As Shannon drove, he could hear heavy breathing coming from Maguire along with sporadic choking noises that would last for a few seconds before sputtering out, then Maguire’s heavy breathing again. There were moments where Shannon was afraid the guy was going to suffocate. At one point he glanced over and saw his passenger’s face dead still and lit up by the moonlight like something waxen, not quite alive. Then the heavy breathing and sputtering kicked in.
When he arrived back at Maguire’s townhouse, he shook Maguire until he opened his eyes. At first there was only disorientation and confusion in those eyes, then a heaviness fell over his face as he realized where he was. “Shit,” he moaned. “No way I can climb those stairs tonight. Too fucking tired. I think I’ll sleep here.”
“Your choice,” Shannon said. He folded the car keys into Maguire’s large pudgy hand. “If I left those in the ignition you could get picked up for DUI, even if you’re sitting in the passenger seat.”
“Much obliged.”
Shannon gave him a hard look. “If you want I can help you up the stairs,” he said.
“Oh man, like to take you up on it, but too tired for that. I’ll just put the seat down.”
He lowered his seat until he was mostly horizontal, then wet his lips as he started to doze off again.
“You were going to give me your cell phone number,” Shannon said.
“Yeah I was,” Maguire said, waking. He recited his cell number slowly, his breath heavy. Then, with his voice trailing off, said, “Tomorrow, call me tomorrow.”
Shannon opened both windows a few inches so there’d be fresh air coming in, then turned off the headlights and made sure the car doors were locked before he left.
When he got home, he found Susan curled up in bed. She stirred when she heard him, twisting her body so she could look back at him, and told him in a drowsy voice that she’d felt tired and had gone to bed early. “You’ll join me soon?” she asked, her beautiful brown eyes half closed as she smiled at Shannon.
He told her he would, then reached over so he could taste her soft lips and feel the moistness of them. Before leaving the bedroom, he checked his email and saw he had no messages. He moved to the living room where he sat cross-legged on a rug, slipped on headphones and played the cassette Eli had made for him. He had a hard time concentrating on it, his mind wandering over the same thoughts as before as he tried to figure out why he was taking this double-murder case. About the time he gave up on the cassette, he decided that it wasn’t a simple question. He had a host of conflicting reasons driving him, altruistic and not-so-altruistic ones, and seemingly every shade in between. When he got into bed, he continued to have difficultly focusing on both Eli’s exercises and his dream work, eventually falling into a fitful sleep where his mind raced down paths that he’d just as soon stay away from. He didn’t find any peace until he turned on his side and, in his sleep, drew Susan’s small body into his, her backside pushed hard into his stomach, his left arm draped around her middle.
Chapter 6
Shannon woke early so he’d have time for a five mile run down Baseline to Flagstaff Drive. Even though it was only a quarter past six and there was a coolness in the air, he could tell from the cloudless sky and the warmth of the sun against his face that it was going to be another hot day. When he got to the beginning of Flagstaff and started the uphill part of his run, he pushed himself hard, trying to sprint up the Flatirons to his halfway point. By the time he reached a gnarled crabapple tree that he knew marked two and a half miles from his apartment, he was gasping in air, his chest aching as if it were going to explode. He turned and coasted down the mountain, letting gravity do most of the work as he took long, bounding strides and at times almost creating the allusion of flying. He tried to clear his mind and concentrate on his breath, fixing his eyes on the fields above Chautauqua Park. Off in the distance he spotted a hawk circling the plains below and watched as it made a quick dive to the ground. Chipmunks and squirrels rushed in the grass and underbrush nearby. Occasionally he’d spot one of them. By the time he returned to Baseline, he had his breathing back under control. A couple of other runners nodded to him as they passed by. He maintained a moderate pace on the mile and a half back to his apartment, trying to give the layer of sweat coating his body a chance to dry.
Susan was waiting for him at the small ceramic table they were able to fit in their kitchen. Even though the kitchen was tiny, it had a bright and airy feel to it, no thanks to Shannon. The day after Susan moved in, she painted the walls a bright yellow and added other little touches to give the space a country kitchen feel to it.
“Have a good run?”
She was wearing one of his T-shirts as a nightgown and had a bowl of fresh fruit and granola in front of her alongside another bowl she had prepared for Shannon. Sitting there without any makeup and her long black hair mostly a mess from getting out of bed, she still took his breath away. He stood for a long moment before sitting at the table next to her.
“You’ve got my heart pounding faster now than when I was running up Flagstaff,” he said.
She laughed at that.
“You find that funny, huh?” he asked. “We’ll see how funny it is when you try explaining to the paramedics why I collapsed clutching my chest and why the big smile stretched across my face. Although one look at you and I think they’ll understand.”
She reached out and took hold of his good hand. “You didn’t answer my question,” she said.
“It was a good run. I needed it to clear my head.” Lifting her hand to his lips, he kissed it quickly. “This breakfast looks great, by the way. Thanks for putting it together.” He mixed some honey into the granola and took a spoonful of it, making sure to include some of the raspberries and blueberries she had added. “I’m going to have to get some business cards made up,” he said. “Maybe I’ll call myself the Crunchy-Granola Detective.”
She laughed again. “Hon, I don’t think it matters how much granola you eat or what type of metaphysical studies or new age classes you take. I don’t think you’d ever fit the definition of crunchy-granola.”
“You don’t, huh?”
“No, I don’t think so. If I’d made hardboiled eggs for breakfast instead, that would’ve been a better fit for you.”
“So I’m just a hardboiled egg?” he asked, a wry grin showing.
She placed a small hand on his cheek and caressed his skin lightly. “You’re definitely a tough guy,” she said. “You’d have to be to survive what you did. So why the funny mood this morning? What’s going on?”
“I guess nothing. When I saw Eli at the Center yesterday, he asked me to try to figure out why I’m still doing detective work, and you know, it’s a pretty good question. It just seems to be opposite to what I’m trying to do with my life here in Boulder.”
“I think you’re overanalyzing this,” she said. “Whatever the reason, it doesn’t matter. Whether it gives you purpose, a way to help people, or whatever. Personally, I think it’s because you’re driven to put bad guys away. But again, it doesn’t matter as long as you’re getting satisfaction from it.”
Shannon was going to recite Eli’s long-standing arguments about how it was interfering with the dream work and out-of-body experiences he was trying to induce, but decided against it. Instead, he took her hand from his cheek and gently kissed each small white knuckle before letting go.
“I forgot to ask you,” Susan said, her eyes sparkling, “how was the game?”
“It was fun. Sox won it in the ninth. I couldn’t quite get into it, though. I think I was distracted by this case.”
“I could’ve told you that would happen,” she said. “Whenever you take a case, your mind’s always churning away working on it. And it doesn’t stop until you’ve solved it. There’re times when I’ll look at you and know you’re a million miles away fitting together all of your clues and planning out your next move.”