“You really can fly this thing, right?” said David, staring out the window of the Cessna, gripping the seat as the ground dropped away under him. He and Jane had just taken off from Flying Cloud field.
“If I can’t,” said Jane, “you’re in big trouble.”
“Very funny. FYI, I didn’t get in until late last night, so my nerves are already shot. Be nice to me or I might have a nervous breakdown all over you.”
“If you’re sleepy, go ahead and rest. These seats are amazingly comfortable.”
“No, no,” he said quickly, sitting forward and looking around. “I’m wide awake. No sleeping for this boy. I close my eyes and I might not wake up.”
She thumped his arm. “How’s Joanna this morning?”
Jane hadn’t told Joanna about her confrontation with Luberman last night. She hadn’t told Cordelia either, mainly because Cordelia was asleep when Jane got back from Eagle Ridge, and she was still in bed this morning when Jane left.
Getting out of town right now seemed like the smart thing to do. Jane had placed herself squarely in Luberman’s sights last night. She
had no expectations that he’d cooled off. On the other hand, even if he got her address from the DMV, he’d have a hard time finding her if she was in Nebraska. When she returned home, she wouldn’t be returning to her house, since it was unlivable at the moment. She also had no plans to spend any time at either of her restaurants. If Luberman couldn’t find her, she wasn’t in any immediate danger. If Brandy told him what they’d talked about, he was probably on his way to Minneapolis right now with a loaded gun. But Jane had the sense that whatever Brandy told him, she’d keep it to a minimum. Brandy had Jane’s cell phone number. If things turned ugly, Jane had to trust that she’d call.
“Man, you couldn’t give me my sister’s life,” said David, glancing sideways out the window. “Well, maybe you could at the moment, but being in the public eye—being a celebrity—is hard work. Ever since Joanna broke out with that first film, she’s been like a human Rorschach test. People don’t see her at all, they just see what they want to see. I read once that Michelle Pfeiffer said she acts for free, but she charges for the inconvenience of being famous. If that doesn’t say it all.”
“But Joanna never seems to let anybody too close. Cordelia’s one of her oldest and best friends, but it’s always seemed kind of superficial to me.”
“I’ve got a theory about that,” said David. He unzipped his brown suede jacket, fluttered his arms trying to relax them. “I could be wrong, but I think Joanna’s always thought that if people truly got to know her—the real her—they’d think, Jeez, she’s really nothing at all. She’s, like, this adored creature, but she feels like an impostor. Did you know that movie stars are nearly four times more likely to kill themselves than average Americans?”
Jane felt more sorry for Joanna than she’d ever thought possible.
As they moved up through the thermals, David closed his eyes and tightened his seat belt. “Is this normal turbulence? I mean, it’s a clear day. Shouldn’t it be calm?”
“There’s always some turbulence. Don’t worry. This plane has lots of power.”
“Power,” he repeated, as if he didn’t quite believe her. “Power is good.”
The plane nosed up through the blue morning sky, banking westward, leveling off.
“If you want, I can show you some of the basics,” said Jane. “Who knows, you might enjoy becoming a pilot.”
“Oh, yes indeedie. Becoming a pilot of a Minnie Mouse planelet is right up there on the list of things I must do before I die—directly after I master the basics of marine biology.”
“Okay.”
“Just get us there safely and fast and I’ll be a happy man.”
“Kenzie is meeting us at the airstrip. She’ll drive us back to her place. It’s out in the country, really beautiful. You’ll love her, David. And she’ll love you, I’m sure of it.” She covered his hand with hers. “You doing okay?”
“Fine.”
They both knew it was an absurd statement. Laughingly meaningless. He wasn’t even in the same universe as fine.
“Kenzie a good cook?”
“Ah, no. Can’t have everything. But she buys a mean steak.”
David nodded to Jane’s boots. “She’s the one who’s influenced your move toward your inner cowboy?”
“Don’t be snide.” She looked over at him and smiled. She wanted so much for this to be a good trip. It was a touchy thing introducing two people she cared about so deeply, not knowing if they’d even get along, let alone like each other. She felt that David was on the edge of something truly scary. The dark circles under his eyes looked worse every time she saw him. It might be selfish, but she hoped that if he was about to come apart at the seams that he wouldn’t do it in Kenzie’s living room.
By seven that evening, they were all sitting on the deck behind Kenzie’s old farmhouse, drinking mojitos and watching the sun set over the golden fields. Much to Jane’s relief, Kenzie and David hit it off immediately. On the way in from the local airfield, they’d begun
insulting each other and by late afternoon, they were acting like old friends.
