by Lanyon, Josh
“Serious as a heart attack,” I assured her.
Her face tightened. “That’s hardly amusing, under the circumstances.”
“If it has a pool, why can’t we move there?” Emma inquired.
“There,” I said, pointing at her. “Excellent idea.”
“Oh, Adrien.” Lisa abandoned the discussion.
Another round of cocktails was served, and plans for dinner got under way. I felt that peculiar, inevitable restlessness again.
To Lisa’s displeasure — and my surprise — Lauren asked if I wanted to go home. I hardened my heart against Lisa’s and Emma’s obvious disappointment and admitted I did. It wasn’t merely the fatigue, although it continued to worry me how tired I was all the time. I had a strange sense of missing something, of being in the wrong place — no matter where I was.
I said my good-byes, and Lauren drove me back to Pasadena. “Thanks for the intervention,” I said when we were on our way.
She brushed it off. “I know how it is when you need quiet to think things out.”
I remembered her impending divorce. She probably did know. For all that Lauren seemed to agree with the other womenfolk that she was doing the right thing, I got the feeling she was in a lot of pain.
We reached the bookstore. I thanked Lauren again, lifted a hand in farewell, and let myself into the big, empty building.
It was warm and very still inside. The heady scent of old books floated with the dust motes in the fading light. Old and used books have a particular scent — very different from new books. That evening it was a mix of old leather, worn cloth, crumbling paper, and wood polish. It smelled like home. I couldn’t imagine willingly leaving Cloak and Dagger ever. Maybe they could stick me under the floorboards when I was done.
I walked over to the plastic wall dividing the bookstore from the other half of the building. There was no sign that the cops had been there during the day. No sign anyone had. Perhaps that was good news.
I went upstairs and unlocked my flat. It was too warm and stuffy upstairs, a bit too redolent of cat. I opened the windows to catch whatever evening breeze there was.
What had been the rush to get here again? Everything was exactly as I’d left it. As it would always be.
I sat down on the sofa, and Tomkins leaped onto the cushion beside me, rubbing his face against my arm.
“Miss me?”
Apparently so. Well, there was no accounting for taste; I’d be the first to admit that.
I dealt with the litter box, fed the cat, decided I’d opt for a snack later, considered having a drink, reconsidered, and returned to the sofa, where I stared at the ceiling for a time.
What the hell was my problem?
If I’d wanted company, why hadn’t I stayed at Lisa’s?
I listened to the distant street sounds as this part of town began to roll up the sidewalks for the evening. I listened to the building settling in for the long evening, stretching out wooden joints, cracking its knuckles.
“Oh, what the hell,” I said.
Tomkins briefly abandoned his pursuit of an ailing fly to throw me a curious look as I rose and went to the phone.
“He’s probably not even home,” I told him.
Tomkins offered no opinion. He sat down to watch, as though my dialing a phone was one of the most fascinating things he’d ever witnessed in his brief life.
The phone rang on the other end.
Once.
Twice.
I closed my eyes, trying to decide if I was going to leave a message.
“Riordan.”
I opened my eyes. Funny how the sound of his voice could still make my heart speed up. You’d have thought I’d be over it by now. You’d have thought wrong.
“Hi.”
“Hey.” One syllable, but his voice warmed perceptibly. “How are you doing?”
“Okay.” I wondered how long it would be before that statement was true.
“Yeah?”
I didn’t think there was any telltale note in my voice, yet his single questioning word held instant and complete discernment. Sometimes I thought Jake, ironically, knew me better than about anyone on the planet.
“Not really,” I admitted. “Did you hear about yesterday?”
“The skeleton in the wall? I heard.”
You could take the boy out of the police force, but you couldn’t take the police force out of the boy.
“We had another break-in too. That’s why I’m calling.”
His voice didn’t cool exactly, though it lost warmth. “Yes?”
“How’s the PI biz?”
He said colorlessly, “I got my first case yesterday. A woman wants me to follow her ex.”
