Read Shamus In The Green Room for Free Online Page A

back with red eyes. “Will took it well.”
    “I’m glad.”
    “I mean, as well as you could expect.”
    “Of course.”
    He sat down. “If you love Maren, you get used to surprises,
    good ones and bad ones. That’s just the way it is. That’s just
    what makes her Maren.”
    He was still using the present tense. “I suppose he’ll want to
    talk to the police,” I said.
    “Yeah, he’s calling Detective Smarinsky right now. I never
    even asked the cause of death.”
    “And he’ll have to notify the rest of the family.”
    “They’re dead. There is no other family. It’s just Will now.”
    He cut into his pancakes so hard the knife scraped against the
    plate. “Shit,” he said in disgust.
    “It’s okay.”
    “It’s not okay.” He pushed his plate away and raked his fin-
    gers through his hair. “And this whole thing messes up our
    plans. It’s not like we have extra time here. The movie starts
    shooting soon.”
    “You’re going to be brilliant.”
    “Maybe we could take just a day off,” he said, “and then get
    back to what we were doing.”
    “That’s fine.”
    “I guess I need to get my head together or something.”
    “Tell me more about Maren,” I said.
    Rafe became very interested in my empty coffee cup. “Can I
    get you a refill? You look like you need a refill. It’s good coffee.”
    My face got hot. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. You
    don’t have to say anything.”
    42
    He shook his head. “It’s just that I can’t believe this. I can’t
    fucking believe this.” He slammed his fist on the table, hard.
    “Why the hell is this happening?”
    I thought of Gambino, always after me to be sensible. “I
    think maybe we should go.”
    “No!”
    I looked at him.
    “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to raise my voice. Look, can we
    just sit here for a little while longer?” he asked.
    “Okay.”
    Rafe twisted his lucky hat in his hands. He folded and un-
    folded his napkin. Finally, he said, “We were inseparable.”
    “You and Maren?”
    He tore his napkin into neat strips and arranged them on
    the scarred wooden tabletop. “It was me and Maren at first,
    when we were just kids. Then it was Will and his girlfriend,
    Lisa, too. Of course, I haven’t seen Maren in years and years.
    Will’s barely seen her, either. We split up before I made my
    first movie. God, it was so long ago. Back then,” he said, shak-
    ing his head, “back then, though, we were unstoppable. The
    four of us. Nobody could touch us.”
    I didn’t quite get it.
    He started to smile. “Do you know Maren was the one who
    taught me to surf?”
    I smiled back. “Really?”
    “She wasn’t like other people. She’d be the only girl out
    there at Lunada Bay, every single day. That’s on the peninsula,
    the Palos Verdes Peninsula, where we grew up. Beautiful half-
    moon cut out of limestone? You had to scale these high cliffs,
    and brave the rocks just to get there. And deal with the surf
    Nazis who thought they owned the place. Maren never so
    43
    much as batted an eye at those guys. She’d be out there, every
    storm season, where the waves would be breaking big—four,
    five o’clock in the morning and still dark out—and nobody’s
    watching the sunrise because they’re all watching her. She
    liked to ride the waves that scared the shit out of everybody
    else.”
    “She sounds amazing.”
    He looked at me curiously, then got up and threw the re-
    mains of his napkin away. I followed him with both our trays
    and dumped the contents into the receptacle. We walked out-
    side. It was still early morning, but the sky was already choked
    with smog.
    “When you come right down to it,” Rafe said, “I don’t
    know how amazing Maren was. She used to drive with her eyes
    closed sometimes. I think she had a death wish.”
    It was a strange thing to say, given the circumstances.
    CHAPTER
    SIX
    Oh, honey, not my Norma Kamali coat from the eight-
    ies!” I screamed, grabbing the scissors out of