I showed her the nickel sized scar on my left shoulder and said, “The other one isn’t as easily accessible.”
“I thought the second bullet shattered your femur?”
“It did. High femur.” I raised my eyebrows. “High—inner—femur.”
A pained expression blanketed her face and she covered her mouth, “Did it nick the old twig and berries?”
Did I hear her correctly? Did an acclaimed investigative journalist just use the phrase “Old twig and berries?”
I tried valiantly to hide a smile, and, as if reading my mind, Alex said, “Sorry, cock and balls.”
I laughed and said, “It’s your turn.”
Alex shook her head, “Let’s take a twenty.” She tapped her shoulders with her fingertips twice, indicating a timeout. “For the next twenty minutes, this is a date.”
“A date? Why not a prune? Or a raisin?”
She rolled her eyes at me, “Are you always like this?”
No, only when I’m in the presence of a beautiful woman, tipsy, and am wearing maxi pads. “Okay, it’s a date. And, by the way, tapping your shoulders is the signal for a full timeout, not a twenty.”
We argued over a couple referee calls (by the way, she was right about the timeout) until I ejected her from the conversation, which she thought was hilarious. The way to a woman’s heart is through her funny bone and I was having inner strife about whether I wanted to tickle Alex’s. I decided to tone it down a bit and said, “So, two cowboys are on the edge of a cliff when they hear the sound of war drums. One cowboy looks at the other and says, ‘I don’t like the sound of those war drums.’ From below they hear someone shout, ‘He’s not our regular drummer!’”
When I pulled my hands away from my mouth (I’d cupped them to give an echoing effect), Alex was crumpled behind the bar. I was a third of the way into my salmon when Alex popped up wiping tears from her eyes, “That is the stupidest joke I’ve ever heard.”
We ate and traded jokes—for the record, hers were much dirtier than mine—for the next twenty minutes. We moved on to sailing. Turns out, Alex was an avid sailor and offered to give me a lesson sometime. After we finished the meal and the bottle, Alex disappeared into the kitchen, returning with a large slice of cheesecake. The two of us devoured the rich, creamy, almond swirled cheesecake, and I’d be fibbing if I said the orgasmic tremor at the end of my fork was the only one on my mind.
After we’d licked the plate clean, I looked at my watch. It was close to ten and I said, “Date’s over, babe.”
She threw me a look daring me to call her babe again then, after clearing her throat, said, “Now it’s my turn. I believe you. I believe every word. I wish you would have told me all this ten months ago so I could have written the truth in my book. There, I’m done. Now back to the date. Where did you grow up?”
“No, no, no. Unacceptable. I went on a tirade, now it’s your turn to tirade.”
“I don’t tirade. I get to the point. I believe you. Everything you said makes sense. Case closed. Did you have any pets growing up?”
“You can’t play the high-and-mighty card. I threatened your life for crying out loud. This is your chance to get even.”
Her emerald eyes penetrated mine as she said, “You were shot twice. You careened off a cliff into the Atlantic. You were in a coma for two weeks and a wheelchair for eight. Not to mention that at this very moment you’re wearing maxi pads. Honey, I think we’re even.”
Alex carried the dishes into the kitchen and left me to sit in my own abashment. On her exit she’d said (this is a verbatim quote, mind you), “Well, Max, do you think you can make us some after-dinner drinks.”
To which I’d piously replied, “I’ll wing it.” Guffaws all around.
I grabbed two Bud bottles from the bar fridge. Done. Alex reappeared from the kitchen, her right arm drooping under the weight of an enormous spotlight. She walked over to the bar and grabbed the beer with her free hand. I asked, “Looking for life on Mars?”
“Oh, this thing. This is for spotting wildlife.”
“Like chimpanzees and elephants?”
She shot me an appraising glance. “Are you qualified to have an adult conversation?”
“I passed all the tests. They said my diploma was in the mail.”