“He’s already her ex?”
“Yeah.”
No wonder his voice sounded flat. “Are you going to take it?”
“Yes.” And clearly it was not up for discussion.
“Do you think you’d have time for another case?”
He sounded almost wary as he asked, “What case? Who’s the client?”
“Me,” I said. “I want to hire you.”
Chapter Five
Since Jake’s key no longer worked following rekeying the building, I had to go downstairs to the side entrance to let him in. I opened the door.
He was wearing jeans and a black T-shirt. The dying rays of the sun gilded his close-cropped blond hair. His hazel eyes seemed lighter than usual in his tanned face. There was something else different about him; I told myself it was the Thai food. He held up a brown paper sack of takeout from Saladong Song.
I quoted, “To know things in the same way a duck does.”
“That’s what I always say.”
“It’s a Thai proverb. I’ve never understood what it means.”
“Maybe it’ll become clear after dinner.”
I turned and led the way upstairs, conscious of Jake behind me on the staircase, the quiet, measured tread of his feet. He’d been here the night before last, so I wasn’t sure why it felt like a lifetime.
We went inside the flat. He still remembered where everything was in the kitchen. I considered that while he got out plates and silverware. Was it a commentary on him or me? I wasn’t sure.
“What made you think I hadn’t eaten dinner?” I inquired, folding my arms and leaning back against the counter.
“Nothing. I was going by the fact I hadn’t eaten yet.” His eyes met mine, and I could feel my mouth twitching into a smile. He never ate tom yum goong soup.
All at once, for the first time in weeks, I was starving. I got him a beer out of the fridge and a bottle of mineral water for myself.
We carried our plates into the living room and settled side by side on the couch.
“When did you get the cat?” Jake asked, observing Tomkins, who was eyeing him distrustfully from beneath the chair by the window.
“It’s kind of a long story,” I said vaguely. “He got mauled by a dog. I’m not keeping him, though. He’s only staying here until he’s healed. After that he goes back to the alley.”
“Uh-huh. Did you name him?”
“Tomkins. John Tomkins.” I felt it necessary to explain. “I had to name him for the vet. He was a pirate.”
“Only you would have a pirate for a vet.”
I laughed, tried not to wince at the pull of sutures and wires. “Hey, he’s great with the tropical fish. Anyway, if I wanted a pet — which I don’t — it would be a dog.”
Jake said seriously, “You can’t have a dog without a yard. Unless you want one of those earmuffs with feet.”
“No. I’d want a real dog.”
That reminded me of Emma and Adagio. I filled Jake in on the domestic drama chez Dauten, and he said, “If you want me to drive you out to the breeder one afternoon, let me know. My current caseload allows for flexibility.”
He sounded sardonic. I wondered how he was doing financially. I’d yet to hear the details of his resignation from the force. And then there was his impending divorce — as
suming that was still on. Would he have to sell his house?
I opened my mouth to ask a lot of questions that were probably none of my business, but the phone rang. I put down my bowl and went to answer it.
“Holy moly. It is the same phone number,” Mel remarked. “You have no idea the memories…”
He sounded mildly shaken — which matched my feeling on hearing his voice so unexpectedly. Not that it should have been entirely unexpected; he’d said he would call. Unusual that I’d forgotten.
“Hi.” I was acutely conscious of Jake listening on the sofa a few feet away. “How’s your dad doing?”
“Excellent. He came through surgery with flying colors.” He filled in the details — as though I hadn’t had enough heart surgery lately — and I listened politely, watching out of the corner of my eye as Jake calmly ate his supper.
“Which is probably more than you wanted to know.” Mel concluded at last. “How are you feeling?”
“Fine. Better every day.”
“Are you up for tomorrow night?”
I felt a flicker of amusement, which I firmly squelched. In my peripheral vision Jake lifted the beer bottle to his mouth, and I watched his throat move as he swallowed. It would probably do me a world of good to go out with someone else, now that I thought about it.
