Shamus In The Green Room (32 page)

“Shall I put on some music?” he asked, changing the subject.

“No, I have a bit of a headache.”

But he was already fiddling with the stereo. Marvin Gaye.

Sexual Healing. Subtlety was not Sam’s middle name.

“Dance?” He started swaying in my direction.

I got out of the chair and turned off the music. “I’m so sorry

if this sounds rude, but I really need to lie down. I had a head

injury recently, so I’m prone to migraines. Dizziness. I throw

up. It’s a nightmare, really. You don’t want to be here for that.”

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Sam began to pale. Vomit is not an aphrodisiac.

“The night before last, I threw up for four hours straight,”

I added, just to be on the safe side.

“Sounds like you’d rather be alone, so I’ll just get my ice

cream,” he said, picking up the two grocery bags, “and be on

my way.”

“Really, I’m sorry,” I called after him.

After he was gone, I went into the kitchen to get myself a

Diet Coke, which I richly deserved. Just as I was about to pop

the top, I heard the front door open. My first thought was,

Had this man really not given up? My second thought was,

I know I locked the door. Before I could get to my third thought,

which wasn’t a pleasant one, I heard laughing. A woman. Then

a man. Who was here? Will and Rafe were in the desert until

Sunday. This was only Friday. Then the distinct sound of a

zipper being unzipped. Metal teeth biting metal teeth. Then

some other biting-type sounds, shoes clattering to the floor,

muffled laughter. Oh, my god.

I backed against the Viking range, then heard the hiss of a

burner going on. I flipped around and turned it off.

I shouldn’t have kissed that Playboy bunny. Pheromone

overload.

“Do you want a beer?” The girl.

“Sounds perfect.” The guy.

I dashed over to the other side of the room, pressed myself

flat against the wall, and mouthed a prayer to St. Jude, patron

saint of lost causes.

The door swung open, missing me by an inch. I grabbed on

to it before it could swing closed and pulled it back toward me

until the hinge clicked into place. Then I held my breath.

“It’s freezing in here,” the girl called out.

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That’s because you have no clothes on.

The door to the fridge opened with a sucking sound.

“Bud or an import?” she yelled.

“Bud.”

I heard two bottles clinking against each other, then the re -

frigerator closing.

As the girl pulled the door closed behind her, I caught a

glimpse of telltale tie-dye.

Kat, Will’s assistant, and Riley, the boyfriend.

It’s so hard to get good help these days.

“You are so hot,” Riley said from the living room, loud

enough for me to hear it. “Take off that thong.”

“Baby,” murmured Kat. At least I thought it was “baby.”

I hunkered down for round two, hoping for brevity, but

they didn’t get very far.

“Riley,” Kat said breathlessly, “I think somebody else is

here.”

I looked down, panicked. No, I had my purse with me. My

sweater, too. The keys were in my pocket. How did they know?

“We’re in deep shit,” Riley said. “I thought he only drank

the imported stuff.”

Sam’s beer. I’d forgotten to toss it. Lucky for me. But it

wasn’t over yet.

Metal teeth biting back into metal teeth.

Scrambling sounds.

The pattering of feet.

“Hurry up,” Kat said impatiently.

Hopping. Hopping?

Finally, the front door slammed shut.

I gave it a minute or two, then started to feel the tension

leave my body. My face relaxed. My arms. My legs. But my

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headache was back now, for real. I emerged from my hiding

place and walked upstairs with my Diet Coke. In the guest

bathroom, I nabbed two more extra-strength Excedrin, which

must rank near the top of the list of man’s greatest achieve-

ments. Better than Advil.

I headed left down the hall.

Then the phone rang. I froze in place.

One ring.

Two rings.

Three rings, then the machine picked up.

Will’s voice, then the beep.

