Warren Lane Page 16

  “You know him?” Will asked, startled.

  “Oh, yes,” she said. “He paid me quite a visit one day. And boy, has that fella got a cock on him!”

  “What?” Will exclaimed.

  “I tell you, that fella has a woody that just won’t quit.”

  “What are you talking about? What woody? How would you know if he had a woody?”

  “Well, he practically forced it on me,” Lucille said. There was a hint of pride in her tone.

  The thought of his mother touching the genitals of that vain, arrogant, skinny little beak-faced man filled Will with disgust, and his face flushed a deep shade of crimson.

  “I did my best to oblige him,” Lucille continued. “At my age, I don’t get many chances. Of course, in the end he just ran off like they all do. But at least I’ve got the memory. Just hearing that name brings a smile to my face.”

  The crimson spread to Will’s scalp and neck, and he began to shake with rage.

  “I’ll kill that motherfucker!” he screamed as he hobbled out of the room. All the way down the hall, Lucille heard him shouting, “I’ll kill him! I will kill him!”

  Chapter 40

  Ready picked up another six-pack on his way into town, and was halfway through the first bottle when he reached Ella’s street, which was lined with fire trucks. A fireman waved at him, and Ready rolled down his window.

  “Street’s closed,” the fireman said.

  “I live here,” Ready replied.

  The fireman looked down the street, then back at Ready. “OK. Just take it slow. There are a lot of people around, and no one’s looking for cars. So watch out. And get rid of that beer.”

  “Yes, sir,” Ready said, putting the beer bottle into the cup holder.

  He drove slowly down the street, and to his horror, saw that it was Ella’s house that had burned. Abandoning his car between the fire trucks, he ran up the walk and tried to enter the dripping, smoldering house. Two firemen pulled him back.

  “You can’t go in there. What’s wrong with you?”

  “Was anyone in the house when it burned?” Ready asked urgently.

  “We can’t tell yet,” said one of the firemen. “We don’t think so, but we haven’t searched everywhere.”

  Seeing Josie standing with her mother in front of the house next door, Ready broke free of the firemen’s grasp and ran to her.

  “Did you see Miss Ella? Do you know if she got out?”

  Josie looked up at him with her habitual serious expression. “I don’t know, mister.” She handed him the flowers she had picked. Ready turned and walked back to his car, which was still idling in the middle of the street.

  “Where is she?” he said to no one in particular.

  “Do you know that man?” Josie’s mother asked.

  The little girl turned her dark eyes up to her mother and said, “That’s the man who drinks too much and sleeps in his car. Miss Ella loves him.”

  Chapter 41

  Downtown, still hobbling with the ice pack pressed between his legs, Will Moore burst through the double glass doors of Lane Investigation. Grunting like a wounded bull, he headed straight for the glass-walled conference room where Lane sat talking with a man in a suit.

  Maxine leapt from her desk and tried to intercept him. “Sir,” she said with fear in her voice. “Sir, you can’t go in there!”

  Will pushed her to the floor with his right hand and walked into the meeting room. At the sight of his angry hobble and dripping ice pack, Warren Lane demanded in a tone of contempt, “What the fuck do you want?”

  “You fucked my wife, you fucked my girlfriend, and you fucked my mother!” Will shouted.

  “Oh my God, he’s gone insane!” said Lane, with a mocking grin.

  Will raised a pistol with his right hand and pointed it across the table toward Lane, whose face melted into an expression of abject terror. Before Lane could say a word, Will put a bullet through his heart. Then he turned and hobbled out, leaving Maxine and the other man frozen in shock.

  Chapter 42

  After hours of driving through the hills above the city, alternately laughing and crying, a great hunger came over Ella as she returned to the streets of Santa Barbara. She thought of Ready.

  Warren, I want you back. Tell me anything! Give me any excuse for kissing that woman and I’ll take it if it makes sense. I just want you back. I want to put that mess behind me. I want to start over, and I want to do it with you.

  When she reached for her phone to call him, it wasn’t there. Shit, she thought. I left it in the house.

  She parked in front of a juice bar. At the counter inside, she ordered a mango smoothie. The bar was empty except for the woman behind the counter and an older couple sitting quietly in the corner. Ella turned to the window and watched the cars go by on the street while she waited for her drink.

  After the whirr of the blender stopped, a woman’s voice on the television behind her said, “A shooting in a downtown office late this morning left one man dead.”

  Ella felt a cold terror rise within her. She put her hand to her mouth and said, “Oh, why did I egg him on? Why did I taunt that violent, angry man?”

  “The victim was identified as Warren Lane, a private investigator,” said the voice on the TV.

  The world went black as Ella collapsed.

  Months later, she recalled the older couple in the juice bar standing over her, the paramedics putting the cuff around her arm to measure her blood pressure, and bits and pieces of the ambulance ride. She remembered leaving the hospital against the doctor’s advice, and the pitying old man at the airport who let her borrow his phone.

  She remembered her hysterical words to her sister on the other end of the line: “I’ll be at JFK at midnight. No, I can’t take a cab! I can’t!” The other passengers in the terminal stared at the snot and tears that poured from her face. “Please pick me up, Anna! I’m begging you! Please help me! Please!”

