The Hand That Feeds You: A Novel Read online

  It would be another forty minutes or so until I would reach the exit for the bar where Billie had revealed herself as Libertine. The transformation still unnerved me. Over a couple of drinks, she had exhibited five of the seven hallmarks of a psychopath.

  I pulled Steven’s car into a gas station. I used to feel that I was not put on this earth to pump my own gas, but I had come to enjoy it. Something about simply knowing how to do it, and the instant gratification of filling the tank. I paid cash and got the lower price for doing so.

  I was coming up on the turnoff to Greenwich, where Billie’s grandmother lived. I had seen her again when I testified before the grand jury. She was sitting by herself on a bench just outside the courtroom. There’s a saying: a young woman dresses to please, an old woman dresses not to displease. Billie’s grandmother was impeccable in a timeless Chanel suit with the accompanying strands of pearls. She had mastered the art of looking through a person and gave a demonstration when I tried to catch her eye. When my name was called and I entered the courtroom, I saw that Billie, who was sitting at a table with her defense team, looked as though she’d been dressed by her grandmother. I had never seen her in a suit before, or in stockings and low-heeled pumps. Her long hair was caught and tied in a high ponytail. She wore no makeup and looked benign. Unlike her grandmother, Billie made eye contact with me, not that I could read her expression. I might have been a docent in a museum, pointing out the brush technique of an old master. Mild interest, that was all she seemed to register, her indictment as something to pass the time.

  It was just before noon when I pulled up the driveway to For Pitties’ Sake. Alfredo was down by the agility course, walking two dogs. One was my Cloud, and the other was a blue-nose pittie. The dogs were in step with each other, I could see, and when Alfredo saw me, he waved and steered the dogs in my direction. He handed off the pit bull to an assistant who had come from the house. Then he released Cloud’s leash and I called her name. From about a hundred yards away, Cloud lifted her head. I called her name again. This time she lowered her head and ran toward me. When she got about ten feet away, she slowed her pace so she didn’t knock me over. Just in front of me, she threw herself onto her back and kicked her legs in the air. I lay down in the grass beside her and let her roll onto me. We held each other that way, until Cloud pressed her forehead into mine; we used to do this—press our foreheads together and close our eyes. Well, I closed my eyes—when I would open mine, Cloud would be gazing at me.

  “You’re going home, girl,” Alfredo said to Cloud, then to me, “She fooled everyone, that Billie. But she never fooled the dogs. That rottie she brought in. I thought she was frightened of Billie the same way she was frightened of everyone.” Alfredo dropped down beside us on the grass. “When Billie brought her in, I should have known this dog had seen something that scared it. The dog was healthy, but something spooked her bad.”

  “The dog witnessed her owner’s murder.”

  “She said that Audie had belonged to an old man who died. She said that Audie had been in the house with the body for a couple of days before someone found them.”

  “How is the dog doing?” I remembered thinking that the dog was behaving weirdly that day in Pat’s studio, but Audie was in fact behaving appropriately, given that Billie was in the woods just outside. I wondered how Billie had subdued Audie. Did Pat open the door to Billie’s knock, thinking it was me coming back? Did Billie bring meat laced with drugs?

  “Turns out she’s the sweetest thing. She protects the smaller dogs here, and I trust her with all of them,” Alfredo said. “There’s a term you’ve heard? The blossom? A dog finds herself out of a bad situation and can trust that she is safe?”

  She blossoms.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The authors wish to thank the following people for different kinds of help with this book: Rebecca Ascher-Walsh, Scott Ciment, Yolanda Crous, Martha Gallahue, Chiu-yin Hempel, Susanne Kirk, Jeff Latzer, Pearson Marx, Arnold Mesches, Barbara Oakley and her book Cold-Blooded Kindness, and, as coeditor, Pathological Altruism, our superb agents, Liz Darhansoff and Gail Hochman, and, at Scribner: Dan Cuddy, Daniel Loedel, Paul O’Halloran, and, especially, our impeccable editor, Nan Graham, whose enthusiasm, precision, and wisdom saw us through this collaboration.

  VICKY TOPAZ

  AMY HEMPEL’s Collected Stories was named one of The New York Times Book Review’s ten best books of the year. Awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, an inaugural USA Fellowship, and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction, she is a founding board member of two nonprofit dog-rescue organizations: the Deja Foundation and Morgan’s Place.

  ARNOLD MESCHES

  JILL CIMENT is the author of a story collection, a memoir, and five novels, including Heroic Measures, coming soon as a film starring Diane Keaton and Morgan Freeman. Her many awards include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, two New York State Fellowships for the Arts, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. She is a professor at the University of Florida.

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  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2015 by Amy Hempel and Jill Ciment

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  First Scribner hardcover edition July 2015

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  Interior design by Akasha Archer

  Jacket Design by Jaya Miceli

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2014040858

  ISBN 978-1-4767-7458-9

  ISBN 978-1-4767-7460-2 (ebook)

  CONTENTS

  Epigraph

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  Acknowledgments

  About A.J. Rich

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