Fallen Idols (34 page)

Emma laughed. “I'm a C tennis player, that's the closest I've come to being a sports person. I've never even seen a volleyball game in person.” She paused. “I haven't lived in L.A. that long.”

“Guess I was wrong. You must remind me of somebody else.”

“I've been told that before,” Emma said with an easy smile. “It's not uncommon, I don't think.”

“I suppose not.” Callie shrugged. “I must have been I mistaken.”

Dinner was at Valentino's. Clancy had eaten at Charlie Trotter's in Chicago, and had thought it the best meal he'd ever had in his life. This one matched it. Walt had ordered in advance, matching special wines with each course. He talked easily to the waiters and sommelier and even the owner, who bustled from table to table but had lime to stop and converse at length with them. Clancy, taking it all in, thought of Fitzgerald. The rich definitely are different from the rest of us, he thought, as he made his way through course after incredible course. They not only have more money, Hemingway had noted, they know what to spend it on. Themselves.

Walt was a charming if overly energetic host. His mission, both Clancy and Callie figured out early on, was to gel them to like Emma, and more important, to accept her. How smart she was, what a great cook she was, what a gift she had for everything artistic, literature, theater, music. They had season tickets to the L.A. Philharmonic. They went to the Catalina Bar and Grill to listen to Sonny Rollins and Chick Corea. They were on the invitation list to every hip art gallery opening in town. On and on.

“Walt, please stop,” Emma said, when he had particularly extolled one of her outstanding attributes. “He can get going a bit much,” she said with a tone of embarrassment. “Tell me about you,” she said to Callie. “Do you I have a preference as to what sex you want your baby to be?”

Callie shook her head. “As long as it's healthy, I don't care.”

“Are you going to do a … what do you call it, when they can determine the sex?”

“Amnio.” Callie shook her head. “No. I want to do everything naturally.”

Emma looked at her. “I envy you.”

Callie put her fork down. Here was an opportunity. “Do you have children?” she asked.

“No. I don't.”

“There's time,” Callie said. She was pushing a little now, but it felt right. As long as she didn't push too hard. “You're a young woman. You're not that much older than me. How old are you?” She laughed. “You don't have to tell us.”

Walt had gone quiet.

Emma glanced quickly at Walt, then away. “I'm thirty-three.”

“You have plenty of time,” Callie told her cheerfully.

Emma smiled. “Who can predict the future?” she asked rhetorically.

The private investigator's name was Artesia Garcia. A full-figured, high-cheekboned Latina in her early forties, she had been a detective in the LAPD before resigning in disgust after the Rampart scandal and setting up her own PI shop. She met Clancy and Callie at nine o'clock the next morning in her office on Wilshire Boulevard, a mile east of the Beverly Hills line.

Will had hired her; the Los Angeles branch of his firm had recommended her. Her specialty, which derived from her police background, was in tracing elusive characters like drug dealers and security scammers who used multiple false identities, moved their money around in shell bank accounts, laundered money from illegal to legitimate businesses. The feeling Will had gotten from her, over the phone was good—she seemed no-nonsense professional, but not full of herself. They agreed that she would get working on their problem immediately, and would meet with his brother and sister-in-law when they came to L.A. He wired a two-thousand-dollar deposit into her bank account as a retainer.

Ms. Garcia's office was spartan, functional, cramped. She picked up a thin folder that was lying on her desk and opened it. “So far, I have drawn a blank,” she informed them. “There is no record of an Emma Rawlings anywhere in Los Angeles, Orange, Ventura, San Diego, Santa Barbara, or Riverside counties. No address for anyone with that name. Your brother told me she had an apartment in Westwood, one of the high-rises on Wilshire?”

“I told him that,” Clancy said. “Or maybe it was Tom, our other brother. I distinctly remember my dad telling me that.”

Garcia nodded. “I checked them all out, thoroughly.
Nada.
No resident of that name owns, leases, rents in any of them. I couldn't find a phone number, even unlisted or cellular, no driver's license, no enrollment in any college anywhere in the state of California.”

“That's bizarre,” Clancy muttered.

The investigator shook her head. “No, it isn't. It means that this woman's name is not Emma Rawlings. The question that has to be answered is, who is she, really? She's hiding her past, using a false name. Why?”

