by John Saul
Alison was in the house, and if she woke up and heard them fighting and understood what it was about—
“You’d better go,” she said, her voice quiet as her eyes instinctively flicked toward the ceiling and Alison’s bedroom on the floor above.
Reading her upward glance, Michael nodded. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered.
“Me, too,” Risa said, her voice cracking. She got off the stool and went into the den, leaving him alone.
A moment later she heard the door from the kitchen to the garage open, and a second later the garage door began grinding upward. As she heard him start his car, then pull out of the garage, close the garage door, and finally drive away from the house they’d shared so long, she pulled a pillow to her stomach, held it close, and began to cry.
All the plans they had for the future began streaming through her mind: seeing Alison off to college, being empty-nesters, and traveling the world. Alison’s college graduation, and her marriage, and the birth of their first grandchild. All the future Christmases and Thanksgivings with the family around the table. Growing old together.
She and Michael.
And all of it was gone. All her dreams, everything she had counted on, shattered in a single ten-minute conversation.
As her tears flowed, she thought she could actually hear her heart breaking.
A warm hand rested on her shoulder, and Risa opened her arms to let Alison slip into them, then gently rocked both of them together.
“It’ll be all right, Mom,” Alison said, and though Risa knew she was trying to be reassuring, her words were belied by the catch in her voice, her red face, and her swollen, streaming eyes.
Risa smoothed Alison’s hair away from her warm forehead and brought her back close again.
“I know,” she sighed. “It’s just that right now, it doesn’t feel like it’s going to be all right. It doesn’t feel like it’s ever going to be all right again.”
SCOTT LAWRENCE PUNCHED the pillow under his head, rolled over, then gave up trying to go to sleep and clicked the bedroom television on to the news on Channel 3, which he hadn’t watched until he met Michael Shaw a little less than three months ago. Now he usually went to sleep with the newscast Michael produced, since he couldn’t go to sleep with Michael himself.
Tonight the entire newscast was centered around the murder in Encino, and though every channel was playing it, Michael’s network had by far the most graphic—and the most compelling—pictures.
Scott shivered, wondering what the carnage the killer had left meant. Maybe a former boyfriend had killed the woman, but from what he could see in the shaky cell-phone footage Channel 3 played again and again, it looked like the man had to be some kind of nutcase.
Which meant this might only be the first of what was going to be a series of killings, which was exactly the theory that the reporter—a pretty but shrill woman named Tina Wong—was not only promoting, but actually seemed to be hoping for. Freaking ghoul, he thought as he clicked over to Comedy Central.
Just as the channel changed, the doorbell rang.
A chill ran through Scott. Who in the world would be ringing his bell after midnight?
Should he open the door?
He looked again at the television, and thoughts of a homicidal maniac going through the neighborhood with a hunting knife in his hand, ringing doorbells and waiting to see who would be foolish enough to open their door, ran through his mind. “Stop it!” he said out loud, turning the TV off and silently cursing Tina Wong for so successfully spooking him. Nobody was going to come all the way up to the Hollywood Hills to slaughter him.
As the bell rang again, he pulled on his robe, went down the hall and through the living room, then turned on the porch light and peered through the peephole.
Michael Shaw stood on his doorstep.
Scott threw the dead bolt and opened the door, a surge of happiness welling up in him that he didn’t try to hide as he grinned at Michael. But as he saw the look on Michael’s ashen face, his grin faded. “What is it?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”
“I told Risa,” Michael said, his voice catching. “She threw me out.”
“Oh, Christ,” Scott said, pulling the door wide. “You okay?” Michael seemed about to lose his balance, and Scott reached out and took his arm, drawing him in and closing the door behind him. “Stupid thing to say—of course you’re not okay. Sit down and I’ll get you a drink.”
Michael collapsed on the sofa, and Scott poured each of them two fingers of scotch, handed one of the glasses to Michael, then sat down next to him.
