Angels (Nevada James #3) (Nevada James Mysteries) (16 page)

Chapter 23

I was
wrong about the yelling. Dan sent me a text that said in no uncertain terms
that I should begin my vacation immediately. He couldn’t have been all that
angry, then. Now he knew the case was really over. And it was. Krystal’s
murderer had been found. I had nothing else to do.

I spent
a few days at home, leaving only for groceries and once to get lunch with Molly
Malone, and then I decided to do something I’d been putting off. To tell the
truth I hadn’t been sure I’d do it at all, but if I didn’t I’d probably regret
it. I had enough regrets in my life. I didn’t need to add another.

Miranda
Callies got me the room number for Paul Wilkins at the hospital. I stopped by
at about two in the afternoon. I didn’t bother checking in at the nurse’s
station. Walk into a place acting like you belong there and you’ll be surprised
how few people challenge you. But when I reached the room itself, the bed was
empty. A nurse stood there with a clipboard in her hand, but there was no sign
of Paul. More than that, there was nothing in the room to indicate there was any
patient being treated here at all.

“Oh,
fuck,” I said. The nurse looked up. “I can’t believe…I’m too late?”

“Too
late?” the nurse asked.

“He
died?” That had been fast. I’d thought dying of liver failure was a
significantly longer process.

“You
mean Mr. Wilkins?” the nurse asked. “Oh, no. He’s…” She looked me up and down.
“I’m sorry, but you are?”

“His
niece.” It was a lie, but the truth wouldn’t have gotten me anywhere. I was
conceivably the right age for him to be my uncle.

“Ah,”
she nodded. “Then it must be your brother who’s the donor?”

I had no
idea what she was talking about, which made coming up with a lie that would be
sufficient to keep her talking difficult. I just wound up giving her a blank
look.

“Maybe
not, then,” she said after a moment. “Other side of the family?”

“Yeah,”
I said.

“Maybe
you didn’t hear, but his nephew matched for a transplant.” She smiled. “It’s
great news!”

“That is
great news,” I said. I looked around. “I don’t really understand, though. Is he
having the transplant right now or something? Why does this room look empty?”

“The
procedure isn’t going to happen for a while yet,” she said. “We won’t need him
back until it’s time to operate. So he went home.” She nodded at me
encouragingly. “You should call him.”

“I’ll
definitely do that,” I said. I stepped away from the door and back into the
hall.

There
was a small waiting area about ten yards away. I walked over to it and took a
seat in one of about a dozen chairs. Only two of the other chairs were
occupied. One held a little girl who looked to be about ten years old. She
appeared to be reading a copy of the
Wall Street Journal
, although I
imagined she was just looking at the pictures. The chair next to her held a
cat. I hadn’t realized pets were allowed in here. That didn’t seem quite right,
but it wasn’t like I was going to call security to complain about it.

So Paul
had gotten his second chance. I’d come here to attempt to offer him some
comforting words before he died. Maybe I’d have told him that his leadership in
A.A. had meant something to me. I wasn’t sure that was true, but he’d probably
have appreciated hearing it. I’d expected to see a frightened old man here.
That hadn’t been in the cards, though. Much like me, Paul had another shot at
life. His may have been more complicated than mine. After all, I didn’t need
surgery. But it was another shot, just the same.

I
wondered what he’d have done if he were thirty years younger. And if he’d had
enough money to go wherever he chose and start things over. What would he have
done?

What was
I
going to do?

“You
seem very distressed,” the girl sitting nearby said. “Perhaps you would care
for some tea. There is a vendor just down the hall from here.”

I looked
up, surprised. The girl had put her paper down and was looking at me. For a moment
I didn’t know what to say. “A…
tea vendor
?” I finally asked.

“I take
it their main business is coffee,” the girl said. “But they do offer tea.” She
nodded at a Styrofoam cup on a small table next to her chair. “It is not very
good, but it is still tea.”

“Oh,” I
said. I took a closer look at the girl. She had blonde hair down to her
shoulders, and wore blue jeans and a t-shirt that had a yellow cartoon monster
on it. I didn’t know the thing’s name. Peekaboo?

“Are you
not Nevada James?” the girl asked.

“For
fuck’s sake,” I said. Then I remembered I was talking to a child. “Shit. I
mean…
darn it
. Sorry about the language, kid. Don’t talk like me, okay?”

“I will
endeavor not to,” she said. I thought I saw a trace of a smile. “But I am
correct, am I not?”

“You are
correct,” I said. Then I cocked my head at her. “You have a very unusual way of
speaking. For a kid, anyway. How old are you?”