“Okay. It sounds like fun, actually. Thanks for thinking of me.”
“I think of you more than you might realize.”
I had no answer to that. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to hear it. I was pretty sure Mel was suffering some kind of Back to the Future emotional retrograde on this visit home.
“What time?” I asked neutrally.
We worked out the details, and I hung up, returning to the sofa and my now-cool soup. The silence seemed newly awkward.
Jake said, “So what exactly is it you want me to do for you?”
I opened my mouth, but the vision that suddenly flooded my mind seemed to short-circuit my speech center.
Jake whispering against my face, “I missed you.” His kisses — for a guy who sometimes had all the subtlety of a blunt instrument, Jake’s kisses — the intimate exploration of tongue, the tease of teeth, the melting, unexpected softness of his lips…
I cleared my throat. “Well, for starters, I want you to see if you can find a guy named Henry Harrison.”
“Okay. Why?”
“Because yesterday he showed up asking questions about the hotel and talking about the murder of Jay Stevens. I find it too much of a coincidence. Seriously. The very day after an attempted break-in?”
Jake considered it. Nodded. “I agree. Do you have any kind of a lead on him?”
“No. Harrison might not even be his real name. He claimed to be visiting from Milwaukee, but he didn’t sound like he was from Milwaukee. In fact, nothing about him jibed. Well, I take that back. He did seem to know something about architecture.”
Jake asked a few pertinent questions about Harrison, and I answered to the best of my ability. Mel’s showing up when he had the day before had completely distracted me. I didn’t want to admit that to Jake.
“Here’s the intriguing part,” I said. “Harrison looked to me to be in his late sixties or so. Which means he could have been a contemporary of Jay Stevens.”
I liked the way Jake’s eyes lit with interest. “That is intriguing.” He thought it over. “Okay. Locate a.k.a. Henry Harrison. What else?”
“Secondly, and finding Harrison might answer this, I want to know what it is someone thinks is hidden in this building. It can’t be Jay Stevens’s body, because that’s been found, and the discovery was all over the news last night, so I don’t see how anyone could have missed it.”
“Your intruder may not watch the news.” He pointed out, “You don’t.”
“True, but if he’s interested enough to break in to the building twice, he’s got to be keeping an eye on the bookstore, and this place was a zoo yesterday.” I added, “The ape in charge was our good friend Detective Alonzo.”
Jake said impassively, “So I heard.”
“What else did you hear?”
“What do you mean?”
“You still have contacts, right? Is there confirmation that the skeleton is Jay Stevens?”
“It’s going to take a while to verify that one way or the other. It’s a good bet that it’s Stevens. The skeleton is male and probably belonged to someone in his early- to midtwenties. His is the only mysterious death associated with the hotel that I’m aware of.”
“I’ve been checking on Stevens.” I told Jake about the Moonglows and Kaleidoscope.
“If the sister is still alive, she might be a lead.”
“I couldn’t find any trace of her, though Sergeant Frame mentioned the name of the investigating officer. Somebody Argyle.”
Jake shook his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”
Argyle was probably long gone. Frame had about ten years on Jake, so she would remember people who had moved on or retired by the time Jake joined the force.
“Frame also mentioned that Jay Stevens and the Moonglows used to play at a club near the beach called the Tides. She didn’t say whether it was up the coast or down.” I smothered a yawn. Eight thirty and I was ready for bed. For sleep. As party animals went, I appeared to be going into hibernation.
“Okay. Those are both good leads.” Jake rose, picked up our empty dishes, and vanished into the kitchen. I heard the taps running, and I stared out the window at the first pale stars in the pink and yellow sky. One thing about smog: it made for beautiful sunsets.
Jake returned to the living room. “I’m taking off. I’ll let you know how it goes.”
I turned around to study him. I hadn’t expected this. On the one hand, I was relieved he was giving up without a fight. On the other…
I rose too. “We rekeyed. I have to lock the door after you.”
“Right.”
