Think Twice (Myron Bolitar, #12)

by Harlan Coben

“It’s the journey, not the destination.” You remember the speaker at your college graduation said that. It’s an old saw of a line, a cliché, but it stuck with you. And it’s not completely true, not by a long shot, but it is a good reminder on those long, lonely nights that joy can and must be found in both the waiting and the tedious.

“Cannabis gummies, Myron. Your Aunt Miriam and Uncle Irv swore by them—Irv said it helps with his gout—so your mother and I figured, look, why not, let’s give them a shot. What’s the harm, right? You ever try edibles?” “No.” “That’s his problem.” That was Myron’s mother, squawk-shouting in the background. This was how they always operated—one parent on the phone, the other shouting color commentary. “Give me the phone, Al.” Then: “Myron?” “Hi, Mom.” “You should get high.” “If you say so.” “Try the stevia strain.” Dad: “Sativa.” “What?” “It’s called sativa. Stevia is an artificial sweetener.” “Ooo, look at your father Mr. Hippie showing off his pot expertise all of a sudden.” Then back to Myron: “I meant sativa. Try that.” “Okay,” Myron said. “The indica strain makes you sleepy.” “I’ll keep that in mind.” “You know how I remember which is which?” Mom asked. “I bet you’ll tell me.” “Indica, in-da-couch. That’s the sleepy one. Get it?” “Gotten.”

Special Agent Monica Hawes, the lead, was a Black woman in her midfifties.

“Where’s Mr. Lockwood?” Agent Hawes asked. “Present,” Win said in that haughty prep-school tone as he—to quote the opening lines of the Carly Simon song Win’s entire being emanated—walked into the party like he was walking onto a yacht. Win—aka the aforementioned Mr. Lockwood—was the dictionary definition of natty as he glided around Myron’s new conference table and took the seat next to him. Myron spread his hands and offered up his most cooperative smile. “I understand you have questions for us?” “We do,” Hawes said. And then without preamble, she dropped the bomb: “Where is Greg Downing?” The question was a stunner. No other way around it. A stunner. Myron’s jaw dropped. He turned to Win. Win’s face, as usual, gave away nothing. Win was good at that, showing nothing. The reason for Myron’s surprise was simple. Greg Downing had been dead for three years. “I thought you were here about the Callister murders,” Myron said. “We are,” Special Agent Hawes countered. Then repeated the question. “Where is Greg Downing?” “Are you joking?” Myron asked. “Do I look like I’m joking?”

“Greg Downing,” Myron said, “is dead.” “Is that your story?” Myron frowned. “My story?” The young agent who looked like a beluga whale leaned forward a little and glared at Win. He spoke for the first time, his voice deeper than Myron expected. Or maybe Myron had expected a high-pitched whale call. “Is that your story too?” Win almost yawned. “No comment.” “You’re Greg Downing’s financial advisor,” Young Beluga continued, still trying to stare down Win; he would have had a better chance of staring down a duvet cover. “Is that correct?” “No comment.” “We can subpoena your records.” “Gasp, now I’m terrified. Let me think on that one.” Win steepled his fingers and lowered his head as though in deep thought. Then: “Say it with me this time: No comment.” Hawes and Young Beluga scowled some more. “And you.” Hawes swiveled back on Myron with a snarl. Myron guessed that Hawes had him, Young Beluga had Win. “You’re Downing’s, what, agent? Manager?” “Correction,” Myron said. “I was his agent and manager.” “When did you stop?” “Three years ago.

Cecelia Callister, age fifty-two, a semi-supermodel from the 1990s, and her thirty-year-old son, Clay, were found murdered in the mansion where they resided with Cecelia’s fourth husband, Lou Himble. Himble had recently been indicted on fraud charges related to his cryptocurrency startup.

Win’s full name is Windsor Horne Lockwood III. The skyscraper they currently sat atop was called the Lock-Horne Building.

“A mausoleum is designed to hold a corpse,” Win said. “A columbarium houses cremated remains.”

Greg was never at peace. Not his entire life. There was something always roiling inside of him. I lived with him and knew him better than anyone and yet I always felt that distance. So I let it go.

