The Last Story (20 page)

"Yes," he said. "Do you want to go there now?"

"Yes. It's a shame we came in separate cars. We can't drive together." I kissed him again.

"I don't want to leave you for a minute!"

He patted my side. "We'll live happily ever after," he promised. "Like in the movies."

I laughed. "Like in a book, silly. Books are better."

Peter followed me in his van, as was our custom.

I always fought my way to the front to be the leader.

To be important. That would stop now, I vowed. I would live as the yogi had said: simply, naturally, like grass.

Stopped at a light, I picked up my car phone and checked my messages. There were several from Garrett. His tone was urgent, I dialed him immediately.

He answered on the first ring.

"This is Garrett."

"This is Jean Rodrigues. I'm sorry about missing our appointment. I was tied up."

"I heard about why you were tied up. Roger Teller was with you when the young man died?"

"Yes. Bob tried to kill Roger and me."

"Really?" Garrett said sarcastically.

"You sound doubtful. I was there, I know what happened."

"You sound doubtful yourself. It doesn't matter.

I have to meet with you tonight."

"You found out something about Roger?"

There was an odd note in his voice. "Yes. Among other things."

"I see," I replied, although I didn't really.

"Where would you like to meet?"

"Where are you now?"

"In my car, in Newport Beach."

"That's perfect. I'm in Orange County as well.

Let's meet at the entrance to the Huntington Beach Pier."

My old stomping ground. "Why there?"

That odd tone again. "Is there something wrong with it?"

"No. I can come. I'll be there in twenty minutes."

"I'll be waiting," Garrett said as he hung up.

Peter had a car phone as well, a necessity because of his handicap. I called him, and after explaining that I had to meet with Garrett about Roger, I told him to go on home and take care of Jacob. I'd catch up with him soon. But Peter insisted on accompanying me. I believe he was curious to see Garrett.

Together, we drove to Huntington Beach Pier, which was only two miles south of where I had died as Shari Cooper.

"Why there?"

Garrett had sounded like he had a lot on his mind.

He was standing at the pier entrance as we arrived. We just pulled over to the side of the road, staying on the Coast Highway. Garrett walked over to my Jag, and I rolled down the window. He nodded to the van behind me.

"Who's your friend?" he asked.

"My boyfriend." I looked around. "Do you want us to park and maybe talk in a coffee shop or something?"

"No, and I don't want to talk here. Can I just get in?"

I hesitated. "Sure. You want to go somewhere else?"

"Yes," he said. "It's not far."

"Fine. Get in."

As Garrett climbed into the passenger seat, I called Peter and told him to follow us.

Everything was cool. But maybe cool was the wrong word.

Garrett, as he glanced over at me, looked like he had just seen a ghost. Or was seeing a ghost. His skin was pale with a sheen of fine perspiration, yet his eyes were as sharp as ever.

"Where do you want to go?" I asked.

"Don't you know?"

Damn! "No."

He noticed my discomfort. "It's just down the road a bit."

"What is?"

"A certain condominium. You're sure you're not familiar with it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Would you have any objection to going to this

condo? I've already been there this afternoon. It's unoccupied—a bunch of empty rooms.

Even the carpet's gone. The manager, Rita Wilde, said I could drop by it whenever I wished." He paused.

"Do you know Rita?"

"No," I lied.

He nodded to himself as he studied my reaction.

"I know her from a few years back. I met her when I was investigating a death at the condo."

I shuddered. "We don't have to go there."

"But I want to. I think it's the right place to talk."

He reached over and put his hand on my arm.

"What do you think?"

My voice was shaky. "I told you what I think."

"Are you afraid?"

"No."

"Are you concerned that the place might be haunted?"

"No."

"Then let's go. We're blocking traffic. It's only two miles north of here."

"OK." I put my Jag in gear.

Peter must have known our destination because he fell back a bit as if he didn't want to follow. Yet he did not drive away. Garret was, of course, right.

