Beware Beware (12 page)

“Your dad really left you with them? To ride Splash Mountain?”

“Yup. They got me a Mickey Mouse ice cream sandwich and it was so cold it made my lip bleed. And I cried and made a scene at the ice cream cart.”

“How long were you with them?”

“I don't know. A long time, it seemed like. It takes a while to ride Splash Mountain.”

His tone suggested a euphemism, and I didn't ask.

“But he came back, and everything was perfect again. I still remember that day as one of the highlights of my childhood.” He took another hit off his pipe and smiled with a wistful glint in his eye.

“How about more recently?”

“What?”

“Tell me about your dad as you know him now. It's been fifteen years since you were eight.”

“Now?”

He gave me a confused look and I could tell he was gearing up to point out that his father was dead.

“I mean until Friday.”

“He was Joe Tilley. He was a movie star. Everyone loved him. He had a scandal here and there. He went to Haiti for a few days when there was that earthquake.”

I didn't feel like correcting him. “I don't need his tabloid dossier. I mean what was he like to you? As a man and a father?”

He closed one of his eyes halfway and looked up at me without a hint of recognition. “I guess he was pretty shitty.” He laughed. “Hey that's a sweet rhyme.”

“Shitty how?”

He shrugged. “He wasn't much of a father. He was shooting during my high school graduation, I guess, but for my college graduation he didn't even make an excuse. He said he'd come and then he straight-up just didn't come.”

“When did you see him, then?”

“When he felt guilty enough. My birthday's in April, and sometimes he'd call me up in June and take me to lunch or something, talk about making it up to me. But he never did, so…”

“You partied with him, though?”

“Not really.”

“Wanted to?”

His face turned red. “He had these legendary parties once in a while. Filled with drugs and famous people and beautiful girls. I was never invited, but I have friends, you know, who are famous. I went to Julian Lillywhite's bar mitzvah. You know, lead singer of The Mooninites?”

I shook my head.

“Anyway, we're still sort of friends, but he's also friends with my dad now. Not close friends or anything, but they're in the same circle.”

“So he kept you in the loop?”

“Yeah.”

“And he told you about this party Friday?”

“Yeah.”

“And you went, I heard.”

He stiffened. “Who from?”

“Jamie Landon.”

I realized as I said the name that Theodore hadn't asked me who had hired me. He seemed, now that I thought about it, oddly incurious about my mission.

His shoulders relaxed, but his mouth formed into a scowl. “Oh, that guy.”

“What about him?”

“I just don't like that guy. He's a smug asshole, and I never trusted him. And now, look, my dad is dead.”

“You think Jamie did it?”

“You're the investigator. What do you think?”

He looked at me with a pressing eagerness in his clouded eyes.

“It's too early to say,” I muttered.

“Well, give me a reason, and I'll go knock that guy's lights out.”

“So what happened at this party?”

“What have you heard?”

“Not much,” I said.

“Who else have you talked to?”

There was a mounting agitation in his voice that was starting to make me nervous. I decided to test him for a tender spot.

“I talked to Jamie, and I talked to the police.”

His eyes widened, clearing and coming fully awake. “What about?”

I shrugged. I had no reason to disclose that I was working on Jamie's behalf, much less that I saw his father's dead body. “This and that, just getting information.”

He scratched one eyebrow, covering his face with his moving hand. “Did they say anything about me?”

I searched my memory for any mention of his name in my interview with Detective Sanchez. Nothing came up, but I didn't need to tell him so right away.

“Why?” I asked.

“It's nothing.”

“Sure it is.”

We sat in silence for a while, and I stared at him openly while his face grew queasy with unease. I felt kind of guilty when it crumbled and he started to cry.

“We had a fight,” he said. “It was fucking awful and now he's dead, and I can't make it right.”

“I'm sorry. What happened?”

“I showed up at the party, hung out with Julian and a few other people I'd met before. I didn't want to go talk to him right away. I knew he might not like me being there, so I just hung out for a bit.”

