Gone for Good (17 page)

I had a strange quasi-dream.

I say "quasi" because I was not fully asleep. I floated in that groove between slumber and consciousness, that state where you sometimes stumble and plummet and need to grab the sides of the bed. I lay in the dark, my hands behind my head, my eyes closed.

I mentioned earlier how Sheila had loved to dance. She even made me join a dance club at the Jewish Community Center in West Orange, New Jersey. The JCC was close to both my mother's hospital and the house in Livingston. We'd go out every Wednesday to visit my mother and then at six-thirty head for our meeting with our fellow dancers.

We were the youngest couple in the club by and this is just a rough estimate seventy-five years, but man, the older folks knew how to move. I'd try to keep up, but there was simply no way. I felt self-conscious in their company. Sheila did not. Sometimes, in the middle of a dance, she would let go of my hands and sway away from me. Her eyes would close. There would be a sheen on her face as she totally disappeared in the bliss.

There was one older couple in particular, the Segals, who'd been dancing together since a USO gathering in the forties. They were a handsome, graceful couple. Mr. Segal always wore a white ascot. Mrs. Segal wore something blue and a pearl choker. On the floor, they were pure magic. They moved like lovers. They moved like one. During the breaks, they were outgoing and friendly to the rest of us. But when the music played, they saw only each other.

On a snowy night last February we thought that the club would probably be canceled, but it wasn't Mr. Segal showed up by himself. He still wore the white ascot. His suit was impeccable. But one look at the tightness in his face and we knew. Sheila gripped my hand. I could see a tear escape from her eye. When the music started, Mr. Segal stood, stepped without hesitation onto the dance floor, and danced by himself. He put out his arms and moved as though his wife were still there. He guided her across the floor, cradling her ghost so gently that none of us dared disturb him.

The next week Mr. Segal did not show at all. We heard from some of the others that Mrs. Segal had lost a longtime battle with cancer. But she danced until the end. The music started up then. We all found our partners and took to the floor. And as I held Sheila close, impossibly close, I realized that, sad as the Segal story was, they'd had it better than anyone I had ever known.

Here was where I entered the quasi-dream, though from the beginning I recognized that it was just that. I was back at the JCC Dance Club. Mr. Segal was there. So were a bunch of people I had never seen before, all without partners. When the music started, we all danced by ourselves. I looked around. My father was there, doing a clumsy solo fox-trot. He nodded at me.

I watched the others dance. They all clearly felt the presence of their dearly departed. They looked into their partners' ghostly eyes. I tried to follow suit, but something was wrong. I saw nothing. I was dancing alone. Sheila would not come to me.

Far away, I heard the phone ring. A deep voice on the answering machine penetrated my dream. "This is Lieutenant Daniels of the Livingston Police Department. I am trying to reach Will Klein."

In the background, behind Lieutenant Daniels, I heard the muffled laugh of a young woman. My eyes flew open, and the JCC Dance Club disappeared. As I reached for the phone, I heard the young woman whoop another laugh.

It sounded like Katy Miller.

"Perhaps I should call your parents," Lieutenant Daniels was saying to whoever was laughing.

"No." It was Katy. "I'm eighteen. You can't make me "

I picked up the phone. "This is Will Klein."

Lieutenant Daniels said, "Hi, Will. This is Tim Daniels. We went to school together, remember?"

Tim Daniels. He'd worked at the local Hess station. He used to wear his oil-smeared uniform to school, complete with his name embroidered on the pocket. I guessed that he still liked uniforms.

"Sure," I said, totally confused now. "How's it going?"

"Good, thanks."

"You're on the force now?" Nothing gets by me.

"Yep. And I still live in town. Married Betty Jo Stetson. We have two daughters."

I tried to conjure up Betty Jo, but nothing came. "Wow, cong rats

"Thanks, Will." His voice grew grave. "I, uh, read about your mother in the Tribune. I'm sorry."

"I appreciate that, thanks," I said.

Katy Miller started laughing again.

"Look, the reason I'm calling is, well, I guess you know Katy Miller?"

