Pulse (6 page)

He stopped at a Burger King drive-through for black coffee and scanned the morning paper. Still nothing about a lostboat or a drowning victim. He blamed the paper. The local section had become lackluster. That’s what happens in a one-newspaper town, he thought. Coverage suffers without competition. The story had gone unreported, he thought, or the boater had somehow saved himself.

He drove with the flow of traffic, windows open. Unlike the stifling hot dead air of summer, there had been cooling fall breezes almost every day. He felt eager and energetic, ahead of rush hour, which would soon stream in the opposite direction, toward downtown. Unscrambling figures, making numbers talk until they spit out the bottom line, had always been an irresistible challenge. Heady with anticipation, he made the turn onto Rory’s street. A police car sat in her driveway. He stopped, overtaken by dread. There were two uniformed officers, one retrieving something from his cruiser, the other near the front door, which stood open. He snatched his briefcase, locked the Mercedes and hurried up the walk.

“What’s wrong, Officer? Is there a problem?”

Rory appeared in the doorway, wearing blue denim, her hair loose, down her back. She seemed to be all right. From behind her, a small boy stared at the policemen.

“I don’t have my license and registration,” she told the cop. “They’re in the glove compartment.”

“Swell.” The cop shook his head. “That’s not smart.”

“I know, I know.” She pushed back her hair and turned to Frank. “My car was stolen last night.”

“Right out of your driveway?” He turned and stared in disbelief down the shady residential street as though the culprit might still be lurking, eyeing his Mercedes.

“I woke up this morning and it was gone. And it’s my week to drive the kids to school …”

“We haven’t had many auto thefts in this immediate area,” reported the taller cop, the one with the clipboard.

“You sure another family member didn’t take it in for repairs without telling you?”

“There are no other family members,” she said quietly, curling a protective arm around her small son’s shoulders, “just us.”

“Notice anything unusual, any strangers around here lately?”

Her eyes turned to Frank.

“I swear I didn’t take it. Not guilty.”

“Of course not,” she said.

“A Mercury Sable station wagon is not exactly the hottest set of wheels in the world of professional car thieves,” the shorter cop commented.

“How old you say it was, a ninety-three? Musta stole it for parts.”

“Three forty-two?” The voice of the dispatcher sounded crisp and clear on the taller cop’s hand-held radio.

“Three forty-two,” he responded.

“Three forty-two, that’s affirmative on that vehicle at your QTH, it’s on the list.”

“Affirmative? Thank you. QRU.” The cop capped his pen, exchanged glances with his partner and gave Rory a withering look.

“Nobody stole your car, lady. It was repossessed.”

“Repossessed?” She sounded shocked.

“Yeah.”

“But how could that be?”

“Simple premise, lady. You don’t make the payments, the repo man takes the car. Let’s go, Bill.”

“But wait,” she protested, “my license, registration and some of my son’s baseball gear, his uniform and his mitt, they’re all in the car.”

“You’ll have to take it up with the lender, ma’am.”

“Will they give it back, Mom?” The small boy plucked at her elbow. “Will they give it back?”

Frank wondered if the child meant the car or his baseball uniform.

Her eyes filled. “They just come and … and steal it from your driveway?”

Halfway down the front steps, the cop turned back to her. “They didn’t steal it, ma’am. It belongs to them.”

“But they don’t even notify you?”

“It’s easier that way, ma’am. They notify us.”

Piqued at the waste of their time and talents, the two cops meandered on down the driveway to their car.

The little boy fought back tears. “But Dad gave me that mitt.”

“We’ll get it back, Billy. We’ll get it back.” She wiped her eyes, and sniffed loudly.

The boy turned and ran into the house sobbing. His mother sank down onto the front stoop, took a deep shuddering breath and put her head between her knees.

Frank still stood there with his briefcase. “This,” he said to the top of her head, “may be a bit more complicated than I thought.”

CHAPTER FIVE

“Y
ou’re late to school anyway,” Frank said over his shoulder. “Want to stop at McDonald’s for a Happy Meal?”

“No, sir.” The boy answered in a barely audible monotone and only after a nudge from his mother. Rory had wanted Billy to sit in the backseat of the Mercedes because of the air bags. Billy had refused to climb into the back unless she sat with him. So she did, her arm around him.

