Burn Out (17 page)
“When do we have to respond?” I asked.
“Not till after the first of the year.”
“That gives us some leeway.”
A pronounced sigh. “Shar, can I be frank with you?”
“Of course.”
“This is urgent. It’s hard to find decent space for an operation of our size in the city. And there’re other things here that need your attention.”
“Such as?”
“Adah Joslyn is fed up with the SFPD and considering a move to Denver.” Adah was an inspector on the department’s homicide detail and the live-in love of my operative Craig Morland.
“So if she goes, Craig does, too,” I said.
“Right. Also, morale is at an all-time low here. Mick and Derek have put up a sign on their office door saying ‘genius room’ and it’s pissing off everybody else.”
“For God’s sake, Ted, it’s a joke.”
“It would be if you were here. You’d put an X through the ‘genius’ and write ‘asshole’ instead, and that would be the beginning of a long string of jokes. But without you, everything’s kind of edgy. The staff meetings suck; Patrick’s so . . . earnest.”
They need me.
But do
I
need them?
“Look, Ted, just tough it out a little longer. I’ll talk to Mick, tell him to tone down the nonsense.”
“You need to talk to him about more than that. He’s kind of in a bad place.”
“I thought he was over the breakup with Charlotte—”
“No, he’s not. And he’s engaging in self-destructive behavior.”
“Such as?”
“Booze. Long, dangerous motorcycle rides at night.”
Shit.
“I’ll call Rae and Ricky. Maybe they can straighten him out.”
“Wouldn’t it just be better if you came back and talked with him yourself? I don’t know anybody he respects more.”
Why me? Why am I always the go-to person in a crisis?
“Okay,” I finally said, “I’ll come down and talk with him. Attend Monday’s staff meeting, too. But I’m working on something up here, and I’ll need to get back pretty quick.”
“When’re you planning on coming down?”
“Well, it’s almost the weekend. I could drive there tomorrow, talk with Mick on Sunday, attend the staff meeting on Monday.” An idea occurred to me. “Actually, I have a project for Mick which may take his mind off his misery.”
“Good. Because he’s becoming a major pain in the ass.”
After I ate my neglected sandwich, I went for a ride across the meadow on King. In spite of the splendid, clear day, I couldn’t keep my mind off the Perezes: Ramon’s strength in the face of various tragedies, past and present; Sara’s love that enabled him to go on. Amy’s disappearance, so long ago now that the sheriff’s department had effectively back-burnered it. I’d promised Ramon and Sara I’d try to find her and had run around gathering information, but all that had resulted in was the unearthing of yet another tragedy.
And now things were falling apart in the city, and I’d promised to go down there and try to set things right. . . .
King seemed to sense my melancholy mood. He stopped by some shoots of green grass that were pushing their way through the brown, put his head down, and munched. I stared out across the meadow. Even as winter was closing in, new life was claiming the high desert. After a while I clicked my heels against King’s flanks, and he trotted obediently toward the stables.
What was it Ramon had said to me about horses?
What you need to do is show them that you’re in control, and that you respect them. Then comes the love.
I was in control, and I respected King.
But love? For a
horse
?
When I returned to the house, the answering machine was still doing its chicken imitation but my cell had recharged. It rang soon after the machine gave a final shriek that sounded—to mix a metaphor—like the chicken’s swan song.
“McCone? No new machine yet?” Hy.
“Sorry. Busy day. Where are you?”
“SFO, about to grab a cab for home.”
Home. I could sleep next to him in our own bed tomorrow night, see our cats . . .
“I need a favor.”
“Anything.”
“Will you fly up here tomorrow and take me back?”
“Absolutely.”
“Thanks. There’re some things I need to take care of in the city. And I really want to see you.”
“Me too. Here’s a suggestion: why don’t I come up tonight?”
“Aren’t you tired after that long flight?”
“Not any more.”
“Well, if that’s the case, just phone with your ETA.”
“I’ll do that, darlin’.”
We lazed in bed till almost noon—it had been another nightmare-free sleep for me—and then Hy went over to see how the Perezes were doing. He came back quickly; no one had been there, but he’d left a note of condolence.
