Read Online Sins of Our Fathers (9781571319128) by Shawn Lawrence Otto - Free Book Online Page B

the most profitable branch in your territory.”
    â€œThat’s why I was offering you a deal,” said Jorgenson.
    â€œWell, let me—” JW stared at him, but words eluded him.
    â€œWhat, do you think I’m fucking around?”
    JW swallowed and forced himself to focus. “No. It’s just, sudden. You want me to investigate him.”
    â€œWithout alerting him, yes.” Jorgenson seemed to calm. “You figure out what it is and if it’s a real threat.” He leaned back again. “We’ll tell people you’re taking a leave to deal with your gambling problem. You get yourself one of those twelve-step books and you carry it around with you. Might even do you some good.”
    JW turned away and looked through the blinds, out at the fields behind the bank, breathing deeply in a conscious effort to get hold of himself. He looked down. Sunlight cast dark stripes across his new suit and his hands. He felt his jaw muscles bulging, and he willed them to relax.
    â€œOkay,” he said, barely audible.
    â€œWhat was that? I didn’t hear you.”
    â€œOkay!” JW had a sudden impulse to strangle him.
    â€œWise man,” said Jorgenson. “Whispering Pines manages some trailer homes out on the reservation, near where this Johnny Eagle lives,” he said. “Go take one. I’ll cover your rent.”
    JW stood motionless, staring out the window. “And if it is a bank?” He turned back and presented a composed face to Jorgenson, who rose from his chair and walked toward him. He stopped and put a hand on his shoulder.
    â€œThen I want you to stop him.”

6
    The sides of JW’s white Caprice became caked with ocher dust as he drove. The reservation road cut through a vast landscape that alternated between trees and meadows. Stands of birch, maple, and aspen ran along high hills on the left, surrounded by sweeping tracts of Norway pine. Meadows of fall wildflowers and scrub pastures ran on the right. Scattered groupings of jack pine towered over everything, their thin trunks shooting high into the air before branching out into heads of shaggy greenery. Barbed wire sagged between ancient wooden posts pitched cockeyed in the soil. A barn collapsed into itself, its gray wood tinged with faint remnants of red paint, its blue-shingled roof folding in at crazy angles and frilled with green moss and lichens. A Model-A Ford sank into a wetland on the left.
    The day was warm, but he kept his windows closed and the air conditioner on to keep his belongings from getting covered with dust. Still, the air coming in through the vents smelled like chalk, and the dashboard became coated with a fine powder. His clothes bulged in gleaming black lawn-and-leaf bags, which filled the back seat. He had once heard such bags called Indian suitcases, and now here he was, his car packed full of them, heading into Indian country. His business suits hung pressed against the doors. The front passenger seat and footwell were piled high with stuffed banker’s boxes, while his briefcase rodetucked under his knees. He turned on the radio and sang along with Boz Scaggs.
    The wilderness eventually crumbled into a collection of scattered prefab houses whose windows were draped with sheets and blankets. Derelict cars rusted into the yards. A trailer home stood on cinderblocks between the road and a rocky lake. Its siding was mostly stripped from its ribs, exposing a gaping hole clear through its middle. In the opening he could see the lake beyond, and inside the trailer four green-webbed lawn chairs standing in a circle around a grill with sawed-off legs. A ways farther on, a woman in office clothes pushed a sputtering lawn mower with a spindly chrome handle, its small engine spewing clouds of blue smoke. She looked at him, but didn’t wave back at his gesture.
    Then woods sprang up again on either side, and the houses were gone. The elevation began to climb and after a