"I guess you're going to tell me," Joshua said, used to the lecture.

"Bet you could count 'em on one hand." Eddie wriggled his fingers for emphasis. "Financial independence is being able to tell your boss to kiss your ass, walk out the door, and live a normal life for years without getting a check from anybody."

"As cheap as you are, you could probably live two lifetimes on the money you've socked away."

"Hey, that would be all right." Eddie grinned, bobbed his head. "But I get to choose the next three lunch spots, seriously."

"Fine. So long as you don't have me waiting in line at a local soup kitchen."

"Whatever, man." Eddie laughed.

The waitress stopped by their table. Joshua ordered the chop house burger, and a Coke. Eddie asked for chips and salsa-one of the least expensive items on the menu-and a glass of water.

After the waitress departed, Eddie said, "So what's been happening, dawg? How's Rachel?"

Joshua felt his gut clench. "She's okay. We're gearing up for the holidays, you know?"

"What was that look for?"

"What look?" Joshua made his facial expression as blank as possible.

"When I said her name, you looked like you were in pain-like I'd punched you in the belly or something."

Joshua couldn't fool Eddie. They had been friends for too long. Eddie had probably read him as easily as he read the programming code that he loved to study.

"I don't know how to put this," Joshua said. "But do you ever get the feeling that you never truly know someone?"

"All the time. Ariel shocks the hell outta me with something at least once a week." Eddie grinned with evident satisfaction. "Welcome to married life-finally."

In a recent discussion about marriage, Joshua had told Eddie that he didn't understand why people claimed that marriage was such hard work, that his own marriage to Rachel was pain-free, a joy. Eddie had told Joshua to wait until the honeymoon was over.

"I know, you think I've been living in some wedded-bliss dream world for the past six months-and maybe I have," Joshua said. "But I think this is something different."

"What do you mean?"

Joshua pushed up his glasses on the bridge of his nose. "You can't tell anyone what I'm going to tell you, Eddie. This stays between me and you."

" 'Course, dawg."

"I think Rachel's got some secrets. About her past. Stuff she's never told me about and doesn't want to tell me about."

"Don't we all?" Eddie shrugged. "Damn, I thought you were gonna say something serious."

"This is serious to me. It all started when she had a nightmare last night. She was fighting some guy in her dream. When I asked her about it this morning, she said she didn't remember any of it, had no idea who she might've been struggling with."

"Maybe she doesn't. Do you always remember your dreams? I sure don't."

"I know but . . ." Joshua sighed. "I thought she was lying, that's all."

"She could've been. She might not have wanted to talk about it, 'cause it would dredge up bad memories."

"I guess so."

"All I know is, everyone has secrets, some of 'em good, some of 'em bad," Eddie said. "You haven't told Rachel everything about yourself, right?"

"I've told her the most important stuff about me."

"All of it?" Eddie's gaze was keen. "Every deep, dark secret?"

"I don't have any deep, dark secrets."

"Maybe you don't. But some folks do, dawg. Some people have been through some rough shit in their lives-shit they don't want to tell anyone, including a spouse. You've gotta respect that."

"You think I'm overreacting?"

"Nah, I think you're just starting to learn what being married is all about. You can't sweat every little detail about your wife. She's not gonna be perfect, just like you aren't perfect. But you've gotta love her anyway for who she is, overall."

"Makes a lot of sense," Joshua said. "I guess I'll let it go."

"Rachel's a great woman. You two have a good thing going. You'll hit a rough patch every now and then, like most married folk do . . . but there's no sense in rocking the boat without having a damn good reason."

"Let's hope I never have a reason, then," Joshua said.

"Nah, man," Eddie said sagely, shaking his head. "You're gonna have a reason one day, trust me. But you better hope that when you have one, that boat doesn't sink."

After lunch, Joshua was walking through the underground parking garage, going back to his car, when he remembered his promise to Rachel to call the restaurant group to whom he had submitted the proposal last week.