“They’re probably still in Sacramento,” I said. “This is so much for one couple to bear. I wish I could help more. . . .”
Hy hugged me. “You already have, McCone.”
“I feel bad, leaving at a time like this. But the situation in the city—”
“I know. And Ramon and Sara will understand.”
“But, Ripinsky, what about King?”
“Who?”
“King Lear.”
“Lear Jet?”
“No, King. Who’s going to take care of him?”
“One of the sheepherders. They know when Ramon’s gone, and they pick up the slack. How d’you think Lear . . . uh, King’s survived all these years?”
“Are you sure the herders know Ramon’s not home?”
“In territory like this, everybody knows what’s going on.”
“Not everybody. Not by a long shot.”
We arrived in San Francisco at around seven that evening. The cats, Ralph and Allie, were happy to see us, and while Hy was ordering a pizza, Michelle Curley, the teenager next door who tended to them and the house when we were away, came over to give us a report and an arrangement of pyracantha berries from her mother’s garden.
’Chelle was an amazing young woman: all-A student; star basketball player; budding entrepreneur. She’d told me only a month before that her dad had volunteered to match the funds she had saved to rehab a wreck of a house in the next block; the purchase had been sealed, and Curley & Curley were in business. I wasn’t to be concerned about losing her as a house-and-cat-sitter, she’d reassured me, because projects like this first one always went over budget and she’d need the cash flow.
Real-estate mogul in the making—purple hair, tiger-striped fingernails, multiple piercings and all.
’Chelle’s report was good: the cats were eating well, the ficus in our bedroom had responded to the new food she’d been giving it, the chimney sweeper had come out and cleaned both fireplaces. We invited her to share the pizza, but she declined, admitting shyly to having a date.
That night we slept peacefully in the new bedroom suite we’d had constructed on the lower level behind the garage. Just before we drifted off I said to Hy, “I can fix these things with Mick and the agency. With you guarding my back, I can fix anything.”
Wrong again, McCone.
The phone woke us before eight that morning. Ricky, saying Mick had been involved in a motorcycle accident and was in critical condition at SF General’s trauma center.
I didn’t ask for details, simply said we’d be there as soon as possible. As I drove, white-knuckled, to the hospital, Hy said, “This is not your fault. You know that.”
“I’ve been up at the ranch wallowing in me, me, me. If I’d been here it wouldn’t’ve happened.”
“Maybe, maybe not. You’re not that powerful.”
I glared at him, and he shrugged, looked out the side window.
The waiting room at the trauma center was quiet at almost nine; presumably most of the victims of a San Francisco Saturday night had been cared for and released or admitted, and their loved ones—if any—sent home. Rae and Ricky sat on a sofa, holding hands. Her face was pale beneath its freckles. His eyes were bloodshot, his hair unkempt; given that and the beard he was growing for a film role he’d accepted, you’d have thought him a derelict who had come in to escape the fog, rather than a country-music superstar.
We all hugged, and I sat down on the sofa with them while Hy went outside to use his phone.
“You hear anything yet?” I asked.
“He’s still in surgery,” Rae said. “Broken bones, ruptured spleen, all sorts of injuries.”
“Damn kid,” Ricky muttered. “Charlene and I never should have let him talk us into that moped.”
Ancient history. When he was in his teens Mick had run away at Christmastime because Ricky and my sister had refused him the scooter; as my luck would have it, he’d come to the city and my Christmas Eve job was to find him. And later, as overly well-off and permissive parents will do, my sister and Ricky granted him his wish. A string of more and more powerful bikes had followed.
“He’d have pursued his passion anyway,” I said.
“Yeah, that’s what the Savage men do—pursue their passions. I should’ve set a better example—”
“Stop it, Ricky,” Rae said. “You’ve been a good father to him.”
“Have I?”
“Yes.” She stood. “I’m going to try Charlene again.”
Ricky watched her leave the waiting room, then said to me, “This is about Keim, isn’t it?”
Charlotte Keim, the operative I’d lured away from Hy’s firm years ago, only to have to ask him to lure her back when she broke up her relationship with Mick. “Probably.”
