"I'm devastated by this," he said. "Aubrey was such a sweet girl. So young and good and ... oh, I guess you could
say mixed-up."
"Let's start with what you saw and heard," Merci suggested.
Coates looked at Zamorra. "Can I get you coffee, cocoa, anything?"
"No."
Coates exhaled, looked into the fire, began. He was home alone tonight. Around eight-thirty he heard footsteps on the wooden walkway above. He heard a knock upstairs— Aubrey Whittaker's place, number 23. A moment later he heard the door shut. Nothing of consequence, then, until a little after ten o'clock, when he heard Aubrey Whittaker's door shut again, and footsteps going back down the upper walkway in the direction from which they had come earlier.
"How could you tell her door from number twenty-four or twenty-two?" asked Merci.
"From living here eighteen years. I've listened to lots of people come and go. You know."
Yes, she did know. Because she could imagine Alexander Coates. You've waited for lots of dates, she thought. You've waited and listened to their footsteps and wondered how they'd turn out. You can tell a lot about a man by the way he walks.
"All right. Next.""Next, at approximately ten-fifteen, I heard footsteps coming down the walkway again, in the same direction. I heard them stop at Aubrey's. I heard the door open. Then, immediately after the door opened, or almost immediately, I heard a loud thump, like something heavy hitting the floor. Then the door closed. Not a slam, but... forcefully. Nothing for a minute or two. Then, thumping on the floor again. It was like the first thump, but continuous, like moving furniture or a fight or a struggle of some kind. It lasted for maybe a minute. Then quiet again. Then footsteps going back down the walkway toward the stairs."
"Did you look?" asked Merci.
"No. I was in the bath."
"Did you hear a gunshot, a car backfiring?"
"Nothing like that."
"Did you think of calling the police ?" asked Zamorra.
Coates looked at Zamorra with his wide gray eyes, then back into the fire. "No. None of the noises I heard were alarming. None were loud or seemed to indicate trouble. They were just noises. My policy, Detectives, my personal belief on such matters is that privacy should be honored. Unless disaster is... well, you know, happening right in front of you."
"But when you got out of the bath, you decided to go to her door?"
"Correct. When 1 got there—this would have been around ten forty-five, I saw her door was open."
Coates sat forward, set his elbows on his knees, rested his head in his hands. "I thought it was blood on the door. The door was open maybe ... six inches. I did not touch it or look past it. I literally raced back to my home and dialed nine-one-one immediately. 1 didn't know what to do with myself. I went back upstairs and looked at the door again. I said her name, foolishly perhaps. I came back down here. I paced the floor for what seemed like hours. The young officers arrived at exactly ten fifty-six."
Merci watched Alexander Coates weep into his hands. Experience had taught her to keep a witness talking and thinking instead of crying. Tears cleanse the memory as well as the eyes.
"You did all right, Mr. Coates."
"Did I really?"
"Absolutely. Now, when you went up to number twenty-three the first time, was Aubrey Whittaker's porch light on or off?"
The sniffling stopped. "On."
"And the second time?"
"On as well."
"Did you hear cars coming or going from the parking lot during this time?"
"Yes. But there's the Coast Highway traffic, so the sounds get mixed up. I can't really help you there. You learn not to hear cars, after eighteen years on Coast Highway."
Half an hour later they were almost finished with Alexander Coates. He said that Aubrey Whittaker rarely had visitors that he noticed. He said that he and Aubrey sometimes talked in the laundry room by the office, because neither worked days, so they washed their clothes in the slow hours. She had gorgeous sad eyes and a sharp sense of humor. She never mentioned irate boyfriends, stalking ex-husbands or enemies of any kind. She was not, in his opinion, hard or mean-spirited. However, in his opinion, she was alone and on a journey, searching for something in her life she had not found yet. It was Coates's impression that Aubrey was an escort of some kind. She drove a dark red, late-model Cadillac.
Merci nodded at this summation, again wondering her way into Alexander Coates. Years ago, a wise old mentor had told her that putting herself in another's shoes would make her a better detective and a better person. She had absolutely no knack for it, and she didn't believe him then. She'd never seen a reason to try to understand people she didn't like in the first place, which was almost everyone. But the old guy, Hess, had been right: In the two years, three months and twenty-two days he'd been dead, Merci had worked hard at this, and she'd learned a few things she might not have learned otherwise.
Such as, if you spent eighteen years in the same apartment, listening to your neighbors and their lovers come and go, you got good at it.