“Ten,”
the girl said. “Although I have been told that I am an old soul. I suppose that
is accurate.”

“I
suppose it must be,” I said. “Yeah, I’m Nevada James. I guess you saw me on
television sometime a while back.”

“Perhaps
that was it,” the girl said. “As I said, you seem distressed.”

“Nah,” I
said. “I’m just…thinking, I guess.”

“Do you
wish to talk about it?”

“Not
really,” I said.

“Very
well,” the girl said. She went back to looking at her paper.

“Have
you ever thought about running away?” I asked abruptly.

The girl
sat her paper down on her lap. “So you do wish to talk.”

“No,” I
said. “Well, yes. To someone I know. But anyone I know is going to try to talk
me out of it.”

“Running
away?”

“Yeah.”

“Ah,”
the girl said. “So you believe it is a bad idea.”

“Maybe.”

“Why is
it you wish to run away?”

“Because
I have a situation I’ll never get away from as long as I’m here.”

The girl
considered that. “The Laughing Man.”

My eyes
may have widened a little. “How much do you know about that?”

“As you
said before, I must have seen it on television.”

I
nodded. “Okay. Yeah.”

“A
difficult situation, to be sure. And where is it you wish to go?”

“Somewhere
else.”

“I
suppose the answer was obvious. You would not, I take it, retain your current
identity?”

Was this
girl seriously ten years old? Was this how kids talked? To be fair, I didn’t
know a lot of kids. I didn’t know
any
kids, actually. “No,” I said. “New
name. New identity. New city.”

The girl
nodded. “Even with all of those things, would you not still be yourself, Ms.
James? Reinvention is a difficult thing. It takes some dedication.”

I
thought about that. “Maybe if I kept up the act long enough, I wouldn’t be.
Fake it until you make it, you know? I wonder if it’s worth giving it a try,” I
said. “It’s not like I have anything to lose.”

The girl
nodded. “Whatever you decide, I am sure you will be successful. You are quite
clever.”

“Thanks,”
I said. Had
that
been on television?

“Have
you thought about San Francisco at all?” the girl asked. “There are many
opportunities for a clever person there. You might find some of them...quite
interesting.”

“San
Francisco has never really been my thing,” I said.

“Perhaps
you will feel differently in the future,” she said.

“Maybe.”
I stood up and looked around. “I’m going to go. Are…are you here with your
parents or something?” In the time we’d been sitting here, nobody had checked
in on her.

“My
parents have been dead for some long while now,” she said.

“Oh.
Sorry. God, you’re so young.”

“Yes.”
She went back to her paper and then looked at me once she noticed I hadn’t
left. “Ah. You are concerned why I am sitting here alone?”

“Yeah.”

“My
legal guardian was injured by a…was in an accident. I am waiting here while he
receives stitches.”

“Okay,”
I said. “Well, good luck to you.” I offered her my hand to shake, which she
did. “I never got your name.”

“Artemis,”
she said. She nodded at the cat next to her. “This is Jeffrey.”

Jeffrey
looked at Artemis, and then at me. He meowed once, then began washing his face
with his paw.

Artemis
nodded at me. “Be well, Ms. James. Perhaps we will meet again one day.”

“Perhaps,”
I said. I left the hospital. On the drive home it occurred to me that just
might have been the strangest conversation I’d had in my entire life. It had
helped me sort things out, though. I knew what I was going to do next.

Chapter 24

Three
weeks later I was sitting in a departure lounge at Los Angeles International
Airport. Abercrombie’s exit package had had everything I needed. A driver’s
license and a passport in a new name. A social security card. The cash I’d been
keeping in my closet was being quietly laundered into a new bank account. And I
had an itinerary; one that would take me to a place I’d never heard of before.
More importantly, it was a place where nobody had ever heard of me.

Samantha
was still in her coma back in San Diego. There wasn’t much chance she was ever
going to wake up. If she did, I’d be called to testify at her trial, but I was
going to be very hard to find.

It was
hard to shake the feeling that I was doing something terribly wrong. I’d told
Dan, Sarah, and Molly Malone that I was going to be taking an extended
vacation. I’d said I needed some sun. I’d mentioned Hawaii, although that
wasn’t where I was going. I hadn’t said goodbye to any of them. They’d have
flipped out if I had. Everyone knew I didn’t do goodbyes.

My house
was locked up tight. Abercrombie would check in on the place from time to time,
collecting the mail and making sure everything was all right. He was the only
person that would be able to contact me if there was something I needed to
know.

Maybe
this really was just a long vacation. But maybe it wasn’t. Maybe I’d find that
my new life agreed with me, and I’d never come back. Part of me hoped that
would be the case.

