The Bequest (25 page)

Swafford sat at
a rear booth of Nate’n Al’s Deli on Beverly
Drive, pancakes half-eaten on the plate before him, his coffee mug nearly
empty.
The
two CHP detectives entered and
looked around
for a
moment. Swafford waved to get their attention then gestured at the
waitress as they headed his way. They slid into the booth across from him
as the waitress brought menus.

Nichols looked at Swafford’s plate. “Breakfast? You know what time
it is?”
“It’s never too late or too early for pancakes.”
“Point taken.”
“So what happened to Capalletti?” Stillman asked.
“One between the eyes, contact entry, and the gun in his hand,”
Swafford said. “And blowback on his wrist.”
“No one does it that way,” Nichols said. “You either eat the gun or
put it to the side of your head.”
“I know all we usually get here in Beverly Hills is littering, loitering,
and parking violations—except as of late—but even I figured that one
out,” Swafford said.
“So the scene was staged by someone who doesn’t have much
experience at it.”
“Or someone who wants to confuse us,” Stillman said. “You think
Capalletti really pulled the trigger himself?”
“Somebody could have put it in his hand and then fired it. We’re
gonna run a tox screen and see if he was knocked out first. But either way,
I’m betting someone else was in that room with him.”
“Somehow this has all got to be tied to whoever tried to take out the
actress, right?” Stillman asked. “And her friend?”
“Contrary to movie dialogue, sometimes there are such things as
coincidences.”
“You and me eating at the same In-N-Out last weekend, that’s a
coincidence.
Identical screenwriters
taking
headers off cliffs,
people
shooting at actresses and their BFFs, then the actress’s boyfriend getting
his ticket punched and the boyfriend’s boss eating a truck grill—that’s not
a coincidence; that’s a pattern.”
The waitress returned and took their orders: two coffees, two short
stacks, and eggs over easy for both of them—another coincidence a
vindicated Swafford noted as the detectives followed his lead and ordered
breakfast in the middle of the day.
“Here’s something else to throw into the mix,” Nichols said after the
waitress left. “We got Bob Keene acting like he was in a trance; we got
Annemarie Crowell with a license to do hypnotherapy back in her home
state; and
guess who
we’ve got on camera lurking around Keene’s
building the same time he buys it?”
“Do tell.”
“You get one guess, so make it a good one.”
“I think I know the answer to this one: Annemarie Crowell.”
“Give that man a cigar,” Nichols said. “She’s our next stop. You want
to come with us?”
“I don’t want to be a third wheel, but just try and stop me.”
“It’s out of your jurisdiction. Don’t want you to stretch your leash
too far from BH.”
“It’s not a leash; it’s a bungee cord. I think I’ll survive both the fall
and the rebound.”

Swafford thought the apartment complex where Annemarie Crowell lived
was equally as drab as Mike Capalletti’s house was elegant. Though exactly
how elegant did any house look with a dead guy in the master bedroom?

He wheeled into the parking lot and found a space directly in front of
the apartment that also bore an “Office” sign on its door. He got out and
stood next to his car while waiting on the CHP officers. He scanned the
complex, the parking lot in bad need of re-paving, the stucco in bad need
of updating, the doors in bad need of paint, and the whole thing in bad
need of a wrecking ball.

