About Face (3 page)

“That one's hers,” he whispered. “You can get in, can't you?”

“What, break in? Forget it. We'll ring the manager.”

“No! Absolutely not!” Rod clasped his hands in my direction. “Please. Just believe me. She may be in trouble. The manager's not the person to try.”

I refrained from asking how often he spied on her from this spot. But I did ask if he'd seen something happen through that window.

“I'm—I'm not sure. I wanted the police to check on her, but they said she can't be reported missing until twenty-four hours go by. It might be too late by then.”

“Too late for what?”

Rod spun, looking to his left, then his right, as if an invisible fiend lurked in the dark. “
I don't know
. That's what I mean. I'm afraid she's in there, I'm afraid she's . . .” His lower lip trembled. Again his hands clasped. “I want to hire you, Bill. I have to find out what happened. Wes told me you had some experience. I'll pay you the same rate as the film, plus expenses. I'm serious about this.”

That got my attention. Film work had been very, very slow lately. I wasn't turning down jobs of any kind. “You're that worried about her?”

“Worried sick,” he said miserably.

The climb looked feasible. The Dumpster could get me to the single-story roof. A combination of drainpipes, wisteria vines, and balcony railings could get me to Alissa's balcony. The sliding glass door would be open, if I was lucky, or could be pried open.

“Does she live alone?” I asked.

“Yes. That's why the light concerns me.”

I fixed my gaze on him as well as I could in the dark. “I might do it. But I want to know what's going on here. Who was that young guy who came to your house today?”

“He's—” Rod faltered. “He gave me reason to believe some-thing's happened to Alissa.”

“Yeah, but who
is
he? I'm not going up there until you spell this out.”

“I will,” Rod promised. “Afterward. Please just find out for me if she's there. If she's alive. Then I'll explain.”

“Explain first. Then I'll tell you if she's alive.”

A wild look leaped into Rod's face, as if the fiend was closing in. He grimaced, made a run for the Dumpster, and managed to
swing his legs over the edge. But the lid was open and he promptly toppled into the bin, disappearing with a soft thump. The Dumpster wasn't empty. He emerged a moment later with a vexed whimper.

“Let me help you out, Rod.”

“I'm going up there!”

“Come on out of the Dumpster.”

“Go to hell, Bill.” He gained a precarious knee-perch on the lip.

“Rod . . . Rod, listen to me. I'll go. Now calm down.”

He came all at once, pitching forward. I caught him and lowered him to the pavement. “I'll go,” I repeated, “assuming you haven't woken half the neighborhood.”

Rod brushed himself off. “I'll take full responsibility. You're in my employ.”

Rod had done nothing in the past week to make me think he wouldn't keep his word. And I hated to say it, but in addition to the pay I was drawn by that sense of not wanting to see what I might find, yet feeling a compulsion to look. Alissa's smile lingered in my memory.

We waited a few more minutes to make sure we hadn't attracted attention. Then Rod gave me a boost up on the Dumpster. I balanced on the lip for a moment, hands pressed to the windowless wall, trying not to inhale too deeply. A sideways jump allowed me to grip a drainpipe that ran down the wall. Climbing it hand over hand brought me to the roof of the utility room.

If I spent more of my free time rock climbing or lifting weights, I might have been able to pull myself up the drainpipe to the third floor by arm strength alone. Being a mere camera jock, I needed footholds. The Granada was a vintage forties building: The wisteria twining up the drainpipe to the balconies
had been there for decades and the vines had grown thick as cords. I hoped they were strong enough to hold 175 pounds.

My arms still did most of the work. Using the wisteria cords for toeholds, I made it to the first balcony and rested, bending over the iron rail, my feet wedged between the bars. The sliding glass doors here were dark. At the second-floor balcony, a murmur of voices came from inside the apartment. I leaned forward and saw the blue flicker of a TV. The curtains were open. I couldn't rest here.

