Next To You (38 page)

‘Yes. I got carried away. I just wanted her to be quiet. Can you help?’

‘Can I
help
?’ Disgusted, he moved, shoving Alex out of his way. The man landed hard on his tailbone, the lamp on the end table shook, and Will lurched around to the front of the sofa.

Caroline sprawled on the couch, one leg wedged deep behind the back cushion, an arm above her head, her pink blouse unbuttoned, exposing her smooth midriff and the bottom curve of her right breast. The soft fabric of her black skirt was hiked up to display black panties and the lace tops of her stockings. Damp strands of hair made streaks across her parted mouth and staring hazel eyes.

The scene was exactly as Will expected: interrupted, disheveled, sweaty—except Caroline’s lips were blue, and suddenly, exactly like the mistakes and assumptions of these last few months, nothing was as it seemed.

‘Alex,’ he whispered, ‘what have you done?’

Chapter 18

Bonnie Chesterman wore a velvet hot pink tracksuit with a collection of gold necklaces around her neck. The tiny feathers on the toes of her purple boudoir slippers fluttered as she stood in the open doorway, patting Will’s back. ‘She wouldn’t let me call them when
he
was here before, but the police are on their way now,’ Bonnie said.

A broad-shouldered paramedic named Statham deposited his gear beside the yellow couch where Caroline lay. ‘What happened here?’ Statham asked. ‘Was she choking?’

‘You’ll have to ask him.’ Will jutted his chin towards Alex as Arch and Dennis came through the doorway, helping the other paramedic with additional emergency equipment. ‘I came in and she wasn’t breathing. I don’t know for how long. She was blue. She was
blue
. I did what I could.’

Will watched Statham bend over and take Caroline’s wrist.

Moti, a wiry Indian with inky hair, joined Statham. ‘Okay. She doesn’t look cyanotic, she’s breathing now, and that’s good. You did a good thing. What’s her name?’ Moti asked, pulling a stethoscope and blood pressure gage from the red kit he opened with the flick of an orange clasp.

‘Caroline.’ Will moved to the end of the yellow-striped couch. Dennis slipped a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

‘Caroline?’ Statham called her name, lifting her eyelids and checking her pupils reaction to flash of his penlight. A second later, he ground a knuckle into her sternum. ‘Caroline, open your eyes.’

‘Hey, Red, man says you were here. Is that right?’ Moti called out to Alex.

Nodding, Alex stumbled forward, rubbing his ear, his eyes vast and anxious. ‘You think she’ll be okay?’

‘We’ll have to have a doctor check her out. Since we don’t know the length of time she was hypoxic. Her airway is clear and her pulse is good. Tell us what happened. Was she choking?’

‘No.’ Alex shook his head.

‘Do you know if she took anything, pills, other drugs?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Do you know if she’s allergic to anything?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘What happened? Did she just keel over or was it a slow reaction? Did she complain of a headache? Was she confused or jumpy? Did she vomit?’

‘No. No, none of that. She … was yelling. She wouldn’t listen to me. She kept yelling and I … I … Jesus. I held my hand over her mouth. She was screaming and I just put my hand over her mouth. I wanted her to know how much I love her.’ Alex looked across the sofa at Will. ‘I’m sorry.’

Will’s head snapped up. Before any of the neighbors could intervene, he’d shoved past frightened Bonnie and dug his hands into Alex, boosting the man toward the open door. ‘
You’re sorry
?’ Will bellowed on he landing. ‘
You wanted her to know how much you love her?
’ He drove the man into the tan bricks, red head meeting the masonry, giving off a dull clunk. ‘You stalk her, you get her fired, you practically kill her, and you’re
sorry
?’ Will shouted, and bowled Alex down the stairs with a single roll.

***

Six hours after being arrested Will sat on a hard gray metal chair in an uncomfortably lit gray room, without his jacket and tie. His belt had been confiscated too, the shoelaces removed from his mahogany wing tips.

The room he was in now was slightly better than the precinct lock-up with the white walls and stench of the alcoholic who shared the cell. In here he could lean on the tabletop and shield his eyes from the overabundance of light. His tinted glasses were somewhere on the floor beside the couch at Caroline’s. In a way he was lucky he didn’t have them. The police probably would have taken those as well, thinking they were sunglasses.

The door opened and he felt familiar hands settle on his shoulders. ‘I’m sorry it took me so long to get here, Willie.’ Yvonne kissed the top of his head. ‘They’re processing you.’

