“Me?”
“All rambling and flustered.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”
“If you ask me, you’re doing fine.”
A corner of his mouth turned up. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“I just don’t want you to think I’m trying to…”
Smiling, Robin raised her hand. “Hush,” she said. “Eat.”
He shrugged, looked as if he might start to speak again, but stopped himself and began to work on his breakfast.
Robin, too, began to eat. Her heart was slamming. She could hardly swallow, but she washed down the food with water and coffee, and kept shoveling more into her mouth, determined not to let Nate notice her turmoil.
He looked pleased. “You got your appetite back?”
“So it would seem. I think your speech cured me.”
“Now that you don’t have tonight hanging over your head.”
“Guess so.”
“Well, I never should’ve—”
“Eat, okay?”
“Was this motel all right?” he asked, nodding at it through the window. “We could check you into a different one if—”
“This one’s just fine.”
Nate finished his breakfast in silence. He kept looking at Robin and trying to smile. She could see that he was not only disappointed but also embarrassed.
Robin walked behind him to the front counter. He paid. He held the glass door open for her.
Outside, she took his hand. “Come on, cheer up,” she said. “It’s not the end of the world.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
At the curb, they waited for a break in traffic. Then they rushed across the street.
“There’ll be other times,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“I don’t want to spend all day wondering what’s going to happen tonight. Can you understand that?”
“Sure.”
“I’d get my fingers tangled in my banjo strings and forget how to sing.”
They stopped in the parking lot. “I’ll go ahead to the office and—”
“Come on up for a minute. I want to give you something.”
“Okay.”
They climbed the stairs. They walked along the balcony. Robin took the room key from her purse. The point of the key clicked and skidded around the lock hole.
“You’re a nervous wreck,” Nate said.
“And it’s all your fault.” Finally the key went in. She turned it and opened the door. Nate followed her into the room. He didn’t see Robin hang the Do Not Disturb sign on the outside knob before shutting the door.
He turned around. From the look on his face, Robin could see that he didn’t suspect. He was still fighting his disappointment about tonight. But being very brave about it.
Robin wrapped her arms around him. She gazed into his eyes. And saw confusion.
“Those other times?” she said, her voice shaking. “Well, this is the first of them.”
“Huh?”
“I’d be wrecked all day, waiting for tonight.”
Nate looked shocked. “You’re kidding,” he whispered.
“Think so?”
His moan seemed more agonized than happy. He pulled Robin hard against him and she found his lips with her mouth.
Thirty-one
“He didn’t go for it?” Joan asked when Dave returned from the chief’s office.
“He agreed it was peculiar, but thought we’d be jumping the gun to launch an investigation. If Gloria hasn’t turned up by tomorrow…”
“The old twenty-four-hour crap,” Joan said. “Same thing I got when my mother disappeared.”
“You didn’t come up with anything?”
Shaking her head, Joan took her jacket off the back of her desk chair and slung it over one shoulder. “I made the calls. The people at the paper haven’t heard from her since yesterday morning. Nobody fitting her description turned up at the hospital. Or the morgue.”
“That’s something, anyway.”
They walked out to the patrol car. Joan tossed her jacket into the trunk, then slid into the passenger seat. The car was warm. She rolled her window down. Dave got in behind the wheel and drove out of the parking lot.
“It had to be someone who didn’t want suspicion directed at Funland or the beach area,” Joan said. “If there really was foul play, that’s the only thing that makes sense. Otherwise, why bother?”
Dave nodded. “They went to a lot of trouble to make it look like she came home last night.”
“That was no easy trick.”
“Not too hard. The lot’s nearly empty after closing time and they could tell she had a VW by the key. The registration in the glove compartment has her address.”
“Had to be somebody pretty sharp,” Joan said. “And someone who knows the town. I can’t see a bum pulling a gimmick like that. Their heads are too messed up.”
“Maybe not all of them.”
“All of them I’ve seen. This is way out of their league. It almost had to be the trollers.”
“Or a third party we’re not even aware of. Could be she ran into a serial killer, something like that. We’re about due. Haven’t had one here since Gunderson, back in eighty-two.”
“Possible,” Joan said. “But I’d put my money on Great Big Billy Goat Gruff and the gang. They probably jumped her, thinking they had themselves a troll.”
“She would’ve corrected that impression pretty quick, I think.”
“Told them who she is? She’s not stupid. If they knew they had Gloria Weston, it’d get pretty nasty.”
“It’d get nasty enough if they thought she was a troll. If they figured out she wasn’t…” Dave shook his head. “Suddenly, they’re confronted by a lucid victim. Someone capable of fingering them, testifying against them.”
“Kill her? Dave, that’s a mighty big step for a bunch of kids who’ve never really done worse than beat up some bums and…leave them in compromising positions.”
“If it’s that or getting busted…”
“Yeah. Jesus. I know.”
“They wouldn’t have fooled around taking her car and clothes home unless they’d known she wasn’t going to be turning up. Ever.”
“This is getting awfully damn grim.”
“She knew better,” Dave said.
“Real consolation.”
“Yeah.”