I let the vines take more of my weight as I climbed to the third floor. They twined vertically around the drainpipe, making the toeholds slippery. My right foot slid and suddenly I was dangling from the pipe. I looked down to see where I would splatter. If I could propel myself out and to the left, there was a chance I'd land in the Dumpster. I hoped my landing would be as soft as Rod's.

My arms were feeling the burn when my feet finally found a bit of leverage. I wedged my hands under the pipe to give my arms a second of rest, then ordered them to pull me the final yards to the third floor. I thrust a foot between the bars of Alissa's balcony and threw myself around the corner and over the top of the railing, gulping air. Once I was on the balcony, I stood up and gave Rod a wave.

“Are you okay?” he whisper-yelled.

I shushed him and made my way past some planters and a plastic chair to the door. The white curtains were drawn, illuminated by a weak light inside. I gave the sliding glass door a pull. Locked. I waited a minute, gathering my strength, then took the handle in both hands. Simultaneously lifting and shaking as if to rip it from its track, I popped open the door.

I stepped back and waited. No sound came from inside. By now I was focused simply on the job and not on what I might
find in there. Crawling was the way to go, I decided, in case someone was waiting to take a swing at me.

The floor was cool tile. A single table lamp lit the room and its brass-riveted, Mission-style furniture. The plaster ceiling curved in the direction of a Moorish arch. A large TV sat across from the couch and a desk stood against the opposite wall beneath a leaded glass window. My hand slid under something soft and silky. I lifted it to discover that my wrist had been lassoed by a black lace bra. I decided to stand up.

The apartment had a galley kitchen, a darkened bedroom, a spacious tiled bathroom, and no dead bodies. The closets stood open. Clothes were littered in the bedroom and living room, on furniture and on the floor, as if they'd been considered and abandoned in a marathon dress-up session. The bed was unmade. The medicine cabinet was empty save for a few fallen vials. A leather purse sat by the front door. It was empty.

I went back to a small message board attached to the side of the refrigerator and turned on a light. The name Erika was scrawled on the board, as if owed a return call. Below it were letters and numbers that had been erased. I leaned in to decipher and memorize them.

The wall phone next to my ear rang, jolting me upright as if I'd been caught.

I shut off the light and made for the balcony. Then the phone machine on the desk picked up. I heard Alissa's answer message again. Another woman was on the line, her voice young and throaty, but strained.

“Alissa, it's me. Are you back? I've been worried about you, I wanted to check up.” She paused and said, “Are you back? The thing is, when I was parking, I think I saw someone in your apartment, and I was afraid it could be an intruder or something.” A longer silence followed. The voice turned shivery. “Oh
my God . . .” she said as it dawned on her that that someone was probably listening to her.

This was bad news for two reasons. First, it meant the woman had seen me break in. Second, it meant she was close by. I considered exiting by the normal route. Then I considered witnesses in the hallway and the manager about whom Rod had warned me. I left everything as it was and went back out the sliding door.

Going down was easier than coming up. I kept a grip on the drainpipe and shimmied down. The balcony railings gave me points of balance. From the roof of the utility room I slid straight down the pipe. I grabbed Rod and told him we had to get out of there.

“And Alissa?” he asked, dreading the answer.

“She's not dead.” At least not in there.

» » » » »

I'd fulfilled my end of the deal. Now I was looking forward to Rod fulfilling his. We were in the doughy embrace of his brown leather living-room couch. Rod had commanded fire in the brick brass-plated fireplace. A glass of apple juice sat in front of him. I'd requested a stronger beverage and he'd produced a light beer. After I'd explained to him why I had to make such a quick exit from Alissa's apartment, he wanted only to talk about the interior. It was as if he heard none of my insistent questions about why he'd wanted me to go in. He was particularly interested in her clothes.

“Surely you've seen what she wears,” I said.

“She dresses very nicely. But was there anything more, uh, like what she'd wear to a nightclub? Kind of racy?”

“I didn't seen any spangles. But she has nice underwear.”

Rod's face went red. I saw my opportunity. “It's your turn now, Rod. Clearly you've never been inside her apartment. I don't think you've even been to the front door. You've only spied on her from the back.”