Michael drained half his glass, then finally managed a weak smile. “Thanks. You have no idea how much I needed that.”
“Actually, I probably do,” Scott said. “I went through the same thing fifteen years ago. So, what happened?”
“I hurt her so badly,” Michael said, choking as a sob rose in his throat. “And I never meant to—I never wanted to hurt anyone at all.”
Scott gave Michael’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “She was going to find out sooner or later,” he said. “Better to get it over with now than drag it out.”
Michael nodded. “I guess.” He took a deep, ragged breath. “Can I stay here tonight? Tomorrow I’ll move into a hotel until I can find a place.”
“First you have to tell me why you didn’t call before you came over,” Scott countered.
Michael turned to look directly at him, hesitated, then blurted, “Because I was afraid you might tell me not to come.”
Scott’s brows arched. “So at least I know you’re not quite as smart as I thought you were, which is good. Puts us on more of an equal footing. And of course tomorrow you can do whatever you like,” he went on, “but it sort of seems like moving into a hotel is going to cost you a lot of money you might not be able to afford, at least if Risa turns as mean as my ex did.”
“So I can stay until I find a place?” Michael asked, sounding to Scott like a little boy who’d just found a puppy under the Christmas tree.
“Why not just move all your stuff in here?” he said, doing his best not to sound as anxious as he was suddenly feeling. But when Michael turned to face him, the look in the other man’s eyes and the tone of his voice told Scott all he needed to know.
“You really mean that?” Michael asked. “I mean, the way I hope you mean it?”
“I would have meant it the day we met if I’d had the guts to say it, but I was sure if I did, it would only scare you off. So, yes—I really mean it now. We’re going to end up together anyway.” The words seemed to hang in the air for a moment, and then something in Michael’s eyes changed.
The love Scott had been certain he saw there only a moment ago had shifted into a look of uncertainty. “Oh, God,” he whispered, the happiness draining out of him. “I’m an idiot. What am I pushing you for? Just forget what I said. Do whatever feels right to you. If you don’t want to live here, that’s fine. We’ll find you somewhere else—”
Michael shook his head. “It’s not that. It’s Alison—” He fell silent. How could he tell Scott what he was thinking as he imagined Risa telling Alison that her father was gay and now living with another man? Would he lose Alison, too? He couldn’t! Suddenly he wanted things to be the way they’d been only a few hours ago, when he’d had a family. He liked having a daughter, and he liked having a wife. Alison had been the center of his world since the day she was born, and Risa his best friend for more than twenty years.
Except, he realized, that wasn’t quite true. If she’d truly been his best friend, wouldn’t he have told her the truth about himself years ago? And if she was truly his wife, why hadn’t they acted like more than roommates for more than half of those twenty years?
Now he looked at Scott, at the face of a man whom he loved more than he could ever have imagined loving another human being even three months ago. A man who was not Alison, but who had become every bit as important to him as his daughter.
And he knew he couldn’
t go back to being Risa’s husband. He’d gone way past that a long time ago, and there was no turning back, even if he wanted to.
Scott let the silence hold. He knew exactly what Michael was going through, and it was a process Michael had to go through himself. Though he was already certain that, in the long run, Alison would love her father just as much as she ever had, he also knew how hard that idea might be for Michael to accept right now. Scott knew that all he could do was let Michael know that whatever he was going through, he was not alone. “I love you,” he finally whispered.
Michael’s tortured eyes fixed on him. “It seems like I hurt everyone who loves me.”
Scott smiled. “I’m willing to take that risk.” He reached over and took Michael’s hand. “I know you won’t believe me right now, but everything really is going to turn out all right. Risa’s not going to kill you, and Alison’s not going to hate you, and you and I are going to be just fine.”
Michael closed his eyes and felt Scott’s warmth next to him. Was it possible? Could he finally live with no more lies, and no more wondering if everyone knew about him? But as he felt Scott’s arms slip around him, he suddenly knew as much as he could know, at least right now, that he was with the person he wanted to be with, needed to be with.
