stopped him. No one ever did. At the dance hall, no one stopped
him as he ran himself ragged, the syncopated rhythms of the rag-
time beating out any other thoughts. He kissed a pretty girl who
picked his pocket. He let her. He laughed and danced and did
everything to excess and almost — almost — managed to forget.
When he stumbled home that night, he had just enough wits
about him to do so quietly, tipping the elevator attendant extra as
they reached the penthouse floor. Thom planned to slink down
the hall toward his room but froze when he saw lights on in
his father’s office, leaking out beneath the door. What was his
father doing home? He was never home. The last Thom had heard,
his father was in Germany. Before that, London. Before that,
Chicago.
Anywhere but here, anywhere but where his favorite son
lay ill and his other son frantically tried to make it better, or
numbly tried to escape when it wasn’t. Edward Wolcott was a man
who fixed problems. When the doctors had made it clear that
Charles would never be fixed, well, he’d moved on to things that
could.
Muffled voices drifted toward Thom, and he walked to
the office door, leaning his head against the frame. At first Thom
was confused, sluggishly failing to process what he was hearing.
One of the men sounded like his father, but not the father he knew.
Gone was the cold, imperious authority. Gone was the razor-sharp
efficiency. His father sounded . . . scared. Pleading.
“... surely something else can be arranged. There are
all sorts of boys for the taking, anywhere you look in this city.”
“The nature of a sacrificial offering is that sacrifice is required.”
This other voice was calm, detached but pleasant. A woman.
Thom scowled. Why was his father bringing a woman here? If