Too Big to Die

by Sue Ann Jaffarian

  twenty-four

  I was quiet on the drive to Torrance, which Holly read as physical discomfort. “Are you feeling better today?” she asked, casting glances my way.

  “I am, thanks,” I told her. “I took a painkiller last night and it really helped.” I glanced over at her. We were in her tiny car and she was at the wheel. From somewhere in her go bag she’d pulled out a white V-neck knit shirt to wear today. “You and Greg stayed up late,” I noted.

  “I hope you don’t mind,” she said. “We talked a lot about my mom and how she was back then.”

  “He liked her a lot,” I assured her. “They weren’t in love, but he liked her and thought highly of her.”

  “That’s what he told me last night.” She sighed. “I just wish she had stayed in touch with him, though. It would have been nice growing up with him in my life, even if just as a friend of the family.” She shot me a smile. “Mom would have liked you, too.”

  I went back to my thoughts. While Greg and Holly made breakfast this morning, I had taken my laptop into the living room. Although I doubted it would be there, I wanted to see what I could find about Jane Newell on our firm’s system. This time, though, I had been blocked from access. It made me wonder if they had noticed my snooping yesterday and cut me off or if our IT department had finally gotten around to deactivating my access now that I was on leave, which they should have done on Monday. I didn’t think Steele would have gone back to the office and squealed on me. I didn’t need the information from the firm’s records, but it would have been interesting to see if Jane Newell had been a client for other things besides the initial trust. Holly had said Jane had used another firm for most of her legal needs, and that would make sense if she had any misgivings about T&T and their association with Kingston.

  My cell phone rang. I hadn’t stored it in the cross-body tote I was now carrying out of convenience. Instead, I held it in my hand like a lifeline. The display said it was Jill Bernelli, and it wasn’t her T&T number but her personal cell phone number. It was 9:45 in the morning. Jill should be at work already.

  “Hey, Jill,” I answered as the thought struck me that she didn’t want anyone to know she was calling me. A call from our office phones could be traced easily. I kept my voice upbeat, but my gut tightened as I held the phone to my ear.

  “Odelia,” Jill whispered, confirming my thought about this call being off the books. “Where are you?”

  “In a car heading out to meet someone. Why?” I asked. Holly kept glancing over, curious about the call. “The question is, where are you?”

  “In the ladies’ room in the café in our building,” she whispered. “I didn’t want anyone to know I was calling you.”

  Chalk up another bingo for the fat lady in the arm sling.

  “Big stuff is going down here this morning,” Jill continued. “Steele has been on the phone this morning with the LA office, and there’s been a lot of yelling and screaming. While that was going on, I got a call from HR telling me to pack up the personal stuff in your office.” She paused. “Odelia, you’re being fired!”

  I sucked in air as if gut punched. It wasn’t totally unexpected, but it still felt like an assault. “Do you know why? It can’t be because of the dog thing?” I asked her the question even though I knew the answer. I’d been caught snooping on a client, and that client was hitting T&T hard to be rid of me. Doris Hoffman might even have contacted Kingston herself, saying I was snooping around her son.

  “Eddie took your computer out of your office,” Jill reported. “He said you violated company confidentiality. Did you, Odelia?”

  “No,” I told her, “but I did access the firm’s records yesterday, after they put me on leave. Hang on.” I looked down at my cell and went to the home page. I had separate icons for my personal email and my firm email. I punched the icon for my T&T email and found my user name and password no longer worked. “They’ve already removed me from the firm’s email,” I told Jill. “Any idea when they’re going to do the deed? Steele’s the manager of the OC office, so it will fall to him to toss me out the door.”

  “Oh, Odelia, you know that’s the last thing Steele would want,” Jill said, her voice sad. “I’m telling you, Jolene and I thought he was going to have a stroke this morning. He was still yelling at Joe Templin when I slipped out to call you.”