Dave slowed the car and swung into the Funland parking lot. “Look,” Joan said, “this is just ‘worse-case-scenario’ stuff. Gloria might be fine. There are other explanations. She could’ve met someone last night. A guy. Maybe an old friend. Maybe they had a few, somewhere, and he drove her home in the Bug. She changed clothes and went off with him.”
“Leaving her keys and purse in the house?”
“You said she’s got a spare house key.”
“It’s a nice theory,” Dave said. “I hope you’re right. But it’s got too many holes in it.”
“There could be simple explanations for the holes too.”
Dave swung into a parking space and killed the engine. He looked at Joan.
“I know,” she muttered.
“Dammit, we tried to warn her.”
“Yeah. We did. But we should’ve tried harder.”
“We didn’t know something like this would happen.”
“I just wish we had it to do over again. We could’ve stopped her. I could’ve stopped her. I could’ve gone over to her when I saw her sitting there on the steps in that ridiculous troll costume.”
“She would’ve just told you to go to hell.”
“She’d still be alive, Dave. I would’ve seen to it. Shit, I would’ve kept her handcuffed inside her house last night, if that’s what it took.”
“We didn’t know. We can’t blame ourselves. We knew it was dangerous, but…life is dangerous. I could get shot on duty today…”
Joan felt something shrivel inside her. “Hey, don’t say that.”
“The point is
, I’m taking the risk every time I put my uniform on. Would you blame yourself and think you should’ve kept me handcuffed at home?”
“I’d blame myself for not blowing away the bastard first.”
Dave smiled. “That’s different. I might blame you for that myself. The thing is, we didn’t know her damn stunt would get her dead. If she’s dead. We don’t even know that, for sure. Come on, we’d better get over to the boardwalk.”
They left the car. Joan met him behind it. She wished they were alone, so she could hold him.
“We’ll get whoever did it, Dave. We’ll nail him—or them. We’ll find out what they did to her.”
“Really? How do we do that?”
“Come back tonight. After closing time. I’ll dress up.”
“Use you as bait? No way.”
“It’s something we have to do. And you know it.”
Jeremy sat hunched over the kitchen table, slicing apart his fried eggs, bacon, and toast and forking mixes of them into his mouth.
“You certainly have yourself an appetite for someone at death’s door,” his mother said.
He nodded and scooped more food into his mouth. He’d never had a hangover before. He’d always heard that people in his condition were repulsed by the mere thought of food, but he felt ravenous.
Of course, he’d barfed on the way home last night. That could account for the maddening hunger.
“I really ought to ground you, you know.”
He looked up at her. The movement of his eyes was like a rheostat turning up the pain in his head from dim to bright. “I told you I’m sorry. Geez, what do you want? It wasn’t my fault Shiner had a flat.”
“And whose fault was it that you came home drunk?”
“I didn’t know the punch was spiked.”
“I’m sure.”
“I didn’t. Besides, everyone else was drinking it.”
“If everyone else jumped off a—”
“I know, I know. God, I said I was sorry. You don’t have to crucify me.”
“Don’t talk that way.”
He leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes. They felt hot and dry under his lids. And too big. As if they’d swollen to twice their size with some kind of terrible, throbbing pressure. “I learned my lesson,” he muttered. “I feel like…horrible. I promise, I’ll never drink again. Just don’t ground me. Please? I’m supposed to meet Shiner at the beach.”
“That’s another thing. Shiner. She certainly had me fooled. I thought she was a perfectly nice young lady.”
Jeremy opened his eyes and frowned. “She is.”
“I don’t call it nice to go to a party and get drunk. Not when she has the responsibility of driving you home afterward. There’s no excuse for that. And you should’ve known better than to get into the car with someone who—”
“Mom, she didn’t drink. All she had was Pepsi.”
“I’m supposed to believe that?”
“It’s the truth. She didn’t have any booze.”
“So she knew the punch was spiked?”
“No. She just doesn’t like punch.” In spite of the pain pulsing through his head, he came up with an idea. “I remember now. She said she’s diabetic. That’s why she didn’t have any punch. She was drinking sugarless Pepsi.”
“Hmmm.”
He didn’t know whether his mother bought that or not. Then he wondered why he was trying so hard to defend Shiner. Hell, she’d gone off and left him.
With good reason.
Maybe they could make up, though. If he ever saw her again.
But the main thing—Shiner was his excuse for going to the beach this morning. He had to convince Mom of her innocence, or she might keep him home.
If he couldn’t go to the beach and see Tanya…
“She figured out the punch was spiked,” he said, “and warned me. That’s when I stopped drinking the stuff.”
“Well, I might have been a bit hasty in my assessment of her.”
“She liked you. She told me she wished her mother was more like you.”
“Really?” She raised her eyebrows, looking surprised and pleased.
“Yeah, she thought you were neat.”
“Well, that’s all very well and good, but I still think you’d better just stay in the house. I can’t condone last night’s behavior.”
“Shiner’s expecting me. She’ll be waiting. She’ll think I stood her up.”
