by Michael Nava
“He has a place in Malibu,” I said, finally.
“What’s the address?”
“I don’t know. His wife, she would know. I think I could get us in the neighborhood, though.”
Cresly’s mouth twitched. “All right,” he said. “You tell us how to get there. I’ll send a car to his wife and get the address to alert the sheriffs in Malibu. Can you think of anywhere else he might go?”
I shook my head.
Cresly ordered a car to go to Zane’s house and get the Malibu address from Irene Gentry. Freeman, who had been stone silent, said, “I’m sorry, Henry.”
“Let’s hope you don’t have anything to be sorry about.”
“Where do we go?” Cresly asked.
“Out Sunset to the Coast Highway,” I said, “then go north into Malibu.”
“You heard the man,” Cresly snapped at Daniels. He reached to the floor and came up with a siren which he stuck to the top of the car. We shot into the darkness, the siren whining and utter silence between us.
We sped through the city, its lights exploding around us like landmines. As we passed through UCLA, the radio crackled. I could not make out what was being said but a moment later, Cresly looked at me over his shoulder.
“We got an address from Zane’s wife,” he said. “Twenty- eight hundred Sweetwater Canyon Road. That sound right?”
“I never knew the address,” I replied, “but I should be able to recognize the house.”
Cresly relayed the address to the sheriffs in Malibu, who had already been alerted to what was happening.
“They’ll probably beat us to him,” Daniels, the other cop, said. He sounded disappointed.
I sat back in the seat. Freeman lit a cigarette. We passed a row of luxury condominium buildings lit up against the darkness of the January sky like ocean liners. A helicopter swept through the red skies. Traffic yielded in our wake and soon we were at the end of Sunset, facing the dark ocean at the end of the land. We turned onto the Coast Highway.
I considered the possibilities. If we found them at Malibu and Josh was unharmed, then there would be no reason to arrest Zane and no chance to link him to the murders he had committed. But if Josh was hurt — I stopped myself. If they were there at all. They could be anywhere in this catacomb of a city and anything could be happening. My body grew cold.
I looked out the window to the ocean. The last time I had been out here, the sea was alive with light. Now it swagged against the shore illuminated only by car headlights as they flickered, briefly, across the ocean’s oily darkness. I thought of Sandy Blenheim, who had been disgorged by the sea only a few days earlier, and it was with relief that I turned away from the water as the highway twisted inland. Soon, the honky-tonk business district of Malibu sprang up around us. We passed the bar where I had stopped to call Freeman. The woman who had flipped me off might be there now, getting herself comfortably drunk.
Without warning, a seismic shiver worked its way up my spine. When it passed I found myself balling my hands into fists.
Freeman, sitting beside me, asked, “You okay?”
We skidded across an intersection. There was a Texaco station at the southwest corner and a road beside it that led off into darkness. Suddenly, I knew that that was the road that led to Zane’s place.
“We’re going the wrong way,” I said.
Cresly said, “What?”
“The road where Zane lives. We just passed it.”
“Sweetwater Canyon’s up a ways,” Daniels said tentatively.
“Don’t you understand?” I said impatiently. “She lied to us.”
“You sure?” Cresly asked, skeptically.
“I remember the gas station back there. That’s where I turned.”
There was silence in the front seat.
“We’re wasting time,” I snapped. “Cresly…”
Almost at that instant, the radio flared up. This time I could hear what was being said. Twenty-eight hundred Sweetwater Canyon Road was a vacant lot next to a trailer park.
“Turn around,” Cresly said.
Daniels pulled a U-tum in a flurry of lights, squealing brakes and horns. Two minutes later we were back at the road by the gas station.
Cresly looked over his shoulder. “Where to?”
“It’s not far,” I said. “Kill the siren. You don’t want him to panic.”
“Right.”
The dark trees swayed like ghosts along the road as the sea wind ripped through them. Out beyond the lights of Malibu, it was dark as a tomb. The landscape passed as if in a dream and yet I could feel we were coming to the place. The house behind the cypress. The ginger-colored cat. The charred wood in the fireplace. The trees came into view.
“There,” I said. “There’s a house behind those trees.”
Daniels pulled into the driveway and we came to a lurching stop, just missing the white Mercedes that blocked the Chevette ahead of it.