As soon as they reached the ranch, Kenzie insisted that David come out to the barn to meet her horses. She let them out into the field to run around while they all sat on the fence and watched. David seemed to relax for the first time since he’d come back to the Midwest. Jane took it as a good sign.
After a dinner of grilled steak, baked potatoes, and a tossed green salad, David excused himself to go upstairs. He wanted to call Diego and then take a shower. It was going on ten. He told Kenzie that when he came back down, he expected “the women of the house” to have his pipe and slippers ready for him. Kenzie countered by suggesting he might want to get to bed soon because he was scheduled to muck out the barn in the morning.
“‘Muck’ isn’t in my official Funk and Wagnals Gay Dictionary,” said David on his way up the stairs, “so I have no idea what you’re talking about. On the other hand, if the barn needs a good interior redesign, you’re in luck.”
After he’d disappeared upstairs, Kenzie leaned toward Jane and whispered, “He’s wonderful. Everything you said he’d be.”
They sat for a few minutes, finishing their beers.
Pressing her hand over the cracked surface of the pine table, Jane said, “The problem is, something’s bothering him. Something serious. But he won’t tell me what it is.”
“He is wound pretty tight.”
“You can tell?”
“In case nobody’s mentioned this to you lately, Lawless, so are you.”
Jane leaned back in her chair and folded her arms. “Maybe. But he came to Minnesota to see me. He wants my help. I think he would have talked to me the morning after he arrived, but then this thing happened at my house. He was terribly embarrassed, so he just shut down. Whatever it is that’s upsetting him, I can tell he’s scared. Really scared.”
Kenzie got up from the table, carrying the plates and silverware into the kitchen.
Jane followed with the glassware. They set everything on the counter, then moved toward each other. To Jane, Kenzie felt like everything good, everything warm and safe in her life.
“I know you’re worried about him,” said Kenzie, resting her arms on Jane’s shoulders. “But you can’t make him do what he refuses to do. He’ll either tell you what’s on his mind, or he won’t. I suggest, since he’s not in any immediate danger, that until he makes a decision, you concentrate your efforts on other matters.”
“For instance?”
“Me.”
“You, huh.”
“I haven’t seen you in three weeks!”
“Feels like years.”
“But you’ve got that plane now, Lawless, except it sure must have lots of terrible mechanical problems with it because you never use it.”
Kenzie joked a lot, but Jane could always tell when the jokes stopped and the serious comments began. And this was serious. “It’s the club, sweetheart. You’re right, I get a little … overinvolved sometimes.”
“Try the word ‘workaholic’ on for size. See if it fits.”
“Okay, okay. But it’s up and running now. Doing well. The first year is so important in the life of a restaurant.”
“And you’re indispensable.”
“Well—”
“So let’s agree, you are indispensable. But you’re indispensable in more than one place. You need to spread some of that indispensability around.”
“I’ll remember that. Actually, after David and I fly home tomorrow, I’ve got only one other matter I need to deal with and then I’ll be back.”
“You mean your trashed house.”
“Well, yeah. There’s that. But David’s taking care of it.”
“Then what?” She looked at Jane hard. “Tell me it doesn’t have anything to do with that PI buddy of yours.”
Jane hadn’t mentioned anything about Gordon Luberman to
Kenzie because she wasn’t sure how long it would take to make progress toward a solution. And she also knew Kenzie wouldn’t be thrilled to hear that Jane was working on a case with Nolan. “Well, actually—”
“Be honest with me here, Lawless. Are you putting your life in danger again for some stupid, dumb-ass reason?”
“No, no. Nothing like that. I promise. I’ll be back in a few days. By the time I have to leave to go back home, you’ll be sick of me.”
Kenzie drew Jane against her. “Not much chance of that.”
Glancing at the kitchen counter, Jane said, “Let’s leave the dishes for David. He can put them in the dishwasher as easily as we can.”
“Love the way your mind works, Lawless. When he’s done, he can smoke his pipe and slippers. They probably taste about the same.”
“Besides, he’s a night owl,” said Jane, caressing the small of Kenzie’s back. “And I’m kind of … sleepy all of a sudden. Aren’t you?”
“Can hardly stand up straight.”
“So we should probably hit the sack.”
“He’ll understand that exhaustion overtook us.”
“Exhaustion,” said Jane, closing her eyes as Kenzie kissed her, shivered against her. When they were together, it was as if Kenzie could reach inside and pull the one thread that unraveled all the connections that normally held Jane upright. “God, but I’ve missed you,” she whispered.
