The Pendleton Omens - 18. Chapter 18

Police work is sometimes just a slog interrupted by distractions. Somewhere in the middle of Wednesday afternoon, I decided I needed a break from the phone calls, and the e-mails, and the credit card checks, and the questions, and I called Owen. I really hadn’t talked to him for a week. Wednesday, he’d been out. Thursday, he mostly stayed in his office, trying not to give everyone his cold. Friday, I only worked in the morning, to use the afternoon to help get out of my apartment. Saturday, I flew.

“How’s your head?” I began.

“Less stuffed than it was,” he admitted. “How’s Scoot?”

“Where’s Scoot? is the question. We still don’t know. Though thanks for backing me up the other day.”

“Not a problem.”

“This is tough work.”

“So you’re not just out there lying in the sun?”

“I haven’t even been near the pool.”

“You’ve got one?”

“Everyone does. Scoot’s building’s no different.”

“You’re not staying at a hotel?”

“Not when there’s an empty two-bedroom apartment available. It makes no sense,”

“I still think you’re on the beach,” he said, laughing.

It was the first time I’d heard him laugh since I told him about Noah. It seemed a good sign.

“I hear you moved,” he went on. “Actually, I watched you do some of it.”

“You could’ve helped.”

“I had a cold, remember?”

“You’d do anything to avoid work,” I joked, almost comfortable again. “Though it was an easy move. Mainly clothes.”

“Elena says you need to do some paperwork for her. For all our vouching on the phone.”

“Will it wait?”

“All depends if you want to get paid before you get back. And when are you coming back?”

“I wish I knew.”

“Any way we can help?”

“I’ll let you know. I honestly didn’t think it would take this long. You can’t believe how many people Scoot knows without them really knowing him.”

“Yeah, well, how many of us really know ourselves?”

And there we wandered into it. I don’t think either of us planned to. We were doing so well. But the point was, did I take the opening or let it hang?

I couldn’t duck.

“Owen,” I began.

“Donny...”

That cracked me up. And took me off the subject.

“You know I’ve always thought it was a pain in the ass that you never had a nickname.”

“The Big O.”

“That’s when you were a kid. And first jerking off.”

“Maybe I still am.”

“Hardly likely,” I joked. “And nothing I want to talk about anyway.”

“I thought that’s exactly what you wanted to talk about.”

Unfortunately, he was serious.

“It’s a little far away,” I said.

“Maybe we’re safer at a distance.”

“I’d rather do it over a beer.”

“I might punch you out.”

I laughed. But again he was serious.

“I didn’t think it had gotten that bad,” I told him.

“Why? I’ve nearly punched you a couple of times. The first time for getting caught.”

“Caught?”

“Sleeping around. Sneaking around. Whatever you want to call it. How could you wreck a perfectly good marriage?”

“Owen...”

“Donny...”

“Stop it.”

“No. I’m sitting at my desk, hanging onto this phone like I might break it in half. Now you got me talking. Talk.”

That was a bit scary. I had no idea he was that angry.

“You’ve got more control than I thought,” I offered.

“You just don’t know.”

“Why?”

“Because you’ve been too busy with your own damn life to ever see anyone else’s.”

“That’s not true.”

“No, you’re probably right. You were a good husband while it lasted. And you’re obviously a good father, or you wouldn’t be in fucking California right now. But maybe, if you were a little less self-centered, I wouldn’t be so pissed off at you.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked. I was lost. “I’m just about the lowest key guy you know. And I’ve never been especially selfish.”

“Especially?”

“No more than, say, you are. And I don’t mean that as an insult.”

“So you’re giving yourself compliments now?”

“I’m just saying, I’m no worse than you.”

“Then you don’t see yourself very clearly.”

“I think I do.”

“But you didn’t think you’d ever get caught. And you didn’t think anyone ever knew what you were doing until you did.”

That threw me. “No, I didn’t think anyone knew. I was always very careful.”

“You want to know the first time you got your cock sucked?”

“I think I remember that,” I tried to joke.

“So do I.”

“What?”

“You want day, time, and year?”

“You talking high school?” I was embarrassed now.

“I’m talking junior high.”

“When I was fourteen?”

“I’m talking Philip Haines.”

“How did you know that?”

“Because he sucked everyone’s cock. Or tried to. I’m the one who broke his nose.”

“That was you?” Now I did laugh. It was an unsolved local legend.

“Yeah. I managed to keep it secret. He was the only one who knew, and he wasn’t about to tell.”

“Because he’d tried to suck your cock?”

“Because he told me he’d sucked yours. As a way to try and get to mine. And he told me you’d sucked his.”

“Well, he was lying there. I didn’t have any guy’s cock in my mouth till I was twenty-nine.”

Oddly enough, Owen laughed.

“What?” I asked.

“Just later than I guessed.”

“But how’d you keep Haines from talking all those years?”

“Because I told him I’d break his neck. And I told him I’d do it in front of everyone and make it look like an accident. That I’d never be blamed.”

“And he believed you?”

“Yeah, you really lucked out on that one. It could have changed your life.”

I almost wanted to say Thanks. But I was still stunned.

“After that, you got pretty good,” he went on. “Even I have to admit it. You got very sharp.”

“Why would that be luck?”

“Because you could have fucked up at any moment. But you thought you were smart.”

“I never felt smart.”

“You never thought anyone would notice. And I’m not talking about sleeping around. I’m talking about every day.”

“How?”

“You don’t think I noticed?

“What?”

“You staring at me.”

“I never stared.”

“Well, looked.”

“I never would have touched you, Owen.”

“And that’s half the giveaway. You don’t touch guys. You can’t touch them even in normal ways. You don’t know how. You don’t trust yourself.”

“Maybe,” I had to admit.

“God’s truth.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

“And that’s how you fucked up a perfect marriage.”

“It was never perfect.”

“It was close. You got along better with Sharon than I do with Lisa. Still do.”

“Well, I was on my best behavior. Because I knew I was messing around, and I couldn’t do anything else to complicate Sharon’s life.”

“You didn’t have to start screwing around.”

“I did. If even you could see it, how do you think I felt? I was out of control. I could feel it spilling all over the place. I knew if I didn’t do something, I was going to wreck my life.”

“You did that anyway.”

“No.”

“And you wrecked Sharon’s.”

“No.”

“You could have let anyone else marry her and she’d be happier.”

“You just said we were perfect.”

“For as long as you could fake it. Then you left. And ruined the rest of her life.”

“I don’t think so.”

“But you don’t know. And no offense to this Noah guy. Rob says he’s a perfectly nice. But I hope he hurts you the way you hurt Sharon. And I hope you’re just as unhappy.”

There wasn’t a lot I could say to that. And I didn’t know where to start. I was furious with Owen, and it wasn’t rational. Because he wasn’t rational.

I said nothing for so long that Owen finally had to ask, “Donny?”

“Yeah?”

“I can’t forgive you because I don’t want to. You see how pissed off I am just trying to explain. It’s not you and Noah Sewell I mind. I don’t care about that. But I can’t believe you know so little about yourself. That you’ve hurt so many people with so little thought. And that I just watched and let it happen.”

“What would you have done?”

He almost had no answer. Then he said, “Not break Philip Haines’s nose for one thing.” And he hung up.

And I felt like a jerk.

He was wrong.

At least partly.

And he was right.

But that’s what having secrets will do.

It wasn’t even four o’clock, but I went into Scoot’s bedroom, closed the door, closed the bathroom door to make it good and dark, and went to sleep.