Jericho Point

by Meg Gardiner

  ‘‘How’d you guess?’’

  ‘‘Lieutenant Rome sent me a copy of the crime report you filed.’’

  I made a mental note to send Rome a bouquet of weeds.

  She opened her notebook. ‘‘Friday night, at the party. The fire captain describes you as ‘agitated’ when they couldn’t locate Miss Gaines’s body. Were you expecting them to spot it?’’

  ‘‘I was hoping they’d find a live girl, not a corpse.’’

  She ran her index finger down the torn plastic sheeting on my car window. ‘‘This doesn’t look street legal.’’

  ‘‘If you want to find out who’s behind all this, check out some guys in a band called Avalon.’’

  ‘‘And where would I find them?’’

  ‘‘Bar mitzvahs, the veterans’ hall, maybe the policeman’s ball.’’ I gave her a rundown.

  ‘‘Right. Disco.’’ Her cowlick waved in the breeze. ‘‘Blame it on the boogie.’’

  She closed the notebook. ‘‘Covering your tracks on the fly doesn’t work. It leaves a messy trail.’’ She nodded at the car. ‘‘Get that fixed.’’

  Nuts. It was driving him nuts. The more he thought about it, the more he knew. This was the one, the big kahuna, the performance that should be getting top billing in his collection.

  Hey, sweet stuff, come in here for a minute; I got something for you.

  Dumb as a stump, the girl, she always had been. And upset like she was, she was easily distracted.

  Yeah, it’s awesome to see you, too. Ssh, close the door; it’s too loud out there. Go on and lock it. No, leave the lights off. Little surprise here for you.

  But she was crying, and over P.J., of all people.

  Why do you let him get to you this way, girl? He’s not worth it.

  Chicks.

  In trouble? Hon, a dickhead like him is always in trouble.

  Okay, right there his line could have been better, but that was the tricky thing about live performance.

  No, you’re right, he’s not a dickhead. I shouldn’t have said that. I just get hot, seeing how you worry over him.

  Taking her eyes off the prize. That had always been her problem, now that he thought of it. Getting distracted, falling in woo-hoo love. Which was why she was never going to make it. As anything.

  Hush, girl, don’t cry. Tell me what he did to make you so upset.

  And she did. Just spewed it right on out. Telling him all the details, and what she planned to do about it, which would have blown everything sky-fucking-high. Idiot. Writing her own ending, right there.

  Well, I have something to make you feel better. Turn around and close your eyes; it’s a surprise.

  Drumroll.

  Okay, I’ll give you a hint. It’s a necklace.

  Pause the memory. Shit, was that not the best line, or what? A necklace. He smiled, and turned to the mirror, and watched himself smile. A necklace. An E-string necklace, you fucking moron. Let’s see how it fits.

  Hot, hot. He was hot. Except . . .

  He didn’t get to see her reaction. And that was always the best part—audience appreciation. The silence at the end of this show left him feeling . . . dissatisfied. But what the hell. He had more good lines.

  Jesse met me in the lobby at Sanchez Marks. ‘‘Got your body armor on?’’

  ‘‘Chain mail, crucifix, garlic. Let’s go.’’

  In her office, Lavonne pointed me to a chair.

  ‘‘I’ve boxed three rounds with Jesse over this. He won’t stand by and let you be accused of stealing from a client. And he can’t represent you because it puts the firm in an impossible position.’’ She crossed her arms. ‘‘So give me something that renders this argument moot.’’

  I handed her a folder. She put on her glasses and sat down at her desk.

  She read the crime report and my credit agency file. Jesse scrawled on a legal pad. The sunlight showed how pale he was. I told Lavonne about the fake checking account at the bank. She listened, like a stone.

  ‘‘Is there anything else?’’ she said.

  ‘‘Yeah.’’ Jesse tossed the legal pad on the desk.

  In black ink, he had written, EVAN WOULD NEVER FUCKING DO THIS. She stared at it. In spite of myself, I smiled.

  ‘‘Pithy as always, Mr. Blackburn,’’ she said.

  ‘‘Karen Jimson’s looking in the wrong direction,’’ he said.

  ‘‘I agree.’’

  I felt an electric sense of relief. ‘‘You believe me.’’

  ‘‘Yes. I’ll talk to Karen.’’ She closed the folder. Her face turned rueful. ‘‘And you know which direction she will have to look.’’

  ‘‘My brother’s going to have to deal with it,’’ Jesse said.