The CHP guys came along a few minutes later. They parked next to
Swafford’s car then got out.
“You boys get lost?” Swafford asked.
“And I guess you got here like a homing pigeon,” Nichols said.
“GPS.”
“They check your passport at the border?”
“No, but they told me I had to switch to polyester. You got an extra
suit I can borrow?”
“Trade you for an Armani,” Nichols said.
“Okay, now that we’ve all sufficiently insulted each other, let’s go
talk to this mesmerizing witch. You got an apartment number?”
“Just the street address.”
Swafford pointed toward the “Office” sign. “Then let’s see what we
can find out here.”
He pushed open the door and led the way in.
Rondell, the apartment manager, stopped with a bean and cheese
burrito halfway to his mouth, feet propped on a small coffee table, blackand-white western reruns on the television.
“Damn it,” he said. “Doesn’t anybody knock anymore?”
“It says ‘office,’” Swafford said. “I never knock at a place of business.”
“It’s also where I live.”
“Then may I make a modest suggestion. Add a sign under ‘office’ that
says ‘please knock.’”
“Yeah, maybe I’ll do that,” Rondell said. “You’re the second person
to make that suggestion this week.” He took a big bite of the burrito then
spoke while he chewed. “You po-lice?”
“The bad haircut give it away?” Stillman asked.
“Something like that,” Rondell said. “But you ain’t from this part of
the city. Clothes are too fine.”
“Beverly Hills,” Swafford said, flashing his badge.
“You know you in Los Angeles, right? Don’t got no jurisdiction
outside of Camelot.”
Swafford stepped aside and, with a sweeping gesture of his hand,
ushered Stillman and Nichols to the front. “Ahh, but these gentlemen are
state cops, and they have jurisdiction all over this fine city and beyond.”
Rondell squinted, swallowed the mouthful of burrito, and took his
feet off the coffee table. “So what business you got here?”
“Annemarie Crowell.”
“The crazy lady.” Not a question; a statement of fact.
“So you know her?”
“Yeah. What’d she do?”
“She live here?”
“Not no more. Like I told that actress, she moved out.”
“What actress?” Swafford asked, though he felt like he already knew
what the answer would be.
“Teri Squire. Annemarie said she’d be around, and she left me an
envelope to give her. And I’m like, yeah, right, Ms. Oscar gonna come
slumming around here. Then damned if she don’t show up. She’s the one
who told me about the ‘please knock’ sign, by the way. So, anyway, I gave
her the envelope and she left without so much as a thank you.”
“What was in the envelope?” Swafford asked.
“Don’t know. Never looked. It just had a name on the outside.”
“What name?”
“Peggy Tucker.”
“Who is Peggy Tucker?”
“Hell if I know,” Rondell said as he took another bite of burrito.
“Shook up that actress, though, when she saw it.”
“Shook her up, how?”
“You know, she looked kinda surprised and she got all red in the
face.”
“She open the envelope?”
“Not in front of me. Just took it and skedaddled out the door.”
“We need to see Annemarie Crowell’s apartment,” Swafford said.
Rondell took a key from a hook on the wall behind his head. “Like I
said, she done moved out a few days ago, but the apartment’s empty. Just
follow me.”
He led the way out of the office, then up a flight of stairs to a
concrete walkway that looked to be hanging on for dear life. Swafford
walked beside Rondell, the two state cops behind.
“How long you been managing this place?” Swafford asked.
“Hell, must be better’n five years now. It ain’t much, but it’s rentfree.”
“You know all the tenants?”
“Most of ‘em. Course, most of ‘em come and go, so by the time I
learn their names, they done split.” He pointed to a door badly in need of
a fresh coat of paint, which hardly distinguished it from any other door
along the way. “Here it is.”
He inserted the key and pushed the door open, then stepped aside.
Nichols and Stillman went in first, followed by Rondell, then Swafford.
The bare apartment consisted of a cramped living area that combined with
a kitchenette to create one long, but narrow, room. On one side of the
kitchenette, a doorway led to a bedroom, with a matcher on the other
side. Threadbare brown carpet covered part of the floor, with linoleum
the base for the kitchenette. Early American Depressing-as-Hell.
“How long did Ms. Crowell live here?”
“Longer’n most. Few years, I guess,” Rondell said. “Maybe a little
more. Her and her loser son moved in with Leland a little bit before he
offed himself.”
Any distractions created by the rundown apartment disappeared in an
instant as all three men suddenly found themselves riveted by what
Rondell was saying.
“She lived here with Leland?” Nichols asked.
“Yeah. Her and Leland’s brother Rodney moved in at the same time.
Rodney and Leland was twins, I think. Damn sure looked like each other,
if they weren’t.”
“Did you know Rodney?” Swafford asked.
“Not too good. Not like I did Leland. Leland was a good dude. Pretty
much kept to himself. Writing on that computer of his. Always writing.
Kept saying he was gonna be a famous writer some day.”
“Where’s the bathroom?” Nichols asked.
“In the bedroom over there,” Rondell said, pointing to the left of the
kitchenette. “Ain’t but one. Don’t know whose idea it was to put only one
bathroom in this place, then stick it inside one of the bedrooms.”
“Okay, we got it from here,” Nichols said. “We’ll lock up before we
leave.”
“I should stay here with you,” Rondell said. “It’s my ass if—”
“If what?” Stillman asked. “If the Beverly Hills cop takes out his
pocket knife and helps himself to a hunk of this fine carpet?”
Nichols snorted.
“We’re cops, man,” Stillman said. “What are we going to do?”
“I seen cops search places before,” Rondell said. “I’ve seen how they
trash ‘em.”
“We’ll put everything back like we found it,” Stillman said. He
looked around then raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. “Oh, that’s
right. There’s nothing here to put back.”
“All right, I got ya,” Rondell said. “You the funny cops. Just let me
know when you leave.”
With that, he exited the apartment. The three detectives stood in a
triangle and exchanged glances. “So,” Nichols said at last. “Anyone else
interested by this little turn of events? Our dead screenwriter has himself a
look-alike brother. What do you want to bet he was our latest cliff diver?”
“I think we need to get moving on an exhumation order, do a little
DNA comparison,” Swafford said. “We—”
His cell phone interrupted him. “Swafford,” he answered.
“Detective,” a voice on the other end said, “we got the phone records
for Capalletti. The last call he made was to Teri Squire’s cell phone.”
Swafford tucked the
phone
between his ear
and
shoulder
then
extracted a pen and notepad from his coat pocket. “Give me the number.
Then I need you to check out a name for me: Peggy Tucker.” A pause,
then, “I don’t know who that is, but she’s got something to do with Teri
Squire.”