Alex shook her head as I followed her through a small stateroom and onto a small terrace overlooking a large lake feeding into thick woods. The reflection under the full moon made it hard to distinguish where the lake ended and the forest began. The tall pines afraid to move, lest they were only a reflection. There was a short gray brick wall surrounding the concrete terrace and I leaned against it for support. Alex nestled up to me and put her hand on my shoulder, “That’s Lake Wesserunsett.”
She flipped on the spotlight and began scanning the horizon back and forth. The spotlight appeared to be a smidgen less powerful than the moon, and I said, “Are you on call if one of the lighthouses ever breaks down?”
She laughed then yelled, “Look!”
Within its beam, the spotlight held an imposing moose at the edge of the forest. It shook its head, thrusting its horns around like the fearful beast it was and I said, “I think it’s Rocky that likes the spotlight, not Bullwinkle.”
She laughed and turned toward me, unintentionally blinding me with the one million watt bulb. When my sight came back, Alex had her hands around me in a rather intimate position. In hindsight she may have blinded me intentionally.
I could feel my breath reeling off her forehead and my stomach dropped like an elevator headed for BB2.
I slowly pushed her away and said, “I can’t.”
I glanced around for the ventriloquist hiding behind the terrace wall, but it turns out I actually said these words. In truth, I couldn’t shake Caitlin from my mind’s eye. I hadn’t given her a chance, and I had fundamentally screwed her over. I owed her another shot. Scratch that, I owed us another shot. I’d loved her, possibly still loved her, and if it wasn’t for my unrelenting stubborn streak we would still be together.
As for Alex, she threw me an inquisitive glance that might as well have asked me if I were gay out loud. When she opened her mouth, I expected her to ask if I were into ice skating as a young lad, but instead she said, “How did your parents die?”
She added, “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. It’s just something I stumbled on while I was doing research for the book.”
Surprisingly, I kept my composure and said, “An airplane crash.”
“Where?”
“Near the California-Oregon border.”
“How old were you?”
“Twenty-six, it was my first year as a detective with the Seattle Police Department. I did the funeral thing then moved back in with my little sister, Lacy.” I wisely skipped the part about the monumental inheritance.
“Then you up and moved to New York?”
“A couple years later, Lacy got a swimming scholarship to Temple and I decided to tag along. She was the only family I had left and I couldn’t imagine not seeing her every day. Plus, I’d spent my entire life in Washington; I was ready for a change.”
“Then you started with the Philadelphia Police Department?”
“Not exactly. I was more or less thrown off the force in Seattle and didn’t think I could follow the protocols of another department.”
She nodded.
I continued, “I had an old friend from college who was a Philly homicide detective and he would ask for my opinion on cases every so often. I broke a couple of his cases, and pretty soon the department had hired me on as a consultant. And then a year ago, the FBI came a knocking.”
Everything I’d just recounted Alex knew verbatim, but I didn’t feel like impeding the conversation. I saw an opening and swiftly asked, “Considering I thought you were a man until about eight hours ago, why don’t you tell me a little about yourself?”
She shrieked, “You thought I was a guy?”
“Well the name doesn’t leave much room for imagination.”
“Yeah, well if I said I didn’t do it on purpose, I’d be lying.”
No shit? Why not just go by Façade Tooms, Hoax Tooms, or False Pretense Tooms. I asked, “So you started going by Alex instead of Alexandria?”
“Nope. Alex is my given name. My parents were convinced they were having a boy.”
“So I guess you’re lucky your name isn’t Jack or Fred.”
“Oh, I don’t think they would have been that cruel. Although I think they’re convinced they made me into a lesbian as it is.”
I laughed. “Why would they ever think that?”
She ran her hands through her shoulder length, beaver brown hair. “Up until about a year ago my hair was always really short, like Demi Moore’s.”
“Demi Moore Ghost? Or Demi Moore G. I. Jane?”
She looked at me like I’d caught the short bus to her house and said, “I want to see that diploma.”
Alex was indulging me with a little background information when I heard a rustling near the terrace wall. I grabbed the spotlight illuminating the wild beast, a bunny-wabbit. Maybe he was a friend of the guy who beat up Baxter and came to gloat. I also didn’t rule out Bigwig, Fiver, Pipkin, Blueberry, or Hazel.
