I awoke to Elvis singing Fools Rush In, blood matting my hair and Paul Brown sitting cross-legged on the floor cradling Lauren Rowe’s head. The rest of her inert body was on its side, stretched between us.

Paul aimed a gun—my gun—at me as soon as I sat up. His eyes were glazed, his teeth bared. No silver fox now; he looked like a mean wolf.

“What happened?” I asked, fighting to keep calm, picking bloodstained pieces of a vase from my hair.

“She won’t breathe,” he said as if insulted. Carefully he rolled Lauren onto her back.

“Maybe we ought to call the hospital?” I suggested, though I knew it was useless. My controlled calm plunged into a cold numbness. Strangulation marks were still visible on Lauren’s white throat.

“It’s too late,” he whispered hoarsely, “too late for everything.”

“Not to give me my gun,” I said tonelessly. I’d been too stupid for too long, and it had cost Lauren her life.

He stared straight through me; gave no sign that he’d even heard me. “I came here expecting so much,” he complained. “She sounded so friendly on the phone. Her voice was happy. I felt full of promise.”

He kept the gun trained on my body but rested his free hand on her arm and petted her skin. “What was I supposed to think?” he asked.

“I think you ought to give me my gun. If we hurry, we might have time to get her help.” Yeah, time for an autopsy. Fuck me and all my crazy about Lauren and close relationships. It cost her her life.

“You’re talking about time? Our hair was black when we met, now look at us. So damn much time and you want more? For what?” he demanded. “The fat man?”

As I thought of Lou, Lauren’s death, all its implications started slicing through my helpless rage.

Paul pulled Lauren’s body up a little higher, onto his legs, holding her possessively. “She used to make fun of fat people, said they had no control. But there she was with this guy,” he said, waving my gun.

I cringed, wondering if I’d get out of this alive. Knowing the only way that was gonna happen is if I talked my way past this stupor. “Must have been hard,” I said, “waiting all these years.”

Paul kept waving my gun, and I grit my teeth to keep from scrambling. “I never left,” he insisted. “It didn’t matter where we lived, who we were with. We were always one with each other.” He looked down at her, smiled tenderly, and stroked her thick hair.

I felt my skin crawl. “Until Lou came along.” I wasn’t sure whether I was playing chickie or searching for a crack in his crazy.

“She was different with him,” Paul said. “I always knew it was in her, always wanted to give her a chance to flower.”

“Only she flowered with Lou, not you.”

He squeezed Lauren’s shoulder. Hard. “I’d be working on the Hacienda and hear them laughing. When they left together, I’d follow. You know what got to me?”

“What?” I asked, sliding forward until my sneakers touched Lauren’s shoes, hoping he was too distracted to notice

“They held hands,” he said despairingly. “Whenever I tried to hold her hand she’d refuse. It feels claustrophobic,” he mimicked, tossing his head, his hand snaking down to clasp hers.

“You didn’t stop with the occasional follow, did you?” He was getting more and more upset, but his grip on the fucking gun was steady. I wanted to keep him talking while I looked for some sort of opportunity. Opportunity for what? There was no opportunity left for Lou, no opportunity for Lauren. But Lauren’s cold body didn’t matter to Paul—death didn’t do them part.

“Sometimes, watching them was almost enjoyable. Lauren was blossoming, and I knew it was only a matter of time before we’d be back together,” he said.

“You mean a matter of time until you murdered her.”

He looked confused. “You never murder someone you love.” He let go of her fingers and ran his hand across her breasts.

His obsessive pawing was weirding me out. “I get it, you killed her with kindness.”

He glanced at me with the first hint of anger shining through his cloudy eyes. “She took him to the cliffs. Our cliffs. He couldn’t make it to the ridge, so they only went out a little way. I’d sit and watch them from the woods.”

“That made your blood boil, didn’t it? This man sitting on your rocks, taking your place, with your woman while you hid in the woods.”

Paul’s eyes gleamed as he shook his head. “Patience.”

For a moment I thought he was warning me.

“I have patience,” he continued, “there was no need for anger.”

He might have patience, but I was losing mine. My headache was starting to recede, my self-loathing quieting. I wanted out, and I wanted to bring this motherfucking murderer with me. “You stopped following them for a while,” I said.

“You,” he said pointing the gun. “When I heard that Lauren asked you to help, it worried me.” Again he drew his lips across his teeth. “A blessing in disguise; it gave me time to think. When she called it “stalking” I knew I was finally having an effect.”