‘Am I being arraigned? Did I make bail? Do I have to stay in overnight?’

‘No. We can go when the paperwork’s done. Here, put these on.’ She handed him a pair of sunglasses.

‘They’re too small,’ Will mumbled as he tried to fit her glasses on his wide face.

‘Well, just rest them on your nose or something. Quincy’s been here for a while. He wanted to see you, but they’ll only let lawyers back here. You want to tell me what happened?’ Yvonne stood beside him.

‘I lost my temper.’

‘Is that what you call it?’

‘I lost control. Completely.’

‘You certainly did.’

‘Did I kill him? Is he dead?’

‘No. Lucky for you. He’s got concussion, two broken collarbones, and won’t be able to sit without an inflatable ring for a while. That was good luck too. It was pretty stupid to beat him up like that, Willie. Even if he refuses to press charges, you could still be hauled into court for grievous bodily harm.’ Yvonne set her hands on her hips. ‘What was it you thought you were doing jumping into a bar fight like a cowboy? You’re not a young man, you know. You’re fifty-six …’

‘So are you.’

‘What’s that got to do with any of this?’

‘Do you consider yourself old?’

‘That’s not the point,’ she huffed.

‘What is your point then?’

‘You’ve always taken great pains to avoid that stereotypical evil albino thing. You hate that so much you
educate
everyone you meet, and now look what you’ve gone and done. Don’t you think people are going to talk? Don’t you …’

‘I don’t give a fuck what other people think.’

Frustrated, Yvonne threw up her hands. ‘You really
are
having a midlife crisis.’

‘The only crisis I’m having is being stuck in here arguing with you when I want to be someplace else,’ Will said quietly. His voice grew thick like clotting cream and he covered his eyes. ‘You haven’t said anything, and I’m so afraid to ask. Caroline. Is she … is she …?’

‘No. No. They say it’s good you got her breathing when you did. She’s quite agitated. She didn’t know where she was or what day it is. They’re going to run some tests, a CT, and I think Quincy said an MRI to see if she suffered any brain damage.’ Yvonne tried to give him a reassuring pat.

‘Brain damage? I didn’t ever consider that. Brain damage? Mother of God, help her.’

‘She didn’t know Quincy. She thought he was the doctor, and she was asking him to find someone named Drew. Do you know who that is?’

‘Her dead husband.’

‘I thought you said her husband …’

‘Didn’t Quincy tell you I mistook the abusive brother-in-law I threw down the stairs as her husband? Her husband’s been dead for a few years.’

Turning, Yvonne leaned her backside against the table. ‘Oh. She was screaming about her baby. She wanted to know where her baby was. I didn’t know she had a baby.’

‘The baby’s dead too. She’s all alone.’

‘John Reginaldi’s there with her now. He calmed her down a bit.’

‘I want to be there.’

‘What would you do if you were there? You can’t do anything. She doesn’t know her husband and child are dead. How are you going to help with that? Sorry if that sounds harsh, but—’

‘I know her. I know what she likes and she likes movies. I could talk to her about movies.’

‘Movies, Willie? She’s emotionally distraught. I doubt discussing the latest blockbuster is going to—’

Will uncovered his eyes for a moment. ‘Maybe that might ease her distress, and at least it would be something better than being stuck here with nothing to do but worry and speculate about what sort of brain injury that moronic jackass caused trying to smother the life from her. You know, she put so much damage behind her. All she wanted was a normal life again. She talked all the time about wanting to be average like everyone else and she doesn’t realize she’s not like anyone else.’

‘No, she isn’t.’

‘
Why
don’t you like her?’ Will squinted at Yvonne.

‘Aren’t you at all concerned about what this might mean about your future? What are you going to do if you’re disbarred?’

‘Somehow my job doesn’t seem so important.’

‘You love your job! You love working with Quincy.’

‘It’s a
job
, Vonnie, not a life, not someone’s life.’

‘It’s
your
life. Aren’t you at all worried about going to jail, because you could, you know?’

‘Look,’ Will gestured to the table, tipping back his chair, ‘bridge me, and all this space in between. When I get to the part where I have to cross, then maybe I’ll worry.’

‘Willie?’

‘Yes?’

Yvonne turned away and hugged herself for a moment. ‘Would you have done the same thing if it had been me?’

‘What?’

