Jonathan Kellerman_Petra Connor 02 (29 page)

“Big decision, makes sense.”

“Disappointed?”

“Of course not. It's your life.”

“We could still get a house,” he said. “With both of us working, we could probably get a decent place sooner rather than later.”

“Sure,” she said. Surprised by the coolness in her own voice.

“Is there a problem?”

“I'm a little overwhelmed right now. Dangling. And all because I helped get rid of a really bad guy.”

She broke free, stood, marched into the kitchen. “Plus, there's the June 28 stuff. Three days to go and I've got squat.”

“What about that husband—Doebbler?”

“Everyone's sure he killed his wife, but there's no evidence. He fits in some ways but not in others.”

“Like what?”

She elaborated. He listened. Petra saw the eggs and bread and milk sitting on the counter. Time to be
useful.
Scooping butter into a pan, she turned on the gas, soaked the bread in milk, and, when the butter was bubbling and barely brown, dropped in two slices.

Nice sound, the sizzle. There was something to be said for mindless work.

Eric said, “You could surveil Doebbler on the twenty-eighth. He moves, he's your guy.”

“And if he doesn't, someone dies.”

He shrugged.

“
Mister
Blasé.”

He didn't answer.

The French toast was ready. She plated it, set it in front of him.

He didn't move.

“Sorry for snapping,” she said.

“I didn't mean to be glib,” he said.

“You didn't do anything wrong.”

“I didn't take you seriously,” he said. “You're up to your eyeballs in junk.”

Gazing up at her. Eyes softer than she'd ever seen.

She cradled his head. Picked up a fork and slipped it between his fingers. “Eat. Before it gets cold.”

CHAPTER

44

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 26, 10:00 A.M., NUMBER SEVEN BUS, SANTA MONICA LINE, PICO AND OVERLAND

I
saac almost left home without taking the paper bag.

Plagued by restlessness all night, he'd slept until eight-forty. His parents and his brothers were gone and he admitted, with some shame, that the resultant silence was wonderful.

With the bathroom all to himself, he took his time showering, shaving, walked around naked, slid his briefcase out from under the bunk bed. Checked under his papers to make sure the gun was all right.

Why wouldn't it be?

He pulled it out, aimed it at the mirror.

“Bang.”

Stupid idea, the gun. What had he been thinking? He rewrapped it, put it back in the bottom of the case, touched the bruise on his cheek. No swelling, slightly tender. Those kids had been stupid little punks, he'd overreacted.

Maybe he'd return the gun to Flaco.

Running his hands over his body, he lifted an edge of window shade, looked out, and caught a blade of sky above the air shaft. Blue streaked with white.

He put on fresh khakis and a short-sleeved yellow shirt. The heat that had already permeated the apartment said this would be a short-sleeves day.

Even at the beach, where the air was always cooler.

Was he growing addicted to sand and ocean?

There were worse vices.

Last night, unable to sleep, he'd allowed himself fantasies of living there one day. Rich doctor, beautiful wife, brilliant kids, set up in one of those big houses on the Palisades.

Or, if fate really steered things his way, a place right on the sand.

Surf, gulls, pelicans, dolphins. Waking every morning to the sound of the ocean . . . about as likely as waking up naturally blond.

But he could while away another day at the pier.

He'd worked hard, was entitled.

Spoiled brat. Deservedness has nothing to do with it.

The key to success wasn't virtue, it was knowledge, knowledge was power.

The old familiar mantra filled his head:
stay on target, get educated.
The Ph.D, then the M.D. Acquire a specialty, get an academic appointment, publish like a demon, earn early tenure, build a reputation that can be parlayed into lucrative consultantships.

Maybe even an M.B.A., a position at some pharmaceutical company . . .

One day he'd be Dr. Gomez. Meanwhile, he'd gotten himself into a fix with Klara.

She kept calling. How long could that go on?

He'd have to deal with it, sooner rather than later. But today . . . the beach.

He went into the kitchen, put his briefcase on the counter, and poured a glass of milk. Changed his mind. He'd return to the public library, use the tools he'd come to believe in: thorough data collection, deductive and inductive reasoning, hard work. Problems were solvable; there had to be an answer.

He gulped the milk and headed for the door. Saw the bag on the tiny mail table to the right of the door.

Brown paper, neatly folded—his mother's trademark. His name printed in red crayon. Shaky letters because she'd never been confident about her literacy.

