BECAUSE THE NIGHT

345

to touch briefly what he was, offer their innocence as barter, and then get out before his hard line fervor destroyed their hard-earned and fatuous sense of life’s amenities.

And then, last year, Teddy Verplanck merged into his path, turning his universe into chaos. When that symbiosis was completed, death and rebirth occurred simultaneously, and as his wounds healed, Lloyd became a hybrid warrior formed of his past and its validity and of accredited blood testimony as to where it would ultimately take him.

And his hard line fervor cracked and solidified, leaving him to tread air in the middle of a fissure.

Before he could consciously recall his vow of abstinence, Lloyd drove to Wilshire and Beverly Glen and the only destination that gave the softer part of his fissure credibility. Finding the door open, he walked into the entrance hall and cleared his throat to announce his presence. His answer was the shuffle of feet and an unexpected giggle.

“You’re early,” Linda called out.

Trying to track the voice, Lloyd said, “It’s Hopkins, Linda.”

Linda stepped out of a closet next to the dining room, dressed in a silk robe. “I know it is.”

Lloyd walked forward to meet her. “Am I that predictable?”

Nodding her head both “yes” and “no,” Linda said, “I don’t know. Just don’t apologize for this afternoon. I was as out of line as you. No pretexts this time?”

“No.”

“Want to talk before or after?”

“After.”

Linda smiled and tilted her head toward the bedroom, then let Lloyd step ahead of her and walk in. When his back was turned, she slipped off her robe and let it fall to the floor. Lloyd swiveled to face the soft sound, seeing Linda nude, framed in the doorway, backlighted by the glow of a hall lamp. Keeping the frame at arm’s length, he undressed, wincing when his gunbelt hit the carpet. Linda giggled at the impact, then laughed outright when he leaned over and fumbled off his shoes and socks and snagged his zipper and nearly fell out of his pants. Whispering something that sounded like “beyond the beyond,” she slid past him and lay down on the bed. Lloyd saw her take up a beckoning position, a single shaft of light fluttering across her abdomen. Using the light as a beacon, he came to her. She talked while he held her and felt her and tasted her; little sighs about 346

L.A. NOIR

love and green doors. When his kisses became more persistent and then trailed down to her breasts, those sighs became the gasped word “Yes.” Lost in the word’s repetition, he let his lips move lower, until “yes” crescendoed into “Now, please, now!”

Lloyd obeyed, joining their two halves in a single abrupt motion, then pulling back to a sustaining movement as Linda coiled herself around him and pushed upward. He moved slowly; she with the unrestrained fervor of a graceful animal exploding with gracelessness, forming a point-counterpoint give and take that battered awareness of technique to death. Then he began to move with her fury, and the cop/whore entity pushed itself into a wordless, gasping trance.

Linda succumbed to reality first, twisting her head from the crook of Lloyd’s collarbone. She traced his back with her palms and kissed his neck softly, until he pulled his head from the pillow and looked down on her, revealing a blank, tear-mottled face. All she could think of to say was, “Hopkins.”

Lloyd rolled over and took her hand. When he remained silent, Linda said, “It’s after. We were going to talk, remember?”

Twisting sideways to face her, Lloyd said, “What do you want to talk about?”

“Anything except what just happened. It was perfect; let’s not mess with it.”

Lloyd positioned himself so that his eyes and Linda’s were only inches apart. “No earth-shaking postcoital revelations?”

Nodding her head so that their noses rubbed, Linda said, “Yes. I’m quitting the Life. I’ve got seventy grand tucked away, which should set me up in some kind of business enterprise. I’m quitting the shrink, too. If I quit hooking on my own I won’t need him, and therapy is too expensive for a fledgling businesswoman.”

“He’ll be very sorry to see you go.”

“I know. He’s a very brilliant shrink, but I shouldn’t associate with men who are obsessed with me. Having pictures of me on the wall is just too sad. Even though he takes them down for my visits, I still feel manipulated. Do you remember the pictures? Exactly how was I posed?”

“You weren’t posed. They were candid type shots.”

Linda’s face clouded. “Really? That’s strange. All the pictures in the book were posed.”

Lloyd shrugged, then felt an overlooked connection hit him. “Never un-