Self-Defense (57 page)

“After the first few years it was chicken
feed. Nothing’s come in for the last five.”

“How much chicken feed?”

“I’d have to check. Probably not more than
a hundred and fifty thousand, all told.”

“And Mr. Trafficant’s advance payment for
his book?”

“Seven thousand dollars. He blew it all in
a crap game the same day he cashed the check. That’s why he was so uptight when
Lowell threatened to kick him out. Here he was a best-seller, eighty-five g’s
dropped in his bank account, and he had no idea how to handle it. Now can you
get me to a decent place?”

“We’ll work on it, Mr. App.”

“Meantime, can I have my own food brought
in? The crap here is loaded with fat and grease. I have my own chef, he could—”

Bleichert reread the confession and his
notes of App’s recitation.

The door from the hallway opened, and a
stocky black jail deputy came into the observation room.

“DA Bleichert?” he said, scanning my
consultant’s badge.

I pointed at the glass.

“They in the middle of something?”

“Just finishing up.”

He looked through the one-way. Bleichert
was still reading. App and MacIlhenny sat in silence.

“Hmm,” said the deputy. Then he knocked.

“Yeah?” said Bleichert, annoyed.

The deputy went in. “Sorry to bother you,
sir, but I’ve got an urgent message.”

Bleichert was annoyed. “From who? I’m
busy.”

“A Detective Sturgis.”

“What does
he
want?”

“He said to tell you in private, sir.”

“Okay, hold on.” To MacIlhenny and App:
“One sec.”

He came out of the room, closed the door,
and tapped his foot. “Okay, what’s so damned urgent?”

The deputy looked at me.

Bleichert walked to a far corner well away
from me. The deputy followed and whispered something in his ear.

As he listened, Bleichert’s sour face
lightened. “I’ll be
damned
!”

“Everything okay with Lucy?” I said.

Bleichert ignored me. To the deputy:
“You’re sure?”

“That’s what the man said.”

“How long ago?”

“Hour or so.”

“And this is
definitely
confirmed?”

“That’s what he said, sir.”

“Well, I’ll be
damned—
unreal...
goddammit.. . okay, thanks.”

The deputy left and Bleichert stood
thinking. Then he returned to the interrogation room.

“So,” said App, “can we start the
paperwork?”

“Sure,” said Bleichert. “We’ve got
lots
of paperwork.” Big smile.

App said, “I eat a high-carbohydrate,
low-fat diet.”

“Good for you.” Hard voice.

MacIlhenny said, “Stan?”

Bleichert opened his jacket and hooked his
thumbs in his belt loops. “Bit of a new development, gentlemen. I’ve just been
informed that Mr. Lowell passed away this afternoon: massive stroke. So all
deals are null and void and we’ll be filing that confession as evidence against
Mr. App.”

App went white as his sweater.

MacIlhenny shoved his bulk out of the
chair, charged forward, waving his hands as if warding off hornets. “Now, see
here—”

Bleichert whistled and collected his
papers.

“This is
unconscionab—”

“Not at all, Land. We negotiated in good
faith. You yourself said so. No accounting for acts of God. Guess God didn’t
approve of the deal.”

MacIlhenny tottered with rage. “Now you
just—”

“No
you
just, Land. All bets are off and
this
stays on the record.”

Waving the confession.

“Always put it in writing,” said
Bleichert, grinning. “I learned that watching
The
People’s Court.”

No funeral.

Cremation took place at the mortician’s
college across the street from the county morgue. The ashes sat on a shelf
until Ken came forward and picked up the urn. He asked Lucy if she wanted to
accompany him when he tossed it off the Malibu pier. She said she’d pass.

She
was
experiencing a grief of
sorts.

“I guess he didn’t have a good life,” she
said. The ocean was blue and lazy. Yesterday a sea lion had walked out of the
surf, ignoring Spike’s rage and begging for food before waddling back in.
Today, no signs of life on the beach, not even birds.

“No, he didn’t,” I said.

“I guess I should feel sorry for him—I
wish
I could feel something other than relief.”

“Right now, relief makes sense.”

“Yes... the way he spoke to me. After his
words, Graydon-Jones’s gun seemed almost silly. That’s how I got the courage.”

She stared at the water. “I suppose he was
a prisoner as much as anyone. Fate, biology, whatever.... I’m a part of
him—genetically.”

“That troubles you?”

“I suppose I’m worried some of him is
in
me. If I ever have kids...”

“If you ever have kids, they’ll be great.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because you’re a kind, caring person. He
elevated selfishness to an art form, Lucy. No one would ever accuse you of
being selfish. You almost lost your life because you’re not selfish.”

“Whatever.... So, I guess it’s over.”

My acquiescent smile was a lie. Her
mourning of Puck had been cut short prematurely. I still didn’t understand why
she’d put her head in the oven. Still didn’t know if the Bogettes or anyone
else were out to get her. Maybe, with the dream out of her head, we could find
the missing pieces.

“So,” she said, touching her purse. “Guess
I really don’t have anything to talk about right now.”

“Tired?”

“Very.”

“Why don’t you go home and catch up on
your rest.”

“Think I will—only thing is, Ken wants to
go places and I don’t want to hurt his feelings.”

“What kinds of places?”

“Palm Springs, San Diego... Driving
around. He’s a nice guy, but—”

“But you want to be alone,” I said.