"Yes."

There was a moment of silence. He probably remembered that I'd dated her older sister and what fate had befallen her. "She asked me to call you."

"What's the problem?"

"I found Katy on the Mount Pleasant playground with a half-empty bottle of Absolut. She's totally blitzed. I was going to call her parents "

"Forget that!" Katy shouted again. "I'm eighteen!"

"Right, whatever. Anyway, she asked me to call you instead. Hey, I remember when we were kids. We weren't perfect either, you know what I mean?"

"I do," I said.

And that was when Katy yelled something, and my body went rigid. I hoped that I'd heard wrong. But her words, and the almost mocking way she shouted them, worked like a cold hand pressed against the back of my neck.

" Idaho!" she yelled. "Am I right, Will? Idaho!"

I gripped the receiver, sure I heard wrong. "What is she saying?"

"I don't know. She keeps yelling out something about Idaho, but she's still pretty wasted."

Katy again: "Friggin' Idaho! Potato! Idaho! I'm right, aren't I?"

My breath had gone shallow.

"Look, Will, I know it's late, but can you come down and get her?"

I found my voice enough to say, "I'm on my way."

Squares crept up the stairs rather than risk the noise from the elevator waking Wanda.

The Yoga Squared Corporation owned the building. He and Wanda lived on the two floors above the yoga studio. It was three in the morning. Squares slid open the door. The lights were out. He stepped into the room. The streetlights provided harsh slivers of illumination.

Wanda sat on the couch in the dark. Her arms and legs were crossed.

"Hey," he said very softly, as if afraid of waking someone up, though there was no one else in the building.

"Do you want me to get rid of it?" she said.

Squares wished that he had kept his sunglasses on. "I'm really tired, Wanda. Just let me grab a few hours of sleep."

"No."

"What do you want me to say here?"

"I'm still in the first trimester. All I'd have to do is swallow a pill. So I want to know. Do you want to get rid of it?"

"So all of a sudden it's up to me?"

"I'm waiting."

"I thought you were the great feminist, Wanda. What about a woman's right to choose?"

"Don't hand me that crap."

Squares jammed his hands in his pockets. "What do you want to do?"

Wanda turned her head to the side. He could see the profile, the long neck, the proud bearing. He loved her. He had never loved anyone before, and no one had ever loved him either. When he was very small, his mother liked to burn him with her curling iron. She finally stopped when he was two years old on the very day, coincidentally, that his father beat her to death and hung himself in a closet.

"You wear your past on your forehead," Wanda said. "We don't all have that luxury."

"I don't know what you mean."

Neither of them had turned on the light. Their eyes were adjusting, but everything was a murky haze and maybe that made it easier.

Wanda said, "I was valedictorian of my high school class."

"I know."

She closed her eyes. "Let me just say this, okay?"

Squares nodded for her to proceed.

"I grew up in a wealthy suburb. There were very few black families. I was the only black girl in my class of three hundred. And I was ranked first. I had my pick of colleges. I chose Princeton."

He knew all this already, but he said nothing.

"When I got there, I started to feel like I didn't measure up. I won't go into the whole diagnosis, about my lack of self-worth and all that. But I stopped eating. I lost weight. I became anorexic. I wouldn't eat anything I couldn't get rid of. I would do sit-ups all day. I dropped under ninety pounds and I would still look at myself in the mirror and hate the fatty who stared back at me."

Squares moved closer to her. He wanted to take her hand. But idiot that he was, he did not.

"I starved myself to the point where I had to be hospitalized. I damaged my organs. My liver, my heart, the doctors still are not sure how much. I never went into cardiac arrest, but for a while, I think I was pretty close. I eventually recovered I won't go into that either but the doctors told me that I'd probably never get pregnant. And if I did, I'd most likely not be able to carry to term."

Squares stood over her. "And what does your doctor say now?" he asked.

"She makes no promises." Wanda looked at him. "I've never been so scared in my life."

He felt his heart crumble in his chest. He wanted to sit next to her and put his arms around her. But again something held him back and he hated himself for it. "If going through with this is a risk to your health " he began.

