Books by Jonathan Kellerman

FICTION

ALEX DELAWARE NOVELS

Mystery (2011)
Deception (2010)
Evidence (2009)
Bones (2008)
Compulsion (2008)
Obsession (2007)
Gone (2006)
Rage (2005)
Therapy (2004)
A Cold Heart (2003)
The Murder Book (2002)
Flesh and Blood (2001)
Dr. Death (2000)
Monster (1999)
Survival of the Fittest (1997)
The Clinic (1997)
The Web (1996)
Self-Defense (1995)
Bad Love (1994)
Devil’s Waltz (1993)
Private Eyes (1992)
Time Bomb (1990)
Silent Partner (1989)
Over the Edge (1987)
Blood Test (1986)
When the Bough Breaks (1985)

OTHER NOVELS

True Detectives (2009)
Capital Crimes (with Faye Kellerman, 2006)
Twisted (2004)
Double Homicide (with Faye Kellerman, 2004)
The Conspiracy Club (2003)
Billy Straight (1998)
The Butcher’s Theater (1988)

NONFICTION
With Strings Attached: The Art and Beauty of Vintage Guitars (2008)
Savage Spawn: Reflections on Violent Children (1999)
Helping the Fearful Child (1981)
Psychological Aspects of Childhood Cancer (1980)

FOR CHILDREN, WRITTEN AND ILLUSTRATED
Jonathan Kellerman’s ABC of Weird Creatures (1995)
Daddy, Daddy, Can You Touch the Sky? (1994)

Mystery is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2011 by Jonathan Kellerman

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

BALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kellerman, Jonathan.
Mystery: an Alex Delaware novel/Jonathan Kellerman.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-345-52438-6
1. Delaware, Alex (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Sturgis, Milo (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 3. Forensic psychologists—Fiction. 4. Police—California—Los Angeles—Fiction. 5. Los Angeles (Calif.)—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3561.E3865M97 2011
813′.54—dc22      2010053031

www.ballantinebooks.com

Jacket design: Scott Biel
Jacket image (car and storefront): Shutterstock/Konstantin Sutyagin

v3.1

This one’s for
Kim Hovey.

Contents

Cover

Other Books by This Author

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

About the Author

ike a con man on the run, L.A. buries its past.

Maybe that’s why no one argued when the sentence came down: The Fauborg had to die.

I live in a company town where the product is illusion. In the alternate universe ruled by sociopaths who make movies, communication means snappy dialogue, the scalpel trumps genetics, and permanence is mortal sin because it slows down the shoot.

L.A. used to have more Victorian mansions than San Francisco but L.A. called in the wrecking ball and all that handwork gave way to thirties bungalows that yielded to fifties dingbats, which were vanquished, in turn, by big-box adult dormitories with walls a toddler can put a fist through.

Preservationists try to stem the erosion but end up fighting for the likes of gas stations and ticky-tack motels. Money changes hands, zoning laws are finessed, and masterpieces like the Ambassador Hotel dissolve like wrinkles shot with Botox.

The Fauborg Hotel was no Ambassador but it did have its charm. Four somber stories of Colonial brick-face, it sat on a quiet block of Crescent Drive in Beverly Hills, wedged between a retirement home and a dry cleaner. A short walk but a psychic universe from the Eurotrash cafés of Canon Drive and the shopping frenzy on Beverly and Rodeo, the Fauborg appeared in few guidebooks but managed to boast one of the highest occupancy rates in the city.

Built in 1949 by a French Holocaust survivor, its design aped the mansions in the American movies that had transfixed Marcel Jabotinsky as a teenager. Jabotinksy’s first guests were other postwar émigrés seeking peace and quiet. That same desire for low-key serenity continued with the hotel’s clientele, divided between the genteel grandparents of Eurotrash and the odd knowledgeable American willing to trade glitz and edgy and ironic for a decent night’s sleep.