“Come on,” Scott said, pulling Michael to his feet. “Let’s go to bed.”
An hour later, with Scott’s arms still wrapped around him, Michael fell into the deepest sleep he’d had in years.
He was home.
5
CONRAD DUNN STARED DOWN INTO THE SMASHED FACE OF HIS WIFE, and all the love he’d ever felt for her dissolved into a cold, dark fury.
On purpose. Margot had done this on purpose.
Diving head first onto the rocks below the bluff in Palos Verdes was one thing, but diving face first was entirely another.
What Margo had done wasn’t simply a matter of killing herself. No, she had taken it much, much further, deliberately destroying the best work he’d ever done.
Sabotage. After all he’d done to make her so beautiful—to turn her face into a work of art—her dying act was to destroy not only herself, but his work—his brilliant work—as well.
The last of his grief and his guilt evaporated as he gazed down at the pulpy mess Margot had made of his greatest, most perfect creation, and he had to grip the edges of the stainless-steel table to maintain his balance.
Danielle DeLorian, already wearing a rubber apron, took the dress he’d brought from Margot’s closet from his hand before he dropped it, hung it carefully on a hanger the mortuary had provided for that purpose, then stood next to Conrad as he fixated on the ruin that had been his wife.
“She did this on purpose,” Conrad breathed, his voice trembling.
“You don’t know that,” Danielle countered.
“I know,” Conrad assured her, his eyes boring deeply into hers. “Believe me, I know.”
“Well,” Danielle said, looking up at the clock, more to break the lock Conrad held on her gaze than because she needed to know the time, “we have a lot of work to do if you’re still going to insist on an open casket.”
“Oh, we’re having an open casket all right,” he said, his voice grim. “I told her I would make her beautiful again, and by God I intend to do it right now.”
The act of putting on an apron and a pair of rubber gloves gave Conrad a moment to reject his rage and put both his brain and his emotions into professional mode. This was a reconstruction job, nothing more. He’d been doing those all his life, and as he looked down at the wreckage that lay on the table, he knew exactly what needed to be done to repair it.
All of it.
He gripped the chin and moved the head back and forth.
The head, not her head.
“Fortunately, most of the damage was done to the right side,” he said. Much of the scarred skin was missing, along with the underlying tissue. Bones had shattered, and what skin was left had blackened at the edges.
The eyeball was missing.
He turned the head and probed with practiced fingers. “On the left, it’s mostly abrasions and contusions.” His fingers probed further. “There’s an orbital fracture here, but that’s relatively simple.”
“Perhaps there’s a way to orient her in the coffin so her good side—” Danielle began as she tested the iron in preparation for curling Margot’s newly washed hair into gentle waves.
“When I’m finished,” Conrad cut in, “there won’t be a good side. There will be two perfect sides.”
He set to work, first filling Margot’s mouth with cotton, so her cheeks wouldn’t appear so sunken, then doing the same with the empty eye socket. The lids would be closed anyway, so there was no need to replace the eyeball itself. Next he trimmed off the black, curling edges of skin with a pair of surgical scissors and began cutting away the mess of crushed flesh and shattered bone beneath. When the last of the debris had been cleared away, he picked up a jar of putty from the tray of instruments and began to sculpt one half of Margot’s face.
“Be careful not to tug,” he warned Danielle as he smoothed putty around the cotton-stuffed eye socket.
She nodded silently and continued working as efficiently and expertly as Conrad himself, laying the flowing waves of hair around Margot’s head so they would neither be soiled by his work nor be in his way. Only when the face was finished would she finally lay the hair over Margot’s shoulders.
Two hours later the reconstruction was finished. Conrad stood back, regarding his work with the detachment of the complete professional. The face looked smooth and blank, like a freshly fired ceramic doll’s head.
