Body Copy (26 page)

Who were the people in this case who mattered? Roger’s widow and his stepson were cryptic, but ultimately they seemed to just be protecting their feeble image of themselves as perfect. As people with money and reputations and no skeletons in the closet. Yeah, right—we’ve all got

’em. And we all try to hide ’em. But if the stepson would bend the law to protect his mother’s reputation, what else would he do? That glass eye, that shifty manner. Maybe the business with paying off Bill Peterson was a ruse to keep cops and detectives away. You know, he paid off a cop to protect his mom, but he definitely didn’t
kill
his stepdad. Or did he?

And Wendy Leahy? Okay, she lied, she lied a couple 261

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times. So? She was a nice girl who ran a gym who got offered five large by a charismatic Roger Gale and took it. So sue her.

Tyler Wilkes? The guy’s a joke. Hires another P.I. on a paranoid, implanted fear that he was gonna somehow end up in trouble for doing business with Paul Spinelli. And the karate studio? The sex show? What was Roger Gale doing there? Did he see a show? Did he not see a show? Did some sex performer have the poise to tell Tremaine that Roger Gale had never come in when in fact he actually had? Did these sex-show people connect to Roger Gale’s death or to Kelly Burch or to Dean Latham or to anything? Anything at all?

Who killed Roger Gale and why?

The one murder that might have had any connection at all was Kelly Burch’s. But wasn’t that a friggin’ shot in the dark? So what if they got murdered on the same day. So what.

Tremaine lay down on his back and looked up at the sky. A disconnected thought popped in his head. Even in the midst of this whirlwind of analysis, he thought to himself, it’d be nice to solve this one, even if it was just to impress Nina . . .

He looked at the sky, at the stars, the white dots among the blackness. He envisioned each star to be an element in the case. He started drawing imaginary lines between them to form figures in his head, like constellations. Everything, from the moment Nina appeared at his trailer until now, moved around in his brain as he looked at the vast California sky and the stars.

He drifted off to sleep.

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At about three in the morning, he woke up. Thinking: Where the hell am I? Then he went down the ladder, went inside, and went to bed.

He woke up again at about 5:00 a.m. His mind, before having a chance to process anything else, went directly to the case. He walked into the kitchen, made a pot of coffee, and stood there, watching the pot slowly fill up with dark brown liquid. Drip. Drip. Drip. Just standing there in his little kitchen at the crack of dawn, watching the coffee but focusing on the case. And then his mind—almost out of nowhere—went to Dean Latham.

And that’s when it happened.

He realized that the man he’d talked to, the movie producer, Dean Latham, was not the Dean Latham in the picture with Kelly Burch.

That robe-wearing washed-up movie producer was innocent. He had told Tremaine the truth. He’d never met Kelly Burch and he’d never met Roger Gale. Tremaine owed him an apology, and he’d give him one.

Dean Latham, the movie producer, did, however, share his name with the man in the picture, the man with the long black hair and the glasses, Kelly Burch’s lover.

But it was by sheer coincidence. The Dean Latham in the picture was a different Dean Latham. The Dean Latham Tremaine had met had absolutely nothing to do with the case.

Yes, Tremaine thought, the Dean Latham in the picture was someone else. Someone who was, without question, entirely vital to the case he’d been struggling with.

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Tremaine got a feeling in his stomach, his subconscious mind connecting with his conscious mind. His logical attack on the case colliding with his instincts.

And he realized that the girl from the karate studio, the sex performer, hadn’t lied to him either. She’d never seen Roger Gale before. That was the truth. In fact, Tremaine realized, Roger Gale had never even been to the karate studio. No, Tyler Wilkes was mistaken. Tyler thought he’d seen Roger Gale go in the karate studio, but he was wrong.

Roger Gale had gone somewhere else.

Tremaine focused on the name Dean Latham, examining it closely. Then, staring at the name in his mind, the letters in Dean Latham’s name began to float independently of each other. Tremaine’s eyes were pointed at random things on his kitchen counter, but what he saw was the name Dean Latham etched in his imagination. The letters danced around and began to take different positions. Began to re-order themselves to form something new. Tremaine letting his mind go, letting it work on its own, as he’d done so many times working that silly Jumble word game.

