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SHOULD I GO or should I stay? This must be the let’s pretend phase of my driving by Tristan’s house project. Deep down I knew at some point this afternoon I would find myself casually cruising by his place, just to look, mind you, as I had no plans of crossing the gate, assuming it was open of course.
The yummy food provided by Brenda had been digested a while ago, and I still paced my small living room debating the pros and cons of my plan. Well, the pros were bound to win. No doubt. I had to know.
On this Sunday afternoon I would find myself leisurely cruising by his house. Time to stop fighting the urge and go. I rummaged through my so-called pantry to see what item I urgently needed from the grocery store right now. Couldn’t think of anything. Probably because my brain wasn’t functioning straight, but I settled on salt. Yes, absolutely. After all, salt was essential to every meal. Essential. I liked that word, a lot. I showered, even washed and blew dry my hair, light make up, no need to overdo it.
I was just going to Fry’s for some salt. I put on some nice, casual, grocery-store-appropriate clothing and quickly walked to the garage I shared with Brenda, hopped in my leased SUV, and out to the store I went.
Once I was totally out of sight of Brenda’s place, I breathed easier, feeling a little less nervous. Sheesh, it’s not like I was going to rob a bank or something.
The Fry’s store at Tatum and Shea is humongous—I kid you not. I always think they should provide shoppers with roller skates at the door. It’s that big. Since I had no clue on what isle I could find the salt and I didn’t see anyone to ask, I walked around aimlessly until I found it, bottom shelf, same isle as rows and rows of spices. Good to know. I used the self-checkout, and soon I was heading toward the south side of Shea Boulevard.
With the plastic bag holding the lonely salt container sitting on the passenger seat, I slowly made my way to the Dumonts’ neighborhood. My heart pounded so fast you’d think I had a date with destiny instead of a casual drive to spy on the state of affairs of the love of my life.
Thankfully no one would recognize me in the leased SUV. Not that anyone would care about my driving by anyhow. The closer I came to the house, the harder it was to breathe. Would he be there?
Sudden memories of the first time I saw him came hurtling at me. I was delivering escrow papers for Sunny, my boss and Tristan’s real estate agent. He looked no different from the other construction workers up at the end of the unfinished driveway. Well, except for the ponytail and those eyes... amber velvet.
I shook away the image and slammed on the brakes. What the hell? In my soul I had built images of Rebecca and the dark elegance of Manderley, of all those old, forbidden mansions associated with lovers’ drama and spouses’ mysterious deaths. Never mind the blue desert sky and mild winter weather. A storm brewed in my mind.
The whole street looked more like a circus than an upscale estate. Cars cruising slowly, bicycles riding even slower, some just left on the sidewalks. Was there a parade? Did I miss the memo?
I inched forward, noticing two media vehicles. I recognized the local channel’s logo. And I couldn’t decide what to do. Never in a million years would I have expected this kind of crazy scene. What was everyone looking for? Did something else happened that I didn’t know about?
I did notice a tall chain-link fence newly installed around the whole lot where the fire-damaged home stood. As I approached at a slug’s pace, I could tell the temporary fence had been set up as protection from the crowd of lookie-loos of which I was now a part. And... in case of doubt, it clearly stated Rent-A-Fence at the very top. Why, oh why, did I not listen to Brenda?
And then I noticed him, Neighbor Bob. Good, a familiar face. Neighbor Bob who lived a few houses down from us, was a retired National Guardsman. We all looked up to him as a sort of an armed good guy/protector. He was licensed to carry, as he proudly and often reminded us, and he also assured us he had a gun for every occasion. I thought he liked very much to play the badass role. If he really was tough or not, I had no clue. But he was friendly, and I decided to go say hello.
I scoped the area I knew so well and found a spot where I could park my vehicle without getting into trouble. I also noticed that the Dumont gate was locked. And for good measure, it had a yellow Do Not Cross police tape spanning it.
No clue if Tristan was locked inside or if he’d ever even set foot there at all. I figured if I joined Neighbor Bob’s vantage point, I’d have a much better view of the side that supposedly had the fire damage. I grabbed my bag and then paused to really look at all the commotion, completely unjustified in my opinion.
There weren’t any celebrities involved, no scandalous lifestyle. Why so much interest? Of course not having followed the news put me at a disadvantage.
And that’s when I really looked at the unfolding scene. Few appeared to be local folks. Most of the people standing around either filming or recording something seemed a bit out of place, and then it dawned on me... these were the influencers. I was pretty sure that was the term used on YouTube and other social media sites I made a point to avoid. A few of the people had their own entourage which would explain the circus-like atmosphere.
What a sad statement. I shook my head as if that would help me get a clearer picture of the whole mess, locked my car, and headed toward Neighbor Bob’s premium spot. He gave me a polite hand wave from afar. Good, now I could pretend to be there with a purpose besides the salt. It occurred to me that with all the commotion I hadn’t seen a single cop car.
