House of Smoke (59 page)

“Hello, stranger,” he says, warmly but warily.

“Hello your own self.” She has to look up, she’d forgotten how tall he is.

“Out pretty late,” he remarks. She had called him a few minutes ago from her car phone, just down the road.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize,” she lies. It’s a white lie, it was acceptable.

“I don’t mind. I’m glad you called. I’ve missed you, Kate.”

“I’ve missed you, too, Cecil.” She pushes up against him. Hug me, please.

He pulls her close. “Yeah,” he says softly into her hair.

“Me, too.”

“Been busy, huh?” He holds her at arm’s length, looks at her face. “You’re healing up good.”

“I don’t feel that,” she says. “I can’t hardly look at myself anymore.”

“You look good to me, babe.”

Babe. A term of endearment. Finally, from someone. This is a good one: she’d forgotten. You don’t throw them back in, and you don’t treat them casually, either. She’s going to make it up to him, if he still wants her when it’s all over and everything’s come out in the wash.

“You’re good for my ego … and other things, too.”

“That’s what I’m here for,” he says.

She feels shy around him all of a sudden, leaning against him in the nighttime darkness, lit by a single bulb over the entry to his house. They haven’t seen each other for weeks, she had deliberately avoided him, she didn’t want anyone to see her for a long time, especially a man she’s attracted to, and then there was the stuff with her kids and the stuff down south and all this shit around her life.

“Come on in.” He looks past her to her car. “Do you want to stay the night? Can you?”

“Yes.”

Her overnight bag, which she always carries for situations such as this, is in the trunk of her car, along with the documents from Saperstein. She’s dying to show the stuff to Cecil; he’d understand, he knows these players. And she strongly wants a partner—not an ear like Carl, but a real partner, someone who will help her in a real, physical way. So she isn’t all alone.

But she doesn’t show him what she has or ask him to help—not yet, not until it’s over. Deep down, she wants to keep this to herself. She knows that. It’s her fight, she has to do it herself. That’s the way she is, even if it means putting herself in jeopardy, like when she went with Laura and the whore and didn’t have backup, or when she went alone to see Wes. Or just now, a mile from his doorstep.

First things first. She takes his hand and leads him into the house, to his bedroom.

“Please make love to me,” she says, her voice unsteady, pulling his face down to hers and kissing him on the mouth, hard.

They are still asleep in each other’s arms when first light comes, before sunrise. Quietly, so as not to awaken him, she slips out of bed and dresses in the living room.

Forgive me for what I’m about to do, she asks him silently. It’s not because I don’t care about you. It’s who I am, and what I have to do. And then she promises him that once she does this one thing she’ll be faithful to him for as long as. …

“Leaving?” he asks from the doorway. He is naked, his cock at half-mast, morning erection.

“I didn’t want to wake you.”

“In a hurry?” There’s an edge to his voice which he doesn’t bother trying to conceal.

Evasively: “I have something I have to do this morning.”

He looks at her. “When are you going to let me in?”

Her first impulse is to say “What do you mean?” but they’d both know that would be bullshit. “Soon,” she tells him instead. “It won’t be long.”

He shakes his head. “That doesn’t cut it, Kate.”

She doesn’t want to leave. She wants to get back in bed with him and stay there all day. But she can’t. “It’s the best I can do right now, Cecil.”

“You’re using me,” he tells her.

“I don’t want to.”

“Then don’t. Be real, okay? That’s all I ask.”

“I want to. I …”

“No. You want this to be easy, without paying all the dues. At least with me.”

That stings. “That’s not true,” she protests.

“It isn’t? You don’t seem to have a problem banging on my door any hour of the night and asking to be taken in when
you
need comforting. But relationships are a two-way street,” he adds pointedly.

“I’m sorry if I disturbed you,” she says stiffly.

“Bullshit you are,” he replies. “Last night wasn’t the first time, in case you’ve forgotten. How about when you’d been over to see Miranda and you came storming in here accusing me of being unfaithful to you because I’d slept with someone years before I even met you? You can be a little irrational, Kate. And more than a little selfish.”

She feels flushed, her breathing is rapid, shallow, her pulse is racing. “I’ve gone through hell,” she manages to say, trying as best she can to defend herself.