I knew the Fauborg because I drank there. The lounge at the back was smallish and dim with nothing to prove, paneled in dark rift oak and hung with middling Barbizon landscapes. The eighty-year-old hunchback behind the bar concocted the best Sidecar in town and Robin likes Sidecars. An assortment of pianists, mostly former studio musicians on pension, worked the big black Steinway in the left-hand corner, never intruding upon the pleasant buzz of conversation and the harmonious clink of crystal glasses. The staff was attentive without being nosy, the snacks were decent, and you left the place feeling as if you’d been recivilized.

Robin and I spent a lot of Sunday evenings in a cracked leather rear booth, holding hands, nibbling on cheese crackers, and inhaling Gershwin.

One Saturday morning in the spring, Robin was delivering a new guitar to an aging rock star who lived in the flats of Beverly Hills and the drive took her past the Fauborg. A sign strung up over the fanlight announced:

LAST NIGHT TOMORROW:
COME CELEBRATE—OR MOURN—WITH US.
THANKS FOR THE GOOD TIMES.

The Family of Marcel Jabotinsky

Robin shouldn’t have been surprised; the previous week we’d shown up at a Thai place we’d enjoyed for half a decade only to find an abyss surrounded by chain-link where the building had stood. The month before that, she’d run into an old high school friend and asked how her husband was.

“Which one?”

“Jeff.”

The woman laughed. “Jeff’s ancient history, sweetie. Cliff’s recent history but he’s gone, too.”

Tissue paper city.

Robin said, “Not much of a choice, is it? Surrender to the inevitable or risk a whole bunch of mawkish nostalgia.”

We sat on the living room couch with Blanche, our little French bulldog, squeezed between us and following the back-and-forth.

I said, “I can go either way.”

She pulled on a curl, let it spring back. “What the heck, I’ll never get a Sidecar that good and it’s a chance to put on a dress.”

“I’ll wear a suit.”

“I like you in a suit, darling. But not the black one. Let’s pretend it won’t be a funeral.”

Who knew?

e showed up at nine p.m. The light behind the fanlight was dingy.

Crescent Drive was depopulated except for a man with a walkie-talkie leaning against a parking meter just north of the hotel. Thirties, tall, broad, with short yellow hair, he flashed us a slit-eyed appraisal before returning to watching the empty street.

His suit was black and it draped his bulk uneasily. An interesting bulge swelled his breast pocket, a spiral cord ran from an earpiece down the back of his collar.

Robin whispered, “If someone needs serious guarding, where are the paparazzi?”

I said, “Good question. They swarm like blowflies at the first whiff of moral decay.”

“Some flies are kept like pets. Once I was delivering a mandolin to Bite and sat in his kitchen as his publicist phoned the paps to tell them where The Star would be for lunch.”

Something made me turn back to Mr. Black Suit. His head jerked away quickly and he studied the sidewalk; he’d been watching us. Despite the theatrical apathy, his shoulders were tight, his profile less animate than Rushmore.

We must’ve lingered too long because he half turned and stared. Robin smiled and gave a fluttery finger-wave. Her curls were wild, copper-bright in the moonlight, her dress a tight black tulip, set off by red stilettos.

Usually that has its effect.

Black Suit was no exception and he smiled back. Then he stopped himself, returned to reviewing the pavement.

Robin said, “Guess I’m losing my touch.”

“He’s a robot.”

“I used to be good with machines.”

A push of the brass door leading to the Fauborg’s lobby plunged us into a sooty, demi-darkness that turned the Damson-plum carpeting to soil-brown. All the furniture was gone, no one worked the desk, gray rectangles marked the walls where paintings had been removed.

One thing hadn’t changed: the familiar olfactory stew of roasted meat, disinfectant, and grassy French perfume.

The ancient air conditioner thumped the ceiling at odd intervals but the air was close, musty, dank.

Robin squeezed my arm. “This might be a bad idea.”

