No Way to Die (22 page)

“Holy shit,” he said.

“Dumbass,” Doc said. “You should have just left directions for them.”

“No shit,” Toni said.

“Obviously, we’ve got to tighten up, folks,” I said. “If the Madoc guys are really bad guys, at some point we can expect them to stop playing patty-cake with us and start getting hostile for real. When that happens, we’d better have our shit together.” I stared at Kenny. “Understood?”

He nodded. “Sorry, guys,” he said. “It won’t happen again.”

I nodded. “Good. Maybe I should have Doc stick with you all weekend to make sure you don’t get us killed between now and Monday morning.”

He looked mortified. “I can’t—he can’t,” he said. “I’ve got a date tonight. He’d definitely get in the way.”

“What,” Toni said, “not enough eighteen-year-olds to go around?”

“I can’t do it anyway,” Doc said. “I’m going out, too.”

I looked at him. “Doc?You too? You have a date?”

He looked at me. “Why so shocked? What am I—ugly or something?”

“No, no,” I said, holding up my hands. “It’s not like that at all.”

“I think you’re quite handsome, Doc,” Toni said.

“Thank you,” he said to her.

“I’ve just—I mean, you haven’t—” I started to say that Doc had only rarely gone out on dates since his live-in girlfriend had been killed in a traffic accident six years ago. I decided not to go there.

“I’m glad for you, amigo,” Toni said. “You have a good time.”

I nodded. “Me too, dude.”

He nodded. “Cool.”

“So what about you,” Kenny said to Toni. “I heard you on the phone sounding all gushy and shit.”

She glared at him. “Were you eavesdropping on me, you little twerp?”

“Hi, John,” Kenny imitated Toni in a falsetto voice. “Sure, John. Love to, John. Should I go topless, John?” He reverted back to his normal voice. “Just a wild shot in the dark, but I’m guessing you’re going out with some poor schmo named John.”

“I am,” she said. “And he’s no schmo.”

I looked at her. She noticed me looking and said, “He just called.”

I looked at her for a few seconds, and then I smiled and said, “Good. Great. You’ll have a good time. I hope all three of you have good times.”

“What about you, boss?”Kenny asked. “Is the FBI in the house this weekend?”

“Nope. I’m on my own.” I thought about everyone else going out tonight. I was glad for them, but a little lonely for myself. I decided right then what I was going to do. “As a matter of fact,” I said, “I’m taking my guitar and my fishing pole, and I’m heading for the mountains. See you all on Monday.”

I DIDN’T WANT to hang around my apartment Friday night, so I loaded the Jeep and took off in the dark. I took the Edmonds–Kingston ferry and then drove to the Olympic National Park’s north entrance near Port Angeles. I got in late and set up camp in the pitch black. At least it wasn’t raining. I curled up in my bag and slept like a rock.

Saturday morning, I woke to the sounds of birds singing in the trees. I stepped out of my tent into—wait for it—beautiful sunshine! In fact, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky all day long. Temperatures rose to the mid-fifties. It was a glorious spring day (although it technically wouldn’t be spring for another couple of weeks).

First thing, I went for a good long trail run—maybe fifteen miles or so. I like running on the streets in the city well enough, but if I can, I really like running trails in the woods.I have plenty of time to think without having to worry about cars pulling out unexpectedly. Instead of breathing in exhaust fumes, I get to smell clean air and pine trees. There’s no traffic trying to run me over. There are no pedestrians to slow me down—I pretty much have the place to myself. I did see one older couple hiking when I was on my way back but that was it. I stopped and talked to them—they were staying in a trailer at the same campground.

My mind was free to wander. I thought about the Rasmussen case and how there were so many unanswered questions. I thought about Jennifer, which, for some reason, made me think about Toni. I hoped Toni had a good time with John Ogden on her date last night, but the thought of her having too much of a good time left me feeling a little strange. I’m not a jealous guy, and regarding Toni, I had no standing to be jealous in the first place. Still, the notion of Toni on a date with an old boyfriend left me feeling oddly uneasy.