‘If I had been … in a similar situation … if Colin had been rough when I left him would you have … was I ever as important, as significant to you as it seems she is?’

With vehement, frustrated disbelief, he stared at her through the long, white, downy lashes of his half-closed eyes, ignoring the glare that coated everything with whitewash. Very quietly, he said, ‘What is this, Yvonne? The woman I’m in love with almost died and you’re asking me something completely irrelevant? Did I hurt your feelings that much the other night?’

‘Willie, I adore you, you know that. I just …’

His voice dropped even lower, ‘Tell me something truthfully. You’re the one who had her fired, aren’t you? Caroline thought it was Alex, but Greg Brady said the grievance came from an attractive blonde. I figured it was one of Caroline bad-tempered clients, but it was you. You made the complaint, not Alex, not that loud-mouthed woman you told me about. Did you do that because you were pissed off with
me
?’

‘Please, Wil—’

‘Did you make the complaint?’

Yvonne rubbed her lips together for a moment, like she had just applied lipstick and Will stared at her, his face a snow-covered new edition to Mount Rushmore. She closed her eyes briefly to escape his stony, glare and said, ‘Yes.’

With carefully controlled fury, and a muted velvety tone, he said, ‘Your first ex-husband wounded your pride and sliced into your ego because he said he didn’t want to sleep with you anymore, and you get back at him by dragging someone else into your malevolent teenage pettiness. Did you ever have proof your second husband was having an affair or did your ego get in the way again there too? What about number three? Same thing? There’s a reason you don’t stay married for long and I didn’t understand why until now. Those two other poor guys worked it out, but I’m an idiot for letting you stay in my life because I never really knew how selfish you are. You’re selfish and appalling, Yvonne, absolutely nauseatingly appalling.’ Will shielded his eyes again from the painful brilliance of the room, or maybe it was from the sickening glare of his narcissistic ex-wife.

‘You surprised me too.’

‘Because this is the first time you’ve ever heard me say I love someone else? You have no right to be angry with me. No right at all.’

Yvonne sighed with resignation. ‘You’ve always known me better than anyone, Willie, but I see I never really knew you. I always believed I got far beneath the surface of your skin, but I never really moved past that affable disposition of yours. Frankly I never bothered to find out if there was more to you than a dependable big man. I suppose I was afraid. I was losing the constancy I always had with you and I didn’t like it, especially since you didn’t want me. Did you figure out you loved her before or after you threw that guy down the steps?’

‘I worked it out a few days ago. It’s amazing to discover the things people are capable of doing when they realize how much they love someone, isn’t it? I asked her to marry me.’

‘You did?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well … congratulations.’

‘She turned me down, so go ahead and feel smug.’

‘I don’t feel smug. I’m not triumphant, Willie. I’m disappointed, and disillusioned with what I’ve always believed. Things with us have been a certain way for so long and I never thought they’d change. I never thought you had this in you. I just never saw it. I never felt it and I guess that’s why. You know?’

Exasperated, Will frowned. ‘That’s why
what
?’

‘I wanted passion in my marriage.’

This he whispered, because it was the only way he could hold on to his temper, ‘Thirty-odd years later you’re giving me an explanation? You wanted a divorce because you felt I lacked passion?’ The chair squeaked across the linoleum as he slid it back to stand, his fingers holding the folded sunglasses up to his eyes and he glared down at his ex-wife. ‘Oh, what a brilliant time to divulge that fact. You really are angry with me for finally loving someone besides you, aren’t you Vonnie? That’s why you’ve turned into this insecure adolescent. That’s why you’re unburdening your guilt and making such unbefitting confessions while I’m in jail. You know what I finally see? In all the time I’ve known you, you never once, ever, asked me what I want or asked me how I am. You simply tell me.
You’re having a midlife crisis, you love your job, you want to take me to bed, Willie
. So before you actually take this opportunity I’m handing you and ask me, I’ll tell you. What I want now, Yvonne, is for you to grow up and stop calling me
Willie
.’

Yvonne put a hand to her forehead. ‘For the love of God, it scares the hell out of me to think you came so close to … I’m sorry. I was resentful and jealous for a while, but I only know one side of you. You’ve always been so passive, so rational and composed. I’ve never seen you out of control and I’m actually terrified to find out I know nothing about the person I thought I could read like a dog-eared favorite old book. I’m disgusted with myself and I’m horrified you nearly broke a man’s neck!’