“Want to leave?”

“You and me quitters? Not in our DNA.”

Half the light fixtures had been removed from the lounge. The room was a cave. As my eyes adjusted, I made out the overstuffed leather and green plaid seating. Here, too, the artwork was gone.

Same for the big black Steinway with its gigantic brandy snifter for tips. Tinny music seeped into the room from an unseen speaker. An easy-listening FM station. As we stood waiting to be seated, Barry Manilow was replaced by a commercial for auto insurance.

Like pedestrians in a fog, the other patrons materialized gradually. A group of handsome white-haired people in their sixties who looked as if they’d driven in from San Marino, a quartet of well-dressed continental types ten years older, both men wearing ascots.

One exception to the maturity motif: two tables from our usual corner a young woman in white sat alone, checking her watch every fifteen seconds.

No one came forward to greet us and we settled behind a scarred coffee table stripped of snacks, flowers, candles.

The insurance commercial ran on. Glass rattled from the bar.

Gustave wasn’t bent over the slab of polished oak. In his place, a grim, big-chested brunette who looked as if she’d finally given up on a film career mixed what looked like a standard Martini while consulting a cheat-sheet. The concept of gin with a splash of vermouth seemed overwhelming and she grimaced. Clots of moisture created tiny reflecting pools along the bar-top as her fumbling fingers spilled as much booze as they splashed into the glass. She took a deep breath, reached for an olive, shook her head, and put it back in the bowl, health code be damned.

Her third attempt at carving a lemon twist was partially successful and she handed the drink to a server I’d never seen before. Looking too young to be allowed in a place where spirits flowed, he had floppy dishwater hair, a soft chin, and a dangerously overgrown bow tie. His red jacket was a flimsy cotton rental, his black pants ended an inch too soon.

White socks.

Black tennis shoes.

Ralph, the Fauborg’s waiter for decades, had never deviated from an impeccable shawl-lapel tux, starched white shirt, plaid cummerbund, and patent-leather bluchers.

Ralph was nowhere to be seen, ditto for Marie, the middle-aged Savannah belle who split busy shifts and offered naughty one-liners with refills.

Red Jacket brought the Martini toward the young woman in white, plodding cautiously like a five-year-old ring-bearer. When he arrived, she dipped her head coquettishly and said something. He scurried back to the bar, returned with three olives and a pearl onion on a saucer.

As the commercial shifted to a pitch for the latest Disney movie, Red Jacket continued to linger at the girl’s table, schmoozing with his back to us. She wasn’t much older than him, maybe twenty-five, with a sweet oval face and huge eyes. A white silk mini-dress bared sleek legs that tapered into backless silver pumps. A matching silk scarf, creamy as fresh milk, encircled her face. The head covering didn’t fit the skimpy dress; winter on top, summer on the bottom.

Her bare arms were smooth and pale, her lashes too long to be real. She used them to good effect on the waiter.

The watch on her right arm sparkled with diamonds as she consulted it again. The waiter made no attempt to leave as she pulled something out of a white clutch. Ivory cigarette holder that she rolled slowly between slender fingers.

Robin said, “Someone’s channeling Audrey Hepburn.”

The girl crossed her legs and the dress rode up nearly crotch-high. She made no attempt to smooth it.

I said, “Audrey was a lot more subtle.”

“Then someone else from that era. Hey, maybe she’s who Dudley Do-Right’s guarding.”

I looked around the room. “Can’t see anyone else who’d fit.”

“Someone that cute all alone?”

“She’s waiting for someone,” I said. “That’s the fifth time she checked her watch.”

“Maybe that’s why I thought of Audrey. Roman Holiday, poor little princess all on her lonesome.” She laughed and snuggled against me. “Listen to us. The chance to be together and we’re messing in someone else’s business.”

The girl produced a cigarette, fit it into the holder, licked the ivory tip before inserting it between her lips and half smiling at the waiter.

