To Die in Beverly Hills Read Online Free PDF

called. I really am. I hope you won't have trouble going back to sleep." The phone clicked.
    Carr hung up and fell back onto the pillow.
    A short time later the doorbell rang. Carr awakened, but didn't move. It rang again. He crawled out of bed and stumbled to the door.
    "It's me," Sally said, hearing him move across the living room floor.
    He opened the door. Sally was dressed in a jogging suit. Her auburn hair was pulled back and he could tell that, despite the hour, she had put makeup on. He smelled something perfumy as she walked past him into the bedroom. He followed and got back into bed.
    She stood at the window. "I suppose now that I've made a fool out of myself and come over here in the middle of the night you're just going to go back to sleep and leave me standing here," she said wistfully. Carr didn't say anything. Sally waited a few minutes before she moved closer to the bed. "You don't care enough even to talk to me for a few minutes."
    He grabbed her arm and pulled her into the bed. They kissed. His hands tore at her clothing. They made love for what must have been an hour. Afterward Sally lay next to him, rubbing her hand lightly across the hair of his chest.
    "You live as if there's no future," Sally said softly. "You don't save money. You hate to make plans. I have to force you to buy new clothes. You're driving the same car you had when I met you nine years ago. You could probably get a loan, but you won't buy property. You might as well be a corporal living out of a duffel bag. Your television didn't work almost all of last year. Are you aware of that? Are you aware that it took you a year to have your television fixed?"
    "I don't like television."
    "That's not the point," Sally said. "The point is that you're living as if there's no tomorrow. Our relationship is an endless succession of one-night stands." With this, Sally rolled away from him. "I've never tried to change you," she said after a while. "Not that I wouldn't have liked to, it's just that you're probably the most stubborn and unchangeable person I've ever met. It's because you've been in an all-male environment since you were seventeen years old...the army, Korea, your career with the Treasury Department...you're in a paramilitary organization. Are you aware of that?"
    "I guess you're right," Carr muttered. His eyelids were heavy. In the darkness, he felt Sally stir. She rested her head on his shoulder.
    "I love you," she said in an almost inaudible whisper.
    "I love you too," he said. Sleepily, he wrapped his arms around her. He thought of their first date years before. Sitting at a table in a restaurant Carr couldn't afford, they had treated each other with deference.
    "It's as if our whole relationship is déjà vu ," she said.
    Her skin was soft and he could feel the outline of her breasts against him. In the darkness, he thought she wiped her eyes. He considered asking her if she was crying, but didn't.
    When Carr woke up the next morning Sally was gone.
     
    He daydreamed about walking along the beach with her, and their frequent Sunday-afternoon routine of dinner at her place. She always cooked too much. Finally he forced himself out of bed.
    In the bathroom, he realized he'd forgotten to buy shaving cream again, so he shaved with bar soap. Having showered and dressed (thank God he had one clean white shirt left), he went into the kitchen.
    He boiled water and poured it into a cup. Dug through the cupboard and found the instant coffee container. There was less than a teaspoon in the jar. Regardless, he emptied the jar's contents into the boiling water. He mixed the water with a spoon; it turned barely brown. Having forgotten his search for something to eat the night before, he went to the refrigerator and saw that he was out of milk for the coffee. "Damn," he said out loud. He slammed the door shut. Fed up, he tossed the semi-coffee in the sink and rinsed out the cup, tore off a piece of brown paper bag. With a broken pencil he found in a