Hidden River (Five Star Paperback) (27 page)

How much did Amber know? How much did she want to know? Is that why I’d slept with her? To find out the truth.

And she lay there snoring, and I knew what I was going to do.

A crime.

It could kill her.

It could fucking kill her.

I eased myself out of the bed. I went to the kitchen and got an ice cube.

I found my jacket. I took out the needle, the spoon, I got some water, my alcohol swab. I boiled the heroin, drew it up through the cotton wool. It would be her foot, she’d never notice and I’m the master, I always find a vein, every time.

But ketch and alcohol do not mix. Just ask any of a dozen dead rock stars. It can stop the heart. Can I take her across the line? What if she’s done nothing? Can I do that to her? Can I take her across and still have the right to save her, protect her?

I found a vein, put the ice cube on it, to numb it. She didn’t wake. I took off the ice cube, swabbed the spot with alcohol, injected the heroin above her heel.

She moaned for a second in her sleep.

I let her absorb it, I watched her chest move up and down.

Her breath became shallow, she began to sweat. Was her heart going to fib? I sat there, frightened for ten minutes, but then she came out of it. She was in the center of the high. There were things I had to know and this might be the way.

I woke her.

“Amber,” I whispered. “Amber.”

She looked at me, smiled.

“Amber, I want to ask you something.”

“Ask me anything,” she said drowsily, happily.

“I want to ask you about Charles.”

“Ask me anything,” she moaned.

Heroin isn’t a truth serum and the memory doesn’t blank afterward, so you have to be reasonably subtle, not shock them enough so they’ll remember.

“If Charles wanted to get into someone’s computer, could he do it?”

“Computer?” she asked, her eyelids heavy, her lips in a pout, quivering, under the opium paralysis.

“Yes, Amber, a computer. Could he get into someone else’s computer?” I asked quietly.

“Carrickfergus,” she said.

“What?”

“Carrickfergus,” she said.

“What does that mean?”

She groaned, started drifting off. I didn’t have much more time.

“Ok, forget that, what about Charles?”

“Charles.”

“Yes, look, if Charles was going to kill someone, how would he do it?” I asked gently.

“He wouldn’t do it, he wouldn’t kill anyone.”

“But if he had to, if he had to kill someone.”

“He wouldn’t,” she said.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Her eyes fluttered, closed. Damn. I looked at her. That was enough, I couldn’t risk anything more, she’d remember, I’d kiss and tell her she was beautiful and say something about, oh, I don’t know, Africa, lions. In the morning it would all be jumbled up. She wouldn’t recall. It hadn’t worked or maybe it had and she knew nothing, she was as innocent as the—

“Throw it,” she said lazily from her sleep, her eyes still closed.

“Throw what?”

“Throw the gun, get rid of it,” she insisted.

“Where would you get rid of the gun?”

“Have to get rid of it, Italian gun, throw it away, anywhere, Cherry Creek. Get rid of it.”

“Why there?”

“I don’t know, the nearest river, get rid of it, get rid of it….”

She began to snore again.

She knew, then, she knew Charles had killed Victoria. She had told him to throw away the gun.

I could imagine the scene. He’s just killed Victoria, he comes back. “Oh, Amber, something awful has happened, it was an accident”—and he’s still got the goddamn gun.

Congressman Wegener’s birthday announcement is coming up, they have too much to lose. Maybe he didn’t mean to kill her. Maybe he went to confront Victoria and things got out of hand. Amber keeps a cool head. She orders him back out into the snow to get rid of the gun. He throws it in the water and it’s washed away, like what else? Her conscience. Her humanity.

I stared at her sleeping form, at—what was it Yeats said?—“that terrible beauty,” and I thought, Am I better than you? Me, who took a chance on killing you, to get that?

Had a wee while left.

I looked her over. I examined her, as if she were a corpse. That scar on her shoulder had been a tattoo she had had removed. It was about the size of a silver dollar. I could tell from its shape that it had been a harp. Working-class girl, with a harp tattoo. Shanty Irish girl, bit of a klepto, marries old-money Charles? Then she reinvents herself as patrician fabulous? She didn’t give much away. Just that accent and the way she ate pizza. I admired that. Liked that even as I hated her for what Charles did to Victoria. Hated her and wanted her, too. My muscles ached. My body writhed. I wanted a hit.