As they were on their way up the stairs, Jane remembered that David had asked her earlier about getting the keys to Kenzie’s truck for him. He said that if he had trouble sleeping, he liked to drive around. It settled him down. But Jane didn’t want to break the mood. One night without access to wheels couldn’t be that big a deal. Holding hands, Jane and Kenzie entered the bedroom and shut the door behind them.
In the middle of the night, Jane’s eyes blinked open. The bedroom was dark except for the tiny red glow from the digital alarm clock on the nightstand and the weak moonlight streaming in through the open window. The red numbers said two forty-three.
Jane wasn’t sure why she’d awakened so suddenly. As she lay in Kenzie’s arms, listening, getting her bearings, she had a nagging feeling that she should check on David.
It took almost a minute to disengage herself from Kenzie without waking her. Sitting on the edge of the bed, she pulled on her jeans and sweatshirt. She found her boots and socks near the foot of the bed and left the room, closing the door behind her. She stopped by David’s room first but found that it was empty. The bed didn’t look like it had been slept in.
Tiptoeing down the drafty farmhouse stairway to the first floor, she sat on the piano bench in the living room and yanked on her socks and boots. Glancing to her right, she noticed that there was a dim light flickering in the sunroom at the back of the house. She assumed that David was up watching TV, although he must have the volume pretty low because she couldn’t hear a sound.
When she entered the room, she saw that someone had been sleeping on the couch. The side pillows had been propped against one end, and an afghan was bunched up at the other. An empty fifth of rum was lying sideways on the floor next to the couch. The bottle bothered her. David had been drinking too much lately. She felt guilty now for disappearing the way she had. She should have at least said good night. Maybe he felt abandoned when he came down and found that Jane and Kenzie had gone to bed, although he would certainly understand that they hadn’t seen each other in weeks. Still, it bothered her.
Opening the double doors to the back deck, she stepped out into the dark country night. A cloud partially obscured the half-moon, but as it sailed away, she could just make out the forms of Ben and Rocket standing outside the fence, their heads down in the grass. A light was on in the barn. Kenzie would never leave the light on and the horses out at night.
Jumping off the side of the deck, Jane sprinted across the grass to the gravel drive. Approaching the horses slowly, she opened the gate to the field and walked them inside, then shut them in. As soon as she entered the barn, she saw that the ladder to the hayloft was lying
flat on the ground. It was heavy, made of rough-sawn wood, and would have made a loud noise when it hit. She assumed that’s what had spooked the horses. With the barn door open, the noise had no doubt driven them outside—and at the same time, awakened her.
“David?” she called softly, her eyes searching the shadowy interior. Looking up, she saw him standing near the edge of the hayloft, gazing up at the rafters. There was no railing on the loft, which was a good fifteen feet above the ground.
“David?” she said again, more cautious this time. “What are you doing up there?”
He glanced down but didn’t reply. In the dimness, she couldn’t make out his expression.
“You’ve got to come down. It’s not safe up there. You could fall.”
She hefted the ladder back up and propped it against the edge of the loft. Starting up, she wondered if he’d had so much to drink that he wouldn’t be able to make it down without falling. If she had to sit up there with him until he sobered up, that’s what she’d do.
As she stepped off the ladder onto the hayloft floor, she said, “How drunk are you?” He was about six feet away, his back to her.
When he turned around, his face was screwed into a thick fist of rage. “I knew you’d find me sooner or later.”
“David?”
He rushed at her, ramming her into the side wall. She hit with a hard thud, sliding to the floor. “David, it’s me,” she gasped. But he was at her again, on top of her this time, hands at her throat. She pried a finger free, then a hand, and bit it hard, tasting blood. He yelped and slugged her, grabbed her hair, and slammed her head against the floor.
The world suddenly went hazy.
Feeling his weight lift off her, she tried to focus, to scramble free. She crawled toward the ladder, but he was on her again, this time flipping her on her back. They struggled together, rolled across the hay. He was so much stronger than she was, but he reeked of alcohol. It slowed him down, altered his judgment. “David, it’s me. Jane.”
“This time, I’m gonna kill you,” he bellowed. He rose up over her, both hands clenched together. They were inches from the edge of the loft.
Looking past him, Jane saw Kenzie. She was behind him, a shotgun pointed at his back.
“No,” screamed Jane. “Don’t!” She bucked, tried to break free.
A blast cracked the air.
Startled, David turned.
Kenzie slammed the butt of the shotgun into his forehead. He fell sideways, moaning in pain, rolling, grasping his head in both hands.
Jane slipped away from the edge. “God,” she said, touching a cut near her eye, which was bleeding a thick river down her cheek. “I don’t … I don’t know what happened.”
