Unplugged

by Lois Greiman

  The house went quiet again. I was pretty sure I could hear the adrenaline pumping through my veins.

  He gave me a smile. “Because you look tired.”

  I tried a laugh. “Oh, yeah. Of course.”

  “Good, though,” he said. He eyed me steadily. “Fit. You been running?”

  “Yes.” I nodded. “Yes. All the time. Well . . . you know, few times a week.”

  “I can tell.” He skimmed my body with his sin-dark eyes, then exhaled softly. “Truth is . . .” He rose to his feet. I had to crank my head back to follow his movement. “I wanted to stop by and apologize again.”

  “Apologize?” I searched his eyes for a lie, but he looked absolutely sincere. Then again, he’s Hispanic. There’s no one who can look as earnest as a Hispanic guy. They can lie through their teeth and still look twice as sincere as an Irish priest. Swear to God.

  “I’m sorry I had to leave so abruptly that night at your place.”

  “Well . . .” I reminded myself to breathe. “Your wife—”

  “Ex-wife,” he corrected.

  I cleared my throat and refused to let my mouth drop open at his choice of words. “Yes. Ex-wife. She needed you.”

  The tic of a grin lifted the enigmatic scar at the corner of his mouth. “Actually, it was Rockette that needed me.”

  I gave him a look.

  “My dog was sick.” The grin lifted another millimeter. “You remember Rockette,” he said. “I believe you interrogated her under false pretenses.”

  I pursed my lips and fiddled with a fold in my slacks. “I did not interrogate your dog,” I said.

  “It must have been my ex-wife you were interested in, then.”

  I gave him a prissy look. So what if I had confiscated a friend’s pet, showed up at the dog park at the precise moment his ex-wife arrived, given her a fictional name, and drilled her about her ex-husband. Any number of people might have done the exact same thing.

  “Anyway, I should have called you,” he said. “Later . . . when I had to cancel our date. I’m sorry I didn’t. Especially after I saw you at the precinct house.” Was there a compliment in his tone?

  I rose to my feet. I had looked pretty good at the precinct house. I smoothed down a pant leg. It remained as wrinkled as a fourth-grader’s love note.

  But the look he gave me suggested he didn’t give a rat’s ass about the condition of my pants. I couldn’t help but remember the night we’d gone at it like pirates in my vestibule.

  My hormones were starting to hum again. They’d been fired up when Bennet had caressed my hand the night before, then left to simmer. Well . . . maybe “simmer” isn’t the right word. After all, a couple of thugs had abducted me. So my system had probably had other things to worry about, but those ol’ chemicals are hard to keep down. Real scrappers.

  “I’m sorry about Solberg, too,” he said. “I mean, he’s probably fine. I’m just sorry you have to worry. I checked the airlines. He was scheduled to fly home on the thirtieth.”

  I nodded. I’d checked, too.

  He grinned a little. “Maybe I was wrong.”

  “Probably,” I said, and swallowed. He did not have the sexiest smile in the universe. It was just the celibacy talking. “About what?”

  “About you going into forensics. You’d make a hell of a detective. I suppose you called his hotel in Vegas, too.”

  I had. “They said he hadn’t checked out, but that doesn’t mean much.” I scowled. “He could have left days ago. They wouldn’t necessarily know.”

  “Or tell you,” he added. Silence lengthened.

  I tensed. “What do you know?”

  He shrugged, looking nonchalant. “Not much more than you do. You leave a message at the hotel?”

  I nodded.

  He did the same. “Me, too. No news.”

  “And no one’s reported seeing him?”

  “No.”

  “I . . .” I scowled, surprised to be saying it. “I appreciate your help, Rivera.”

  “I figure I owe you. After . . .” He shrugged. The movement was slow and liquid. “Well . . .” He brushed a strand of hair from my face. I didn’t swoon. “Some people get kind of pissed when I accuse them of murdering the guy who tried to rape them.”

  I shrugged. I was beginning to relax a little. “I like to be different.”

  “You’re succeeding. Well, I’d better let you go,” he said, and moved toward the door.

