A Love Worth Saving

by David Horne

  “No.”

  “Where were you after you left the firm last night?”

  “I went to dinner with Gordon. After I left the restaurant, I went to Rick McFadden’s apartment.” He looked at the detective but felt Gordon’s eyes burning on him.

  “Why did you visit your business partner?” the detective asked.

  “We’re facing bankruptcy. I needed to see Rick.”

  “What did you discuss with him?”

  “Don’t answer that.” It sounded like a lawyer and not his lover who spoke before Perry.

  “What time did you leave his apartment?”

  “I got there as soon as I left the restaurant. I think I was there maybe ten minutes.”

  “Was Rick McFadden alone?”

  “Yes. He was drinking when I got there.”

  “Why do you think he was drinking?”

  “Don’t answer that.” Gordon sat very still, but Perry felt as if he was a million miles away.

  “Mr. Conway.” It was exhaustion and frustration that Perry saw more than a disgruntled detective. The woman didn’t sleep. If he paid more attention to her the day before, it’s possible Macdonald wore the same clothes. But Perry hadn’t looked too closely at the woman. “Let me put this into perspective for you. We’ve got two murders and now arson.”

  “Do you have an arson report from the fire marshal?” Gordon asked.

  “Not yet.”

  “Don’t speculate, Detective. You know how this works. We’re here as a courtesy. Unless you’re charging the firm’s client with something, you should explain your case and let us make a rebuttal.”

  “Sawyer, you’re a pain in my ass, you know that?”

  “I do, Macdonald.” Gordon gave the woman a sincere smile. “We’re both doing our jobs. I know Mr. Conway is in the middle of something and we’re going to keep doing our jobs to make sure he’s left alone. Isn’t that right?”

  It seemed to satisfy her. Whatever happened was enough to appease the detective. She gave Perry a look that suggested he wasn’t a suspect. “As soon as we find out what happened with the car lot, you’ll know.” It was a veiled accusation. But Perry knew he didn’t have anything to hide. He wasn’t guilty of anything except maybe thinking of getting into the used car business was a good idea.

  “Is there a lot of damage?” he asked.

  The detective gave him a look that suggested defiance, but she didn’t have any fight left in her. Later, Perry suspected what he first thought of lingering cigarette smoke might have been left over from the fire at the car lot.

  “The business is gone. Some of the vehicles, like those inside the showroom, are gone.” She didn’t bother showing any empathy. Perry’s heart sank so deep he didn’t think it would beat again.

  “Mr. Conway, either you are the best actor in the world, or you didn’t know about the fire. Either way, you’ll be charged with arson soon enough.”

  “Detective Macdonald, I think we’ve already covered your aggressive supposition.” Perry felt Gordon’s hand rest firmly on his shoulder.

  The detective, lost for words, still looking exhausted, finally let down some of her guards. “It will come out.” She spoke to the room. It just happened that Gordon and Perry were the only other people that occupied the space. “There is something seriously wrong with the way you’re doing business when people are dying around you.” It was a statement that made Perry shake uncontrollably. Because Gordon had his hand pressed against Perry’s shoulder, the tremor radiated through him.

  The detective left the two of them alone. Gordon tapped Perry to move again.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Without request, without words, Gordon knew Perry needed to see the damage. They didn’t stay long. There were a few other cars outside the car lot. There were two television news vans parked in tandem along the street. Police and fire personnel surrounded the car lot. No one from the outside had access to the site.

  “That’s Rick’s car,” Perry pointed out. It was parked on the opposite side of the road, several yards from the entrance to the main lot. Gordon pulled up next to the car. It was still late. Other than the activity at the car lot and the cluster of observers, the frontage road had little traffic.

  “What happened?” Rick asked. He stared through the passenger window at Gordon and Perry. His face was alabaster.

  “Make sure you have representation when the police call you. Don’t speak to the police on the phone. If they want to see you, make arrangements with the office.” Gordon spoke to Rick with a cold edge.

