Bad Intent

Chapter 5

The freeway was a shimmering, blazing hot nightmare. The heat seemed to have endowed everyone on the freeway with a hair trigger and, worst of all, my car air conditioner was out. I hadn’t had it serviced for three years.

In Northern California where I live-rather, used to live-fluorocarbon coolants are sufficiently environmentally incorrect to make using air-conditioning on the rare hot day a matter for public scorn. Truth is, I never remembered to get the damn thing fixed.

I drove up the 405 and over the Sepulveda Pass into the Valley in bumper-to-bumper spurts of speed and fast stops. A trip that should have taken no more than fifteen minutes stretched well beyond an hour. I hadn’t yet learned how to gear my life’s schedules around rush hour, the way the natives do; everyone who doesn’t have to be on the road hides out until the worst is over.

By the time I pulled in under the branches of the eucalyptus sheltering Mike’s condo complex, I was desperate for quiet, a cool bath, a place to lay my head.

Mike had bought the condo with wife number two, Charlene, the decorator. She had turned it into something worthy of a magazine layout before the reality of being a cop’s wife got to her. The carpet was dull silver gray and there were only two bedrooms to accommodate four of us.

Though the condo was on the good side, the south side, of Ventura Boulevard, it wasn’t far enough on the good side to be up in the hills where there might be a consistent ocean breeze, some view. There were other reasons I didn’t like living there, beyond location, smog, and dull gray carpet. I’m not a jealous person by nature, but I felt there was entirely too much of Charlene in that condo.

Our newly combined households had three cars but only a two-car garage. I was last one in for the day, so I had to go find a slot in guest parking and hike back through the landscaping. I didn’t mind, because once I had parked I was more or less home. Santa Ana wind whipping through the trees was nice, the pool filter gurgled pleasantly. I could count the steps until I was inside, count off the seconds before I was running a tub and washing the outside world away.

Already feeling better, I opened the front door. A blast of noise as wild as the heat outside hit me full face. Headbanger music cranked up on the living room CD, an electric drill somewhere, and Bowser, our dog, all competed for air space. For a second I couldn’t decide whether to go in or not. In the end, I steeled myself and walked out of the frying pan and into the fray.

The music was so loud I could feel the bass through the soles of my Reeboks and the treble in my fillings. Michael, Mike’s college-freshman son, sat sprawled on the living room floor surrounded by his new textbooks and a litter of schedules and course syllabi he was organizing into notebooks. When he looked up at me the smile he gave was absolutely beatific he seemed so happy.

“How was the first day?” I screamed.

“Hot,” he yelled back. “Effin’ hot.”

“Got all your classes?”

“All but one. Had to petition it.”

He was on a new threshold and eager to leap through. I loved his enthusiasm as much as I hated his music. I fairly itched to smash the CD with my heavy bag, but I gave Michael the best smile I could muster-he was someone else’s son-covered my ears with both hands, and fled toward the far reaches of the condo.

I found no relief when I opened the door into the long hall that runs between the bedrooms. The dog was shut away behind a bedroom door, howling to cover the noise of the drill in Mike the Elder’s hand. I nearly tripped over the drill cord.

Mike and my daughter, Casey, were affixing an eight-footlong hardwood ballet exercise barre to the hall wall. I believe Casey was supposed to be holding up her end of the barre so Mike could see where to drill holes into the wall studs for the heavy support bolts. But Casey was using the barre as she held it, stretching out one spidery-long ballerina leg, then the other. Mike, with a pencil in his mouth, was trying to yell something at her that she couldn’t hear over the combined din of CD, drill, and dog. Maybe that was safer-for him, she was someone else’s child.

On my way past, I gave her rock-hard rump a sharp tap. “Hi, Ma,” she shouted. “Don’t you love this?”

“Are you helping?” I asked.

Casey looked over at Mike, saw the grimace he tried to transmogrify into a smile, and straightened right up. “Sorry,” she said, chagrined, and planted both skinny feet on the floor again so she could hold the barre firmly on its marks.

