Part 37 (2/2)

sometime soon and earn my rent.”

”Right. Hutch will be by later to pick you up. He'll drop you off at my place after dark.”

* 245 *

”What a glamorous life,” I commented.

”Right. Mick? You won't like this, but the gun Beaugez used was the gun that killed Elmo Turner.”

”What? That doesn't make sense. That's not...”

”Calm down,” Ranson ordered. ”It's probably an odd coincidence.

Milo throws it away or p.a.w.ns it, and Ben gets it through some perverse fluke. I doubt that it means anything..”

”Then why the h.e.l.l tell me?”

”Should I let you read about it in the paper?”

I shook my head. Ranson had to be right, it couldn't mean anything.

When I didn't reply, she said, ”See you later,” and left. I sat around and read law books out of sheer boredom and to keep myself occupied.

Idle hands are the devil's workshop, Aunt Greta had always said. Aunt Greta could go to h.e.l.l, I decided. I didn't want to think about her anymore. That was easy. The hard part was not thinking about having made love to Cordelia last night.

Hutch came and got me a little after six. By the time we got up to Ranson's, she was already there. She hurried me in, then talked briefly to Hutch.

”Make yourself at home,” she said as she came back in. ”You know how, I'm sure.”

”As if I had any choice,” I replied.

”I've got to work on some reports,” she said, and she went into her study.

I didn't see her until eleven when the phone rang. From what I heard, I gathered it was Alex. They talked for a while. After she hung up, Ranson suggested that it was time for bed. ”I'm very tired,” she added, with a yawn to prove her point.

”Yeah, me, too,” I agreed, though I didn't really want to go to sleep. There would be no one to hold away my fears tonight.

Ranson disappeared into her bedroom after helping me unfold the couch and make it up.

I turned out all the lights, save the one next to me. As tired as I was, I still didn't want to sleep. Waiting is always the hardest part. That's what I was reduced to these days. Just waiting. And remembering.

If Ranson had had headphones, I would have listened to music, even the sixties rock and roll she seemed so fond of. Instead I found my * 246 *

bottle of Scotch and took a swig. Another couple of shots and I would be able to sleep.

A light from the bedroom door fell across me. Ranson stood watching me.

”I forgot to brush my teeth,” she said, a tight anger in her voice.

She couldn't miss seeing the bottle.

”I thought you were asleep,” I mumbled.

”You'll get yourself into trouble with that. Drinking alone.”

”I am in trouble,” I replied. ”Remember?”

”That's the solution? Drinking cheap Scotch by yourself?” she said contemptuously.

”Oblivion's better than pain.”

”Pain will still be here in the morning.”

She came over to me and put her hand on the Scotch bottle to take it away. I tightened my grasp and wouldn't let her have it.

She suddenly let go. ”Do as you like,” she said. Then she turned and left, going back into her bedroom and shutting the door.

I sat still, not moving. Then I defiantly took a large swallow of the Scotch. It burned all the way down. I took another one. Finally, I put the bottle down. Then I fell asleep.

I shuddered awake. I had been having a dream. A nightmare. My father was there. No, not my father, but what death had made him.

Blackened and burned, almost beyond recognition. He led a parade of the dead and dying. Barbara Selby, with blood dripping out of her head, dyeing her hair a harsh crimson. Frankie, with his guts hanging out, dragging behind him like a ghastly tail. And Ben with half his head gone. They were coming after me. Telling me that they would never leave me alone. The final horror hit me when I realized that I was awake and that I knew it to be true. They would never leave me. I would carry their memories until the day I died.

I sat shaking, holding myself. I thought of waking Joanne, telling her that tonight was the night I needed her to hold me. But I was afraid of her anger and that she would dismiss my dream as a result of my drinking.

I got up and paced the living room, trying to get the b.l.o.o.d.y and burned images out of my head, but I couldn't walk away from my memories. I stood staring out the window, watching and waiting for the gray dawn to come.

* 247 *

When Ranson came out of her bedroom in the morning, she found me dressed, with coffee already made. ”What are you doing up?” she growled, still groggy.

”It's a free country. I can wake up when I feel like it.”

”You look like s.h.i.+t. But cheap Scotch will do that to you.”

”It's hard to get decent Scotch when you're under arrest,” I retorted.

Ranson's jaw tensed, but she didn't say anything. She went into the bathroom and slammed the door.

I sat drinking coffee.

Ranson came back out of the bathroom. ”You can stay with Danny,” she said. ”I don't want you here.”

”I don't want to be here.”

”I'm not watching you drink your life into the gutter. You want to be a f.u.c.k-up, be a f.u.c.k-up somewhere else.”

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