He fumbled in his pockets, shook his head. Out of her clutch came an ivory lighter that she held out to him. He lit her up. She inhaled greedily.

No smoking in bars has been California law for years. When the girl in white created haze, no one protested. A moment later, someone across the room was also blowing nicotine. Then two more orange dots materialized. Then four.

Soon the place was hazy and toxic and oddly pleasant for that. The commercial ended. Music resumed. Some imitation of Roberta Flack being killed softly.

Robin and I had been ignored for nearly ten minutes while Red Jacket lingered with the girl in white. When she turned away from him and began concentrating on her Martini, he returned to the bar, chatted with the befuddled brunette.

Robin laughed. “I am definitely losing my touch.”

“Want to go?”

“And lower my odds for lung cancer? Perish.”

“Okay, I’ll go educate Surfer Joe.”

“Be gentle, darling. He’s still wrestling with puberty.”

As I stood, the barkeep said something to Red Jacket and he swiveled. Mouthed an O.

Loping over, he grinned. “Hey. You just get here?”

Robin said, “Seconds ago.”

“Great … er … so … welcome to the Fowlburg. Can I get you guys something?”

“We guys,” I said, “will have a Sidecar on the rocks with light sugar on the rim, and Chivas neat, water on the side.”

“A Sidecar,” he said. “That’s a drink, right? I mean, it’s not a sandwich. ’Cause the kitchen’s basically closed, we just got nuts and crackers.”

“It’s a drink,” I said. “Any wasabi peas left?”

“There’s no vegetables anywhere.”

“That’s a bar snack. Peas coated with wasabi.”

Blank look.

Despite Robin’s soft elbow in my ribs, I said, “Wasabi’s that green horseradish they put on sushi.”

“Oh,” he said. “We don’t got sushi.”

“We’ll just take whatever you have.”

“I think we got almonds.” He ticked a finger. “Okay, so it’s Champagne and a … Sidecar.”

“A Sidecar and Chivas,” I said. “That’s a blended whiskey.”

“Sure. Of course.” Slapping his forehead. “I never did this before.”

“You’re kidding.” Robin kicked my shin.

“A Sidecar,” he said, repeating it again in a mumble. “They just called from the temp agency yesterday, said there’s a place closing down, you got five hours to get over there if you want it, Neil. Mostly I work in places with no drinking.”

“McDonald’s?” I said.

Kick kick kick.

“That was in the beginning,” said Neil. “Then I did two years at Marie Callender’s.” Grin. “All the pie you can eat, man I was getting fat. Then I lost that and signed up with the temp agency and they sent me here. Too bad it’s only one night. This is a cool old place.”

“Sure is. Too bad they’re tearing it down.”

“Yeah … but that’s the way it is, right? Old stuff dies.”

“We’ll take those drinks, now. And those almonds, if you have them.”

“Last time I checked we did, but you never know.”

As he turned to leave, the girl in white slipped on oversized, gold-framed sunglasses with lenses so dark they had to be blinding her. Sucking on her cigarette, she twirled the holder, stretched coltish legs, ran a finger along the side of a clean, smooth jaw. Licked her lips.

Red Jacket watched her, transfixed.

Robin said, “She is beautiful, Neil.”

He wheeled. “So are you, ma’am. Um … oh, man, sorry, that came out weird. Sorry.”

Robin touched his hand. “Don’t worry about it, dear.”

“Um, I better get you those drinks.”

When he was gone, I said, “See, you’ve still got it going on.”

“He probably looks at me like I’m his mother.”

I hummed “Mrs. Robinson.” She kicked me harder. But not enough to hurt. Our relationship’s not that complicated.

he Sidecar devolved to a Screwdriver, the Chivas was a whiskey slushy, overwhelmed by crushed ice.

We laughed and I tossed bills on the table and we got up to leave.

From across the room, Neil held up his palms in a What-me-worry gesture. I pretended not to notice.