  “Ummm, yeah,” I said, stomping out the estrogen that was smoldering like a forest fire. “Thanks for letting me know—”

  “Oh, I almost forgot.” He stopped and turned, then reached behind him and pulled something out of his back pocket. I glanced at his hand. He was holding my wallet.

  It took a full three seconds for reality to thump me upside the head. I yanked my gaze to his. I could feel my heart banging against my ribs, probably trying to wake up my brain.

  “What’s that?” I don’t know why I said it. But they were the first words that popped into my cranium.

  His eyes had gone deadly dark. Not a muscle twitched. “You don’t recognize it?”

  Jesus God, what was he doing with my wallet?

  “McMullen?” he said, as if he’d found me at the bottom of a deep well and was wondering if I was still lucid. “You okay?”

  “Well, I . . . Well, I . . . Sure,” I said, rather unsteadily. “I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

  13

  It is far better to know the painful truth than to live with a kindly falsehood.

  —Father Pat

  R IVERA STARED AT me. Nothing moved in the entire world. Not a sound was made, not a soul whispered.

  “So this isn’t yours?” he asked.

  “Mine? Mine?” In that moment I sincerely hoped that big, hairy Jed would come around the corner and shoot me dead.

  “It’s got your driver’s license in it,” he said.

  “My license?” I laughed. I sounded like Fran Drescher on speed. “That’s . . . preposterous.” I was shaking my head like a dog fresh from the pond. “No. I . . . My wallet’s in my purse.”

  “Go get it,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Get your purse.”

  I motioned spastically toward the couch, where I’d left my handbag only minutes before. “It’s . . .” My hand was waving wildly. I caught sight of my wristwatch and yanked my arm toward my face as if it were entirely disconnected from the rest of my body. “Oh, wow! Look at the time. I’ve got to go.” I jerked toward the door. But he reeled me in by the back of my shirt before I’d taken the first step.

  “Get your wallet,” he ordered.

  I swallowed hard. There was nothing I could do. I knew he held my wallet in his hand. And I knew where he had gotten it.

  I raised my chin a dignified inch, tugged my elbow from his grasp, and flowed gracefully toward the couch. Or maybe I tottered.

  I picked up my purse, slowly. My mind was spinning out of control. Maybe I could hit him in the head with it. Maybe I could fake a seizure. Maybe I could offer to sleep with him in exchange for the privilege of my continuing freedom. Maybe—

  Wait a minute. Seducing Rivera would be a heinous experience, of course. But perhaps for the sake of sweet freedom I could manage it.

  I glanced toward Rivera. He remained where he was. No incoming 911s, no shoot-outs at the OK Corral. Damn. Just about then even an emergency call from his ex-wife looked pretty good.

  “Are you going to check if it’s there?” he asked.

  I realized in that instant that I’d been staring at him for a good seven seconds. He stared back, but he wasn’t drooling, so I lifted my chin with haughty nonchalance and propped my purse on the couch’s armrest to better rummage through its contents.

  He watched in silence. I scowled and bent studiously over the thing. Still nothing. Go figure. Taking the few steps to my staircase, I sat primly on the third one, plopped my purse on my lap and gave it my all, practically crawling inside the bag in an
effort to prove my certainty that I had not lost my wallet to two thugs in a Cadillac while they plied me with threats.

  The silence stretched on, accented by the click of my lipstick against my compact.

  “Anything you want to tell me, McMullen?” Rivera asked.

  I glanced up. A full confession was on the tip of my tongue, but he looked so damned smug, I couldn’t seem to force the words past my lips.

  And anyway, Solberg, damn his anemic hide, had said that secrecy was a matter of life or death.

  “I can’t believe it,” I said. “I didn’t even know it was gone.”

  His expression remained absolutely bland.

  “Last night . . .” I shook my head and made an exasperated tsking noise. “I . . . went out, but I only left my purse unattended for a couple seconds.” I was shaking my head and hoping it wouldn’t flop right off. “What’s the world coming to?”

  “You’re saying your wallet was stolen?”

