“I’m going to believe you on that. I guess that’s about it.”
Petra said, “Could we talk more about Marta’s errands in the city?”
Pastern answered quickly. “She liked to shop- discount clothing places, that kind of thing.”
Let it ride. “Okay… can you think of any reason Kurt might have to murder Marta?”
“So you do suspect him?”
“At this point I don’t know enough to suspect anyone, Emily. That’s why it’s important for you to tell me everything you know.”
“I have.” Pastern’s smile was shaky.
Petra smiled back. Tasted her designer coffee. Dreadful. She’d give Pastern one more try and if the woman continued to resist, follow up with a phone call tomorrow. Tonight.
Emily Pastern untied her hair and shook it loose. She had knotted it up tight, created an austere little bun that gave her face an ascetic cast.
“The errands,” said Petra.
“Okay. I might as well tell you because you’ve taken the trouble after all these years and you do seem like someone who cares.”
She moistened the dog’s snout again. Breathed in deeply.
Dramatic type; Petra wondered how much of what she said could be taken seriously.
“Okay,” Pastern repeated. “I’m pretty sure Marta was having an affair.”
Petra waited for the woman’s breathing to slow. “With who?”
“I don’t know, Detective. But she gave off all the signs.”
Petra held out an expectant palm.
Emily Pastern said, “Dressing better, walking bouncier- sexier. Color in her cheeks. She was still reserved, but there was something going on beneath the surface. A glow. A fire.”
The color in Pastern’s cheeks heightened. Ah, suburbia.
Petra said, “Happier than usual.”
“More than happier. Alive. It wasn’t because of Kurt, believe me. He was the same old dull Kurt.”
“But Marta changed.”
“Anyone who knew her could tell she had. Suddenly she was gone all the time. Rushing here, rushing there. Which wasn’t like Marta at all. It was true what I said about her being bored. She told me she found the Valley too slow. But her way of coping had been stay-at-home stuff. Being a PTA mom, collecting- glass figurines, samplers, little Japanese teapots. She used to hit the flea markets regularly. Then all that stopped and she boxed up her collections and started driving into the city regularly.”
“Around the same time she started to dress and walk sexier?”
“Exactly the same time,” said Pastern. “You’re a woman. You know I’m right.”
“You’re making a good case, Emily.”
“Maybe Kurt found out. Maybe that’s why he did it. It sure wasn’t for any romantic reasons of his own. He’s never remarried and if he’s been hooked up with another woman, I haven’t heard.”
“Would you have heard?” said Petra. “With his being distant and all that?”
“Oh, yeah,” said Pastern. “Our kids still go to the same school. West Valley Prep. It’s still suburbia, Petra.”
Petra watched as she wiped her lips daintily. Drama queen or not, Pastern had given her something to work with. She asked her if there was anything else she wanted to say and when Pastern shook her head, thanked her, fished a ten out of her purse and stood.
Sophia grumbled.
Pastern patted her calm and reached for her own purse. “No, it’s on me.”
“Against regulations,” said Petra, smiling. Little Miss By-the-Book. Ha.
“You’re sure? Okay, then, nice to meet you, hope you get him.”
As Petra started to leave, Pastern said, “Why’d you ask me if Kurt and Marta had a dog?”
“Just curious,” said Petra. “Trying to get a feel for them as people.”
“He’s a cold person,” said Pastern. “She was a nice person. I’ll tell you who did love dogs: Katya. She was always over playing with Daisy. Her needs were so obvious. But Kurt wouldn’t hear of it.”
“Too messy.”
“He’s compulsive.” Pastern frowned. “Real life isn’t like that.”
“Sure isn’t,” said Petra. “What color is Daisy?”
“A deep beautiful mahogany red. She’s show-quality.”
No match to the hairs on Coral Langdon. So much for the complex transfer scenario Petra had formulated. From daughter to dad to…
She said, “I’ll bet she is. Any idea how Katya’s doing?”
“My daughter, who’s in the same grade but not the same class, says she’s very quiet, keeps to herself. What else would you expect? Growing up with someone like that. Besides that, a girl needs a mother. It’s basic psychology, right?”
Petra flashed a plastic smile, muttered something. Escaped.
CHAPTER 41
Petra drove east on Ventura Boulevard to Laurel Canyon, took that winding, leafy route back to the city. She loved Laurel, with its mix of ramshackle, radical, and royal. Great place to live in the unlikely event she ever had money.
She zipped past what was left of the old Houdini estate. Some magic would be nice right around now. Something to help her figure out if Emily Pastern’s suspicions were righteous.
Marta’s infidelity, Kurt a revenge murderer.
If so, he’d planned meticulously, lured his wife out of the theater, maybe using Katya as the bait. Then he’d exploited his daughter again for an alibi.
From everything she’d seen, now buttressed by Pastern’s comments, Kurt was a cold fish. One of those technically minded guys who saw everything as an equation.
You humiliate me, I kill you?
No reason it couldn’t have happened that way. She ran the scenario through her head: Kurt calls Marta from the phone booth, then heads over to the theater parking lot to wait. Marta shows up, they drive off- he drives. Then he pulls over around the block. Tells her the real reason he’s there. He knows about all those trips to the city.
Maybe there’s a confrontation, right there. Or perhaps Marta, caught off-guard, tries to smooth things out. Kurt’s beyond appeasement; he’s brought a weapon.
Or perhaps he’d planted it in the trunk of Marta’s car. Or had used something already there- a jack, a tire iron.
No, the coroner’s report said something wider, smoother.
Marta tries to escape, runs from the car. He grabs her.
Spins her, gets behind her. A tall guy like Kurt would have had plenty of leverage for a crushing occipital blow.
She goes down, he continues bashing her brains out. Doing it on the street. You act like a slut, you die like a slut.
Had he intended on leaving her there, remembered that the bleeding thing on the sidewalk had once been his wife and relented? Propped her back in the car? Or had that just been an attempt to conceal the body in order to give him more time to get home, crawl into bed, and enjoy murderer’s dreams?
Marta hadn’t been found until morning. Kurt, getting Katya ready for school, would’ve had plenty of time to be “surprised.”
As she passed the Canyon Market, Petra thought of a third possibility. Positioning Marta behind the wheel had been a different kind of message: You drove into the city to meet your lover. Now sit in the driver’s seat in that same damn car with your brains leaking out.
Destroying her humanity, her soul. Would a tech type like Kurt Doebbler believe in the soul? Or would he view people as nothing more than the sum of their cells?
I pulverize your gray matter, I reduce you to nothing.
Pastern had called Kurt compulsive. Maybe that cold, flat demeanor masked volcanic rage.
He does Marta, gets away with it. Decides he likes it.
Decides to commemorate the date.
What were anniversaries but time souvenirs? And psycho killers loved to keep mementos.
Nice little profile she was developing. The only problem was, lots of stuff didn’t fit. Like the dog hairs on Coral Langdon when Kurt hated animals. And Kurt, as charmless a man as Petra had ever encountered, seemed the last guy Coral would have stopped to have a pooch chat with.