Two minutes later, Myron heard Big Cyndi squeal, a sound that makes children cringe and your cat hide under the couch. But it was, Myron knew, a squeal of delight.

Years ago, Big Cyndi and Esperanza had been a hugely popular pro wrestling tag-team champion for the famed league known as FLOW, which stood for the Fabulous Ladies of Wrestling (they had originally been called the Beautiful Ladies of Wrestling, but a TV network had an issue with the acronym). Their monikers were Big Chief Mama (Big Cyndi) and Little Pocahontas, the Indian Princess (Esperanza). Both women were Latina, not Native American, but no one seemed to care.

Big Cyndi was six foot six and flirting with three hundred pounds while Esperanza was maybe five two and sported a minuscule suede bikini with fringes—made for a comical and dramatic appearance. Pro wrestling is never about the wrestling. It’s about the plot and the characters. It’s a morality play, almost biblical in its storytelling.

“You know how this works, Win. We knock on doors and stir the pot and muck things up and hope something rises to the surface.” “Our usual carefully crafted plan, then.” “Correct.”

“We are all contradictions, Myron. We are all hypocrites. We want black and white. But it’s all gray.”

‘You are always seventeen waiting for your life to begin.’ It’s true, don’t you think?”

The screen jerked, and now Myron could see his mother’s face. She wore huge sunglasses that looked like someone had glued two manhole covers together.

Ed Newton raised Jackie the best he could. He was a good man, surprisingly gentle and patient with her. She was his whole world. You could see it every time he trudged through the door at the end of his shift. His face lit up when he saw Jackie. The rest of the world? It could go to hell, as far as Ed was concerned. He didn’t hate. He just didn’t really care. His daughter was his everything, and like the best of fathers, he somehow managed to make her feel that without suffocating her. Ed Newton worked long hours doing hardwood flooring for TST Construction, mostly on new residential complexes on the outskirts of Philly. He didn’t mind hard work. He loved tools and making things with his hands, but his bosses were cheap rat bastards, always trying to cut corners, always trying to squeeze the last bit of juice out of anyone who worked for them. “It sucks working for someone,” Ed Newton oft repeated to his daughter between bites as they sat at the Formica kitchen table. “Be your own boss, Jackie.” That was the dream.

By the time they raised enough capital to get a business loan, Jackie was thirty-three, Ed was sixty-two—but a dream delayed is not a dream denied.

Money does a lot for a man, but it doesn’t stop a bullet.

If he could go back in time, he’d rather have saved Brenda and never met his current wife, awful as that might sound. But that’s what he’d do. And the best part, one of the many reasons he fell so deeply and passionately in love with Terese, is that she would get that too. We are our mistakes. Sometimes they are the best part of us.

“Before I say anything, nothing happened.” “Myron?” “Yeah?” “That’s not the reassuring opening you think it is.”

“It’s funny,” Terese said. “Do you know what I was thinking before you said that?” “Tell me.” “How great we are together.” “We are.” “Two damaged souls who heal each other when they connect.” She sat up. “You and Emily are the opposite: Two damaged souls who destroy each other when they connect.”

“Knowing everything is overrated,” she said.

Great competitors had that ability—to move on. To be the best in any sport, you must have the reflexes, the physical ability, the mental attitude, the scary-ass competitive drive—but you also had to hone the simple ability to forget. Did you blow the save? You forget it. Miss the putt? Forget it. Make a big turnover down the stretch? Shrug and onward. The great ones know how to forget.

ninety-one percent of serial killers are male. So for the sake of simplicity, I’m going to say ‘he’ for right now, okay?”

this serial killer isn’t just murdering someone—he’s setting up someone to take the fall. He’s done it in Las Vegas, Texas, New York, wherever. The cases are then”—Myron made air quotes with his finger—“‘solved.’

we’ve now found one overlap between the cases of Jordan Kravat and the Callisters. And that overlap is…?” PT stopped and waited. “Greg Downing,” Myron replied. “Bingo, Myron. Do you believe it’s just bad luck that Greg Downing is the only connection we can find between any of the victims?” “It could be,” Myron said. “But do you believe it?” “No,” Myron said. “I don’t believe it.” “So that means we know what one thing for certain?” PT asked. “Whatever is going on here, whoever or whatever is responsible for all these murders—it’s directly connected to your old nemesis, Greg Downing.”