  “Don’t worry, Jill,” I said, trying to reassure her. “I’ll be fine. Greg doesn’t want me to go back to the firm, and I’m beginning to see things his way. I’ll call you tonight after you get home. Okay?”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “And, Jill,” I said to her, “stay out of this. There’s a lot of shit coming down soon, and I don’t want you to get hit by any of it. Do you understand?”

  “But I want to help you,” she said, her voice changing to strong and defiant.

  “You can help by staying out of the way. Really, Jill, that will be a big help, knowing you’re not in the way of Kingston’s wrath. He’s a very nasty man.”

  When I ended the call, I filled Holly in on what was going on. “Kingston wanted you fired because of that stupid little dog?” she asked.

  “Originally, yes,” I told her, “but now I think he wants me gone in order to stop me from snooping into his affairs.” I snorted. “Like that’s going to happen now!”

  I called Greg and filled him in. He was both pleased and pissed off. “Any official contact from the office yet?” he asked me.

  “Not yet, but when it happens, you’ll be the first to know, honey.”

  “I’m going to call Seth,” Greg said. “If the firm calls you in, I want Seth with you. Do you know if he’s back from Sacramento yet?”

  “I think it was just an overnight trip,” I said, “but if he’s not available, we can ask his partner, Doug Hemming. He’s pretty cool.”

  I was barely off the phone with Greg when I received a call from Steele.

  “You’re not getting that?” Holly asked.

  “Let him cool his heels.” I let the call go to voice mail. The message was short and noncommittal, telling me to please call him back as soon as possible. We were about fifteen minutes from Torrance. I waited a full five minutes before returning Steele’s call.

  “Hey,” I said in a forced cheerful voice. “You rang?”

  “I need you to come into the office today, Grey,” he told me, his voice crisp. “Around noon.”

  “I can’t make it then, Steele,” I said, working hard to keep the anger out of my voice. “I’m actually heading somewhere with a friend right now. How about three?”

  “I need you here no later than one, Grey.”

  “And I’m telling you I can’t make it until three.” I wasn’t about to tell Steele I was in the midst of lawyering up. “It’s either three today or tomorrow—your choice. I’m a busy woman these days.”

  “So I hear,” he quipped. Steele was quiet for a bit, then said, “See you at three.”

  “LA office or OC office?” I asked, letting him know I knew he wasn’t calling me in to have coffee.

  “OC,” he said, his voice so weary and worn, I felt sorry for him. Steele was being caught in the middle, but it couldn’t be helped.

  I called Greg and gave him the skinny on the time of the meeting. He told me Seth was available and eager to help. Greg had filled him in. “Seth said he’d meet us at my shop around twelve thirty. Can you make that? I hope you don’t mind, sweetheart, but I want to be in on this.” I was glad of that.

  “We’re almost to Church Construction now,” I told him. “If we’re quick with Donna, then yes, I can make that.”

  twenty-five

  When we entered the Church Construction office, it was as empty of people as it had been two days before. For a fleeting moment, I wondered if Donna had taken off, then a flat, familiar woman’s voice came from the back. “Be right out.”

 
; I pointed at the photos of the former Kingston home. “This is the project where Burt met Marla Kingston. It was about two years ago.”

  Holly took off her sunglasses and studied the photos. “Nice digs.”

  “What are you doing back?”

  I turned around to find Donna standing behind her desk. She was dressed similar to how she had been dressed when I last saw her, and she was just as unhappy to see me.

  “Ben isn’t in right now,” she said, assuming I was there to see Ben Church.

  “I’m not here to see him,” I told her. “I want to speak to you.”

  “I’ve got nothing to say to you,” she said. “The police have already talked to me, and I’m not as nice or as patient as Ben.”

  “That’s obvious,” I shot back. “But how nice were you to Burt Sandoval?” I took a step toward her. “Were you nice to Burt after business hours?”

  “That’s none of your business,” she said. “Burt’s gone and it’s your fault.”

  “My fault?” I asked, using my good hand to point at myself. “How do you figure? I didn’t shoot Burt. My husband and I tried to save his life.”