“Scaring the shit out of her was one hell of an effect.”

He bent down from his seat on the floor and gently kissed Lauren’s forehead. But he lifted his head too quickly for me to do anything but prop myself up with the palms of my hand. “I was sending her all my feelings, all my love,” he said with a pleased expression.

Lauren had promised to listen to me, had promised to stay with Lou. But she hadn’t. Lauren never fucking listened to anyone, always did what she wanted. I heard my own ‘blame the victim’ and shook it out of my head. It was time to shift gears. If Paul remained in his delusions, I’d be dead without him even realizing he killed me. “You loved her so much you tried to murder her in her sleep, poison her.”

He frowned, “You’re talking about the furnace. Yes, I was upset about the divorce but that had nothing to do with the furnace. Alexis needed to sell the Hacienda. I’m sure she owes that Shylock of hers money. I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone. I just wanted Lauren to sell the house!”

Daughter helping Daddy, Daddy helping daughter. One big, happy murder.

Paul’s eyes blinked rapidly, drops of spit gathering at the corners of his mouth. When he spoke it was directed to Lauren. “Even after I stopped giving you money, I put it away for us.”

Paul caressed Lauren’s cheek, running his fingers lightly over her parted lips. “I love you, I’ll always love you.”

I pushed past my disgust and clubbed him with words. “You’re one sick fuck, Paul. You’ve never loved anything but yourself and power. That’s why you stopped giving Lauren money, why you went back to stalking. You loved the power it gave you, the power to frighten her.”

“No,” he protested, his calm finally starting to crumble.

“That’s what floats your boat,” I barked. “You want ‘em scared. Or you want ‘em dependent like Anne. You love the power, Paul, not the person.”

Paul’s hand moved to her upper arm. “You make it sound simple, but it isn’t.”

“Bullshit! Lauren wanted a divorce and you made her pay. Made her pay for all those wasted years you played house with Anne while you waited. Only Lauren wasn’t coming home and all your waiting wasn’t gonna matter.”

He rubbed his forehead with the trembling gun. “No matter where I really wanted to be and who I wanted to be with, I helped Anne heal a broken heart.”

“Man-Of-The-Year,” I said snorting. “All that patience for nothing. All that good housekeeping for nothing. All that time for nothing. So when Lauren told you about the divorce you decided to kill her. If you couldn’t have her, no one would, right!”

“I never thought about killing her, ” sweat staining his madras shirt.

“Then why isn’t she breathing, Paul? Why is she lying in your fucking lap branded with your fucking finger marks?” I sat completely still while he looked down and stared at Lauren’s lifeless eyes.

“It just happened,” he murmured, his eyes widening with rage. “It was the same our entire life. Things just happened. One after another. No matter what I did or what I tried, things just happened.”

His hand—and the gun in it—started to shake.

He glared down at Lauren. “You told me the old man was moving in. You told me to stop coming by, you didn’t need a handyman. What was I supposed to do, walk away? I wasn’t even working on the Hacienda for you. I was doing it for Alexis.”

“Alexis, Anne, Lauren, Vivian” I spat, “you were helping ‘em all! What about Stephen? Or Ian? Were you helping them too?”

He acted like he’d been asked a different question, from a different person: The dead one in his lap. “You didn’t mind Allie being mine as long as the boys were yours,” he said. “But you never expected them to despise me. I don’t blame you for that.”

Paul suddenly pushed her head, dangling it over the side of his thigh, his eyes blazing. I tensed, thinking he was finally going to shoot. He glared at me but kept speaking to Lauren. “You let that old man take care of you and taking care of you was all I ever wanted!”

He paused, his hand coming to a full stop on Lauren’s shoulder. “That’s why I couldn’t understand what you were talking about,” he said, his voice cracking, a violent convulsion rocking his body. “Your words didn’t make sense,” he shouted, shaking his dearly departed. “But you wouldn’t stop, you wouldn’t listen. You just kept saying the same thing over and over again.”

Before I realized it, his large hand was around Lauren’s neck. “You were going to marry Lou, you were going to fucking marry Lou...”

I leapt head first over Lauren’s body, heard a shot, then listened to Paul shriek as a bullet grazed his leg. I grabbed the gun and slammed him on the side of his head. Slammed him again, this time knocking him unconscious. But still had to pry his fingers from Lauren’s throat.