  ‘‘My regrets.’’

  Her disorderly curls gleamed in the sunlight. She looked pensive.

  ‘‘Something bothers me, deeply, about all of this,’’ she said. ‘‘The stolen checks and the identity theft. I think it’s possible that someone close to the Jimsons is involved in both. And I don’t mean your brother, Jesse.’’

  ‘‘Then who?’’ he said.

  She leaned forward. ‘‘Watch out for Karen’s daughter.’’

  Outside, traffic rolled past. Cars honked. Lavonne looked exceedingly serious.

  ‘‘I say this not as an attorney, but as a parent.’’ She nodded at the photos of her daughters, Yael and Devorah. ‘‘The girls went to high school with Sin. And I go way back with Ricky.’’

  ‘‘Way back?’’ he said.

  ‘‘Before Karen, or Charlie.’’

  She nodded at a photo of her husband, Charlie Goldman: glasses, bow tie, and a gently distracted smile. He was a professor of classics at the university. Jesse and I gawped at her.

  ‘‘Pull your jaws off your laps. I didn’t always look like a warmed-over burrito. I was a hot chick,’’ she said. ‘‘My point is that Sin has been a handful since the day Ricky married Karen.’’

  We continued gawping.

  ‘‘She made parents nervous. The teasing, the sexually provocative poses. The bitter-teen persona. And she leveraged the hell out of her position as Ricky’s stepdaughter.’’

  I was still straining to imagine Lavonne as a hot chick. I brought myself back. ‘‘The rock heiress come to call?’’

  ‘‘You know the story, that Karen dragged Ricky up here to save him from his appetites. In truth they were desperate to get Sin away from Hollywood. The girl was out of control,’’ she said. ‘‘Of course, she resented moving, as she puts it, to East Buttfuck. She’s never forgiven them.’’

  ‘‘For moving to a mansion in Montecito? Then why doesn’t she get herself a job and move out?’’ I said.

  ‘‘Gilded cage. She gains control of a trust fund when she turns twenty-five. She loses it if she steps out of line, and the leash is short. Trust me, she is a miserable young woman.’’

  She tapped her fingers on her desk. ‘‘She’s an instigator.Expert at manipulating . . . softer people to do her bidding.’’

  I thought of P.J., her windup toy. I scooted forward on my seat.

  ‘‘You think Sinsa stole the checks.’’

  The phone rang. She grabbed the receiver, said, ‘‘Not now,’’ and hung up.

  ‘‘I don’t know a thing about Brittany Gaines. But I know that this sort of thing is right up Sinsa’s alley,’’ she said.

  Jesse gave me a glance. ‘‘If she stole the checks, she’s behind the bad debt to the Mings.’’

  ‘‘How do we find out?’’ I said.

  Lavonne shook her head. ‘‘You don’t. The police do. You stay away from her.’’

  Her face was hot. I had never seen her this way.

  ‘‘Lavonne, did she do something to your family?’’ I said.

  ‘‘There were incidents. Felonious. Devorah was lucky not to have been injured or arrested. Let’s leave it at that.’’

  Her daughter was now, as far as I knew, a straight-A student at City College. I left it.
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  ‘‘Perhaps it comes down to this: Her eyes don’t reflect the light. It’s spooky. She seems to draw in other people’s energy and crush it.’’

  We sat for a minute, listening to traffic. Jesse said, ‘‘Maybe her parents shouldn’t have named her after a strain of cannabis.’’

  ‘‘Her parents named her Cynthia. Calling herself Sinsemilla was her own idea.’’

  With a knock on the door, the receptionist stuck her head in.

  ‘‘Sorry. Jesse, you really need to come out here. Your brother dropped something off for you.’’

  In the lobby, a cardboard box sat on the receptionist’s desk. A mewling sound was coming from inside it.

  ‘‘Oh, God,’’ Jesse said. ‘‘Tell me that’s not a baby.’’

  The receptionist reached into the box. ‘‘I’d say about nine and a half pounds.’’

  She lifted out a puppy.

  At sunset that evening, scarlet embers of light ticked across the ocean. Off of Isla Vista Beach, a surfer lay on his board, waiting for one last wave. When it came, he paddled like hell and stood up to ride it toward the cliffs. In the angled light, he caught sight of an object lodged in the sand. For an eerie second it looked like an arm reaching up out of the water, and he cut a turn away from it. But when he went closer, he saw that it wasn’t an arm. It was the neck of an electric guitar, sticking out of the sand.

