Telling Lies

Chapter Eighteen

“I clean now,” Mrs. Lim said, struggling behind a cart stocked with enough cleaning equipment to put any hotel maid to shame. “You don’t look so good. You go rest.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I think I will.”

I had a lot to think about. Somewhere in the back of my mind, it was all beginning to gel-old mayhem, fresh mayhem. The possible connections between what had happened to Emily and events from twenty-something years before were both legion and intriguing. I could think of a variety of reasons why someone might want to keep those connections buried. Many of us live, work, on a keen edge that can be easily shattered, each of us perhaps with a different vulnerability.

I was thinking about what Celeste had said. If rumor got out that I was a drunk, perverse, belonged to the KKK, had AIDS, I would have major trouble getting project funding-a big chunk of arts donations comes from rich folks who are politically and socially sensitive themselves. If the charge is set in the right place it doesn’t take much to blast most of us out of the water.

Some people are better survivors than others. My father had avoided being blacklisted during the fifties only by waiting out the craziness by taking a research position with a European university. Many of his colleagues hadn’t been as prescient and had disappeared from academia.

I thought I was getting closer to the answer, but there were still many missing pieces.

I called my mother, but got the answering machine. The message, typical of Mother’s efficiency, said, “Emily tolerated the move to Palo Alto very well. Her condition remains stable. The rest of the family is fine. We hold our friends so dear and thank you for caring.” That was that.

Another call netted me the information that Rod Peebles was hosting a holiday open house for his major supporters in his district offices later in the morning. I was told he was due to show in an hour or so, the variable there depending, I suspected, on how late his night before had been. For at least an hour, then, I was a bit at loose ends. So, while Mrs. Lim attacked what was left of the fingerprint technician’s spotty mess, I turned on the television and tried to get through a few more of the videotapes.

It was tough going, watching Emily and her group perform at demonstrations around the county: at a massed rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, marches on college campuses, speeches given in auditoriums, in city parks, in front of various federal buildings and induction centers.

I heard their cant over and over, heard their blueprint for a perfect world. It sounded so young, so impossibly utopian. It was a beautiful dream, the world they were fighting to create. Peace and love, equality for all, government of the people and by the people. It was also a seductive dream, and I suspect that’s what made the message seem so dangerous. Someone in high places was afraid of them: the official response to their challenge was generally armed troops or squads of itchy-looking police.

Emily and her comrades preached passive resistance, but they were not creampuffs. As often as not, the demonstrations ended in violent routs. Sometimes before they even got underway they were cut off by a furious storm of nightsticks and rifle butts. I watched, with the ache of fear and dread, my knees pulled up to my chest and my hands clenched, as men in riot gear poured into the crowds of unarmed protesters.

Sometimes the men with batons swung their sticks like machetes to cut through the mass of demonstrators. Other times, they seemed to pick a target, always a long-haired kid. They would swarm over the kid, hold on to his arms so he couldn’t cover his head, and beat him, their sticks swinging again and again like spokes on a broken windmill. I don’t understand how anyone survived. When it was over, the men in uniform, smiling, spent, would drag the longhair away. Sometimes there would be a closeup of a bloody face, a semi-conscious kid suspended between two men in uniform, blood pouring into his beard.

On several tapes, I saw Jaime go down into that windmill. Once, Lucas was pulled off a park bandstand and submerged into the netherworld of batons and combat boots. He came up flashing a peace sign with bloodied fingers.

When Garth put together the tapes for me, he had intercut the scenes of violence at peace demonstrations with bits of Vietnam war footage, other young men being brutalized in a very different way. It was a matter of news chronology, I knew, and not an artistic or political device. But juxtaposed in this way, the two parts of those war years – the homefront and the war zone looked strangely similar. Where was the war? It was a lot to absorb.

My parents, when I lived at home, used to restrict my television watching. And at school, we were allowed access only on the weekends. I grumbled about it as a matter of form. After seeing Emily take some good licks, I began to see their wisdom. As a teenager, I doubt I would have been able to handle the scope of both her struggle and her fame.

