The Burning

Chapter 11

Back at the kitchen table Andrea drained her water in one go. “You’ve been lying to me,” she said.

“We’ll call it even.”

Silence.

“What do we do?” she said.

“The main thing is figuring out where he’s gone. I need your help. You know him better than anyone.”

She tilted her chin upward in grim satisfaction: Of course she did.

“I need to ask some questions without you getting upset. Can you do that?”

“I’m not a child, Clay.”

“No, you’re not. Besides the gun that I saw at your house, do you own any others?”

“No.”

“Is there a chance Luke might’ve gotten ahold of one for himself?”

“No.”

“Would he have told you if he did?”

“Why are you asking me if you don’t believe me?”

“I do believe you. But we both know he’s not allowed to own a firearm. He might’ve kept it a secret to avoid incriminating you.”

“We trust each other.”

I decided not to touch that one. “Fair enough. How’s your financial situation?”

“Why does that matter?”

“The only other explanation I can come up with for the Camaro being at the victim’s house is that Luke sold it to him. Why would he do that it unless he felt he had to? You know how much he loves that car.”

“Not everything is about money, Clay. Not everyone thinks that way.”

“What round of IVF are you on?”

Her mouth pinched.

“Eight,” she said. “Plus four courses of IUI.”

“That’s expensive.”

“I know what it costs.” She tucked her feet under her. “We borrowed.”

“How much?”

“Two hundred thousand.”

“How much is left?”

A shake of the head: Nothing. “Luke wants to stop.”

“Is that what you were fighting about?”

She barked a laugh. “He said we should get a horse, instead.”

“Are you behind on your payments?”

“No.”

“When does the loan come due?”

“It’s... There’s no deadline.” A beat. “It’s from your parents.”

My mother is an office manager. My father teaches middle school math and science.

“How can they afford that?” I asked.

“They took a second mortgage. What’s the first explanation?”

“What explanation?”

“You said money was ‘the only other explanation’ for the car being there. What’s the first explanation?”

I didn’t answer.

Andrea shrank back in revulsion. “You think he did it.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You don’t have to. I can read you. You’re thinking it.”

“What I think is we need to find him before anyone else does, and to do that we need to line up all the facts, regardless of how unpleasant they might be. He might not be in any trouble.”

“You just got through telling me he is.”

“I said might. I could be wrong. I hope I am. Scott thought Luke could’ve taken off to clear his head. Maybe he talked to my parents. I’ll find out. But I guarantee that if you tell them he’s missing, they’re going to panic. They’re going to want to know why we haven’t called the police. It doesn’t matter what I say. They’ll make an end run around me. Then it’s out of our hands.”

“So?” she said. “We should call the police.”

“A missing adult, they won’t do a thing. The only way to get them interested is if there’s an indication of foul play, and the only way to do that is either to lie to them or to tell them about the car. And you don’t want to do either of those things. Because whatever you believe I think about Luke, I guarantee it’s better than what some random cop is going to think.”

She wiped her face again, roughly.

I said, “I’m sorry to have to ask this, but is there a chance he could be seeing someone else?”

“That’s what you come up with? One fight and he’s having an affair? No. There’s no one else. I know him and he knows me. If he wants to be free, I’d let him.”

“Okay. Who else would he turn to in a pinch? Who’s he close with?”

“Scott’s who comes to mind.”

“People from his gym? Couples you socialize with?”

“We keep to ourselves.”

“You must have friends.”

“Of course we have friends.”

I took a pad and pen from the counter. “Make a list.”

“They’re not going to talk to you. You could be anyone. I’ll do it.”

“The whole point of this is to keep things quiet.”

“No, Clay. The whole point is Luke.”

The thought of her ad-libbing made me uneasy. But I’d involved her. She was a variable I now had to account for. On top of that, it was in my interest to keep her occupied. “Fine. Call them and let me know what they say. Call your credit card companies and see if he’s used his recently. The more dead ends you can eliminate, the better. What about people from NA?”

“I told you, he’s clean.”

“Okay, but he spends time with them, and he might tell them things he doesn’t tell you. Where does he attend meetings?”

She rolled her empty water glass between her fingers. “We’ve moved on.”

“Moved on from what?”

She did not answer.

“He’s stopped going,” I said. “Am I hearing you right? Is that what you’re saying?”

“I’m saying we’re beyond that.”

“What happened to ‘Once an addict, always an addict’?”

“A one-size-fits-all approach might help in the beginning, but an individual’s needs change over time. You want to be rigid, be rigid. Are you the same person you were when you were twenty?”

“Why would you stop doing something that’s working?”

“It wasn’t working. Not for us. You’re not listening.”

“How do you know he hasn’t relapsed?”

“We’ve been managing this way without a problem for two years.”

“Managing with what.”

“Diet. Exercise. Self-care. You need to read a little, Clay.”

I gave myself a second. “How about this: Where did he used to go for his meetings?”

She named a church in Moraga. “You’re wasting your time, though.”

“I’m covering all the bases. What about people from prison? Does he associate with any of them?”

“He’s been out for five years. That’s in the past.”

“Did he have a beef with anyone inside? Anything that could follow him out?”

“No... I don’t know. Who is this person?”

“Which person?”

“The man who died.”

News about the murder would go public soon enough. Withholding Vandervelde’s name served little purpose. And she might know something about him.

“Rory Vandervelde,” I said.

