After a half hour it was time for Ballard to get ready. It was almost four and she wanted to get back into the city before the crush of traffic moving east got into full swing. She went to her van, opened a can of food for Lola, and put it in her bowl on the ground in the parking lot. While the dog ate, Ballard looked through the work clothes she had on a hanging bar in the van to make sure she had a clean suit for the night.
After dropping Lola at night care, Ballard avoided the freeways and took surface streets toward Hollywood. She got there by 5:30, parked in the Hollywood Station lot, and changed clothes in the locker room before returning to the parking lot and switching to her city-ride. She then drove to West Hollywood, cruising by the apartment building she believed was the home of Nathan Brazil, John Hilton’s roommate at the time of his murder.
She found parking on Willoughby and walked back to the apartment. There was no security gate, another indication that the building was not a sought-after address. She was able to approach apartment 214 directly and knock. Almost immediately the door was opened by a man with short black hair and a neatly kept beard. Ballard didn’t recognize him from the four-year-old driver’s license photo she had previously pulled up on the computer.
She had unclipped her badge from her belt and was holding it up.
“Mr. Brazil?”
“Yes, what is it?”
“I’m Detective Ballard with the LAPD. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“Well, what’s it about? This is West Hollywood, not L.A.”
“Yes, I know it is West Hollywood. I’m investigating the murder of John Hilton in Hollywood and I know it’s been a long time but I’d like to ask you about him and about his life back when you lived together.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I never lived with anyone named that.”
“You are Nathan Brazil, right?”
“Oh, no. I’m Dennis. Nathan’s my husband — I took his name. But I’m sure he doesn’t know anything about a murder. What was—”
“Is he here?”
“No, he’s at work.”
“Where is work?”
Dennis started getting cagey.
“He works at a restaurant, so you can’t just go barging—”
“He still works at Marix?”
His eyes confirmed this by widening slightly in how-do-you-know-that surprise.
“Do you have a card?” he said. “I’ll have him call you.”
“Or you could just text him now, tell him I’m on my way and to be ready. This is a homicide investigation, Mr. Brazil. We don’t make appointments at people’s convenience. You understand?”
“I guess I do now.”
“Good. Thank you for your time.”
Ballard walked back to her car. Marix was around the corner on Flores and it might have been faster to walk but she wanted to park the city-ride out front as part of her show of authority. If Nathan Brazil had the same attitude as his husband, he might need to be reminded of the power and might of the state.
She parked in the red zone in front of the three-step walk-up to the restaurant. Before she got to the first step, the glass door opened, and a man in his mid-fifties and unsuccessfully fighting baldness stepped out and positioned himself on the top step with his hands on his hips. He wore black jeans, white shirt, black tie, and black apron.
“Table for one cop?”
Sarcasm dripped off his words like melted cheese.
“Mr. Brazil?”
“It’s amazing! You only took thirty years to respond to my call.”
Ballard joined him on the top step.
“What call was that, sir?”
“I wanted to talk about my friend. I called many times and they never came and they never called back because they didn’t give a shit about John.”
Ballard saw a holding area near the front door with bar tables where patrons could drink and congregate while waiting to be seated. It was empty now, too early for a wait for a table. Ballard gestured to the space.
“Can we speak privately over there?”
“Sure, but I have one early bird I need to keep an eye on.”
“No problem.”
They moved into the waiting corral and Brazil positioned himself so that he could see through the glass windows of the restaurant to a table of four men.
“How long have you been working here?” Ballard asked.
“Almost eight years,” Brazil said. “Good people, good food, and I can walk to work.”
“I know it’s good food. I’ve eaten here several times.”
“Is this where you butter me up and then say the case will never be solved?”
“No, it’s not. This is where I tell you I’m going to solve it.”
“Sure.”
“Look, Nathan, I’m not going to lie to you. A lot of time has gone by. John’s parents are dead, one of the original detectives is dead, and the other is retired in Idaho. There are—”
“They never did give a shit anyway. They didn’t care.”
“Is that based on them not returning your calls?”
“More than that, honey. Not that things are all that different now, but back then they weren’t going to jump through hoops for a drug-addicted poof. That’s just the way it was.”
“You mean a gay man?”
“Poof, fag, queer — whatever you want to call us. LAPD didn’t give a shit. Still doesn’t.”
“To me it’s a victim and that’s all I see, okay? I inherited this case because it was lost and then it got found. I’m on it now and it doesn’t matter to me who John Hilton was or what his lifestyle choices were.”
“See, that’s what I mean. That’s the problem. It isn’t a ‘lifestyle.’ And it’s not a ‘choice.’ You’re hetero, right?”
“Yes.”
“Is that a ‘lifestyle choice’ or are you just hetero?”
“I get it. My mistake and I appreciate what you’re saying. What I’m saying is that it doesn’t matter to me what John was or did. Gay or drug addict or both, he didn’t deserve what happened and I’m interested, no matter what the people before me were. Okay?”
“Okay. But I have to go check on my table now.”
“I’ll wait here.”
Brazil left the area and went into the restaurant. Ballard watched him take another order for margaritas — it was happy hour — then put in the order at the bar at the back of the restaurant. He came back to Ballard a few moments later. She felt they had gotten the ground rules out of the way and Brazil had had a chance to vent. It was time to get down to business.
“Okay, so how long were you living with John before he was killed?”
“Murdered. I prefer ‘murdered’ because that’s what it was.”
“You’re right. It was a murder. How long did you live with him?”
“Eleven months. I remember because it was sort of awkward. We lived in this dump in North Hollywood and it was time to sign a new lease. Neither of us wanted to but we were too lazy to look for something else and think about moving all our shit. Then he got murdered and I couldn’t do the rent on my own. I had to move.”
“It says in the investigation records that he came to the studio where you were working on the night he was murdered.”
“Yes, Archway. I found out later from the guy at the gate.”
“And that was unusual for him to come there?”
“Sort of. Not really.”
This had stood out to Ballard in the murder book chrono — that it was unusual for Hilton to go to Brazil’s workplace. Now she was hearing something different.
“I read a report from the first investigation that had you saying he’d never done that before,” she prompted.