She looked at the meager folder and frowned. “Surveillance wasn't supposed to be included in my initial investigation, it eats up money and I didn't know how much you people want to spend on this, but I spent an afternoon following her, anyway. The woman left no trail. Shopped at Nordstrom, paid in cash. Ate lunch, cash. Did everything by herself, she didn't meet anyone or go anywhere that might have given me a lead. I ran her license plate number down with DMV. It was leased through a New York bank, and I can't get into bank

records without a warrant, which is out of the question for a private investigator.”

Clancy nodded somberly. “Well, it's not like this comes as a big surprise.”

“I'm sorry,” Garcia said apologetically. She closed the folder and placed it back on her desk. “What do you want me to do now?” she asked.

Callie shifted in her chair. Her back was stiff. She was only a little more than a month pregnant, but she could feel her body changing, becoming less flexible. “Let's put a hold on this,” she suggested. “We're going to be spending plenty of time with her for the next couple of days. Maybe we'll find something out you can use.”

Garcia nodded. “Good idea. You'll be on the inside.” She smiled wickedly. “I thought about trying to swipe her wallet to see her driver's license, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. I'll bend the law as much as I can without jeopardizing my license, but I won't break it.”

Clancy nudged Callie. “Maybe you can sneak into her purse,” he suggested. “You wouldn't have any moral scruples about that.”

She punched him on the arm. “That's not my style, bozo, as you well know.” She stood and shook hands with Garcia. “Thanks for your help. We'll be in touch.”

Walt was impatiently waiting for them when they returned. “Where were you?” he asked, his voice testy, almost whining. “I've got a million things planned for us to do today.”

Clancy glanced at his watch. It was barely ten-thirty— the entire day was still ahead of them. He noticed that Emma's car wasn't in the driveway. He would love to know where she went during the day, the details of her secret life.

“We had coffee with a couple of Callie's old volleyball teammates,” he lied easily. “I told you Callie wanted to see friends when I called you two weeks ago, don't you remember? You and Emma weren't up when we left, so we took off. Sorry if we miscommunicated.”

Walt looked momentarily confused; then he nodded. “Slipped my mind. I better up my dosage of ginkgo biloba,” he joked. “A mind is a terrible thing to waste. Anyway, no big deal,” he said buoyantly. “Is there anything you two want to do? I could suggest a million things. Do you want to do the tourist shtick, Universal Studios or one of those places?”

Callie shook her head emphatically. “We came out to see you, not to gawk at dumb movie effects. Let's do something personal, the four of us. Go to the Getty, go bike-riding along the strand in Santa Monica. Or just hang out. You don't have to entertain us, Walt. We're lust happy to see you, your new house, your new”—she bit her tongue at “lady”—”friend. Speaking of Emma, where is she?”

Walt went back into the kitchen and poured himself another cup of coffee. “Do either of you want a cup?” he asked. “There's plenty.”

“No, dad, we had coffee out,” Clancy answered. “So Emma went where?”

Walt blew on his mug. “She had an appointment. Something to do with school, or her advisor, I don't know exactly,” he said with a vague air. “She'll be back soon.” He thought for a moment. “You're both good athletes, want to do something fun that you won't be able to do in Chicago till next spring, now that the weather's freezing hack there, or will be shortly?”

“Like what?” Clancy asked. “Surfing? Skateboarding?”

“Yeah, right,” Walt laughed. “Like I want to break a leg. Sorry, Callie,” he said, catching himself.

“Don't worry,” she told him. “That's ancient history. And if I hadn't bunged up my leg I wouldn't have met Clancy, so all's well that ends well. So what do you have in mind, Walt?”

“Golf!”

“Golf?” Clancy repeated. “You play golf?”

Walt nodded vigorously. “Yes, and I'm pretty good for someone who never swung a club a single day in his life until he was sixty.”

“This takes the cake,” Clancy said in slack-jawed astonishment. That his father had taken up golf was as off-the-wall—although harmless for a change, thankfully—as any of the other radical changes he had undergone over the past year-plus.

“You play,” Walt reminded his son.

“Yes, but I'm a yuppie,” Clancy answered. “You're a man of culture. Have you joined a country club?” he asked, trying to make a joke out of the question.