“Was this your first time at one of these things?”

He nodded. “Yeah, actually. I never managed to get in before. Isn't that crazy? My dad threw all these parties where most of the guests were closer to my age than his, and he didn't once think to invite me?”

“Not that crazy if you think about it. It sounds like they were drug-fueled ragers. Not exactly kid friendly.”

“I would've felt better about it, you know, if I thought he was excluding me out of concern. But I'm pretty sure he wasn't excluding me intentionally at all. I think he just forgot I existed most days.”

Again, I thought of the usual platitudes about all parents loving their children and blah, blah, blah, but what good were platitudes in the face of lived experience?

“And if he'd thought about it for one second,” he continued, “he would have figured out how much it would mean to me if I could be one of the hundred or so people partying in his penthouse.”

“You'd asked him, too, hadn't you?”

“Yeah.”

“And he said what?”

“Usually he just ignored me. It's not like I saw him in person too often. When I cornered him he'd say something about it being ‘weird' to have his kid around.”

“Maybe you made him feel old.”

He snorted. “If I made him feel old it's 'cause he was old.”

Joe Tilley was between Chaz and my mom in age. I tried to picture them partying with Lori and her friends, dressed in flashy duds in some glamorous room. The image almost made me laugh.

“So, tell me about this fight,” I said instead.

“The police didn't mention it, huh?”

I nodded.

“I'll tell it to you straight. I know there were people who overheard the fight, and I don't want anyone getting any ideas. If you're running a story or whatever you can say you got the straight dope from me. Okay?”

“Sure.”

He took a deep breath and looked at his pipe before turning to me with an earnest sheen of suffering in his eyes.

“I was talking to this girl, a model. We were hitting it off, kind of, though now that I think about it I guess she was only interested 'cause she figured out who I was. Anyway, I was talking to her, and then my dad came barging in the room. He cut in and started talking to her, 100-percent cold-shoulder ignoring me. There was no way he didn't see me. I know he didn't give two shits about me, but I wasn't, like, straight-up invisible.”

“Jesus.”

“He was trying to get me to leave. He wanted me gone, and that was how he decided to try and make that happen. I was so mad I almost did leave, but I didn't want to give him the satisfaction.”

“So what'd you do instead?”

He rubbed his eyes vigorously, and spoke while they were hidden. “I shoved him. Hard. He stumbled and almost knocked the model right over.”

He paused, and I waited a minute for him to continue before nudging him on. “Is that it?”

“No,” he said, breathing heavily. “He turned around and slapped me across the face. In front of everyone.”

I winced. That was a tough last memory to carry of anyone, let alone someone who should've been biologically programmed with a measure of parental love.

“He got in my face and told me to get out of his house, like we weren't in a fucking hotel room. I spat on the floor and said he'd be sorry.”

“You said it like that? Like, ‘You'll be sorry'?”

“I said, ‘One of these days, you'll be sorry.'”

He was trembling, and I understood, now, why he'd been eager to talk to me. He'd had something to confess, and he'd been waiting, behind the transparent walls of his house, for a confessor to come and find him.

“Honestly”—he sniffled—“I know the word is he was murdered, but I can't help thinking he killed himself. Maybe it was all my fault.”

“The police haven't asked you any questions?”

“No.” He shook his head broadly and looked at me with wide eyes pumped full of something like innocence. “Why?”

*   *   *

The interview petered out after that, and I left Theodore's house without coming to any solid conclusions. The conversation had been illuminating in a lot of ways, but if he had any real information to give, he'd certainly kept that light under a bushel. As I drifted back across the peopled canal of the Boardwalk, my head swam with a turbulent blend of pity and suspicion for the murdered man's son. I had to wonder why the police seemed to favor Jamie when there was a more obvious suspect to clear, and I debated whether to give Detective Sanchez a call. I got in my car and called Jamie instead.

“They had an actual fight?” he asked after I shared my report. “The night of the party?”

“That's what he said.”