“So you’ve already eaten breakfast?”

“Yes, sir.”

The kid was not easy to strike up a conversation with, Frank thought.

“Where do I turn?” They were approaching an intersection. “Remember, I’m the only one aboard who’s never been to Coconut Grove Elementary. I need a good navigator.”

Billy leaned forward and pointed. “It’s that way.” His disgusted tone made it clear that anybody with any smarts wouldn’t need directions.

Frank smiled to himself. He had arrived, briefcase in hand, ready to delve into the Alexander family finances. Instead he was driving their kid to school. Did that make him the car-pool mommy?

“Mom?” piped up the small voice of the boy in the backseat. “Do we have any money?”

“Of course, sweetheart.”

“Are we poor?”

“No, we’re not poor. Daddy worked very hard and left us enough money to take care of everything.”

“Then why did they take our car?”

“Because Mommy made a mistake. She won’t do that again.”

“Do I still get ten dollars if I get all A’s on my report card, like Daddy promised?”

“If Daddy promised, you’ll get it—if your report card is all A’s.”

Frank watched them in the mirror, heads together. They shared the same coloring, wide eyes and fringed lashes. The boy closed his, burying his face in his mother’s shoulder.

“Voilà.” Frank glided the Mercedes to a stop in a
No Parking
zone outside the sprawling Mediterranean-style elementary school. “Didn’t think I’d ever find it, did you?”

Rory smoothed the boy’s hair and straightened his collar. “Mommy loves you. Have a good day, sweetheart. Tara’s mom will bring you home with the others. I’ll be waiting for you.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.” She handed him his lunch, packed in a brown paper sack. A frantic search earlier had determinedthat his
Star Wars
lunch box was gone, left in the station wagon.

Frank smiled reassuringly as Billy turned to him.

“My Dad’s on a trip,” the boy said. “He’ll be back.” He scrambled out the door and darted through the empty schoolyard into the building.

“Wait,” Rory said, watching, “I want to make sure he’s all the way inside.”

Frank turned to her. “You can ride in the front seat now, ma’am. If you’d like to.”

She tossed her head back and laughed heartily, an infectious, pleasant sound. “I’m so sorry about all of this. I swear.” She settled into the front passenger seat with a sigh. “That boy has turned into a child of Satan.”

“Seems fine to me.”

“Shoulda seen us this morning. Billy gets absolutely hysterical about the car. So does the other mother, forced to take over the driving today. Had to cancel an appointment with her dermatologist. Then Billy flat out refuses to get in her car with the other kids and insists on waiting for the police. He totally freaks when they show up. Then, once they’re gone, he insists on going to school. Says he can’t miss his fourth-period art class.” She sighed and shoved her hair back. “I usually refuse to let an eight-year-old run my life, but right now I’m cuttin’ him some slack.”

“Why do you think he insisted on being there when the police came?” Frank asked quietly.

“Thinks he’s the man of the house now and didn’t wanna miss a thing.”

“It’s probably more than that.”

She paused. “I kin see it,” she said, face solemn. “Last time the police came his daddy was taken away. Now the caris taken away and here come the police again. Maybe he was afraid that when he got home from school, I’d be gone too.”

“Bingo.”

“You’re good,” she said, with a sidelong glance. “As demented as I have been lately, that did not immediately occur to me. It helps to talk things out with another parent.”

She appeared on the verge of tears, so he changed the subject. “Want to stop for breakfast?”

“If you don’t mind, I think I would.”

He pulled into a Denny’s. Rory walked ahead of him to the booth. She moved with a lithe, careless grace that turned heads. When the waitress brought the menus, she removed the sunglasses she’d worn since they left the house and folded them on the table.

“I started wearing them ‘cuz my eyes were always red and puffy,” she explained.

“How are you doing now?”

“Much better,” she assured him. “There were days when just getting up and putting on clothes was an effort. If it wasn’t for Billy, I would not be making it.”

“You had any help?”

“The transplant program has an aftercare coordinator. She sent me a bereavement packet. For his birthday she’s gonna help us arrange another service, a celebration of Daniel’s life.” She brightened. “Maybe you can come.”