  Rick merely nodded.

  “We’re ruined,” Perry stated.

  It didn’t need elaboration or sympathy. Rick’s grave countenance was enough to prove to Perry that nothing good would happen after that.

  “Please,” he whispered to Gordon.

  “We’re going,” Gordon told Rick. The man still had a pallor hue and a grave expression. But he said nothing. Gordon raised the car window and pulled away from Rick.

  There were no words between Perry and Gordon for the rest of the ride back to Gordon’s house. Before he got out of the car, Perry exhaled. Some tears broke free. It was the blackest hour, the darkest day. People had died. The business was a target for something that Perry didn’t understand.

  “I can’t stay here tonight.” Perry managed to speak though his voice cracked.

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to go home.” Gordon switched off the engine and remained behind the wheel. “I want you to stay.”

  The honesty helped warm Perry’s heart. “You’ve got a case coming up. You’ve been talking about it. I feel like I’d only be in the way.”

  “Your safety is more important.”

  “I’ll be okay.” Perry opened the car door. The overhead dome light shone down on them. “I don’t think anything will happen tonight. Not after this. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  He got out of the car. Gordon climbed out of the driver’s seat and joined Perry beside his vehicle. He put his arms around Perry and squeezed him. “I can’t make you stay. But you are welcome here.”

  “I know. I appreciate it. I’ve got a lot of phone calls to make tomorrow. Most of what I need is at the house. We’ll have to do an inventory on the business. Maybe we can get some of the other lots to take the remaining inventory off our hands.”

  “Do you think another car lot would cause this much trouble?” Gordon asked. They stood close together. Their embrace pulled apart, but their hands remained joined.

  “I’ve never heard of anything like this before. I don’t know what to think.” Perry shook his head. “I just don’t know what to think.”

  “That’s a good reason to stay here.”

  “I know.” Perry kissed Gordon. His mouth opened and their embrace came together again. There was passion in the kiss, heat in the embrace. He had a lover, a friend that was willing to stand beside him while the rest of the world had burned away.

  “I know this isn’t what you need right now,” Gordon started. He had a simmering gaze on Perry. “But I want to say it now because I feel it.” He breathed deep and smiled just a little to show he had better news than Perry suspected. “I’m falling in love with you.”

  Perry chuckled. It wasn’t malicious, just spontaneous reaction to the overall chain of events that brought the two of them together.

  “I already fell,” he whispered. He pulled away and got into the car. Gordon watched him from the driveway as Perry backed out and drove away.

  Perry had his world ruined in a matter of weeks. People died around him. There was something beyond his understanding going on at the car lot, and he felt guilty. It wasn’t that he had anything to do with the actions surrounding the business. He was innocent of any wrong-doing. He felt guilty because he’d managed to somehow come out of the dark holding the hand of a man he’d never known had any of this not happened. Perry couldn’t deny the guilt of the moment, but he’d never trade it because he wanted Gordon in his life foreve
r.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The apartment felt cold and exposed. It was a duplex, and the neighbors rarely spoke to Perry. He wasn’t concerned about his immediate neighbors or their personal choices when it came to getting to know the people around them. In truth, Perry never took the time to get to know them. They’d been in the conjoined apartment for over a year. He knew there was a couple that lived there. They drove separate cars. They never stayed up too late. Only once did Perry hear loud music through the walls. It was a Saturday night, and Perry felt they deserved some liberties.

  But it sounded as if one of them was still awake. The moment Perry unlocked the door and entered the duplex, he heard footsteps. It was strange because he’d never heard the neighbors’ footfalls before.

  When Perry turned on the living room light, the footsteps stopped. Heavy boots, he thought. Someone wore something that resounded on the thin carpeting. If the apartment had a mirrored layout as Perry’s apartment, the boots came from the back bedroom of the next door building. It was the room Perry used for an office on his side of the apartment. From the living room, the layout of the apartment didn’t have a view of the hallway that led to the back of the house. There were two bedrooms and the bathroom.