Matter of fact, call them this morning. Between eleven and one would be a good time, I think. I have a good feeling about it.

It was half past twelve. Joshua climbed inside his Ford Explorer, pulled up the company's number on his Blackberry and called them.

Fifteen minutes later, he hung up. Dazed.

They had hired him to do the corporate identity package. Their deal with another design firm had fallen through that same morning, and they had been wading through a slew of proposals and been on the verge of contacting a different designer-when Joshua had called. Joshua's timing couldn't have been better, they said. He must've been psychic, to know exactly when to call. It was downright uncanny.

Sure is, Joshua thought, marveling over his wonderful, mysterious wife. Uncanny.

Chapter 5.

Late that afternoon, Dexter disembarked a CTA bus that put him within four blocks of his mom's house, in the old South side neighborhood where he'd grown up.

He'd cleaned the rest of the blood from the Chevy's interior, wiped it down to remove his prints, and left it sitting in a strip mall parking lot in Harvey, a South Chicago suburb with a serious crime problem. Leaving the doors unlocked and the key not-so-discreetly tucked underneath the sun visor, he was positive some petty hoodlum would boost the car in a matter of a few hours, and by the time the snow melted and the cops found Cecil's body, his vehicle would have been dismantled through a chop shop and all but untraceable.

In spite of the cold weather-it was in the mid-twenties and the infamous hawk was out in full force-people were hanging out on street corners. They were all of them young brothers, in their late teens or twenties, clad in parkas and skully caps, talking shit and looking hard at everyone driving or walking past. They reminded Dexter of inmates milling in the yard: grown men who had nothing productive to do with their time. The jagged skyline of downtown was visible in the hazy distance, but the skyscrapers and the business that took place within them were as meaningless to these men as constellations in the night sky, light years' distant.

Dexter strutted down the sidewalk, duffel bag swinging from his shoulders. As he approached a knot of the youths, all of them glanced at him, threateningly, but while the others looked away, one of them, a tall, muscled youngster with a big forehead, continued to glare, as if Dexter had invaded his territory. The kid didn't recognize him, and an unfamiliar man was easy prey on these mean streets.

He met the kid's glare with one of his own.

Don't even think about it, young buck. I'm not in the mood.

The kid lowered his gaze, backing down.

Although the players on these streets were different from the ones he'd known in his youth, some things never changed. There were Alpha males, the leaders of the pack, and then there were Betas, the meek followers who bowed their heads when an Alpha strode past. In every environment of his life-these streets, college, law school, the corporate law firm, prison-Dexter had been an Alpha. Dominance ran in his blood.

His mother lived in a modest, one-story brick home with dark shutters that stood on a square island of crusty snow; all of the houses in the neighborhood were located so close to one another that if you stuck your arm out the side window, you could touch the wall of your neighbor's home. Warm light glowed at the front windows of his mom's place, and twinkling Christmas decorations adorned the shrubbery and window frames.

While driving from Peoria, he'd stopped at a pay phone, called his mother, told her he'd been released and was coming home that day. She had squealed with joy. If his expectations held true, she was busy preparing a royal feast in his honor.

He rang the doorbell, waited.

He heard shuffling footsteps, and felt himself being examined through the fisheye lens in the door. Then the door flew open and his mother shrieked.

"Dex, baby! Oh, my Lord!"

"Hey, Mom."

She pulled him inside and into her arms. In her early seventies now, his mother was a short, delicate woman with hair gone almost completely white, and big, sad brown eyes. She'd had much to be melancholy in her life. Her husband, Dexter's father, had died of lung cancer seven years ago, Dexter had served time in prison, and Dexter's little brother Leon had never been worth a damn. It was enough to batter a woman's spirit.

Of course, Dexter had long understood that women were the weaker sex anyway. His father had taught him all about that, had told him how he'd molded Mom from a sassy young siren into the deferential matron who accepted that her proper role was serving the men in her life. Dexter had aimed to impart the same lessons to his own wife-until his prison stint had interrupted her schooling.

But soon, class would resume.

