Maybe he’d evaded arrest by submitting to the leadership of a far brighter villain.
Any self-congratulation at I.D.’ing Sporn faded as she realized she was no closer to finding him or Larue.
Time to try Wayne again, hopefully he’d learned something and wasn’t just being protective. But still no answer or message at his private line. Finishing her tea, she took her sandwich with her and handed it to an emaciated homeless woman who was astonished by the unsolicited generosity.
Back in the Escape, she gave Center Street another try, made half a dozen uneventful passes, timed over an hour to avoid being conspicuous, and saw nothing.
Time to regroup.
Then she saw him.
Big man working his way out of a black Prius parked illegally in front of the site. Pulling to the curb, Grace watched as Walter Sporn waddled to the padlock that secured the chain-link, let himself in, relocked.
Smoking a cigar and wearing a black mock-turtle over black sweatpants and black sneakers.
He had to be well over three hundred pounds. But not a roly-poly pushover; a substratum of muscle underlay the fat and, despite the rocking gait imposed by tree-trunk thighs, he moved quickly and confidently.
So confident he wasn’t bothering to check out his surroundings when he emerged a few minutes later, returned to the black Prius, and drove away.
Gliding right past Grace.
Why would he be vigilant? For years — decades — he and his buddies had gotten away with everything.
Grace let a pickup truck with a Berkeley city emblem pass before pulling out.
The truck gave her perfect cover. Evasive driving, huh, Walter?
Time for a little motorcade.
Chapter 44
Walter Sporn, a poor fit for the Prius, drove south of campus and turned onto Claremont Boulevard, continuing into a neighborhood of large, gracious Craftsman, Tudor, and Mediterranean houses on tree-dimmed streets that evoked Grace’s years in Hancock Park.
This was the Claremont district, one of the college town’s most affluent enclaves and home to generations of old money, brand-new Silicon Valley profits, professors with trust funds. Grace knew the area well; a couple of times Malcolm had booked rooms at the Claremont Hotel, a giant century-old masterpiece of architectural excess tricked out with overlapping triangular segments and a landmark tower and set on twenty or so acres atop a hill that offered spectacular views. During their stays, Grace and Malcolm had breakfasted in the dining room. Memories of that time had slipped from her consciousness — as a rule, the past held no attraction for her — but now she recalled Malcolm’s seemingly endless appetite for pancakes and scholarly discussion and smiled.
Far cry from her current digs at the Olds. One adapted.
With the truck still between her and Sporn, she swerved slightly, just in time to catch Sporn turning onto a street called Avalina. A sign said No Exit.
Parking, she jogged to the corner and peered up the block. Short block, full view all the way to the end of the cul-de-sac. She watched as the Prius turned right into a driveway, counted houses to pinpoint the location, returned to the Escape and waited.
When Sporn hadn’t reappeared in an hour, she hazarded a stroll.
The houses lining Avalina perched atop sharply sloping lawns, many partially blocked by mature vegetation. The property Sporn had entered was nearly at the street’s terminus.
Gigantic Tudor, slate-roofed and multigabled, weathered brick face nearly blocked from view by unruly ten-foot hedges, three massive redwoods and two nearly-as-large cedars. And, incongruously, a thatch of spike-leaved palms. Tiny bluish-white flowers speckled the hedges, which had been trained into an arch that stretched over the cobbled-and-dirt drive. The Prius was parked behind its twin.
Two black cars. Black clothes for Sporn, same as the children of Arundel Roi the night they’d showed up at the ranch.
Grace continued to the end of the street, reversed direction and crossed the street, and pretended not to take another look at the brick mansion. Not a single glint of window glass behind the veil of green but that didn’t mean much.
Memorizing the house’s address, she forced herself to walk away slowly.
Back in her room, she tried the Olds’s WiFi again, found it no more useful than before. But her disposable cell worked just fine and she tried Wayne, yet again.
This time he picked up. “Where are you?”
“NoCal.”
“Lovely region. May I hope against hope that you’ve decided to settle for sightseeing?”
Grace laughed. “What’s up, Uncle?”
“Oh, well,” he said. “At least you’re okay.”
“I’m great.”
“Does that mean you’ve accomplished whatever it was you set out to do and are on your way back home?”
“Making progress.”
Silence.
Grace said, “Really, I’m fine.”
“So you say... you will take care of yourself.” A command, not a request.
Grace said, “Of course.”
“If you don’t make a solemn pledge to that effect right now, I won’t tell you what I learned.”
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of Wayne—”
“I’m serious, Grace.”
“I promise. Everything’s fine, really. What did you learn?”
Wayne cleared his throat. “Let me preface this by reminding you that I can’t vouch for the factuality of what I’m about to tell you. But my source has never let me down.”
Sounding every bit the lawyer.
“I’ll bear that in mind, Wayne.”
“Okay... as you might expect, this has to do with the late Ms. McKinney. Who, as we discussed, does not appear to have ever indulged in a romantic or sexual relationship with anyone or anything at any time.”
Grace waited.
“However,” said Wayne. “And this is a big however, Grace, my source — a new one, one can’t keep going to the same well — claims that at some point in middle age, Selene began to regret not having a family.” A beat. “It’s a common thing... she tried to solve her problem by adopting.”
“Tried? Someone with her clout was turned down?”
“Oh, she was allowed, all right,” said Wayne. “Scored herself a white girl — not a baby, perhaps she had no stomach for poopy diapers — a lass of around eight or nine. A name beginning with a Y — Yalta, Yetta, something like that.”
Grace heard him sigh.
“Here’s the painful part. The poor thing was with Selene for a couple of years, enjoying the life Selene was able to provide until Selene realized she wasn’t cut out for motherhood, after all, and solved that problem by giving the girl back.”
“Shit.”
“Indeed,” said Wayne.
“Who’d she give her to?”
“Unknown, Grace, but presumably to whatever agency or shyster colleague of mine found her the poor thing in the first place. Can you imagine the hurt? Rejected twice? Good Lord. No surprise that led to the poor thing developing problems.”
“What kind of problems?”
“The kind that end up with a young woman being incarcerated, Grace.”
“Sybil Brand,” said Grace. “Where she met Roi.”
“That’s where girls who acted out criminally went in those days, Grace. It keeps getting worse. Somewhere along the line, she had two children of her own.”
“Only two?”
“Yes, I wondered about that,” said Wayne, “but that’s all my source is aware of. Here’s the story and it goes back twenty-five years ago, Selene throwing herself a party for the Christmas season — she was always fêting herself — big garden affair at her home, the right people on the guest list, rented topiary and all that. My source is a right person and this is what she — what was observed: At some point during the bash, there was an attempt by my source to use the powder room but it was occupied and an alternative was sought. What presented itself was a lav in the utility wing, off the kitchen, and as my source did her thing and was walking out, she heard a commotion.”