Rod jumped to his feet and began to pace in front of the fire, arms folded. “It's not like that,” he said. “I was just worried about her safety.”

“You never even called her to ask, did you?”

“I didn't want to intrude.” He'd circled around behind me, and for a moment I thought he'd left the room altogether. It was unsettling, but I'd seen him do this before when he was working on a particularly difficult problem. “I didn't want to frighten her. Did you—you didn't see blood anywhere, did you?”

“No. And the clothes didn't look like they'd been flung around violently. It was more like they'd been laid in place.”

“It seems like she'd be neater.”

“The apartment looked nothing like your desk. But then, neither does mine.” Rod's desk was spotless every morning and it was returned to that state by the end of each day. His idea of organization was having everything put away. Mine was having everything out where I could see it. “Tell me what you know about this. An email address was written on her message board.” I spelled it out:
[email protected]
.

“It sounds like a spam address.”

“What about a woman named Erika? Her name was also on the board.”

He stopped behind me. “Erika. Yes, she's mentioned her. Erika works with Alissa.”

“Where do they work?”

He waved the question away as if he didn't know and resumed his pacing in front of the fire. My patience was at an
end. “Rod, who the hell is this woman? You've allowed me to believe she's your girlfriend, your fiancée, or at the very least someone you date. She's none of those, is she?”

“Is that what people think she is?”

“Of course they do! That's how you talk about her. Now, what's this all about?”

Rod knotted his arms tighter. His expression had become inert. His voice was barely audible. “We really were very close. I'm telling you the truth.”

“All right, I believe you were close. Who is she? Where does she work?”

A little brightness came into his eyes. “She was the one who told me about Plush Biologics. She introduced me to Dr. Plush.”

Plush Biologics had sprung from the work of Ronald Plush, an elite dermatologist with a cult following in the Valley. Eternaderm was their gene-based wonder therapy for skin. Rod's Algoplex had done such a good job providing molecular simulations and data visualization for Eternaderm that Plush's primary backer, Sylvain Partners, had agreed to fund the elaboration of Algoplex's technology.

“Fine,” I said. “She works for Plush Biologics. What does she do there—she's a scientist?”

Rod looked at the fire, not me. “She's done other types of things. Here's the point: I really need her to be at the dinner Monday night when we sign the Plush deal. I'm at ease with her around. I feel more like
myself
.” He returned to sit on the couch, facing me, the pleading back in his eyes. “That's why I need you to find her. By Monday. Forget about the film; it doesn't matter. I really need her that night. I don't want to blow it.”

“You don't mean stop working on the show. You mean find Alissa and have a rough cut to screen Monday night.”

“No!” Rod waved his hand as if erasing a blackboard. He started to get up again, but I held his arm. “I mean yes, if you can. But Alissa is the priority. The rest truly doesn't matter.”

“All right, then,” I said evenly. If I hadn't seen him pour the apple juice myself, I'd have thought he was inebriated. “If you want me to find Alissa, you have to answer my questions. What's her job at Plush Biologics?”

Rod looked away again. He didn't answer immediately, and when he did, his voice was soft. “She's had a hard life. Her mother, Wendy, was very young when she had Alissa. Alissa never even knew her father. She sort of got in the way of her mother's ambitions, and Wendy let her know it. Wendy always had some scheme going, she was always sure success was just over the horizon. Not real stuff, a glitzy kind of success. They lived in L.A. As soon as Alissa was old enough to be put in front of a camera, Wendy started pushing her, too. She was smart enough to get away from her mother eventually. But it may have been too late. Alissa learned word processing, project management, Photoshop, a few programs that got her executive-assistant jobs in high tech. She was playing it straight, working her way up from the bottom, unlike her mother. It was her way of rebelling. But she never succeeded in completely escaping Wendy.”

“Where does Alissa work now?”

“She's a kind of hostess.” Rod still wouldn't look at me.

“You'll have to tell me where. Tomorrow I'll interview her manager and her coworkers. I'll find Erika.”