fooling around in the cab of Leroy’s truck two weeks ago. On one hand, it was astonishing and almost admirable that the man could remember and relive the anguish of every affront he’d ever committed; on the other, it was like speed-dating the worst loser on the planet. Once I assured him that he needn’t add my name to the extended list of people he’d unintentionally wronged or maimed, he told me what had happened. It was as I’d suspected.
He’d dropped off his amorous pal and then come back to meet me. When he saw the cops he figured it was a setup and put the pedal to the metal. He was calling from a weigh station, where he sat chain-smoking-by the sound of it-and waiting for a text message from his buddy letting him know that his “date” was over and he wanted to be picked up.
Warren had flip-flopped for the last two hours on whether or not to call me, whether or not he believed the voice mail message I’d left for him. I just wished that he had flopped about two hours earlier.
“I think I still have about an hour,” he said, trying to suggest another meeting.
“I’ve already had a pretty exciting night. Can we do this on the phone?”
Warren didn’t say anything for a while, but even in my semiconscious state I could tell he had something to spit out and he did. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and stood up.
“Okay, let’s try this one last time,” I said, getting dressed in the same clothes I’d flung around the room earlier. “Thirty minutes. There’s an all-night deli at a strip mall near the Merritt, just off Wave Hill Road.” Even at that hour, I thought there’d be traffic. Hell, by that time, they’d be serving breakfast
“I’ll be there.”
This time I resolved to stay in my car until I saw Warren and got a reality check. Was he as safe and as aw- shucks innocent as he and Mama Warren wanted me to think or not? I thought so, but I still wasn’t sure.
There was no time for a hot caffeine jolt, so I grabbed a diet Red Bull from the fridge, hoping the buzz would clear my head. I pulled on my jacket in the entranceway and stepped down to the door that led to the garage. Just as I turned the doorknob-“Burglary! Burglary! Step away from the house!” An earsplitting shriek ripped through my brain. It was me, screaming. I dropped my keys and my bag. The two horrendous sounds-the siren and the taped warning-continued alternating until I scrambled back up the stairs to turn off the alarm. All I could think of were World War II documentaries and ambulances during the London Blitz.
I finally found the alarm code, entered it, and the hideous noises stopped, although the vibrations seemed to hang in the air for a few seconds like the aftereffects of a fireworks display. Then the phone rang. Cripes, what was it now?
“Alarm Central. We have a report of the alarm going off at your residence.” It was nice to know someone was paying attention, since I hadn’t noticed one light go on in any neighboring houses.
“It was me.” I leafed through the instruction manual, looking for some language or jargon to put the caller’s mind at rest. “I’m the homeowner. It was an accident.”
“We understand. We just need your password.”
My password? I had so many passwords they were recorded on multicolored notes stuck all over my office. My bulletin board and the side of my computer were feathered with them, but none was the password for an alarm system someone else had installed at least three years ago.
“Uh, I don’t think I have a password. It was the previous owner’s system. But I can assure you, I’m fine.”
“We understand, ma’am,” Cheerful Clerk said, “but we still need your password. After all, you could be the burglar. You could be holding the homeowner hostage.” This speech was delivered in a singsong manner and with all the sensitivity and concern of someone reading it off a plastic card hanging in his cubicle while he text-messaged his girlfriend. The homeowner could be hog-tied on the kitchen floor…
“Okay, okay, I get it. I’ll look for the password.”
I searched through the manual again. Nothing scribbled on the back, no dog-eared corners in the booklet to give me a hint what the damn password was.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to tell you,” I said. “I didn’t install the system and I’ve never even been sent a bill for the service.” That got his attention.
I heard keyboard clicking. “Let’s see…the system was installed four years ago and that fee included five years of monitoring at no additional charge. That period ends in seven months.”
“So what does that mean? Can I change the password?”
“Yes, ma’am. You can go on our Web site, but you’d have to sign in with your original password. Otherwise we need you to do it in writing and send it to us along with a copy of your deed.”
My deed? I looked at the clock. I didn’t want Warren to drive off again and I could still be on time if I got off the phone in the next thirty seconds. “Great, you know where I live. Send me the form. I’ll make a copy of my deed. Gotta go, thanks.” I hung up and dashed out the door to my car.
Not long after I turned onto Lakeview Road, I saw red flashing lights in my rearview mirror. I slowed down, not wanting to attract any more attention, and I was relieved when the patrol car made a left a few blocks behind me.
I pulled into the strip mall and parked about a hundred or so feet from the deli’s entrance. It was still open, but it was not the teeming hot spot I’d read about in the Bulletin.
I was still visible from the road-that couldn’t be helped-but at least I was out of the direct light of the streetlamp. I killed my lights but left the engine running to stay warm and to make a quick departure if necessary.
I’ve tried to re-create what happened next, but it’s something of a blur, a weird permutation of what had happened earlier. Just as Warren pulled in, he must have seen what I’d seen in my rearview mirror not long before- the red flashing lights of a Springfield police car. This time Warren tore ass out of the lot, knocking over a bank of free newspaper stands on his way to the highway. Something told me his truck driving partner would be hitching a ride to Virginia in the morning.
Seconds later the police car screeched into the lot, stopping at an angle, just shy of the overturned newsstand. Two cops jumped out and started running toward my Jeep. I turned the lights on to show them I was all right.
O’Malley stopped running first and walked the rest of the way. He did not look amused, but I was.
“You just can’t stand the thought of me meeting another man, can you?”
Twenty-eight
“You mean to tell me after all that, you never even met the guy?”
Babe Chinnery snatched back the menu as if she were going to withhold food because I’d failed to accomplish my mission. “I’m disappointed in you.”
“Hey, I have an absolute rule about how many times per night I’m going to arrange to meet a strange man in a deserted parking lot.” I said it a little too loud and got a few puzzled looks from the other diners at Babe’s.
I was disappointed, too. I’d given up an entire night’s sleep and had gotten only two useful words from Jeff Warren on the phone-Eddie Donnelley. How useful they were remained to be seen. Was Donnelley behind all Caroline’s troubles-old and new? That was the suggestion Warren had made, and it was what had gotten me out of bed a second time when common sense should have dictated that I stay put. Some people were like ticks-they just couldn’t let go of things-and I was turning into one of them.
Babe didn’t bother listening for my order. She brought me a tall glass of orange juice, coffee, buttered toast, and three scrambled eggs, well done, a meal that would have been anathema to me two years earlier, before I knew that a little bread and butter wouldn’t kill me. Her only acknowledgment of my formerly restricted lifestyle was that she didn’t heap a mountain of Pete’s parsleyed potatoes alongside the toast. A side dish fondly referred to as the 3Pete, Pete’s parsleyed potatoes were so good, they were all some diners had for breakfast, but I needed protein-and that wasn’t one of the Ps in the secret recipe.
Babe set the plate down in front of me and cast a quick eye around the diner. She decided she had a few minutes before the only other customer in the diner asked for the check, so she settled in on her side of the counter to wheedle the rest of the story out of me as I ate.
“This Donnelley creep must really hold a grudge. I myself don’t believe in holding grudges,” she said. “Stresses you out. Bad for the digestion, the skin. I knew a girl in the Collins Band whose hair fell out because she was stressed over not being named lead tambourine. Although she may have pulled it out herself. We were never really