  Perry removed his shoes. He yawned and walked around the sofa. The footsteps started again. Loud thudding stomping that sounded like running. When he looked down the dark hallway to the back of the house, he saw a figure pass from the office to his bedroom.

  It was a moment of fight or flight. An intruder in his house, the footfalls jumbled as if the person stopped, or moved around something. Goosebumps exploded over Perry’s face and arms. He stumbled backward, backing into the living room.

  There was a crash, and he managed to make it to the front door, scrambling onto the small front porch. He heard the clatter of something at the side of the house. Perry ran from the short porch and back to the car. He knocked his knee on a railing. He stubbed his toe on a flat stone that jutted from the sidewalk.

  The crashing through the trees at the side of the house diminished as if someone ran away instead of toward him. It was loud enough to wake the neighbors. The porch light next door came on.

  One of the bewildered faces poked out from the open door. Perry didn’t know if it was the man or woman of the couple, only they had wide eyes.

  “Call 911!” he shouted. The door immediately slammed shut.

  He’d left the car keys and his smartphone on the side table by the door. Perry wasn’t interested in going back into the house. Even with the front door still wide open. It was beyond his ability to rationalize that whoever was in the house had already fled.

  Perry limped out to the road. He lived in a quiet neighborhood. Other than the duplex he lived in, there were only a few houses. Each of the dwellings had large yards. There was a dog suddenly barking from one of the neighbor’s yards down the road. Perry did his best to run toward the sound. In the center of the road, he felt if anyone came at him, he’d see it. He didn’t want to think that he’d already been shot at. These people had murdered twice. Now, for some reason beyond his understanding, he found he was a target too.

  The rev of an engine started from the side of the road. A thick collection of roadside bushes obscured the vehicle. When the car pulled onto the street, the driver didn’t turn on the lights. It sped away from Perry.

  While the license plate was obscured, one thing Perry noticed. It wasn’t an ordinary license plate. It was a dealer plate.

  The scream of police sirens from a distance helped Perry’s fear subside. He limped back to the duplex, staying away from the side of the road until he reached the driveway. The front door to his house remained open. He saw inside the house but did not dare return to the residence. The neighbors peeked out the front curtains at Perry. He must have looked like a lunatic, standing in the road, waiting for the police to arrive in a t-shirt, jeans, and no shoes on his feet.

  ***

  The police officers who searched the apartment didn’t speak much to Perry. He suspected they knew his history. Detective Macdonald didn’t show up at the scene. He didn’t go back into the house until after the officers made a sweep inside and around the exterior of the duplex.

  Perry allowed one of the young uniformed men to escort him into the house.

  “There’s a lot of damage to the back bedroom,” the officer said.

  All the lights were on inside. Perry peeked in at the room to the right. The first room he saw the figure emerge from. The office was in shambles. Someone had scattered all the files in the cabinet everywhere. It would take hours to figure out what was missing.

  The officer stood inside Perry’s bedroom. Looming law enforcement walked with heavy boots through the apartment. It wasn’t just the two responding officers. There were others at the scene. Still, Detective Macdonald wasn’t among the crew.

  “The window’s destroyed.” The officer looked from Perry to the gaping hole in the wall. The frame was destroyed. “We didn’t recover any fingerprints on the frame. There’s no blood.”

  Perry just nodded. But it was hard to concentrate because he kept hearing the boots walking around the rest of the place and it was impossible to shake his trepidation. He backed out of the bedroom and returned to the living room and sat on the sofa.

  “Do you have somewhere you can stay the night?” the officer asked Perry.

  He hadn’t called Gordon. It was only a matter of time before his lover found out what had happened. But Perry needed to wrap his head around the intrusion. He needed to get an inventory of what was missing from the personnel office. It needed to happen sooner rather than later, but he didn’t want to do it in the dark.

