rain, “but better safe than sorry.
There’s a lot of blood, but I didn’t see any spurting, no torn artery.
Must hurt like the devil, though.”
“Funny,” Peake said, “but it doesn’t hurt much at all.”
“Shock,” Ben said worriedly.
“No,” Peake said, shaking his head. “No, I don’t think I’m going into
shock. I’ve got none of the symptomsand I know them. You know what I
think maybe it is?”
“What?”
“What I just did-shooting my own boss when he went bad-is going to make
me a legend in the agency.
Damned if it isn’t. I didn’t see it that way until he was dead. So,
anyway, maybe a legend just doesn’t feel pain as much as other people
do.” He grinned at Ben.
Ben returned a frown for the grin. “Relax. Just try to relax-” Jerry
Peake laughed. “I’m not delirious, Mr. Shadway.
Really, I’m not. Don’t you see? Not only am I a legend, but I can
still laugh at myself! Which means that maybe I really do have what it
takes. I mean, see, maybe I can make a big reputation for myself and
not let it go to my head. Isn’t that a nice thing to learn about
yourself?”
“It’s a nice thing,” Ben agreed.
The night was filled with screaming sirens, then the bark of brakes, and
then the sirens died as running footsteps sounded on the motel driveway.
Soon there would be questions-thousands of them-from police officers in
Las Vegas, Palm Springs, Lake Arrowhead, Santa Ana, Placentia, and other
places.
Following that ordeal, the media would have questions of their own.
(“How do you feel, Mrs. Leben? Please?
ow do you feel about your husband’s murderous spree, about nearly dying
at his hands, how do you feel?”) They would be even more persistent than
the police-and far less courteous.
But now, as Jerry Peake and Julio Verdad were loaded into the
paramedics’ van and as the uniformed Las Vegas officers kept a watch on
Sharp’s corpse to make certain no one touched it before the police
coroner arrived, Rachael and Ben had a moment together, just the two of
them.
Detective Hagerstrom had reported that Whitney Gavis had made it to the
hospital in time and was going to pull through, and now he was getting
into the emergency van with Julio Verdad. They were blessedly alone.
They stood under the promenade awning, holding each other, neither of
them speaking at first. Then they seemed to realize simultaneously that
they would not be alone together again for long, frustrating hours, and
they both tried to speak at once.
“You first,” he said, holding her almost at arm’s length, looking into
her eyes.
“No, you. What were you going to say?”
“I was wondering…”
“What?”
….. if you remembered.”
“Ah,” she said because she knew instinctively what he meant.
“When we stopped along the road to Palm Springs,” he said.
“! remember,” she said.
“I proposed.”
“Yes.”
“Marriage.”
“Yes.”
“I’ve never done that before.”
“I’m glad.”
“It wasn’t very romantic, was it?”
“You did just fine,” she said. “Is the offer still open?”
“Yes. Is it still appealing?”
“Immensely appealing,” she said.
He pulled her close again.
She put her arms around him, and she felt protected, yet suddenly a
shiver passed through her.
“It’s all right,” he said. “It’s over.”
“Yeah, it’s over,” she said, putting her head against his chest.
“We’ll go back to Orange County, where it’s always summer, and we’ll get
married, and I’ll start collecting trains with you. I think I could get
into trains, you know? We’ll listen to old swing music, and we’ll watch
old movies on the VCR, and together we’ll make a better world for
ourselves, won’t we?”
“We’ll make a better world,” he agreed softly. “But not that way. Not
by hiding from the world as it really is. Together, we don’t need t,o,
hide. Together, we’ve got the power, don’t you think?
“I don’t think,” she said. “I know.”
The rain had tailed off to a light drizzle. The storm was moving
eastward, and the mad voice of the wind was stilled for now.
the end.
•