by Sue Grafton
“Hello?”
“Hey, this is Peggy. I’m still at St. Terry’s, but I thought I better bring you up to date. Gus was admitted. He’s a mess. Nothing major, but serious enough to require a couple of days’ care. He’s malnourished and dehydrated. He has a low-level bladder infection and his heart is acting up. Bruises galore, plus a hairline fracture in the radius of his right arm. From the X-rays, the doctor says it looks like it’s been there a while.”
“Poor guy.”
“He’ll be fine. Of course, he didn’t have his ID or his Medicare card, but the admissions clerk looked up his records from a previous hospitalization. I explained the security issues and the doctor agreed to admit him under my last name.”
“They didn’t make a fuss about that?”
“Not at all. My husband’s one of the neurologists on staff. His reputation is the stuff of legend, but more to the point, he has a temper like a junkyard dog’s. They knew if they made a stink, they’d have to deal with him. Aside from that, in the past ten years, my father’s donated enough money to add a wing to this place. They were kissing my ring.”
“Oh.” I’d have verbalized my surprise, but her husband’s occupation and her dad’s financial status were two facts out of the many I didn’t know about her. “What about the girls? Shouldn’t you be home by now?”
“That’s the other reason I called. They’re having supper at their playmate’s. I talked to her mom and she was cool, but I did assure her I’d pick ’em up within the hour. I didn’t want to take off without giving you the lowdown.”
“You’re incredible. I can’t thank you enough.”
“Don’t worry about it. I haven’t had that much fun since grade school!”
I laughed. “It was a hoot, wasn’t it?”
“Totally. I did make it clear to the charge nurse that Gus was to have no visitors except for you, me, and Henry. I told her about Solana…”
“Naming names?”
“Of course. Why should we protect her when she’s a piece of shit? It was obvious he’d been badly abused so the nurse got right on the phone and put in calls to the police and the Elder Abuse hotline. I gather they’re sending someone out. What about you? What’s happening on your end?”
“Nothing much. Sitting here waiting for the bomb to go off. Solana must know by now he’s been snatched. I can’t understand why she’s so quiet.”
“That’s unnerving.”
“For sure. In the meantime, I called a friend of mine at the police department. Given the warrant out on Solana, a couple of officers should be arriving shortly to arrest her fat ass. We’ll come over after that.”
“There’s no big rush. Gus is sleeping, but it’d be nice if he saw a familiar face when he wakes up.”
“I’ll be there as soon as possible.”
“Don’t forfeit the chance to see Solana handcuffed and thrown in the back of a black-and-white.”
“I’m looking forward to it.”
After she rang off, I gave Henry the update on Gus’s medical status, some of which he’d gathered from listening to my end of the conversation. “Peggy’s put everyone on notice about the possibility that Solana might show up and try to see him. She won’t get anywhere so that’s good news,” I said. “I wonder what she’s up to? You think the cops have arrived?”
“There hasn’t been time enough, but hang on a sec.”
He washed his hands in haste and toted the dish towel with him as he left the kitchen and stepped into the dining room. I followed, watching as he pushed the curtain aside and peered out at the street.
“Anything?”
“Her car’s still there and I don’t see any sign of life so maybe she hasn’t figured it out yet.”
That was certainly a possibility, but neither of us was convinced.
34
By then it was close to six. Henry packed his meatloaf in a cake pan, covered it, and put it in the fridge. His plan was to bake it for supper the next day. He extended an invitation, which I accepted, assuming we would both be alive. In the meantime, his homely activities had introduced a note of normalcy. Given that it was happy hour, he took out an old-fashioned glass and poured his ritual Black Jack over ice. He asked if I wanted wine, which in truth I did, but I decided to decline. I thought I better have my wits about me in case Solana showed up. I was of two minds about the possibility. On one hand, I thought if she were going to blow her stack, she’d have done it by now. On the other hand, she might be out buying guns and ammo in order to give full expression to her ire. Whatever the reality, we deemed it unwise to keep ourselves on prominent display in the brightly lighted kitchen.
We removed ourselves to the living room, where we closed the drapes and turned on the TV set. The evening news was all bad, but restful by comparison. We were beginning to relax when the knock came at the front door. I jumped and Henry’s hand jerked, slopping half his drink.