"Look at my baby." Teary-eyed, sniffling, Mom stood back and examined him from head to toe. "You look good."

This was the first time she'd seen him in four years. He hadn't allowed her to visit him in the joint. He couldn't bear the thought of her seeing him led around in shackles and wearing that ugly orange jumpsuit.

"How've you been feeling?" He held one of her bony, wrinkled hands. "You look too frail, Mom."

"I been gettin' by, with the Lord's grace." She sighed heavily, and he sensed that there was something she wasn't telling him. But she only laughed. "Set down that bag and take off that coat, baby. You at mama's now."

He was happy to comply. After the bitter coldness of outdoors, the house felt almost tropical. Delicious aromas wafted through the warm air, making him salivate.

"Something sure smells good," he said.

"I fixed a big, welcome-home dinner for you. I know you probably didn't eat too well in there."

When his mother spoke of the penitentiary, she never referred to it directly. She would always say, in there, or in that place. As if to call prison what it was would be an acknowledgement of a reality too terrible to contemplate.

"Can I take my things into my old bedroom?" he asked.

Her eyes darkened. "Well, your baby brother's been staying here . . ."

"Has he?" He understood why his mother looked sickly. Leon had been making her life miserable.

"Now that you home, maybe you could talk to him," Mom said. "He always looked up to you, Dex."

"Is he here?"

She nodded. "Tell him dinner's ready."

Swinging his bag over his shoulder, he went down the hallway. The house hadn't changed at all. The same old upholstered sofas and chairs wrapped in crinkly plastic. The same decor-ceramic figurines of Jesus and angels, holy hands and crucifixes. The same photographs on the tables and walls: his jazz musician father, posing with his saxophone; childhood shots of Dexter and Leon; pictures of their extended family; a photo taken at Dexter's law school graduation; and on the hallway wall, a picture of Dexter and his wife on their wedding day.

Dexter stopped.

Unlike many inmates who decorated their cells with photos of their women and their children, Dexter hadn't kept photos of anyone. He'd purposefully left behind pictures of his wife. Being forced to look at her every day would have driven him into a murderous rage and resulted in time being added to his sentence. He had his memories of her-since childhood, he'd had an almost photographic memory-and that was punishment enough.

He ripped the photo off the wall.

Tapping it against his thigh, he walked to the bedroom.

His brother Leon was curled in fetal position on the full-size bed. He hadn't stirred when Dexter entered. Dexter took one whiff of the sour air and realized why: his brother was nursing a hangover.

Leon was three years Dexter's junior, and they looked a lot alike, just like their father. But Leon had a messy Afro whereas Dexter's hair was shaved close to the scalp, and he was much thinner than Dexter, which led Dexter to believe that Leon was still on drugs, too.

And he had moved into their mother's house in his condition. Leon never would have dared to do such a thing when Dexter was free. Dexter wouldn't have allowed it, would've kicked his ass at the mere suggestion.

Dexter dropped his duffel bag and jacket onto the floor. He walked to the bed, raised the glass-framed photo high, and brought it down hard against his brother's skull.

Glass shattered. Leon came awake with a yelp, putting his hands to his head. "Oww! What the fuck?"

"Get out the bed, you sorry-ass Negro. It's four o'clock in the afternoon."

Rubbing his head, Leon sat up. He blinked at Dexter and laughed, uneasily. "Oh, hey Dex. You-you got out?"

He was on drugs on all right. That high-pitched, staccato, stuttering voice was a dead giveaway.

"I got out this morning. What the fuck are you doing living here with Mom?"

"I-I ain't living here." Leon scratched his ashy, rail-thin arms with long fingernails caked with grime. "Who-who told you that?"

"She did."

Leon chuckled, but he wouldn't meet Dexter's gaze. He scratched at his chin furiously, as if trying to scrub away invisible dirt.

"You're on that shit again, too, aren't you?" Dexter asked.

"What-what?" Leon laughed. "Nah, nah, man. I-I don't touch that shit no more."