WIN by Coben, Harlan (best book reader txt) 📕

them had been taken in the basement of a town house on Jane Street in Greenwich Village. “It was down in the dark dwelling,” the serious narrator informed us, “that they brewed the most deadly cocktail of all—the Molotov cocktail.”

Dum, dum, duuuum.

The narrative then went back in time to how Ry Strauss and Arlo Sugarman originally bonded as sixth graders in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn. They flashed up an old black-and-white classic team photo of Ry and Arlo on a Little League team, half-standing, half-kneeling, dramatically using red marker to circle the two young faces on the far right.

“Even then,” Mr. Voiceover gravely intoned, “Strauss and Sugarman stood side by side.”

The documentary mercifully skipped those poorly acted and poorly lit reenactment scenes, the ones you always see on true crime drama. They stuck to real footage and interviews with local police, with witnesses, with survivors from the bus crash, with families and friends. A tourist had snapped a photograph of Ry Strauss and Lake Davies running away. The photo was blurry, but you could see them holding hands. The rest were behind them, but you couldn’t make out any faces.

The documentary did a bit on the seven victims—Craig Abel, Andrew Dressler, Frederick Hogan, Vivian Martina, Bastien Paul, Sophia Staunch, Alexander Woods.

Jessica says, “Remind me to tell you about Sophia Staunch when we’re done.”

The documentary focused in on five teenage boys from St. Ignatius Prep who had gone to New York that fateful night to celebrate the seventeenth birthday of Darryl Lance. Back in those days, bars and clubs were not strict about proof of age—and the drinking age had only been eighteen anyway. It came out later that the boys had gone to a strip club with the subtle moniker Sixty-Nine before hopping on the late-night bus heading back out to Garden City. Darryl Lance, who had been in his mid-forties when they filmed the documentary, spoke about the incident. He’d only suffered a broken arm, but his friend Frederick Hogan, also age seventeen, died in the crash. Lance welled up when he described the flames, the panic, the bus driver’s overreaction.

“I could see the driver turn the wheel too hard. We went up on just two wheels. I could see the bus start to careen out of control and head for that stone wall. And then we plunge off the road almost in slow motion…”

They then replayed the press conference where Vanessa Hogan absolved the Six. “I forgive them totally because it’s not my place to judge, only God’s. Perhaps this was God’s way for Frederick to pay for his own sin.”

I turn slightly toward Jessica. “Is she saying God executed her son for going to a strip club?”

“Apparently,” she says. “I interviewed her for my story.”

The doc moves on to Billy Rowan’s surprise visit to Vanessa Hogan. On the screen, an older Vanessa Hogan spoke to the documentarian about it:

“We sat right here, right at this very kitchen table. I asked Billy if he wanted a Coke. He said yes. He drank it so fast.”

“What did you talk about?”

“Billy said it was an accident. He said they didn’t mean to hurt anyone, that they only wanted to make a statement against the war.”

“What did you think of this?”

“I kept thinking how young Billy was. Frederick was seventeen. This boy was only a few years older.”

“What else did Billy Rowan say?”

“He saw me on the television. He said he wanted to hear me forgive him with his own ears.”

“Did you?”

“Yes, of course.”

“That couldn’t have been easy.”

“The path isn’t supposed to be easy. It’s supposed to be righteous.”

Jessica looks at me. “Good line.”

“Indeed.”

“She used it on me too.”

“But?”

Jessica shrugs. “It sounded too rehearsed.”

Back on the screen, Vanessa Hogan says:

“I tried convincing Billy to surrender, but…”

“But?”

“He was so scared. His face. Even now, I think about Billy Rowan’s scared face. He just ran out my kitchen door.”

I whisper, “She’s kind of hot.”

“Ew.”

“You don’t think so?”

“You haven’t changed, Win, have you?”

I smile and shrug. “What was your take when you met her?”

“Two words,” Jessica says. “Batshit crazy.”

“Because she’s religious?”

“Because she’s a nut. And a liar.”

“You don’t think Billy Rowan visited her?”

“No, he did. A lot of evidence proves it.”

“So?”

“I don’t know. Vanessa Hogan’s reactions were just all off. I get the belief that your son has gone to a better place or that it’s God’s will, but there were no tears, no mourning. It was almost as though she expected it. Like it wasn’t a surprise.”

“We all grieve in different ways,” I say.

“Yeah, thanks for offering up the comforting cliché, Win. But that’s not it.” Jessica rolls on her side to face me. I do the same. Our lips are inches apart. She smells incredibly good. “Sophia Staunch,” she says.

Another Jane Street Six victim. “What about her?”

“Her uncle was Nero Staunch.”

Nero Staunch was a huge name in organized crime back in the day. I roll on my back and put my hands behind my head. “Interesting,” I say.

“How so?”

“Lake Davies not only changed her name, but she changed her entire identity and moved to West Virginia. I asked her if she did that because she was afraid Ry Strauss would find her.”

“What did she say?”

“Her exact words were, ‘Not just Ry.’”

“So she was afraid of someone else,” Jessica says. “And who better than Nero Staunch?”

When we finish the documentary, Jessica asks to see my list of people to question. I show it to her. We add Vanessa Hogan. Why not? She was the last person to see Billy Rowan.

“Is Nero Staunch still alive?” she asks me.

I nod. “He’s ninety-two.”

“So out of the game.”

“You’re never really out of that game. But yes.”

I add his name to the list too. We are still in the bed. Jessica meets my gaze and holds it.

“Are we going to do this, Win?”

I move to kiss her. But I stop. She smiles.

“Can’t, huh?”

“It’s not that,” I say.

I don’t quite understand what I am feeling, and that annoys me. Jessica and Myron have been over for a long