He nodded. How could he not go? It would be a celebration of his own life as well.

“Billy and I are working on a patch for the donors’ quilt. He’s a pretty good artist for a third grader. He made that plaque over the doorbell.”

She ordered a mushroom omelette and hot tea. “Want bacon or sausage with that?” the waitress asked.

“No, thank you. We should be kind to our animal friends,

not eat them.” She spoke the words casually as though she repeated the line often. The middle-aged waitress lifted an eyebrow and poured Frank’s coffee.

“I’m a vegetarian,” she said, when the waitress left.

“I gathered that.”

“Now, where were we? Oh yeah, gettin’ help. I’ve been looking for a support group, gone to a couple meetings, in fact. But so far I’m finding that most widows’ groups are for older women. Can’t find one that relates to my specific situation. Maybe none exists. Young widow, small child, suicide, organ donor, financial confusion.” She watched for a reaction. “You knew Daniel was ruled a suicide?”

He nodded. “What about relatives, friends?”

“My own mother, up in North Carolina, has never been an especially sympathetic woman. Said I could send Billy up there for a few weeks, but I didn’t want to disrupt his routine any more than it has been. My best friend, Doreen, came down from Atlanta. Known her since kindergarten, we were in each other’s weddings. First thing she said was, ‘Rory, I know how expensive it was for Daniel to be in intensive care on those machines and all, but why didn’t you come to us first, instead of just pullin’ the plug?’ ”

He winced.

“Then there’s psycho bitch, my mother-in-law. God bless her, she’s here, lives in Kendall. Can’t stop callin’ to tell me what a happy boy she raised. ‘What happened, Rory? What did you do to him? Why was my son so unhappy?’ Shit, I thought her son was happy. I had no idea he wasn’t, that’s what makes it so hard. She’s playin’ grieving mother to the hilt now, but when he was still alive she sure tried her damn level best to spoil every holiday, every occasion, never missed a chance to make him miserable, always workin’ herself up into some kind of soap-opera snit.”

She leaned back as the waitress slid their steaming plates onto the table.

“This is my first step in the right direction,” Rory said, lifting her orange juice glass. “Gettin’ straightened out, if you’re still up to it.”

“Definitely.” He dug into his eggs.

“I know I’ve got to snap out of it and get this show on the road for Billy, to get him over it. He’s become so clingy. He’s not really that way, least he never was.” She chewed on a piece of whole wheat toast.

“Nobody gets over it when they lose a parent at that tender age.”

She nodded, then swallowed. “You have no idea what it’s like to lose someone so suddenly.”

“Oh, yes I do.” He fiddled with the spoon on his saucer, then raised his eyes to meet hers. “I most certainly do.”

“What happened?”

“My father was murdered when I was a child.”

He heard her shocked intake of breath. She set her fork down. “How old were you?”

“Ten, almost eleven, not much older than your son. Robbers killed him in his shop. My mother sent me to bring him home because he was late for supper. I found him.”

“Lordy, did they solve it?” She leaned forward, an odd intensity in her eyes.

“Yeah, two punks. They went in there with a gun, to rob him. He knew them, had refused to buy stolen property from them in the past. So I’m sure they intended to kill him all along, though they denied that. They were only convicted of robbery and second-degree murder. They got life, but in those days all life meant was about seven years. They’ve been out for decades, if they’re still alive.”

“Did you go to the trial? Did you see them?” She had stopped eating and was totally focused.

“I saw them once. Dressed up for court, wearing suits and ties. Nice haircuts. Their families were there. Fancy lawyers. My mother took me on the first day. I had to testify about finding him. She cried all the way home on the bus. Out loud. Embarrassed the hell out of me. Everybody stared. We didn’t go back for the rest of the trial, she was too drunk.”

Rory closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“We wouldn’t have known the verdict except for a little paragraph in the newspaper. And the detective, he came by one day to tell us it was over, that they’d been sent upstate to Raiford Prison.”

Frank hadn’t discussed his father’s murder for years. He wondered why he was talking about it now.

“At least you had resolution, some kinda justice,” she said softly.

