the Prostitutes' Ball (2010) (26 page)

"You must leave," Wa Sun persisted, putting his hand on my arm.

"Back off or you're gonna be put under arrest," I said. He dropped his hand.

"Just what on earth is this?" Stender said, blundering to his feet as if about to protect his dinner guests with heroic feats of mortal combat.

"Good to see you again, Mr. Sheedy. Do you remember me?"

"Haven't a clue," he snarled. "Get out."

"At the Skyline Drive house. I'm the homicide detective you let in there a few days ago."

"Oh, good Lord. When will you people ever learn?"

Probably a pretty good question, but he wasn't going to get the answer from me.

"You will leave my house immediately," he blustered. "This is outrageous. I'm having a dinner engagement."

I crossed to him. "It's a police matter. However, there's no need for us to go to the mattresses. I only need a little of your time. Now happens to be extremely convenient for me, but if you disagree, I can start making phone calls."

"Absolutely preposterous! Get out!" he thundered, bobbing his head and waving his arm at me.

He was so used to pushing people around, he'd completely forgotten what it felt like forty years ago when he was still stuck in the mail room.

"Stender, who is this person?" Mrs. Sheedy asked.

He didn't answer. He looked at his wife and then at me. This intrusion and my refusal to leave embarrassed him in front of his guests, causing his temper to boil over. Then as I watched, he reined it all in.

He lowered his voice and said, "Come with me."

Chapter
44.

I followed him out of the dining room into the den, or maybe the Sheedys called it the great room. Either way, it was huge and overlooked a rectangular-shaped swimming pool.

The room was done in a macho hunter-killer theme. Elk and deer heads, nail-studded bar stools, brown leather furniture, forest green walls, and a Kilgary plaid area carpet. Old flintlock hunting rifles from the seventeen hundreds hung like crossed sabers over a magnificent walk-in fireplace.

"How dare you invade my house while I'm entertaining?" he began. "I've been told that case on Skyline Drive is over. They've caught the man. This is outlandish!"

"Mr. Sheedy, despite all that, I still have some questions."

"You obviously have no idea who you're dealing with."

"I know who you are. That doesn't get you out of this." Then I decided to just hit him with it hard. A blitz interview technique can often unnerve a stubborn witness and, in the ensuing confusion, cause them to make mistakes.

"Do you represent now, or have you ever represented, the Latimer Commodities Exchange?" I said without warning.

He just stood there; his jaw began clenching. He obviously wasn't going to answer.

"You might as well tell me and not make me go to a lot of trouble, because I will find out. It's going to be in somebody's records somewhere. Court or corporate documents."

An awkward moment followed while he silently ran through his options. Then he said, "I don't believe I have any obligation to reveal my business practices to you without first knowing the scope and context of the inquiry."

"Let's move on then. I'll get it myself. Do you handle any clients that trade in precious metals?"

"No."

"I'm curious as to when you started your business relationship with Thayer Dunbar."

"You are going to have to tell me, without prevarication, to what end or in what context this inquiry resonates."

Damn, he talked fancy.

"I'm trying to solve a murder case."

"It's solved."

"Not the one I'm working."

That stopped him. "And just which one is that?" he asked.

"Did you have any dealings with Thomas Vulcuna before his death in 1981, or with Eagle's Nest Productions before you acquired it through the Dorothy White Foundation?"

"You know, I've had just about all of this nonsense I care to deal with."

He turned to his desk and picked up his cell phone from its charging dock. Then he started scrolling through the call log until he found a number on speed dial. He hit the Send button and put the phone to his ear.

"You can't avoid answering my questions by calling someone for help," I said.

"Wanta bet?"

He turned slightly away from me and spoke into the phone. "Chase, its Stender."

Uh-oh, I thought.

"I have one of your police officers here. He rudely interrupted a private dinner party at my residence and is asking damn fool questions about God knows what. I do not appreciate this kind of harassment and if you and I are going to continue in our little quest, I demand that you muzzle this man and make sure he never be allowed to return to my home."

He listened and then said, "No, I don't know his name. A police person of some kind."

He turned and handed me the phone. "For you," he said coldly.

"Hello?"

"This is Chase Beal. Who am I speaking to?"

"Detective Scully, Homicide Special, sir."

"What are you doing bothering Mr. Sheedy, Detective?"

"I'm trying to deal with a case I'm working on, sir."

"It's over. Ms. Wilkes has thoroughly briefed me on the Sladky shooting. We won't be requiring any further assistance from you on that, so leave Mr. Sheedy's house immediately."

"It's not Sladky I'm working on."

"Not Sladky?"

"No. It's an old case that was just reopened."

"And what case is that?"

His voice was ice-cold. I wanted to keep our armored car heist a secret for a little longer, but I needed something to pop Sheedy open. I decided to give them half of it.

"The case is the Vulcuna family murder-suicide from 1981 ," I told him. "We had Thomas Vulcuna down as the murderer of his wife and daughter who then shot himself. It was closed in eighty-one. Now we think its a triple murder with the killer still at large."

As soon as I said this, Stender Sheedy abruptly straightened up. It was as if somebody had jerked him upright by an invisible cord attached to the top of his head.

"What is that case?" Beal asked. "I'm afraid I don't know it or what it could possibly have to do with the Sheedys."

"The Vulcunas owned the house on Skyline Drive that Brooks Dunbar now owns. The same address where Sladky committed the triple murder. Mr. Sheedy was the attorney who acquired that property for the Dunbars in 1982. That's why I'm over here."

There was a long silence on the other end of the line. Sheedy was now beginning to twitch as if he had suddenly developed a nervous disorder.