  “I’ll get a room at a hotel.” His voice had no strength.

  “Let us know where you are.” The young man had a kind voice. He produced a business card for Perry. “This is the case number. I’ll finish our report. There’ll be an officer stationed outside the duplex for the rest of the night.”

  “Thank you.” He looked at the card as if it was something foreign.

  “Is there anything more you can think of regarding the intruder?” The officer waited, looking down at Perry but otherwise relaxed. There was no accusation in his voice. He was doing his job and not pointing fingers. “Anything that happened after you left the house?”

  Perry shook his head. He didn’t talk about what he saw when the car sped away. There were police investigating where the car had parked. They took pictures of the tire tracks.

  “And you didn’t get a look at the license plate.”

  “Whoever it was didn’t turn on the lights of the car.” Perry didn’t lie to the police. He didn’t have a lot to say because Gordon had coached him. But he’d left out what he did know. It was in the details that made Perry think whatever was going on would eventually come out.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The world he’d created with Rick was covered in charred metal and plastic. The vehicles in the showroom were blackened shells and melted rubber wheels. Since the cars were inside, there was very little gasoline in the tanks. It was something Perry insisted when the cars were inside. Because he had some foresight in the safety of others, the vehicles hadn’t exploded.

  “We’re not going to recover from this one,” Rick said. They weren’t allowed access to the car lot or the building. There were still fire marshals investigating the fire. It was a crime scene and standing beside his business partner, Perry didn’t know what to say.

  He hadn’t slept. He didn’t share what happened at his apartment. In the daylight, nothing looked better. It was still ruined. Fire and water had destroyed the building. Some of the cars around the building experienced damage from the flames. The intense heat had blistered the paint of the sports car last driven by Gordon.

  Perry didn’t know what to say. There wasn’t anything that could make him feel any better. He had a secret and kept it close to the chest for now.

  “Have you talked to any of
your friends at the other lots to take the cars off our hands?” he asked Rick.

  “We can’t do anything.” Rick didn’t have any emotions in the delivery. “The police froze the accounts. They’re not letting us unload any of the inventories,” he added. “I thought you knew that already.”

  Perry shook his head.

  “You look like shit,” Rick pointed out.

  “I had a rough night last night.”

  “Trouble in paradise?” Rick asked.

  “Nothing like that,” Perry replied. “We’re out of business. We’re in a world of shit. People are dead. What’s going on, Rick?” Perry asked. He hoped if there were a shred of decency in Rick, he’d reveal it at that moment.

  Before Rick answered Perry’s phone buzzed. Gordon was calling, and Rick didn’t have anything more to say to Perry. He moved away to talk to Gordon.

  “How’d you sleep last night?” Gordon asked him.

  “Not too well.” It was enough of an answer to satisfy Gordon. He didn’t need to unload anything more of the overnight events. It would come out soon enough. “How’s court going?”

  “I think we’re ready to wrap up this case. We didn’t need too much from prosecution to...,” and Gordon trailed off. He didn’t say anything more for a while. Perry just waited. He stared out at the ruin of the business. People moved with purpose through the debris. “What’s wrong?”

  “What do you mean?” Perry asked.

  “I’m just getting a vibe from you that’s all.”

  “I’m looking out over the fire damage.”

  “Okay. But I feel like there’s something else you’re not telling me.”

  “I’ll talk to you later about it.” Perry felt more than any other time in his life. He needed a friend. “Is your offer still open for me to stay?”

  “Of course,” Gordon responded quickly. “Stay forever.”

  Perry looked at Rick. He was on the phone and standing several feet away from Perry. They started as friends, eventually became lovers, and stayed business partners. But something happened along the way, and Rick wasn’t coming clean with something. While Gordon immediately understood there was something wrong with Perry. Perry had never had that kind of connection with Rick. And the divide was broader and deeper than he’d ever known.