J. Jance - Fatal Error

That was the living room. In the kitchen he had no table, just a single stool parked by the kitchen counter. His cooking equipment included a coffeepot and his place-setting-for-one set of dishes. The only reason he still had a microwave was that it was a built-in. He had no pots and pans. No extra glasses. For bedroom furniture, he had the AeroBed that he and Linda had once used for out-of-town guests. Oh, and a pair of suitcases. When Linda removed the dresser and the chest of drawers in the bedroom, she had dumped Gil’s clothes out of his drawers and into a pair of open suitcases on the bedroom floor. She had taken the washer and dryer too.

That was it. Linda had been gone for two months now. She had told him it was all about the job, but when he had driven up to Mt. Shasta to see the kids, they had told him about the new man in her life-someone she had hooked up with at last year’s all-class reunion, one she had attended solo because, surprise, surprise, Gil had been working.

So here he was, living in an almost empty house on Rattlesnake Road. When he and Linda bought the house, they had gotten a great deal on it because the couple who lived there before were going through a nasty divorce. Gil probably should have thought about that and realized that a street address with the word rattlesnake in it was most likely a bad omen-that things probably wouldn’t turn out well if they tried living there. And they hadn’t.

Difficult as it was to fathom, he had fewer possessions now than he’d had in college. He had spent those two months going to work, doing his job, and feeling like a human train wreck. But today he had seen a real human train wreck, the bodily remains of Richard Lowensdale.

After spending so much time at the crime scene, Gil was appalled to see the resemblance between his place and Lowensdale’s house on Jan Road. His house didn’t stink like that-he still took the garbage out to the street every week-and it wasn’t overheated. All the same, it looked forlorn and empty and uncared for, and there were several discarded newspapers on the floor next to his chair.

Someday soon he was going to have to do something about that. But right now he needed sleep, and having an AeroBed in the bedroom beat the hell out of sleeping on the floor.

San Diego, California

When Brenda awakened once more, enough time had passed that her clothing was no longer damp. She had no idea what time it was or if it was day or night. She wondered if she was still wearing her watch, but with her arms fastened behind her, there was no way to tell if it was on her wrist or if it had been taken from her somewhere along the way. And even if she had been able to hold it up to her face, she wouldn’t have been able to see it. There was no light. Only the occasional rumble of an airplane passing overhead told her she wasn’t marooned in outer space.

She tried not to think about how thirsty she was, but her mind tricked her into remembering all the words to an old country/western song that her father used to sing:

All day I’ve faced the barren waste

Without a taste of water-cool, clear water.

Even when she concentrated on something else, the unwelcome words continued to echo inside her head.

Keep a’movin’, Dan.

Don’t cha listen to him, Dan.

He’s a devil not a man

And he spreads the burning sand with water.

How long will I last without food or water? Brenda wondered. Six or seven days? Longer? And how long have I been here already?

Then, just when she was ready to give up, when she was ready to pray to God and ask that in his mercy he take her, Brenda heard Uncle Joe’s voice, speaking to her from across the years, his voice low and filled with quiet dignity. “All I had to do each day was choose to live.”

Yes, Brenda thought as she drifted back into a feverish sleep. That’s what I choose too.

Scotts Flat Reservoir, California

Grass Valley High School was generally thought to be divided into three separate but relatively equal groups-the jocks, the nerds, and the druggies. The jocks were somewhat smart and drank beer; the brainy nerds were incredibly smart. They were also geeky and drank whatever; the druggies were habitual underachievers who spent lots of time smoking grass, some of which they managed to grow themselves in out-of-the-way places.

John Connor, whose parents were big Terminator fans, didn’t quite fit in any of the molds. He was a genuine jock-varsity football, basketball, and track. That should have put him firmly in the beer-drinking camp except for the fact that he was a born-again Christian who didn’t drink anything, including coffee or tea or even soda. And although he was smart and could have been a nerd, the coffee, tea, and soda prohibitions counted against him.

John may have been “born again,” but he wasn’t a fanatic about it and didn’t much believe in turning the other cheek, which meant that he had knocked the crap out of several guys on the JV football team before they gave up and decided they could just as well be friends. Now, as seniors with their final football season behind them and with basketball season in full swing, John and his best pals, Pete Bishop, Tony Alvarez, and Jack Whitney, were spending Sunday of their long MLK weekend celebrating Saturday night’s basketball win and enjoying the fact that there was no school on Monday.

Tony’s cousin worked in a liquor store. As usual, Tony had provided the single case of beer and, as usual, John was the designated driver. Pete’s dad worked for Nevada County Irrigation, and Pete had grown up trailing his dad around the Scotts Flat Reservoir. On Sunday the boys followed Scotts Flat Dam Road across the dam and off into the woods to a secluded clearing where local teenagers did their illegal drinking.

Now, at eleven o’clock at night and with all the beer gone, they were heading back to town. Just east of the earthen dam, the drinkers started whining about needing a pee stop. John pulled off into a tiny parking area near the dam. While his friends went off into the woods to relieve themselves, John sauntered over to the edge of the lake. He and his father came here fishing sometimes in the summer, but now with a fringe of ice still clinging to the edge of the shoreline, fishing season seemed a long way off.

He stood there on the edge of the lake, watching a sliver of moon make a slender golden splash in the choppy water, and wondered what would happen to him; what did the future hold? John was still hoping for an appointment to West Point, but that was probably a pipe dream. Yes, John was smart and his GPA was outstanding, but his parents weren’t well connected, and there were always political ramifications to consider.

So he looked at the cold water and wondered what would happen if he didn’t get the appointment. Would he go on to college? He’d had a couple of scholarship offers but not enough to cover the full freight, and his folks couldn’t really afford to pay his way. He could maybe try going the ROTC route or perhaps he would end up doing what his father had done and volunteer.

The water wasn’t giving him much of an answer. The chill wind sliced through his letterman’s jacket and made him shiver.

“Hey, John,” Jack yelled at him. “We’re done here. Are you coming or are you going to stand around gawking all night?”

Turning away from the water, John tripped over something soft. His eyes had adjusted to the dark enough that when he righted himself he could see the object that had tripped him was made out of leather and was most likely a purse. He looked around. There was no one in sight, no one to connect to this lost property, but then he caught a glimpse of something else-a pair of white tennis shoes, gleaming in the pale moonlight, parked at the edge of the frigid water.