Burn (16 page)

He only wished that he'd taken it easier on the gas pedal as he pulled away from the curb.

The vase of flowers he'd brought for Heather toppled as he swung the car around, and by the time he'd caught up with the other vehicle, the empty passenger seat was soaked to the springs.

IN
the summer of 1950, the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade of Camp Pendleton, California, sailed from San Diego to the port of Pusan, Korea.

That August, in the hills to the east of Chinju, North Korean troops scattered and pinned a U.S. Army rifle company belonging to the 25th Infantry Division. A support team of 5th Marines from the 1st Brigade attacked from flanking positions, sustaining numerous casualties but eventually routing the enemy force.

Days later, while recovering in adjacent beds of a MASH unit in Taejon, a young Marine and an infantryman from the 25th became friends. Before their respective discharges—the infantryman to Tripler Army Hospital in Honolulu, the Marine back to his unit at the Pusan Perimeter—the two men promised each other two things: to not get shot again for as long as they lived, and
to keep contact stateside after they'd found their way home from the war.

The wounded Marine's name was Doren Lomax. After completing his military service, Lomax would return to his native southern California to establish himself in the private sector, most notably as the founder and CEO of the multimillion-dollar corporation known as Lomax Enterprises.

But apparently he'd also kept his word.

At least that was the way Larry Tomiczek had told Andrew the story. When he'd finished, he'd swirled his drink in hand, grinned a little, and said, “Is that some crazy shit, or what?”

Andrew still hadn't interpreted the personal ramifications of the history lesson. But he couldn't help but marvel at the cosmic scope of the odds that seemed to be organizing against him.

“Who was that guy used to be on the radio when we were kids?” Larry had dipped a finger in his bourbon and licked it. “Your ma always played him on that clock radio you guys had on top of the fridge. What was his name?”

“I don't know who you're talking about.”

“Used to always say, ‘And now you know …’”

Larry had intoned the words with tenor gravity.

“ ‘… the rest of the story’ ”

“Paul Harvey.”

“Riiight.” Larry had nodded fondly, riding the memory. “Paul Harvey, right, right. That guy still on the radio? He even alive anymore?”

“I have no idea, ” Andrew had said.

He truly hadn't. But since Larry had planted the cue, Andrew couldn't help but hear Paul Harvey's avuncular
cadence delivering the inevitable kicker that tied every tale with a trademark twist.

The man in the other bed of that Taejon Army field hospital: Private First Class Zaganos, Cedric A.

Good old Cedric. Andrew's former boss. The man who sent Eyebrow Larry Tomiczek to California.

And now you know …

It was a story best retold over dinner, Andrew decided. As it turned out, he never quite had the chance.

They didn't drive far. Heather Lomax directed him to a little steak and seafood place five minutes away. Andrew didn't know the restaurant, but the restaurant seemed to know Heather Lomax.

It began the moment they walked in together. The slender man greeting and seating clearly recognized Heather, and he came forward to meet her with open arms. The two embraced; when the man finally broke the clinch and leaned back to look at her, Andrew noted that he'd traded the smile for tear-brimmed eyes.

When Heather touched Andrew's elbow and introduced him as a friend of the family, the man smiled earnestly and shook Andrew's hand with the most heartfelt grip Andrew had received all week.

It went on like this. They were seated at an out-of-the way table, but they might as well have been the center of the room. Every few minutes, somebody new appeared. Their waitress pulled up a chair and sat with them at the table for ten minutes, squeezing Heather's hand while the two of them talked. The chef came out from the kitchen. Even the bar staff took their turns. Andrew sat by quietly, smiling the way he imagined a friend of the family might, as each new visitor wished Heather a happy birthday.

You hang in there,
they said.
David's fine. Keep the faith,

sweetie, he'll turn up. Any day now. He'll be milking this for weeks….

When he finally found an uninterrupted moment, Andrew looked up from his whiskey rib eye and said, “You're a popular person around here.”