“A passing driver found him under his bike on the shoulder of Highway 1 at five this morning, reeking of alcohol. What the hell was he doing there?”
Playing with his death wish.
I didn’t voice the thought. “Apparently he’s been in a pretty self-destructive mode lately.”
“You knew this? And you didn’t warn us?”
“I only found out yesterday. It was one of the reasons I came down.”
He nodded, grasped my hand. I followed his gaze as a doctor in scrubs approached us. The doctor looked too young to be so tired; he smiled reassuringly at Ricky.
“Your son’s a lucky man, Mr. Savage. He’ll be in casts for a while—left arm and leg—but he’s young and he should heal completely. He’ll need physical therapy, and I’d also recommend counseling. Has he been drinking heavily for long?”
Ricky looked at me, shrugged. “I haven’t seen much of him lately.”
I said, “I think his drinking may have been escalating since last winter, when his woman friend broke up with him.”
The doctor looked questioningly at me. Ricky introduced me as Mick’s aunt and employer.
“Well,” he said after we’d exchanged greetings, “he’s still in recovery, but you should be able to visit with him soon for a few minutes. One of the nurses will take you to him.”
Then he was gone and Rae was back, saying Charlene and her husband Vic were on their way up from Los Angeles. Hy followed her in, asked about Mick’s condition; Ricky reported what the doctor had told us. At that point Charlotte Keim rushed through the entrance.
“What’s
she
doing here?” Ricky asked.
“I called her,” Hy said.
“Why the hell did you do that?”
“She has a right to know. And he has a right to see her if he wants to. It may even help him.”
“Get her out of here.”
Hy kept silent, his gaze level with Ricky’s. After a moment, Ricky looked away. “Ah, what the hell. Just keep her away from me.”
Hy went over to Keim, who was pale, her brown curls disheveled, and guided her to the opposite side of the room.
Rae said to Ricky, “You can’t blame Charlotte. Mick did this to himself.”
“. . . I know that. Like I did a lot of things to myself. And like me, I suppose he’ll try to blame it on everybody else.”
“I don’t think so. Over the past few years you’ve set a good example for him.”
“Whatever. I just want to see him.”
I moved away, went over to Hy and Keim. She looked at me, eyes moist. I put my arm around her and said, as Hy had to me earlier, “This is not your fault. It’s good of you to come.”
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t care for him.”
“I know.” I looked at Hy. “Why don’t you guys get some coffee? I’m going to drive over to the pier for a while.”
The pier was always occupied, even on a Sunday. This morning, two cars belonging to the architects in the second-story suite opposite ours were parked in their spaces on the floor. I went up the stairs to the catwalk, and ripped down the
GENIUS ROOM
sign from Mick and Derek’s door, before I continued to my office. I shuffled through the papers in my inbox till I found the Port Commission’s rental-increase notice.
They had to be crazy.
No way we could afford this. And even if that hadn’t been the case, I’d feel I was being extorted every time I walked through the door.
But where the hell would we find comparable space?
Maybe it was confirmation that I’d be better off out of this business. But maybe not . . .
I settled down to do some hard thinking.
Mick had been moved to a private room when I returned to the hospital. He was awake, his parents and their spouses beside his bed. His left limbs were in casts, the leg elevated; cuts and bruises marred his features and his nose was taped where it had been broken; both eyes were black. And he was angry—with himself.
“I’m such a stupid shit—” He saw me in the doorway. “Hey, Shar, you didn’t have to come down here.”
“I was already in town when you pulled your genius act.”
He smiled weakly. “I guess I better take the sign down.”
“I already did.”
Charlene hugged me and said, “I think the four of us should take off, so you can talk with Mick before he gets his next pain shot and falls asleep. Meet us at Rae and Ricky’s later.”
After they’d all exited, I said, “What did you think you were doing?”
He grimaced. “Jesus, I hurt. I don’t know. To tell the truth, I don’t remember anything except thinking I could fly on the bike.”
“Be glad you couldn’t.”
“. . . Charlotte was here. Dad was pissed, but he let her see me.”
“And?”
“She told me we’d talk later. I know that probably doesn’t mean much, but at least she came.”