the couch where Andrew had thrown his weight on top of me and I had pummeled him with my legs. The absence of that struggle made me feel light-headed. But no, it was the sudden absence of him, as if he had been sucked backward out of my life as quickly as he had been rocketing forward, into the future — a home, shared; a partnership taking root. I missed his loud opinionated criticism of the Dodgers; his puppy love for the Lakers; the puffed-up hyperbole about his job
As I hovered, weightless, knowledge came to me that we were too close to go out this way; that stunned awful look he’d thrown as we wrestled for the car door meant to say he was as bewildered as I at how far things had gotten out of hand. I have noticed our destinies are wound around our physical selves: Andrew was built big, big enough to absorb heavy body blows — his, and those of traumatized victims of crime he had comforted during the wearing routine of twenty years of homicide investigation. I sensed that he would take this blow, as well. If he had been sitting across from me in this mess, I know he would have felt just as disoriented, as responsible as I. Neither one of us could have told you what had been true during those scrambled seconds, but we might have said this: We cared for each other. And we shared a code.
Nobody was coming to get me because Detective Andrew Berringer had not turned me in.
I wanted it to be true. It would mean an ending of such happiness.
Lifted by the hope that he was actually protecting me, that we were still in this together, I rose from the couch and settled into the familiar depression in the rattan chair. The laptop sat on the glass table. I believed this was what Andrew was somehow telling me to do, yet logging on to the Bureau website created the most toxic self- loathing of the entire ordeal. I was planning to use classified material on detecting bloodstain evidence to cover up the crime. As it was loading, I came as close as ever to swallowing the gun. It would have made a pretty picture, with the FBI logo shining on the computer screen.
Between the supermarket and a pharmacy in the Marina I was able to get everything I needed. At a hardware emporium it cost almost a hundred bucks for wire brushes, nylon scrubs, wood putty, pine oil cleaner, garbage bags, disposable gloves and a rented rug shampooer.
There was not much blood splatter. I was able to scrub it up with ice water, cleanser and bleach, and then I put on Marvin Gaye and steamed the carpet and washed the floors. It is amazing how much dirt came up. Buckets of black water poured down the sink until the gold flecks in the floor tile winked. I scoured the coffee table and the walls. Threw the cotton bamboo cushion covers into the washing machine. Washed the sliding glass doors. Sprayed the kitchen tile a million times with mold remover, polishing it shiny with rolls of paper towels.
All this time I kept checking the clock, as if knowing the hour were reassurance that I was proceeding on course.
There were so many things to get rid of! The doormat. The vacuum cleaner bag. I unscrewed the swinging door with the bullet hole,
At intervals, by the clock, I would call Andrew because there would have been another of those big black arrows pointing to the sudden halt in communication, and left a couple of messages:
Since I could not go to a doctor without documenting my injuries, I took some old antibiotics and leftover Tylenol with codeine. There was fever and my pelvis ached. Peeing was agony. The toilet bowl went red. I waited until after midnight to sneak along the empty hallway, removing traces of the blood trail with my trusty brush and bucket. It took working until 4 a.m. to do all that housework because I was moving slowly and had to rest.
FD-823 (Rev. 8-26-97)
RAPID START
INFORMATION CONTROL
Case ID: 446-702-9977 The Santa Monica Kidnapping
Control Number: 5231 Priority: Immediate
Classification: Sensitive Source: Culver City Police Department
Event time: 11:27 PM
Method of contact: CDVDB (California Domestic Violence Data Base)
Prepared by: Ripley, Jason
Component/Agency: Kidnap and extortion squad, FBI, Los Angeles
Event narrative:
A seventeen-year-old female calls 911 to report her mother’s boyfriend is beating up the mother. Officers find only the girl at home. Suspect she has been abused also, but she vigorously denies it and denies even making the complaint. Report attached.
CULVER CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT
Culver City, California
Domestic Crime Unit
Complaint Intake
1. NAME Santos Roxy Angela
2. ALIASES none
3. STREET ADDRESSES 3340 Keyes Drive Palms CA
4. RACE (check all that apply) 
Black White 
Hispanic Asian American Indian Other
5. DATE OF BIRTH 4/23/80
6. HEIGHT 5’6”
7. WEIGHT 123 pounds
8. HAIR COLOR Blond
9. OCCUPATION High school student
10. AFFILIATIONS WITH GROUP OR ORGANIZATION THAT MIGHT BE RELEVANT TO THIS CRIME? No
11. VICTIM mother, Mrs. Audrey Santos, age 35 OCCUPATION Cashier EMPLOYER Home Depot
12. OFFENDER Carl Vincent, age 30 OCCUPATION Lab Technician EMPLOYER unemployed
13. PREVIOUS ARRESTS unknown
14. TYPE OF ATTACK unknown
15. WEAPONS USED unknown
16. FREQUENCY OF ATTACKS unknown
17. HOSPITALIZATIONS unknown
Responding Officers: Stewart and Salerno
Officer’s Statement: Upon arrival at the home, the complainant denied making the 911 call that Carl Vincent, the mother’s live-in boyfriend, had attacked her mother, and instead refused to make a statement. Several broken bottles were found in kitchen garbage. Complainant denied they were result of a domestic dispute. Stated that her mother and the boyfriend were at the movies. Officers left the premises at 12:40 AM.
“Did you see this report?” asked Jason Ripley.