“Justice,” he said. “A rare thing.”

“I know.” She cleared her throat. “I want to tell you something, Frank. Please don’t call me crazy.”

“I promise I won’t.”

Her voice dropped to a white-hot whisper. “I don’t believe Daniel killed himself.”

“What do you mean?” His gaze remained steady, but his heart thudded so loudly he wondered if she could hear it.

“He did not commit suicide. Daniel did not put that gun to his head. He was murdered. I’m sure of it.”

The electricity he felt had to be generated by her intensity. “What makes you believe that?”

“Nobody will listen to me, but I swear, somebody else did it, somebody killed him.”

The hair on his arms tingled and stood on end.

“He couldn’t, wouldn’t leave us that way. He had no rea-son. He loved life too much. Daniel always loved the good things, good food, good drink, good sex. That man would never put a gun to his head.”

“Didn’t he leave a note?”

She hesitated. “Yes. But it was on his computer screen. It was cryptic, apologetic, all it said was good-bye. Anybody could have typed it, or forced Daniel to type it.”

“Who do you suspect?” He wondered if she heard the slight tremor in his voice. Was this why he was here?

“I don’t know. That’s just it. I thought perhaps someone he’d argued with at the restaurant. He was a tough boss. Or robbers, but I don’t think anythin’ is missin'.”

“What did the police say?”

“They were useless,” she said impatiently. “Didn’t want to listen. They were nice at first, then they quit returnin’ my calls.”

His watch began to beep. “Do you have to call someone?” she asked.

“No, it’s an alarm watch. Kathleen bought it, just the other day. Reminds me, as if I could forget, to take my medication.” He asked the waitress for a glass of milk, spread out his array of pills, then swallowed them, as she watched.

“I’m no shrink,” he said calmly, as they drove to the tow company’s lot, “but I’ve heard that the families of suicides often refuse to believe it.”

“It’s called denial,” she said flatly, “and it ain’t a river. I know all about it. Survivors can’t accept that they failed to see the signs, that they ignored the cry for help. Daniel had no family history of suicide, it does not run in his family. He was not mentally ill. He didn’t talk about killing himself. He had no prior attempts.”

“That you knew of.”

“Don’t you think I’d know?” Her voice rose, then fell. “Iguess that’s unfair, because you didn’t know us. You couldn’t know his lust for life. His death was like a nightmare. I kept telling myself that when I woke up, I’d find it really didn’t happen. It can’t be, I kep’ thinkin'. He was so young. Weren’t we enough for him? I grasped at straws. Maybe he was sick and didn’t tell us. But the medical examiner did an autopsy and said he found no sign of any illness. It seemed so unfair. He took all the answers with him. I didn’t ignore his cry for help, I never even heard it. I was blamin’ myself. If I hadn’t gone out that day, if I’da come home sooner. I could have stopped him. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized, he didn’t. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t. I knew that man, we were together for almost twelve years.”

The towing company, west of the city, returned Rory’s inventoried personal possessions in a cardboard box, but the man in charge wouldn’t even let her see the car.

“Looks like I’m a pedestrian now,” she said flatly.

“What about your husband’s car?”

She sighed. “He had a Lexus. I couldn’t bring myself to drive it. The damn car had his smell in it, the aftershave he always used. I couldn’t even stand to see it, after he … was gone. I sold it. Daniel was in the restaurant business. The manager of the Miami Beach restaurant offered to take over the payments. Even now, I still expect it to pull into the driveway with Daniel behind the wheel.”

“I’ll call my lawyer this afternoon and see how we go about bailing out the station wagon.”

She smiled. “Thanks. I’d like to have it back, but no sweat, if it’s too much of a hassle, forget it. I can buy us a new one once I get the bank business straightened out, or the insurance check comes in. Should be any day now.”

“No more excuses,” he told her. “It’s time for us to get back to your house and get to work.”

She nodded. “Let’s do it.”

The day was bright and brilliant. Headed for Coconut Grove, he opened the sunroof and turned on the sound system. Her hair blew in the breeze, glowing red in the sun, and the music flowed around them. Daniel Alexander may not have been a certifiable mental case, he thought, but he had to be crazy to leave a woman like Rory.