“He was beating the crap out of you, that’s what happened.” Kenzie looked frantic. “Are you okay? Anything broken?” She held the gun on David.
“I don’t think so.” Jane examined the inside of her mouth with her tongue. With a little time, she hoped the world would rebalance itself.
David was on his hands and knees at the back of the loft, swearing a blue streak.
“Sit down and shut up!” ordered Kenzie.
He turned to look at her.
“Don’t make me repeat it!”
He stared at her a moment longer, looking wild, disoriented, then turned and fell backward against the wall.
“What the hell were you doing?” demanded Kenzie. She walked over to him, still keeping the shotgun pointed at his chest. “I fired at the ceiling, asshole, but I should have fired at you.”
David stared at her, his mouth slightly open, then fastened his eyes on Jane. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice barely audible.
“Sorry? Sorry?”
“I … I never meant … I mean … God, you don’t … I wouldn’t—” It was a sentence that apparently had no end.
Jane was completely bewildered. “Why the hell did you attack
me?” she said, moving into a crouch, then standing up. Every inch of her body hurt.
“I … I—”
“You said you wanted to kill me.”
“No,” he said, pressing his fists to his eyes. “Never. God, never.”
“Then what’s going on, David? Tell me!”
He pulled his knees up to his body and started to cry. “Just shoot me, okay? Get it over with.”
“Be careful what you ask for,” said Kenzie, her voice cold.
“Do it!”
“David,” said Jane, her voice softer this time. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Everything.”
She lowered herself to one knee so she could look him square in the eyes, but she kept her distance. “That’s not an answer.”
“I’m losing my mind. I’m insane. Is that clear enough? Do you get it now?”
Jane felt a terrible pressure in the air around her. “David, that’s ridiculous. You’re as sane as anybody I know.”
“Am I? I don’t remember anything until I heard that shotgun blast. I don’t know what I’m doing anymore, Jane. I’m a danger to everyone around me. I need to be locked up!”
“Just slow down, okay? You said you don’t remember fighting with me?”
“No. God, did I hurt you? One minute I’m watching TV on the couch, the next I’m sitting here. Did I really attack you?”
She gave him a questioning look.
“Oh, shit. Shit! Call the police. I’ll sit here quietly until they come. Don’t take the gun off me.”
“Are you telling the truth?” asked Kenzie, her eyes full of suspicion. He nodded, covering his face with his forearm. “It used to happen less often. Maybe once or twice a year. But it’s gotten worse in the last few months. That’s why I left Atlanta. I was afraid I’d hurt Diego.” He hunched forward, head against his knees. “The night before I left, I woke up out on our front lawn. I had a hammer in my
hand. A hammer! Can you understand how much that scared me? I had to get away, figure out what to do. I couldn’t explain it to Diego because he would have insisted I stay. But every minute I was there, he was in danger!”
Jane got up and crouched a few feet away from him. He seemed too raw to be touched, but she needed to be closer.
“See,” he continued, his entire body slumping with exhaustion, “it usually happens at night, although it happened once during the day. I fall asleep one place and wake up another. That’s why I’ve been sleeping in my car. I use handcuffs, cuff myself to the steering wheel. It’s the only way I can make sure I stay put.”
Jane remembered the welts under his watchband.
“I’ve tried ropes, but somehow I manage to untie them. All I can do is hope that I don’t figure out how to unlock the handcuffs. I mean, I can go for days and days without an episode, and then it hits like a hurricane. I made the mistake of sleeping in Joanna’s loft the other night. I was drunk, not thinking straight. The next morning, I woke up in her bed. She was in the living room on the couch. God knows what I did or said. She gave me a pretty strange look before I left, but I was too embarrassed to ask why.”
Jane glanced up at Kenzie.
“I’m tired all the time,” he said. “I can’t work, can’t think straight. I mean … I know this is nuts, but I thought if I came to Minnesota, told you what was happening, that you’d help me make a decision. I think … I mean, I need to be committed, Jane. I want you to do it.”
An involuntary shudder rumbled through her. “Surely there’s something we can do short of that.”
David scraped tears away from his eyes. “I’m such a mess. I shouldn’t have come here. I should have known better.”
Jane held out her hand to him, but he pulled his body away.
“Jesus, Jane, don’t be nice to me, not after what I just did to you.” He broke down, began to sob again.
She moved over next to him, slipped her arms around him. Instead of pushing her away, he gripped her hard. “I feel like I’m falling.”
She sat on the floor with him, rocking him in her arms. “We’ll figure this out, David. I promise.” She looked up at Kenzie, who stared back at her with an expression so swollen with fear that, for a second, Jane wasn’t sure she remembered how to breathe.