and turned on the light. The bed was made, but some clothes lay draped over the large chair near the dresser.
He moved to the bedside table and opened a drawer and there, found the address book. He flipped through it quickly and then placed it in his jacket pocket. He then turned and met Matt back in the hallway.
Together, they entered his bedroom. His bed, which still had the same navy blue comforter on it, was still made. On the wall was a large poster, this one a movie poster from the movie Repo Man. His dresser was still where it had been when he moved. He opened his closet and found a few old articles of his clothes still hanging there. His shelves were still stacked with old boxes of comic books. He also spied a stack of old spiral-bound notebooks and he pulled them from the shelf to look at them.
They were ancient dream journals that he’d kept for a while, at the urging of one of his old therapists. He looked at them, not really looking at them and decided to take them with him. He also removed an old jacket of his, a brown leather jacket, which was still in very nice condition.
With a sigh, he shut the closet door and turned to Matt.
“You got everything you need?” Matt asked.
“Yeah, I think so,” Steven replied, surprised at how shaky his own voice sounded. Although the rooms of the house were still furnished, he though he heard a slight echo, but shut it out of his mind, as he walked back into the hallway and turned the light out. He turned off the lights, as they made their way back down the hallway, and then re-
turned to the kitchen, to the answering machine.
He played the messages. There were only three- one from Ashley on Saturday- “Mom, call me.” There was another from JC Penney saying that a package was ready for pickup. The third and last call was from his father, telling his mother he was on his way home from work on Friday.
Steven was shocked at how off guard the sound of his father’s voice on the machine caught him. His father’s voice sounded clear and full of, well, life.
Matt placed a hand on Steven’s shoulder and said gently, “Come on man, let’s get out of here.”
Steven nodded, turned off the kitchen light and then shut and locked the front door behind him as they exited.
Steven’s cell phone rang as they were pulling out the driveway.
“”Hello,” he answered. It was Sarah and her voice sounded urgent and filled with panic.
“Where are you?” she asked, her voice reaching a feverish pitch.
“Just leaving my parents house,” he said. “What’s wrong?”
“You just need to get here right away,” she said. “There’s no time to explain. Just
hurry up, please hurry.”
Steven hung up and told Matt to step on it.
They arrived at Ashley’s apartment, out near the lake, about ten minutes later and
jumped out of Matt’s car in a rush.
They actually heard the noise before they rounded the comer to Ashley’s front door. It was a loud banging followed by someone’s irate screams.
“Open the door you fucking bitch,” yelled a man’s voice, seemingly oblivious to rousing the attention of neighbors. “I said open this door before I beat the living shit out of you. You think last week was something. You haven’t seen nothing.”
“Just what the hell is going on here?” Steven said, his own voice raised.
The sound of Steven’s voice startled the guy, who spun around quickly to face him and Matt.
“Mind your own fucking business,” he said, turning his back to them, and continuing to beat on the door.
Matt grabbed him first, spinning him back around by his shoulder.
“This is my sister’s apartment,” Steven said. “I think that does make it my business.”
The realization of what was going on caused a sudden change in the guy’s demeanor, as he looked confused for a moment and then backed down some.
“Steven?” he asked, looking warily at them.
Then it dawned on Steven who this was. It was Henry, Ashley’s latest boyfriend. He was a doctor, or a doctor in residence. Admittedly, Steven didn’t really know the difference or care for that matter. His mind jogged back to the night Ashley had called to tell him about their parents. She had mentioned something to the effect of, “First Henry, now this.”
It was now, suddenly, that Steven realized he hadn’t asked Ashley what the problem was with Henry. Now, though, he suddenly knew and a black pit inside him seemed to open up.
“Man,” said Henry, trying to play it off, as if he hadn’t just been banging on Ashley’s door threatening her. “Sorry about all the noise. Your sister, she just.”
“She just what, needs another ass kicking,” said Steven, moving toward Henry.
“It’s not like that man,” Henry said.
“You sure?” Steven said, not a question. “That’s not what you just said twenty seconds ago.”
“We broke up last week,” Henry said.
“You mean she broke up with you after you kicked her ass or before?” Steven said moving toward Henry even more.
“Man, I suggest you back up a little,” Henry said. “There’s no need to get crazy here.”
Before he could get another word out, Steven was on him, with both fists flying. Henry backed up and tried to get an arm up to deflect the blows, but he wasn’t able to, Steven grabbed him by his throat with one hand and shoved him hard against the bricks of the outer wall of the apartment.
Henry stood about the same height as Steven, but was thin and wiry, built more like a runner. Steven, on the other hand, was a good twenty pounds heavier than the guy. Both of Henry’s hands tried to claw at Steven’s wrist, which still had him pinned to the wall and was blocking off air.
“Let him go before he dies,” Matt said. “His face is turning blue, you’re going to fucking kill him.”
But Steven didn’t care. Eventually he let go and Henry doubled over, both hands moving to his throat. Steven then delivered an uppercut to Henry’s body, forcing him to double over. Steven punched him again, this time in the side of the head, and Henry went
down.
By this point though, Steven was in a frenzy, enraged. There was no thought and he began kicking Henry repeatedly, in the body, and in the head. Finally, more out of tiredness than loss of rage, Steven slowed down. He then bent down, and leaned in close to Henry’s face.
“If you ever touch my sister again, if you so much as even try to call her, I will kill you,” Steven said in a low growl. “Are we clear?’
Henry just continued to cry and a strange gurgling noise came from his throat as he coughed up blood.
“Are we fucking clear?” Steven yelled.
“Yes,” Henry muttered.
“Her fucking parents are dead. Our parents are dead and you have the nerve to show up here. I ought to kill you,” Steven said.
Together, he and Matt carried him out to his car and deposited him in his front seat.
“You got about three minutes to get out of here before I call the cops and tell them you were breaking and entering,” Steven said. “And don’t think I won’t do it.”