“You stay there,” he said. He set his glass on the coffee table and went to the door. He flipped on the porch light and put his eye to the spy hole. It couldn’t have been Solana because I watched him remove the burglar chain, prepared to let someone in. I recognized Cheney’s voice before I caught sight of him. He stepped into the room, accompanied by a uniformed officer whose name tag read J. ANDERSON. He was in his thirties, blue-eyed and ruddy-complexioned, with features that spoke of Irish ancestry. I flashed on the only line of poetry I retained from my days of making mediocre grades in my high school English class: “John Anderson, my Jo, John, when we were first acquent…” That was the extent of it. No clue who the poet was, though the name Robert Burns lurked somewhere at the back of my brain. I wondered if William’s father was correct in his belief that memorizing poetry served us later in life.
Cheney and I exchanged a look. He was adorable, no lie. Or maybe my perception was colored by the comfort of his being on the scene. Let him deal with Solana and her goon of a son. While Cheney and Henry chatted, I had the opportunity to study him. He wore dress slacks and a shirt with a button-down collar, over which he’d pulled a caramel-colored cashmere coat. Cheney came from money, and while he had no desire to work in his father’s bank, he was smart enough to enjoy the perks. I could tell I was weakening in the same way I weaken at the notion of a QP with Cheese. Not that he was good for me, but who cared?
“Did you talk to her?” Henry asked.
Cheney said, “That’s why I’m here. We’re wondering if the two of you would step next door with us.”
Henry said, “Certainly. Is something wrong?”
“You tell us. When we pulled up, we found the front door standing open. All the lights are on, but there doesn’t seem to be anyone there.”
Henry left with Cheney and Officer Anderson, without bothering to put a coat over his short-sleeved shirt. I paused long enough to retrieve my jacket from the back of the kitchen chair. I grabbed Henry’s as well and scooted after him. The night was chilly and the wind was picking up. There was an empty expanse of curb where Solana’s car had been. I trotted along the walk, reassured by the notion that Cheney had the situation under control. He was right about Gus’s house. Every room was ablaze with light. By the time I crossed his front yard, I could see Anderson on his way around the side of the house with his flashlight, the wand of white zigzagging across windows, the walkway, and surrounding shrubbery.
Cheney had Solana Rojas’s arrest warrant in hand and I gathered that gave him a certain leeway to check the premises in search of her. He’d also uncovered two outstanding warrants for the arrest of Tomasso Tasinato, one on charges of aggravated battery, and the other for battery with great bodily harm. He told us Tiny had twice been caught on tape shoplifting items from a Colgate minimart. The owner had identified him but then decided not to file charges, saying he didn’t want the hassle over some beef jerky and two packages of M&M’s.
Cheney asked us to wait outside while he went in. Henry shrugged himself into his jacket and tucked his hands in the pockets. Neither
of us said a word, but he must have worried, as I did, that something awful was in store. Once Cheney assured himself the place was empty, he asked us to walk through with him to see if we noticed anything out of the ordinary.
The premises had been picked clean of personal items. In my earlier unauthorized home invasion, I hadn’t noticed how barren the house was. The living room was intact, furniture still in place: lamps, the desk, a footstool, fake roses on the coffee table. The kitchen was untouched as well, nothing out of place. If there’d been dirty dishes in the sink, they’d been washed, dried, and put away. A damp-looking linen dish towel had been folded and hung neatly across the rack. The spray bottle of cleanser was gone, but the smell was still strong. I thought Solana was taking her compulsive tidiness a bit too far.
Gus’s room was just as we’d left it. The covers were flung back, sheets and spread rumpled and looking not quite clean. Drawers still stood half-open where Peggy’d hunted up a sweater for him. The humidifier had run dry and no longer hissed with steam. I continued down the hall to the first of the two spare bedrooms.
