“It’s a Porsche Boxter.” Tony was proud of his car, the one outward sign that he had accomplished something in his life. Well, there was the townhouse, which he had shoehorned himself into, but he still needed to have Josh live there as a tenant to come up with the payments. He had leased the Porsche-a manageable down payment, and reasonable monthly payments made him look respectable. Of course, when the lease ran out, he would be left with nothing. But he would cross that bridge…
“It’s small. And it sounds as if the engine is behind us.”
“It’s behind our seats. Located for maximum stability.”
Shahla looked nervously over her shoulder. “I hope it stays there.”
Those were not the comments of a car buff. Shahla wasn’t impressed. Maybe he should have settled for a Honda. He made it all the way up to third gear on Pacific Coast Highway and felt a little better as he listened to the purr of the engine. He needed to take a trip to the desert so he could let it run for a while, like a racehorse. It was not built for the stop-and-go driving of a city.
They arrived at the police station within five minutes. Bonita Beach was a compact city. Joy’s murder had reverberated through it like a fire siren and left the residents feeling betrayed and anxious. The full impact to the city and to the Hotline had grown on Tony as his shock had worn off, and now he wanted to find the murderer as much as Shahla did.
They walked into the station together and approached the counter, behind which sat a young female officer doing something with a computer. After a few seconds, she looked up and said, “Can I help you?”
Tony explained that they had some possible evidence for the murder investigation. He expected her to just take the envelope and their names, but she said, “Detective Croyden’s here. I’ll get him. Have a seat in there.”
She pointed to a doorway that led into a conference room. Tony and Shahla went into the room containing a worn wooden table and worn wooden chairs. On the wall were posters relating to drugs, alcohol, and other temptations of the flesh. The posters exhorted the reader against yielding to these temptations.
Shahla said, “‘Can I help you?’ means, ‘Am I able to help you?’ I was tempted to say, ‘I don’t know. Can you?’”
“So what should she have said?” Tony asked. He had never paid much attention in English class.
“‘May I help you?’ That asks for permission.”
“Thank you for the lesson.”
“No charge.”
“Well, if it isn’t two of my favorite people. I might have known I’d see you on Friday the thirteenth.”
Detective Croyden had entered the room while they had their backs to the door, looking at posters. Tony turned around and said, “Working late, aren’t you?” He knew why Croyden might be sarcastic with him, but not Shahla, unless she had let some of her dislike of the police show when he talked to her.
“Crime never sleeps,” Croyden said. “What have you got for me?”
He didn’t ask them to sit down, and he didn’t take a seat himself, so the three of them remained standing. Tony thought he looked tired. There were bags under his eyes, and his facial wrinkles were pronounced, as was his broken nose. Tony pointed to the brown envelope he had set on the table and told Croyden what was inside. He related how he had found and handled the white envelope, mentioning that several of his own fingerprints might be on it.
“But at least you came to your senses before you covered it with your prints,” Croyden said, with what might be faint praise. “Do you know what’s inside it?”
Tony missed a beat while he reconsidered his first answer and then said, “No.” He hoped Croyden hadn’t noticed his involuntary head-fake.
“All right, we’ll take a look at it. You said the Hotline office door was locked. That’s good. Did anybody knock or did you hear any sounds outside the door?”
He directed this question to both of them. They shook their heads.
“All right. Tony, do you have any objection to the desk officer taking your fingerprints so that we can eliminate the ones on the envelope?”
He could probably refuse, at least temporarily, but what would be the point. “No objection.” It appeared that Croyden was dismissing them.
Shahla said, “Detective Croyden, since the person who left the envelope knows where the Hotline is, doesn’t that sound to you as if the…killer might work for the Hotline?”
Croyden looked at her for a while, and Tony began to wonder whether he wasn’t ogling her breasts instead of contemplating his answer. He finally said, “Sha…” and stumbled.
“Shahla.”
“Shahla, first of all, we don’t know whether the envelope was left by the killer. Assuming it was, there is a possibility that he-or she-works for the Hotline. But other people know where it is, too.”
“You mean, like ex-listeners. But we just moved to this building six months ago, so that eliminates most of them.”
“A smart caller could find out. One of your listeners could have slipped and given away your location to a caller. Like the Chameleon. I told Nancy she had a security leak big enough to drive a Hummer through.”
Tony said, “It’s my observation that the listeners are very security conscious. I don’t know how the Chameleon might have found out.”
“But you know and I know that some of these guys can sweet-talk the teenyboppers on the phone, and they’ll lose their heads. Look at all these young girls who are seduced on the Internet.”
“We’re not like them,” Shahla said hotly. “We’ve been through the training and, anyway, we’re a lot smarter than the dippy girls who look for love online.”
“What have you found out about the Chameleon?” Tony asked to try to defuse the situation.
“Still working on it,” Croyden said stiffly. “Did you get any calls from him today?”
“No.” If there had been calls from him during the previous shifts, his name would have been on the board.
“He hasn’t called since you went after him. Looks like you scared him away. And made our job harder.”
Tony was tempted to make a retort about the police not being able to find him, even with subpoenaed call records, but Shahla didn’t know about those.
Croyden said, “Listen, I’d love to chat with you, but I’ve got work to do. Tony, come over to the counter, and we’ll get your prints.”
“What if there are prints on the envelope that aren’t on file somewhere?” Shahla asked.
“We’ll try to match them against any suspects’ prints. Why, did you touch the envelope? Do we need to take your prints?”
“No,” Shahla said hastily. “I…don’t want to get my fingers dirty.”
“I’ll have a piece of cherry pie with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream on top,” Shahla said to the waitress at the Beach House, the local all-night diner.
“Uh…coffee-decaf,” Tony said when she looked at him. He didn’t want to stay awake the rest of the night.
“Well, at least you’re not anorexic,” Tony said to Shahla. “But we can’t eliminate the possibility that you’re a binge eater.” It had been Shahla’s idea to stop here.
“I’m not a binge eater unless you call eating all the time bingeing.”
It was true. She was always munching on something at the Hotline. “So how do you maintain your girlish figure?”
“I’m on the cross-country team.”
“You didn’t tell me that.”
“A girl doesn’t tell all her secrets.”
“I thought you were going to get a job.”
“With all that’s been happening, I haven’t had time to look for a job. But what about you? I don’t know anything about you except that you own a condo…”
“Town house.”
“…you own a town house and drive a noisy car.”
“I’m one of those poor people who have to work for a living.”
“What do you do?”
“I’m marketing manager for an Internet company that gives people who are dissatisfied with their weight or the appearance of their bodies alternatives as to what to do.”