  12

  In Jesse’s kitchen that evening, I stared at the puppy. ‘‘Cute.’’

  ‘‘Yeah, he should be on a calendar.’’

  Sunset reddened the house, throwing long shadows across the big space that comprised the living room, dining room, and kitchen. Wood and glass shone pale below the high ceiling. Beyond the wall of windows, surf churned the beach. The dog lay curled on a blanket inside the cardboard box with its tail tucked between its legs. It was skinny, all scruff and brown fur, with a white patch around one eye.

  Jesse was mopping up its latest mess. A whiff reached me.

  ‘‘Gah.’’ I opened a window. Salty air rushed in, dispersing the odor.

  I am not a pet person. To my mind they’re all blood-letters, including hamsters and goldfish. The puppy gazed at me with the eyes of a Dickens waif. Not buying it, buster. I stayed by the window.

  ‘‘So here’s the story.’’ Jesse slapped the mop onto the floor. ‘‘P.J. rescued him from the animal shelter.’’

  ‘‘Why’d he give him to you?’’

  ‘‘He’s an apology.’’

  ‘‘Most people send flowers.’’

  The puppy wobbled to its feet, wagging its tail. But that’s how they break down your defenses—they feign adorableness, right before they chew through your tibia. It whimpered at me.

  Dammit, this was too much. I crouched down next to the box. Tentatively I stroked him. The tiny thing was soft and trembling.

  ‘‘Poor little guy,’’ I said.

  ‘‘Know anybody who wants him?’’

  ‘‘You don’t?’’ I sounded palpably relieved.

  ‘‘I work. I’m not home.’’ He jammed the mop into the bucket and stopped. ‘‘There’s no way I can take care of him.’’

  I felt like a match had been lit against my head. How could P.J. be any more clueless, doing something that actually made Jesse feel worse than before?

  ‘‘Call your idiot brother,’’ I said.

  ‘‘He won’t take him.’’

  ‘‘Then he can return him to the shelter.’’

  ‘‘They’ll put him down. He’d never let that happen.’’

  The puppy whined.

  ‘‘Then I’ll take him,’’ I said.

  He gave me a disbelieving look. ‘‘Right.’’

  ‘‘I’m serious. I’ll find him a new home.’’

  ‘‘Delaney, you wouldn’t have a dog in your house if it wore a French maid’s outfit and served you caviar in bed.’’

  ‘‘Just for a day or two. Until somebody adopts him.’’

  I picked the puppy up. He didn’t rip out my carotid artery. He was warm in my arms.

  ‘‘Forty-eight hours, max. Piece of cake.’’

  The puppy licked my hand. And peed on my blouse.

  I rinsed the blouse in the bathroom sink. I wrung it out, held it up, and spotted, on the shelf beside the towel rack, the manuscript for my new novel.

  The first chapter, anyway. Back in the kitchen, I found Jesse putting away the bucket and mop. He looked tired. I had to do something about this situation.

  ‘‘What do you think of my new story?’’ I said.

  If he’d been a gecko, he would have scurried up the wall and through a crack. ‘‘It’s awesome.’’

  Turning on my heel, I strolled to his bedroom. Books were stacked on the nightstand.

  ‘‘Let’s see what we have. Band of Brothers. The California Bar Journal. The new FDR biography.’’

  He came in behind me. ‘‘I’m reading your manuscript.’’

  ‘‘Warrior Politics: Why Leadership Demands a Pagan Ethos. Oh, and a DVD. Beavis and Butt-Head Do America.’’ I put a hand on my hip. ‘‘You haven’t read past page nineteen.’’

  ‘‘Sure I have.’’

  ‘‘That’s what’s in the bathroom.’’

  ‘‘No, really. That part with the soldiers dying.’’

  I walked toward him. He backed up.

  ‘‘Rowan’s men. Her lovers. They all get killed; it’s terrible,’’ he said.

  I kept walking. ‘‘How?’’

  ‘‘How what?’’

  He had that Honey-does-this-dress-make-me-look-fat? expression on his face: Just hand me the seppuku knife, now. He kept backing up.

  ‘‘How do they die?’’ I said. ‘‘Come on, the medicos explain it.’’

  ‘‘Um.’’ He backed into a corner and had to stop. ‘‘Too much woman?’’

  I gave him the black stare. He held his breath.