"You get your ass out of there right now," Chase Beal ordered. "Be in my office at eight A
. M
. on Monday morning prepared to defend this behavior. If I get another call from Stender about this, I'll fall on you like a mountain of shit."

"Yes, sir."

I handed the phone back to Sheedy. He listened for a moment, then whispered his thanks and disconnected. He was pale when I arrived but now he was bone white.

"What kind of quest are you on with Chase Beal?" I asked. "You helping him with his campaign for mayor?"

"You will leave my house immediately," he said.

I had accomplished what I came here to do, so I said something
I've always wanted to say, but which is never said in real life, only in films.

"In that case I'll see myself out," I intoned elegantly, then spun on my heel and left.

It was a movie moment. I washed Hitch had been there to see it.

Chapter
45.

I left the Sheedys' Georgian house, passing the three expensive cars belonging to his dinner guests, which I'd failed to take adequate note of before.

I slid behind the wheel of my MDX and pulled up the street, then hung a U-turn and parked half a block away where I had a view of his front door. I had a hunch something was about to happen.

I didn't have to wait too long.

Ten minutes later Stender Sheedy Sr. ran out on his very important dinner guests, almost falling down the front steps in his haste to get to his car.

He climbed into the Mercedes and backed out, clipping one of the stone lions on the way. He bounced over the curb cut in his driveway, threw the car in gear, and raced up the street.

If I'd set fire to a cat's tail, I wouldn't get this much reaction.

I
pulled out after him, keeping the lights off for the first few blocks before switching them on.

Single-car tail jobs are hard because if the subject is paying even the slightest bit of attention, it doesn't take much effort to pick you off. But judging by the panicked way Sheedy was driving, I didn't think he was wasting much time on his rearview mirror.

After he turned up Coldwater Canyon, I was pretty sure I knew where he was going the deserted house on Skyline Drive.

Was he worried about that Brinks truck?

I followed him up into the hills, dropping farther back as his destination became clearer. When he turned onto Mulholland, I let him get far enough ahead so that I wouldn't be in his rearview at all.

I turned onto Skyline and pulled behind a van parked about a block down from the mansion. Then I got out of the Acura and walked to a place where I could see what he was doing.

He was in a moonlit argument with the two patrolmen stationed at the foot of the drive, guarding the property. They were denying him access and it wasn't hard to figure out what he was saying. His arms were flapping. He was bobbing his head as he shouted at them. It was the same sort of behavior he'd displayed less than an hour ago when he was shouting at me.

His dialogue had to be something like, "Have you any idea who you're dealing with?" Punctuated with words like "outlandish," "outrageous," and "preposterous." He seemed to be very frustrated with all us little people who for some reason were being uncharacteristically disrespectful tonight.

He got back into his car and burned rubber to display his anger to the cops. He flashed right by me going downhill without so much as a glance in my direction. He was having a bad night.

I jumped back into the MDX and followed. In the next few minutes I almost lost him because I'd assumed he would turn left on Mulholland and head back toward Bel Air. Because of that assumption I turned in the wrong direction, but fortunately caught a glimpse of the distinctive taillights on his Mercedes in my rearview mirror. He was going the other way on Mulholland, toward Laurel Canyon Boulevard. I backed up, swung around, and followed him. He took a left on Laurel, heading down the hill into the Valley.

He was on a mission, running yellow lights, occasionally leaving me stuck at intersections behind a line of traffic. Just past Moorpark Avenue I thought I was going to lose him so I took a big chance and put on my hidden flashers in the grille, growled the siren, and broke through a red light. Despite my light show, I somehow remained undetected.

I followed him onto the 101 North heading toward Ventura. I kept several car lengths back. Once on the freeway, he was a little easier to follow.

I had put Hitchs number on my cell phone's speed dial so I jammed the Bluetooth into my ear and hit Send. No answer. I left a voice message for him to call back ASAP.

I kept driving, trying Hitch every ten minutes or so. He was either out of cell range or had turned his phone off while he was interviewing Meeks. The fifth time I called, I was deep into the West Valley.

This time Hitch answered on the first ring. "Whatup, dawg?"

I told him briefly about my meeting with Stender Sheedy and that I was tailing Sheedy, Devine & Lipscomb's senior partner on the 101, heading toward Santa Barbara.

"I'm liking this," Hitch said. "This is all great Third Act stuff."

"I'm trying to stay on this guy, but he's going fast and once he gets back on city streets my single-car tail is gonna be tough. I could use some help. I just passed Thousand Oaks. You still anywhere out here?"

"Yeah. What's your next exit?"

I saw it coming up on my right. "Royal Oaks."

"Okay, I'm not that far. Let me know when he turns off."

Sheedy exited on Lynn Road, turned left, and headed toward the ocean, which lay on the other side of a chain of low hills about ten miles to the southwest. I stayed on the phone with Hitch, giving him my changing location as I kept driving.

Finally, I followed the Mercedes into a green valley that was home to some big, lush horse-breeding ranches with expensive-sounding names like Arabian Acres and Kensington Farms. The properties stretched out magnificently on both sides of the road. Huge ranch houses and miles of lush grass were bordered by white slat fences.

Sheedy kept going straight until he turned onto a road marked W. Potrero. Half a mile farther on the Mercedes slowed and pulled up to a large arched gate with a white security shack.

I saw it just in time to shut off my headlights as I approached, rolling to a stop off the road about a quarter mile back. Hopefully I had remained out of sight of the guard shack that protected the drive. Sheedy spoke with the uniformed security cop for a moment before he was passed through.