I still had time.

I forced myself to have a scout around. The predictability of the decor. What did it show? What a good job the cleaning woman did? Charles’s shallowness, Amber’s impression that this was how the other half lived. No cultural cringes, no giveaways. I went to the garage and checked their car. An E-type Jag. Had Charles killed Alan Houghton on Lookout Mountain? That’s where they’d found Houghton’s car. Charles could have arranged a meeting up there, killed him, put the body in the trunk and dumped it somewhere, a lake, a canyon, the foundation of a construction project. I popped the trunk, checked it, but it had been long since cleaned. A spare tire, a tire iron, and a Leatherman multitool.

Back to the house. That photograph of Charles playing lacrosse. But screw the murder, I wanted more about her. I searched the drawers, I smelled her underwear, I went through her things. Lingerie, fishnet stockings, tasteful stuff from a high-class boutique. But then at the back, a leather panty with an attachment for strapping on a dildo. I rummaged around. Nothing else. Kinky little minx. I went up to the bed and touched her breasts, kissed her. I watched her. I could have killed her with that dose. Thank God, she was alive, breathing easily.

Got up, searched some more. Looking for back story, photographs, but there was precious little. The past was wiped. Something to be ashamed of, maybe. Finally, in Charles’s study I found a box of college stuff. I rummaged through and found a few pictures of an Amber Doonan in a Harvard production of
Twelfth Night
. Further down another yearbook. No Amber Doonan, but a photograph of Amber Abendsen, a talented actress in the drama society. She had changed her name. Why? Could she have married someone before Charles?

A talented actress, the caption said.

What else about you, Amber? What else could I know about you? I found her purse and rummaged through it. Driving license, credit cards. A notebook with all the pages blank. More to know but too late now.

Too late now. I was shivering. I put the box away. I went back to her. Breathing. Lovely. I needed a hit. I couldn’t bear to look at her without a hit.

I threw the used needle in the garbage. I cleaned the vessel in the bathroom sink. I cleaned the spoon, let it air-dry. Waited, patient. I took the ketch, I boiled it, I found a vein. Alcohol and heroin do not mix, I thought as I injected myself. I stowed my kit back in my jacket, I lay down with her on the bed.

I climbed on top of her, I touched her belly, breasts. She could barely respond, but I had to have her.

I eased my way inside….

Early morning. Sunlight the color of her hair, filtering through the wooden slat blinds. She’s awake, looking at me. She smiles when she sees me wake.

“Hey,” she says.

“Hi. You look great,” I reply.

“Really? I don’t feel well at all,” she says.

“What’s the matter?”

“I’m just a bit under the weather, groggy.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I say, and look at her.

She seems a little yellow. I kiss her and touch her legs and incidentally check out her left heel. If you miss the vein you can leave a big blister, but I didn’t miss the vein and it seems fine down there.

“I don’t feel a hundred percent but I know what will help. Let’s make love,” she says.

“Ok.”

I kiss her and climb on top and we make love, but I’m still under the influence of the smack and I let her be on top and her back arches and her big breasts heave and drip sweat, and we come together and we’re happy.

I laugh and she laughs.

“Well, that’s position twenty-one in the Kama Sutra knocked off,” I say in an Indian accent.

“What did you say?” she asks, suddenly sitting up.

“I said that that’s position twenty-one of the Kama Sutra knocked off.”

She wraps the blanket around herself and rubs her eyes. Her leg moves in such a way that it is no longer touching mine. She shivers. She looks at me in the half-light with those cat blue eyes. She turns away. I’ve screwed up somehow. She yawns.

“You better go, Charles might be back soon.”

I stretch lazily and nod.

“Gosh, yes, it’s seven o’clock, you better go, we have a maid service that comes,” Amber says.

“I’ll see you this afternoon?” I ask.

“Yes. Come here, Alex, kiss me,” she says.

I lean over, kiss her. Thinking: She’s beautiful, she’s frightened, but she’s basically good, and somehow, somehow, it’s all going to be ok, it’s all going to work out for the best, for her and for me and for everyone.

Of course it is.