“I don’t want to reject him, but—this is
terrible, I know—but sometimes he’s
cloying.”

“Wanting too much too fast?”

“What should I do?”

“Explain to him that you need some time
alone. He should understand.”

“Yes,” she said. “He should.”

Milo called later that day. “Thought I’d
give you some bits and pieces. Lowell’s Mercedes was left in the long-term lot
at Burbank Airport, so Ms. Nova probably flew the coop.”

“Can’t blame her.”

“We’re lifting prints from the house
tomorrow, see if we can find out who she is. We can live without her testimony,
but it wouldn’t hurt to have it so we can add an assault-with-intent-to-kill to
Graydon-Jones’s trouble. We did locate Doris Reingold at her son’s in Tacoma;
police up there are watching her till she comes down next week. And Gwen Shea’s
lawyer called to let us know Tom phoned her from Mexico. Hanging out with his
buddy—midlife crisis, casting off responsibilities. Supposedly, he begged Gwen
for forgiveness, promised to fly back tomorrow. All three of them are being
treated as material witnesses, no charges. The major good news is that
Graydon-Jones is sticking to his guns on App—asshole finally figured out you
can’t share a sleeping bag with a cobra. App’s lawyer is screaming and yelling,
trying to void App’s confession; the DA says there’s a better-than-even chance
it’ll be ruled admissible. Major good news number two is that the feds are
finishing up their bookkeeping on Mr. A, and he’s got close to twenty mil in
assets that can be snatched. So all in all he’s in trouble.”

“Still in prison?”

“Languishing.”

“No pesto and arugula?”

“Oh, sure. And for dessert, they can move
him into general pop. Find him a four-hundred-pound roommate named Bubba, see
what cooks up then.”

The next day I received a package from
Englewood, New Jersey. Inside was a blue binder containing two hundred neatly
typed photocopied pages. Taped to the front cover was a piece of white
stationery with
Winston Mullins, M.D.
on the letterhead.

A handwritten note read:

This is Darnel’s book. Hope you like it,
W.M.

I read half. Clunky in places, but talent
and grace shone through in others. The story line: a young man, half white,
half black, makes his way through the academic and literary worlds, trying to
define his identity through a series of jobs and sexual dalliances. Expletives,
but no violence. The bride in question: art.

I put the binder down and called Lucy. No
one home.

She probably hadn’t the heart to
disappoint Ken.

Or maybe she’d held her resolve and had
gone away for some solitude.

Either way, I’d wait. We had our work laid
out for us.

That evening, as I was playing guitar and
waiting for Robin and Spike to come home, my service called in with an
emergency message from Wendy Embrey.

Now
what?

“Dr. Delaware?”

“Sure, put her on.”

Click.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Wendy.”

“How’s Lucretia?”

“Fine, but—”

“You’ve seen her recently?”

“Yesterday.”

“This may be nothing, but I just got off
the phone with a woman I think you should talk to. I know there are two sides
to every story, especially with this kind of thing, but after listening to what
she said, I strongly advise you to call her.”

“Who’s the woman?”

She told me. “I reached her through her
father—he’s the head of the real estate company. I was trying to collect—not
important. Anyway, I gave her your name, said you might call.”

“Just in case I can’t reach her, give me a
summary of what she told you.”

She did. “Which might explain a few
things.”

“Yes,” I said, feeling cold. “It might.”

I hung up and punched numbers frantically.

Then I scrawled a note to Robin and ran
out to the Seville.

Lights shone from the second story of the
house on Rockingham Avenue. Ken’s Taurus was in the driveway, but no one
answered the bell.

I ran around to the side gate. Locked. I
climbed over.

He was out on the terrace, slumped in a
chair, head down. Half a vodka bottle on the table, along with a glass full of
melting ice.

When I got ten feet away, he looked up
groggily. Then, as if a button had been pushed, he sat up mechanically.

“Doctor.”

“Evening, Ken.”

He looked at the bottle and pushed it
away. “Little nightcap.
Evening
cap.”

His voice wasn’t slurred, but the words
were coming out too carefully. His hair was mussed, his glen plaid button-down
shirt wrinkled.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Just dropped by to see how Lucy’s doing.”

“Oh... she’s not here.”

“Where is she?”

“Dunno, out.”

“Out driving?”

“Yeah, I guess.” He sat up straighter,
tried to finger-comb his hair.

“Any idea when she’ll be back?”

“Nope, sorry. I’ll be sure to tell her you
stopped by. Everything okay?”

“Well,” I said, sitting. “I’m not sure.
That’s why I’m here.”

He moved his chair back. The wrought iron
grated on the flagstone. He looked up at the second story.

“You’re sure she’s not here, Ken?”

“Of course.” His faced changed, turning
piggish.

Suddenly, his hand moved toward the
bottle. Mine got there first and put it out of reach.

“Listen,” he said, “I don’t know what this
is about, but I’m bushed, doc. All this crap we’ve been going through, a guy
deserves some R and R, right?”

“We? You and Lucy?”

“Exactly. I don’t know what your problem
is, but maybe you’d better get out of here and come back when you have an appointment.”

“Are you making her appointments now,
Ken?”

“No, she—listen.” He stood and smoothed
his pants and smiled. “I know Lucy likes you, but this is my place, and I want
some privacy. So...” Crooking a finger at the gate.

“Your place?” I said. “Thought it was the
company’s.”

“That’s right. Now—”