Compared with the last view I’d had, Solana’s room was empty. The carved mahogany bed frame remained, but the other antique pieces were gone: no burled walnut rocking chair, no armoire, no plump-shouldered fruitwood chest of drawers with ornate bronze drawer pulls. She couldn’t have loaded furniture in her car in the scant hour she had available after she returned home. For one thing, the items were too cumbersome, and for another, she was in too great a hurry to bother. This meant she’d disposed of the furniture earlier, but who knew what she’d done with it? In the closet, the hangers had been shoved apart and most of her clothes were gone. Some garments had tumbled to the floor and she’d left them in a heap, indicating the haste with which she’d packed.
I moved to Tiny’s room. Henry and Cheney stood in the doorway. I kept expecting to find a body—his or hers—shot, stabbed, or hanged. Uneasily, I eased in behind Cheney, hoping he would shield me from anything gross. The air in Tiny’s room was dense with “guy” smell: testosterone, hair, sweat glands, and dirty clothes. Overlying the ripe odor was the same smell of bleach I’d noticed throughout. Had she been using the spray cleanser to wipe the surfaces free of prints?
The two heavy blankets that served as blackout curtains were still nailed to the window frames, and the overhead light was tawny and ineffectual. The television set was gone, but all of Tiny’s toiletries were still strewn across the counter in the bathroom he shared with his mom. He’d left his toothbrush behind, but he probably didn’t use it anyway so no big deal.
Officer Anderson appeared in the hallway behind us. “Anybody know what kind of car she drives?”
Cheney said, “A 1972 Chevrolet convertible with the word ‘dead’ scratched into the driver’s-side door. Pearce made a note of the plate number in his field notes.”
“I think we got it. Come take a look at this.”
He went out the back door, flipping on the porch light as he passed. We followed him down the steps and across the yard to the single-car garage at the rear of the lot. The old wooden doors were padlocked, but he held his flashlight against the dusty window. I had to stand on tiptoe to see in, but the car inside was Solana’s. The convertible top was down and the front and rear seats were empty to all appearances. It was clear Cheney’d need a search warrant before he went further.
“Did Mr. Vronsky own a vehicle?” he asked.
Henry said, “He did, a 1976 Buick Electra, metallic blue with a blue interior. His pride and joy. He hadn’t driven it for years and I’m sure the tags on the license plate expired. I don’t know the license number, but a car like that shouldn’t be hard to spot.”
“The DMV will have the information. I’ll notify the sheriff’s department and the CHP. Any idea which direction she might’ve headed?”
“No clue,” Henry said.
Before he left, Anderson secured both the house and garage with crime scene tape in anticipation of a return with a warrant and a fingerprint technician. Cheney wasn’t optimistic about recovering the cash and other valuables Solana’d stolen over the years, but there was always a chance. At the very least, latent fingerprints would tie the cases together.
“Hey, Cheney?” I said, as he was getting in his car.
He looked across the top of his car at me.
“When the techs dust for prints? Tell ’em to try the vodka bottle in the cabinet above the sink. She probably didn’t think to wipe that down before she left.”
Cheney smiled. “Will do.”
Henry and I went back to his house. “I’m heading over to the hospital and after that, I’ll hit Rosie’s,” I said. “Care to join me?”
“I’d love to, but Charlotte said she’d stop by at eight. I’m taking her to dinner.”
“Really. Well, that’s interesting.”
“I don’t know how interesting it is. I treated her poorly over the business with Gus. I was a butt and the time has come to make that right.”
I left him to get himself gussied up and walked the half block to my car. The drive to St. Terry’s took less than fifteen minutes, which gave me time to ponder Solana’s vanishing and Cheney’s reappearance. I knew it wouldn’t be smart to renew that relationship. On the other hand (there’s always that other hand, isn’t there?), I’d caught a whiff of his aftershave and nearly whimpered aloud. I parked on a side street and headed for the brightly lighted hospital entrance.
My intended visit with Gus was short-lived. When I reached the floor and identified myself, I was told he was still asleep. I chatted briefly with the charge nurse, making sure she was clear about who was allowed to see him and who was not. Peggy had laid all the necessary groundwork, and I was assured his safety was uppermost in everyone’s mind. I did peek in at him and spent half a minute watching him sleep. His color had already improved.
