Serpent’s Tooth. Faye Kellerman

      “Sure.”

      “Peter, I don’t like making Thanksgiving. It’s no charge for me to make yet another big feast, a month after our major holidays are over. And yes, I do know what that holiday means to her. Peter, we’ve gone down to Gainesville twice for Thanksgiving. It’s lovely, but it isn’t the kind of holiday she wants. It hurts her tremendously that we can’t eat her beautifully cooked food in her house on her special china.”

      “Why? She says things to you?”

      “No, of course not. But that doesn’t mean I don’t notice her wincing when we sit there at her table with fruit and raw vegetables on our paper plates.”

      Decker was quiet.

      Rina said, “I can’t change the fact that we’re observant, kosher Jews and they’re Baptist. That’s just life. I can’t take over her kitchen. But she can take over mine. Let me invite her out here to make her Thanksgiving with my pots and pans. Cook everything in my house in my kosher kitchen—”

      “Rina—”

      “I’ll buy the meat and all the trimmings, but she can have free rein. I’ll even go shopping with her to pick out a set of china of her choice. I have so many sets of dishes, one more won’t hurt. She can cook to her heart’s content. Do all her favorite recipes including her pumpkin pie. Only accommodations she’ll have to kashrut is using nondairy margarine and Mocha Mix instead of butter and milk. And, of course, no honey-glazed ham.”

      “She won’t do it.”

      “She doesn’t even like ham—”

      “It’s not the ham, Rina, it’s the whole thing. She’ll feel displaced.”

      “At least let me try. I think she’ll come out. I think she’d love to cook up a storm, actually have us eat her meals. And then there’re the grandchildren—Cindy as well as our Hannalah—”

      “That means Randy’s left alone.”

      “So I’ll invite Randy and the kids and wife number …”

      “It’s still three.”

      “Your nieces and nephews will love it here. Disneyland—”

      “They’ve got Disney World, Epcot Center, and Universal Studios. Theme parks are no big deal to them.”

      “Yes, but we’ve got Las Vegas—”

      “Oh, my sister-in-law will love that.”

      Rina sighed. “Just think about it, okay?”

      Decker was quiet. “You’d put up my brother’s family?”

      “Absolutely. I find Randy … interesting—”

      “I love my brother.”

      “I know that.” Rina smiled. Even though Randy worked two jobs—he was a vice cop and moonlighted as a security guard—he was always flat broke. Peter had been sending him cash for years.

      Silence. Then Decker said, “I’ll call Mom tomorrow.”

      Rina said, “I’ll call her tomorrow. She’ll say no to you, but yes to me.”

      Decker knew that was all too true. He turned toward his wife, draped an arm around her shoulders, and drew her to his chest. He kissed her mouth, licked her lips. “I love you.”

      “I love you, too.” She kissed him again. “Want to make more out of this?”

      “Wish I could.” He laughed. “I’m afraid I’d be arrested on charges of Assault with a Dead Weapon—”

      Rina laughed, slapped his shoulder. She kissed him gently, licked his mustache. Her hands snaked around his body, stroked his long muscular back with tender fingertips.

      He let out a soft rumble. “Feels good.”

      “I think I detect signs of life—”

      “That’s not life, that’s just a reflex.”

      “Whatever it is, it’s good enough for me.”

       8

      Waking up before the sun, Decker showered, shaved, and said his morning prayers alfresco, bathed in the golden light of dawn. Afterward, he let the dog out, pitched fresh hay to his stable of four horses, changed the animals’ water, went through yesterday’s mail, and had coffee brewing by the time Rina roused the crew for school.

      Although anxious to get his professional life going, Decker forced himself to make a little time for breakfast and family affairs. The day’s topics included his stepson’s driver’s license, buying a newer car for Rina, and giving Sam his own set of wheels in the form of Rina’s old Volvo. Decker promised they’d hit the car lots on Sunday. And if Rina had the inclination, maybe they’d look at new living-room furniture as well. His wife was surprised, delighted. Immediately bright with ideas. Decker felt good. It had been a long time since he’d seen Rina’s smile.

      After the boys left for school on the bus, Decker played zoo with Hannah, her stuffed animals being nefarious creatures of prey, and Ginger, the Irish setter, doubling as Simba the Lion. Then Decker carted his daughter off to school. Hannah threw her pipe stem arms around his neck, kissed him on the cheek with soft little lips. Decker felt an overwhelming desire to cling to her, to lug her into work in a papoose. Instead, he lowered her to the ground and watched her scamper off. The experts talk about separation anxiety. Were they referring to the child or the parent? Cloaked in wistfulness, Decker left the neon-painted schoolhouse, arriving at the station by half past eight.

      All business, he made phone calls, signed papers, went over reports, checked in with his detectives, then buried himself in pathology reports and bullet trajectories for the next four hours. Head buzzing, he finally broke for lunch at one-thirty. At his desk, he opened his brown bag—two chicken sandwiches, two pieces of fruit, two bottles of Martinelli’s sparkling apple juice, and a half dozen cookies. Food that could be easily eaten in a car.

      He took his lunch and his briefcase and headed for the Volare. Within minutes, he was on the road, felt his shoulders relax, his face go slack with freedom.

      Devonshire division patrolled a varied geographical area—some residential, some small business, some factories, and lots of rolling foothills and fallow acreage waiting for a land boom that was always “just around the corner.” Developers ran scared out here and not without reason. The district had been the center of two major earthquakes, was Saharan hot in the summer, and was situated far from city action. Still, it was God’s green acres in the late autumn—glorious blue skies with long stretches of wildflower fields and oak-dotted hills ribboned with miles of hiking and horse trails. Giant sycamores and menthol-laden eucalyptus swayed in the winds.

      The division also contained several million-dollar housing developments—big mama, multiroomed mansions floating in seas of green lawn. The gated communities ran complete with pools, spas, tennis courts, recreation rooms, and banquet facilities. When Greenvale Country Club opened its doors fifteen years ago, Decker wondered why the rich would join a club, paying hefty premiums for amenities available on their own premises.

      Yet Greenvale had made itself a known quantity. Though it wasn’t as prestigious as some of the older, established L.A. clubs, it had its own cachet, boasting an elitist membership and hosting its fair share of society weddings and black-tie-only charity events. It seemed that human beings had an infinite capacity to rate—to separate and segregate into in-or-out crowds.

      The club sat on twenty-five acres, the buildings obscured by umbrellas of specimen trees. As the Volare chugged up the long, shaded drive, Decker noticed several gardeners tending the lawns and