Though her message was fairly consistent, Emily’s backdrop changed as she traveled back and forth across the country and to Hanoi, Paris, London, Frankfurt. I wondered who covered her travel expenses: Emily was a full-time student, and my parents couldn’t have helped her – they struggled along on a professor’s salary. She must have had enormous debts, financial and otherwise.

As I watched her and her comrades, what began to emerge were patterns, certain consistencies in the interaction of the core group and the crowds, the FBI, the police, the camera. And certainly, with each other.

I was reminded of dummy bumps. My own head hurt. The apartment was stuffy, and too small for Mrs. Lim, me, the TV, and the vacuum at the same time. I gave up and piled all the tapes back into the carton.

I got up to search Emily’s medicine cabinet for some aspirin. She had a shitload of prescription drugs and pharmaceutical samples, but nothing that looked like ordinary aspirin. My days of chemical experimentation are long over, so I passed on it all.

I put on my jacket and went to tell Mrs. Lim that I was going out. When I found her, she had her head in the oven.

“I’m going over to Broadway,” I said. “Need anything?”

Mrs. Lim sat back on her haunches and wiped her face on her sleeve. I make noodle for dinner. You just put in oven, ten minute, maybe fifteen minute.”

“Thank you. You’ve been so wonderful. I could not have gotten through the last two days without you.”

She dismissed the schmaltz with a wave of her hand and picked up her cleaning rag again. “You be one for dinner tonight, or two?”

“Excuse me?” I said.

“Michael Flint leaves his tie under living room chair,” she said, and winked lewdly. I press, you give it back to him.”

“I’ll do that,” I said.

She smiled up at me, showing the gaps among her front teeth. The smile was absolutely salacious. “Noodle for two?”

“That would be perfect. I’ll get out of your way now.”

It was pretty funny, thinking about Mrs. Lim taking someone to her bony breast. But at some point, she must have. The image was damned disconcerting.

On my way out, I found Mike’s tie folded over a hanger by the front door. I ran the red and blue silk through my fingers and thought about Mike and wondered how he was. I really had nothing new to tell him-Mrs. Lim found your tie?

I went into Emily’s study, anyway, and dialed the number on the card he had given me.

“Robbery-Homicide. Pellegrino speaking.”

“Is Detective Flint in?” I asked.

“Sorry, he’s out in the field. Can I take a message?”

“Just tell him Maggie called.”

“Will do.”

I felt vaguely disappointed, and I puzzled over why I felt as

I did all the way downstairs and out across Hill Street. The sky was clearing, deep blue holes burned through gray clouds. It was still windy. My short jacket, the one Jaime had paid for, didn’t offer much warmth. But after the closeness of the apartment, the brisk air was a welcome slap.

I cut through Gin Ling Way, giving Hop Louie’s wide berth, and headed for the shops on Broadway. There were at least a dozen Chinese apothecaries in the long block, but no occidental drugstores. Seeking at most directions to the nearest Thrifty, Jr., I stepped into Hong’s, an apothecary I had once visited with Emily.

Hong’s had been around long enough for the oak cabinets that lined the walls to have acquired a soft, burnished patina. The cabinets had hundreds of tiny drawers, each drawer no more than six inches square on the front. It was the contents of the drawers that gave the place its delicious air of mystery-the ingredients of ancient folk remedies: magic cures for impotence, rashes on the liver, a runny nose. Emily told me that Mr. Hong once offered to mix her a tea that would attract a husband. She had turned him down.

The shop was narrow. Much of the floor space was taken up by barrels and wooden crates filled with dried yellow fish and squid, cuttlebone, a variety of desiccated roots, herbs, preserved seaweed, and aromatic teas. Most of it looked fairly disgusting to the uninitiated eye. But the smell was wonderful, a combination of sharp spice and dry earth.

Mr. Hong, in a white pharmacy coat, stood behind the long glass counter. He was mixing a potion for an ancient man who sat on a high stool at the far end.