“It's that fucking kid. He fucking did it.” He was amped up, and though the same thought was skipping across my mind, his enthusiasm caught me off guard.

“Why the sudden change? You already knew they argued.”

“Yeah, I know, but I've been thinking about it ever since we talked, and it just makes sense. And man, I didn't know it got physical. That's another level.”

“He seems to think
you're
the most likely suspect. Though he also mumbled something about suicide, so maybe he hasn't quite picked a theory. He seemed pretty confused.”

“Or maybe he was trying to confuse you.”

“I have to say, he was pretty forthcoming, as things go. It was almost surreal.”

“He was probing you because you talked to the cops. Not a bad move for that doofus.”

“Come on, there's no need for that. His dad was just murdered.”

“Yeah—by him, probably.”

I could almost hear him pacing. “Hey, calm down, man. We don't know that.”

“Fine, fine, fine. But look, someone killed him. If I had to pick a favorite, I'd go with Thor.” He paused. “Did he tell you he has a standing relationship with every gossip rag in the country? Did he volunteer that?”

“No, but you already said he'd talk to me if he thought I might be press.”

“It's extreme, though. He would ask Joe to lunch, and the paparazzi would show up. It's why Joe stopped seeing him.”

I was almost embarrassed by how pathetic that sounded, but I remembered Thor Tilla's videos and thought he must not embarrass too easily. Still, it was hard not to feel bad for him.

“Look, I'm not defending that or anything, but it sounds like Joe stopped seeing him in any meaningful sense when he was eight years old.” I caught the rebuke in my voice and filtered it out. “I mean, I'm sorry your friend died, but pretending he was any better than he was is just not going to help us find his killer.”

He was silent, and in that interval, with some relief, I decided on my next move.

“I was thinking of making my way over to Los Feliz,” I said. “I want to talk to his wife.”

“Willow?” There was a note of alarm in his voice. “I know spouses are always suspect, but—”

“Not because I think she killed him, Jamie. I'm just assuming she knows more about him than most.”

“Right,” he said, the “t” lost in a falling sigh.

“Maybe she'll have more insight on Theodore, and either way, I'll be surprised if she has literally nothing to contribute.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line. I thought I could hear him sawing dead skin off his lip with his teeth. “Do you want me to call her and set it up?”

It only occurred to me that moment how hard it might be to access Tilley's widow without some sort of in. “Oh, sure, yeah, that'd be great. You're friends?”

“Yeah, sort of. Call you back in five minutes.”

*   *   *

What I knew about Willow Hemingway, I'd gathered from the Internet, pulling facts and credible gossip to form a mental file. Though most notable for her marriage to a newly deceased A-list actor, she was moderately famous in her own right. At thirty-two-years old, she had a long career behind her. She started out as a teenaged model, then acted in soaps, picking up minor spots on sitcoms and crime shows here and there. At twenty-three, she landed a regular supporting role on a teen drama that was popular when I was in high school. That was the pinnacle of her acting career. Over the next several years, she collected a small number of credits, and when she was twenty-nine, she married Tilley, who was sixteen years her senior. As far as I could tell, she stopped acting after the wedding, but her prominent marriage saved her name from obscurity.

Jamie called back with a gate code and an all clear. Willow was at home, and she'd agreed to see me. Forty minutes later I was outside of her house, smoking a cigarette and watching the scene. A hundred other people had had the same idea, and I was grateful that Jamie had covered my lapse of foresight. For as long as Tilley's death was news, Willow Hemingway was the most famous actress in America.

I walked down the street with my hands in my pockets, and got past several parked cars before a murmur rose behind me. By the time I'd reached the gate, car doors were opening and equipment shifting, and a few people asked who I was. I ignored them, feeling heat rise to my head, and covered the keypad while I pressed in the code. The gate gave a rattling buzz and the background noise rose to a flashing, shouting frenzy. Somebody touched my arm and I swatted away a meaty hand, its knuckles matted with dark hair. I walked into the driveway without turning around.