Read Online Badlands by C. J. Box - Free Book Online Page A

the day before about Kyle tossing the last of his newspapers on their driveway at 6:45—fifteen minutes late.
    â€œYou were here early enough,” Alf said. “Why were you so late with the delivery?”
    Kyle didn’t want to say he’d seen the rollover. He hoped Alf wouldn’t ask about it.
    But he did.
    â€œWere you rubbernecking around that crash? I heard about that. Some Mexican high on drugs went off the road. Things are crazy around here. That kind of thing never used to happen.”
    Kyle said he’d seen the car crash from a distance.
    â€œAh,” Alf had said. “I wish I could understand what the hell it is you’re saying to me. Anyway, next time deliver the newspapers and then go rubbernecking.”
    Kyle had no idea what rubbernecking meant, but he didn’t think he’d told a lie. He just hadn’t told Alf everything .
    *   *   *
    THE NIGHT before when his mom got home clutching a bag of hamburgers, T-Lock had bounded through the small house and had met her at the back door, saying, “Fuck those burgers. We’re going out!”
    His mom, who had already taken off her thick winter coat to reveal the maroon McDonald’s smock, began to protest immediately. She brought dinner home, she said. They couldn’t afford to go out. They never went out, she reminded T-Lock, except to fast-food places. She’d spent the entire day on her feet at McDonalds’. And the other fast-food places were packed with men as well and it took forever to get your order …
    T-Lock wouldn’t take no for an answer. He was giddy and his grin was in full beam. He took the bag from her and tossed the burgers on the counter and yelled for Kyle to grab his coat.
    Kyle’s mom was as thin as T-Lock, with short dirty-blond hair, brown eyes, wide cheekbones, and a slash of a mouth. She was small and wiry and often had a pinched, don’t-mess-with-me-or-my-kid expression on her face like she was looking for a fight. Kyle didn’t mind.
    T-Lock insisted they were going out, and held out her coat for her like she was a queen and he was somebody who dressed the queen.
    It had been so long since Kyle had seen her smile like that he didn’t mind T-Lock’s lie to her about winning $300 in the North Dakota Lottery that day. He said he’d won the Hot Lotto with a Triple Sizzler, to be exact.
    Kyle thought that was a pretty specific lie.
    *   *   *
    T-LOCK DROVE his mother’s van. Before going to the Wagon Wheel, he merged dangerously between two huge muddy trucks in a convoy of them on Main Street. The traffic was unbelievable, practically gridlock in both directions. Exhaust rose from beneath the big trucks and swirled with the snow in the streetlights. It was loud inside the van because of the throbbing diesel engines all around them from idly moving or barely moving trucks.
    They drove three blocks before T-Lock exited Main into the packed parking lot of Work Wearhouse.
    Inside, they waited for twenty minutes in line behind rough men in muddy and oil-covered coveralls cradling small mountains of thermal underwear, fireproof clothing, Carhartt parkas. It smelled earthy in line, Kyle thought, like what it might smell like after a meteorite blew a hole open in the ground.
    At the register, Kyle watched T-Lock peel several bills from a roll and hand them to the salesclerk. Kyle knew where the money had come from. Although he wanted and needed the winter items, he wasn’t sure he liked the idea of T-Lock spending money on him when they agreed they’d spend the money on his mother. When he looked at his mom to see if she was suspicious, she simply smiled at him. She seemed genuinely touched T-Lock was buying warm boots and gloves for her son.
    â€œWhat do you say to Tracy, Kyle?” his mom prompted. She never called him T-Lock.
    â€œThank you,” Kyle said.
    T-Lock winked