Alex started back up, “I was up to college. I got a scholarship to Boston College for cross-country and studied journalism.”
Cross-country. That explained the figure. I remarked on this, “You look like a runner.”
She smirked. “I opted against the traditional method of binge-and-purge for the less conventional binge-and-run.” She looked at me and said, “You look like a runner too.”
To a woman, this is an incredible compliment; to a man, it’s an incredulous insult. “Thanks. I went on a lead-based diet.”
“You mean bread?”
“No, I mean bullets.”
She covered her mouth, “Oh, I forgot. But aren’t you supposed to gain weight when you’re in a wheelchair?”
I patted my stomach. “Good metabolism.” There are no two words in the English language that anger a woman more when combined than good and metabolism.
Alex shook her head. “I hate people like you. If I don’t go running tomorrow morning there will be a cheesecake shaped fat pocket in my ass.”
I didn’t believe that for a second. “How far of a run?”
She counted on her fingers. “Eight miles.”
“How did you come up with eight?”
“One mile for each drink. Four miles for the cheesecake.”
I wondered how many hours of sex that converted into. She studied my face and said, “Eight hours. One mile of running is equal to one hour of sex.”
We both stood there for an unpolished Humpy Dumpty and if I said the thoughts running through my head were PG-13, I’d be lying. I heard a faint ringing in the background of the X-rated movie playing in my head, and the lead actress, Xela, said, “I think your cell phone is ringing.”
The ringing was indeed coming from my pocket and I extracted my phone. I checked the caller ID; it was Lacy. If it’d been anyone else, I would have clicked on my voice mail. I flipped the phone open, “What’s up?”
“I just called to tell you that you’re the master. You got me sooo good.”
Got her? Oh, my little practical joke. I’d strategically placed thirty fly traps throughout the house. If you aren’t familiar with a fly trap, they unravel from the ceiling about three feet and are covered in a half tree sap, half Elmer’s glue type concoction. I’d gotten three of them stuck to my face on the way out and I’d hung them. “Well thank you, Lacy Prescott. That means a lot coming from you, although it’s easy when your prey is deaf, dumb, and blind.”
“Just blind, you prick. Where did you get the parts, they feel so real.”
“What parts? They’re fly traps. I picked them up at the hardware store.”
“No, the body parts in my bed. They feel so real.”
As she said the words I knew my worst fears had been realized.
Tristen Grayer was back.
Encore in October
Chapter 12
My autonomous nervous system kicked in and my body couldn’t decide whether to fight or flight. So I stood still, like a deer in headlights. No, wait, Alex was shining the friggin’ spotlight in my eyes again.
She said, “Oops, sorry,” and ran into the house.
I flipped my cell open and dialed Caitlin. She picked up on the third ring, “This better be good.”
Caitlin should have asked, “Where?” The only reason I would be calling at 11:30 p.m. on a Monday night would be to report a murder or put in for a late night sex romp. “Where?” covered both bases. I cleared my throat and said, “My house.” She was silent, the reality of the situation piercing her skin. When it hit marrow, she asked, “Are you there?”
“No, I’m thirty minutes out.”
She didn’t ask where I was. And if she had, I would have said the dentist. Lucky for me, this wasn’t the time for questions or comedy routines.
Caitlin said flatly, “I can be there in twenty.”
I flipped the phone closed and saw I had unconsciously made my way through Alex’s house and was nearing her front door. Alex had absconded somewhere and I hoped she would understand my leaving without a proper so long, farewell, arrivederci, miss-me-miss-me-now-you-have-to-kiss-me.
I beelined it to the Range Rover, rammed the key in the ignition, threw the car in drive, slammed down the gas, then slammed on the brakes, nearly crippling Ms. Tooms in the process. Alex hit the hood with both hands and threw open the passenger door. Her chest was heaving as she said, “I’m coming with.”
I would have thrown her out, but it would have wasted valuable time. And, to be perfectly honest, I didn’t mind her presence. She apparently knew where I lived and directed me through a shortcut even Hillary wasn’t wise to. (I would later go on to name the route “The Lewinsky.”)