He paused at the table and picked up the DVD lying there. “The Maltese Falcon?” He said with a faint smile, “I’d have expected Captain Blood.”
“I’m kind of off pirates just now.”
“Ah.” His smile faded. “Yeah.”
Into the sudden silence between us, I said, “I heard Paul Kane is suing you too?”
“Hmm?” It seemed to take him a second to follow what I was saying. “Yeah.”
Not a big deal for him, it seemed. I opened my mouth to say…I have no idea what. Jake cut me off with a brisk “it doesn’t matter. Kane’s going away for a long time, and the lawsuits are strictly nuisance bullshit.” The expression in his eyes was one of curiosity. “You’re not worried about that?”
“No.” I really wasn’t. He looked unconvinced.
“There’s more than enough evidence to convict Kane a couple of times over.”
“I know.”
He waited for me to spit out whatever was on my mind. When I didn’t, he turned away again and opened the door. I followed him downstairs.
At the side entrance, he said with a long, straight look, “Night, Adrien.”
“Jake?”
He nodded.
“Maybe this isn’t my business. All the time we were seeing each other —”
“Ten months.”
Ten months. Not that long, really. Making it all the more difficult to explain why it sometimes seemed like one of the most important relationships of my life.
“Were you still seeing Kane all that time?”
Had he been expecting the question? Jake answered without hesitation. “At first, yes. I quit seeing him after we spent those days at the ranch.” His gaze met mine steadily, seriously. There seemed to be a message there. I wasn’t sure what it was.
I said, and I was astonished to hear the pain in my voice, “I’d thought — I don’t know why — that I was sort of your first.” I added quickly, “I mean, I know I wasn’t your first, because you said —”
He said, “You were the first in every way that counted. You were the first guy I ever kissed.”
He smiled faintly, unreadably. “Come to think of it, you were the first guy I had sex with in a bed.”
I had no idea what to say to that. The images that it conjured were enough to shut anyone up, I guessed.
“You’re comparing apples and oranges. Paul and I didn’t date. We weren’t friends. We didn’t have a relationship outside of the club we both belonged to. He had a voracious appetite for pain, and I had a powerful desire to inflict it.”
I wished that I hadn’t asked. It was more than I wanted to know.
“However, when I went back to the club after my marriage, my relationship with Paul did change. We became friends. Or if not friends, at least I allowed the relationship to extend outside of the confines of the club. I was fond of him.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry you were hurt. I’m sorry Paul hurt you. I’m sorry I hurt you.” Straightforward, sincere, take it or leave it.
I nodded.
“Good night,” he said.
“Good night.”
I locked the door after him and went upstairs.
* * * * *
The bookstore remained closed on Thursday. I was a model prisoner.
By now I was getting the morning routine down to a science: I weighed myself, took my temperature, checked my blood pressure and heart rate, inspected the ugly incision on my chest. Everything indicated I was recovering right on schedule. And I did feel more cheerful, despite the daunting array of medications I was still on.
I did my tai chi, had breakfast — forcing myself to eat a bowl of oatmeal — opened my e-mail, promptly closed it again, and decided to go for a stroll.
As I walked, I couldn’t help noticing how loud and busy and smoggy the city was. It had never bothered me before. Now I felt…vulnerable, and the noise and crowds unsettled me in a way they never had before.
Reluctantly, I thought of the house in Porter Ranch — and the pool in the backyard. It would be nice to swim again. Nice to lie in the sun and enjoy the peace and quiet of the surrounding hills. And it would be good for me. Lisa was right about that.
But the house was far too large for one. Too large for two, really — although if it were two people used to needing their own space…?
I walked for about twenty minutes, stopping only to buy a couple of CDs — The Essential Glenn Miller and The Very Best of Cole Porter — came home, put Cole Porter on, and fell asleep listening to Carmen McRae’s version of “Every Time We Say Goodbye.” I woke reenergized, went downstairs, and opened my e-mail for real — this time dealing with about half of it.