The exact same way she'd printed his lunches when he was at Burton. All the other kids eating in the school cafeteria—a wonderful place, those steam tables, the hairnetted women, jewel-green and sun-yellow vegetables, slabs of pink meat and white turkey, things he'd never seen—succotash? Welsh rarebit?

His mother had been afraid of the strange food. Or so she'd claimed. Later, he'd found out that scholarship students didn't qualify for the caf, the school's generosity only went so far.

He'd been ashamed of his sack lunches, until some of the other kids had thought his tamales and black beans cool. There'd been a few snickers—this
was
middle school, after all. But the Burton student body had been well-drilled in the virtues of diversity and, for the most part, had seemed impressed by Irma Gomez's cooking.

That made it easy for Isaac to trade his homemade fare for the contents of the rich kids' caf trays. Chewing away with forced aplomb, pretending to like the bland stuff, because he desperately wanted to blend in.

It had been a while since Mama had packed him a lunch. Maybe he'd ditch it, get himself a fried sausage from a street vendor near the library.

No way, the guilt would overwhelm him. He stuffed the bag in his briefcase, left, and hurried down the stairs.

Guilt was a big part of his makeup. So scratch the M.B.A. and the drug companies.

There goes the house on the beach.

As he hit the street, he changed his mind again. Two days of library work had produced nothing. What could he hope to find? He walked to Pico, caught the number seven bus, and rode all the way to Overland when the aroma of his mother's food, seeping through the brown paper, got his gastric juices going and he unfolded the flap and looked inside.

Atop the foil-wrapped morsels was a scrap of paper, folded over. He fished it out, read “BRO,” in large, clumsy capitals. Isaiah's writing.

He unfolded the note.

THE LADY COP CALLED LAST NIGHT.

Just that, no number.

He got up from his seat, rang the buzzer. Exited at the next stop.

The station's rear door was locked. Since he'd been coming here that had only happened twice, because someone had forgotten to open it. He found his 999 key.

It didn't come close to fitting. Change of locks? Then he noticed the closed-circuit camera above the door. Flaking paint where the device had been installed. The lens was focused right on him. It made him feel like a suspect and he turned his back.

New security measures because of some terrorism alert?

He was thinking about that when he saw an older silver Cadillac drive into the lot and park. That old drill-sergeant type, Detective Dilbeck.

Isaac approached the car and Dilbeck rolled down his window.

“Morning, Detective.”

“Morning, Mr. Gomez.”

“The door's locked and my key doesn't work.”

“Mine neither,” said Dilbeck. “Everyone comes in through the front until things calm down.”

“Calm down from what?”

Dilbeck bared his teeth. “Captain Schoelkopf was murdered yesterday.”

“Oh no.”

“For the time being, they're being extra careful. Not that what happened to the captain applies to anyone else. He cheated on his wife, hell has no fury and all that. You haven't annoyed any feisty females lately, have you, Mr. Gomez?”

Isaac smiled. His stomach churned.

Dilbeck got out of his car and began walking toward the lot's entrance. Isaac stayed in place.

“No work today, Mr. Gomez?”

Isaac half heard him. Thinking: heightened security probably means a metal detector. The gun . . .

“Actually, I'm on my way to school, just dropped by to get Detective Connor's number. She phoned me last night but my brother neglected to write down her number.”

“She's home,” said Dilbeck. “You know what happened to her?”

“Yes, sir. It's kind of important that I talk to her. She was trying to reach me about a case we're—she's working on.”

“Well, she's not working on anything now, Mr. Gomez.”

“Still, I think I should return her—”

Dilbeck clapped his shoulder and stared into his eyes. “You're a nice young fellow, but we're sticklers for privacy around here. How about I call Detective Connor and tell her you stopped by. Give me a number where you can be reached.”

Isaac gave him the BioStatistics office number. Now he
had
to return to campus.
What a tangled web we weave.

He reached USC forty minutes later, took an indirect route to BioStat that circumvented Doheny, and headed straight for his mailbox. It had been days since he'd checked and the box was stuffed. Circulars, departmental memos, junk mail.

Five messages from Klara, all in the same curvy handwriting. The last three were dated yesterday. Exclamation points.

Sandwiched between those was a single slip listing Petra's name and a number to call. A 933 prefix that had to be her home.

He asked the secretary if he could use a department phone to make a local call.

She said, “Haven't you been a stranger.”

He shrugged. “Working on the dissertation.”

“Poor baby. Don't tie up this one, use the extension in the Xerox room. You know the drill: eight for an outside line and no phoning Europe.”