For me the condo was as haunted as a cemetery. I hadn't been back to it since the day I reaquainted myself with Jimmy. With my badly disguised uneasiness, I wasn't fooling Garrett one bit. Clearly he had read Remember Me; nevertheless, I decided to let him wonder and admit to nothing. The whole way there, I forced him to give me directions.

We parked outside the condo, I believe, exactly where my friends and I had parked the night I died.

Peter rolled out the van's side door in his wheelchair as we walked over to him. He wasn't happy about our meeting place.

"Why are we here?" he demanded.

"Garrett wants to talk to us here," I said. "Detective Garrett, this is my boyfriend—Lenny.

Lenny, meet Garrett."

Garrett shook Peter's hand. "How did you two meet?" he asked.

"It's a long story," I muttered.

He gave me a knowing look. "I'm sure it is."

We went upstairs, took the elevator. To the fourth floor. When you fall off a fourth floor—if you're into such things, which I don't recommend—the police speak of your falling three stories to your death. Because you fall only three stories since you begin such a plunge from the floor of the fourth floor. The details don't really matter. If you land on your head on concrete—as I had—you die.

Garrett led us to what had once been the Palmone residence.

The door was unlocked. We went inside. Turned on the lights. It was dark now.

A cool ocean breeze blew in from the open balcony door.

I tried but couldn't stop trembling.

I ran from the room then, through the kitchen and out onto the balcony and into the night.

I remember standing by the rail, feeling the smooth wood beneath my shaking fingers. I remember seeing the flat

black ocean and thinking how nice it would be if I could only exercise my magical powers and fly over to it and disappear beneath its surface for ages to come. I remember time passing.

Then things went bad.

"Are you cold?" Garrett asked.

I lowered my head. "Yes," I whispered.

"Have you been here before?" he asked.

I shook my head.

"Did you know that someone died here?"

"You just told me."

"Shari Cooper died here. Did you know her?"

"No."

"Why did you choose that name for your pen name?"

His gaze was steady and bored into me, but his will wavered. He didn't really want the truth from me. When all was said and done, the truth was terrifying. Especially when we needed to hang on to our limited ideas of selves and the universe. Truly, as the Rishi had said, modern religion's attempt to define with words the ultimate reality was the ultimate blasphemy. Garrett looked at me as if he couldn't decide to swear at me or plead with me.

"It's just a name," I said. "It means nothing."

Garrett shook his head. "I read your book."

I sighed. "Did you enjoy it?"

"How could you write that book? How could you know those things? You put me in your book!"

"I had never met you until two days ago."

"You put my daughter in your book!" He took a step toward me, roughly grabbed my shoulder.

"She went into hysterics when she read your epilogue!"

Peter started to intervene but I motioned him to stay back. I continued to hold Garrett's eyes, trying to tell him silently that these were questions better left unasked and unanswered. For his own sanity.

Yet I was the one who had decided the story should be published. I was as responsible for his daughter's confusion as I was responsible for her recovery from drug addiction.

"I'm sorry I upset your daughter," I said. "I realize my book upset a lot of people. But it will help even more people. It's an important story. I had to tell it. But it's just a story. Think of it that way. For you, I believe, that would be best." I paused. "We don't need to stay here. Whatever happened here, it's in the past. We should go."

Garrett released me and turned away, his shoulders sagging. He could have aged fifteen years since I walked into his office three days ago. It was as if I had stabbed him with my revelations of how he had solved the mystery of my death, stabbed him with a blade that had created deeper mysteries. The condo was cool but he was now drenched with sweat.

"You're not going to tell me anything?" he said, his back to me.

"It's just a story," I repeated.

"But the things you described. No one could ... " He whirled as if to pounce on me with another barrage of questions. Then the strength seemed to flow out of him. He glanced around the

empty rooms, shaking his head. He spoke in a soft, weary voice. "That night, after I finished questioning the kids, I sat here and drank scotch and tried to figure out what had really happened. I drew a sketch of the condo layout. I paced through the rooms several times and drew an X where I believed the murderer—if there had been a murderer

—must have stood when he or she pushed Shari Cooper to her death. Then I found an orange stain on the floor. Clay that matched the tiles on the roof.