  Chapter 43

  Susan was sitting on her bed in the hotel room, looking at her phone, when the news of Lane’s murder appeared on TV.

  “A shooting in a downtown office late this morning left one man dead. The victim was identified as Warren Lane, a private detective. Witnesses say local business owner William Moore walked into Lane’s office and shot him to death, apparently without provocation.”

  Susan looked up at the screen and blurted, “Oh, God, Will. What have you done?”

  “Police say Lane may have been investigating Moore’s personal and business affairs.”

  The screen showed a photo of Lane, with his slicked-back hair, long nose, and green eyes. The caption beneath the photo said Warren Lane.

  “That’s not Warren Lane,” Susan said.

  A second later, her phone rang.

  “Hello?”

  “Susan?” It was her lawyer. “Are you at the Canary?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m on my way to pick you up. Did you hear the news?”

  “Yes, but… that’s not Warren.”

  “When the press finds you, they won’t leave you alone. Pack a bag and meet me in front of the hotel in five minutes.”

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “Away. And Susan,” he added.

  “Yes?”

  “We did a little digging into Will’s business and all I can say is… this is going to be a mess. A big, big mess.”

  Susan made no response.

  “Susan? Are you still there?”

  “I’m here,” she said.

  “Meet me in front of the hotel.”

  “I will.”

  Chapter 44

  Twenty minutes after Susan left the Canary, Ready pulled up in front. He had eight beers in him now and was visibly drunk. “You can’t park that here, sir. I can park it for you if you’d lik
e,” said the valet. Ready ignored him and walked into the hotel with his keys in hand.

  He went directly to room 302, but no one answered. He instinctively reached for his phone, but it wasn’t there. He remembered leaving it on the roof of the car back at the gas station. “Shit!”

  He went to the front desk and asked the attendant if he had seen Susan Moore. “She checked out a little while ago,” the man said.

  “Any idea where she went?”

  “I don’t know. A car picked her up outside.”

  Ready returned to his car and drove to Susan and Will’s house. There was a crowd of police cars and news trucks in front of the driveway. Pulling up next to a man with a television camera, Ready asked, “What’s going on?”

  “A murder.”

  “Here?” Ready asked in panic.

  “No,” said the cameraman. “The shooter lives here.”

  “Will?”

  “William Moore,” the man said.

  “Did he shoot her before he burned the house?” Ready asked in a panic. “Oh God, please don’t tell me he did that.”

  The cameraman looked at the house. “This house isn’t burned. And it was a man he shot. A detective named Warren Lane.”

  “But I’m Warren Lane.” Ready was sinking into confusion. “What about Susan? Where is Susan?”

  “The wife?”

  “Yes,” Ready said.

  The cameraman shrugged. “No one knows. First one to find her gets the prize.”

  An hour later, Ready was back at the mission style house, grimly opening the first in a series of bottles that would fuel his long descent into darkness.

  Chapter 45

  Six weeks after Will murdered Warren Lane and Susan and Ella disappeared from his life, Ready stood in the kitchen of Gary’s house, pouring himself a bourbon and soda with unsteady hands. Gary and Rebecca sat at the table behind him. The counters were covered with empty beer and wine bottles. The party guests had left.

  “Do you really need another drink, Mark?” Rebecca asked.

  “Why not?” Gary said. “He’s so fuckin’ tanked, one more isn’t going to make a difference.”

  “You’re just as drunk as he is,” Rebecca said.

  “You stickin’ up for your little pretty boy?” Gary asked. “Hey, Mark. First time Rebecca saw you, she said she wanted to fuck you.”

  “I did not,” Rebecca protested. “I would never say something like that.”

  “You thought it,” Gary said. “Remember?” he said to Ready. “You were in your underwear, and she couldn’t stop looking at you. You know what she said? She said she wanted to mother you.”

  “You’re being rude,” Ready said. “I’m as drunk as you are and even I think you’re being rude.”

  “So, now it’s you two,” said Gary, pointing back and forth between Ready and Rebecca, “you two against me, huh?”

  “It’s not anyone against anyone,” Rebecca said. “I think you should go to bed.”

  Gary turned his attention back to Ready and said, “You know what your problem is, Mark? You’re a loser. Seriously. You’re twenty-eight years old, and you’re a house sitter. A boat sitter. You wash a rich guy’s cars and clean his yard. You know, when I was twenty-eight, I was building my second software company. I was four years from retirement. Where are you gonna be in four years?”

  “Dead,” said Ready.

  “That’s right, because you’re a loser. And you drink like...like you’re trying to kill yourself. Matter of fact...” Gary got up from the table with an effort that required two attempts. “...matter of fact, here.”

  He took Ready’s drink and dumped it in the sink. Then he put the glass back in Ready’s hand and filled it to the top with straight bourbon.

  “There you go. Drink that. Maybe that’ll finish you off.”

  Ready drank two ounces of it before Rebecca could take the glass from him.

  “Gary, you’re being an ass. You’re an awful drunk,” she said.