Heather dipped the tip of her fork into the little tin of salad dressing next to her plate. She then speared a small bite from her only entrée, a half portion of turkey Cobb salad.

“David and I always come here on our birthday” she said. “It's his favorite place in town. I know it was stupid dragging you here, of all people. But I … I just needed this today.”

That,
Andrew thought,
and you wanted to show me how nobody who knows your brother thinks he did what he probably did.

He felt snide for thinking it, but that didn't change the situation he seemed to be in. All because of the rich kid of some rich guy who happened to have indirectly saved the skin of Cedric Zaganos on some other continent, some other lifetime ago.

Andrew had never considered himself a philosophical person, but he was beginning to wonder if this was what people meant when they worried about their karma.

Heather Lomax seemed preoccupied throughout the rest of the meal. When the traffic to and from their table finally thinned, Andrew tried asking a question about her brother. Heather didn't even seem to hear it.

While they ate, he noticed three things.

He noticed the way she ingested her salad deliberately, in layers, from the top down, one ingredient at a time: bean sprouts, turkey strips, blue cheese crumbles, and so on down the line until only the lettuce remained.

He noticed that she put her fork down after each bite and didn't pick it up again until the next.

And he noticed that she'd raved about the cheesecake for almost a full minute on the car ride over. But when dessert came, she didn't touch a bite.

No check arrived for the meal. The busboy asked Heather for her autograph. She rose, kissed him on the cheek, and refused. After the kid scooted back to the kitchen—embarrassed, but seemingly unwounded— Heather took up her purse from the seat and looked at Andrew.

“Thank you, ” she said. “I feel better. Let's go.”

Andrew said, “Where now?”

“Someplace where we can talk, ” she said.

Andrew followed her out of the restaurant, back to the car.

ROD
had grown to despise the sound of marimbas. Every bouncy, tropical note of the scale. He was starting to wish he'd never had the silly goddamned doorbell installed in the first place.

A few months ago, it had seemed quirky and fun, announcing his visitors to the opening few notes of
To the Max with Rod Marvalis.
Why the hell not? He'd never had a theme song before.

But the novelty had long worn off. Lately, Rod longed for a simple ding, a standard dong. Better yet, sweet silence. He vowed to have somebody out to disconnect the wires one of these days.

In the meantime, he called out, “Christ, Denny, the door's open. You can come on in.”

The front door burst wide before the last lilting marimba beat trailed away. Denny Hoyle skidded into the house, carried by the force of his own momentum. He
stopped and stood, panting, in a Padres T-shirt with the sleeves cut off. He wore a black Club Maximum ball cap pulled low over his eyes. The eyes darted about, scanning every corner. Hoyle gripped a tire iron in his left hand.

“Rod!”

“Denny. Take it easy. I'm right over here.”

Rod raised a hand from behind the Ikea buffet module he'd picked up a couple of months ago to use as a dry bar for the living room.

“Rod. Shit. You okay?”

“I'm fine, Denny. Take a breath.”

“What's happening?”

“I'm fixing drinks.”

Denny Hoyle blinked. “I mean …” He looked over his shoulder. He turned in a circle.

“Ice?”

“Huh?”

“Do you want ice? For the gin, Denny. Bombay Sapphire. We've got ten botanicals here. I'll drink 'em all myself if I have to, but I was planning to share.”

“I thought there was some emergency. You said … I came quick as I could.”

“Yes, you did, ” Rod said. “You damn well did.”

“Huh?”

“I may have exaggerated on the phone.” Rod grinned. “Sorry about that. I just wanted to be sure I had your attention.”

Denny just stood, vibrating in place.

“But, Denny, ” Rod said, holding the cocktail tongs over the ice bucket. “Let me just get this straight. It's one in the morning. I call you and tell you I need you right away. You jump in your car, make it all the way up here in fifteen flat, grab that thing out of your trunk ready for trouble … and then you ring the doorbell?”