Tremaine thought about the words, the name, Dean Latham. The letters began laying themselves down into new creations.

First he saw: dean latham.

And then he saw: dea lantham.

And then he saw: the lad mana.

And then he saw something else, something that made him shake his head and even smile. And he grabbed a pencil and a piece of paper and he wrote what he saw down. Tremaine knew, as he wrote it, the identity of the man in the picture with Kelly Burch, the man who had written her 264

B O D Y C O P Y

love letters. A man who had gone to great lengths to disguise his appearance. A man who hadn’t gone to a karate studio but had gone next door to a wig store, Expert Wigs, to buy himself a long black wig. That way, disguised, he could be
across a table at a crowded restaurant
with Kelly Burch, the beautiful young girl he loved. Yes, the man in the picture had even changed his name so when he was with her he could completely become someone else. But he hadn’t chosen just any name. No. He’d made the perfect name using only the letters of a title that described him to a tee. He’d left a clue. Of course he had, he was too creative and clever not to.

This is what Donald Tremaine wrote down out of the letters in the name Dean Latham: the l.a. ad man.

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C H A P T E R 3 7

Tremaine got in the Cutlass instantly.

He called Jack Sawyer as he drove toward Gale/

Parker.

“You up, Jack?”

“What do you mean? I’m old, I wake up at three in the morning.”

It was just 6:00 a.m., but Jack Sawyer, the Salty Dog, was alive and kicking, thankfully. Tremaine asked him if he could meet him at Gale/Parker not in an hour, not in a half hour, but as soon as possible, right now, preferably.

Sawyer, the good man that he was, said, “absolutely.”

At the steps leading to the Gale/Parker reception area, open for business, as always, Tremaine stood there waiting for Sawyer. He saw Sawyer pulling in, looking alive in his pickup at this early hour.

B O D Y C O P Y

As Sawyer approached, he said, “You P.I.s keep funny hours. Luckily, so do old advertising farts.”

“Thank you for doing this.”

“It’s okay. They’re gonna think I’m in the office early to work. Never hurts. Even at this stage in my career.”

“I’ll tell you what I need as we walk in.”

They got inside, got to Sawyer’s office, and Tremaine told Sawyer what he’d discovered. Kelly Burch, the secret affair, the love letters, the disguise, the double life that Roger Gale had been living. Then Tremaine said to Sawyer,

“I know I’m not wrong, but this case is insane. Nothing is as it seems. I needed to bounce this off someone who knew Roger well. Who knew what he was capable of. And what I’m wondering is, now that I’ve told you what I found, does it connect to anything you know about Roger?”

Sawyer took a long pause and then said, “We had a big, crazy costume party here at the agency once. I’ve got some pictures of it. I think you’d be interested in seeing some of them.”

Jack Sawyer went into a filing cabinet in his office and produced a photograph from the costume party. And there was Sawyer dressed as a clown, standing next to Roger Gale dressed not as a recognizable character but as someone else. A guy with long black hair and big black glasses.

Sawyer said, “Roger came to this party, not wearing a costume-party costume. He just came as someone else.

That was his costume. And nobody recognized him for a while. It was typical Roger, playing with people’s minds.”

Tremaine looked at the picture from the costume party.

It was the same guy who was in the picture Angela Coyle had shown him.

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Sawyer said, “This help you out?”

“I was sure. Now I’m positive.” Then Tremaine said,

“When Roger Gale was with the girl, Kelly, he went by a different name, too. He called himself Dean Latham. Not just a random choice. Gale used the letters in the moni-ker ‘The L.A. Ad Man’ to come up with, to create, Dean Latham.”

Sawyer nodded, but his face betrayed confusion, this onslaught of bizarre information hitting him at such an early hour.

“Read these letters he wrote to her,” Tremaine said.

Tremaine produced the letters, handed them to Sawyer.

Sawyer read them, then just kind of stared for a moment and said, “Wow. There’s a lot in there. Love, lust—obsession, maybe.”

“Yeah,” Tremaine said. “And Gale couldn’t tell Kelly how he felt when he was Roger Gale, ad exec, L.A. Country Club man-about-town. So he became someone else when he was around her and told her his deepest feelings.”

“You think she knew who he really was?”