While
Swafford talked on the
phone, Nichols wandered
into
the
bathroom, which was hardly more than an indoor outhouse. A small sink
supported by aluminum props, a mirror that doubled as a medicine
cabinet, a toilet with no lid, and a porcelain bathtub with shower curtain.
All in all, no more than five by five—twenty-five square feet for the
hygienic needs of three people.

And from the looks of the facilities, not much hygiene was involved.
Orange rust stains marred the sink and tub, and other stains marred the
toilet, which looked like it hadn’t been flushed in a couple of days. The
reflective surface of the mirror had flaked away right in the center, as if
designed to prevent anyone using the sink from actually looking himself in
the eye. Nichols wondered if there was something psychological involved,
like a guilty conscience at work, at least metaphorically.

He pulled a pair of rubber gloves from his pocket along with a plastic
bag, tools he always carried with him. You never knew when you might
run across evidence during the day. From his pants pocket, he extracted a
pocketknife. He paused for a second as he considered whether to cut loose
a hunk of carpet just to prick the apartment manager around.

He sat on the edge of the tub, opened the knife to expose a blade
about an inch-and-a-half long, and probed around the perimeter of the
shower drain. The pop-up plug was loose, so he pulled it all the way out
and put it aside. He inserted the blade into the drain, scraped it around the
sides, and pulled it out. Several clumps of hair stuck to the side of the
blade. A single long gray strand, at least ten inches long, dangled beneath
it. He lifted the blade and pulled the single strand all the way out, then
inserted the entire clump in the plastic bag, sealed it, and tucked it in his
pocket.

Swafford was dialing his cell phone under the
watchful eye of
Stillman when Nichols returned to the main living area.
“Got enough for a DNA match for someone,” Nichols said. “Got at
least one belonging to a female.”
“Annemarie Crowell,” Stillman said. His partner nodded.
“All right, here goes,” Swafford said as he punched the speaker button
on the cell and held it out so all three men could hear.
Rather than going straight to voicemail, the phone rang. And rang
and rang.
Then the ring tone abruptly ceased as someone answered on the
other end, but said nothing.
“Hello?” Swafford said. “Hello? Ms. Squire?”