“She bought it?”
“Maybe.”
“Well,” she said, “if what we’ve tossed around tonight is remotely right-on, you’re not going to be able to sell that story too much longer…you’re seeing her in therapy, Alex?”
“No regular sessions, on an as-needed basis. How much do I tell her?”
Petra looked at Milo.
He said, “It’s your homicide, Detective Connor.”
“Hmm,” she said. “I wouldn’t want her knowing every investigative detail but she needs to understand enough not to be careless. Is there some other place she can live if she has to?”
“She has no other family,” I said. “Claims she has friends.”
“Claims? You think she’s lying?”
“She says she studies with other students but she’s never talked about any purely social relationships. And there’s nothing in her home that smacks of college life.”
“Sounds old before her time. Losing a parent can do that to you. You’re wondering if the dam’s going to break?”
“I’m keeping an eye on the water level.”
“She’s got one relationship,” said Milo. “Kyle Bedard tracked her down in Facebook, claimed he got curious after we talked to him about when Tanya and Patty lived in his grandfather’s house. We warned her about getting too involved, but you know kids.”
“Think he’s stalking her for an unhealthy reason?”
“Probably not, but who knows? That a fair assessment, Alex?”
I nodded.
“Another Bedard entanglement,” said Petra. “Alex, maybe you should guide her away from him. Somehow get it across that this family seems to wrap its tentacles around everything.”
“But give her no investigative details.”
She exhaled and fooled with her hair. “We do have a moral duty to protect her but scaring the hell out of her for nothing can’t be good for her mental health. Can she be trusted not to leak to Kyle or anyone else?”
“I think so.”
“Then follow your instincts.”
Milo said, “While you’re talking to her, maybe you can find out if she’s got any memories of Blaise De Paine.”
“Will do.”
Petra stood and rotated her neck. “Walk me to my chariot, gents.”
The next morning at nine, I left a message for Tanya to call.
By one p.m. I still hadn’t heard back. At ten after Milo phoned.
“Finally a bingo. When Patty moved into the duplex on Fourth, Mary Whitbread owned it, along with Whitbread’s own building and two others nearby. But two years before, all the properties had been owned by the Bedard family trust.”
“Myron sold them to her?”
“The trust did. The trustees were the old man and Myron.”
“Did she get a bargain price?”
“Sweet deal for the mistress? I’m no expert but the numbers don’t seem deflated, maybe Mary had her own source of dough. Your guess about Myron sending Patty over there is looking better. The other monumental finding is that the bullets excised from Leland Armbruster’s corpse did not match Patty’s gun.”
“Small blessing.”
He said, “Raul and Petra got in early to track Myron down in Europe. So far, zippo. The final autopsy results on Lester Jordan aren’t too profound: method of death, strangulation, mode of death, homicide. Robert Fisk still hasn’t surfaced and Petra can’t find current addresses on Blaise De Paine or Moses Grant. But, hey, if life was too easy, we’d start thinking we were more than apes with thin pelts.”
“No intelligent design for you?”
“Not when I read the newspaper.”
“Blaise De Paine is potentially accessible,” I said. “We know his mom.”
“Petra’s view on that-and I agree-is that revisiting Mary Whitbread right now would sound too many alarms and raise the risk of another vanishing felon. What I came up with is back-tracing the Hummer to an address, it’s not a common vehicle. There’s no such beast registered to De Paine or Peterson Whitbread, but he could be using another aka. I’m waiting for DMV to fax me a list of all Hummer registrations. In the meantime, I’ve been calling around at dealers, no luck, yet. Seeing as De Paine likes to make an impression, I wondered if it could be a rental and started with the Budget lot in Beverly Hills because they do all sorts of thrills-for-a-day, a couple of birthdays ago I rented Rick a Lamborghini. Gave him a backache, but that’s another story. Unfortunately, the only black Hummer on their lot has been on long-term loan to a film outfit. The other three are silver, red, and there’s a yellow convertible, talk about tasteful. I’m about to call Hertz.”
“The yellow one sounds right for your next birthday.”
“Oh, sure,” he said. “Rhino drives a Bumblebee.”
When Tanya hadn’t gotten back by three, I tried her again.
“Oh. Hi.” Soft voice, tense.
“Bad time?”
“No…I was actually going to call you. Mr. Fineman-Mommy’s accountant-asked me to look for some tax records and I found something in the bottom of the drawer.”
“What?”
“Um-I’m not sure what it means. Can I show it to you?”
“Of course. One thing you should know: Your mother’s gun doesn’t match to any known crime and has been ruled out in the case we told you about.”
“That’s great,” she said. All the emotion of a cyborg.
“Everything okay, Tanya?”
“Yes…I was planning to leave for campus at five. I could drop by before then. If you’re not busy.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
“Is four thirty okay?”
“Perfect.”
She clicked off midway through my good-bye.
CHAPTER 25
She arrived five minutes early, clutching a padded envelope. Gray knit gloves sheathed her hands though the weather was mild.
In the office, she tore the envelope flap, pulling out a photo and a sheet of lined paper folded twice over.
The snapshot showed Patty and Lester Jordan standing next to each other in the dirty-custard space that was Jordan’s living room. His hair was dark, wispy, and plastered to his skull. His eyes bagged, his legs bowed. A gray sweatshirt provided bulk that fooled no one.
Patty’s stocky body tilted toward Jordan, as if she was ready to break his fall.
Tanya unfolded the lined paper and handed it to me. The creases were grubby and the edges were fuzzy. A note in blue ballpoint printing read:
To the alleged Florence nightingale: I’m giving this back to you because you don’t give a damn. I don’t know why you think it’s professionally ok to do what you did. The old bastard’s rich, he can get anyone to change his diapers but who’s going to walk me around and wake-shake if I need that? I can understand others being manipulated by that a-hole’s $$$$$ but why you, Pat? You always said $$$$$ wasn’t a big deal to you. You always said honesty was everything, Pat. Obviously, all that talk about honesty was just the usual bullshit like what they shovel in all those fucking rehabs. Don’t get me wrong, Pat, I’m not p.o.’d, I’m HURT. Capital H. And you know where that leads with me, Pat. What else am I supposed to do, Pat? And whose fault will it be if I fall hard, Pat?
Enjoy the rest of your life.
Les
Tanya said, “He says he’s not mad but that’s rage. Do you believe his arrogance? ‘Wake and shake’? She got him through an overdose, probably saved his life, so instead of being grateful, he guilt-trips her? And that last part-‘You know where that leads with me.’ He’s threatening to O.D. again, right? Implying it’ll be her fault. How does someone get so entitled!”
I said, “That’s an addict focusing on his own needs.”
“He probably became an addict because he was selfish. And weak. All those people who can’t hold it together.”