“Hell, no. They're way too expensive. My neighbors around here are all members of clubs, the best ones, they take me.” He pointed out the front window. “That house, across the street? He's a member of Bel Air, he manages James Garner and all these hotshot actors. Jim's a member, we've played a few times, hell of a nice guy. Down the street are two members of L.A. Country Club, awesome golf course. You've got to know God or one of his disciples to get in there. Plus I have friends who are at Riviera, Brentwood, Hillcrest. I play all over, public courses, too.”

“How egalitarian,” Clancy said dryly. His father, the renowned university scholar, the self-proclaimed champion of the common man, now a golfing partner of Hollywood stars in Bel Air, California, one of the most exclusive communities in the world? Is this what happens when your wife is killed and four million dollars drops into your lap? Or was it nothing more than a function of age, an inevitable tilt toward conservatism? If so, he hoped it wasn't hereditary.

“And Emma?” Callie asked. “Does she play, too?”

“No.”

They turned. Emma had slipped in without anyone noticing. She was dressed nicely, in a chic skirt and blouse, stockings and low heels, as if coming or going to a meeting.

“I don't play golf,” she said, as she crossed into the room and flopped her purse on the kitchen counter. “I don't have the time to practice, and I don't like to do anything I'm not good at.”

Telling, Clancy thought. He caught Callie's eye. They were on the same wavelength. He noticed Callie eyeball mg Emma's purse.

I have to go shopping for dinner,” Emma added. “I'm looking tonight.”

“That'll be something to look forward to,” Walt told Callie. “Emma's a true gourmet chef, as you well know, Clancy.”

“I'm not, but thank you,” she answered graciously. “But you three go. It'll be fun.”

“I'd rather go shopping with you,” Callie said to Emma.

Emma seemed startled at the suggestion. “Don't be silly Shopping's a drag. It's beautiful outside, and the courses Walt mentioned really are spectacular. You don't even have to play to enjoy them, you can walk alongside. Walt always walks, he hates carts, he's too macho.”

“Carts are for old men and slackers,” Walt declared disdainfully. He picked up the phone. “Let me make a few calls,” he said as he began dialing. “We'll get on one of those courses.” He smiled at Clancy. “Me and you, father and son. A friendly wager on the side, not enough to break you, Clancy,” he joshed.

“You really don't have to go with me,” Emma told Callie again. Her voice seemed to have an edge of discomfort to it.

“But I want to,” Callie answered, sweetly but firmly. “The boys need their time together.”

Whoever Walt had called had picked up the phone. “Ed?” Walt said, in a hearty, hail-fellow-well-met voice. “Walt Gaines. How you doing, buddy?” There was a brief pause. “Good, good. Listen, Ed, is there a chance you can get my son and me on your wonderful golf course today? He flew in all the way from Chicago because I told him I could get him on. You don't want to make a liar out of me, do you?” he said, laughing.

Clancy, listening to this end of the conversation, felt like he was eavesdropping on a couple of small business owners from a burg in Illinois, members of the local Masonic lodge. His father had always been disdainful of such mundane conventions. Now he was part of one.

“Super,” Walt was saying. “Just give them your name at the pro shop? Thanks, Ed. I owe you one.”

He hung up the phone. “We have a tee time in an hour. Normally you have to play with the member, but this guy's got enough clout he can phone us in. You're going to love this course, it was one of Ben Hogan's favorites. Or maybe it was Nicklaus, one of those legends.” He gave Emma a quick hug. “Anything but bouillabaisse,” he chided her affectionately. “Otherwise, Clancy's going to think you can only cook one dish.”

Clancy wore his running shoes. He rented clubs and bought balls and a golf glove at the pro shop. His father paid for everything; he didn't even bother to put up a token protest, he knew Walt would have been (or acted as if he bad been) insulted. They shared a caddie, a middle-aged Chicano named Raúl, who knew the course blindfolded.

As it was midweek, they had the course practically to themselves. Walt, having only recently taken up a sport that is frustrating even to those who have played it their entire lives, was all over the place. A sliced drive off the first tee, followed by a wormburner second shot left him muttering; but a decent long-iron third shot, a good chip, and two okay putts gave him a bogey on the par five, a respectable-enough score.

“I'm happy if I can play bogey golf,” he informed Clancy as they walked to the second tee box. “As long as I don't embarrass myself, that's all I ask for. I'm happy breaking a hundred.”