10: THE REMOVER OF OBSTACLES

D
enver already up. Dollars being made in oil, high tech, commerce, land spec, tourism, and the like. I noted the cars, counted the SUVs, the Jesus fish and the odd “God Hates Gays” or “Abortion = Murder” bumper sticker. At Einstein Brothers I bought a mixed bag of bagels. Carried them to the building, walked up the five flights.

“Alex, what about you?” John asked.

“Not too bad, mate,” I told him.

Areea smiled at me. She was always here now. Before her job, after her job.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Hi,” I said.

John took the bag of bagels, split it open, and toasted three of them.

“Where’s Pat?” I asked.

“He’s putting his face on.”

Pat always spent at least an hour getting his appearance into some kind of shape for the day ahead. There were sores to be covered, a beard to be shaved extremely carefully, there was rubbing alcohol and pancake to be applied to his skin.

“I’ll just take a half, John,” I said as I went into the bedroom to boil my heroin and shoot up.

“Ok, pal,” he said. He didn’t ask where I’d been all night, or what was going on. This was one of John’s good qualities.

I found a clear track of vein, injected myself, lay down on the bed.

“Did you fall asleep?” Areea asked a couple of hours later.

“Yeah,” I said.

John gave me a look and shook his head. “You’re running late,” he said, “and your bagel’s freezing.”

“Where’s Pat now?” I asked him.

“He’s not feeling well,” John said.

“No?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll go visit him.”

I walked down the hall to Pat’s. I
was
a bit late, but I had to ask him something.

He was wrapped in a blanket in the living room, sipping raw gin from a pint glass. His face drawn, tired.

“Get you anything, mate?” I asked.

He shook his head.

“Listen, I’ve got a question. It can wait if you’re not up to it,” I said.

“Fire away. I’m better than I look.”

“Where does Cherry Creek go?”

“The river or the shopping mall?” he asked, stroking his stubble, his dead cheeks.

“The river. How could a shopping mall go anywhere?”

“It meets the South Platte at Confluence Park.”

“And then what?” I asked.

“Platte, Missouri, Mississippi, Gulf of Mexico.”

“Shit, ok, I see.”

“Why you wanna know?”

“Oh, nothing, just curious.”

“You wanna know anything else, sip of gin or a martini?”

“Nah, I have to go, actually.”

“Don’t think of fishing there or anything, just a couple of feet deep, best of times.”

“Ok, Pat, I have to head. Are you sure I can’t get
you
anything?”

“No.”

“Gotta go to work,” I said apologetically.

“Sure,” he said. “Oh, nearly forgot, last night I got a call about you.”

“What?”

“Yeah, some Native American dude from the Denver Police Department called up, wanted to know if I had anyone stay over with me on the night of June twenty-second. Maybe two Mexican, Australian, or Irish guys.”

“Shit, and what did you say?”

“I said nope, said I used to take paying guests but it wasn’t worth the hassle anymore.”

“And what did he do?”

“He thanked me, said it was just a routine inquiry, and hung up.”

“His name was Redhorse, right?”

“Yeah, something like that,” Pat said.

“Did the right thing, Pat, he’s looking for us since—”

Pat put up his hand to stop me. His eyes cold, certain.

“I don’t want to know,” he said. “The best thing is if I know nothing.”

“Ok. Probably best if you don’t tell John, either,” I said.

Pat’s eyes widened, but then he nodded and I said goodbye. I’d forgotten all about Redhorse. Or, if not forgotten, I had put him out of my mind. If I had any sense at all, I’d see that now was the time to quit, to get out of town. But I was so close. So close. And the hook was deeper than ever.
She
was deeper….

Incredibly, at the CAW offices Charles was there, looking a bit bleary-eyed but showered, his hair gelled back, wearing a fresh linen suit, white shirt, and tie.

“Alexander,” he said with a big grin, “you like cigars?”

“You had a baby?” I asked.

“Sort of,” he said, laughing. “I gave my first public speech last night.”

“How did it go?” I asked.

“Very well. Here,” he said and give me a silver tube.

Charles explained that he’d given the speech to a packed hall in Aspen, made lots of contacts, and then driven back this morning. He had even met Newt Gingrich and Senator Dole. He said that giving a speech wasn’t that much different from lecturing, or presenting a brief, or doing a rap at a door, except that you had to read off a Teleprompter, which took some getting used to.

