Unwanted Company - Barbara Seranella (31 page)

* * *

Munch brought the bag of hamburgers to the house.
Asia was playing some involved game with the dogs. She'd tied scarves
around their necks. "Now, kids," she was saying in a
falsetto voice, "you must learn to behave or no cookies."

Sam responded by leaning forward and licking the
girl's face. Asia looked up and saw her mother. "She keeps
licking the inside of my mouth," she complained.

Munch suppressed a smile. "Go wash your hands. I
brought lunch. "

From the bathroom Munch heard Asia exclaim in the
same falsetto, "Shut the door. Can't I get any privacy around
here?"

Nicky's tail could be seen waving out the door. Munch
called her work.

"Bel Air Texaco," Lou answered.

"
Hi," she said. "How's it going?"

"You better get in here," he said.

"
Why? What's up?"

"Here, I'll let her tell you herself."

Munch heard some scuffling noises as the phone was
laid down, then Lou came back on. "I don't know what's going on
here. She won't come to the phone."

"That's all right," Munch said. "I'm
on my way."

She grabbed a hamburger out of the bag. Asia walked
into the kitchen. "Let me see your hands," Munch said. Asia
held out her hands, palms up. They passed inspection. Caroline had
heard Munch's end of the telephone conversation and looked at her
quizzically. "I need to run by my work real quick," Munch
said.

"Did you call Mace?"

"
He wasn't in. I'll try again as soon as I get
back."

Munch drove to the Texaco station. Lou was talking to
a customer when she pulled in. He saw her and pointed to the rear of
the shop, circling his finger to indicate that he meant around the
back. A six-foot ivy-covered berm separated the rear of the lube bay
from a neighboring apartment building. The shop used the space to
store broken equipment and used body parts. Munch pushed past an
unreliable tranny jack and the fender off a Toyota pickup truck.

A woman stepped out from behind a fifty-gallon drum.
Despite the clothes and short straight hair, Munch recognized her
immediately. "I oughta kick your ass," she said.

"
What did I do?" Ellen said.

"'Why don't you tell me," Munch said, not
knowing whether to punch or hug her friend. "And where did you
get those clothes?"

Ellen tugged at the crocheted vest. "Can you
believe people wear this kind of thing when they don't have to?"

Munch held up her hand, hoping to ward off a side
trip into bullshit. "C'mon, let's get out of here. You can tell
me on the way."

"Where are we going?" Ellen asked. "Back
to your house?"

"
No, my house isn't safe anymore. Asia and I are
staying at a friend's place in Venice."

"What happened at your house?" Ellen asked.

"No," Munch said. "You go first. What
happened in Mexico, and what the fuck were you thinking, taking my
limo down there in the first place?" Now she felt like hitting
her again.

"
I was trying to help you out," Ellen said,
sounding affronted. Tears formed in her eyes.

"
You're dangerous when you think," Munch
said, trying to remain indifferent to her friend's tears even though
she suspected they were sincere for a change.

They reached Munch's car. Ellen put her head down and
slunk into the front seat. "I'm sorry," she said.

Munch came around to the driver's seat. Instead of
starting the engine, she said, "I thought you were dead."
And then she was crying, too. They hugged. Then laughed, then cried
some more. Ellen broke it off first.

"
Will you look at the two of us?" she said,
laughing and wiping her face with a corner of the crocheted vest. She
lifted the corners of the vest with both hands. "Are we a sight
or what?" This got them both laughing so hard that they stopped
making noise.

Lou walked over to the car and bent down so that he
was looking in at them through the driver's window. "What's so
funny?" he asked.

Munch composed herself enough to say, "Lou, you
remember my friend—"

"Diane," Ellen said, cutting her off. "And
no, I don't think we've met."

Ellen's accent was completely absent. She also seemed
to have undergone a complete physical transformation. It was just a
trick of body language, Munch realized, how Ellen scrunched her nose
as she spoke and showed a lot of teeth. She also rounded her
shoulders and used her hands a lot.

"I've got to take Diane to—"

"a shelter," Ellen said, finishing her
sentence.

"Her—"

"
Son of a bitch husband," Ellen said, "has
hit me for the last time."

Munch nodded. Had she thought of this before or was
this story an inspiration of the moment? Either way, Ellen was good.

"
I told you that guy was an asshole," Munch
said. "So Lou, this guy is dangerous. If anyone comes by asking
questions . . . "

"
Don't worry," Lou said. "I won't say
a thing. When are you coming back to work?"

"
As soon as I can," Munch said. "I
can't wait for things to get back to normal." She looked at
Ellen as she said the last sentence.

Lou patted the window frame, and said, "You do
what you need to do."

"
Thanks," she said.

As they drove away, Ellen said, "He seems like a
nice fellow."

"
Forget him," Munch said. "What
happened in Mexico?"

"How did you find out about Mexico? " Ellen
asked.

"A cop friend of mine found out you crossed the
border."

"
Why did you think I was dead?"

"That same cop also had a tip that the police
had an unidentified murder victim—a young woman wearing nothing but
a red wig."

Ellen's face drained of color. "How young?"

"
Maybe thirteen. I went to identify her,
thinking it was going to be you."

"How was she killed?" Ellen asked.

"She was stabbed with some kind of pointed tool.
When the killer was done, he taped white crosses over the wounds. The
cop didn't say, but I'm sure the killer was this guy they're calling
the Band-Aid Killer."

"What kind of tape?" Ellen asked.

"White medical tape, like the kind they use to
hold gauze in place." Munch also told Ellen about the murders in
Hollywood and Mexico and finally about the sperm trail in Asia's
underwear drawer. "Mace St. John, the detective I know, thinks
it must be one of the guys you took down to Mexico."