  “That’s why I don’t do it all the time,” Gary said. “Maybe if I was good at it like Mark here, I’d get drunk more often.” Then turning back to Ready, he said, “You used to be a good worker. You used to take care of things. Now everywhere I go, I find your puke. What the hell happened to you? Have you been sober for even a minute since we came back?”

  Ready shook his head.

  “No?” Gary asked. “Is that a no? Well, at least you’re honest. Now I’m going to be honest. I don’t want you around anymore. You’re worthless. You’re a sad, moping drunk, and you don’t clean anything, and I can’t rely on you for anything. It’s time for you to move on.”

  “OK,” Ready said.

  “Why don’t you leave now? Go back to the boat and pack up all your shit. I want you out by morning.”

  “Oh, Gary, he can’t drive,” Rebecca said. “Look at him.”

  “Maybe he’ll get lucky and go over a cliff,” Gary said. “No point in him going on like this.”

  Ready stared at him for a second through bleary eyes, then said, “Bye, Gary.” He fished his keys from his pocket and added, “Bye, Rebecca.”

  “Mark, you can’t drive!” Rebecca insisted. She tried to follow him from the house, but Gary held her back as Ready went through the front door.

  After several attempts, Ready managed to get his key into the ignition. A few seconds later, he smashed into a tree at the end of the driveway. At the sound of the crash, Rebecca ran to the car, with Gary staggering behind her. She opened the driver side door. The air bag was stained with blood from Ready’s nose. Ready looked dazed and sick.

  “Are you OK, Mark?” Rebecca asked. “Are you all right?”

  Gary staggered up behind her and said, “Christ, look what you did to my tree.”

  Rebecca spun around and slapped him.

  “What’s that for?” Gary asked.

  She pushed him to the ground. As Gary tried without success to stand up, Rebecca helped Ready from the car.

  “You’re staying here tonight. You’re not driving. Understand?”

  Ready nodded.

  * * *

  Ready slept until 2:00 p.m. the next day. Rebecca was at his bedside with a damp washcloth and a bowl of water when he awoke.

  “You threw up while you were falling asleep,” she said.

  Ready looked at her with bloodshot eyes.

  “You need help, Mark. I don’t know what made you take this turn. Gary said you didn’t used to be this bad.”

  Ready closed his eyes.

  “You’re going to die, Mark. Do you understand that? You’re going to die if you don’t get some help.”

  She waited for a response, but he gave none.

  “Do you want help, Mark? Have you had enough?”

  He opened his eyes again.

  “Gary and I will pay for it. We’ll send you to rehab. Will you go?”

  Ready continued to look at her, but made no response.

  “Mark, I’m asking you: Do you want to live, or do you want to die?”

  Ready considered the question in silence for a long time. Finally, he said, “I want to live.”

  “Then you have to go to rehab. You have to. I can take you now. I’ve been on the phone all morning. I found a place that will take you today. Please, Mark!”

  “OK.”

  It was three more hours before he was able to make it out of bed. Rebecca helped him into the kitchen, where coffee and toast were waiting.

  Gary came in as Ready was finishing his coffee. “Hey!” he shouted in a jovial tone that insulted the quiet of the house. “There’s the champ! Man, I have no idea how you can drink like that every day. I have the worst hangover ever. Shit!”

  Gary paused a moment, then said, “Hey, uh...Rebecca said I was really mean to you last night. I don’t know wh
at I said. But I’m sorry.”

  “It’s OK,” Ready said.

  “Do you remember anything I said?” Gary asked.

  “No. Except you fired me.”

  “Oh, well, nothing I said last night holds. We’re going to get you to rehab, and if there’s anything you need while you’re in there or after you get out, you just ask.”

  “Thanks, Gary.”

  “Are you ready to go?” Rebecca asked.

  “I’m ready,” Ready said.

  “OK. Gary, I’ll see you tomorrow?” Rebecca asked.

  “Yeah. I’m going to lay back down.”

  “Come on, Mark.”

  As they left the driveway in Rebecca’s car, Ready saw his old Toyota crumpled against the tree. He looked down at his feet and didn’t look up again until they reached the highway.

  Chapter 46

  In a white cinder block room at the county jail, Will sat in an orange jumpsuit at a steel table that was bolted to the floor. His lawyer sat across from him. Beneath the harsh fluorescent light, Will looked much older than his fifty years.

  “You’re not going to beat this one, Will.”

  “Come on,” said Will. “You’re my advocate. You’re supposed to be on my side.”

  “I am on your side. That’s why I’m urging you to plead guilty.”

  “But I’ll give you hundreds of hours of work between the trial and the appeal,” Will said in a joking tone. “How can you turn down that kind of money?”

  The lawyer leaned forward. “Will, I’ve worked with people like you before. You have a lot of money. You’re used to getting what you want, and you think consequences are for other people. This time, you have to pay the consequences. You can’t talk your way out of this, and you can’t buy your way out.

  “The police have your gun, with your fingerprints on it. There’s a clear motive. Your wife hired him to see if you were having an affair. And you were having an affair. You killed the man in front of witnesses who have identified you. Before the shooting, you walked down the hall of a retirement home shouting repeatedly that you were going to kill him. You can’t win this case, Will. You can’t.”