Too Little, Too Late (32 page)

Lately, he’d been plagued by doubts about getting married again and having a baby. He’d tried twice before Brooke and he’d made a mess of both marriages. Brooke was a sweet girl who deserved better than him. No matter how many times he’d thought about it, it was time to get his shit together, get a quick divorce and put his life back in order. The baby would have his name and he would support both of them, no question there. Maybe once all the dust had settled, he’d even give celibacy a shot.

***

Karen was busy washing her hands and didn’t notice Liz come out of one of the restroom stalls until she reached for a paper towel to dry her hands. By that time, Liz had already noticed her and the two of them awkwardly stood staring at each other.

“I almost didn’t recognize you,” Karen ventured guardedly. “You look different.”

“It’s the hair,” Liz offered in embarrassment. “I don’t normally wear it up.”

“It looks good like that.”

“Thanks.” Another silence.

“Do you go clubbing a lot?” Karen asked.

“Me?” asked Liz. “Oh God, no.” She gave Karen a guarded look. “What about you?”

“Yeah, I like to go,” Karen told her.

“Fake I.D.?” Liz ventured.

“Yeah.” Karen quickly changed the subject. “So are you here with friends?”

“Friends from my old job brought me here for my birthday,” Liz explained.

“I hear you’re going to be working for my grandmother soon.”

“Yeah.”

“Good luck with that. Anyway, I’d better get back to my friends,” Karen told her, anxious to get out of there.

Liz glanced around to make sure they weren’t being overheard. “Your grandmother showed me the necklace.”

Karen immediately sat down on one of the upholstered benches near the make-up tables, her awkwardness forgotten. “And?”

“It was my mother’s.”

“So how come your mother was going to give it to my grandmother?”

Liz sat down beside Karen. “I don’t know.”

Before Karen could say anything more, the restroom door was thrown open and a breathless Ashley stuck her head inside. “Come
on
! You’re missing all the fun!”

Karen stood up and gave Liz a hesitant smile. “See you around.”

“Sure.” Liz stood up and went over to the wall of mirrors, pretending to check her hair.

“Oh, and Liz?” Karen had opened the washroom door and was about to leave.

“Yes?”

“Happy birthday.”

Karen left before Liz had a chance to respond.

***

As Eric stared morosely at the dance floor, he saw Brooke making her way through the dancers. Right behind her, he thought he saw someone he recognized but then the bobbing head of a dancer blocked his view. The tightness he’d felt in his chest all afternoon was becoming uncomfortable. He got up to tell Brooke he was going home. He ducked around the bodies gyrating in his path, wincing in pain as a dancer’s high heel trod on his toes. Eric felt his chest constrict and instinctively grabbed onto the owner of the heel to keep himself from falling.

“Hey, back off, jerk!” the girl yelled, as she turned on him. Surprise caught her off guard. “Dad!”

Eric never heard her, or the gunshot, as he slumped unconscious to the dance floor.

***

Brooke thought she heard a loud “pop”, like the kind made by a firecracker. She stopped in mid-stride when someone’s blood-curdling scream reverberated over the music and whirled around in time to see what looked like a man’s body fall to the floor.

“Someone get the lights!” she yelled over the music as she rushed to where she had seen the body fall.

Before Brooke was able to reach it, there was another “pop” and suddenly, pandemonium broke out over the dance floor as everyone scrambled in every direction. Brooke was violently knocked to the ground. She heard several more screams just before the music stopped and the harsh lights came on. From her vantage point on the floor, she now saw two people down.

“They’re still breathing!” a girl yelled out. Brooke was galvanized into action, rushing towards the two casualties on the floor.

Someone had separated them so that both were lying on their backs, facing Brooke. Falling to her knees, she stared at the unconscious figures of Eric and his daughter before her eyes were riveted to the growing pool of blood seeping out from underneath Karen’s body.

Eve shifted the huge overnight bag from her right shoulder to her left as she hurried down the hospital corridor. Today had been the first day she had actually felt confident enough to leave the hospital for a few hours since the shootings three days ago in order to have a quick shower, get a change of clothing and to pay some overdue bills. The past few days had been a nightmare she didn’t wish upon anyone and Eve was grateful that she had had her mother and Paul to lean on.