I walked over to watch, fascinated. Maybe a little magic was what I needed, too.

Suspended by a cord from Mr. Hong’s forefinger was a scale, a salad-plate-size copper disk. He opened drawers and measured out ingredients, weighed each carefully on his scale, then poured it all into a stone mortar: white beetle carapaces, a length of dry snakeskin, thick black threads of something, a thumb-size bit of a hairy red root. All of this he ground in the mortar. Finally, he poured the powder onto a square of pink paper and twisted the corners.

The old man waiting for this concoction had no teeth and one eye had a milky cloud. He put some money on the counter, tucked the twist of pink paper into his shirt pocket, and shuffled with difficulty toward the door. I hoped the powder had the right magic. I hoped he lived long enough to get home and brew it up. Or whatever he was supposed to do with it.

Mr. Hong smiled at me. “May I help you?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I have a headache.”

He bowed, reached under the counter and brought out two large glass bottles filled with white tablets. “Bayer or Tylenol?” he asked.

“Bayer, please,” I said, smiling to myself.

As I searched my pockets for money, he poured me a glass of water and opened the aspirin. He counted two onto a square of the pink paper and put the paper in front of me.

“It is the change in the weather that makes your head hurt,” he said.

“Is it?” I swallowed the tablets and decided against countering his theory with my own: too many late nights, a bit of booze, a good thumping, hours of old videotapes. Emily. I put the water glass down on the paper and set a dollar next to it. “Thank you.”

He counted out some change and bowed when he handed it to me. “Have a nice day.”

I walked out laughing. Even in Chinatown, weren’t we to be spared? The prospects for the day I faced could hardly qualify for “nice.”

My head began to clear a little. The back of my neck still felt stiff from the blow I had taken at La Placita church, but it was better, too. Maybe “nice” was relative.

I decided to take the bus downtown rather than hassle with Max’s car in traffic. I could get the car anytime. I went down to the Dash stop across from Saigon Plaza and waited in the queue.

Caesar came shambling down the street and saw me before I could decide whether I wanted to speak with him or not. “Hey, pretty lady,” he said. “How you doin’ this fine day?”

“Okay,” I said. “How are you?”

“Not so good, but thanks for asking. You find that dude you was lookin’ for?”

“Not yet.”

“I’ll keep my eyes open.”

I appreciate it.” That should have been good-bye, but he just stood there.

“So?” I said.

“Like I say, I’m not doin’ so good. Don’ know how long I can keep my eyes open.”

I found a couple of singles in my pocket. “Maybe a little pick-me-up would help?”

“Thank you, pretty lady.” He scooted off at a good clip, going a whole lot faster than he had come.

I caught the Dash and took it to Sixth Street, then walked the two and a half blocks down Flower to Rod Peebles’s district office in the Broadway Plaza. When I had called earlier, I hadn’t asked if I could join the party nor even left my name. I thought surprise might be the best approach.

Rod was an enigma to me. After spending a good part of the last twelve hours watching Emily’s core group in action, I still hadn’t figured out how, where, perhaps if, Rod Peebles fit in. He wasn’t quite what he seemed to be.

At every demonstration I had seen on Garth’s tapes, Rod arrived early with the vanguard of people who set up the platform and sound system, got out the propaganda, tacked up the banners, piled picket signs, set up the legal table. They were a very efficient group: each had a task and performed it. But Rod was a floater. He hung around the sound man, though I never saw tools or electrical tape in his hands. He hovered near the boxes of printed matter while others took handfuls and headed off to enlighten passersby. Rod never picked up a flyer, tacked up a banner, touched a picket sign. During speeches, he stood on the platform with the others, but always at the rear. Rod was background noise; he didn’t give speeches.

As far as I could see, Rod’s single function was to keep track of the suits-FBI, campus administration types, I don’t know who else. Lester Rowland seemed to be around a lot. And Rod was always at his elbow.

