Killer Karma

3

Urgency pounded in Cole as he rushed out of the Hall and across the front terrace to the steps. How long would it take him to run to Noe Valley? Too long. Even a car would take longer than he liked. He wanted to be home now. If only he could fly.

In the middle of which thought he hit the newel post at the bottom of their hall stairs.

Cole gaped around him and through the archway into the livingroom. What happened? Was he really here? He ran his fingers along the crack in the cap of the newel post filled with wood putty, one of his first repairs when they moved in. From upstairs came furiously-paced violin music…“Summer”, from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. Hearing the female half of their twins play brought her image to mind…all gangly arms and legs, seemingly taller every day, so intent on the music that Renee looked almost angry, and older than nearly fifteen. This was real, but…how had he gotten here?

A voice coming up the hall from the kitchen said, “Talk to me, Sherrie.”

Joanna Trask, Sherrie’s mother. He headed down the hall. Did her presence mean he died recently? She made sure to be here when Sherrie needed her. Though living in Oakland let her visit almost any time.

In the kitchen Joanna sat on a stool at the island — an older version of Sherrie but with plain, tame hair — watching Sherrie fill a plastic bucket at the sink.

Cole focused on Sherrie, too. Despite the weight of foreboding and urgency, seeing her brought the usual surge of warmth. Even after sixteen years, nothing welcomed him home like wrapping his arms around her and burying his face in the kinky mass of her hair…today tied back. The thought of her body against his and her breasts in his hands still had the power to arouse him.

Then she turned. The strain in her face kicked him in the gut.

Joanna frowned with concern. “I know that phone call upset you.”

Sherrie said nothing, just carried the bucket to the stove. He saw she wore rubber gloves, and instead of adding water to the big simmering soup pot, she opened the oven door and knelt to begin sponging out the white residue of oven cleaner.

A chill ran through Cole. Silent and scouring the kitchen? Something had seriously pissed her off. The same thing that caused his guilt?

Joanna continued, “What did Sergeant Leach say to you?”

Cole grimaced in dismay. Management Control was involved in his murder investigation? What the hell had he been doing? And of all the internal affairs officers that could be on his case, what bad karma picked Norman Leach? He doubted Leach had forgotten the fake bullet holes put on his new Corvette when they worked together in the Northern District…and maybe still brooded over the suspicion that Cole Dunavan and Kevin Rasgorshek were responsible.

His old partner’s name brought a mental dope slap. Damn! Razor was someone else he should have remembered right away. Since becoming partners on Patrol in the Northern District, they had been like brothers. All the time they spent running around together off duty resulted in endless ribbing and lewd comments when Sherrie and Razor’s second wife Lauren turned up pregnant at the same time and delivered Kyle and Holly within a week of each other. Razor could tell him what had been going on…if only there were a way to ask.

“Did the sergeant have something more to say about that woman?” Joanna asked.

Woman. Cole forgot Razor. What woman?

Sherrie silently rinsed her sponge in the bucket.

“Does he still think Cole went off with her?”

What! Anger and horror sent heat and ice through Cole. Leach was accusing him of an affair!

“Sherrie, no!” He ran to the stove and dropped to his knees, coming to her eye level. If only he could turn her to look at him. “Don’t believe Leach. I wouldn’t do that to you!”

Not when it was one of her biggest nightmares and he knew the cost of screwing around. Goodbye Sherrie. She made that clear when he convinced her to marry him. After growing up with a father whose zipper automatically dropped for anyone female, she had zero tolerance for infidelity.

If she believed he cheated on her, that explained this cleaning mania. Without memory, though, how could he be sure what happened? He felt guilty about something. Heartsick, Cole watched her wipe under the oven’s lower heating element. “Sherrie, no matter what, I’d never leave you.”

Suddenly, the real meaning of Leach’s assumption hit Cole. No one knew he was dead! He jumped to his feet. He had to find a way to tell them.

Joanna sighed. “Listen to me. If anyone knows the signs of an affair, I do, and one phone call means nothing.”

Cole groped for memory of a phone call…or a name or face. Anything. In vain.

“Not just one call.” The words came in brittle syllables. Sherrie scrubbed at the oven. “Now Leach says there were three. She called Cole twice Wednesday evening before he made that call to her. When he phoned me to say he had ‘something to do’ before coming home, it was the second time in three days he’d done that.” She dunked the sponge and wrung it out with a savage twist. “Cole was on edge since Monday. A case bugging him, he said…but those make him distracted, not jumpy. How would you call it?”