The
first of the flights I’d be on today was taking off in another hour. I was
relieved that it was still on time. A long enough delay might have given me
time to change my mind. I didn’t want to change my mind. I wanted to go.

I was
debating whether getting myself a soda this close to boarding was a good idea
when my cell phone rang. The caller ID showed an unlisted number. Normally I
didn’t answer those; they’d be telemarketers dialing at random. But this time I
got a sinking feeling in my stomach. The timing was just too perfect. I
couldn’t ignore it. I answered the call but didn’t bother saying hello. I just
waited.

“Hello,
Nevada,” the Laughing Man said.

Of
course he’d known. How could he not?

The
Laughing Man’s voice was a tenor, musical and almost beautiful in its own
twisted way. I could hear him breathing through the Greek theatre mask he
always wore. The one that depicted his terrible smile. “How did you get this
number?” I asked.

“I’ve
always had it, of course,” he said. “It just seemed rude to call this line
without asking your permission first. We do have boundaries, after all.”

“But
this is an exception, I take it.”

“I
seemed to have no other alternative.” I heard him sigh. “Would you please tell
me exactly what it is you think you’re doing?”

I looked
around the lounge. Half a dozen other people were talking on their phones, but
none of them were wearing masks. That wouldn’t have gone over well with airport
security. And nobody appeared to be paying any attention to me. “Take off that
mask,” I said. “I want to hear your real voice.”

“You
mistake me, Nevada,” the Laughing Man said. “The other face I wear out in the
world,
that
one is the mask. This is the face of my true self.”

“Freak.”

“As you
say. But you haven’t answered my question.”

I
thought about lying to him, maybe telling him I was going on vacation like I’d
told the other people in my life. But he knew better, and in a way I felt he deserved
the truth. He’d been my nemesis for a long time. As odd as it might sound, that
had to count for something. “I’m done with this,” I said. “I’m leaving. For
good.”

“I don’t
understand.”

“I can’t
do this anymore,” I said. “I want out. I will never have a normal life unless I
make a change. A big change. And I can’t do it here. I’ll never stop being what
I am.”

He
didn’t say anything for a moment. “Do you really think pretending to be someone
else will change who you are? That’s very naïve of you, Nevada.”

“Maybe
it is,” I said. “It
probably
is, actually. But I have to try.” I heard
desperation in my own voice and didn’t care for it very much.

I
listened to the Laughing Man breathe through his mask for what seemed like a
very long time. Finally he spoke again. “It won’t last, Nevada. You’ll come
back. I understand your wanting to change, and that’s admirable, but there are
fundamental things about who and what we are that
can’t
be changed. They
are the most basic elements of our character. You can go anywhere you want, you
can use any name you want, but in the end you will always be Nevada James. You
will always be broken, Nevada. There’s nothing you can do about that.”

In my
heart I suspected he was right. I didn’t want him to be, but what he was saying
made more sense than I wanted it to. “Maybe. I guess we’ll see.”

He
sighed. “Very well, Nevada. Go have your little adventure. I’ll miss you, of
course, but I think our separation will be brief.”

That was
it? “Are you going to come looking for me?” I asked.

“No,” he
said. “I won’t.”

“I don’t
believe you.”

“Does my
word mean anything to you? I’ve never lied to you.”

I
thought about that. “No,” I said. “You’ve never lied to me.”

“Then I
give you my word you won’t hear from me. I won’t come for you. It’ll be you
that comes back to me.”

This
conversation was going very strangely. We sounded almost like old friends. But
if he’d been here in front of me right now, I’d have fought him to the death. I
didn’t have my Glock thanks to the TSA, but I was good with my hands.

“All
right,” I said. “I believe you.”

“Good.”

“Let me
ask you something, then?”

“If you
like.”

I
hesitated. I didn’t know how to phrase this. “There’s something I’ve been
wondering about,” I finally said. “Ever since you came back, that first night
in my house, you said you were going to start the game again. Our game. I mean,
that’s your word for it, not mine. But it’s been a year and you’ve
done…nothing. You send me your cards and flowers, and I know you’ve been
watching me, but you haven’t started the game. I find it hard to believe you’ve
just been trying to come up with something really interesting this whole time.”

He was
quiet for a moment. “No,” he said.

“Then
what’s going on?” I asked. “If you weren’t going to start playing, why haven’t
you just shown up and tried to kill me? You’ve threatened to enough times. Why
didn’t you kill me that night four years ago, for that matter?”

He went
silent again. I wondered if he’d hung up, concerned about me trying to trace
the call. Our few conversations in the past few years had all been brief. But
when I listened closely I could still hear him breathing quietly.