  I was still shaking my head. I don’t know why. I’m pretty sure I was trying to convince him of the affirmative. “It must have been. Wherever did you find it?” “Wherever?” Jesus, McMullen. “Wherever?”

  “Funny story,” he said. But his expression suggested it might not be ha-ha funny, but the other kind. The kind that gets you five to ten in San Quentin. “It was in an old Cadillac that was found parked in front of the Four Oaks.”

  “Really!”

  “The back window had been shot out.”

  “No!”

  He said nothing.

  “You mean my wallet was just lying in someone’s car and no one . . .” I swallowed, wondering if I was going to hurl, or be struck dead. “No one took the car . . . or the wallet. That’s . . . lucky.”

  “You don’t know anything about it?”

  Oh, yeah, I was going to be sick. “How could I?”

  A muscle jumped in his jaw. “We haven’t found the owner of the car yet.”

  “Well . . .” I shrugged and smiled. “It’s a big city.”

  “Found his friend, though. His late friend.”

  As the reality of his words seeped in, I felt myself go sickly green. I swallowed. “Late, as in . . . tardy?”

  His smile was carnivorous. “Late as in dead.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Want to tell me about it, Chrissy?” he asked, taking a step toward me.

  I retreated, though I don’t know how my knees managed it. They felt about as sturdy as dental floss. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “All right, let me refresh your memory. There were two guys. One was scrawny. The other one was big, going to fat. The scrawny one was called Lopez. You know him?”

  I tried not to remember the clawing terror. “Any relation to J. Lo?”

  A muscle jerked in his jaw. “He was a known felon. Kid found him this morning on his way home from a sleepover at his buddy’s house on Zinnia Way.”

  Oh God. Oh God. “Found him where?” My voice sounded hollow.

  “Couple miles from the restaurant. He’d been shot in the back of the head. Brains were spattered across fifty feet of asphalt and—”

  “Are you . . . ?” I stopped him, breath hitched in hopeful anticipation. If Lopez was shot, I hadn’t killed him. It’s amazing what will lift your spirits sometimes. “Are you sure he was shot?”

  “Close range. Nine-millimeter Sig. Any idea what a bullet will do to a man’s cranium at four yards? We were lucky we could get an ID. Half his face—”

  But I never heard the rest. I was stumbling toward the bathroom, covering my mouth and gagging.

  Five minutes later I felt a little better. At some point in my not too distant past I had stashed a pack of cigarettes under my sink. It had been unopened. There was a God. I only hoped he was forgiving, or had a kick-ass sense of humor.

  I was sitting on the bathroom floor. I’d slammed the door shut after entering. Rivera hadn’t tried to follow me. Maybe he was a gentleman after all. Then again, maybe it was the retching sounds that had made him so atypically considerate.

  I sat some more, then drowned my third cigarette in the toilet bowl, closed my eyes, and dropped my head against the wall behind me.

  I could hear Rivera moving around in the kitchen. Maybe he’d make himself a sandwich and go home.

  But finally I heard him stride across the floor and rap on the door.

  I didn’t respond. He pushed the door open, scanned the bathroom, and dropped his gaze to my position near the toilet.

  Our eyes met.

  “Have you been smoking?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “Quit,” I said. “Years ago.”

  “There are butts in your toilet.”

  “Damned plumbing.”

  He made a snorting sound. “You feeling better?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, you look like hell. Have you had breakfast?”

  I shook my head. I had my back propped against the scant stretch of wall between the vanity and the toilet. The room didn’t smell that bad, even from my position. Mom would have been proud.

  “I’ll make you something,” he said, “while you shower.”

  I blinked at him. “I didn’t shoot anyone,” I said.

  He made some kind of noise that defied description and closed the door.

  I didn’t know what that meant. I didn’t know what anything meant, and I didn’t know what to do. So I might as well shower, even if it had been his suggestion.

  I started the water running and stripped down, but not before I locked the bathroom door. I’m not a complete idiot.

  The water felt good against my back. The tension eased a notch, but my mind was still spinning. I didn’t know what the hell Rivera was going to do, but I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be accusing me of employing vast quantities of common sense.

