“You have to stay where you are, honey,” said Paul. His voice was faltering. “Please don’t cry.”
“No,” I said, and kept on moving slowly, inch by inch, until I wrapped my arms around Paul, holding his to his sides. I laid my head against his chest; how strange it felt to be holding someone built differently from Martin; taller, thinner, less muscled. I could feel Paul’s heart beating beneath my cheek. I had sunk a knife into this man’s body. His blood was staining my left arm and hand.
And I felt his extended forearm fall to his side, the arm holding the gun. I heard the thud as the gun fell to the grass. I felt both his arms circling me, pulling me closer to him for the first and last time.
He buried his face in my hair.
“Sweet,” he said, and then Martin clipped him in the head with the gun butt.
We had a hard time getting ourselves believed, even after Lynn told the other cops that Paul, his heart overflowing under the emotional pressure of the funeral, had confided in her that day, following Jack’s interment, that he was “deeply involved” with me. He also told her some of the same points he’d raised against Martin; that Martin was an absentee husband, that Martin permitted slander against my name.
To say the least, Lynn was highly skeptical and dubious about all Paul’s fantasies. And she knew me well enough to know that’s just what they were.
But she wasn’t happy to testify against a fellow officer. No one on the police force was delighted to be told that one of their number had murdered another officer, one female civilian, and attacked a male officer and a male civilian.
And Paul popped back into a more rational frame of mind to deny everything except that he had a real crush on me, not exactly an unknown situation. He said that Martin and I had attacked him unprovoked, that I’d misunderstood certain things he’d told me, and that Martin had then pulled Paul’s gun from Paul’s holster and hit him with it.
That was not exactly a sturdy defense, no matter how much the police wanted to believe one of their own. And there were stains matching Arthur’s blood between the seat cushions of Paul’s car. And there was a matching stain left on the handle, a stain not washed off by Paul’s own blood. Then Jenny Tankersley, that tough flier, came forward to tell Lynn that she’d seen Paul practicing sharp banking moves in one of the small planes she rented, and that she’d noticed something odd; he was opening the passenger door of the little plane while he was flying, then banking to let the door slam shut.
“I knew it was someone after you,” Angel said one day, the day Paul finally confessed to Jack’s murder.
“You did?” I said. “Sure.”
“You thought it was me, but I knew it was you. You just weren’t looking at it straight.”
“You seem much more a candidate for obsessive love than I,” I said stiffly.
“It’s not your fault,” she said, shading her eyes against the sun. We were lying in our swimming suits on the sundeck, cold drinks at hand. I was trying desperately to feel as lighthearted as the day and the frivolous occupation should have made me. There was not a cloud in the sky. I glistened with oil as though I were going to be fried. I hadn’t tried to get a tan in years, avoided the sun as I would the plague. And yet here I was, trying to lighten up my life.
Angel was lying on her back, and I stole a glimpse at her stomach. It was definitely convex.
“That’s not
I closed my eyes and felt myself flushing.
“You gotta work that through, Roe. Or you’ll go crazy. There are pregnant women everywhere.”
I nodded. I hoped she was watching.
“You know when the baby comes, Shelby and I gotta find somewhere else to live.”
“I figured,” I said quietly. I turned over on my stomach and buried my face in my arms.
“In fact, before. Because my mom told me after it comes, I’ll be too busy to move.”
“So, have you looked at houses?”
“No. I want you to go with me.”
I pushed up on my elbows to look at her.
“Shelby found us this place. I want to find the next one,” she explained, as if every couple operated this way. “But I’ve never bought a house, I don’t know what to ask or look for, and you do. Will you come with me?”
“Sure.” I was glad I had on dark glasses.
Actually, I could call my mother and she could be on the lookout. They’d need at least three bedrooms; maybe they’d have another baby… or Angel’s mom might come to help take care of this one… and they’d want a yard for the child to play in. I projected Shelby’s income and I ran through the neighborhoods in Lawrenceton that would suit it.
“Would you want a pool?” I asked.
I saw Angel’s mouth curve in her slow rare smile. “Sure,” she said. “Gotta get our exercise somehow.”
A shadow fell across Angel’s legs.
“Martin!” I said in amazement. “You’re back early.”
“I told them they didn’t really need me at that meeting. They could have asked me everything they needed to know on the phone,” he said, setting his leather briefcase down on the deck and loosening the knot of his tie, an act I never failed to find sexy.
Lately I’d been finding precious little sexy, and I hadn’t been able to go back to the cemetery. I had a feeling I’d never sit there in peace again.
Angel said suddenly, “I’m done to a crisp, and the doctor told me not to get too hot!” She gathered up her towel and lotion and strode off to her apartment without further ado. I heard her tromp up the stairs, and just a few seconds later, tromp down again. “Gotta go to the store!” she yelled.
Surely that was a little peculiar?
I opened my eyes. Martin had taken off his starched white shirt, his shoes and socks, and was slipping down his pants.
“Good Lord!” I exclaimed.
“No, just me,” he said.
“Did you give Angel some signal?”
“Yes, this.” And Martin pointed at the chaise where Angel had been baking, pointed to the garage, and made a pantomime of hands on the steering wheel.
“What! Why?”
“Because I want to have sex with you on our sundeck right here and now and I don’t want Angel to watch,” Martin said.
“Oh.”
“Because you haven’t seemed to want to do that lately, and I thought maybe an exotic locale would- stimulate your interest,” Martin continued, stimulating my interest right then and there, in front of God and the big blue sky.
“Martin! Don’t do that!”
“Why not?”
“Well… I don’t know…”
“Then why don’t I do it a little longer?”
“Ahhh… okay.”
“Then maybe I could just move this chaise over by yours…”
“Oh. Umhmm. And then?”
“I was thinking you could show me how you put that oil all over…”
“And then?”
“Roe, I may be too old for a ‘then’!”
“Oh, not you,” I said confidently.
And I was right.