“Alexander Graham Bell invented a convenient device—”
“I don’t know her number, Mom. And she isn’t listed. They were getting all these crank calls last year, and…Please. It’s not fair to Shiner. She was going to make a picnic lunch, she’ll have gone to all that trouble, and she’ll be waiting there not knowing what happened to me. It just isn’t fair.”
“You should’ve thought of that last night.”
“Right!” Jeremy snapped. “Fine.” He flung his knife and fork down. They crashed against the plate, and his mother flinched as if she’d been slapped. Tears glimmered in her eyes. “I’ll stay home. I’ll stay home forever. Ruin my life, why don’t you? The first time in my damn life I make a friend, and all you want to do is wreck it. If you hate me so much, why don’t you just shoot me and get it over with!”
He shoved his chair back and raced from the kitchen.
“Jeremy!” she cried out after him.
“To hell with it! To hell with everything!”
He ran to his room and threw himself onto the bed. His head roared with pain. It felt as if daggers were being plunged into his brain. He clamped the pillow down over his ears and lay there sobbing in agony.
A few minutes passed before he heard the footsteps he expected. The mattress tipped slightly as his mother sat down on the edge of the bed. Her hand stroked his back.
“If it’s that important to you,” she said. Her voice was muffled, but Jeremy could hear it trembling. He loosened his grip on the pillow but kept it over his head. “I don’t want to stop you from having a picnic with a pretty girl. I was your age once myself, you know. I understand these things.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have…yelled and gone crazy.”
“That’s right, you shouldn’t have. But I suppose I was being a little harsh. You do need to be punished, though. I’ll dock your allowance for two weeks—and you wash the dinner dishes.”
“For how long?” he muttered.
“The same. Two weeks.”
“That’s pretty stiff.”
He heard her laugh. She gave his rump a gentle swat, and he felt the mattress rise.
He rolled over and sat up as she walked toward the door. She looked back at him. Her eyes were red, her face wet.
“Thanks, Mom,” Jeremy said.
“Even if we have our little problems, honey, I still love you. Don’t ever think I don’t.”
“I know. I love you too.”
“You’d better get a move on, now. You don’t want to keep Shiner waiting.”
Nate kissed Robin gently on the mouth. “I wish I could stay,” he whispered.
“Me too. But I don’t want to make you late.”
“We’ll have tonight. And tomorrow, and the next day and the next.”
“You’ll get tired of me.”
“I’ll never get tired of you.” Nate kissed her mouth again and eased himself back, kissing her chin, the side of her neck. His penis slid out of her. The loss of it gave Robin an empty ache, but she still held the feel of it like an afterimage. He kissed each of her nipples, her sternum, her belly. Then he was kneeling over her, looking down with wonder and sadness in his eyes.
Robin folded her hands beneath her head. She raised her knees, and pressed them gently against his sides.
“I’ve never…felt this way about a girl before,” he said. He ran his hands slowly down her thighs. “What is it about you, anyway?”
“I’m easy?”
“Are you?”
“No. Just for you.”
&nb
sp; “I think I’m in love with you. It’s not because of…what we just did. I was in love with you before.”
“I was in love with you before too. I still am, only more.”
“Same here.” He rested his hands on her knees. “God, I wish I didn’t have to go.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“No. Stay and take that bath.” He smiled. “Now you really need it.” He patted her knees, then climbed off the bed.
Robin rolled onto her side. She watched him bend down and pick up his underwear. His body was sleek and muscular, his skin deeply tanned but white where shorts had kept the sun away.
As he stepped into his jeans and fastened them, Robin rose from the bed. She sat on its edge, feet on the carpet, and watched Nate get into his T-shirt, socks, and tennis shoes.
It felt strange, being naked while he was dressed.
It felt just fine.
She stood up, and he came to her. He put his hands on her hips. He gazed into her eyes. “Guess I’ll see you in an hour or so,” he said. “Just come to the arcade whenever you’re ready.”
“I’ll make it quick. I already miss you.” She wrapped her arms around him, hugged him tight, and kissed him.
Jeremy rode his bike close to the curb, going slowly and coasting because the exertion when he had to pedal fueled the pain in his head. He was feeling a lot better now. The clean, fresh breeze seemed to help.
So did the prospect of eating a waffle cone when he reached Funland. Though he’d never had a hangover, he somehow knew that ice cream would smother the flames in his stomach.
He remembered hurling the remains of his waffle cone at Tanya, wiping the mess from her leg, going up inside her shorts, and then his thoughts slipped to last night in her bedroom and the memories of that set his heart racing, pounding hot pain into his head.
Don’t think about it, he told himself.
But now that his mind had entered her room, he couldn’t tear it away.
The images whirled and tumbled, took Jeremy’s breath away, made his heart slam until he thought his head might explode. He squeezed his eyes shut. Felt the bike lurch sideways. Snapped his eyes open and saw that he’d swerved out into the middle of the lane. A car horn blared. Without looking back, he twisted the handlebars to the right. The car sped by. Someone yelled, “Asshole!” Jeremy’s front tire rubbed the curb, and he put his foot on the pavement to hold himself up.