As we passed Snow White, her eyes met mine. Big, dark, moist. Not seductive.

Welling with tears?

Her lower lip dropped, then clamped shut. She avoided my glance and smoked single-mindedly.

Suddenly her getup seemed sad, nothing but a costume.

Neil nearly tripped over himself bringing the check but when he saw the cash, he detoured to Snow White’s table.

She shook her head and he slinked off.

A commercial for ecologically sound detergent rasped the smoky air.

When we got back outside, Dudley Do-Right was gone.

Robin said, “Guess we were wrong about Snowy being his charge.”

“Guess we were wrong about taking a final jaunt on the Titanic. Let’s go somewhere else and try to redeem the night.”

She took my arm as we headed for the Seville. “Nothing to redeem. I’ve got you, you’ve got me, and despite those killer legs, that poor little thing has no one. But sure, some real drinks would be nice. After that, we’ll see what develops.”

“Mistress of suspense,” I said.

She tousled my hair. “Not really, you know the ending.”

I woke at six the following morning, found her at the kitchen window, washing her coffee cup and gazing at the pines and sycamores that rim our property to the east. Polygons of pink and gray sky cut through the green; intensely saturated color, bordering on harsh. Sunrise in Beverly Glen can be brittle splendor.

We walked Blanche for an hour, then Robin headed to her studio and I sat down to finish some child custody reports for the court. By noon, I was done and emailing recommendations to various judges. A few were likely to listen. As I put the hard copy in a drawer and locked up, the doorbell buzzed.

Shave and a haircut, six bits, followed by three impatient beeps.

I padded to the living room. “It’s open, Big Guy.”

Milo pushed the door open and stomped in swinging his battered, olive-vinyl attaché case wide, as if preparing to fling it away. “Step right in, Mr. Manson, then hold the door for Mr. Night Stalker.”

“Morning.”

“All these years I still can’t convince you to exercise normal caution.”

“I’ve got you as backup.”

“That and a Uzi won’t buy you a Band-Aid if you ignore common sense.” He marched past me. “Where’s the pooch?”

“With Robin.”

“Someone’s thinking right.”

My best friend is a gay LAPD homicide lieutenant with inconsistent social skills. He’s had a key to the house for years but refuses to use it unless Robin and I are traveling and he checks the premises, unasked.

By the time I made it to the kitchen, he’d commandeered a loaf of rye bread, a jar of strawberry preserves, a half gallon of orange juice, and the butt-end of a four-day-old rib roast.

I said, “Hey kids, beef ’n’ jam, the new taste sensation.”

He cast off a gray windbreaker, loosened a tie the color of strained peas, and settled his bulk at the table. “First conundrum of the day: carbs or protein. I opt for both.”

Brushing coarse black hair off a lumpy brow, he continued to stare at the food. Bright green eyes drooped more than usual. Where the light hit him wrong, his acne-pocked pallor was a hue no painter had ever blended.

I said, “Long night?”

“The night was fine, it was the damn morning that screwed things up. Four a.m., why can’t people get their faces blown off at a civil hour?”

“People as in multiple victims?”

Instead of answering, he troweled heaps of jam on three slices of bread, chewed the first piece slowly, inhaled the remaining two. Uncapping the juice, he peered inside, muttered, “Not much left,” and drained the container.

Contemplating the roast, he sliced, cubed, popped morsels of meat like candy. “Got any of that spicy mayo?”

I fetched some aioli from the fridge. He dipped, chewed, wiped his mouth, snorted, exhaled.

I said, “Male or female bodies?”

“One body, female.” Crumpling the juice carton, he created a waxed paper pancake that he pulled out like an accordion, then compressed. “And for my next number, ‘Lady of Spain.’ ”

A dozen more pieces of roast before he said, “Female, and from her figure, young. Then again, this is L.A. so maybe all that tone came courtesy of surgery, let’s see what the coroner has to say. No purse or I.D., the blood says she was done right there. No tire tracks or footprints. No jewelry or purse and her duds were expensive looking, some designer I never heard of. Patrice Lerange. Ring a bell?”

