And then I heard it. A sound. A horrible, libido-killing sound.
Phin was snoring.
My hand stopped, flattening out like someone had stomped on it. I shrunk back, turned and faced the other way, the luxurious heat of arousal transforming into the sting of rejection. Giggly and turned on to red-faced humiliation in less than three seconds. It had to be some kind of record.
I closed my eyes and swore that if he ever tried to touch me again I’d break off his fingers. Then I tried to sleep.
Exhausted as I was, sleep didn’t come.
CHAPTER 30
LUCKY BITCH.
It had a December 31 vibe, like counting down the seconds until the new year, and Alex had been looking forward to seeing the monochromatic fireworks of poor Lance’s head blowing up. But lucky Jack stormed in at the last possible second and saved his miserable life.
How anticlimactic.
Things became interesting again when the two cops arrived, but Jack killed the live feed in the middle of that little drama. Cue commercial. Switch channels.
Alex considers her next move. It’s still too early to pay Jack’s ex a visit, so she spends some time on the Internet, reading up on defibrillators, replying to an e-mail in her anonymous account, learning about bulletproofing a vehicle. Boring stuff, but necessary. Then she logs on to the homepage of her pay-as-you-go cell phone ser vice provider. The phones are impossible to trace, but they do keep track of minutes and numbers called. Because Alex is spoofing caller ID, most of the numbers listed are 555-5555.
But there are a few real numbers. The numbers Jack has called from the phone Alex gave her.
One of them is interesting. An 800 number. Alex makes a mental note to call it later.
At a little after seven a.m. she dresses in the police uniform and goes for a ride, finding a twenty-four-hour con ve nience store and picking up two rolls of duct tape and some quick energy foods: chips, beef jerky, candy bars. She also gets a six-pack of bottled water.
It’s going to be a thirsty day.
Back at the hotel she checks her appearance and then knocks on Alan’s door.
“Yeah?” he answers.
Alex steps away from the peephole, letting him see her good profile and her cop clothes.
“Mr. Daniels? It’s about your ex-wife.”
She resists a smile when she hears the lock turn, the Cheetah stun gun palmed in her right hand.
Two seconds after the door opens, Alan is on his knees. Two seconds after that, he’s facedown on the carpeting.
Alex checks the hallway for witnesses, and seeing none, drags Jack’s husband to bed.
CHAPTER 31
I FELT LATHAM’S ARM slip around my waist and I sighed, happy it had all been some horrible dream.
But it didn’t feel like Latham’s arm-it felt like a stranger’s-and everything came back at once and I jolted, then went rigid.
“You okay?” Phin, his voice sleepy.
“Yeah. Just forgot where I was.”
Phin’s hand was still on my hip, burning there like an iron. I nudged it off.
“I wasn’t trying anything.”
“I know.” My tone had more regret in it than I might have liked.
Sunlight peeked in through a crack in the drapes. I looked at the clock radio. A little past ten a.m. I’d managed about four hours of sleep. Not too bad. I’ve been able to function on less.
I rubbed my eyes, felt some crud in the corners, and immediately wondered how my hair looked. My breath was probably awful as well. I wanted to get up, dress in the bathroom, but didn’t want Phin to see me in my underwear. Earlier it seemed daring. Now it was just plain embarrassing.
“I’m not used to waking up next to cops,” Phin said. “Especially pretty ones.”
I felt his finger trail up my spine. I flinched away.
“Jesus, Jack. We’re both adults.”
I faced him, hugging the sheet to my chest.
“You’re a good-looking guy, Phin. I’m sure you’ll rebound quickly.”
He smiled and locked his hands behind his head, triceps bulging.
“Do you like being miserable? Is that your thing?”
His pillow talk needed some work.
“No, Phin. Like most other people in the world, I actually try to be happy. And sometimes I actually achieve it for brief periods of time. But to me, being an adult means having responsibilities.”
I was lecturing, but Phin appeared more amused than chastised.
“I used to be like that. Feeling like the only thing holding the world together was my self-discipline.”
“There’s a difference between taking care of business and being a control freak.”
“I know that. Do you?”
And to think I almost slept with this guy.
“I try to do my best. Sometimes it doesn’t work out, but I keep trying. It’s all I can do.”
Phin adopted a pensive look as if he was considering what to say next. I waited, feeling dorkier and dorkier in my sports bra and red pan ties.
Finally, he spoke.
“Let me tell you a story, Jack. Young man. Had a decent paying job in an office. Was in love with a girl who loved him back. They even had the wedding date set.”
“This is you, I’m guessing.”
“It was me. Living the American dream, on my way to two-point-five kids and a thirty-year fixed mortgage.”
“So what happened? One day you just decided a life of crime was sexier?”
His eyes went somewhere else. “I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Told I had eight months to live. Maria-Maria Kilborn, my bride to be-she and I were…right. Like we were supposed to be together. You know? When someone is just perfect for you?”
I nodded, a lump forming in my throat. “I know.”
Phin focused, smiled sadly. “But she wasn’t strong, Jack. She was strong in some ways. But not emotionally. She cared about people. A lot. Maybe too much. I remember driving home from the doctor’s office, thinking about how I was going to tell her, seeing it in my head. And I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t hurt her like that. Not only the telling her, but thinking about her watching me die…”
Phin cleared his throat, then scratched the back of his neck.
“So I didn’t go home. I rented a hotel room, called an escort ser vice, and fucked my brains out while Maria was going crazy wondering where I was. She tracked down our credit card usage, came to my room, saw me with the whore. There was screaming, crying. She told me she never wanted to see me again. And she kept the promise.”
I made a face. “Do you think that was noble, what you did? Breaking up with her instead of being honest?”
His gaze was intense. “You tell me, Jack. Is it easier to hate someone, or to miss them after they die?”
I thought about Alan, who left me, and Latham, who left me in a different way.
Phin was right. Losing Latham hurt more.
So was he a coward, or was he being strong?
When I met Phin, on the Job, I’d immediately liked him. He’d been involved in a gang fight, three against one. They were armed. Phin wasn’t. All three wound up in the hospital.
During the arrest Phin was compliant, polite, even jovial. Like he didn’t have a care in the world. I bumped into him accidentally sometime later, at a local pool hall, and we began playing eight ball on a somewhat regular basis. He was attractive, sure, but I think the thing that drew me to him was his attitude. He seemed free. Even bald from the chemo, taking breaks between games to go throw up, he seemed more at ease with himself than anyone I’d ever met.
I wondered what it would be like to live in the moment like that. To not worry about anything other than the now. Was it liberating? Or empty? Brave or weak?
“This was a few years ago.” Phin turned on his side, propping his head up on his hand. “I had surgery. Had treatments. Still kept getting worse. Nine to five didn’t really seem that important anymore, so I quit. Eventually I ran out of money, lost my insurance. Lived on the street, day by day, getting by. But something funny happened. I didn’t die.”