Denny blinked back at Rod from beneath the barn-roof crease of the ball cap's bill. “Didn't feel right just busting in.”

Rod laughed. “My friend, you are a piece of work. I swear.”

Denny Hoyle released a long breath and bent to a resting position, tire iron across his knees.

Just then—speaking of ding and dong—Rod's other guests appeared from the hallway, each with a drink already in hand. The two had gone off to powder their noses together a few minutes before. From behind the buffet, Rod could see that the tall one still had a faint white streak of dust above her top lip.

“Ladies, ” Rod said. “Denny. You remember Cammie and Vivian?”

Denny looked more confused than ever. “Um … hi.”

“We were just getting ready to have a hot tub, ” Rod said. “I hope you brought your trunks.”

“My what?”

Vivian took her cue. She looked at her taller friend, took a deep breath, and drained her drink in one gulp. Then she sashayed over to Denny in her stretchy one-piece sport dress with the sexy white strips down each side.

“Don't worry, ” she told him, swiping his cap and planting it backward on her own head. She hooked an arm around his neck and beeped his nose. “I didn't bring mine either.”

The look on Denny Hoyle's face was priceless. “Rod?”

Rod came around and handed Denny a tumbler of gin. Then he went to Cammie, who beckoned with a slow curling finger. Rod licked his pinky, wiped off her leftover coke mustache, and rubbed it into his gums.

Cammie made a purring sound, leaned in, and tried to lick it back.

“So, ” Rod said, smacking his lips. “Who's ready to party?”

Andrew made Heather Lomax a deal.

Her argument:
You met me on my court. Now I meet you on yours. Fair is fair.

He didn't understand her insistence, but frankly, he liked her idea. He was exhausted to the point of meltdown; if they went somewhere else and one more person recognized her, he was afraid he might send them away with their teeth in their hands. So he agreed, on one condition. Heather Lomax couldn't have surprised him more than by accepting it.

She rode all the way to the beach house curled up in the backseat of the car, underneath the emergency blanket he'd pulled from the trunk, out of view of whatever friends of her father happened to be working tonight's shift in the park on behalf of the LAPD.

While he made coffee, Heather wandered, looking around. She complimented his taste. He told her it wasn't his. She didn't ask what he meant by that, and he didn't elaborate.

She finally sat down to wait on the same couch upon which he'd bound Travis Plum the day before. Andrew asked her about her friend Benjamin over the buzz of the bean grinder.

“What about him?”

“He strikes me as the protective type, ” Andrew said. “I expected to see him tonight.”

“You told him not to come, didn't you?”

“That's what I told him. That doesn't mean I thought he wouldn't.”

“My guess, ” she said, “is that he's parked outside your little pub down in Torrance. Waiting for me to show up.”

Andrew poured a pot of water into the coffeemaker. “So you didn't fill him in on the change of plans.”

“No.”

“Just like you didn't tell him about that letter in your purse before sending him to pay me off yesterday.”

“How do you know I didn't tell him about the letter?”

“Call it a hunch.”

“I didn't want him to worry.”

“Considerate, ” Andrew said.

“Don't get high and mighty with me, ” she said. “You don't know a thing. I love Benjy And he's risking a lot, looking out for me. But I don't need a chaperone.”

Andrew let it drop. He brought down a pair of heavy ceramic mugs from the cupboard and leaned against the counter, waiting for the coffee to brew.

She took hers with milk. He topped off her mug, put the jug back in the fridge, and poured his own cup black. When he brought the mugs out to the living room, he saw that she'd slipped off her sandals and turned on the television. She sat with her legs pulled up on the couch. She'd helped herself to the remote control.

Andrew sat in one of the rattan chairs with his coffee, saying nothing. He watched Heather flip through the muted channels as she took a careful taste from her mug. She snorted and rolled her eyes.