Within the core group, there was an obvious power elite-Emily, Jaime, Aleda. The others were satellites whose focus was primarily on the Big Three rather than each other. Taken as a whole, they all seemed to be good and affectionate friends, more extended family than comrades in arms. There was always a lot of hugging, supportive cheering, appreciative feedback. Rod was never in the clinches. I never saw him take a lick.

Though they appeared very cohesive in public, I had overheard many bitter arguments among the core group at my parents’ house. I could not remember ever hearing Rod’s voice amid the shouting.

What had Max said about Rod? He didn’t seem to shit, shower, or fuck. He wasn’t a loner by choice. What was his function?

Rod Peebles might have been a walk-on player during the sixties, but in his own seventeenth floor office in the Broadway Towers, he was a star. Billboard art left over from his last campaign plastered an entire wall of the reception area: RE-ELECT ROD PEEBLES, and an eight-foot high air-brushed impression of his face. I don’t know how his staffers could have worked everyday under the gaze of his hand-painted azure eyes.

Except for the poster, the furnishings were very subdued, if a bit posh for a government office. There was a Christmas tree in one corner, a menorah in another; all bases covered. A caterer was setting out trays of pastries and fruit on fold-up tables covered with neutral-colored cloths. I could smell coffee brewing in the big silver urns. The four or five staffers helping with last-minute preparations for the open house were young, well-trimmed and neatly turned out. Rod, at their age, would never have fit in among them.

A bright-looking young man in shirtsleeves and a modified Kennedy haircut walked over to greet me.

“Hi,” he said. “We aren’t quite ready, but welcome.”

“I’m not here for the party,” I said. “I want to speak with the Assemblyman for a moment.”

“Rod’s expecting you?”

“My name is Maggie MacGowen.”

The blank expression behind his smile was filled in by a rush of recognition. “Emily Duchamps?”

“Yes. My sister.”

As I said, he was bright-looking. He took my hand and held it perhaps longer than was necessary, maybe mulling through some possibilities.

“May I see the Assemblyman?” I asked again.

“Have a seat,” he said. “I’ll check.”

The young man went through the heavy mahogany doors that led to the inner office.

Rod Peebles came right out, flushed, showing a lot of capped teeth.

“Maggie,” he crooned, smothering me in an embrace. “Gosh, what a nice surprise.”

“Can we talk somewhere?” I asked.

“Come on inside.”

He ushered me through to an impressive office with a magnificent view of the city. I was hoping for someplace private, but I seemed to have interrupted a meeting. There were half a dozen men and women in intense discussion around the massive granite conference table. They didn’t look like a party crowd. No one even looked up as we walked in. I counted six chairs pulled up to the table, all of them occupied. Rod and I went to a leather sofa against the near wall and found space to sit among a clutter of crossword puzzles and sunflower seed shells.

“What can I do for you, Maggie?” he asked.

“Where is Aleda?”

He threw up his hands. “Damned if I know. I walked on water to get her out-in my custody-but she took off for parts unknown.”

“Am I supposed to believe you?”

“What choice do you have?” he laughed. “What choice do any of us have? Aleda has always done exactly what she wanted, and the rest of us be damned. My neck is really on the chopping block on this, Maggot. She’s called in a couple of times, but she won’t say where she is.”

“Maybe that’s smart, after what happened to Emily,” I said. “But I really want to talk to her.”

“Next time she calls, I’ll tell her.”

The discussion at the conference table grew very loud, seemed to crescendo; then there was a thoughtful silence. Rod seemed oblivious to it. One of the conferees, a tall, thirtyish woman with a well-cut, East Coast suit picked up a thick appointment book and walked over to us.

“Yes, ma’am?” Rod said, looking up at her.

“You up for one more assembly run before we try state senate?”

“You tell me. Am I?”

She grimaced. “That’s the consensus. We’ll make the announcement in April, when you get back from Washington.”

“When do I go to Washington?”

“Rod, did you look over the calendar I gave you?” She could have been speaking to an idiot child. She held her hand out to me.

“Lena Hilgard,” she said. I did my master’s thesis at Columbia on Emily Duchamps and the political ramifications of the Peace Movement.”

