Three O'Clock Séance: An Inspector Rebecca Mayfield Mystery (The Rebecca Mayfield Mysteries Book 3) (12 page)

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Rebecca thought she would hear from Richie immediately after meeting with Carmela and Geri. She even imagined him storming into Homicide to complain about her questioning his precious mother. But he didn’t.

She heard nothing at all.

Now, at home, as she ate leftover Chinese food by herself, she realized she felt disappointed.

Okay, that did it. Enough was enough.

Whenever she and Richie were together she knew his words as well as her own about not wanting anything to do with each other beyond friendship, simply weren’t true. Not that she thought he was seriously falling for her, or God forbid, her with him, but she couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt such a “zing” when a man simply touched her—or gave her a quick kiss while standing on a sidewalk.

Lust.

That summed up exactly what she felt for him. Nothing more.

Yesterday, poor, sweet Ray Torres had asked her for a date Saturday night. She realized that would be like going from a Ruth Chris Steakhouse to Chuck E. Cheese. And yes, she hated herself for feeling that way even as she said, “No.”

Looking at the situation with Richie logically, the only reason he was still on her mind was because nothing sexual—like making love—had ever happened between them. The last time she’d been in his house, they’d come close. He’d kissed her. And not only had she kissed him back, but immediately knew she wanted lots more than kisses from him. The poor fellow had just been stitched up and was on pain medication from having been shot in the arm, but none of that mattered to her—and from his reaction, it hadn’t to him either.

She had no doubt where that kiss would have led if Carmela hadn’t taken that moment to swoop in on them like Florence Nightingale, vowing to care for Richie until he was back to normal.

Rebecca suspected that if she had treated Richie the way she had other men she’d been attracted to over the years, he’d be out of her life. He would have disappointed, bored, or otherwise irritated her, and she’d have dumped him every bit as fast as she had the others.

The best way to deal with this situation now was head-on. And so she would. That very evening.

She phoned Bo Benson and asked if he’d cover for her that night since she was supposed to be on-call. He agreed since she’d taken three of his night shifts recently and he owed her. Besides, no one was murdered on a Tuesday night (usually), so it should be easy for him.

She then changed into an attractive, but casual dress—again with the nylons which meant she was seriously lusting after the man—and headed for Richie’s nightclub.

The interesting thing about Big Caesar’s was that, while the main part of it was a posh nightclub with a live band and singers, its large bar area was fast gaining the reputation of an upscale place for well-heeled, age thirty and up singles to meet. But she wasn’t there to meet someone new. She went there to see one person only. Mr. Big Caesar himself.

As she walked in, the band was playing Big Bad Voodoo Daddy’s “Mr. Pinstripe Suit
.”
Recent jazz and swing tunes as well as the old classics were played at Big Caesar’s, and seemed equally popular with all age groups.

She took a stool at the bar, and ordered a Mai Tai. A nice looking but persistent fellow came by to talk to her. She was doing her best to ignore him when Richie showed up. “This is a surprise,” he said. The look he gave the stranger caused him to quickly slink away.

For some reason, Richie didn’t look or sound happy to see her there. She wondered if she’d read him wrong until she met his eyes.
Naw
. “Just wondering what’s happening with your client. I haven’t heard from you.”

“It’s being worked on,” he said. “Not a police matter.”

A police matter?
He might have thought that put her in her place, but not so fast. “I had an interesting conversation with your mother and Geri earlier.”

“So I heard.”

“Why am I not surprised? Anyway, I think she’s worried about ‘us’ because she mentioned how highly she thought of your fiancée, and made it clear I’d never measure up.”

He had the decency to look embarrassed. “I didn’t know.”

“Maybe you should let her know she has no worries on that score.”

He studied her a moment, as if trying to figure out where she was going with all this. “I’ve tried.”

“Good,” she said. “I must say, I’m surprised any woman interested in you ever got Carmela’s blessing. I wonder how she did it.”

He thought a moment, then shrugged. “She died.”

Rebecca’s mouth dropped open. But then, the more she got to know the Amalfis, the more sense his answer made.

He said nothing more about it.

All of a sudden, she felt bad about her bitchy mood, about her reaction to his mother, even about his fiancée. Not only had she put her foot in it, she put both feet in. The band started playing “It Had to be You
.”

“One of my favorite old songs,” she said softly, hoping he saw the apology in her eyes.

He nodded, but made no move to ask her to dance, not even to make small talk. And he loved to talk.

Okay, she’d officially blown it. Bringing up his fiancée, what had she been thinking? Coming here was one of her dumber moves ever. “I should get going.”

That seemed to jar him. “Wait. I’m sorry—a lot’s on my mind.”

“It’s okay—”

“Let’s get a table. We’ve got some great shrimp cocktail tonight. Very fresh. And oysters.” He lifted an eyebrow. “You know what they say about oysters.”