“Hello, Mr. Simic, this is Mrs. Meloni from Joshua Tree Ele-

mentary. We just wanted to thank you again for hosting the auc-

tion while you were out here. It was a huge success: we raised close

to thirty thousand dollars for the library fund! Thanks again. You

were wonderful. So handsome, too! I guess I’m a little overexcited,

I’m going on and on here. Well, good-bye.”

Rafe went to the desert to see the stars. But I suppose there’s

no escaping being the star. At least it was a good cause.

I was surrounded by good causes.

I went up the spiral staircase that led to Will’s office on the

third floor.

I hit the switch.

Looked like the same mess it had been the night of Rafe’s

party.

I squinted at the pockmarked file cabinet against the far wall.

The same drawer was open—the middle one—with the

same papers poking out at the same odd angles.

Strange.

My gaze traveled around the room.

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The trash can was filled to the top, as if it hadn’t been emp-

tied all week. And in the middle of Will’s desk, on top of the

Post-it notes, and the tangle of thumbtacks and wires and pa-

pers, was the plastic champagne glass he’d overturned when

he’d tossed the file Kat had given me onto the desk.

This didn’t look like the same mess, this was the same mess.

Exactly the same mess.

Which would seem to indicate that it wasn’t a mess at all,

just a clever facsimile of one.

The thumbtacks.

The wires.

The papers.

The champagne glass.

The file.

All props.

It was a stage set.

Like Rafe’s office, I suddenly realized.

Rafe’s office was as serene as this one was frenzied, as pris-

tine as this one was chaotic.

I cast my eye over Will’s desk again.

The yellow file.

It wasn’t just a prop.

I’d seen it before.

Not the night of the party, but before.

I’d seen it in Captain Donaldson’s office. He’d started fin-

gering it absentmindedly when our talk had turned to Maren.

I moved the champagne glass out of the way and slid the

file toward me. Without pausing for so much as a breath, I

opened it. There was a note inside, typed on a small sheet of

white paper.

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Dear Rafe,

This is good-bye. I need to disappear. I’ve made mis-

takes before, but these are ones I can’t undo. Say a prayer

for me, and be happy. We will always belong to one an-

other. You have always been there for me. Remember, noth-

ing on this earth is final.

No signature.

This must be Maren’s “suicide” note to Rafe. What was

Will doing with it? Had he stolen it from Captain Donaldson’s

office?

I put the note back and was about to close the file when

I saw the Post-it notes that had been affixed to the other side.

Dozens of them.

You will get what you deserve.

Don’t take things that don’t belong to you.

Stop interfering with other people’s lives.

What you are doing, young lady, is very, very wrong.

I’m talking to you.

Oh, my god.

He was talking to me.

I leapt out of the chair and ran out of the room, down the

hall, down to the second floor, down the main staircase, out

the front door. The sun was still shining. My car was close by,

just across the second bridge. I flew over the first bridge with-

out so much as looking right or left. The ducks were squawk-

ing wildly. I was headed toward the second bridge, already

thinking of what I had to do next—and, for the first time since

Captain Donaldson showed us that dead body with that white,

white skin, I knew, I absolutely knew—when I saw him com-

ing toward me, Maren’s brother, Will, a smile on his face.

CHAPTER

THIRTY-NINE

Hey, Cece,” he said. “Fancy meeting you here! What’re you

doing in our neck of the woods?”

“Where’s Rafe?” I asked, trying to catch my breath. The

latter’s sports car was parked on the tree-lined street just be-

yond the bridge. Freshly washed. Impeccable. Green.

Will’s eyes followed my gaze. “Oh, the car. I borrowed it for

a couple of hours. I think Rafe’s at home. Maybe not. I don’t

really know. Are you okay? You look kind of messed up.”

Rafe was nowhere in sight. All I could see was a couple of

kids on roller skates and a young woman pushing a stroller. It

was a beautiful day for a walk, but there was a chill in the air.

The woman bent down and tucked the blanket tighter around

her baby, who reached up to tug on her long hair. She laughed.