Mike had full hands, barre in one, drill in the other. My captive, at last. I had to mess with him because there was nothing he could do about it. I gave his rump some attention, too-more like the squeeze test I give melons at the market than the tap I had given Casey. Mike rolled his eyes to let me know he liked it. I pressed up behind him and kissed the soft, short hairs at the back of his neck until he broke out in goose bumps. He turned off the drill, lost the pencil between his teeth, and gave me his face to kiss. I obliged.

“Hi, baby. Almost finished here,” he said, turning the drill back on. I gave him another pat and went to tend to Bowser before his anguish did some real damage to the far side of the bedroom door.

I opened the door slowly to keep Bowser from bounding out and getting involved with the drill or romping through Michael’s books. He let me know he was happy to see me, but Old Bowse weighs over fifty pounds and he made it difficult to get in through the door. When I managed to squeeze into the room, in his glee, he nearly knocked me over.

I thought his eyes still looked a little glassy from the tranquilizers he had taken for his flight down from San Francisco the day before, but his energy had returned sufficiently for him to have thoroughly trashed the room. Shoes, clothes, pillows, freshly laundered bath towels covered the floor. Maybe he didn’t like the gray carpet, either.

Seeing me made him stop barking. In appreciation, I got down on the floor and let him nuzzle me, rolled him over and rubbed the long fur on his belly. He smelled like the Giorgio bubble bath I had left beside the tub. I didn’t want to go into the adjoining bathroom to confirm what I suspected.

Suddenly, the drilling stopped. Mike shouted something and, miraculously, the music disappeared, too. It took a moment for the last reverberations to ripple through the air before blessed silence was restored. But it came.

Bowser growled once, looked around as if he had lost something, then he sighed big time for both of us. He hardly looked up when Mike and Casey came into the room.

“All finished?” I asked.

“All finished,” Mike said.

“It’s perfect, Mike.” Casey made a slow pirouette. “Thanks.”

“No problem. Just stop growing, will you? I don’t want to have to raise the sucker.”

“I wish,” she said. At five-eleven, she was only three inches shorter than Mike. “Can we take it with us when we move?” Mike groaned.

Bowser got up, routed through the rubble on the floor until he found his leash, which he dragged over to Casey.

“Want a walk, old man?” she asked him. “Want to go see if that little schnauzer is down by the pool?”

Walk was the dog’s operative word. Bowser danced around Casey until she managed to hook the leash to his collar. They left the room in a flurry of expectant yelps and slobbery glee and long-leggedjetes.

Mike closed the door behind them.

“What a day,” he said, lying down on the floor beside me. “You look pale.”

“I feel a little pale. It’s the heat.”

“You’re just worn out,” he said. “Moving is a lot of work.”

I yawned. “Thanks for introducing me to Etta. I made a little extra pocket change off her interview. I sold a piece of it to Satellite Network News.”

“You gave Etta a split, of course.”

“That’s not the way it works, Mike. I own all rights to Etta’s video image.”

“Doesn’t seem fair.”

“If I gave her any money she’d have to report it, then the Department of Social Services would screw around with her welfare benefits for months. I’ll find another way to compensate her. Okay?”

“See that you do.” He had a wry grin. “Etta and I go back a long way. Did you talk to LaShonda and Hanna?”

“I haven’t a clue where to find Hanna, and LaShonda is lost somewhere in the county library system.”

“But you’re pursuing them?”

“Uh huh.” I yawned. “Still have your job?”

“For another two years.”

“I saw Marovich’s campaign manager this afternoon. He says this case is a ‘good issue’. What is it exactly the D.A. says you did?”

“Says we coerced some witnesses to identify a murderer, tainted the conviction.”

“Did you do it? Little rubber hose action on the witnesses?”

“The witnesses were ten- or eleven-year-old kids. And I told you this morning, it was a good case.”

“That’s what you said.” I yawned again.