"Then it's my risk," she said.

He tried to smile. "The great feminist returns."

"When I said I was scared, I wasn't just talking about my health."

He knew that.

"Squares?"

"Yeah."

Her voice was nearly a plea. "Don't shut me out, okay?"

He did not know what to say, so he settled for the obvious. "It's a big step."

"I know."

"I don't think," he said slowly, "that I'm equipped to handle it."

"I love you."

"I love you too."

"You're the strongest man I've ever known."

Squares shook his head. Some drunk on the street started scream-singing that love grows where his Rosemary goes and nobody knows but him. Wanda uncrossed her arms and waited.

"Maybe," Squares began, "we shouldn't go through with this. For the sake of your health, if nothing else."

Wanda watched him step back and away. Before she could reply, he was gone.

I rented a car at a twenty-four-hour place on 37th Street and drove out to the Livingston police station. I had not been in these hallowed halls since the Burnet Hill Elementary School class trip when I was in first grade. On that sunny morning, we were not allowed to see the station's holding cell where I now found Katy because, like tonight, someone had been in it. The idea of that that maybe a big-time criminal was locked up just yards from where we stood was about as cool an idea as a first-grader can wrap his brain around.

Detective Tim Daniels greeted me with too firm a handshake. I noticed that he hoisted his belt a lot. He jangled or his keys or cuffs or whatever did whenever he walked. His build was beefier than in his youth, but his face remained smooth and unblemished.

I filled out some paperwork and Katy was released into my custody. She had sobered up in the hour it took me to get out there. There was no laugh in her now. Her head hung low. Her face had taken on a classic teenage-sullen posture.

I thanked Tim again. Katy did not even attempt a smile or wave. We started for the car, but when we were out in the night air, she grabbed my arm.

"Let's take a walk," Katy said.

"It's four in the morning. I'm tired."

"I'll throw up if I sit in a car."

I stopped. "Why were you yelling about Idaho on the phone?"

But Katy was already crossing Livingston Avenue. I started after her. She picked up speed as she reached the town circle. I caught up.

"Your parents are going to be worried," I said.

"I told them I was staying with a friend. It's okay."

"You want to tell me why you were drinking alone."

Katy kept walking. Her breathing grew deeper. "I was thirsty."

"Uh-huh. And why were you yelling about Idaho?"

She looked at me but didn't break stride. "I think you know."

I grabbed her arm. "What kind of game are you playing here?"

"I'm not the one playing games here, Will."

"What are you talking about?"

"Idaho, Will. Your Sheila Rogers was from Idaho, right?"

Again her words hit me like a body blow. "How did you know that?"

"I read it."

"In the paper?"

She chuckled. "You really don't know?"

I took hold of her shoulders. "What are you talking about?"

"Where did your Sheila go to college?" she asked.

"I don't know."

"I thought you two were madly in love."

"It's complicated."

"I bet it is."

"I still don't understand, Katy."

"Sheila Rogers went to Haverton, Will. With Julie. They were in the same sorority."

I stood, stunned. "That's not possible."

"I can't believe you don't know. Sheila never told you?"

I shook my head. "Are you sure?"

"Sheila Rogers of Mason, Idaho. Majored in communications. It's all in the sorority booklet. I found it in an old trunk in the basement."

"I don't get it. You remembered her name after all these years?"

"Yeah."

"How come? I mean, do you remember the name of everyone in Julie's sorority?"

"No."

"So why would you remember Sheila Rogers?"

"Because," Katy said, "Sheila and Julie were roommates."

Squares arrived at my apartment with bagels and spreads from a place cleverly christened La Bagel on 15th and First. It was ten A.M." and Katy was sleeping on the couch. Squares lit up a cigarette. I noticed that he was still wearing the same clothes from last night. This was not easy to discern it was not as though Squares was a leading figure in the haut monde community but this morning he looked extra disheveled. We sat at the stools by the kitchen counter.