The door to the photocopy room was open. He'd nearly made it over there when a hand landed on his upper back.

Light touch, the barest contact. He wheeled and faced Klara Distenfield. She wore a royal blue dress printed with tiny yellow fish, fresh lipstick, mascara, perfume—the same perfume. Her hand remained near the side of his neck.

She smiled and said, “Finally.”

He ushered her into the room.

“What an elusive fellow.”

“Klara, I'm sorry—”

“You should be.” No rancor in her voice. That made him
really
anxious. He found himself looking her up and down, stopped, but not before the images had registered. Red hair pinned, soft hairs escaping. The blue dress, tight over round belly and meaty hips. The breasts. The perfume. Oh, shit, he was hard.

Her gold-green eyes narrowed. “Do you know how many times I've tried to reach you?”

“I've been out. Family issues—”

“Everyone's got a family.” Her lips pursed and tiny wrinkles formed above the gloss. “Whatever the family issue was, it couldn't be too grave. I talked to your brother and he didn't say anything. He sounds like you, by the way.”

The prospect of constructing another lie exhausted him. He said, “Nothing grave, it just took time.”

“So you're okay?”

“I'm fine. What about you?”

“Me?” She laughed. “I'm great. Why?”

“I thought you were upset.”

“About what?”

“What happened.”

“Me?” She placed a dainty hand over one commodious breast. “I was a little . . . thrown. But then we had coffee, remember? And I was fine. Didn't I seem fine?”

“The next day,” he said, “you weren't at work. Mary Zoltan said you were sick. She implied it was more than a cold.” He shook his head. “Maybe I misread the whole thing.”

“Mary's an idiot. I wasn't the least bit sick. I missed two days because my
daughter
was ill. High fever, stiff neck. We were worried about—”

“Meningitis. Is she okay?”

“She's fine, just a virus. But I was pretty frantic.” She sidled closer to him. “You were worried I had some big old neurotic reaction to our little tumble? That's kind of touching.” Her smile was wry. “Except that you dealt with it by
avoiding
me.”

“Not neurotic,” he said. “I thought I . . .” He shook his head.

“You thought you'd traumatized the poor sex-starved librarian and she was going to make your life miserable.” She threw back her head and laughed. Soft laugh. Sexy. Her hand moved down to his crotch. “You're not
that
worried.”

“Klara, what happened—”

“Was great. Don't see it any other way.” She squeezed him, released him. Winked.

“Klara—”

“Chemistry is chemistry, Isaac. One can never explain it rationally. That doesn't mean we have to give in to our impulses.” Sly grin. “Though I can think of worse things.” She stroked his face. “You're really a beautiful young man. I admire your brain and I adore your body, but it could never be anything more than an erotic tumble. Which isn't half-bad, right? You've got the potential to be a fantastic lover and I'm a pretty good teacher.”

Another downward glance. “Don't worry, that's not an invitation for Episode Two. Because right now there are more important things to discuss. And that's why I've been trying to reach you for days, silly lad. First of all, a cop has been nosing around, asking about you. He just left the library, as a matter of fact. Which is why I came
here
to leave you yet
another
message.”

“A cop?” he said. “What's his name?”

“Detective Robert Lucido.”

The guy who'd been hanging near the bulletin board. “Pencil mustache?”

“That's the one,” said Klara. “I didn't know anyone but John Waters wore those anymore.”

“What did Lucido want?”

“He said he was carrying out a routine security investigation of LAPD volunteers because of some new September 11 regulations. Wanted to know what kind of person you are, who you hang out with. Then he got downright unconstitutional: what books you checked out. Of course, I declined.”

“How'd he get to you?”

She eyed the door. “He came to BioStat first and they told him you spent most of your time doing research in the stacks. His story—a routine investigation—is it baloney?”

“Probably.”

“What's really going on, Isaac?”

“I don't know,” he said. “That's the truth. I was just over at the station and they changed the locks. Maybe it's because their captain got murdered—”

“I heard about that—”

“Or it really is terrorism-related.”

“That,” said Klara, “would scare me. You know how open our campus is. Are you sad about the captain?”

“I didn't know him well.”

“Cheating on his wife,” said Klara. “One must be careful who one fucks. And who one fucks
with.
”

She dropped one hand and Isaac readied himself for another goose. Instead, she held his hand. He felt leaden. So many unanswered questions, but his erection hadn't flagged.
Down, you little bastard!

“And Lucido just left?”

“Maybe ten minutes ago,” said Klara. “I made sure he didn't follow me when I came here.”