Jonathan Kellerman - Dr. Death

Someone watching from a distance would have thought, Romance on the beach.

The professional thing would be to pull away. I compromised, avoiding a full embrace by keeping one arm at my side. Patting her back lightly with the other.

What used to be called therapeutic touch, before the lawyers got involved.

I held her for the shortest possible period, then gently drew away.

She smiled. We resumed walking. Walked in step. I kept enough distance between us to avoid the accidental graze of hand against hand.

"College," she said, laughing. "That's what we were supposed to be talking about this morning."

"College isn't all of your future, but it's part of it," I said. "Part of where to go."

"A small part. So no big deal, I'll make Dad happy, apply to Stanford. If I get in, I'll go. Why not? One place is the same as another. I'm not some spoiled brat. I know I'm lucky my dad can afford a place like that. But there are other things we need to talk about, right? If you trust me not to flake out, I can come in tomorrow-if you've got time."

"I've got time. How about after school-five P.M."

"Yes," she said. "Thank you so, so much… I'd better get back home, see if Dad called, maybe he found Eric- he'll probably just blow into the dorm and scream at my father for flying up."

We turned around.

Back at the Mustang, she said, "And I meant what I said-please don't stop working with the cops. Take care of yourself."

Nice kid.

I watched her drive away, eased onto PCH feeling pretty good.

WHEN I GOT home, Robin was in the kitchen stirring a pot-one of those big blue things flecked with white. Spike was off in a corner, making rapturous overtures to a delicious-looking bone.

"You look tired," she said.

"Bad traffic." I kissed her cheek and looked inside the pot. Chunks of lamb, carrots, prunes, onions. My nose filled with cumin and cinnamon and heat, and my eyes watered.

"Something new," she said. "A tajine. Got the recipe from the guy who sells me maple."

I dipped the spoon, blew, tasted. "Fantastic, thank you, thank you, thank you."

"Hungry?"

"Starving."

"No sleep, no food." She sighed. "Bad traffic, where?"

I told her about having to meet a patient at the beach.

"Emergency?"

"Potentially, but it resolved." I placed my arms under her rear, lifted her, deposited her on the counter.

"What is this?" she said. "Passion amid the pots and pans, one of those male-fantasy things?"

"Maybe later. If you behave yourself." I went to the fridge, found some leftover white wine, sniffed the bottle, poured two glasses. "First we celebrate."

"What's the occasion?"

"No occasion," I said. "That's the point."

The rest of the evening passed quietly. No calls from Milo or anyone else. I tried to imagine what life would be like without a phone. We ate too much lamb, drank enough wine to get silly. The idea of making love seemed remote, more of a scripted segment than passion; both of us seemed content just to be.

So we just sat on the couch, holding hands, not moving, not talking. Would it be like this when we grew old? That prospect seemed suddenly glorious.

Eventually, something changed in the air, and we began touching each other, stroking, kissing, risking exploration. Eventually, we were naked, intertwined, moving from the couch to the floor, enduring chafed knees and elbows, strained muscles, ridiculous postures.

We ended up in bed. Afterward, Robin showered off, then announced she was going to do a bit of carving, did I mind?

After she left for the studio, I slouched in my big leather chair reading journals, Hawaiian slack-key guitar music droning in the background. For a while I did a pretty good job of forgetting. Then I was thinking about Stacy again. Eric. Richard. The deterioration of Joanne Doss.

I considered calling Judy Manitow, tomorrow, to find out if she'd come up with any new insights since the original referral. Bad idea. Stacy might find that intrusive. And Stacy had told me enough for me to see that the Dosses and the Manitows had been entangled beyond mere neighborliness. Joanne tutoring Becky, Eric dumping Allison, Becky and Stacy drifting apart.

Bob regarding Richard and Joanne's displays of affection with distaste.

Judy and Bob, dealing with Becky's problems. Yet they'd cared enough about Stacy to pressure Richard to contact me.

Me, not Becky's therapist, because they'd been guarding their privacy-keeping Stacy's issues at arm's length from Becky's? Or had it been Becky's choice-Stacy had just told me Becky had distanced herself, barely spoke to her. Whatever the details, it was best to avoid further complications.

I got up and poured a finger of Chivas. Added to the wine, that put me way past my usual alcohol consumption. Some Hawaiian virtuoso let forth a glissando in C-wahine tuning and I thought about palm trees.

I finished the scotch and had another.

On Wednesday morning, I woke up with a well-deserved headache, an agreeably moldy tongue, sandpaper eyes. Robin was already out in back. I couldn't smell the coffee she'd put on.

I took a one-minute shower and got dressed without falling over, looked for the morning paper. Robin had been so eager to work that she hadn't taken it in. I went outside and retrieved it.

The front page screamed at me.

The Mysterious Portrait of Dr. Death

Sudden Appearance of Painting Raises New Questions About Eldon Mate's Murder SANTA MONICA. When Grant Kugler, owner of the Primal Images art gallery on Colorado Avenue, showed up last night to unpack an installation, he found a surprise donation propped against the rear door. A package, wrapped in brown paper, containing an original, unsigned oil painting described as a copy of Rembrandt's "The Anatomy Lesson." Only this version deviated from the original in that it depicted murdered "death doctor" Eldon Mate in a double role, as dissector and cadaver.

"Not the work of a master," opined Kugler. "I'd rate it competent. Why it ended up at my door, I can't say. I'm not one for representational art, though I can be amused by social commentary."

The article went on to quote "police sources who spoke on condition of not being named," and attested to "intriguing similarities between the painting and details of the Eldon Mate crime scene, raising questions about the identity of the artist and the motivations for abandoning the portrait. The picture has been taken into custody."

That conjured images of burly men trying to figure out a way of handcuffing the frame. I wondered how long it would take Milo to get in touch. I'd finished half a cup of coffee when the phone screeched.

"I assume you read," he said.

"Sounds like Zero Tollrance is in town."

"Tried to do some follow-up on that Colorado article you gave me. No one knows Tollrance, there was no lease on the building he used for his show because he was squatting in it, one of those big industrial shells full of lowlifes. I don't know if Tollrance was even living there. Denver PD never heard of him, and the critic who wrote up the show doesn't remember much other than Tollrance looked like a bum and didn't answer his questions-didn't talk at all, just pointed to his canvases and stomped away. He figured him for a nut. That's why he called it 'outsider art.'

"A bum."

"Long hair and a beard. Mr. Critic said he had some 'primitive talent.' Said the same thing the gallery owner did-representation's not his thing. Which I guess means in the art world, if you know how to draw, you suck."

"So why'd he go to Tollrance's show?"

"Cuuuuurious. Intriiiiigued. Couldn't even get out of him how he found out about the show. Maybe Tollrance faxed him an announcement, maybe not. He said there hadn't been much of a crowd, no one buying. He never heard from Tollrance again, has no idea what happened to the paintings."