“Did you really?” I said. “Why does that make me feel old?”

She finally smiled. “It’s nice to meet you, Miss MacGowen. I admire your films.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I’ve thought for a long time that it would be interesting to do something about political staffers, what their function is within the system.”

“Good idea,” Rod said brightly. “Lena, see if you can work something out with Maggie to coincide with the campaign.”

Lena gave Rod a dubious glance. “Trust me, Miss MacGowen. There are some aspects of politics the public would rather not know about.”

I glanced at Rod and thought she might be right.

“Nice to meet you, Miss MacGowen,” she said, offering her hand again. “Sorry to interrupt.”

Rod passed me a bowl of sunflower seeds. I have a good team,” he said. “Top credentials, everyone.”

I refrained from asking him why they hadn’t saved a seat at the table for him.

“I’ve taken enough of your time,” I said. “If Aleda should call, tell her how much I want to talk to her. I’ll probably be out the rest of the day, but tell her I expect to be at Emily’s all evening.”

“If she calls, I’ll tell her.” He stood up with me and walked me to the door. He stretched. “It’s about lunch time. Want to go out with me for a bite?”

“What about your party?”

I forgot,” he chuckled. “They won’t miss me.”

“Maybe another time,” I said. “I left Max’s Beemer up at the Police Academy last night and I need to go fetch it.”

“Police Academy?” he repeated, as if he hadn’t a clue. Then suddenly he flashed me his poster smile and squeezed my hand. “Always good to see you. Drop in again.”

“Thanks for your time.” Thinking again that Rod wasn’t a loner by choice, I turned and walked out, leaving him to his sunflower seeds and crossword puzzles.

I was in the hall, waiting for the elevator down, when Lena Hilgard slid out of Rod’s office. The edgy way she kept looking over her shoulder toward the office, I knew she had something to tell me. When the elevator came, I held the door for her, ignoring the collective glares of the people inside who were thus forced to wait.

“Looking for me?” I asked.

She nodded, checked the hall a last time, and ducked into the elevator in front of me. There were maybe eight or nine people going down with us. She kept her eyes forward, and her mouth shut, until we came out in the basement shopping mall.

When the other passengers had moved along, she finally spoke: “Don’t worry about Aleda. She’s with friends. When it’s safe, she’ll call you.”

I was dumbstruck for a moment. “Did Rod send you?”

“Good Lord, no.”

Lena was maybe twenty-five or twenty-six. Too young to have known Aleda before she went underground, and too mainstream to have known her after.

I took her by the arm and quick-stepped her into a vacant public telephone alcove. “You talked to Aleda?”

“Not directly. Only to an old friend of hers.”

“Who?”

“I can’t say.”

“I think you’d better.”

“I can’t take that responsibility.” She looked around nervously. I know it seems melodramatic, but honestly, it’s too dangerous to say anything. My only motive was to reassure you.”

“Okay.” I leaned against the cold wall and took a few deep breaths. When I felt calmer, I tried again.

“How do you know this friend?” I asked.

“We became acquainted during the course of my research on Emily Duchamps and the Peace Movement. We’ve stayed in touch. This friend helped me get my job with Rod. And I returned the favor by using Rod’s office to arrange for Aleda’s release.”

“You did?” I asked, leery. “Not Rod?”

She chuckled sardonically. “Rod couldn’t release a fly from a glass of lemonade unless he had a committee to vote on it.”

“You keep saying Aleda’s friend. If this is someone from the old movement, someone with enough pull to get you a job, he or she should be Rod’s friend, too?”

“Think about this,” Lena said. “If Rod Peebles was such a close associate of Emily Duchamps, why is it that when I requested his federal dossier under the Freedom of Information Act, there wasn’t a single document relating to him on file? No surveillance logs, no booking slips, no indictments, not one scrap of political writing?”

“You’re the scholar,” I said. “You tell me.”

“I just did.” She had said her piece and was edging away from me, back toward the elevator. I walked with her.

“Why do you work for Rod if he’s such scum?” I asked.