“I
suppose I owe you that much,” he said at last. “There must have been some
confusion on your end.”

“You
might say that.”

“The
thing is, Nevada, for a long time I wasn’t able to answer that question,
myself. Why didn’t I kill you when we fought four years ago? Why didn’t I kill
you when you were strapped to that chair last year?”

“Last
year you said you’d missed the game.”

“But I
think I was lying to myself. The truth is a bit stranger. The truth is…you make
me
feel
, Nevada.”

Something
cold and prickly crawled into my stomach. I felt like I might throw up. “I’m
not sure how to take that,” I said. “Are you telling me…are you in
love
with me?”

He
chuckled. “No, no. Of course not. Love isn’t something I’m capable of. Emotions
have never been something I’ve understood or been able to relate to. It’s like
telling a man who sees in black and white to start seeing in color. It’s
just…throughout our strange little time together, you’ve made me
feel
. I
didn’t realize it until I was standing over you with my blade all those years
ago. I thought that if I killed you, I might never feel again. That was a
difficult thing to contemplate. So you lived.”

I thought
that over. “So that’s why you haven’t started the game,” I said. “You’re afraid
that when we play…that will end.”

“Exactly.
So you live. You are very strange to me, Nevada, but I find that I like having
this relationship with you. That keeps you safe from me, at least for now. I
will continue to admire you from afar, as I’ve been doing for some time now.”

I wasn’t
sure if I should feel relieved or not. I’d have had to admit I’d felt a certain
connection to him in the past. As much as he was a sick psychopath, as much as
I hated him, I’d known we had a bond. It was something only we understood. I
doubted anybody else could. “You realize this isn’t going to stop me from
putting a bullet in your brain if I ever figure out who you are.”

“Of
course it won’t. That’s part of the appeal, I think.” He sighed. “I fear that
our relationship, such as it is, is destined to end quite violently. I don’t
know which of us will win. But it won’t happen yet. And certainly not while
you’re off pretending to be someone else. So have a nice trip, Nevada. I’ll be
here when you get back. Maybe we’ll play then. Maybe not. Time will tell.”

“Time
will tell,” I said. I looked around. An older woman had overheard part of my
side of the conversation and was looking at me like I must be a crazy person.
And about that, she was probably right. “Anything else we need to talk about?”
I asked.

“I
answered your question,” he said. “Now will you answer one of mine?”

“Ask
it,” I said. “We’ll see.”

“I’m
wondering how far you’ve come in determining my identity,” he said. “I haven’t
really given you any clues, but after all this time you must have some
theories.”

I’d had
theories, all right. Plenty of them. And they’d all be wrong. “I don’t know,” I
said. “For the longest time I thought you were an FBI agent I’d been working
with.”

“FBI?
How flattering.”

“I was
wrong, but I’m not convinced you aren’t government. Maybe law enforcement. You
have resources that wouldn’t be available to someone in the general public.”

“Perhaps.”

“And
there’s this,” I said. “You’re somebody I’ve met before. You wouldn’t have been
able to resist it. You’d have wanted to look into my eyes and know you were putting
one over on me. You may say that mask is your real face, but I know you’re not
using your real voice when you talk to me. You’re afraid I might recognize it.”

He
didn’t say anything for a long moment. “Tell me I’m right,” I said.

“You
are. We have met, Nevada. Not quite for the reason you suggested, though. It
was more that I wanted to know you as someone you weren’t hunting.”

“You
wouldn’t have wanted to stand out, though. It would have been mundane. Did we
only meet once?”

“I
answered your question already. I won’t answer your second.”

Damn.
Knowing that would have given me a little more to work with.

“We’ll
meet again, Nevada,” he said. “I’m sure of it. Enjoy your trip.” And with that,
he hung up.

I stared
at my phone for a moment. Was there any point in getting in touch with
Abercrombie and asking if he could figure out where that call had come from?

Of
course there wasn’t. And even if he managed to come up with something, I wasn’t
sure it would have been enough to make me stay.

I put
the phone back in my jacket. What the Laughing Man had said had cut me to the
core. He was probably right. I could pretend all I wanted, but I was always
going to be me.

I was
always going to be broken.

But I
just didn’t care anymore.

Albert
Hammond’s “It Never Rains in Southern California” was playing over the airport’s
PA system. It seemed appropriate somehow.

I took
my phone out of my pocket, ejected the SIM card, and cracked it between my
teeth. It went into the nearest garbage can. After a moment’s consideration, I
tossed my phone in after it.

And then
I sat back in my chair and waited for them to call my flight.