Never Happened (13 page)

“All right. I'll cooperate. On one condition.”

His undivided attention remained on her.

“You see that the local police have the goods on Henson's killer, who I assume is the same one who blew up O'Neill's house, and I'll cooperate all you want me to.”

“You're admitting that you have the lens.”

Alex smiled. “Let's just say I can guarantee you'll have it…if we have a deal.”

“You do understand this will mean I'll be on top of your every move.”

Now there was an image she could have done without, considering her current dilemma where this man was concerned.

“As long as Henson's killer gets his, I can do business with the devil himself.”

The
next morning Alex waltzed into her office to find her entire crew, sans Marg, waiting for her arrival.

“Alex, we want to talk to you.”

Alex nodded to Shannon. “Sure.” She glanced at Brown then the Professor. “What's up?”

“We've taken a vote,” the Professor said.

She tossed her bag onto the counter and then leaned against it. “What kind of vote?”

“We think,” Brown said in that saucy Latino accent, “that you have been working too hard.”

Alex turned to Shannon. “Did you put them up to this?” She was going to kill her best friend, no matter how nice her husband was.

“It's true, Alex. It's been almost a month since you've even been out on a date. You need a break. Especially considering what you've been through lately.”

If she only knew. Blake had sworn her to secrecy last night.

“You,” Brown interjected, “need a man, baby.”

“What Brown is trying to say,” the Professor jumped in, “is that we've arranged for a nice evening for you. A night on the town with a nice man.”

Alex couldn't speak for a moment. They set her up on a blind date?

“It's not as bad as it sounds,” Shannon urged. “Brown and I put our heads together and came up with a really amazing plan for the evening. You're going to have a great time no matter if you like the guy or not.”

Alex opened her mouth to tell them how much she appreciated the thought and just exactly what they could do with it but the phone rang, delaying her delivery.

Shannon's expression went from relaxed to worried as she listened to whatever the caller was saying.

Alex resisted the urge to tap her foot while she waited for her to hang up. She had a thing or two to say to this crew. The very idea that they would think she needed help finding a date was ludicrous. She'd just been busy, that was all.

Shannon hung up. Before Alex could launch into what she had to say, Shannon blurted, “Alex, that was your mom. She sounded extremely upset. She needs you home ASAP.”

 

Alex tore into her driveway and shoved the gearshift into Park. She was out of the 4Runner and up the steps to her mother's place before she could take a breath.

“What's wrong?”

Her mother stood in the middle of the living room wearing her sexiest red robe. It was past eight, why was she still dressed for bed? Her hair was all mussed and her mascara was smeared.

Alex attempted to catch the breath she'd lost dashing up the stairs. The earthy smell of sex abruptly rushed deep into her lungs.

“What happened?” She told her racing heart to calm. It was only sex. It wasn't as if her mother was having a heart attack. As far as Alex could tell she was stone-cold sober, as well.

Marg shook her head frantically. “I don't know. He…he…we were…” She flung her arms heaven-ward. “He just made this strange gurgling sound and then he was gone.”

Dread spread through Alex, making her stomach roil and her knees weak. “He who?”

Her mother moistened her lips. “Ah…Robert.”

“Let me get this straight.” The room tilted slightly, but Alex wrestled control of the hysteria attempting
to rise. “You're saying that you and Robert were having sex—”

Marg stopped chewing on her finger long enough to interject, “Making love. We were making love.”

Alex swallowed just to make sure she still could with her throat contracting with violent spasms. She took another deep breath. “You were making love and he sort of gurgled and then he…” She made a gesture of uncertainty with her arms. “He croaked.”

Marg nodded. “I don't know what to do.”

Another deep breath. Stay calm. It wasn't as if her mother had murdered someone. Not technically anyway. “Let me take a look.”

She crossed the living room-kitchen combination, hesitated at the open door of the one bedroom, then went inside.

Robert, naked as the day he was born, was sprawled across her mother's bed.

“Did you roll him onto his back like that?” It was the most clinical question she could think to ask considering Robert's state. And she wasn't talking about his being dead.

“No…I was…ah…on top.”