Perhaps they had located Angelique, arrested Leo, and figured out who the dead person in the burned car was. Maybe that was Leo, if he was a bad driver and got stuck in the desert with his dead half-sister’s Kia and something went wrong...
I was so focused on my interpretation of the facts that I bumped into some guy standing around with a group of people taking pictures or videos of the locked gate with the yellow tape. Weirdos. The encounter somehow caused my handbag to slip from my arm, and I barely caught it before it landed on the street. The man bent to help me, or so I thought, until I felt something sharp pushing against my left side, right below my rib cage. Stunned, I assumed a spider or an ant bit me, except—the man’s arm grabbed me around the waist.
“Hey... Get your...” I looked up and met the unflinching hateful eyes of Rogelio Avondo. I stopped breathing and tried to cry out. He held me with one arm, and now the sharp pressure against my skin increased. He hissed, “Keep your f**king mouth shut and start walking. You and I are going for a ride, in your car. Move.”
Something in my mind screamed. No, no. My lips quivered; no sound came.
He literally forced me upright and made me move. Everything came to a standstill. The only thing I knew for sure was that if I got into my car, he would take me somewhere and kill me.
I let my body go limp while my eyes searched for Neighbor Bob, but the spot where he stood was now empty. Rogelio was as aware as I of the unsuspecting, indifferent crowd preoccupied with the real or imagined drama unfolding in some new or revised desert version of Manderley, the mansion at the end of the driveway. The young rich man and the missing older wife made for a great tale, more interesting than the real-life crisis feet from their precious lenses.
It didn’t matter how much I resisted; Leo was almost twice my size. He lifted me up ever so slightly until my feet no longer touched the ground, and he kept walking. Slowly, painfully we reached my SUV. The keys were safely anchored inside the pocket of my purse along with my cell phone. He only had two arms and two hands, and one of the two was busy holding a knife against my body. It was now or never. Think, Monica, the knife is to your left. And just like that, I screamed and pivoted to my right, hitting his stomach with all the strength I could put into my elbow and flung my handbag with the car keys in it as far as I could, toward the crowd that suddenly fell silent.
I didn’t know if he cut me with the small knife, I felt no pain and refused to linger on it. Instead, I sprinted toward the clusters of people standing idle. He grabbed the back of my denim jacket and jerked me back. Not so fast. I kept on pulling forward, and in an instant he was left holding my jacket while I ran and screamed.
“Help, help.”
Was everyone deaf? And like in a predictable bad movie scene, I tripped and went down, and Rogelio tripped on my feet, landing inches from my face.
The shadow of his hand holding the knife high above me fell across my face, and my whole body started to shake.
That’s when I heard, “Put it down or I’ll shoot.”
Neighbor Bob stood right across from Rogelio, looking like a real mean dude. He would have scared me to death had I not known him. Wow.
In minutes we were surrounded by cameras, microphones, and media people. But no police? Someone helped me up, someone else handed me the bag I had thrown, and before I could check my left side, Detective Ross was splitting the crowd and arresting Rogelio Avondo.
He didn’t even put up a fight. The weirdest part of all was when the people standing around spontaneously clapped and shouted bravo to Neighbor Bob.
And me? I craned my neck as hard as I could hoping to get a glimpse of that mansion on the low hill. Was he watching? Did he see the man who may have killed Silvia De Aguilar now trying to kill me? Detective Liz Reid, rosy cheeks and steady stride, approached her partner to help with the arrest.
I nodded at her and returned to stare at the hill. Detective Reid stepped closer, patted my arm, and whispered, “He’s not there. He’s staying with a friend.” Then she went to talk to Neighbor Bob.
Was I so transparent? Some of the lookie-loos, like a changing wave, surrounded me, asking my name. But Detective Reid stepped in and reminded me I would need to go with her and Neighbor Bob to give a statement. Another police car arrived in a squeal of tires. Someone handed me the denim jacket, covered in dust. Whatever spunk had sustained me I didn’t know, but it was quickly evaporating. I offered to drive my own SUV to the police headquarters.
Reid shook her head and pointed to my hands. Wow, didn’t know how badly I was shaking. Then she moved even closer and bent to check out my waist.
“Monica, you’re bleeding. Let me see. We need to get you checked out.”
I attempted to convince her it wouldn’t be necessary.
“It doesn’t look deep, but we must follow protocol,” she replied. “Come sit in my car while we wait. How are you feeling? All that adrenaline must have kept you going. You probably didn’t know that creep cut you.” Suddenly Detective Reid was speaking to me as a friend, or even more, as a sister.
I should have said something, thanked her, I don’t know. But I couldn’t. It was as if my whole being had sprung a leak and my soul had seeped out. All I wanted was to sit and cry and have someone close to keep me warm and dry my tears and tell me everything was going to be all right.
But houses, even the special ones, don’t have a beating heart, only shuttered gates.