  A knock sounded at the door. “Breakfast’s ready.”

  I considered making him suffer by letting the meal go cold. But there’s some saying about not cutting off your nose to spite your face. I shut the water off, toweled dry, and realized I hadn’t brought any clean clothes into the bathroom with me.

  Rethinking the complete idiot idea was kind of painful. I rummaged around in the cabinet, dragged out a Little Mermaid beach towel, and wrapped it around my body. Twice, ’cuz I’m so skinny. Or because it was the approximate size of a parachute. Then I towel-dried my hair, added a little product, did the finger-trilling thing, and turned toward the door. I stopped, turned back.

  A little makeup wouldn’t hurt. I didn’t want to be one of those women with a bad mug shot. Or, on the upside, maybe if I looked really hot, my indiscretions would entirely slip Rivera’s mind.

  So I dabbed on a little mascara. And some eyeliner. A swipe of lip shimmer. Not lipstick. I wasn’t trying to drive the guy mad with lust, just convince him to keep me out of the pokey.

  I studied my reflection in the mirror. My hair was droopy and my face looked as pale as soy milk. I was pretty sure his sanity was safe.

  Sighing, I unlocked the door and stepped into the hall.

  Rivera was just raising his hand to knock again. I shrieked, scuttled backward, and clasped my towel against my chest like a shield.

  He lifted a brow as if trying to judge my level of rationality. “You ready?”

  My bottom was pressed against the vanity. “For what?”

  The scar at the right corner of his mouth twitched. But his eyes remained steady. “I was thinking breakfast?” He left the statement kind of open-ended, like a question.

  All the air had been sucked out of the bathroom. We stared at each other.

  “Oh.” When I found my voice, it didn’t sound like my own. “Sure. Yeah. Just let me . . .” I took a tentative step, trying to skirt around him. He stepped aside just as I did the same thing. Unfortunately, we headed in the same direction. Despite my attempt to cover as much flesh as humanly possible, the towel had slipped a little. I was squeezing my arm tight against my torso. His gaze dropped. Mine
did the same. My boobs were pressed together like Pillsbury’s finest and spilling over the top of the towel.

  I raised my gaze. He raised his, slowly.

  “Bribing an officer of the law comes with a sizable penalty, McMullen,” he said.

  My mouth dropped open. I tried to step around him. He tried to step out of the way. Maybe. Anyway, we bumped again. I bumbled against him, squeezed my arms harder against my chest, and glanced at his face.

  His lips curved up with dark amusement. It was about as close as he ever came to giddy giggles.

  I glared, shoved him out of the way, and stormed past.

  It only took me a couple of minutes to dress. It wasn’t as if I was trying to impress him. The man was Satan’s hand . . . child . . . hand. . . . The man was Satan.

  He turned from the stove as I entered the kitchen. His eyes roved over me. They’re Spanish dark, but there was a funky light behind them. I resisted tugging my sweater up. Not that it was low-cut or anything. Okay, it was kind of low-cut . . . and clingy. But it was one of the few sweaters that had survived my exodus from Schaumburg, and it was chilly outside. November in L.A. Brrrr. Couldn’t have been more than seventy-five degrees. On Sunset Boulevard the nouveau riche would be donning their furs.

  “You look better,” he said.

  I didn’t know if I should thank him or stab him in the eye. I settled for taking the plate he handed me.

  A trio of something that looked like crepes sat in the middle of the dish. A slice of orange was twisted into a spiral and stood upright beside them.

  I blinked stupidly as I sat down at the table. He took a wineglass out of the freezer, filled it with grape juice, and set it beside my plate.

  I stared at him, dumbfounded. He shrugged. “Mamá always wanted a girl.”

  As he turned away I couldn’t help but notice she hadn’t even gotten close. His hips were narrow, his ass as tight as a California plum.

  “It would be more appetizing if you had some cilantro,” he said.

  I doubted it. His ass was pretty much perfect. But I jerked my gaze to my meal just as he turned toward me. My fork was already in my hand. Like a Boy Scout. Always prepared. “What are these?”