“Ongoing research.” She punched the elevator call button. “Rod is one of the political ramifications of the Peace Movement.”

“Thanks, Lena,” I said. “Call if I can ever do anything for you.

I waited until she was gone; then I walked back up into the light of day.

If Lena had been telling the truth, the only old friend I could eliminate was Rod Peebles. I thought it wouldn’t be too difficult to track down Aleda when I was ready. I had a more pressing agenda to work on first: I needed something from Celeste.

Celeste lived on the far west side of town, in the posh Holmby Hills area bordering UCLA. I had to retrieve Max’s car to get out there.

First things first. There was a rank of public telephones across Flower Street. I waited for the light, then walked over and waited my turn in line for a phone. I didn’t have any heavy gold chains, or shopping bags, or even a baby in a stroller. I felt awfully out of place.

Mr. T’s jeweler was behind me, waiting impatiently for the phone. I turned my back on him, dropped in two dimes and dialed Mike’s office.

“Robbery-Homicide. Pellegrino speaking.”

“Is Mike Flint back yet?” I asked.

“This Maggie again?” Pellegrino asked.

“Yes.”

“He’s in. Hold on.” I heard him call out, “Hey Flint, call for you on the love line.”

Mike snapped, “Get a life, Elmer,” before he picked up the phone.

“Flint here,” he said. “Don’t pay any attention to these juveniles. You’d think they didn’t have anything better to do than butt into other people’s private affairs. Hi, Maggie.”

“Hi, Mike. You left your tie under the chair.”

He laughed. “Is that where it was? I had to stop and buy one on my way in. Found exactly what I wanted in the newsstand downstairs. Hand-painted hula dancer. Best one in the place. The only one, too.”

“Are the big boys giving you a hard time?”

“Just something for them to do. How are you?”

“I dropped in on Rod Peebles at his office. Very interesting.”

“Oh.”

“That’s all?” I asked. “Oh?”

“I hoped you were going to say something like, last night was fantastic and what am I doing after work.”

“Mrs. Lim is making noodles for dinner. Enough for two.”

“Is she?” he said, drawing it out.

“What time are you off?”

“Three,” he said.

“I thought it might be a good idea to go hang out by the wishing well around four, the time Emily was supposed to be there, see who walks by. Maybe you could meet me there.”

“You’re all business, aren’t you?”

“Not all business.”

“In that case, I’ll meet you by the wishing well at four. What are your plans for the rest of the day?”

“Not much. Get Max’s car. Visit a few old friends.”

“Maggie,” he said, suddenly all seriousness. “Take care of yourself.”

“I’ll see you at four,” I said.

After I hung up, I caught the Dash bus and took it back up through town. I got off at the end of the line on Bernard Street, just north of Chinatown. The Police Academy was maybe a little over a mile further, straight uphill. As long as it wasn’t raining, I thought it would feel good to walk. I crossed under the freeway and found Stadium Way.

The neighborhood below the stadium was interesting, just about all that’s left of old Chavez Ravine. I walked up a steep, curving road, past woodframe and stone houses, heard a few backyard chickens. The storm the night before had given everything a good scouring, washing away the usual coat of dust and smog residue. The houses were pretty rundown, but the air smelled fresh and everything looked bright and shiny. Leftover rainwater dripped from huge trees onto weedy lawns. A rare morning.

There was no sidewalk, so I walked at the side of the street. People greeted me; a toddler honked his trike horn for me. The neighborhood was so peaceful it could only exist in some space warp light years from L.A.

I heard a car approach behind me, so I stepped onto someone’s lawn to give it more room to pass me. The driver went very slow. I hardly looked at the car, an old green Volvo, because, as any woman will tell you, you make eye contact with an asshole who is looking for a pickup and you have a nuisance on your hands. So I only glanced to make sure he wasn’t going to run me down.

A little Toyota truck sped up the hill behind the Volvo and honked impatiently. The Volvo accelerated and passed me with gears grinding. I glanced at his rear as he drove on, noticed that the driver sat low and wore a baseball cap. That is a generic “he.” The hat is all I saw of the driver.

