Already Gone

– 47 –



I open my eyes, and for a moment I don’t know where I am. There’s a thin strip of morning coming in through the break in the curtains, turning the room a cold blue. Diane is lying on the bed with her back to me. I sit up slow, trying not to wake her, then walk out into the hallway.

I hear the delicate sound of dishes coming from the kitchen, and when I turn the corner I see Doug standing at the sink, rinsing a coffee cup.

“Morning,” I say.

He looks back at me, then points to the table. “Have a seat. Want some coffee?”

“Sure.” I pull out one of the chairs and sit down. There is a silver ring of keys sitting on the table next to a folded map.

“I woke up early,” Doug says. “Couldn’t sleep.”

I start to apologize again for dropping in so late, but he stops me before I finish.

“It wasn’t that. I was just thinking about your situation.” He motions toward the hall. “Is Diane still sleeping?”

I nod.

Doug reaches for the coffee pot and fills two cups. He hands one to me, then pulls out a chair and sits down. “I didn’t ask many questions last night. I know you’ll only tell me what you want to tell me, so I didn’t see the point in pushing.”

“I appreciate that.”

“Well, you might not in a minute.” Doug takes the key ring off the table. “These are the keys to my place in El Regalo. If you’re set on going, I’ll give them to you.”

“But?”

“But I want to know what happened. I want to know why she’s back and why you think Gabby wants to kill her. From what I know of him, he watches out for you, so why would he want to kill your wife?”

I don’t say anything.

“Is it money?”

I sip the coffee and it burns. “Of course it’s money.”

Doug sits back and waits for me to go on. The house is still, and the only sounds I hear are the morning birds on the lawn outside the window.

“Where do you want me to start?”

“The last I heard of Diane, she was dead. Now she’s not. Why don’t you start there?”

I nod. “Okay.”

I go over everything, trying to keep it all straight in my head as I talk. Doug listens, refilling his coffee cup once while I speak. He doesn’t show any emotion at all until I tell him about the statues and the diamonds. Then his left eye starts to twitch.

“And Gabby wants to kill her because of the diamonds?”

“Because of the company that owns the diamonds,” I say. “He thinks she’s a loose end and will lead them to him if they come looking.”

“It makes sense.”

I hesitate for a moment. “He also thought she was working with Briggs. He thought she was using me the entire time to find the statues.”

“And you didn’t believe him?”

“Of course I didn’t. I still don’t.”

“But?”

“What makes you think there’s something else?”

Doug shrugs. “Tell me there isn’t.”

I pause, look down at my cup. “It does seems a little coincidental.”

“You could say that.”

I finish the last of my coffee then set the cup on the table in front of me. “But I trust her.”

Doug stands and grabs the coffee pot. He refills my cup.

“Why don’t you spit it out. I know you’ve got thoughts on all of this. Do you think Gabby’s right?”

Doug shakes his head. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Maybe?”

“I’ll say this. People might fake their deaths in the movies, but not in the real world, not like this.”

“How do you know?”

“Because you don’t just decide one day to do something like that. You can’t just hit a reset button on life. It’s not that easy.”

“She did it.”

“And that’s what bothers me,” Doug says. “She did it. She faked her own death.”

“I don’t see your point.”

Doug puts the coffee pot back, then sits. “How would you go about faking your death? Any ideas?”

I shake my head.

“She knew how to do it.”

“She had help.”

“That doesn’t make it better,” Doug says. “Whoever did it knew what they were doing. They were able to arrange the entire thing. They were pros, and that worries me.”

“Worries you?”

Doug leans forward and rests his arms on the table. “How much do you really know about Diane?”

“She’s my wife.”

“Can you trust her?”

“She’s my wife.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s my answer.”

Doug leans back, doesn’t speak.

“Do you think Gabby’s right? Do you think it’s all a lie, our marriage, our life together?”

“Do you?”

My immediate reaction is to tell him, “No, of course I don’t, none of it was a lie.” But no matter how much I want to say it, I can’t do it.

Doug watches me for a moment, then he picks up the keys and twirls them once on his finger.

“You still want them?”

“Yes.”

“Then they’re yours.” He slaps them on the table and slides them toward me. “Maybe some time alone, just the two of you, away from all this, will make things clearer.”

I stare at the keys and don’t say anything.

Doug picks up the map, unfolds it, and lays it flat on the surface of the table. “Here’s where you’re going.” He turns the map so I can see. “El Regalo, right here. When you get there, talk to a man named Oscar Guzman. He runs the local market in town, and he takes care of the house for me. Everything in town goes through him. I’ll write a letter of introduction for you before you go. Give it to him, and he’ll help you with anything you need.”

“You shouldn’t do that. If we get stopped, they’ll know you helped us.”

“I’ll take the chance,” Doug says. “But that’s as far as I’ll go. Once you’re down there, neither of you should try contacting me or anyone else back here for at least a month, maybe longer.”

I nod. “It’s a deal.”

“Good.” Doug sips his coffee, then looks back at the map. “Let me show you the best place to cross, and a few of the back roads you can take to avoid the police.”





When Diane wakes up, we all sit in the kitchen, and I tell her the plan. She listens, sometimes looking at the map, sometimes staring out the window at the cars passing along the street.

When I finish, she turns to Doug and says, “Thank you for this.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” he says. “Wait until you get across the border, then you can thank me.”

“Okay, I will.”

Doug pushes himself up from the table and motions for us to follow. “Let’s see if we can find you two some clean clothes.”

Doug has a lot of T-shirts. We borrow a few, then take a couple bottles of water and walk out to the garage and the SUV.

“Follow the roads I showed you. It’ll take a couple more hours, but you’ll be safer.”

I set the water on the driver’s seat, then turn and hold out my hand.

Doug shakes it and hands me an envelope.

“Oscar Guzman.”

I turn the envelope over, then slide it into my back pocket. I want to let Doug know how sorry I am for the way things turned out. He’s put a lot of faith in me over the years, and I can’t help but feel like I’ve let him down, like it was all for nothing.

I start to tell him this, but he waves me off and motions to the glove compartment. “I left you something in case you run into any trouble.”

I hesitate, then reach in and open the latch. There is a .38 inside, and I stare at it for a moment without speaking.

“It’s a good gun,” he says. “Hope you never have to use it.”

“Me too. Thank you.”

“Just keep your eyes open, Jake.” He looks over at Diane as she climbs into the passenger seat, then back at me. “I mean it.”