Alex squeezed her eyes shut to block that picture. “Okay.”

“What'll we do?”

There was that little girl voice her mother always used whenever she got into trouble or just screwed up. As far back as Alex could remember it had always been this way. Her mother got into trouble and Alex rescued her. At what point in Alex's childhood had their roles reversed?

She couldn't remember.

“You're sure he's dead?” She felt as if she should be doing something. Checking his pulse. CPR. Something.

Marg nodded. “I tried CPR but it didn't help.”

“Did you call 911?”

Her head jerked side to side. “He was dead. There was nothing they could do.”

Alex turned and glared at her mother. “How can you be sure there was nothing they could do? For God's sake, Mother, you should have given the poor bastard the benefit of the doubt.”

She gestured vaguely. “It's just that…well…he'd already been dead I think for a few minutes before I noticed.”

Okay, now Alex was officially scared. “How is that possible?”

One red-clad shoulder moved up, then dropped.
“Like I said, I was on top. I heard him making noises, but I didn't know he was dying. I thought he was groaning. You know, with pleasure.”

“You're telling me that the guy was dying and you didn't notice?”

“It's been a long time, Alex,” she fairly shouted. “I was going for number four. I was on a roll. All caught up! I don't know!”

Four? The idea that it had been nearly a month since she'd had sex while her mother was getting some nice action abruptly punched Alex in the face.

What were they doing having this discussion? Alex strode over to the bed and touched his carotid pulse. She flinched at the cool feel of his skin. “How long's he been like this?”

Marg plowed her fingers through her hair. “An hour maybe.”

Jesus, an hour? Damn straight he was dead. Alex glanced down at his lower anatomy. “Did he take something? I mean…” She gestured toward his erect penis. Too early for rigor mortis. “He's still standing up there pretty damned good for a guy his age.”

Marg stared sadly at the well-endowed man. “Viagra.”

“We're gonna have to call the cops. It's not like we can put him in his car and drive him home.”

Marg grabbed her arm. “Please, Alex, you have to help me keep this quiet. What will it do to my reputation?”

Alex's eyebrows raised. “What reputation is that?”

Her mother huffed indignantly. “Just help me out here. And, as God is my witness, I will never drink or have sex again. You have my word.”

Alex glanced back at poor Robert. That vow wouldn't last. But hell, this was her mother. Helping her out was what Alex did.

With that thought, she picked up the phone and called Detective Patton. Man, she missed Henson.

An hour later poor Robert had been taken away in the M.E.'s wagon. The M.E. had told Alex that he suspected a heart attack. Patton had finished taking her mother's statement and gone. Sometime during the whole insane mess, her mother had managed to put on some clothes. Now they sat on her sofa, both too numb to speak.

“I'll miss him.”

Alex shifted her gaze to Marg. She supposed it was possible to form a strong attachment in only three
dates and one sexual interlude. She'd formed an attachment to Henson in about the same.

“He was really a nice guy,” Marg bemoaned.

Alex figured she should say something so she grunted an affirmative.

“Nothing like your father was.”

The statement took Alex aback. What did this have to do with her father? He'd been dead for twenty-five years. “I'm not sure I'm following.” She cleared her throat and tried to look attentive. Her mother obviously needed to talk and Alex needed to listen.

Marg shook her head. “I know it was hard on you, Alex.” She heaved a heavy breath. “But we did love each other, we just weren't good for each other. The jealousy and rage made us do crazy things.”

That was certainly true.

She thought back to those days and honestly didn't see how her mother had survived. Maybe the booze had been her only escape. “Dad was a real jerk for taking the easy way out.”

“Maybe. I don't know, but one of us had to end it. Maybe he did the right thing.” Her gaze connected with her daughter's. “Who knows, we might both be dead if something hadn't given. We were on a fast and furious course toward self-destruction.”

That possibility had never occurred to Alex. She'd always considered her father a coward for killing himself when his wife and daughter needed him.

“He knew I would never leave you—” she shrugged “—I couldn't be what he needed me to be and take care of you. So maybe he did us a favor and saved us both by killing himself. We were a lethal combination, Alex. No matter that we loved each other, we couldn't live together or without each other.”

