Six John Jordan Mysteries

by Michael Lister

  “Yeah,” I said. “There’s a very fine line between faith and foolishness. Most acts of faith are illogical—they don’t make any sense from a practical standpoint.”

  During the next break, Susan waved and blew me a kiss, and when I asked how I was doing, she gave me two thumbs up.

  “Does it offend you men that Reverend Caldwell compared himself to Abraham?” King asked after the break.

  “Deeply,” Imam Jamal said. “I am very sorry for the loss of his daughter, but her death does not make him Abraham, the father of our faith.”

  “Larry,” Bobby Earl said, “I never said I was Abraham. I only meant that I know what it’s like to offer everything up to God.”

  “How could God ask such a thing of Abraham, Rabbi Rosenberg?”

  “Maybe God views death very differently than we do,” he said. “Maybe God expects everything from us.”

  “But we can’t forget,” I heard myself saying before I knew what I was doing, “that in the story this test came at the end of Abraham’s life, after he spent twenty-five years learning he could trust God. This was like his final exam. And, God didn’t accept Abraham’s sacrifice of his son. He tested him, yes, but didn’t allow him to follow through with it. He instead provided a lamb. The God who tests is also the God who provides.”

  “Which is a beautiful picture of Christ,” Father David said. “Think about Isaac carrying the wood for the fire up the mountain the way Christ carried his cross to Calvary.”

  “And it’s certainly a picture of resurrection,” Rabbi Rosenberg added. “Ultimately, nothing is lost, for God redeems and returns to us everything in the end.”

  “Chaplain Jordan, since this story has been getting so much attention, you’ve received a lot of criticism for not adequately protecting Nicole while she was in your chapel.”

  My face filled the monitor, the growing pink glow of my embarrassment obvious.

  It wasn’t a question and I wasn’t sure what to say.

  “Yes?” I asked.

  “Well,” King said, “do you have anything to say to that?”

  “What can I say?” I asked. “I deserve the criticism. I should’ve never left her side.”

  “Okay,” he said, hesitated a moment, then asked, “Who’s responsibility was it to keep her safe?”

  “Mine,” I said.

  “Bobby Earl,” King said, “why take the chance?”

  “Ah,” Bobby Earl said, seeming at a loss.

  “Why take her in such a dangerous place?” King added. “Why ask people like Chaplain Jordan and others to do such a difficult job?”

  “Larry,” Bobby Earl said, “this is what God has called me to do. You’d have to ask him.”

  “God?” King asked with a laugh.

  “Yes,” Bobby Earl said sincerely.

  “Chaplain Jordan,” King said, “do you think Nicole’s killer will be found?”

  “I’m certain of it,” I said.

  “Bobby Earl,” King said, “do you think most people sitting at home watching us tonight think you killed your daughter?”

  “Heavens, no,” Bobby Earl said. “I think they realize—”

  “But as I understand it,” King said, “you and your wife were the only two people to go in or out of that locked office where Nicole was killed. Are you saying your wife did it?”

  “Absolutely not,” he said. “Bunny could never do such a thing. She’s a—”

  “Looks like we’re out of time for tonight,” King said. “I want to thank my guests—”

  “One more thing before we go,” Bobby Earl said. “Earlier you asked if we were suspects and Chaplain Jordan said no one had been ruled out, which might have sounded like we were, but I have been assured by the governor this week that we have been cleared and that they’re not going to waste time investigating innocent people.”

  “Oh,” King said. “So, Chaplain Jordan, the Caldwells are not suspects in the investigation?”

  “As I said before, Larry, no one has been ruled out.”

  “But the governor said—” Bobby Earl began.

  “The governor,” I said, “is not conducting the investigation.”

  36

  “He killed his daughter, didn’t he?” Susan said.

  We were back in the car riding toward Mexico Beach on the brightly moon-lit barren highway next to the coast.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “But if he did, he sees himself as Abraham.”

  “I bet everyone wondered why you said you were certain her killer would be found,” she said, “but I knew.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “You’re certain because you won’t stop until you find him.”

  I nodded.

  “But what then?” she asked. “What will you do with a monster like that?”

  “I may make a little sacrifice of my own,” I said.

  We were quiet for a long time before she said, “Probably not a good idea to make the governor mad at you.”

  “Why should he be any different?”

  She smiled. “Can you believe we’re still married?”

  “No,” I said. “I can’t. Why didn’t you sign the papers?”

  “I meant to,” she said. “But I didn’t want to, so I procrastinated. And then when I began recovery, I don’t know, I guess I just began to see things so differently.” She turned toward me suddenly, eyes moving rapidly, voice pleading. “You didn’t cheat on me, did you?”

  “No,” I said. “I never did.” Then I laughed out loud. “Still haven’t.”

  “You haven’t?” she said. “You mean this whole time you thought we were divorced, and you haven’t...”

  “Sad, isn’t it?”

  “No,” she said. “Of course not. It’s sweet. It’s wonderful. It’s just what I’d expect.”