“Wow, that’s cool, did you write the speech?” I asked.

“Robert and I wrote it. Robert wanted to come and, of course, Amber wanted to come, but, I don’t know, I thought it might be easier if I was there on my own. Amber tells me you escorted her to that play she’s been going on about.”

I nodded. He smiled. There he was. Together, tall, confident, just the sort of person who gets elected to Congress, whose past indiscretions are swept under a rug, never to see the light of day, the sort of fucker who pops up on a vice presidential ticket five years from now. I don’t know what kind of a person Maggie Prestwick was, but I’ll bet she was worth ten of Charles. Victoria Patawasti, I know, was worth a hundred.

“Come on, we’re having a meeting, everyone’s invited, including the campaigners,” he said.

“How democratic,” I muttered.

The meeting was just a pep rally for Charles. He talked about his speech and the conference, how he’d met half a dozen senators, congressmen, and governors. He told us that we should all be ready to see some big changes in CAW in the coming months. CAW was going to be adopted by influential people within the GOP as a counterweight to Greenpeace and the Sierra Club, who were firmly in the Democratic camp. It would mean more money, more work, more potential for growth. He didn’t mention August 6, but he was itching to, I could see that.

My eyes flitted down the table to Amber. Dressed in burgundy slacks and a tight silk cream sweater, her hair piled under a beret, it was a look I hadn’t seen her pull off before. She resembled Faye Dunaway in one of those films from the seventies. She mustn’t have had time to fix her hair before Charles had unexpectedly shown up. That would have been fun if he’d appeared even sooner, interesting seeing her talk her way out of that one. Would Charles’s violent streak extend also to the killing of his wife and her lover in their marital bed? No, a bit too clichéd for him. It would not serve his future self.

The meeting broke up, and although Amber looked nervy, I needed to speak to her. I pushed through the crowd.

“Nice hat,” I said, just as Abe bumped into her, making her spill her tea.

“What?” she said, glaring at Abe.

“Sorry,” Abe said, chastened.

“Forget it,” Amber said, recovering her poise and giving me a nod.

“What did you say, Alex?” she asked.

“I like your chapeau,” I said.

“Thank you, Alexander.”

“You look like Faye Dunaway,” I said.

“Faye Dunaway?”

“Yeah.”

“Doesn’t she always play the villainess?”

“No, I don’t think so. She was the victim in
Chinatown
.”

“Well, that’s not good either,” she said with a tight smile.

“Hey, it was cool about Charles, wasn’t it, apparently he was a big hit,” I said.

“He was, I really should have been there, it was selfish of me to go to the play,” she said almost to herself.

“But you would have put him off,” I said.

“Yes, that’s what he said,” she muttered.

“Next time, maybe he’ll want all of us there, as his confidence grows,” I said.

“Perhaps,” she said, and looked at me for the first time. Abe, Robert, and Charles began laughing at something. I took the opportunity to lead Amber to the windows at the far side of the room. I kept my eye on the trio behind us. Maybe we were looking at the gray clouds, debating the possibility of rain. Denver needed rain badly.

“How soon did he get there after I left?” I whispered.

“About an hour, it was close,” she said.

“Jesus,” I said. “But everything was ok?”

“No, I don’t feel well at all. After you left, I threw up. Revolting,” Amber said.

“Maybe the whisky,” I said, but of course I knew it was the heroin. That was a dumb move on my part, I was lucky I didn’t give her a bloody heart attack.

“Alexander, I don’t know what to think about last night,” she said softly.

“I know, I know,” I said stupidly.

“It’s confusing. I, I think, perhaps, we shouldn’t try to see each other again for a while,” she said.

I looked at her. She was so beautiful and at a loss. I was surprised. I thought she was going to say either “Alexander, I need to talk to you” or “Alexander, this was a terrible mistake” or “Alexander, I can’t see you again.” But not confusion. That was unexpected.

“Do you want to see me again?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“I had a wonderful time,” I said, perplexed.

“Me, too,” she said, and smiled so sweetly that it made my dick skip a beat. Was I falling in love with her?

“And you hid everything? And he has no idea?” I asked.