I wondered whom Doc was seeing. The poor guy—I hoped he’d be able to meet someone special. It wouldn’t be easy because Doc’s a complicated man—one of Kenny’s airhead girlfriends wouldn’t get the job done there, that’s for sure. Doc doesn’t say much so you can’t always tell, but there’s a lot going on inside. It would take a special woman for him. He was almost married to a wonderful Apache girl named Dohesta before the poor girl got run over by a drunken staff sergeant in a flatbed truck early one morning at Fort Lewis. Dot was truly one of a kind, and her death left Doc without a soul mate. He was crushed. Maybe now he was finally starting to emerge from the shadow of that tragedy, six years later. I hoped so, anyway. I wanted to see Doc happy like he used to be with Dot.

After I got back to camp, I cleaned up, and then alternated between fishing and playing my Martin guitar. I caught four rainbow trout—all of which I put back. Thing is, I like fishing, but I’m not real fond of trout. Anyway, these guys deserved to live more than I needed to eat them. So live long and prosper, fish.

Later, I pulled out the Martin and worked on “The Jig Is Up.” I was trying to play it the way Laurence Juber did on his
Altered Reality
CD. I might not get there—Juber’s a wizard, my favorite finger-style guitar player. But I’d been working on the song for a month and a half, and I was making progress. I’d started playing guitar when I was a freshman in high school, but I really took it up in the army. At Fort Campbell—and sometimes even while deployed—we had a lot of downtime. My buddy PFC Bobby McNair from Philadelphia was a real finger-style virtuoso. He encouraged me to buy a decent guitar—my D-28 Marquis. Bobby taught me for three years. By the time I switched from infantry to CID, I was decent. He and I used to play a version of “Dueling Banjos” from
Deliverance
. It’s not that hard, but it never failed to amaze our buddies.

After I was transferred to Fort Lewis, I kept at it. I saved up and bought a really nice Martin finger-style guitar—an OMC-44K. I continued taking lessons. It got to the point where I was pretty good, if I say so myself. I mean, I never played professionally, but who knows—maybe I could. I can definitely entertain myself. My guitars are great instruments—portable enough to easily take with me when I go camping, sounding full and rich enough to be very satisfying. All in all, Saturday was a great day.

Sunday was almost as good, but by Sunday afternoon, clouds were rolling in from the southwest. I couldn’t tell when it was going to start raining (when, not if), so I decided to pack up before it started. By mid-afternoon, I was rolling. A few drops began to fall just as I pulled away from my camp spot.

* * * *

I made it back home and was unpacked by seven thirty. I was tired of driving and cleaning up and putting stuff away, so I threw a frozen pizza into the oven while I showered. I was finished by eight thirty and had just sat down to watch a movie when someone knocked on my door.

I smiled, hopped up, and went to the door. I hadn’t expected Jennifer to get home for another day or so, but she was always welcome. I started to open the door, but decided I’d better check the peephole to be certain. Good thing I did.

“Hey, you,” I said, opening the door. “What brings you by?”

Toni looked at me. “Hey, yourself. I figured it was time we talked.”

My heart started beating a little faster. I nodded. “Okay.”

She stared at me for a second from the doorway. “So are you going to invite me in—?” she said, and then stopped abruptly. She tried to look past me into the room. “Are you—do you have company already?”

I smiled and opened the door wide. “No company—I’m all yours,” I said. “Come in.”

She walked past me, and I closed the door. I followed her into the living room.

“How was the camping trip?” she asked.

“Fuckin’ glorious,” I said. “Sunshine both days. No rain. No people to speak of. Had the whole place to myself.”

“Sounds nice.”

“It was. Very relaxing. I ran on sweet trails both days. I fished. I played the guitar. I loved it. You should have gone with me.” Then, I remembered why she hadn’t. “Oh, speaking of which, how was your weekend? How’d your hot date with Ogden go?”