Pushing open the door of Karen’s hospital room, Eve stopped and stared in surprise. Eric was sitting in a wheelchair beside Karen’s bed. Father and daughter were laughing, bent over one of the many fashion magazines that littered her daughter’s bed.

“Don’t you two look cozy,” she commented before looking at her ex-husband closely. “Should you be out of bed?”

“It was only a mild heart attack,” he told her brightly. “The doctors said I should be as good as new in a couple of weeks.”

It seemed almost inconceivable to Eve that Eric would suffer a heart attack at the same time, and in the same place, where Karen had been shot. Eve threw her overnight bag on the cot beside her daughter’s bed before going over to kiss Karen’s pale cheek. “How are you feeling this morning?”

“Okay, I guess,” Karen told her, “except for my stupid shoulder. Will I really have to have physiotherapy, Mom?”

“If that’s what the doctors say, then yes.”

“That’s because the bullet lodged in the muscle, close to the bone,” Eric told her patiently. He gave Eve a measured look. “A few more inches over and it could’ve been so much worse.”

Eve nodded, momentarily overcome by a magnitude of emotion as she realized for the hundredth time how close they had come to losing their daughter. Karen had sustained a substantive blood loss and the surgeons had worked on her for over three hours to remove the bullet and repair some of the damage to her shoulder as well as the surrounding tissue and musculature. She would need plastic surgery later but right now, her doctors were more concerned with Karen regaining the full range of motion in her shoulder.

“Tell Mom the rest of your news, Dad!” Karen urged, basking in the knowledge that she had both her parents’ undivided attention.

“The doctors said I can probably go home in a few days,” Eric told Eve.

“That’s great,” she replied, genuinely happy that he was going to be okay.

“Except that I’m supposed to take it easy for the next few weeks—”

“—so Dad’s decided to move in with us for a while,” Karen finished happily. “He’s also arranged it with the doctors so I can get the physio at home instead of having it here in the hospital.”

Eve looked at Eric in surprise but he avoided her gaze, wheeling his chair over to the window instead. Not wanting to upset Karen, Eve took hold of Eric’s wheelchair.

“Where are you guys going?” asked Karen, watching them closely.

“I’m just taking your dad for a spin in his wheelchair,” she told Karen.

“Shit, I just knew it!” Karen’s eyes filled with tears. “You two can’t go five minutes without arguing!”

“We’re not arguing, are we, Eve?”

“No, we’re not,” she replied through gritted teeth. “And we’ll be right back.” With that, she wheeled Eric out of the room over to an empty sitting area just down the hall from Karen’s room. The television was on and a local news station was interviewing Clint Staebler, the owner of the Beverly Highlander, who announced that the police were still looking for the shooter. Taking a deep breath, she faced her ex-husband. “You can’t make a decision like that without discussing it with me first.” Eve tried to keep her voice calm.

“I’m a doctor and I’m Karen’s father.” He tried giving her an engaging smile but it fell short of being genuine. “I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize my daughter’s health.”

“Well, I may not be a doctor, but I
am
her mother,” Eve reminded him. “And I’d like to be part of the decision-making process where she’s concerned.”

“I thought you’d be happy to have her home.”

Eve looked at Eric closely. His perpetual tan had disappeared virtually overnight and he looked pale and drawn. Eve took a deep breath. “Okay, Eric. Level with me. What’s really going on?”

“What’s wrong with a father wanting to spend more time with his daughter?” he hedged. “You’re making it sound like a crime.”

“There’s no crime in that,” she conceded, “but what about Brooke?”

“What about her?”

“How do you think your new wife is going to like your moving back in with your ex-wife?”

“You let me worry about that,” he told her brusquely.

Eve was not put off by his dismissive tone. “I wish I could,” she told him, “but I can’t. Not when you plan on disrupting our daughter’s life, letting her get her hopes up over a reconciliation that simply isn’t going to happen.” She began pacing the small room. “And who do you think is going to be left picking up the pieces when you and Brooke make up and you go back to her?”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Don’t you think the two of you should be hashing things out?”

He gave her a tired smile. “I think I’ve made a real mess of things this time. And now with the baby…” He shook his head, looking overwhelmed.

