A Cold Heart

of her voice. He couldn’t hear her. Which was fine.

Not a bad-looking guy, when you got past his personality.

She’d thought him weird, now she knew him as another victim.

Life was like a prism; what you saw depended on how you turned the glass.

His mother described him as depressed. Sometimes depressed people duked it out with the police, wanting to end it all but lacking the courage and hoping to force the police’s hand.

Suicide by cop, they called it.

Had Eric chosen suicide by perp?

Experienced guy like that- all that Special Forces experience- how had he ended up getting shanked by a ninny like Shull?

It made you wonder.

She looked down at him.

Not a bad-looking guy at all. Kind of handsome, really. She tried to picture him younger, tan, easygoing as he rode the waves.

“Eric,” she said, “you’re going to pull out of this.”

No response. Just like when they rode together.

Petra stroked his fingers, feeling warmth through the latex of her gloves.

“You are definitely going to pull though, Detective Stahl. And then you and I are going to talk.”

52

Allison and I were naked on her bed. My left hand rested on the nape of her neck. Her nails grazed my arm.

She released a long exhalation, freed herself, slipped under the covers. Lifting her hair above her head, she knotted it loosely. “How’s Robin doing?”

“Better.”

“Good. Could you hand me that water, please?”

“Sure.”

“Thank you.”

Moments ago we’d been lost in each other. Now we were having a civilized conversation.

I said, “Robin’s on your mind?”

“I’m not preoccupied with her. I feel for her.”

She drank water. Placed the glass down carefully. “Darling, eventually you’re going to have to deal with it.”

“With what?”

“Saving her. What it means to her.”

“Tim’s with her. She’s getting support.”

I’d stopped by the house in Venice two days ago. Tim had met me at the door, wanting to say something. The words had frozen in his throat- vocal guru struck mute. He clasped my hand, shook it hard, walked out. Leaving Robin and me alone in the living room. Strange to see her, just sitting there. As long as I’d known her, she’d had trouble doing nothing.

She accepted a hug, thanked me, told me she was okay.

I agreed that she was.

Both of us, getting through the moment. I stayed for a while, then left.

Allison said, “I’m not talking about support, darling.”

I said, “The way I see it, I didn’t save her. Far from it. Tim’s the hero, his call got the ball rolling. I didn’t even answer the first time he tried to reach me. And if it wasn’t for you, who knows if I’d have followed through.”

“If not for me, you’d have been there sooner.” She smiled.

“What?”

“A group effort,” she said. “That’s how you see it.”

I got up on my elbow. “Is this the best time to have this discussion?”

“What better time?”

“Tonight,” I said, “I was thinking more of a romantic evening.”

“To my mind, honesty’s part of romance,” she said. “At least a bit of it.” She rolled toward me, took my face in her hands, kissed my lips.

“I’d better not argue,” I said. “Woman with a gun and all that.”

She smiled again. Lay back down.

Got up on her elbows. Kissed me in a new way.

53

“An ironic tale for when they write my biography,” said Milo, finishing his sandwich. “I get my warrant, am feeling like an ace, and the show goes on without me.”

“Shull’s mommy hired a good lawyer,” I said. “It ain’t over till it’s over.”

“True,” he said, wiping his face. The sandwich was a do-it-yourself project. Turkey and steak and cold meatballs and whatever vegetables he’d found in my fridge, stuffed between slabs of hand-cut rye. Big enough to require a building permit.

“Still,” he said, “I confess to optimism.”

“There’s a switch.”

“You see, Alex: I am open to change.”

“You are, indeed.”

He folded his napkin. “It kills me that I missed it. Nothing like catching one in the act. In twenty years, I can count the times.”

The act had been Robin. I said nothing.

“Stahl’s doing better,” he said. “Rick says he’ll definitely live. Guy’s lucky. And stupid. Going one-on-one with Shull, no call for backup. Petra says his explanation is everything happened too fast.”

“Thank God he was there to slow Shull down.”

“Thank God you were there.”

“I owe that to Allison.” Thinking: Robin owes Tim and Allison.

Thinking: Life is complicated.

“How’s Robin doing?” he said.

“She’s coping.”

He played with his napkin. “I went by to see her, right after. She looked pretty numb.”

I got up and poured myself a cup of coffee.

“Anyway,” said Milo, “this morning Stahl talked a bit more to Petra. Not a word about getting stabbed, and she didn’t want to stress him. What he was anxious to tell her was that before Shull drove to Robin’s, he headed for a vacant lot in Inglewood, not far from where Kevin’s car was found. We found the place, dispatched a couple of cadaver dogs, and they went nuts. Couple of hours ago, we dug up some bones. Techies are headed over to Encino right now, to get dental records on Kevin.”

“Sad,” I said.

“Yeah.” He worked on his sandwich. Took a breath. “We went through Shull’s place with the proverbial teeny little comb. Great big house for one guy. All this old expensive furniture he got from Mommy. But he lived liked a pig, didn’t take care of anything. He had a camera hooked up to remote, took photos of himself and hung them all over the place. All dudded up, posed like some Ralph Lauren sophisticate, but there was rotten food and roaches on