J. Jance - Day of the Dead

“So he’s got no priors.”

“Not even a parking ticket, as far as I can find.”

“Good work, Shelley,” Brian told her. “Now give me that address again.”

Erik limped down the mountain with his injured ankle screaming at every step. As much as it hurt, Erik was forced to concede that maybe the ankle was broken. Damn! he muttered to himself. Just what I need.

It was hotter than he expected and he had already consumed the last of his water. Once he reached the trailhead, he could call someone to come pick him up. Not Gayle, though. Not after last night.

They had been lying in bed. They were always lying in bed, either at his house or hers. Given the reality of Tucson’s social milieu and Gayle’s standing in same, there weren’t many places they could go in public without attracting attention. So they stayed home-his home or hers-ate take-out food, and screwed. Much later, one or the other of them would dress and go home.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, tweaking one of the curls of reddish-blond hair on his naked chest. “You’re awfully quiet.”

Erik didn’t want to say what was wrong. They’d been going through a stormy period for the last several weeks. That happened fairly regularly, but things had been better the last couple of days, and he was reluctant to rock the boat. Gayle Stryker didn’t like having her boat rocked.

What was wrong had its origin in a tiny blue envelope that had shown up in Erik’s mail earlier that week-an envelope with a birth announcement inside. Ryan and Brianna Doyle had had a baby, a seven-and-a-half-pound boy they’d named Kyle.

Erik and Ryan had met in fifth grade at Hollinger Elementary, and they’d been friends ever since. Five years earlier, Erik had been best man when Ryan and Brianna were married at St. Philip’s in the Hills. Receiving a birth announcement from a good friend shouldn’t have been an earth-shattering experience, but it was.

Ryan’s wedding had happened only weeks before Erik met up with Gayle Stryker, who promptly took over his life. Gayle became Erik’s life. Since then he’d barely seen Ryan and Brianna. After neglecting them for so long, he was surprised he was still on their Christmas card list, to say nothing of the one for birth announcements. But seeing the picture of the wrinkly-faced, more or less ugly, round-headed baby had brought Erik’s own life home to him in an entirely new way. What the hell am I doing?

In the beginning, once he got over being flattered and utterly dazzled by Gayle’s beauty and attentions, he’d given himself a serious talking-to about the age difference between them. What did it matter if she was almost the same age his mother would have been, had Louise LaGrange lived, that is? Gayle was beautiful, she was rich, and she wanted him. What else counted? Erik had asked her more than once if she ever considered leaving her husband.

She’d laughed and said, “Every day and twice on Sunday,” and let it go at that. She never spoke of getting a divorce. She never spoke of making any changes. She seemed perfectly content with the way things were-as if she didn’t mind if she and Erik went on the same way indefinitely. And they had done exactly that-for more than five years.

Erik wondered sometimes about what would happen if Lawrence Stryker croaked. The man was pushing sixty-five. According to Gayle, he had lost all interest in sex, or at least all interest in sex with her. He took medication for high blood pressure, and there had been talk about his needing a pacemaker, although, as far as Erik knew, one had never been installed.

So, if Larry died, what then? Would Erik and Gayle’s affair evolve into a more normal relationship? Or was normal not what Gayle had in mind?

That was how things stood right up until the day that damnable birth announcement arrived. Thirty-something women were supposed to be the ones with biological clocks, but suddenly Erik heard his own clock ticking loud and clear. He was thirty-five; Gayle sixty-two. Having kids had never been part of their equation, but still…Did he want to spend his life with someone almost twice his age? In the little cocoons where they spent their private time together, age didn’t matter, but at work sometimes, there were things that struck him-music playing on someone’s radio, for instance, or someone else cracking a joke-that made him realize he and Gayle came from different generations.

“Where are we going?” Erik said finally.

“Going?” she asked. “Well, now that we’ve had dinner and dessert, I’m going home.”

“Not that,” Erik said. “I mean, where are we going long-term?”

“Does it matter?” Gayle returned. “Seems to me we’re doing just fine. What’s wrong?”

“Wouldn’t it be nice if you didn’t have to get dressed and go home?” Erik asked. “If we could live together like normal people?”

“Like husband and wife, you mean?”

He nodded. “That, too.”

Gayle’s eyes blazed with immediate fury. “You’ve met someone, haven’t you!”

“No,” Erik said quickly. “Nothing like that. I swear to God.”

“You’re tired of me, then?”

“No. Of course not. You’re wonderful-the best thing that ever happened to me.”

But by then Gayle had already hopped out of bed. She pulled on clothing without taking her usual detour through the master bedroom’s spacious shower.

“What, then?” she continued. “You probably want to go find some sweet little twat to have babies with! From what I’ve heard, having babies is vastly overrated.”

Gayle’s words bristled with so much hostility that Erik couldn’t bring himself to say she was right. In the face of her fury he couldn’t admit that having a regular life-with a home and a wife and a couple of kids, and maybe even a dog-was exactly what he wanted.

As Gayle strode down the hallway, buttoning her blouse, Erik went after her. “Come on,” he said. “Why are you so upset?”

She rounded on him so suddenly that he almost smashed into her. “Why?” she demanded. “If you’re not smart enough to figure it out, I’m not going to tell you.”

He caught up with her when she stopped in the kitchen long enough to slip on the high heels she had shucked off when she came in through the garage earlier in the afternoon.

“Please, Gayle,” Erik pleaded, touching her shoulder. “Don’t do this. It’s all a misunderstanding.”

She shrugged out from under his hand. “Misunderstanding?” she asked, glaring up at him. “I don’t think so. I read you loud and clear!”

When they were in the bedroom-hers or his-she was always careful to keep the blinds closed and the lights properly dimmed. But out here in the kitchen with its bright fluorescent lighting and with anger distorting her features, the lines a team of skilled plastic surgeons usually kept at bay were clearly visible. Seeing them Erik realized suddenly that Gayle Stryker was old-old and shrill and very, very angry.

Once she sped out of the garage, Erik’s first reaction was relief. This wasn’t how he would have chosen to end their relationship, but ending it was probably a good idea-if he ever was going to have a chance at a “normal” life. But then, after the first shock wore off, Erik realized how much else would be ending as well-his love life, his job, his company car. Those were all irretrievably intermingled. His involvement with Gayle affected every aspect of his life. Walking away from her meant walking away from everything else.

When that realization hit him, he tried calling her cell phone-the one on a family-plan program that he and Gayle shared and where the bill never showed up at the offices of Medicos for Mexico. Erik called several times. She never answered, and he didn’t leave a message.