"
I am not surprised. They were not very nice
men." Then Ellen told Munch what she had found when she went
through each of the unconscious men's pockets.

"That's why we've been so worried about you,"
Munch said, not missing the fact that Ellen omitted that she had
relieved the men of their cash. "I have microphones in the back
of the limo that come on whenever the privacy partition goes up. On
the tape, they were talking about you. Wondering if you'd seen
anything."

"
Good," Ellen said. "I hope they are
losing sleep over it."

"
I wouldn't count on that. These guys are really
connected. I heard Mace talking last night. He said every time he
gets a lead, his boss tells him to back off. I heard him tell his
wife that this guy was probably going to get away with it if they
didn't get some kind of break."

"
What can we do?"

"I have a plan," Munch said, feeling the
delicious thrill of fear mixed with excitement. Being a passive
victim had never been her style.

"
Hot damn," Ellen said, letting out a hoot.
"It's about time we got us a dog in this hunt."
 

CHAPTER 25

Raleigh couldn't take his eyes off the pictures of
the dead women. He had moved his base of operations to a small condo
on Barrington in Brentwood. Because of the heat generated by first
the Hollywood incident, and then the fiasco in Mexico, many plans had
to be changed. Victor was too much of a wild card. The Romanian
needed to be brought under control, and if he couldn't do it, who was
going to?

He spread the photographs of the dead women out
before him on his kitchen table. It was clear he needed to take
charge of the situation and do the right thing. As usual, the burden
fell on his shoulders to act in the best interests of everyone, with
or without official sanction.

He lifted the 0ne-pound Folger's coffee can out of
his bag of groceries. At least Victor had come through with his
promised sample.

Raleigh handled the can with great respect, knowing
that nestled within the sawdust inside this can were two buttons of
plutonium-239, each weighing a quarter of a kilogram. The reports he
read assured him that this particular plutonium isotope had a
halflife of more than twenty-four thousand years, meaning that it
gave off very few radioactive particles. The most prominent form of
radiation it did emit was alpha radiation, which was incapable of
even penetrating a sheet of paper, much less a layer of human skin,
or the stainless steel of a Fo1ger's coffee can. Still, he was gentle
when he removed the can from his bag of groceries.

Cassandra meowed and rubbed against his leg. "All
right," he said, reaching for a can of tuna fish. "Daddy's
taking care of you." He opened the can, separated the chunks on
a small ceramic dish, then lifted the cat onto the counter to eat.

He would return the
merchandise to Victor in time for the man to complete his
transaction. The Libyans had won the bidding war. They would receive
the shipment in exchange for $380,000, to be delivered in bundles of
hundred-dollar bills. God bless America.

* * *

Munch drove to her neighborhood, but didn't make the
turn down her street. A quick glance told her that no police cars
were parked in front, but who knew who else was watching? She turned
down the next street and stopped at the house of the neighbor whose
backyard connected to hers.

"Come on," she told Ellen. '

Munch knocked on the door. A minute later, she tried
the bell.

"It looks like no one is home," Ellen said.

"Yeah, I know the couple who lives here, and
they both work," Munch said. "I just wanted to make sure."
Munch led the way. They walked casually around to the side of the
property where an eight-foot cyclone fence extended from the exterior
wall of the garage. On the other side of the fence, there was a
narrow dog run that ran the depth of the house and yard. Munch
climbed the fence and dropped down into the dirt on the other side.
Ellen followed.

An old golden retriever with a white muzzle and
rheumy eyes lifted his head. Munch reached down and petted him. "Hey,
Rocky," she said. "It's okay, boy. " The dog wagged
his tail feebly. The two women crossed the neighbor's yard. Munch
lifted a loose plank in the fence separating the two yards and slid
through. Ellen did the same.

"Let's just do what we came to do," Munch
said, as they entered the house by the back door, "and then get
the hell out of here."

"
Fine by me," Ellen said.

They both dropped to their hands and knees and
crawled across the kitchen floor until they reached the limo office.
Munch reached into a filing cabinet and retrieved her logbook. The
paperwork from the Saturday night limo booking was right on top. She
circled the number Raleigh had called from the limousine.

"
Hand me that phone," Ellen whispered.

Thirty minutes later, Munch and Ellen arrived at the
house on Carroll Canal. Mace was already there and looking grim. No
surprise there, Munch thought, feeling herself bristling in the
presence of his perpetual anger. No wonder Caroline is boiling on the
relationship.

Mace stood on the front porch and watched as the two
women emerged from the car.

"
Hey," Munch said.

"You must be Ellen," Mace said, regarding
Munch's passenger with a cop's eye for detail.
 
On
the ride over Ellen had ditched the vest and opened the collar of her
shirt. Then she'd opened up her hat-box-size cosmetic case and
applied eyeliner, three shades of shadow, copious mascara, and a
fresh coat of lipstick. Now as she left the car, she raked her eyes
over Mace, giving him the full benefit of her artwork, and said, "And
you must be the man who's going to straighten this whole mess out. "

Mace looked up and down the street, then said, "You
better come inside."

The house smelled of freshly baked cookies. Caroline
emerged from the bedroom, a worried look on her face. She relaxed
visibly when she spotted Munch. "Oh, good," she said.
"You're back."

"Anything wrong?" Munch asked. "Where's
Asia?"

"
She's asleep on my bed," Caroline said.

The bathroom door opened, and Cassiletti stepped out.
Ellen brightened. "And who might you be?"

"This is Detective Cassiletti," Munch said.