dealing with this and you and he are gonna have to be around each other.”
“No problem for me,” I said.
Klimes chuckled and motioned for me to stand up. I did and he unlocked the cuffs.
“Make no mistake, though, Noah,” he said, hooking the cuffs onto his belt loop. “Touch him again, and I’ll shoot you.” He aimed his index finger at me. “Got it?”
I examined my hand. Just scraped, no cuts. “Got it.”
Klimes waddled away.
“You’re lucky he’s a good guy,” Liz said. “Anybody else probably would’ve taken you inside and beat the shit out of you.”
Klimes and Zanella walked around the other side of the house, Zanella throwing one last look over his shoulder at me.
“He nearly crushed me on the patio,” I said.
“Big, strong guy.”
“I’ll say.”
The people who had come outside for the altercation were filtering back into the house. My house. The one with the dead girl in it.
“I’m guessing I won’t get to stay the night here,” I said.
“Macho and smart,” Liz said. “What a catch.”
In the past, she would have been chewing me out for what I’d done. Not that I didn’t deserve it. But now, she was cutting me some slack, probably knowing that the punch I’d thrown wasn’t just for Zanella.
FIFTEEN
Liz and I walked up the boardwalk, away from the chaos that had enveloped my house. We were surrounded by bikers, skateboarders, and runners, but I felt more at home among them than I did with the cops and techs in my living room.
“First things first,” she said. “You aren’t a suspect. Obviously, I was with you thenight before last and was at your place until eight yesterday morning. They’ve confirmed you were on the plane and the visit to the prison. Zanella may be acting like an asshole, but they’ve cleared you.”
I figured Zanella couldn’t help acting the way he did. You are what you are.
A shirtless guy on rollerblades, bouncing to his iPod, sliced between us, the aroma of coconut oil swirling off him as he flew by.
A dull pounding was working my temples, a headache on the way. “Was she killed here?”
“Klimes said it doesn’t look like it. Whoever did it brought her here already dead.”
That explained the blood on the patio, but it didn’t explain why. I thought of Darcy standing on the boardwalk, pressuring me to go see Simington. Tough and feisty.
“Any sign of a struggle?” I asked.
“They’re checking.”
I let out a long, slow sigh. A lot had gone on in the last twelve hours, and I didn’t like any of it.
“Obviously, I won’t be involved,” Liz said. “Because of me and you. I called John. He’ll keep an eye on it, stay in touch with Klimes and see where it goes.”
Two middle-school-aged girls shrieked as two boys chased them up the sand, spraying them with water pistols.
“They brought her to my house for a reason,” I said as the kids ran behind us.
Liz nodded. “I thought the same thing. Sending a message.”
“A loud one. Darcy only came to see me about one thing. Means it has to be about Simington. Which is what I told Klimes and Zanella.”
“So a dead Darcy is someone’s way of telling you to stay out of it and away from him.” “Oops.”
We did a U-turn and headed back toward the house. The dark clouds were still threatening but had failed to deliver a single drop of precipitation.
“How was San Quentin?” she asked. “Did you meet him?”
“Yeah. Simington’s a swell guy.” I waved a hand in the air, dismissing any of our conjecture that Darcy or Simington had been a fraud. “He’s my father, Liz. No doubt.”
She looked at me, her eyes heavy with concern. “I don’t know what to say to that.”
“I don’t either.”
“What was he like?”
“Looks like me. He wouldn’t fight with me. Seemed to know how I was gonna feel about him. I was too numb to take in anything else, really.” I paused. “And he had my name tattooed on his wrist.”
She didn’t say anything, waited for me to continue.