  I erupted in laughter.

  He relaxed, almost smiling, and I walked back to the kitchen and got the cardboard box. ‘‘Come on, dog. We’ll go to my place, where people appreciate fine literature.’’

  On my kitchen floor the puppy quivered in the box, looking small. Luke knelt, stroking him. His face was bright.

  ‘‘What’s his name?’’ he said.

  Give them a name, next thing you’re putting their photo on your Christmas cards wearing an elf’s hat.

  ‘‘What do you think we should call him?’’ I said.

  He tilted his head, thinking. ‘‘Ollie.’’

  As in the skateboard move. Or as in Ollie, short for apology.

  I nodded. ‘‘That’s it, then.’’

  Luke lifted the puppy’s ears. I smiled at Brian, ever so hopefully.

  ‘‘No way, no how. I need a dog like I need a root canal,’’ he said.

  I dropped the gooey smile. ‘‘Fine. Then do something else for me.’’

  ‘‘What?’’

  ‘‘We need to threaten P.J. Metaphorically speaking.’’

  ‘‘Metaphorical Threat, that’s my middle name.’’

  ‘‘I thought Death from Above was your middle name.’’

  ‘‘No, that’s my rap handle.’’

  ‘‘Excellent. Because I want P.J. to be Scared into Talking.’’

  When Patsy Blackburn opened the door, I heard laughter inside, overlaid with boisterous voices. Patsy wore a skintight turtleneck with six strands of gold chain around her neck. Her eyes had a fluid glow.

  ‘‘Come join the party. It’s the family of the groom,’’ she said.

  Right—her nephew’s wedding, coming up that weekend. Though I was in the wedding party, I hadn’t met the blushing couple. The remains of a lasagna dinner cluttered the dining room table. The too-bright talk faded when we walked in. Keith Blackburn stood up, extending his hand to Brian.

  ‘‘Commander Delaney, I thought you were still at the Pentagon.’’

  Keith had given his sons their strong looks and their height, though he
seemed to be eroding with time. He was a neat and courteous man who worked on his feet all day at Office Depot, selling staplers and printer paper.

  He introduced us. The parents of the groom, Patsy’s sister, Deedee, and her husband, Chuck Dornan, had an air of insouciant Manhattan sophistication. Santa Barbara was where they kept their winter home. Their son, David, gave us a killer smile that struck me as pure frat-boy bravado. And Caroline Peel, the bride, vibrated like a pink cashmere espresso bean. She hadn’t eaten a bite of her lasagna. Only when Keith introduced me as Jesse’s girlfriend did she stop gripping David’s arm like a claw hammer.

  ‘‘You’re my sub,’’ she said. ‘‘Terrific.’’

  ‘‘Emergency replacement bridesmaid, reporting for duty,’’ I said.

  She eyed me up and down. ‘‘Have you tried on the dress yet?’’

  Caroline had asked me to join the lineup for one simple reason: I fit the uniform. Her first-string bridesmaid was laid up, having been thrown by her polo pony the week before.

  ‘‘My fitting’s Friday,’’ I said.

  David leaned his chair back on two legs. ‘‘You a Pi Phi?’’

  I smiled. ‘‘I’m more sci-fi.’’

  Two blank stares.

  Brian said, ‘‘My sis wasn’t sorority material.’’

  Patsy laughed, loudly. ‘‘Evan writes books. Science fiction. I hear they’re kind of like The Jetsons but with guns and group sex.’’

  Seven blank stares, including mine. Patsy’s cocktail tumbler was empty. She’d hit round three: past sentimental and surly, onto spill-the-beans.

  In the family room, I heard P.J.’s guitar. Through the door I saw him sitting on the floor. He was picking out a blues line, and had a melancholy look on his face. His guitar strings were wound with blue thread at the ends.

  ‘‘Excuse us.’’

  I left as if being chased by bees, heading into the family room with Brian following. P.J. looked up, and his eyes went wary. The guitar fell silent.

  ‘‘Sweaty Shaun Kutner,’’ I said.

  ‘‘Aw, do we have to do this?’’

  ‘‘You sent Jesse a puppy-gram to make up for Shaun. Yes, we do.’’

  ‘‘Doesn’t Jesse like the puppy?’’

  ‘‘Shaun seems to hate you, supposedly because of Brittany. But he’s also Sinsa’s boyfriend, so I think he wants to whomp your butt to keep you away from her.’’