When I came out at the top of the hill, the entire city was fanned out below me. As I skirted Dodger Stadium, the view below was so clear that I could see the ocean, a streak of silver on the horizon where the sun broke through the clouds. I had to stop for a moment to take it all in.

The entire trip had taken less than twenty minutes, but at the end, I felt better than if I’d had a full night’s sleep.

I saw Max’s car ahead in the Police Academy lot, just where I had left it. And in the same pristine condition. Actually better; the rain had washed away the sand and windshield bug kill I had picked up in the desert the day before. The BMW shone.

There were joggers in the hills above the academy. I could hear the police shooting range at a distance, shots fired in pairs-crack crack-followed by a third, single shot. Not quite dancing rhythm, but regular.

Police bodybuilders hung around the weight room above the training field. There was plenty of activity, but overall it was very quiet. I felt mellow.

I took out Max’s keys and set off across Academy Road to the parking lot.

There are a lot of medium green Volvos in this world. Emily drove one. I thought little of the one that had passed me on the way up. Except that it put me in mind of Emily. I started thinking hard about the car when I saw it again, creeping toward me.

As I had before, at first I was thinking only that here was a horny bastard looking for a woman to give a little grief to. Nothing else was logical-I was walking into the Police Academy parking lot. Everything may have seemed quiet, but there were police all around. A guy would have to be insane to bother me there.

In a few seconds, I thought, I would be in Max’s car, and out of there. I knew the acceleration of the Beemer could humiliate an old Volvo with no effort. Still, the situation gave me the creeps-I was glad I had on long pants and a jacket, little flesh showing.

I was still thinking about Emily. Em was shot at close range. With a 9mm automatic of the sort used on Emily, a marksman can regularly hit a target within about fifty yards if he’s good; within seventy yards if he’s lucky. When the distance between me and the Volvo was somewhere between the range of good and lucky, I started to run, flat out, between the rows of parked cars.

Just as I reached the driver’s side of Max’s BMW, I heard the first shot. I ducked. A reflex.

I heard the Volvo rev its motor, as much as a station wagon can rev its motor. I couldn’t tell if the driver was speeding in for the kill or making a fast retreat.

Staying low, I put the key in Max’s lock, turned it, and opened the gates of hell. That’s what it felt like.

A fiery blast rocketed me into the air, flipped me over a couple of times, then slammed me against a stone retaining wall. As I slid to the ground, I felt the stones and mortar peel the skin from my palms. I landed on my butt, dazed and deafened for the moment. I had enough presence left to cover my head against the flaming debris raining down around me.

When the rain of fire stopped, I took a sort of inventory. My right shoulder had taken the brunt of the impact. Though it throbbed, it functioned. The sleeve of my jacket was now a tattered wristlet, and bare skin showed through the knees of my jeans. I wondered about the blood running down my face, but what really bothered me was that I had no idea where I was or what had happened.

An incredible example of female beefcake vaulted the wall behind me and landed hardly rippling the muscles of her Schwarzenegger thighs. She was an Amazon goddess with LAPD 1989 WEIGHTLIFTING CHAMPS stretched across her remarkable chest. I thought I must be hallucinating. She crouched down beside me.

“You okay, ma’am?” she asked in a sweet, concerned soprano voice.

“I think so.” I could hardly hear her, but my own voice boomed in my ears.

“Think you can get up?” the Amazon asked.

“Sure,” I said, but I spoke too soon. I couldn’t find solid ground.

She took my arm and gently assisted. She was a lot to lean against.

“Sure you’re okay?” she asked again.

Being upright made me feel a little queasy, but I nodded. I was glad that she kept a grip on my arm because the ground still felt like pudding underfoot.

I managed to brush myself off. Then I looked out at the parking lot. Billowing black smoke poured into the clean air. The green Volvo was reduced to a smoking chassis at the bottom of a crater. The first row of cars in the lot were completely engulfed in flame.

And so was Uncle Max’s Beemer.