Somehow, by attitude alone, Simon almost succeeded in making it seem that he was in the higher position, looking down on her. “Don’t be such a snarky bitch. It’s tiresome. If you know Dana, you know what a tragedy that is, not just the whole agoraphobia thing, but Dana herself. I mean, she’s smart as a whip and so compassionate. She loves people, all people, not the tiniest bone of prejudice in that girl. But for all her virtues—and there’s a lot more than I’ve mentioned—in spite of her many virtues, she’s always been a little off. You hear what I’m saying? I fell hard in love with her—who wouldn’t?—so I didn’t see the problem for a while, but then it became undeniable. She was always a little off true north, like only two or three degrees off, but over time it gets worse, until she’s not going anywhere on the compass that people like you and me would recognize, she’s off into some weird territory. I feel so bad for her.”
He paused in his odd mix of encomiums and self-justifications to cock his head and regard Jane from a slightly different angle, like an earthbound broken-wing bird turning one eye toward the sky to calculate the likelihood of single-wing flight. After a moment of silence, he said, “You’re not here about Dana or Alexis or Marlo. My Sara sent you, didn’t she?”
“Sara Holdsteck, wife number four? I know that part of your history, but I’ve never even spoken to her,” Jane lied.
Briefly—but only briefly—puzzled, he said, “This isn’t about any ex-wife. So is it Petra? No, it can’t be. Don’t tell me Petra’s brought in some radical-feminist muscle to break some money out of me. I wouldn’t have figured Petra capable of that kind of thing.”
“Why wouldn’t you think her capable of it?”
He shrugged as best he could in his restraints. “She’s a fun kid, and she’s smart enough, but she doesn’t have it in her to look out for herself.”
“Yeah? Well, a little earlier tonight, she came at me with a broken vodka bottle, tried to slash my face.”
“No shit? She really did?” He appeared delighted by the image that those words had painted in his mind. “Of course, after a girls’ night out, she would’ve been drunk. And she can always hold her own when it’s just girl on girl. You gotta tell me, sugar, what’d you do to piss her off?”
“I liked bitch better.”
“What?”
“Don’t call me sugar.”
“Yeah, you’re one of those types. I get it. But what did you do to piss off Petra?”
“I needed her to tell me some things about you, and she didn’t feel in a mood to cooperate.”
“Where is she now?”
“Dead,” Jane lied. “She came at me hard, and I shot her.”
“You’re shittin’ me.”
“Her body’s in the kitchen.”
“Damn, that’s some of the sorriest news I’ve heard in a while. She was really hot. The word hot doesn’t do her justice. She was a fine, fine piece of girl.” He sighed and shook his head. “You’re not here because of the wives, and not here because of Petra. You’re here for you. So then why all this talk, talk, talk, talk? Let’s do business.”
“What did you mean, Petra can ‘hold her own when it’s just girl on girl’?”
“What’s it matter now?”
“Humor me. I’m the curious type.”
“I never been tied up for a gossip session before. Okay, all right. With a guy, any guy, she was like putty, just rolled over no matter what. Did what she was told, drunk or sober or in between. Did what she was told, took what she was told to take, and liked it. Never complained no matter what.”
Jane leaned forward on her stool and peered down as if to read him more closely. “No matter what? So did you hit her?”
“?‘Hit her’? Hell, no. I can get all the girls I want without ever hitting them. What’s wrong with you talking trash like that? We’re making progress, correcting the record, slowly coming to terms, and now you dis me like this. ‘Did you hit her?’ I don’t take offense easy, but that one’s over the line. Did you come here just to insult me, or you want something worth the risks you’ve taken?”
Jane got off the stool. She walked away from him and then back toward him, rolling her shoulders, stretching her neck. “Two things I want. First, tell me where the cash is. And don’t play any games with this, because I’m not Petra. I don’t roll over.”
“Maybe I look stupid right now, but I’m not. I give you one wrong number, you’ll come back here and start cutting me or using a pair of pliers on my balls. I got no leverage. All I want is we do our business and get you gone.”
After he told her where to find the safe and divulged the combination, she said, “You just want me gone, but what about Petra? Will you hang that murder on me?”
“There won’t be a body by tomorrow morning,” he said. “It’ll be ground-up sludge poured in a pond at a sewage-treatment plant. She’s the kind no one’ll miss. Even those dumb-ass bitches she goes club-hopping with—in a month they won’t remember her name. So she went off to Puerto Vallarta or Vegas or Mars with some other stud, just slutting her way to an early grave. So what? Who cares? Nobody. She’s nothing.”
She had parked Petra in the back of the theater because she wanted her to hear the truth of Simon from his lips, in the hope that the girl might ask herself what had gone wrong with her that she’d involve herself with such a man. But in Petra’s fragile condition, Simon’s acid contempt might do her more harm than good, and it was regrettable that she’d had to hear it.
Jane asked, “You sure you can get the sewage-treatment-plant thing done?”
“Haven’t you been telling me how I’m great at making women go away? And does it seem like I worry about cops? Let me tell you, honey, I’m so connected I could get a police escort to that sewage plant.”
Jane knelt on the floor beside him. She could see that he preferred her at a distance. “I’m curious about something.”
“You’re a damn cat with all your curiosity.”
“Why did you name the house computer Anabel?”
“What’s that got to do with the price of beans? Go get the money you came for, honey.”
“Money honey. Rhymin’ Simon. Of all the names in the world, why name the house computer Anabel? It’s a simple question. Isn’t that a simple question?”
“Nothing about you is simple, is it? I didn’t mean honey, it’s just how I talk. I’ll go back to bitch, make us both happy. Okay, all right. The system doesn’t come with a set name. You have to give it one. I could’ve called it anything.”
“But you called it Anabel. Your mother’s name is Anabel. Does it make you feel special to be able to tell your mother what to do, and she always obeys?”
For the first time, he was nervous. In spite of his solipsism, perhaps he began to be troubled by the thought that even if he was the only real person in existence, even if the universe had been created solely as a vehicle for him to tell his story, his fate could take an unexpected turn for the worse.
47
Still kneeling beside Simon Yegg, Jane pressed one finger to the dimple in his chin. “Just like that actor back in the day, Kirk Douglas. When you were little, did your mommy put her finger in your chin dimple and call you adorable?”
As he had said, he wasn’t stupid. He knew where this must be going, and it was forbidden territory.
His expression did not betray the anger that he wanted to conceal from her, but his eyes belied the impression of unconcern and self-control that he worked hard to project. Thus far they had been as opaque as the eyes of a ventriloquist’s dummy, but now they revealed an inhuman fury. If he had not been tied down, he would have killed Jane to prevent her from pursuing her current line of inquiry.
She wiped her chin-probing finger on his rugby shirt. “Tell me now, how much do you hate your mother?”
“You’re off true north yourself. You’re totally off the map. My mother’s a great lady.”
“How much do you hate and fear your mother?” she persisted.
“Just shove it, shut your mouth. You don’t know her.”
“But I know about her. Four husbands. Each an effete wuss, a trust-fund baby from the day he was born. Each of them had just scads and scads of inherited wealth.”
“You don’t go there. You don’t go to family, ever.”
“Four divorces, she gets everything she wants. More than she wants. They give her whatever it takes. They’re in terror of her.”
“They all loved her,” Simon insisted. “Not a one of them ever said a word against her, not one word, not ever.”
Flat on his back, he suddenly couldn’t swallow his saliva as fast as it formed. He choked and coughed. Strings of spittle sputtered between his lips, spattered his chin.