“No idea, he was talking all about his speech, all about himself,” she said.

“Good,” I said.

She touched my hand. This, I saw, would be one of those moments I would always remember. Robert, Abe, Charles, fifteen feet from me. Charles’s wife touching the back of my hand. Five people in this room. Charles laughing. Amber looking at me with sadness in her eyes. What was betrayed on my face? What emotions was I revealing? Could she read me like I was supposedly reading her?

Aye, the moment.

The room. Denver out the window. The Rocky Mountains. The rest of the great North American continent curving away to the horizon.

Amber.

Amber’s husband. Victoria Patawasti’s killer. With those hands. With that fingertip he squeezed the trigger. With that laughing face. Standing there, grim, in Victoria’s apartment. Standing there. Perhaps admiring his handiwork or perhaps recoiling at the horror of it. Stepping back, remembering to drop the driving license, walking out, closing the door, taking the elevator, holding on to the gun. Amber, the devoted wife saving the day. Drop it in the nearest river. Cherry Creek. Drop it. Get rid of it.

Amber. Her lips parted slightly. Breathing out. Her finger on the back of my hand. If time could freeze then we all survive and the bad things don’t happen and it doesn’t get worse. But time can’t freeze….

Amber lifted her finger from the back of my hand, leaned back. Charles was looking at us.

“What are you two conspiring about over there?” he asked, grinning.

“Maybe it’s going to rain. Make a change. Be nice, be like real Irish weather,” I said, meteorology always a good fallback.

“When we were in Dublin it didn’t rain at all, did it, Robert?”

“It did not,” Robert agreed. “We c-could do with a good downpour here, forty days and forty nights, if we’re lucky. They haven’t let me water m-my lawn since March of last year.”

Amber turned away from the window and walked back to the others.

“I’m very proud of you, darling,” she said to Charles.

“Maybe we’ll all get to go to the next conference, or even the convention in San Diego,” Abe said, getting between Charles and her.

“It’s possible,” she said, examining the tabletop like it was the Risk map of the world and she was in trouble in Central Asia. She couldn’t look at him. I walked over and joined the merry group.

Charles finished his conversation with Abe, put his arms around his wife, and lifted her up in the air.

“I was really something, honey,” he said.

“I’m sure you were,” she said, laughing.

“No, really, they were terribly impressed, not just with the speech but the handouts, the whole package. I do believe we are on a roll,” Charles said.

“That’s wonderful, darling,” Amber said, and kissed him on the lips. He kissed her back and I decided to fade into the background. I had never seen Amber kiss Charles in the office before. Not in front of everyone. Perhaps she was just happy for him, perhaps it was because of me. I wanted to deck the bastard. The girl killer. And his accomplice.

“It’s all thanks to you, darling,” Charles was saying.

“No, darling, it’s you, all your hard work,” Amber said.

“I love you,” Charles said.

“And I love you, darling,” Amber said as I finally made it out the conference room door. I was seething. I wanted to get away from everyone. In the main office, Robert had found a cigar clipper and was offering it to anyone who wanted to use it. Abe and he were smoking provocatively under the No Smoking sign. I went to the bathroom, filled the sink, dunked my head, held it there longer than was strictly necessary.

A long, boring day stuffing envelopes.

That night we drove all the way down to Colorado Springs again. Robert, Abe, and Steve West taking the vans, both Charles and Amber staying home. Amber still not feeling well. Robert bossing us about. Like a lot of weak people, Robert was a bit of a bully.

When I’d got enough memberships, I went to look for Robert. I had a couple of things I wanted to ask him. He was glad to see me, he wasn’t making much headway.

“I’m done, Robert, I did every house twice, got fifteen members, I thought I’d keep someone company, you’re the first one I’ve found,” I said.

“Fifteen members, good job, very good job. Charles w-will be pleased,” Robert said.

I hung out and did some of his doors for him. In between we talked about the woeful state of his garden and how well CAW was doing. Finally, I got him off the environment and onto the topic of crime. Two or three questions in, I asked the lead.

“You know, I worry about some of the girls or someone like Amber out on her own, going door to door, you never know who could answer, once when I knocked someone came to the door with a loaded gun. Or there’s vicious dogs. Shouldn’t she have some protection?”