Eve sat down in front of him and took hold of his hands. “Look, Eric. Whatever’s going on with Brooke, you two have to work it out.” She saw the stubborn set of his jaw but ignored it. “You should’ve seen her the night you had your heart attack. She was crazy with worry – we all were.” Eve swallowed hard, momentarily overcome as she thought of that night. “Anyway, all I want to say is that Brooke seems to genuinely care for you. That has to mean something.”

Eric shook his head stubbornly. “She had no right giving Karen those tickets.”

“Karen told me what happened. Anyway, that’s something Brooke’s going to have to live with for the rest of her life.”

“It’s not just about Karen,” Eric told her. “It’s complicated…”

Just then, Eve’s phone vibrated. Pulling it out, she scrolled through her messages. There was an urgent text from her mother to call her. She gave Eric an apologetic shrug. “Sorry, but I’ve got to make a call. It’ll only take a minute.”

Eve dialed her mother’s number. A second later, Kate picked up. “What’s up?” Eve asked.

“I just got a call from the Foundation,” Kate told her quietly. “Esther Solomon died early this morning.”

“You killed me.”
Her luminous smile was beguiling in its beauty.

“You should never have come back!” he cried, trying to make her believe him. “I couldn’t let you live!”

“You betrayed me.”

“No! I loved you!”

Images of Maria’s face haunted Leo, even in his sleep; seemingly beautiful images of a youthful Maria, carefree and innocent. Slowly the images morphed into something evil and violent, mocking him until he was forced to run away from them - except there was no place to run or to hide. She doggedly followed him everywhere.

Eventually, Leo awoke with a start, drenched in sweat and breathing heavily, unable to steady the erratic hammering of his heart. With shaking fingers, he reached for the glass of water beside his bed, drinking thirstily until the water was all gone. He closed his eyes, trying to breathe deeply but Maria’s face flitted before him. Turning on the light, he picked up the
Salvation for Sinners
pamphlet he’d found in Paco Ramierez’s car the day he’d stolen it. He glanced at the words,
we are all God’s children
, before he threw the pamphlet across the room in agitation. He needed to calm down. Shrugging into his robe, he headed down the hallway. At the top of the flight of stairs, he stared below in horror.

“Go away!”

Opening and closing his eyes several times, he willed the images of the writhing snakes to disappear but they suddenly morphed into cobras, rearing upwards, ready to strike. His legs gave way under him and he sat down weakly.

“I don’t deserve this!”

“Yes, you do,” one of the cobras hissed before morphing into Maria’s shriveled face.

He blinked several times, his head slowly filling with the familiar voice.

“I’ll save you, son,”
said his father, from somewhere behind him.

“No!” He stood slowly, holding the banister carefully. “I don’t need your help, Father.”

“You’re allowing her to possess you.”
 

“But I want her to,” he answered feebly, making his way carefully down the stairs. “Maria’s my salvation.”

“She will take over your soul.”
 

“I gave it to her a long time ago,” he smiled sadly into the darkness, “so you see, Father, you haven’t won after all.”

Becoming dazed, he slipped and fell headfirst into the darkness, hitting his head against the hardwood with a dull thud. As he lost consciousness, he saw Maria’s sweet face, holding her arms out to him.

Maybe there would be salvation for this sinner, after all.

A confrontation with his mother confirmed that a reporter was going to do a story on Maria which left Sigi with no choice but to order the sanitarium to release Maria. He quickly hired a
private investigator to keep tabs on Maria but it seemed as though she’d vanished into thin air. The P.I. finally tracked her down to a dump in Tarzana. He knew he had to have Maria in his life again but wasn’t sure how he was going to go about doing it.
 

The girl was always with her. He learned her name was Liz Farrell and that she’d grown up in various foster homes around the L.A. area. When Leo looked at her, he saw the hateful image of his father and he knew he could never have anything to do with her.
 

Mother and daughter seemed to have a regular routine which he memorized. He knew they went for a walk, rain or shine, after lunch each day. Sometimes they ate in the park, but more often than not, they would just walk. Maria would trip along happily while Liz watched her mother indulgently. Watching them made his gut ache. He wanted to be with Maria again but the opportunity wasn’t there yet. And then without warning, they disappeared one day.