“I know,” he answers. “And I’ve tried to be there for you. I’ve wanted to be,” he goes on, his voice rising in pain and frustration. “That’s all I’ve asked. That I can be here for you. That you stop hiding behind that damn wall of yours.” He crosses to her, takes her hands in his. “Let me in, for godsakes. Whatever it is you’re doing, you can’t do it alone. No one can.”

If it were only that simple.

“I will,” she promises. “Just give me a little time. Please.”

“How much?” he asks. “And when?”

“As soon as I can,” she promises him again.

He nods, staring at her, his expression flat, almost a mask. “Don’t take forever.”

K
ATE DRIVES HIGHWAY 154
over the pass. It’s still early morning—a few minutes before seven—so there isn’t much commuter traffic into Santa Barbara yet. She calls Laura from her car phone, waking her up, which is what she wants, she wants to catch the girl unawares, when her mind is not yet functioning clearly.

Kate’s own mind is racing, trying to sort out her feelings towards Cecil, and where that’s going. But she can’t let that affect her, not now. What she’s doing with the Sparks family needs every ounce of her concentration and energy.

Laura’s voice is heavy with sleep. “Hello?” she mumbles into the receiver.

“It’s Kate,” she tells Laura. “Are you alone?”

“Huh?” Not fully awake, she’d been up late partying, her brain right now is mush.

“Are you alone?” Kate repeats. “Can we talk?”

“Yeah, I’m alone.” Her voice is becoming clearer. “Where have you been?” she asks. “I’ve been trying to reach you.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ve found out who had Frank Bascomb killed,” Kate says, her voice flat and calm, “and why.”

“What? …How do you …?”

“I’ll get back to you later,” Kate tells her. “After I finish up something I have to do.” Before she hangs up, she cautions Laura: “Don’t tell anybody about this. Nobody. I’ll call you later.” She already checked to make sure she had Laura’s office and cell-phone numbers. “Stay where I can get in touch with you.”

Then she hangs up.

She waits on making the next call until later in the morning, when she can be reasonably sure that Miranda Sparks has gotten to work.

Celeste, Miranda’s secretary, answers the phone. She listens for a moment, then tells Kate: “I’m sorry, Mrs. Sparks is in a meeting and will be tied up the rest of the morning.”

“This is Mr. Hopkins’s office calling,” Kate tells her, keeping her voice neutral and nondescriptive. “This call is urgent.”

“One moment,” Celeste answers, her voice immediately deferential.

Miranda comes on the line. “Yes?” She listens—a short time, less than thirty seconds. “Who is this?” she asks, keeping her voice calm, mindful she has people in the room with her. Her mind is racing at the information she’s being given. “Who is this?” she asks again—this time to a dial tone.

She hangs up. “An emergency,” she explains brusquely to the people in the room. “I have to go.”

She dashes out without further explanation. Then she drives over County Highway 154 as fast as she can go, to the ranch.

Reaching the cutoff, Miranda’s Mercedes 500 haul-asses down the pitted private road, throwing up dust and gravel as she stands on the brakes and fishtails to a stop in front of the ranch house. She runs up the steps of the front porch to the door.

She pauses for a moment before unlocking it: looking around, as if suspecting she’s under surveillance.

There’s nothing out there—nothing she can see. There’s a chill in the air, the sky is clear, white-blue. No clouds.

She digs in her purse for the keys to the front door. Throwing the dead bolt, a look of surprise and fear comes over her face as she realizes it’s already unlocked. Quickly she tests the doorknob—that’s firm, at least. Whoever was here last forgot to lock it. She suspects it was Frederick, he’s so damn careless. There’s valuable stuff inside, priceless heirlooms, family mementos that can’t be replaced at any price. Not that he ever seems to care—he’s always had everything, so he assumes he always will. A stupid, dangerous assumption—which is why she must be on her toes at all times, forever vigilant.

She unlocks the door and rushes inside, throwing her coat onto a chair as she hurries through the living room into the den, to the old pine breakfront, which is almost as old as the house itself, glancing at the open top cluttered with the memorabilia of her husband’s family’s life.

Most of the pictures are of Laura as a young girl astride a horse, decked out in western tack. There are a couple of Frederick when he was his daughter’s age, also on a horse. The resemblance between them is noticeable. And some older pictures (even one of Dorothy as a young girl with her father), going back almost to the turn of the century.

There are no pictures of her. She is not of this family’s blood. A member by invitation only.