It was a fresh stain, not the sort of thing you would leave on your floor if you were about to invite people over for a birthday party. It was then I knew someone at the party had been up on the roof. It was then I knew that Shari had probably been killed."

"That soon?" I asked despite myself.

He nodded. "Yes. I knew at the beginning. But what I didn't know was—" He paused.

"What?" I asked.

"That Shari Cooper was watching me that night.

That the whole time I drank and worked to figure out who had killed her, she was pacing nearby.

That she was there, trying to help me. It's an amazing thought." He rubbed his head and groaned. "If you think about it, it could drive you crazy."

"I'm sure she'd have liked to help you," I said gently.

He nodded and briefly closed his eyes. When he opened them, his expression was softer.

He didn't want to interrogate me; he just wanted peace of mind. Even before he asked his last question, I knew I had to try to give him that peace. I owed him so much.

"Do you know if Shari and Peter did finally enter the light?" he asked.

I glanced at Peter and smiled at Garrett. "Yes.

They made it into the light. It waits for all of us. In this world or the next."

He nodded faintly. "Thank you."

"Thank you," I said. "From both of us."

Garrett let my comment sink in, then suddenly glanced at Peter, then nodded again to himself. He was a good man, a smart man. I believe he understood much more than I said aloud.

After a moment he shook himself as if emerging from a dream.

"I have to tell you about Roger Teller," he said.

"He's a bad seed. Much worse than either of us imagined."

I raised my hand. "Not here. This is not a good place to talk about such things." I turned for the door. "Let's get out of here."

But before we could move the lights went out.

The darkness was absolute. I couldn't see the others.

Then the lights clicked on. Roger stood just inside the doorway.

The gun he carried looked like Bob's.

Bob, I understood at that moment, had not intended to harm us.

In that awful moment I understood many mysterious things.

"Am I a bad seed?" Roger asked Garrett. "I've never been described that way before." He motioned to all of us. "Out on the balcony."

I stood firm. "It's me you want. Let the others go."

Roger chuckled. "I can have you that much better with the others out of the way." He shook his gun again. "I'm an impatient individual."

And he didn't want to be kept waiting. We went out onto the balcony. The cool breeze continued to blow. The ocean was not a flat black lagoon as it had been the night I died, but rough—a sorcerer's dark pot of boiling brew. Three stories below I saw the lamppost, which had rushed toward me during my fatal plunge. I also saw the faint outline of my bloodstain. Rita Wilde said the mark refused to wash away completely.

"What do you want?" Garrett demanded.

Roger motioned to the railing. "Sit up there."

"You're insane," Garrett swore.

Roger raised his gun and pointed it at Garrett's face. He cocked the hammer, and put enough pressure on the trigger that a single sneeze would fire the gun, and Garrett would have a hole in his head.

"Do as I say," Roger said coldly.

Garrett sat on the railing. Peter and I waited. But what we waited for, I didn't know. God may have worked in mysterious ways, but he didn't work as well when the other guy had the gun. Yet I prayed to him all the same, and to the Rishi and the yogi.

Garrett is a wonderful man! The world needs his wonder!

Roger put the gun to Garrett's forehead. "Tell me," he said. "What kind of crop does a bad seed bring?"

Garrett was fearless. "The usual scum like you."

Roger grinned. "I don't like your answer."

Garrett snorted. "Go to hell."

Roger lost his grin. "I may go there. But not today."

Roger shoved Garrett hard in the chest. The man went over the side.

Like me, he didn't scream. Like me, he landed hard, and on his head.

His skull cracked. Blood splattered everywhere.

Such a gruesome sight—no human should have to behold it.

My eyes closed. God closed both our eyes.

Garrett died instantly.

"It waits for all of us. In this world or the next."

"I know," I whispered. "The light will wait for a man such as you."