Cole winced. Damn! Was there another explanation for why he acted that way? “Sherrie, help me remember. Mention a name.”

Joanna said, “At least guilt would indicate it’s probably the first- ” She broke off as Sherrie shot her a withering stare. A moment later, she frowned. “Aren’t people supposed to be innocent until proven guilty…even husbands?”

Sherrie scrubbed savagely at the glass in oven door. “I’m not letting him turn on the charm and blind me with bullshit until I’m alone in ICU with a dying child while he’s off- ”

Joanna choked.

Immediately, horror filled Sherrie’s eyes. She choked, too, and rushed to throw her arms around her mother. “I’m sorry! Please forgive me. I wasn’t thinking.”

While they clung together, the front door began beeping. Someone punching the entry code on the keypad. Mother and daughter looked at each other, pulled apart, and took deep breaths. By the time the front door banged open and the thump of dumped objects came down the hall, they had put on calm faces.

“Mom, we’re home!” Kyle’s voice yelled.

Sherrie stripped off her gloves. “We’re in the kitchen!”

Cole moved to the far end of the island, away from the danger of walk-throughs.

Feet ran their direction, accompanied by the scrabble of claws on wood. Tiger bounded into the kitchen first and threw his square body at Sherrie, tongue lolling, stubby tail a frantic metronome.

Kyle and his virtual twin Holly arrived seconds later. Even at ten Kyle had the Dunavan lankiness…topped by his mother’s hair. “Have they found Dad?” he asked eagerly.

“Not yet.” Sherrie reached down to pat the dog’s blunt head. “How was sailing?”

That would be on the Chimera, the sloop Razor co-owned with his sister Denise.

The light died from Kyle’s face. He shrugged.

“We had a delightful time,” Holly said. “We went north as far as San Quentin. Daddy let Kyle take the helm all the way back and he was splendid. No one fell overboard, not even Tiger when gulls dive-bombed him.” Then her pixie face lit with mischief. “And Travis thinks Denise’s new girlfriend is a real babe.”

Joanna’s mouth tightened. Sherrie sent her a sharp Don’t say a word! glance.

Tiger spun from Sherrie and ran down the island to dance in front of Cole, his eyes and tail declaring: Fearless leader, you would have been proud of me! I chased a bizillion killer seagulls and watercraft away from the boat!

Cole stared. The dog saw him?

Travis, the male half of the twins, came through the doorway…the Dunavan coloring his only similarity to Renee…built like a middleweight wrestler, and winner of high school trophies proving it. “What’s with Tiger?”

Cole said, “Tiger, freeze. Get on the ground.”

The dog dropped to a sphinx position on the floor.

Razor followed Travis, and stopped in the doorway to polish his glasses on the tail of his 49ers sweat shirt. He should have been the one nicknamed Bulldog. When they were all out somewhere together, his stocky build sometimes made strangers mistake Travis for his son.

“You’ve probably worked up an appetite,” Sherrie said. “Please stay for supper. We have enough of my famous Italian soup to feed a battalion. Or do you have to get Holly back to Lauren?”

Cole came on alert. That was her I-want-to-talk voice.

“No.” Razor shook his head. “I have her for the night.”

Cole pumped a fist. Yes! Now maybe he would learn some answers.

Sure enough, Sherrie said, “Mother, will you see if Hannah’s finished her nap? The rest of you, pick up your stuff in the hall and put away Tiger’s life jacket. Then go wash up. Except you, Razor.”

Travis wheeled from checking out the soup. “Have you heard something about Dad?”

Cole grinned. Travis had cop instincts…watching everything around him, a natural at reading body language and hearing what lay behind the words people said.

Which Sherrie well knew. The shake of her head signaled ask me later.

Joanna’s frown said she wanted to stay, too, but after a sharp look from Sherrie, she slid off her stool and followed the kids out. Sherrie took it over. Razor straddled another stool, resting his arms on the back. Cole leaned on the island where he could see both their faces. He expected Tiger to follow the boys, but the dog stayed, sitting against Sherrie’s legs.

She leaned down and rubbed his head until footsteps faded up the hall. “Is there anything about Cole’s disappearance you aren’t telling me?”

Behind his glasses, Razor’s eyes narrowed. “No. Why?”

“Leach called earlier. He asked if Cole loses his temper with the kids and me and has ever been physically abusive.”

Cole stiffened. What!

Sherrie straightened from petting the dog. “Can you find out what’s going on?”