I kept my foot down on the gas and after two minutes I was rocketing up the ramp to I-95. Once safely on the highway, cruising at the breakneck speed of a hundred and ten miles an hour, I attempted to get my cell phone out of my pocket. It was a futile effort and I said, “Dial this number.”
Alex pulled a cell phone from her pocket, sending something small and metallic onto her lap. She said, “Shoot.”
I rattled off the number and she handed me the phone. After the first ring someone picked up on the other line and I said, “Where are you?”
Conner’s voice shot through the phone, “I’m on my way to your house. What the hell is going on? Lacy wouldn’t tell me shit.”
I told him the situation and I could hear the pistons in his Camaro flex their muscles. It wasn’t safe to talk on a cell at 120 miles an hour so I hung up and concentrated on the road. I handed the phone to Alex, who was fiddling with the small metallic object and, for what it’s worth, didn’t appear to be peeing her pants. At some point, I picked up one of Maine’s finest, his twinkling lights cascading off the tunneling trees in my rear view.
The exit sign told me I had two miles until my stop. The three cop cars on my tail told me I would probably be on the next edition of World’s Greatest Police Chases. Fifty seconds later, I exited and the three cops followed suit.
Oh no, someone must have broken into the Lighthouse Museum.
I covered the next three miles in record time, leading the parade of lights through a number of treacherous turns, slowing down when I hit my street. It was one thing to run over a hitchhiker on the freeway, it was another to run over your neighbor’s curfew-breaking-pot-smoking teen. I found my inlet and skidded to a halt behind Caitlin’s red Pathfinder. I bounded out of the car and immediately heard someone yell, “Down on your knees! Hands up!”
Someone else yelled, “Fuck off, I live here!”
Someone didn’t like Someone Else’s answer and the next thing Someone Else kn
ew, they had their face buried in the leaves and their arms wrenched behind their back. Someone Else tried reasoning with them, but it was hard to get across the message there was a dead body in Someone Else’s house with a mouthful of dirt, leaves, and grubs.
A woman’s voice rang out, “If you don’t get off that man this instant you’ll be writing traffic tickets the rest of your life.”
Oh, Caitlin. Sweet, sweet Caitlin.
I thanked my lucky stars and the cuffs flew off. Caitlin had on a pair of dark khakis and a light Bangor Police Department parka with the words “Medical Examiner” stenciled on the left breast pocket. Alex was at her side, and both brushed a couple leaves off my chest.
I asked, “Where’s Lace?”
Caitlin cocked her head toward the house, “Conner called and said the two of them were in the back looking for Baxter.”
I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to introduce Alex and Caitlin, and to be perfectly honest, I didn’t care if they ever met. I started a trot to the house and yelled over my shoulder, “How long have you been here?”
“I must have pulled up right before you. I was on my way up the stairs when Alex grabbed my shirt and said you were being arrested.”
Alex? These two were on a first name basis? Did I miss something? I filed this information away somewhere in a folder marked Relationships in my cerebral cortex and said, “So you haven’t seen the body?”
“Nope.” Caitlin’s mood did not convey there was actually a body to be seen.
The front door was open and the three of us filed through, heading for the stairs. Halfway there, I turned and started for the back deck. Corpses rarely, if ever, up and leave the scene of crime. Plus, I needed to see firsthand that Lacy was safe.
Caitlin and Alex followed me out to the beach where Lacy and Conner were visible under the moonlight thirty yards away, both shouting Baxter’s name at the top of their lungs. Lacy heard us approach and raced in my direction. She was clad in a pair of yellow pajamas with snoring teddy bears. Let’s just put it this way, if the blood soaking Lacy’s pajamas had been hers, she’d be running about a quart and a half low.
Caitlin swallowed hard, it almost appearing as though she had an Adam’s apple under the soft moonlight, and said, “I’m sorry, Thomas. I should have believed you.”
Lacy didn’t seem overly distraught about the possibility there was a dead body in her bed, but the idea that Baxter was missing was evident in the tears dribbling down her cheeks. This was probably one of the few situations in which it paid off to be blind.