There was one bright moment that made the whole excursion worthwhile. I’d rung for the elevator and I was waiting. I heard the whir of cables and the ping announcing its arrival from the floor below. When the doors opened I found myself face-to-face with Nancy Sullivan. She had her good Girl Scout briefcase in one hand and she was wearing her sensible shoes. As proof there’s justice in the world, she’d been assigned to Gus’s case after having blown me off. She greeted me coolly, using a tone that implied she hoped I’d fall in a hole. I didn’t say a word to her, but I did gloat in my heart. I resisted the urge to smirk until after the elevator doors closed, shutting her from sight. Then I mouthed the sweetest four words in the English language: I told you so.
I drove home, fantasizing about my dinner at Rosie’s. I was going for the fat and cholesterol sweepstakes: bread and butter, red meat, sour cream on everything, and a big gooey dessert. I’d take a paperback novel with me and read while I stuffed my face. I could hardly wait. When I turned onto Albanil, I could see how scarce the parking was. I’d forgotten it was hump night again, and the midweek revelers had put parking places at a premium. In search of a spot, I cruised the street at half-speed, scanning for two other things as well: the sight of a black-and-white, indicating the police had returned to Gus’s house, or the sight of a telltale metallic blue Buick Electra, a sign that Solana was close by. No sign of either.
I turned the corner onto Bay and drove to the end of the block without seeing a car-length of empty curb. I turned right on Cabana and right again on Albanil, checking the block again. Ahead on the sidewalk, I spotted a woman in a trench coat and high heels. My headlights picked up a flash of hair too blond to be real—hooker hair, all tarted up and dyed. This gal was huge and even from the rear I could tell something was off. It wasn’t until I passed that I realized it was a guy in drag. I turned my head and squinted. Was that Tiny? I kept an eye on him in my rearview mirror. A spot had opened up and I angled into it.
Before I shut down the engine, I glanced back at the sidewalk. No sign of the “babe,” so I rolled down my window an inch to listen for the clopping of her high heels on concr
ete. The street was quiet. If it was Tiny, he’d either retraced his steps or turned the corner. I didn’t like it. I removed the key from the ignition, clutching the ring in my fist, keys through my fingers. I looked over my right shoulder once more, checking the sidewalk before I opened the car door.
The handle was jerked out of my hand and the door was flung open. I was hauled up by the hair and yanked from the car. I hit the pavement on my backside, pain searing my tailbone. I recognized Tiny by smell—corrosive and foul. I flailed, glancing back at him. His platinum wig was askew and I could see the stubble on his face that even a late-afternoon shave hadn’t fully eradicated. He’d shucked his trench coat and kicked off his high heels. He wore a woman’s blouse and his XXXL-sized skirt now rode up over his hips, allowing him freedom of movement. His hands were still buried in my hair. I grabbed them, lifting myself in an effort to keep him from ripping off my scalp. My keys had fallen on the street half under the car. No time to worry about that now. I was struggling for purchase. I managed to get my feet under me and kicked his right knee. The heel on my boot might have done some damage except for his bulk, which made him almost impervious to pain. He was pumped up on adrenaline, doubtless hyped on his sense of himself. The hair on his calves and the lower part of his thighs was pressed flat by a pair of queen-sized panty hose. Runners snaked down from the crotch where the nylon had been stretched to the limit. He was making guffing sounds deep in his throat, half exertion, half excitement at the notion of the injuries he’d inflict before he was done with me.
We grappled, both of us down on the pavement now. He was on his back and I lay on my back as well, sprawled awkwardly on top of him. He was scissoring his legs in an attempt to encircle me and lock my body between his thighs. I reached back and clawed at his face, hoping to gouge an eye. My nails raked his cheek, which he must have felt because he punched me in the head so hard I swore I could feel my brain bouncing against the inside of my skull. The fucker outweighed me by a good two hundred pounds. He pinned my arms against me. His grip was viselike, and close up against him like that my elbows were of no use. He rocked back, thrusting himself forward, trying to hook one foot around the other for leverage. I managed to turn my body halfway and I used the bony structure of my pelvis as a wedge to keeping his big knees apart. I knew what he’d do—clamp down, force the air out of my lungs with the increased pressure of his thighs, clamp down again. He’d use compression, like a boa constrictor, tightening his legs around me until I ceased to draw breath.