“From Leach?” Razor grimaced. “I doubt it. But…” He pulled his cell phone off his belt. “…there’s someone else I’ll try.” He looked up a number and punched it in.

Sherrie released the clip on her hair, letting the kinky mass spring loose. “See if they’ll give you any details about this Benay woman.”

Benay! The name hit Cole like a physical blow. The Black Hole collapsed, spewing a tidal wave of memory. He reeled before it, remembering everything…about his murder, and about his relationship with Sara Benay. In horror, he realized Benay was the unfinished business that brought him back…that the majority of the foreboding and urgency arose from danger he brought on her. But for all he had to feel guilty about, at least none of it came from affair.

“Sherrie,” he said in relief, “she was just an informant! Nothing happened between us.”

How did he make Sherrie hear, so she knew he had not turned into Eddie Trask?

He came around the island to their stools. “Can you tell at all that I’m here?” Tiger whined and he bent to scratch the dog’s ears. What let Tiger see him when they did not? “Razor, do you hear me?”

Apparently not. Razor stared into space as he talked into the phone. “Jer, you’re the man who’ll know. I hear there’s been a development in finding Cole Dunavan.”

As Razor listened to the answer, Cole noticed a rhythmic thumping. It sounded like a heartbeat. Moments later he tracked the source and realized it was a heartbeat. Razor’s. And in the last few seconds the rate had gone up. If ghost hearing was sharp enough to hear hearts, Cole wondered, could he also listen to the other end of Razor’s conversation? He leaned toward the phone.

Just in time for Razor to disconnect.

“Well?” Sherrie stared at him expectantly.

Razor slowly folded the phone and returned it to his belt before answering. “They found the car this afternoon…at the San Jose airport. It’s being brought back for processing.”

Sherrie’s breath caught. Cole heard her heart jump.

Razor shook his head. “No, Cole wasn’t in it. But…” He hesitated. “…there’s blood on the passenger side and Homicide is taking over the investigation.”

Which explained the question about physical abuse. Leach obviously thought a lover’s quarrel had turned violent. Cole had to admit that in Leach’s place, he would, too.

Color drained out of Sherrie’s face. “Leach thinks Cole killed that woman, doesn’t he?”

“He’s wrong!” If only he could take her in his arms. Cole settled for touching her hair. “The lab will find it’s my blood.” Unless Benay also had AB positive. But determining he was the victim did not clear him having an affair. He had to come up with more to do that. “I’m sorry, babe…for getting myself killed and putting you through this. If I hadn’t been so damned obsessed with- ”

Joanna’s voice interrupted, calling from the hall, “Guess who’s awake from her nap.”

Hannah burst into the kitchen, red curls bouncing and her t-shirt warning: Watch Out! I’m Two! She started toward Sherrie, but halted, wheeled Cole’s direction, and squealed in delight. “Daddy!”

Cole started. She saw him, too?

“Daddy!” At his feet, she held up her arms. “Play airplane!”

Cole’s throat closed. Shit. “I can’t, pumpkin. I’m sorry. I can’t pick you up.”

The adults stared at her. “Hannah,” Sherrie called. “Come here.”

Hannah frowned. “Play airplane!” She reached out to tug at his slacks…stared in bafflement when the grab failed to connect with anything. She broke into an angry wail.

He smiled wryly. “I know how you feel, kiddo.”

Sherrie slid off the stool and scooped Hannah up. “Daddy isn’t here.”

Hannah twisted, reaching toward him. “Daddy!” Her wail rose like a siren.

Cole ruffled her hair…without a curl moving. “We Dunavans do fixate on things, don’t we?”

A thought that brought him back to Sara Benay. He needed to find her and save her from the mess he landed her in. Which included, he suddenly realized, her becoming the chief suspect in his murder! Once they established the blood as his, the two of them would change places in the lover’s quarrel scenario. Threat and urgency beat at him. He just hated to leave here. What if he settled things and could never come back…never saw Sherrie and the kids again?

So what are you thinking? a voice in him sneered. Hang out here forever? Ignore why you’re still around…blow off cleaning up the mess you made and getting straight with everyone? You don’t mind Sherrie being afraid the man she thought you were is a lie?

He sighed mentally. No, he refused to do that to Sherrie, and he had to deal with screwing up. He brushed Sherrie’s hair. “If I never see you again, remember I love you.”

Cuddling and soothing Hannah, she still showed no sign of hearing him.

He forced his feet toward the hall.