  She reached over and took my hand, lacing her fingers in mine, and laid her head on my shoulder, the scent of her hair drifting pleasantly over me. Her hand felt right in mine, her body like it was made to be beside mine, but an uneasiness, blinking like a warning light at the edge of my mind, whispered that my body was betraying me.

  “What’re we gonna do?” she asked.

  “About what?”

  “In the eyes of the law,” she said, “we’re still married.”

  “I know,” I said. “But that’s not how we’ve been living. The law doesn’t change the fact that we reached a place where we both felt like we had to separate. It can’t heal us or make us right with each other again. It’s powerless to create love.”

  “So there’s no hope for us?” she asked, releasing her hold on my hand and rising off my shoulder. “No chance of—”

  Just then, a black van pulled out of a small side road and rammed into us. My truck fishtailed, but I managed to keep it on the road, and when I had it back under control, I slowed, but continued moving forward.

  “Aren’t you gonna stop?” Susan asked.

  “On a dark road in the middle of nowhere without a gun?” I asked.

  “Why don’t you carry a gun?” she asked.

  “I tend to shoot less people,” I said.

  “But with all the criminals you work around, all the crimes you still investigate...”

  “Now’s probably not the best time for this conversation.”

  I checked the rearview mirror again. The van was still sitting in the middle of the highway, its lights on.

  “We’ve got to go back and help them,” Susan said.

  “I’ve got to find a safe place to drop you off first,” I said.

  “I’m going with you,” she said.

  “On a dark road in the middle of nowhere without a gun?” I asked. “Are you kidding?”

  She smiled at me, reached into her purse, and pulled out a small snub-nosed .38. She pointed it at me and said, “Go back.”

  “What?” I asked in shock.

  “Just kidding,” she said with a smile. “It’s not loaded.”

  She then reached back into
her purse, pulled out a small box of cartridges, and loaded the gun.

  At first I was surprised she had a gun, but then on second thought: Of course she would. She’s a single woman living in Atlanta and her dad’s been in law enforcement all her life.

  “How many of your dates come this prepared?” she asked with a wry smile.

  “Not many,” I said. “Usually they have a very different idea of protection.”

  When I checked the mirror again, the lights in the van had gone off, and just as I was about to turn around, I caught a glimpse of it racing toward us.

  “What’s he doing?” Susan asked.

  “Probably not trying to give me his insurance information,” I said, and floored it.

  My truck did zero to sixty in less than sixty minutes, so the van had caught up to us in no time, and as soon as it did, it rammed us again. And then again. And again.

  I knew I could never outrun or out-maneuver him, so I tried to think of an alternate plan.

  “Could I borrow that?” I asked Susan, nodding toward her gun.

  She handed it to me.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Now, cover your ears.”

  I rolled down the window, and, with my left hand on the wheel, reached out with my right and squeezed off two rounds.

  Both missed.

  “How many rounds you got?” I asked.

  “Not many,” she said.

  “Uh oh.”

  “Don’t miss and it won’t be an issue.”

  “Oh, okay,” I said with as much sarcasm as I could muster at the moment.

  I fired two more rounds. Both of them missed again.

  “This is embarrassing,” she said with a laugh.

  “Yeah,” I said, “laugh it up. It’s all fun and games until they kill us.”

  This was a different Susan—witty, charming, cool under pressure. Not to mention, she carried a gun—how cool was that?

  “I’ve got an idea,” she said, unbuckling her seatbelt and turning around in the seat. She reached back and slid open the center panel of glass. “I’ll steer and you shoot through there.”

  “Couldn’t get less results,” I said.

  When I turned toward the van, I thought I noticed something about the plates, but it was too dark to be sure. So before I fired again, I reached under the passenger seat and pulled out a Q-beam spot light, plugged it into the cigarette lighter, and shined it on the van.

  The van started slowing immediately, but I fired the last two rounds anyway. One ricocheted off the bumper, the other missed completely.

  “It’s another couple of miles to East Point,” Susan said, “Why’d they stop?”

  “They didn’t want me to see their bumper,” I said.

  “What?” she asked in surprise. “Why?”

  “Because,” I said, “it held a Louisiana license plate.”

  When we reached the Driftwood, she asked me up to her room, and I politely declined.

  “I just don’t want this night to end,” she said. “Not yet.... Take your wife for a walk on the beach. Please, John.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to,” I said. “It’s that I want to too much.”

  “Remember what you were saying earlier,” she said. “About the law being unable to create desire?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, if you have the desire,” she said, “the law is on your side. I’m still Mrs. John Jordan.”

  37

  I knew sleeping with my ex-wife was a mistake before our clothes hit the floor.

  We had just come up to her room to change clothes before taking a moonlit stroll along the beach, but she looked and smelled and felt so familiar, and over a year without physical intimacy had been an eternity too long.

  Her eyebrows arched into a question that meant only one thing. It was how she had initiated sex during our marriage—never verbally, not once, just an expression that I couldn’t resist.