“Someone beat us to him,” Freeman said.
“That’s his wife’s car,” I replied.
Our headlights caught a dark-coated figure at the door. It was Rennie.
“That’s her,” I said. Daniels killed the lights and we were in total darkness but for a faint orange light coming from behind the curtain of one of the windows at the front of the house. The curtain seemed to sway a bit as if the window were open.
As we got out of the car, Cresly said to Freeman, “You armed?”
Freeman grunted an assent.
To Daniels, he said, “Radio Malibu. Tell them where we are. Is there a back way out, Rios?”
“Yeah,” I said, opening my door.
“Go around the back when you’re finished, Daniels. Take your rover, but don’t shine any lights. If he’s armed, we don’t want to give him a target.” Cresly picked up his own rover — a handheld radio — and got out of the car. Our feet crunched the gravel as we made our way to the back of the Mercedes.
“What’s she doing?” Cresly asked as we strained to see through the darkness. She made a movement. Cresly drew his gun.
“Mrs. Zane,” he said, “I want you to move back here, move away from the door.”
“Who are you?” she demanded.
“The police, Mrs. Zane.”
He’s listening to us, I thought, watching the fluttering of the curtain at the window. Zane was inside listening. Suddenly, the light went out and then there was an explosion. A bullet sizzled through the darkness, within inches of where I stood. I dropped to my knees.
Daniels, kneeling beside me, said, “Draw his fire, while I get around back.”
“No,” I said. “Josh might be in there. You’ll endanger him. And her.”
Cresly said, “Move around the cars, Daniels. Just go slow.”
“Tom! Tom! Let me in!” Rennie pounded on the door, shattering the stillness. Daniels scurried around the cars and quickly eased himself over the fence at the side of the house. Rennie screamed to be let in.
From within the house, Zane shouted. “Get back, Rennie! It’s all over. Just get away.”
She seemed to collapse against the door. I started toward her.
“Rios, stop,” Cresly said in a fierce whisper.
Ignoring him, I squatted and darted to the porch. She sat with her back against the door, her face barely discernible in the darkness but when I whispered, “Rennie,” she looked up at me, her eyes glittering.
“It’s Henry. Come on.” I reached my hand for her and she slapped it away.
“They’ll kill him,” she sobbed.
I half-lifted, half-dragged her up to her feet. “There’s no time for this,” I said. “The cops are here and more are on their way. You’ll get caught in the crossfire. Let’s go.”
She struggled for a moment longer. “He won’t let me in,” she cried, then she let me pull her back toward the cars. I sat her down on the ground. Freeman was there, his gun drawn, looking into the darkness.
“Where’s Cresly?”
“Out there,”
he said, nodding at a shadowy flicker of movement between a couple of trees.
“What’s he doing?”
“He’s gonna draw Zane’s fire while Daniels breaks in through the back.”
“Josh is in there,” I said.
Just then, we heard Cresly from the other side of the yard say, “Zane. If the boy’s in there with you, let him come out.”
He was answered with another shot.
“Is that his evidence?” I demanded. I started toward Cresly, but Freeman pulled me back.
“You can’t go out there, man.”
“We don’t know whether Josh is in there or not.”
“Then ask her,” Freeman said, jutting his chin at Rennie.
I knelt beside her. Her hair was disheveled and a silvery line of snot ran from her nose to her upper lip. Her face was slack and she looked old. Older than I had ever seen her before.
“Is Tom in there alone?” I asked.
She looked at me without apparent recognition and swayed her head back and forth.
I grabbed her by the shoulders. “Listen to me. Who’s in the house?”
She turned her head away from me, lay her cheek against the car and muttered, “What does it matter. They’re going to kill him.”
Cresly yelled out, “Let the boy go, Zane. If he’s okay we don’t have anything on you.”
I dug my hands deeper into her shoulders and shook her. “Tell me!”
She drew a long, shaky breath. “Is what he said true?” “Yes,” I said. “They know about the murders but they don’t have any hard evidence. Tonight was a set-up. The boy was bait. If he’s all right, they can’t charge Tom with anything.”
Even as I spoke I heard sirens, far off, but approaching.
“I heard another voice,” she said. “Male.”
I released her shoulders and crawled over to Freeman. “She says she heard Josh in there. I’ve got to tell Cresly.”