Her silence read as despair, not deception. Her face was moist and flushed. Candlelight scooped out her cheeks, the cavities beneath her eyes. I felt her sorrow touch mine.

“Who is he?” she asked.

“A car collector. That’s the only connection I can see between them. If Luke was looking to sell the Camaro, this guy had the means to buy it.”

“I’ve never heard of him.”

“It’s okay.” I tapped the pad with the pen. “Please write down the password to Luke’s Gmail account.”

“Why?”

“So I can see who he was in contact with. Starting with the victim.”

“Why do you have to keep calling him that?”

“That’s what he is.”

“You’re acting like it’s Luke who made him into a victim.”

“I—”

“What happened to lining up facts?”

“That’s what I’m doing.”

“No, it’s not. All you want to talk about are things that make him look guilty. What does he have to do to prove himself to you?”

“That’s not the issue here.”

“Oh please. Please.”

She rolled her eyes. My face got hot.

“You know what, Andrea? You want to know what I think? Okay. Here’s what I think. I think it’s one hundred percent possible he did something terrible.”

“Great, well, at least you’re admitting it.”

“I think it’s totally possible. But there are other possibilities, such as that he’s overdosed. Or he’s out somewhere, suicidal. Or he owes someone money, he pissed someone off, and they did something to him. What I’m trying to do is sort through all that, but unless you cut the self-righteous bullshit I’m never going to get anywhere.”

She lurched from her chair and vomited into the sink.

I went over to help her. She swung her arm to keep me at bay. She retched, spat, wiped her face on a dish towel, and hobbled past me to the living room sofa.

I stood in the doorway. “I’m sorry.”

Her eyes were shut, her fists clenched over her heart. “It’s not you, it’s the medication.”

“Do you need anything?”

“An ice pack would be nice.”

I opened the freezer and was greeted by the warm breath of over-thawed meat. Tepid pink water had pooled on the shelves. It dripped onto the kitchen floor. I’d forgotten.

I soaked a dish towel under the faucet, wrung it out, and brought it to her. “No ice. Best I can do.”

She spread the compress on her forehead. A weary, resentful peace settled over the room, like a drowning man giving in to his fate.

“He loves you,” she said.

“I know. I love him, too.”

“Do you?”

“Of course I do.”

“That’s not what I meant. I meant do you know it.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t think you do.”

I kept silent.

“You should hear the way he talks about you.” She shifted onto her side. “Like you’re some kind of god he needs to beg forgiveness from.”

“I never him asked for that.”

“It doesn’t matter whether you did or you didn’t. It’s there.”

“Since when does he care about my opinion?”

“You really believe that.”

“He never has.”

“Then you’ve never paid attention.”

I said nothing.

“He has a few different passwords he uses,” she said.

I brought her pen and paper. She jotted down strings of letters and numbers.

“Thank you,” I said.

She stretched out again and put the compress on. I sat on the floor against the Great Wall of Cardboard.

“It’s not my forgiveness to grant,” I said. “If that’s what he wants, he should talk to the families of the women he killed.”

“He wanted to.”

Restorative justice.

It’s what your brother believes in.

“Is that what he said?”

“He said he wished he could apologize to them.”

“When?”

“I don’t know. A while ago. I told him not to contact them. That he’d only be reviving their trauma.”

For once I agreed with her. “Did he listen to you?”

She peeled off the towel and rose on her elbows. “Why?”

“If anybody has a good reason to want to hurt Luke, it’s them.”

Her throat was pulsing, her eyes bright with terror. “I told him it would be a bad idea. I—”

A knock cut her off.

A voice called, “San Leandro police.”

I said, “Wait here.”

Through the peephole I made out two blocky shapes at the foot of the porch steps.

I opened the door. A flashlight shone in my eyes.

“Evening, sir. We received a call about a disturbance at this location.”

The bald man, driving the red SUV.

The uniforms introduced themselves as Officers Broder and Huang. They asked my name and who else was home. I called Andrea over. She came to the door holding the wet compress against her forehead. Just the kind of thing you’d put over a bruise, if the power was out and you didn’t have any ice.

Broder said, “Is everything okay here, ma’am?”

Andrea looked at me. “What’s going on?”

“Somebody decided to be a hero,” I said.

“If you don’t mind stepping outside,” Huang said, “we’d like a word with each of you individually.”

“I’m fine,” Andrea said.

“Do what they say,” I said.

Even after we had established that she and I were not partners; that it was my residence and not hers; that I was a peace officer; that there was no allegation of violence; that neither she nor I knew the man in the red SUV or had asked him for help; even after Andrea began to lose her patience and complain that this was harassment, and their focus shifted from me to her — aha, she’s the crazy one — Broder and Huang were reluctant to leave the scene before Andrea did.

It was almost midnight. We’d been standing on the front lawn, two islets of two people each, for an hour. I had to force myself not to look toward my car, where a trash can liner containing a handgun sat in the footwell.

I said to Huang, “One minute to talk to her in private, please.”

He conferred with Broder. They backed off to the sidewalk.

“Go home,” I said to Andrea. “Get some sleep.”

“How am I supposed to sleep?”

“Lower your voice, please.”

“We can’t sit around and do nothing.”

“We’re doing what we can. Keep your phone turned on and nearby.”

She glanced at the cops.

“Andrea. Promise me you’ll listen for your phone.”

“Yes. Fine. Yes.”

“Okay. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

She walked to her car. I started for the house, waving to the cops. “Have a good night.”

Officer Huang nodded. They were still there when I went inside.