  I would never again underestimate the power of shared history, like the connection that binds you to school friends for life, though you have nothing but school in common. Susan and I had shared a life together, and that shared experience wrapped itself around us like elastic bands that allowed for only so much separation before they snapped us back together again. I hadn’t thought about her in nearly a year. Now as beauty, softness, and a sweet scent filled my senses, my mind could think of little else, and my body couldn’t quit wanting her.

  We lunged at each other, kissing so hard and long that I was sure we had drawn blood, as we unceremoniously ripped each other’s clothes off. My mouth found her breasts as my fingers danced around her wet and waiting body. I knew what she liked.

  “Oh, God, John,” she said breathlessly.

  She was still beautiful, her brown hair lighter and shorter, her eyes still the color of brandy—windows of the deep decanter of her soul. If her body had changed at all, it was firmer and fitter, the muscles in her arms and abs hard and tight. But she was still soft in all the right places. Her bottom and breasts were still full and not too firm and her secret place was still as soft and as wet as a kiss in the rain.

  She grabbed me hard with her hand, grabbed the throbbing anger, guilt, discipline, denial, and frustration and it took all I could do to hold back the flood threatening the dam of my determination.

  On many occasions, Susan and I had made love. We had become lost in each other’s souls even as we entered each other’s bodies. We had been enraptured. This was not one of those times.

  On other occasions, Susan and I had just had sex. We had searched each other’s bodies for what was missing in our souls. This was one of those times—a time after the end of the innocence. This was not about love. This was about sex. About desire. It was also about anger and regret.

  I was reminded of my sex life with Susan—how she had run hot and cold. How she had found the safety and security of monogamy in a loving and committed relationship monotonous and restricting, longing instead for forbidden fruit; passion without permission.

  For Susan, I thought, stolen bread is sweeter, and I wondered if she had lied to me in the truck about not having been with anyone else while we had been apart. Actually, she had avoided the question.

  I should stop.

  But I couldn’t.

  As my body went limp, collapsing onto hers, a wave of guilt and regret swept over me, tugging me down, the force of its undertow too much for me to resist.

  What have I done? I wondered.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

  “For what?” she asked in shock. “That was great. So intense.”

  We were lying side by side on the floor between the two double beds, never having made it to either of them.

  I felt empty, the void in my heart matching the absence in the room.

  What was it? I wondered. What was missing?

  And then it blew me back like the vacuous whirlwind of Job. Love was missing. God was missing.

  “Wasn’t it? God, it was good.”

  I nodded.

  “But it always felt good,” she said. “And we had it good there for a while, too, didn’t we? I mean in every way. We were good together.”

  Susan was always chatty after sex, which was all right with me, because I was always mellow and reflective. I used to love to listen to her, to the stuff that came pouring out of her with the wash of hormones orgasm produced.

  She was quiet for a moment, then said, “God, that was good.”

  Suddenly, I was overcome by an oppressive and overwhelming sense of loss for what might have been. We had been in love, we had dreams, we had—

  “Hey,” she said, leaning up on her elbow, “did I ever tell you I was sorry?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, let me tell you again. I really am,” she said, her eyes filling with tears. “I’m so sorry for... for what happened... for all that I’ve done.”

  My hard heart melted and I had to blink back stinging tears of my own.

  “I’m sorry, too, Sus
an,” I said.

  She smiled at me, tears at the corners of her eyes. “I still love you,” she said. “I’ve tried to stop, tried to convince myself that I don’t anymore, but I do.”

  She waited, but I couldn’t say the same thing back to her exactly. Not yet. An awkward silence crept into the room like a fog, and I could feel the distance between us increasing.

  “I want to make love to you,” I said.

  “Whatta you call what we just did?”

  “Sex,” I said. “But I’d like to love you body and soul.”

  “Take me down to the beach,” she said.

  I did.

  We walked down the beach, holding hands as we followed the twisting and turning path of the tide as if mirroring the path of our lives.

  After a while she stopped and turned toward me. When she looked up at me, I took her face in my hands and kissed her gently.

  With tears in her eyes, she whispered, “Make love to me.”

  I did.

  And this time love, as well as the God who is love, was present.

  No anger, no hate, no blame, and no shame. Just love and appreciation for the love we once had, for the people we once had been.

  Our love-making on the beach beneath the warm glow of the full moon was tender and sweet, our bodies quickly finding familiar rhythms, seeming to nurture each other with a desire to warm and heal. She felt like home in my hands, and I experienced a rush of emotions similar to our first times together before the cops, before the booze, before the Stone Cold Killer.

  Her climax, though quiet and sweet, was as intense as it had ever been, and she cried softly afterwards.

  Tears of grace.

  38

  The morning after.

  Looking at myself in the bathroom mirror of my small, dilapidated trailer, dark circles beneath bloodshot eyes—the only color on an otherwise pale face, I strained for recognition. Who was this stranger staring back at me?

  I looked bad. I felt worse.

  I’d had a lot of mornings after in my life, and this one was like all the rest, filled with guilt and regret. I had made love to a woman I wasn’t sure I could ever love again, and the fact that she was still my wife couldn’t justify that. The pain inflicted, though not yet felt, hung over me like a dark cloud.