“I’ll go,” Freeman said. “Watch her.”
The sirens were coming closer. “Hurry, before the sheriffs get here. They’ll scare him into something stupid.”
“Zane?” he asked, confused.
“Cresly. Go on.”
Freeman jumped into the darkness and disappeared, with only the crackle of grass, leaves, and twigs to mark his path. I returned to Rennie. The sirens. If Zane couldn’t hear them by now, he soon would. I thought of Daniels alone in the back of the house.
“Did you just lie to me, Henry?” Rennie asked, in a semblance of her old voice.
“I’m just trying to avoid any more killing,” I said.
She wiped her nose on her sleeve and said, “What hate you must feel for me.”
“The boy in there is my lover,” I replied, “and right now I don’t feel anything about anyone except for him.”
“But how — “ she began.
“There’s no time to explain.” From their sirens, I guessed the sheriffs had found the road. “But if anything happens to him, I’ll-”
“You don’t have to threaten me,” she said. “I understand.” I nodded. Someone tugged at my elbow. I swung around and found Cresly beside me.
“What the hell’s going on here?” he demanded.
“She says she heard Josh in there.”
“Bullshit.” He bit off the word. “If he was in there, or still alive, Zane woulda used him to buy his way out. I’m sending Daniels in.”
“You can’t,” I said, but he was reaching for his radio.
Then, three things happened, separated by only a matter of seconds yet seeming to span an eternity. The sirens screamed in my ears. I looked around and saw the first sheriff’s car flash through the trees. Then, I turned back to Cresly who had lifted his rover to his mouth and swung at him wildly, knocking the radio to the ground. He looked up at me, fury and amazement spreading across his face. As he reached for the radio, there was a shot from within the house. We swiveled around. Rennie screamed. There was another shot and then, as its echo faded, doors slammed, voices cried out and the yard was full of cops moving toward the house, guns drawn.
“Don’t shoot,” Cresly shouted. “I got a man in there.”
The sheriffs stopped in their tracks. A deputy hurried over to us. “What is this?”
“Keep your men back,” Cresly said and picked up his radio. “Daniels.”
“I’m right here,” Daniels answered. “Out back. Something’s going on in there.”
We all looked toward the house. The porch light flashed on. Cresly stood up and shouted, “This is your last chance before we start shooting. Come out with your hands on your head.”
Slowly, the door opened. My breath caught in my throat as someone stepped out onto the porch, hands raised high over his head. It was Josh. I breathed.
We were sitting on the porch steps. I had wrapped my coat around Josh’s shoulders and put my arm around him, but he could not stop shivering or talking, even as he cried. He simply talked through his tears.
“It happened so fast,” he said. “He had me sitting by the fireplace with the gun on me. Then we heard the sirens and he looked out the window. Just for a second. I grabbed the poker and just swung. It was dark and I couldn’t see very well but I must have hit his hand because the gun went off and then I heard it hit the floor. I went for it and when I got it I just started shooting — I just…” He broke off, sobbing.
I held him closer. “It’s all right, Josh.”
“But I killed him, Henry.”
“He had the poker,” I said.
“But I couldn’t see that,” Josh said. “I didn’t wait to see what would happen.”
“Thank God for that,” I said. He buried his face in my chest. I looked above his head into the room behind us. A sheriff knelt beside Zane’s body. Someone laughed. Someone sipped from a cup of coffee.
Irene Gentry stood with her back against the wall. Cresly walked up to her and said something. She shook her head slowly, again and again, until he shrugged and walked away. After he’d gone, she lifted a slender hand and, almost contemptuously, wiped the tears from her face. As if aware she was being watched, she looked slowly around the room and then out the door until our eyes met. I tried to read their expression but she was far away. I heard her ask for a cigarette and she passed out of my view.
Josh asked, “What will happen to her?”
“If they can prove the murders, she could be indicted as an accomplice. If not,” I shrugged. “I doubt that anything worse can happen to her than happened tonight.”
He was quiet in my arms. Nothing worse could happen to her. She told me once that we each loved according to our natures and her nature had brought her to an empty place, where it was as easy to die as to love. I looked down at Josh. The light shone off his face. His eyes were full of questions to which I had no answer but one. But that one I could finally give.
“I love you, Josh,” I said.
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