She shrugged. “It was good,” she said. “But I wouldn’t call it a hot date.”

“Really? No wild, passionate sex? No breakfast in bed yesterday?”

She gave me a look.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but no. We went to dinner. We talked. Then he brought me back home, and I went to bed. By myself.”

I gave her a quizzical look. “You okay with that?”

“Of course. What—you think I went out with him to get laid?”

I shrugged my shoulders and raised my eyebrows. “I’m maybe just a little surprised that he didn’t even try?”

“Well, he didn’t. Not everyone’s like you, Logan. Not everyone’s into gratuitous sex like you are.”

“Ouch,” I said, clutching my chest and falling backward on the sofa. “That hurts." I sat up. "And by the way, that’s a strikingly unfair statement. How many relationships have I had in the past three or four years that fall into the category of ‘gratuitous sex’?”

“Define relationship,” she said.

“Okay. More than a week.”

“Counting Jennifer Thomas or not?” she said.

“Well,” I admitted, “okay. So that’s one. But aside from that, how many?”

She thought about it for a moment. “Not many, I suppose.”

“That’s right,” I said. “Not many. About the same number as you, I’d venture to say.”

She rolled her eyes the way she does.

“And do you want to know why I’m so pious?” I asked.

She looked at me. “Why?”

“Simple. It’s because I’m saving myself for you, that’s why. You’re the one.” I threw myself on the floor and wrapped my arms around her feet.

“Oh, puh-leeze,” she laughed, stepping away. “You’re completely full of shit. I need a beer. Want one?”

I laughed. “Sure,” I answered as she walked into the kitchen.

I’d been listening to Juber’s
Altered Reality
, so I turned it back on again.

“So,” I said to her a minute later as she came back into the living room with the beers, “if you’re not here to regale me with scintillating stories of your weekend conquest, why are you here?”

“Believe it or not, I miss talking to you like this,” she said, sitting down.

I smiled. “I hear that,” I said. “Me, too. Why’d we stop, then?” I asked. “It’s because of Jennifer, isn’t it?”

She looked at me and sighed. “Partly,” she said. “Not because I’m jealous, or anything. But nowadays she takes up a lot of your time. You might say that your dance card has been pretty full lately, mister.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. I looked into her eyes. “Really, I mean it. I’m sorry. I never meant for
anything
to get in the way of what we have together.”

She smiled. “That’s nice,” she said. “What will Jennifer have to say about that?”

I shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t care, Toni. And truth be told, she probably won’t care, either. We don’t have that kind of relationship.”

“What, the kind where you actually talk to each other?”

“Be nice. We don’t talk about deep stuff, not like you and I used to. You and I share stuff—heart to heart. Jen’s not interested in that. Anyway, ‘commitment’ is not a part of my relationship with Jen. Never was.”

“You’re saying she could walk in tomorrow and tell you ‘Danny, I met my true love last week in Virginia and I’m moving back there to live happily ever after with him,’ and you’d be just fine with that?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I’d want her to give me my Canucks sweatshirt back before she left.”

She laughed and shook her head. “You’re amazing,” she said. She took a long drink from her beer.

I smiled. “I know.”

She looked up. “Amazing as in ‘bizarre,’ not amazing as in ‘wonderful,’ you dipshit.”

“Ouch,” I said. “That hurts.”

She thought about that for a few seconds. “So let me get this straight—you share your heart with me, while at the same time, you share your bed with her?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I suppose that’s how it is,” I said.

“You realize that sounds kind of fucked up, right? And that it’s probably going to blow up one day?”

I shrugged. “Yeah, maybe. I don’t know. But I know this—you and me—I look at us as permanent. One day we’ll probably each be married, and I hope even then that we can still be best friends, if that’s possible.”

“Hate to burst your bubble, dude,” she said, “but if I ever get married, I’m going to make damn sure my husband’s my best friend.” She paused. “Not to say you and I couldn’t do lunch every now and then.”