Danielle opened her cosmetics case and laid everything out on a tray. “Go get a cup of coffee or something, Conrad,” she said, looking up at the big clock on the wall. “Or lie down for a while. You’re exhausted.”
“Not until she’s perfect,” he replied.
With an expertise in her own field that was equal to Conrad’s in his, Danielle began applying makeup to the colorless putty from which he had rebuilt Margot’s face, and as Conrad watched, his wife slowly began to emerge from the blank, expressionless facade he had created.
He could no longer pretend that this was just another head, just another face.
This was Margot, the love of his life, dead and lying on a slab.
“Conrad?”
He tore his eyes away from his beautiful wife and looked up at Danielle. Perspiration dotted her forehead.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes,” he said, his eyes drifting back to Margot’s face.
“We need to dress her.”
Conrad stripped the plastic off Margot’s favorite dress, a burgundy Versace. He had also brought black lace Oscar de la Renta lingerie; Margot would be as perfectly dressed in death as she had always been in life.
As Danielle carefully peeled away the sheet that covered Margot’s body, Alston Bedwell, the funeral director, pushed the mahogany coffin through a set of big doors and into the cool preparation room where they had been working.
Conrad pulled the sheet back up to cover his wife’s nakedness as Bedwell wheeled the coffin next to the table where she lay. The funeral director stopped short when he caught sight of the classic beauty of Margot Dunn, lying in graceful repose as if ready for a photo shoot.
“Oh, my,” he said. “You’ve done an extraordinary job. She looks…” He paused, searching for the right word, but only one would do. “She looks alive,” he finished.
Conrad’s gaze shifted from Margot to Bedwell. “For me, she’ll always be alive,” he said softly.
The funeral directer stepped forward and laid a professionally gentle hand on the grieving man’s shoulder. “We need to take her upstairs now.”
“Conrad?” Danielle said.
Reluctantly, Conrad drew the sheet back, and the three of them began to dress Margot Dunn.
Twenty minutes later they were finished and Margot looked utterly flawless.
&nbs
p; Danielle flicked her blush brush over Margot’s décolletage one last time and smiled gently at Conrad. “She’s ready to meet her guests.”
Conrad’s heart ached as he gazed at the face of the woman he had vowed to love until death. But it wasn’t long enough—he would love her far beyond something so fleeting as death. “You see?” he whispered to her. “I’ve made you perfect again. You should have trusted me. You should have waited for me.”
But she hadn’t waited, and now he had to figure out what to do with the rest of his life.
RISA SHAW PULLED a simple black crepe dress from the back of her closet and carefully examined it for spots or other flaws. “I guess I should have sent this to the cleaner’s after the party at the Wilmingtons’,” she muttered ruefully, more to herself than to Alison, who idly sprawled on her mother’s bed.
“It looks okay from here,” Alison said.
Risa picked a bit of lint from the hem and turned it around. “Well, it’s going to have to do.” She held it up and looked at herself in the full-length mirror. “It’ll pass,” she decided, rehung the dress on the hanger, and started rummaging through her lingerie drawer. “What are you doing this afternoon?”
Alison hesitated. “Dad’s picking me up,” she said. “We’re just gonna hang out.”
Risa froze as cold fury rose inside her, but she bit back the angry words that came to her lips. Though the wound Michael had inflicted on her still oozed bitter anger, she had decided that no matter how she felt, she wouldn’t let her anger or her pain drive a wedge between Alison and her father. What had happened was between them, and Alison had no part in it at all.
She found the bra and panties she was looking for but kept rummaging anyway, buying time while deciding how to respond to her daughter. Alison had a perfect right to spend time with her father. She wasn’t about to deny that, and she certainly wasn’t going to be jealous about it. Be casual, she told herself. Don’t say anything you’ll wish you hadn’t. “Going to a movie?” she finally ventured, struggling to sound as if nothing was wrong.