She hunches down in front of it, her tight skirt riding halfway up her thighs, takes out an old-fashioned skeleton key from her purse that matches the opening, turns it, pulls the drawer open, and pulls out the Rainier file.

It’s empty. There’s nothing inside.

“Oh, Jesus,” she says softly. She can feel her stomach churning, turning to fire, taste the bile surging up into her throat and mouth. Gagging and swallowing to keep from vomiting all over herself, she starts tearing through the other files in the cabinet—maybe it was misplaced, put in the wrong file. It had to be.

“Looking for this?”

Miranda spins so violently she smashes against the open drawer, losing her balance and falling ungracefully to the floor.

Kate stands in the doorway, staring down at Miranda. She’s changed her clothes. Now she is wearing an old Oakland Raiders varsity jacket over her sweater and jeans. Her day pack is slung over her shoulder. One hand holds a thick manila envelope. “The Rainier Oil file, I presume?” she asks in a clear, strong voice, holding it up for Miranda to see.

Miranda stares at her, almost as if she can’t be there. She manages to rise to her knees, then to her feet.

“That was you?” she finally says. “That called me?”

Kate nods—a short, tight nod. “Yeah,” she answers. “That was me.” She pauses. “You had to know that.”

The two women stare at each other. Miranda looks away first.

“Sit down,” Kate orders her. “I don’t think you should hear what I’m going to tell you standing up.”

Miranda crosses the room and slumps into the seat behind her desk. Kate remains standing, the old wooden desk a protective barrier between them. So this is where ambition gets you, she thinks, when you don’t have a moral base to fall back on. It’s something she needs to remember, in her own life.

“You said over the phone this was a matter of life and death,” Miranda says quietly. “You weren’t kidding, were you?”

Kate nods. She realizes she’s never felt so clear and centered in her life.

“You’ve been living a lie. For a long, long time.”

She forces herself to stay calm, to keep her own voice on an even keel. Even though she is in control, for the first time in her dealings with this woman, her guts are churning.

“Yes,” Miranda admits. “I have. We—” her arms extends towards the breakfront, towards the pictures of her husband, daughter, mother-in-law—“we all have.” She sits up straighter. “What do you plan to do with this?” she asks, indicating the documents.

“That depends on the answers I get to the questions I’m going to ask you.”

“What if I can’t answer them?”

“You better hope to God you can, lady. Because if I leave here without getting all the answers I came for, I’m going to the DA, the
News-Press
, and every TV and radio station in town. And I’m giving them all this.” She takes some more papers out of her day pack, lays them on the desk in front of Miranda. “There’s more,” she adds. “Lots more.”

Miranda glances at the papers, looks up at Kate, then down at the papers again, as she realizes the scope of what it is that’s in front of her. Slowly, her hand trembling noticeably, she picks the papers up and scrutinizes them carefully.

“Where did you get this information? This information is privileged,” Miranda protests feebly. “You have no right to this.”

“Big fucking deal. The thing is, I
do
have it. And by the way,” she adds, “I made copies of all this stuff. They’re tucked away in a nice, safe place, but if anything bad happens to me they’ll immediately see the light of day. I’ve finally learned how to take care of myself,” she informs Miranda.

Gingerly, Miranda touches the papers on her desk, as if they were alive and lethal. “Why are you here?” she manages to ask. “If you’re thinking of blackmailing me—”

“Don’t insult me, goddamn you!” Kate spits. “You’ve done that already. That fat deposit into my bank account, paying off my hospital bills—that wasn’t out of the goodness of your heart. You don’t have any goodness of heart.”

“That money was because you saved my daughter,” Miranda insists. “There was no evil motive behind it. You’re wrong if that’s what you think.”

“Oh, cut the shit! That was a payoff, pure and simple.” She glares at Miranda. “You tried to buy me off with your friends in the Mexican Mafia or whoever the fuck those men were down in Oxnard, and that didn’t work. Then you did the seduction bit—that didn’t stop me, either. So then you figured, might as well take the direct approach, kill the bitch off—and somehow, through some miracle, that failed, too. Now you’re really getting desperate, so you tried to buy me off again, you came at it from another direction, sugar-coating it with apologies and ‘Thank you for saving my poor baby’s life.’” She shakes her head in wonder. “You fuck me and then you try to kill me. You are some piece of work, lady.”