"Hey," I said, "I know you want to blend in with the street people but…"

He took a plate out of a cabinet. "You going to keep wowing me with the funny lines, or are you going to tell me what happened?"

"Is there a reason I can't do both?"

He lowered his head and again looked at me over the sunglasses. "That bad?"

"Worse," I said.

Katy stirred on the couch. I heard her say "Ouch." I had the extra-strength Tylenol at the ready. I handed her two with a glass of water. She downed them and stumbled toward the shower. I returned to the stool.

"How does your nose feel?" Squares asked.

"Like my heart moved up there and is trying to thump its way out."

He nodded and took a bite out of a bagel with lox spread. He chewed slowly. His shoulders drooped. I knew that he had not stayed home that night. I knew that something had happened between him and Wanda. And mostly, I knew that he did not want me to ask about it.

"You were saying about worse?" he prompted.

"Sheila lied to me," I said.

"We knew that already."

"Not like this."

He kept chewing.

"She knew Julie Miller. They were sorority sisters in college. Roommates even."

He stopped chewing. "Come again?"

I told him what I'd learned. The shower stayed on the whole time. I imagined that Katy would ache from the alcohol aftereflects for some time yet. Then again, the young recuperate faster than the rest of us.

When I finished filling him in, Squares leaned back, crossed his arms, and grinned. "Styling," he said.

"Yeah. Yeah, that's the word that came to my mind too."

"I don't get it, man." He started spreading another bagel. "Your old girlfriend, who was murdered eleven years ago, was college roommates with your most recent girlfriend, who was also murdered."

"Yes."

"And your brother was blamed for the first murder."

"Yes again."

"Okay, yeah." Squares nodded confidently. Then: "I still don't get it."

"It had to be a setup somehow," I said.

"What was a setup?"

"Sheila and me." I tried to shrug. "It must have all been a setup. A lie."

He made a yes-and-no gesture with his head. His long hair fell onto his face. He pushed it back. "To what end?"

"I don't know."

"Think about it."

"I have, "I said. "All night."

"Okay, suppose you're right. Suppose Sheila did lie to you or, I don't know, set you up somehow. You with me?"

"With you."

He raised both palms. "To what end?"

"Again I don't know."

"Then let's go through the possibilities," Squares said. He raised his finger. "One, it could be a giant coincidence." I just looked at him.

"Hold up, you dated Julie Miller, what, more than twelve years ago?"

"Yes."

"So maybe Sheila didn't remember. I mean, do you remember the name of every friend's ex? Maybe Julie never talked about you. Or maybe Sheila just forgot your name. And then years later you two meet…"

I just looked at him some more.

"Yeah, okay, that's pretty begging," he agreed. "Let's forget that. Possibility two" Squares raised another finger, paused, looked up in the air "hell, I'm lost here."

"Right."

We ate. He mulled it over some more. "Okay, let's assume that Sheila knew exactly who you were from the beginning."

"Let's."

"I still don't get it, man. What are we left with here?"

"Styling," I replied.

The shower stopped. I picked up a poppy-seed bagel. The seeds stuck to my hand.

"I've been thinking about it all night," I said.

"And?"

"And I keep coming back to New Mexico."

"How so?"

"The FBI wanted to question Sheila about an unsolved double murder in Albuquerque."

"So?"

"Years earlier, Julie Miller was also murdered."

"Also unsolved," Squares said, "though they suspect your brother."

"Yes."

"You see a connection between the two," Squares said. "There has to be."

Squares nodded. "Okay, I see point A and I see point B. But I don't see how you get from one to the other."

"Neither,"Isaid, "doI."

We grew silent. Katy peeked her head through the doorway. Her face had that morning-after pallor. She groaned and said, "I just upchucked again."

"Appreciate the update," I said.

"Where's my clothes?"

"The bedroom closet," I said.

She gestured an in-pain thank-you and closed the door. I looked at the right side of the couch, the spot where Sheila liked to read. How could this be happening? The old adage "Better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all" came to me. I wondered about that. But more than that, I wondered what was worse to lose the love of a lifetime or to realize that maybe she never loved you at all.

Some choice.