"Mr. Coates, those two arrivals you heard upstairs, they were the footsteps of men, correct?"
"Yes." A confessional glance and nod.
"The same man, or two different ones?"
"Oh, different men, certainly. I was going to tell you that if you didn't ask."
"How sure are you of that?"
"Well, if you hear two voices, you know there are two people. Same with footsteps."
"What else about them, by the sound of them?"
Zamorra aimed a look her way but said nothing.
Coates settled his bottom into his chair, readying himself for his presentation. Eighteen years of anecdotal data, Merci thought, about to find its way into a thesis.
"The first? Heavy, but not overweight. Not in a hurry. He was light on his feet, but you can't fool the boards. Pounds are pounds. Young and probably athletic. And familiar. Familiar with the area. He was wearing hard-soled shoes or boots. Not cowboy boots, they have an entirely different sound. I pictured a young businessman coming home from work, happy to be home, eager to see his wife or his lover. When he left he was ... reluctant. He wished he wasn't leaving, but he had to."
Zamorra was staring at the floor, his pen in his hand.
Coates looked at Zamorra with concern, made an internal decision, turned his attention back to Merci.
"The second? A much lighter man. He was young also, light on his feet, quick. Soft shoes. In somewhat of a hurry. I couldn't tell if he was familiar with the area or not. He left much more slowly than he came. He sounded .. . unsteady. Uncertain. I think I remember him pausing, about halfway down. I may have imagined that. I can't swear to it. I pictured him as a young man eager to see someone. Eager to get there, get what he wanted, then eager to leave. You know, an impatient young buck on his way to the next thing. When he paused, I saw him realizing he'd forgotten something. But he didn't go back."
Coates sighed and looked into the fire.
Zamorra abruptly shut off his tape recorder, cast his black eyes on Merci, then the man. "How much pot did you smoke in the bathtub?"
Merci had smelled it very faintly, too, when she had first sat down. It hadn't seemed relevant, yet.
Coates's face took on an expression of blank defiance. "One half of one joint."
"Strong stuff or cheap stuff?" Zamorra asked.
"Very strong."
"There're other people to talk to," said Zamorra. He stood and walked out.
Merci finished her notes. The door slammed.
"That man is unbelievably angry," said Coates.464
"Believe it. Thank you."
Back on the upstairs walkway, Merci stood aside for the coroner's people to wheel Aubrey Whittaker past. She thought that Aubrey Whittaker would most likely have been wheeling around in her red Cadillac if she hadn't answered the door for the wrong guy. She looked out to the sparse 2 A.M. traffic on Coast Highway. Zamorra was already interviewing another neighbor.
Inside she was greeted by the green eyes and wide smile of Evan O'Brien. The CSI held up a small paper bag. Merci took it and looked in at a cartridge casing that had rolled into the bag's corner.
"The forty-five caliber Colt," said O'Brien. "Load of choice for many in law enforcement."
Merci Rayborn looked at the CSI with a hostility that could overtake her in a heartbeat. Jokes about her profession were never funny.
"Hey, Sergeant, don't rain on me for some of the best physical evidence you can ask for. Lynda found it."
"Raped
"Apparently not. And no signs of forced entry. Looks like some kind of scuffle or something in the kitchen."
"How many shots?"
"Probably just one. There's a hole up in the corner of the slider. Your bullet is out there in the ocean somewhere." "Find it."
"Yes, Sergeant."
The End
AUTHOR’S NOTE
T. Jefferson Parker is an
award-winning journalist and the author of six previous novels, including the bestselling Where Serpents Lie. He lives in Laguna Beach, California.
About the Author
About the Author Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information T. JEFFERSON PARKER is the author of thirteen previous novels including the New York Times bestseller The Fallen and the Edgar Award–winning novels California Girl and Silent Joe.
www.tjeffersonparker.com
ALSO BY T. JEFFERSON PARKER
The Fallen
California Girl
Cold Pursuit
Black Water
Silent Joe
Red Light
The Blue Hour
Where Serpents Lie
The Triggerman’s Dance
Summer of Fear
Pacific Beat
Little Saigon
Laguna Heat
Copyright
NEW YORK Copyright © 1999, 2000 T. Jefferson Parker All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of the Publisher. Printed in the United States of America. For information address Hyperion, 77 West 66th Street, New York, New York 10023-6298.
ISBN: 0-7868-8969-1
FIRST MASS MARKET EDITION
10 98765432
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
THE BLUE HOUR Page 37