“Better put you to bed early tonight.”

“Good. A bath. Food. To bed.” I rolled over on my side and stroked his cheek. “But what if I have other things in mind than sleeping?”

“You usually do.”

It was just getting interesting there on the floor when the telephone rang, the beige one, the separate line Mike keeps for calls from Parker Center. Nine times out of ten, when that phone rings Mike has to put on his tie and go off to work. I hate that phone.

When the ringing started, Mike tried not to react too quickly, and I didn’t let him go. We were at home, finally. Alone, finally. Whatever it was could wait, I was sure.

By the third ring I had lost him-I could feel him growing more tense-so I rolled away, grabbed the phone, and passed it to him. He had the grace to mutter, “Damn,” before he accepted the call.

The call was just one more aggravation at the end of an altogether annoying day. I wanted a long walk on the beach until I figured that would mean another hour on the freeway. So, I went in to start the tub.

Bowser had trashed the bathroom, too. I left the rubble to be cleaned up later, except for wadding up great lengths of toilet paper streamers because they tangled underfoot.

I turned on the water, scooped up a handful of spilled bubble bath from the floor, and dumped it under the running tap. Just about the time the bubbles crested the top of the tub, Mike came in, looking grim. As he stood there watching me undress, his expression only grew blacker.

“Do you have to go in?” I asked.

“No.”

“What’s up?”

“I retire in two years and five months.”

“Really?” I said. “You haven’t reminded me for three minutes.”

He slouched against the doorjamb, taut muscles working along his jaw as he pulled off his sweaty polo shirt. “Who was on the phone?” I asked.

“The lieutenant. He had some questions.”

I straightened up and faced him. “How much trouble are you in, Mike?”

“None. It’s just a big pain in the butt.”

“So?”

“So, I don’t want to go through it.” He kicked off his sneakers as he fumbled with his belt. “In the wrong circumstances, two years and five months can be one hell of a long time.”

“Uh huh. What are you thinking?”

He had his jeans down around his knees, but he stopped to look at me. A long, hard look. When he reached for my hands, his gray eyes were dark with some powerful feelings I couldn’t read.

“I’ll tell you what I’m thinking,” he said, at last. “I’ve had it. If I retire right now, I can draw almost half of my pension. By Christmas, we could be living in the woods a thousand miles from the city.”

“Dream on.”

“I’m serious.”

“Then go ahead and quit. But first tell me how you’re going to pay Michael’s tuition at Occidental for the next four years on a partial pension. Don’t forget to add rent for him, because he won’t be able to live at home with you if home is a thousand miles away.”

“You mean, live with us.”

“No. I’ll still be here, chauffeuring Casey to performing arts school and working. You’re the only one retiring. I don’t have a pension to retire on.”

“You sound mad.”

“I’m getting there,” I said. The bubble bath suddenly looked ridiculous. “If you are serious, then you should have had this revelation before last week. We made a deal, you and me. Two years and five months in L.A., then we talk about going back to civilization. Tell me about pain in the butt: I jumped through hoops to get work down here, find office space, rent out my house, enroll Casey in a new school, move all our shit. We haven’t even found our way to the closest dry cleaner yet, so you damn well better not start talking about bugging out for another two fucking years and five months.”

“Whoa,” he said. “Sorry.”

“Exactly. Whoa.” I was steaming by the time I got to that point, but he had the beginnings of a smile for some reason. “Now what?” I demanded.

“Did you know your nipples get hard when you’re mad?”

“Did you know your dick gets hard when I’m mad?”

He looked down at the front of his boxer shorts, at the single eye peeking out through the fly. I reached into the fly, brought out that spying eye and kissed it.

“Either get into the tub,” I said, gently squeezing, “or lie down here on the floor. But do it right now.”

Mike threw back his head and laughed. “I thought you were tired.”

“Which will it be?” I stroked him.

“The tub.” He took me by the hand. “We just have time for a quick scrub-a-dub, though. My father’s coming over to meet you.”