The phone rang. This time I did not wait for the machine. I lifted the receiver and said hello.

"Will?"

"Yes?"

"It's Yvonne Sterno," she said. " Albuquerque 's answer to Jimmy Olsen."

"What have you got?"

"I've been up all night working on this."

"And?"

"And it keeps getting weirder."

"I'm listening."

"Okay, I got my contact to go through the deeds and tax records. Now understand that my contact is a government employee, and I got her to go in during her off hours. You usually have a better chance of turning water into wine or having my uncle pick up a check than getting a government employee to show up "

"Yvonne?" I interrupted.

"Yeah?"

"Assume that I'm already impressed by your resourcefulness. Tell me what you got."

"Yeah, okay, you're right," she said. I heard papers being shuffled. "The murder-scene house was leased by a corporation called Cripco."

"And they are?"

"Untraceable. It's a shell. They don't seem to do anything."

I thought about that.

"Owen Enfield also had a car. A gray Honda Accord. Also leased by the fine folks at Cripco."

"Maybe he worked for them."

"Maybe. I'm trying to check that now."

"Where's the car now?"

"That's another interesting thing," Yvonne said. "The police found it abandoned in a mall in Lacida. That's about two hundred miles east of here."

"So where is Owen Enfield?"

"My guess? He's dead. For all we know, he was one of the victims."

"And the woman and little girl? Where are they?"

"No clue. Hell, I don't even know who they are."

"Did you talk to the neighbors?"

"Yes. It's like I said before: No one knew much about them."

"How about a physical description?"

"Ah."

"Ah what?"

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about."

Squares kept eating, but I could tell he was listening. Katy was still in my room, either dressing or making another offering to the porcelain gods.

"The descriptions were pretty vague," Yvonne continued. "The woman was in her mid-thirties, attractive, and a brunette. That's about as much as any of the neighbors could tell me. No one knew the little girl's name. She was around eleven or twelve with sandy-brown hair. One neighbor described her as cute as a button, but what kid that age isn't? Mr. Enfield was described as six feet with a gray crew cut and goatee. Forty years old, more or less."

"Then he wasn't one of the victims," I said.

"How do you know?"

"I saw a photo of the crime scene."

"When?"

"When I was questioned by the FBI about my girlfriend's whereabouts."

"You could see the victims?"

"Not clearly, but enough to know that neither had a crew cut."

"Hmm. Then the whole family has up and vanished."

"Yes."

"There's one other thing, Will."

"What's that?"

"Stonepointe is a new community. Everything is fairly self-contained."

"Meaning?"

"Are you familiar with Quick Go the convenience store chain?"

"Sure," I said. "We have QuickGos out here too."

Squares took off his sunglasses and looked a question at me. I shrugged and he moved toward me.

"Well, there's a big Quick Go at the edge of the complex," Yvonne said. "Almost all the residents use it."

"So?"

"One of the neighbors swore she saw Owen Enfield there at three o'clock on the day of the murders."

"I'm not following you, Yvonne."

"Well," she said, "the thing is, all the QuickGos have security cameras." She paused. "You following me now?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"I already checked," she went on. "They keep them for a month before they tape over them."

"So if we can get that tape," I began, "we might be able to get a good view of Mr. Enfield."

"Big if, though. The store manager was firm. There was no way he was going to turn anything over to me."

"There has to be a way," I said.

"I'm open to ideas, Will."

Squares put his hand on my shoulder. "What?"

I covered the mouthpiece and filled him in. "You know anybody connected to Quick Go I said.

"Incredible as this might sound, the answer is nope."

Damn. We mulled it over for a bit. Yvonne started humming the Quick Go jingle, one of those torturous tunes that enters through the ear canal and proceeds to ricochet around the skull in search of an escape route it will never find. I remembered the new commercial campaign, the one where they updated the old jingle by adding an electric guitar and a synthesizer and bass, and fronting the band with a big-time pop star simply known as Sonay.

Hold the phone. Sonay. Squares looked at me. "What?"

"I think you may be able to help after all," I said.