Your hand finds the gun—and when it does, when your palm slides onto the grip, when your finger threads its way onto the trigger, you feel the surge. It runs through you like a lightning bolt. You feel the power course through you—the power of life and death. Everyone who owns a gun, everyone who has ever even held a gun, has experienced this. Maybe it’s a small hit. Maybe it’s something bigger. There is a thrill to holding a gun. Don’t let the naysayers tell you differently. Myron and Win continue to head east on 51st Street.

Win considered that. “Nothing ages you faster than someone else’s child.”

Win now tilted back the Shakespeare head, flicked the switch, and voilà, the bookcase slid to one side. Instead of Batpoles, there was a large flat-screen television mounted to the wall. Blackout curtains automatically lowered over the windows, converting Win’s parlor into a man cave–styled theater room—albeit one serving Remy Louis XIII Black Pearl Grande Champagne Cognac. Myron looked over at Win. Win smiled and arched an eyebrow. The man loved his gadgets.

Fear and divisiveness offer engagement. Agreement and moderation do not.

“What percentage of your clients do you think commit the crimes of which they are accused?” “Seventy-three percent.” “Pretty specific.” “If I say three out of four, you’d think I was making it up. Seventy-three percent gives the illusion of specificity and thus believability.”

Terese put her arms around his neck. “You tilt at windmills, my love. I’ve been the beneficiary of that. It’s one of the reasons I love you.” “The other being my prowess in the sack?” “Or your susceptibility to self-delusion.” “Ouch.”

To people outside the area, New Jersey is a mystery; to people inside the area, New Jersey is an enigma. In truth, New Jersey is a dense, jigsaw-puzzle, defined-by-being-undefined mass squeezed between two large cities. The top half—northeast New Jersey—is the suburbs of New York. The bottom half—southwestern New Jersey—is the suburbs of Philadelphia.

Your life is one thing before you have a child. It is forever something else after. Nothing is the same.

The truth—the hard truth—is you are still sane enough to know that you are not sane. You enjoy killing. You enjoy it a lot. You also believe that there are many people who feel—or would feel—exactly the same as you. You are not so different from them, but they have never let themselves “go there,” to use a popular modern idiom, so they don’t know what monster may lie dormant within them. You have. It changed you. You hadn’t expected that. If you’d ever been asked to ponder what killing another human would have been like, you’d have honestly said that idea holds no appeal to you, that the thought of murder repulses you. Like anyone would. Like a so-called “normal” person. You were one of them. You’d never cross that line. And you never meant to. But once you did, well, things changed, didn’t they? For a moment you were a god.

Even now, you don’t consider yourself a psychopath. You feel like someone who had an epiphany, a rare insight with almost religious undertones, and so now you see the world with a clarity that mere mortals can never quite understand.

so you recognized that you are trying to justify what you’ve become, all the while knowing that at the end of the day, you don’t really care.

That’s who we are. The byproduct of the feeble and weak. The fecal wreckage, if you will, of history. We want to believe that there is an ethical center to our being, that our world is peaceful and kind, and yet anyone who has seen even five minutes of a wildlife documentary is reminded that we must kill to survive. All of us. That’s the world whatever higher being you believe in created—a world of kill or die.

Ending another human being’s life—she described it as the closest thing to being a god.

When the elevator door opens, Myron’s father is standing there. He already has tears in his eyes. So does Myron. That’s how it is with this family. Lots of tears. Hearts worn on the sleeves.

He jumps into the elevator and grabs hold of his son. Al Bolitar starts to cry, this man who has spent nearly eighty years navigating this mortal coil, and then this father cups the back of his son’s head in his palm.

I have seen photographs of Myron’s bar mitzvah. There is one taken of a thirteen-year-old Myron with his father on the bimah. It is the part, Myron explained to me, where the father blesses the son. Myron says he can’t remember exactly what his father whispered in his ear that day—something about loving him and praying for his health and happiness—but he remembers the smell of his father’s Old Spice and the way his father cupped the back of Myron’s head with his palm, just like this, just like I am seeing now, a distant echo traveling over the years, a sign that one man is still the father and that one is still his son.