Out here, in the open air, there was nothing to be afraid of.

I returned Will’s smile. “Come on. You know everything

Rafe does. You help him do it, as a matter of fact.”

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He tipped his cap. “I live to serve.”

“How was the desert?”

“Hot.”

“You’re back early,” I said.

“Yeah. Last night. We got bored.”

“It wouldn’t do to let Rafe get bored.”

He wrinkled his brow. “I don’t get you, Cece, but I never

did, to be honest.”

I looked down at my hand and saw the Playboy-bunny key

ring at precisely the same moment he did. Shit.

Will scratched his head. “Those are Rafe’s keys, aren’t they?

How’d you wind up with them?”

“He forgot them. I was hoping to return them. That’s why

I’m here.”

“You’re heading in the wrong direction then.”

“These canals,” I said. “I keep getting turned around.”

He held up his surf bag. “Here. Stick ’em inside.”

O’Neill.

The curling wave.

“I would do it,” he went on, “but I’m kind of loaded down

here.” He indicated the other bag he was holding. “Stan’s

Liquors. My home away from home.”

I dropped Rafe’s keys into the worn leather bag.

“Cece,” he blurted out.

“Yes?”

“Did you take those keys from my desk?” His voice turned

low, conspiratorial. “Because if you did, I could understand

that. I could totally understand that.”

“You could?”

“Yes.”

“And why is that?” I asked.

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“Somebody like Rafe, well, people get kind of excited being

around him. Sometimes they take things. They want to have

them as keepsakes. Or as an excuse to come back, you know,

you left these at my place kind of thing. I would understand

something like that, I really would. No need to be ashamed of

yourself. It’s not like you caused real harm. Like you hurt any-

body or anything.”

“You think I’m a fan?” I asked.

“I’m a fan, too—and damn proud of it. People like us, we

keep the wheels turning. We make it all happen. We’re invisi-

ble, sure, but there’s no industry without us. It’s nothing to feel

bad about. It’s the way it is. Not everybody gets to be the star.”

He was so good. He could’ve been the star. Maybe he

should have been the star. But the show was over. I knew what

I had to do. “I know about Owen Madden.”

The roller skaters were gone. The woman with the stroller

was gone. The wind was picking up.

“Owen Madden.” He staggered backward in mock sur-

prise. “Whoa. I guess you got me.” He laughed. “Owen Mad-

den. That’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time. Everybody

loved that guy. Things didn’t work out too well for him, un-

fortunately.”

“No, they didn’t,” I said.

“Suicide is so hard on the family. What a legacy.”

I couldn’t bring myself to respond.

“What?” Will asked. “Do you not like that I said that?

Something wrong with what I said?”

I choked back my anger. “It’s time to own up to what hap-

pened, Will.”

“You are absolutely right,” he said, his head bobbing up and

down. “This is about me firing you, right? Not that I did fire

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you, but I should have known you’d see it that way. I under-

stand how pissed you are. So you’re venting on me. But if I can

say something here, you really need to get your emotions in

check, Cece. Don’t let them carry you away. You may find

yourself doing things you don’t mean to.” When he saw the

look on my face, he added, “I’m telling you this for your own

good. As a friend.”

“You’re not my friend. You’re Rafe’s friend. That’s the sum

total of who you are. It must get pretty frustrating.”

“Just doing my job,” he said with a grin.

“I was on the subject of Owen Madden,” I said.

“You’re all over the map actually. Maybe it’s the accident.

Rafe told me. He said your forehead looks fine. But those

things leave psychological scars, you know?”

I pushed the hair out of my face. I didn’t care about the

mark on my forehead. I wanted him to see my eyes.

“You blackmailed Owen Madden,” I said. “And he wasn’t

the only one. Maren and Lisa, they got these good men like

Owen Madden into bed, then you took their pictures. Both of

you.” Rafe didn’t make a move without Will. And Will was the

one who had a way with composition. Like Fredericka said, he