That explanation made far too much sense. It seemed so ridiculous to consider her father's suicide a selfless act…but maybe it had been. She'd been a kid at the time, what had she known about love and life and its many complications?

“Whatever his reasons,” Marg went on, “I can live with his choice. I married him. It was my mistake. But you”—he stared meaningfully at Alex—“I'm so afraid that the mistakes we made have kept you from living your life to the fullest.”

That was just ludicrous. “What're you talking about? My life is great!” And it was. She had everything she needed or wanted.

“Alex.” Her mother placed a hand on hers. “You can't run away from love forever. Sooner or later it's going to sneak up on you and you need to be ready.”

Alex didn't draw her hand away as was her first inclination. She didn't want to hurt her mother's feelings. She was vulnerable right now. This was the way it was with them. Her mother needed her, Alex jumped in and helped. It had been that way for as far back as she could remember.

“Mother, I'm fine. I'm perfectly happy with my life. I'm not interested in long-term.”

“You see, that's my point. You should be. And I'm certain it's my fault you haven't let anyone close enough. You've been too busy taking care of me and cleaning up the messes I've made.”

Alex shook her head. “Don't be ridiculous. You're blowing this whole thing out of proportion.”

“I've depended on you and you've let me, Alex, but I could take care of myself.”

Apparently Alex's lack of conviction on that point showed in her eyes. She hadn't meant to let Marg see the doubt but there it was.

“I know you don't believe me,” Marg countered. “You think I couldn't get a job. You think I couldn't get a place if I didn't have this one.” She lifted her chin in defiance. “Well, you're wrong. I keep the job at Never Happened because I love working with you. I live here because I love living near you. But I could
make it on my own. I might fall down now and then but there's nothing wrong with that.”

Alex wasn't sure where she was going with all this. “Mom, you don't have to—”

“That's just it, Alex, I do have to,” she insisted. “I'm terrified that you don't understand that it's okay to make a mistake. It's okay to fail every so often. Life isn't supposed to be perfect. Living life is about taking risks, about allowing yourself to be vulnerable at times.” She squeezed Alex's hand. “That's what you don't get. You
need
to fall. Otherwise you're never going to know just how magical it is.”

 

Her day only got worse.

When she got back to the office, her mother in tow, Brown and the Professor had gone out on an apartment cleanup involving a drug deal gone bad over in Little Havana.

Shannon already had a call waiting for Alex.

Leaving Shannon in charge of her mother, Alex got moving. After the trauma of having Robert die on her and that unsettling mother-daughter conversation, Alex didn't want to risk that her mother would turn to the bottle for solace.

At least there would be no breakup this time.

Alex rolled her eyes. She'd lost it. No doubt.

She parked in the driveway of the house where Walter Brimmer had lived. According to the landlord, he had been one of those obsessive-compulsive people who saved everything. She wanted the place emptied. Brimmer had no next of kin and she needed to get the place cleaned out in time for a new tenant by the first of the month. Mr. Brimmer's attending physician had authorized the funeral home to come pick him up since the man had suffered with severe health problems, high blood pressure and heart problems, not to mention he was eighty. The law allowed for an attending physician to attend to a situation like this, forgoing the autopsy and such.

Donning shoe covers and gloves, Alex took the key she'd picked up from the landlord and opened the door. The less than pleasant odor of molding pizza greeted her. Could have been a lot worse. She shivered as she entered the room and closed the door behind her. The temp of the air-conditioning had to be set at sixty; it was like a fridge in here.

The living room was piled high with magazines and newspapers and dozens upon dozens of pizza boxes. Her nose twitched. That would explain the smell of moldy pepperoni. In one corner of the room
stood a tower of aluminum cans. She would see that all recyclables were taken to a center.

Actually, she realized as she surveyed the furniture and what she could see of the floor, the place was pretty clean, the mounds of accumulated stuff notwithstanding.

She moved down the hall to check out the bathroom and bedrooms. The same scenario. Mountains of clothes and detergent boxes and bottles. Tons of stuff.