She couldn’t deal with him, not after her blunders. She swiveled on the barstool, ready to get off it and leave—to get away and try hard to forget about him. “I’ve got a date. He won’t need any help.”

“That’s for sure,” he said, stepping in front of her. “But if you can tear yourself away from that date, you might want to go along with me to see what Shay found on Claire’s phone. I’m meeting him at ten tonight. As I said, it’s not a police matter, but if you’re interested …”

Damn.
She was. “Let me make a phone call.”

“Send a text,” he said. “It’s faster. Easier.”

She took out her phone and texted herself, then put her cell phone away. “All done,” she said, a bit too brightly, hoping he hadn’t seen through her ruse.

The band, with an alto sax taking the slow, wailing lead, began to play “Embraceable You.” Richie didn’t need to ask. He took her hand, and they went out on the dance floor. It felt almost too good to be in his arms once more, and the closer she got to him, the better it felt. Afterward, they talked, laughed, ate—including oysters—and drank tonic with lime. Once again Rebecca found, to her dismay, how much she enjoyed simply hanging with Richie. But then it was time to go and meet Shay.

o0o

After leaving Rebecca’s car back at her apartment, Richie drove them both to meet with Shay. As they neared the ritzy Presidio Heights area of the city, with huge mansions that had survived the city’s devastating 1906 earthquake and fire, she wondered if Shay lived in one of them. If she thought she’d see his home, she was wrong. They met at a restaurant near Arguello.

Shay was already waiting when they arrived. The place was practically empty, and booths offered privacy.

He had a list of phone calls to and from Claire. Several were suspect, and five were from burner phones. One of his skills was to trace the untraceable, but these phones were worse than most. The difficulty only caused Shay to double his efforts.

Finally, he cracked one number and tracked it to a lawyer in San Francisco.

“A shyster.” Richie grumbled. “That, we do not need. Let’s hope he has nothing to do with any of this.”

“Except that his phone call to Claire came Sunday evening, five minutes before two other burner phone calls to her.”

“Who’s called her since Sunday?” Richie asked.

“No burners. Only the FBI, Brandon Seymour. The only other calls were from old clients, clearly not having anything to do with art smugglers.”

Richie nodded, then turned to Rebecca. “Maybe it’s time to let Seymour know you can’t find Claire Baxter, and neither can I.”

Her cheeks reddened, giving away, as if she hadn’t already, that Seymour asked her to spy on Richie. “Do you think I’d tell him anything?”

“Yes, I do—if you thought it was necessary. He shows up to talk to you often enough. I can’t think of any other reason for his visits. Well, actually I can, but not one that’s work related. Also, your face when I told you I was going to Claire Baxter’s house told me I was right. You’ve really got to learn not to give away so much in your expressions.”

“My expressions are just fine. But I told Bran”—she knew that could irk him and
his
expression proved she was right—“that he was quite wrong about you being involved in all this.”

“Did he believe you?”

“Probably not. And there goes my chance of ever transferring to the FBI.”

“Good,” he said. A lock of her hair had slid forward almost to her eye, and he gently tucked it behind her ear. “I cause you a bit of trouble, don’t I?”

“Yes, you do,” she said a lot more emphatically than she meant to.

Shay stood. “I’ll see what’s going on with the lawyer, and put a guy on to watch him. Also, Vito reports nothing at all going on at Baxter’s home. Maybe he should give up on it.”

Richie agreed. “Move Vito to the lawyer if that makes more sense. And let me know if you crack any more of those burner phones.”

“Will do. See you both,” Shay said, giving Rebecca what she figured was as close as he ever came to a smile.

Richie drove Rebecca back to her apartment. She looked forward to inviting him inside—just the two of them. Finally. But as soon as he turned into the alley, everything changed.

“FBI,” she said, seeing the black van in front of her building. “I’ll talk to them.”

She got out of the car.

“Stop!” Brandon Seymour yelled as he ran towards them.

No sooner had she shut the car door than Richie backed out of Mulford and took off.

“Damn it to hell!” Seymour stopped and glared at Rebecca.

“Don’t you swear at me! What the hell are you doing here, anyway?” she demanded. “And before you ask, no, I haven’t learned anything new.”

“You’re lying. You were at Claire Baxter’s home last night,” he roared. “What did she tell you?”

She gawked at him. “You mean you don’t know?”

“No! I …” Then he stopped at looked at her. His voice turned quiet. “Don’t know what?

“She wasn’t there. She’s missing.”

“What are you talking about?”

“It looked to me like a struggle and abduction, but I can’t be sure. How can you not know that? I thought your men were watching her.”

“Goddammit!” He got on his cell phone and walked back to his SUV.