I shook my head. “Robbery?”

“Looks like it. She had on fancy undies, too, silk lace—Angelo Scuzzi, Milano. So maybe she’s European, some poor tourist who got waylaid. The shoes were Manolo Blahnik, that I heard of.”

He chewed hard and his jaw bunched. “Looks like we’re talking two killers. The C.I.’s found shotgun pellets and wadding in the wound but also a .45 cartridge on the ground and the slug behind her, exactly where you’d expect it to be after blowing out the back of her skull.”

He ate more roast, contemplated a rare piece, put it aside.

“The major damage was to the face with a little pellet spray at the top of the chest. But they left her hands intact, so I’m not sure the face thing was hiding her identity, just plain old evil.”

“Your money or I shoot,” I said. “On second thought, I shoot anyway.”

“Goddamn savages … I know the face can mean personal, but this could come down to a really ugly jack. Hollyweird at night, all those spacey Euro types are wandering the streets, thinking they’re gonna catch movie stars. If she was a tourist, she could’ve wandered into the wrong neighborhood.”

“Where was she found?”

“The Palisades, less than a mile short of Topanga. Bad guys had any consideration it woulda been the sheriff’s problem.”

I said, “That’s a ways from wrong neighborhoods, and expensive clothes don’t say naive tourist. Maybe she got waylaid on the Strip, or somewhere else on the Westside.”

“Wherever she started, she ended up far from the city. We’re talking mountains, ravines, open space, not much traffic. Maybe that was the point. She was left just off the road, a spot where the descent isn’t that steep. I’m figuring the bad guys walked her out of the car, took her goodies, had target practice.”

“Bullet and pellets.”

“All in the face. Almost like a ritual.”

“Who found her?”

“Some eighty-nine-year-old retired Unitarian minister combing for fossils.”

“Fossil hunting at four a.m.?”

“Three fifteen a.m. to be exact. He likes to do it when there’s no traffic, brings a flashlight, takes his time. Only thing he ever sees is animals—raccoons, rabbits, coyotes—and they’re not into archaeology. He said the entire area used to be submerged under seawater millions of years ago, he still finds stuff. He had two spiral seashells in his sack, some petrified snails, too.”

“But no shotgun or .45.”

“I should be so lucky. No, he’s righteous, Alex, really shaken up. I had an ambulance brought just in case but they said his heart was strong for his age.” He drummed the table, wiped his face with one hand, like washing without water. “One mile south it’d be tan-shirts yanked out of a beautiful dream.”

“What were you dreaming about?”

“Not getting yanked out of bed at four a.m.”

“Lately you’ve been kind of bored.”

“Like hell I have. That was Zen-serenity.”

He ate more roast, topped with extra aioli.

“Spicy.”

“So what can I do for you?”

“Who says anything? I came to visit the dog.” Reaching into a pocket of the windbreaker, he drew out a nylon chew-bone. “This okay for her?”

“She prefers truffle-marinated elk ribs, but it’ll do in a pinch. She’s out back with Robin. I’ve got some mail to catch up on.”

“Had your breakfast yet?”

“Just coffee.”

Swinging his attaché onto the table, he flipped it open, drew out his cell, downloaded a screen of thumbnail photos. Enlarging one, he handed the phone to me. “No breakfast, nothing to lose.”

The body lay on its face, supple-limbed even in death.

Wind or impact had lifted the hem of the dress nearly crotch-high, but the legs hadn’t been spread, no sign of sexual posing.

Short dress. The flow of white silk.

Same for the blood-and-gore-splotched white scarf that swaddled what had once been a face. One backless silver shoe remained in place.

What had once been the face was a clotted horror.

Milo said, “You just turned a really bad color. Sorry.”