“I don’t know,” Tremaine said. “I’m sure she knew he wore the wig. If the sex was as great as he says in the letters, I’m sure she yanked on his hair a time or two.”

Sawyer managed a laugh.

Tremaine said, “I don’t think she cared who he really was. She was a drug addict, maybe he paid for her blow.

But I’ll tell you this. She probably knew him as well as anyone. The guy sure as hell went out of his way to keep people in the dark.”

Sawyer looked at the letters, at the picture, then at Tremaine.

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Tremaine said, “You read those letters . . . Those were real feelings from a part of Roger Gale that he never showed anyone else. In the end, the guy who wrote them . . . That’s Dean Latham, not Roger Gale. Same body, different guy.”

Sawyer said, “In the ad business, we call that body copy.”

Gallows humor. Tremaine knew he liked this guy.

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C H A P T E R 3 8

After leaving Gale/Parker, still in his car, Tremaine called John Lopez. If he’d needed his help before, he’d definitely need it now. Luckily, Lopez answered. And listened. Listened as Tremaine told him his theory and his plan. This was when the bullshitting between them was over, and Lopez didn’t make any of the jokes that were par for the course. No, he just listened and, in the end, agreed to Tremaine’s request.

Then Tremaine made another call. This one he pulled his car over for. No distractions. The midmorning traffic was in full swing—it was almost nine now—so Tremaine ducked into a random parking lot in Marina del Rey that serviced some small businesses. He sat in his car facing a 20/20 Video, a nail salon, and Rubio’s Fish Tacos.

B O D Y C O P Y

He pulled out the little piece of paper Evan Mulligan had given him, the one with his number on it, and dialed him up. Tremaine sat in his car, concentrating on the matter at hand but looking at an old poster in the window of 20/20

Video for
Blade II
. Tremaine was in a stare-down with a Mohawk-sporting Wesley Snipes vampire when Evan said,

“This is Evan.” The standard at-work hello.

“It’s Donald Tremaine,” Tremaine said.

There was no immediate response from Evan. But then, just before the silence became an awkward silence, Evan said, “Sure, the P.I. I didn’t expect you to call. So quickly, anyway.”

Tremaine said, “I was hoping to talk to you a little more.” Tremaine, measuring very carefully his words.

Making sure not to say too little, not to say too much.

“Um, okay. What about?”

“About Dean Latham.”

“Dean Latham? The guy you asked me about? I told you, I don’t know him.”

This is where Tremaine had to be careful, had to make sure that what he said had the right result. Tremaine said,

“Dean Latham was having an affair with your former girlfriend, Kelly.”

What Tremaine got in response was another pause.

Now Evan exhibited a little edge, just a slight one, but it was there, as he said, “Okay. So? Are you calling to tell me I was wrong about her not being involved with someone?

Dude, I was just telling you what I thought.”

“Listen, Evan, will you meet me to discuss this further?

I want to tell you a few things, but I think we should meet in person.”

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“Listen, I don’t know Dean Latham, and if you’re sure Kelly was having an affair with him, then maybe you should look into him. But if you have questions for me, can’t you just ask me now?”

“This is about more than Dean Latham,” Tremaine said, at this point choosing his words with total precision, choosing them so they’d have just the right effect on Evan Mulligan. He said, “This is about how Dean Latham’s affair with Kelly led to her murder. I want to talk to you before I talk to the police, before I talk to anyone.”

“Why?”

“Because you can help me determine if I’m right.”

“Right about what?”

“Right about who killed her.”

“Where do you want to meet?”

“Wherever you want.”

Evan paused. Then he said, the edge in his voice gone now, “Why don’t I come to you. I don’t want any more memories of my girlfriend’s murder to be in my house.”

Tremaine said, “Do you know where Crystal Point is, in Malibu?”

“The public beach?”

“Yeah,” Tremaine said. “Why don’t we meet there.

There’s a couple benches, and they light up the sitting area at night. You can leave your memories there.”

“What time?” Evan said.

Tremaine hung up the phone, the
Blade II
poster still stared at him. The hustle and bustle around Rubio’s and the surrounding shops seemed liked a cartoon, everybody going on about their day, while he sat in a hot 1971 Oldsmobile Cutlass contemplating a case where he hadn’t had 272