Rebecca watched him drive off. As she stepped into the breezeway—alone—she shared his sentiments exactly.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

The next morning, Evelyn Ramirez presented the results of Neda Fourman’s postmortem to Rebecca. With no relatives to object, it took no time to obtain needed approvals to dig up the body. Evelyn was so curious about what she might find, she performed the autopsy during the night.

She was over the moon that she now had autopsied two—count them, two—cases of batrachotoxin poisoning. She was even thinking of doing a paper about it.

Rebecca brought evidence of the poisonings and life insurance policies to Lt. Eastwood. She had been working like crazy the past week to find hard proof of Geller’s hand in the murders, but so far could find no evidence beyond circumstantial. Although Eastwood had been skeptical of why she was even looking into such a thing, he was now convinced that the two deaths were the tip of a very dangerous iceberg, given the type of poison being used.

He decided she could bring Sandor Geller in for questioning, although she didn’t yet have enough evidence to ask for a search warrant of his files. She didn’t tell her boss she didn’t need a search warrant; she had Shay. She also didn’t tell him that, for some reason, she found it hard to believe Sandor Geller was a killer, despite so much pointing towards him. But it wouldn’t be the first time a killer had surprised her.

She would lay the facts in front of Geller and see what his explanation was for everything going on. And if she had to lean on him to get his cooperation, so be it.

After quickly briefing Sutter on what she’d been working on, the two of them left for Geller’s Octavia Street office.

“I’ll drive,” Sutter announced. “You’re looking awfully tired these days, Rebecca. Usually when homicides are kind of quiet, I use the time to catch up on my sleep. You look like you’re doing the exact opposite.”

“Guess I’ve had a lot on my mind lately,” she said. Like bodies supposedly dying of natural causes that weren’t so natural. Like FBI agents bugging her. And like Richie Amalfi back in her life.

That very morning, as she drove to work listening to the radio, Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game” came on, a song full of warning about feeling desire for the wrong person. Her thoughts had immediately gone to Richie. She had flipped through the dial and stopped when she heard Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood
.”
Now
that
was a song she could relate to.

As much as she wished Bran Seymour hadn’t been there to ruin her evening with Richie, if he had come in, she knew where it would have led and she wondered if she wanted her already messed up life to get even worse.

“Rebecca?”

Richie?

“Time to wake up.”

Abruptly, she sat up and looked at Sutter. “I wasn’t sleeping, just resting my eyes.”

“Sure. You weren’t snoring either. We’ve arrived.”

“I never …” But he was already out of the car, and then, so was she.

They walked into Geller’s reception room and asked to see him.

“He’s not in,” the young receptionist said, eying the detectives cautiously since they’d questioned her and the other staff members about Candace Carter. “Can I take a message for him?”

“Is he home?” Rebecca asked.

“I’m not sure. He left at noon and hasn’t returned.”

“We’ll need the address.”

“I’m sorry, but Mr. Geller—”

Simultaneously, both inspectors flashed their badges. Without another word, she wrote down Geller’s home address.

o0o

Sandy Geller lived in a multi-million dollar condo at the top of Russian Hill, near the apartment Richie’s cousin, Angie Amalfi, had lived in before she got married. Rebecca and Sutter walked into the opulent, marble-floor foyer. A suited doorman, middle-aged and balding with a fresh-scrubbed look, greeted them.

Rebecca and Sutter showed their badges and asked for Geller. The doorman buzzed him twice, but received no answer.

“He must not be home,” the doorman said.

“Check your logs,” Sutter ordered. “I know how your security system works.”

Rebecca smirked at Sutter as the doorman did as he was told. She knew Sutter loved to play the tough cop now and then.

“Well, he is home according to our logs of everyone who enters and exits the premises,” the befuddled doorman said, staring at the two inspectors. “And his car is in the garage. So I’m afraid he must be indisposed.”

“Then get his indisposed ass to answer the door,” Sutter demanded. “We don’t have all day.”

“But if he chooses not to answer, I’m not sure—.”

“What if he’s sick?” Sutter interrupted. “Or hurt and in desperate need of attention? Do you really want to ignore us and leave him there, possibly bleeding, maybe dying? When would you open the door in that case? After someone complains of the stink, or wonders why bloated flies are pouring out of his apartment vents?”

The doorman swallowed hard. He put in a call to the building manager and explained the situation. “Yes, sir,” he said, then hung up and faced the inspectors. “This way, please.”

o0o

Rebecca sensed something was wrong from the moment the doorman stood in front of Geller’s apartment and knocked. Not that she believed in ESP, but cops quickly developed a sense of what was going on around them. It helped keep them alive.

Finally, the doorman gave up and used his key to unlock the door.

Rebecca and Sutter entered. As opposed to the rococo style of the building’s foyer, Geller’s apartment was completely modern, all in grays and browns with crisp lines. It didn’t take them long in the starkly decorated space to find out why Geller didn’t answer. He was in the living room, face down in a pool of blood still dripping from the spot where his skull had been bashed in.