“Any idea what time she was killed?”

“Best guess is midnight to four and the old guy was there by three fifteen, so that narrows it.”

“I saw her from nine to nine thirty. She was young—twenty-five or so, sat ten feet from Robin and me. Extremely pretty, big dark eyes, but I can’t tell you about her hair because it was completely covered by the scarf. She was wearing a diamond watch, carried a white silk clutch, smoked a cigarette in an ivory holder and used a matching lighter. A few minutes in, she put on rhinestone-framed sunglasses. She seemed to be waiting for someone. There was a theatrical aspect to her behavior. Robin thought she was channeling Audrey Hepburn. No need to show Robin these pictures.”

He inhaled deeply, placed his hands flat on the table. “Where. Did. This. Happen?”

I described the Fauborg’s final night.

“Hotel swan song,” he said. “Hers, too. Oh, man … so maybe she was staying there and I’ll get a name from the register.”

“Good luck but doubtful, no one was working the desk and the place looked cleaned out.”

“Someone’ll have a record.” He scratched the side of his nose. Sweat stained the table where his paw had rested. “This is weird, Alex.”

“All the cases we’ve worked, maybe it was due.”

“Anything else you want to tell me?”

“There was a guy out in front with a Secret Service thing going on—black suit, white shirt, black tie, two-way radio, what looked like a gun bulge. Robin and I assumed it was for her benefit because no one else in the bar looked like they needed protection.”

“Why’d you figure she did?”

“We didn’t, she was just the most likely candidate. It’s not that she projected vulnerability—maybe she did. She also looked like someone who should be famous but neither of us could place her. She kept checking her watch but when we left no one had showed up. And Mr. Black Suit was gone so maybe his gig had nothing to do with her.”

He pulled out his pad. “What’d this guy look like?”

I told him and he scrawled. “The waiter might know if anyone showed up. He was paying pretty close attention to her. Some temp named Neil. She vamped for him and he bought it pretty hard.”

“When was closing time?”

“I don’t know. You’re wondering if they were both there till the end and he tried to pick her up and something went bad?”

“Her clothes and the watch say she was way out of his league but some guys don’t convince easily. Give me a detailed physical on this amateur.”

ead people don’t answer questions. Sometimes the same goes for dead businesses.

Milo’s attempts to get info from the former owners of the Fauborg Hotel proved fruitless. Marcel Jabotinsky’s heirs had relocated to Zurich and New York and London and Boulder, Colorado. The hotel had been unoccupied for two months with most of the fixtures sold at auction and the records dumped. No one knew a thing about the temporary staff who’d worked the bar’s final night.

A niece in Colorado thought the evening had been coordinated by her cousin in Scarsdale. That woman denied any involvement but believed that an uncle in Switzerland had hired an event-planning outfit.

“Waste of money far as I’m concerned, but Hermann’s senile and sentimental.”

Hermann didn’t answer his phone. Cold calls to local event coordinators pulled up nothing.

I said, “Neil said he got the gig through a temp agency.”

Plenty of those on the Westside. Brite-Quick, the twelfth company Milo reached, admitted supplying two people to the Fauborg at the request of Madame Estelle Jabotinsky of Park Avenue.

“She sounded pretty old,” said the owner. “If I’m remembering correctly, the deal was to honor the guy who built the place or something. But she didn’t want to spend anything and all she’d go for was two people.”

“Could I have those two names, please?”

“They in trouble?”

“Not at all.”

“Let me emphasize,” said the owner. “We background-check, they had to come up clean.”

“That’s great. The names?”

Sherree Desmond, 43, bartender, address in Mount Washington.

Nelson Neil Mutter, 22, waiter, Gower Street, Hollywood.

No criminal history for either. Sherree wasn’t fond of paying parking tickets. Nelson who preferred Neil had just applied for a temporary license, requesting reciprocity from DMV Nebraska.

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