Read Last Lie for Free Online Page B

Peter had wanted me to be.
    To memorialize my minority landowning status--and to taunt me with the reality of my comparatively diminutive holdings--Peter had carved a sign on a big hunk of scrap mahogany from his shop's stash. Peter was a woodworker extraordinaire; the woodcarving that commemorated the limits of my stewardship was a fine piece of art. He had proceeded to anchor the sign proudly, with dowels and marine glue, to the mailbox post at the end of the lane.
    The placard read: ALAN'S AHAH.
    It stood, of course, for "Alan's almost half a hectare."
    Until the day he was murdered on the stage of a downtown theater, Peter loved the fact that no one had ever guessed the meaning of the acronym.

4
    M y brief meeting with Mattin Snow during the week before the big housewarming they were planning to show off their new digs--or at least the "before" version of their new digs--proved an inauspicious start between new neighbors.
    I think Emily was aware that I shared her sense of impotence about the state of affairs that was developing across the lane. Peter and Adrienne had been almost perfect neighbors. Whoever followed them into that house had a high bar to vault. I was determined to offer Mattin and his wife, Mimi, whom I had not yet met, as much latitude as I could muster while they settled into our remote Spanish Hills neighborhood and assimilated into our odd part-of-Boulder-but-not-part-of-Boulder culture.
    I reminded myself that I didn't really know Mattin. But Boulder is, despite its geographical size, a small town. Our good friends Diane and Raoul knew Mimi and Mattin well and considered them friends.
    Diane, in fact, was the one who told me who had purchased Adrienne's house. She'd explained that she'd only known Mattin for a few years, but that she'd known Mimi, Mattin's wife, and her ex-husband since Raoul's heady NBI days in the eighties. Diane, who knew more about other people's family histories than the average ancestry website, also informed me that Mimi had a couple of kids who wouldn't be around much--a daughter, currently studying in Prague, who was a cheerleader at the University of Iowa, and a son who was at a boarding school in the mountains perfecting his skiing, or something.
    Diane thought we'd all become fine friends. Lauren seemed to agree. It was increasingly clear to me that my wife was a fan of Mattin's work, and perchance even a fan of Mattin himself. Lauren, I knew, had good radar. So, except for the part about maybe being a jerk about Emily running off leash for ten minutes each evening, I was working to keep an open mind about my new neighbor.

    EMILY'S LATE ROUNDS the night of the big housewarming began only after she completed a careful reconnaissance of the few vehicles that remained parked across the lane. Her quick appraisal--she's a nimble beast--ended with a head-shake and a loud huff. I could relate. She then dashed through the narrow gap between Peter's old barn and our house in the direction of the distant dark vertical gash in the Front Range that was the entrance to the wonders of Eldorado Canyon. When she reemerged in my sight she was halfway down the hill, hopping at an angle in the Bouvier-as-jackrabbit motion of hers that I have never tired of observing. In seconds she bounded over the nearest miniridge--okay, it was more like a berm--and disappeared from view.
    Our other dog was by my side.
    When Adrienne died the previous year, she left behind her wish that Lauren and I raise her son, Jonas. Our second dog was her posthumous gift to Jonas. Fiji was a Havanese, a breed I hadn't known existed. It took Jonas a while to settle on a name for the puppy--she'd come to us as Callie, a moniker that he announced wasn't going to last. Befitting her heritage, Jonas had eventually named his new dog after a tropical island. Jonas being Jonas, he'd chosen an island about as far from the puppy's ancestral homeland, Cuba, as was possible.
    Fiji had no choice but to stay with me while Emily