  Donna’s eyes took in Holly. “Who’s she?”

  “My stepdaughter,” I told Donna without any hesitation.

  Donna was about to say something else, then decided against it. Instead, she returned to her accusation, her face as hard and set as a profile on Mount Rushmore. “Like I said, if not for you and your husband’s heroics, Burt would be alive. The dog lived, but Burt was murdered. I told him not to go see your husband, but he wouldn’t listen.”

  “Okay,” I said, “let’s talk about that.” I placed a hand on the back of one of the visitor’s chairs for balance. I wanted to sit, but I didn’t think Donna would take kindly to that. “Greg and I had never met Burt until last Saturday, so we’re rather stumped as to why he wanted to talk to Greg in the first place. He helped us with the dog, then took off before the police could question him. Next thing, he’s calling Greg for a meeting. Before the meeting, he’s gunned down.” I squeezed the chair back as my still-sore hips cried for relief. “All I want to know is why did he need to talk to Greg?”

  Donna’s mouth twisted. “Burt was in over his head. He said the police seemed to know you guys, so when we got back to his place, we looked you up on the internet. Seems you and your husband are some kind of PIs, so he wanted some advice. It wasn’t something he could go to the police about.”

  “We’re not PIs,” I told her, “but sometimes trouble seems to find us or people ask for our help. So what did Burt need our help on?”

  Donna eyed Holly again, then turned back to me. “Sunday, the day after the thing with the dog, Burt received a death threat.”

  “Excuse me,” I said, interrupting her, “but I need to sit down. I had a bad fall recently.” I moved to the front of the chair I was using for support and sat in it. Holly remained standing, leaning against a file cabinet set against one wall.

  “Okay,” I said once settled, “let’s start at the beginning. What was your relationship with Burt? I know he wasn’t married.”

  “Burt and I were seeing each other for about eight months,” Donna told me with some reluctance. “But we kept it quiet because we worked together and…well, because I’m still married. I work with mostly men here, and you know how they can be about that kind of stuff.”

  It was a start, giving me hope that I might be able to pry other information out of her before I had to be in Huntington Beach at twelve thirty. “Donna, I’m very sorry for your loss.” I paused a few heartbeats before continuing. “Do you know why Burt received the death threat?”

  She nodded. “It was because of her,” she said looking at Holly.

  “Me?” Holly asked with great surprise. “I didn’t know the guy.”

  “Not you, stupid,” Donna said. She pointed at the photos of the grand house. “Her, the Kingston bitch.”

  Ah, there’s the opening I needed.

  “Burt and Marla met on that job and stayed in touch after, didn’t they?” I asked, shifting my weight in the chair to find a comfortable spot.

  Donna took a seat behind her desk. She took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. She looked even more tired than last time. Her shoulders slumped forward and I felt she might crack if pressed in the right place.

  “That job,” I prodded. “Something happened between them during the project, didn’t it? Something that came back to haunt Burt into his grave.”

  “Yes and no,” Donna admitted. “They met on that job. One day Burt found her sitting in her car out front crying. He comforted her and from time to time they talked. She told him about how unhappy she was and how brutal Kingston was to her.”

  “Did they have an affair?” Holly asked.

  Donna nodded and replaced her glasses. “Yes. Burt told me it lasted during the remodel and for about a month after. During the remodel, the Kingstons were staying at their home in Orange County, so Burt and Marla would stay in the Beverly Hills house after the crew went home. Burt said she became paranoid about her husband finding out after the remodel was done and broke it off. That was long before he and I became close.”

  The phone on Donna’s desk rang and she answered it, forcing her voice to sound professional. She told the caller that Ben Church wasn’t in but she’d be happy to take a message for him. Quickly, she grabbed a pen and jotted down something on a message pad positioned by the phone.

  I glanced over to Holly. She remained leaning against the cabinet, her arms crossed in front of her. We exchanged meaningful looks. There was a gleam in her eye, like the one Muffin gets when she’s about to trap a bird.

  “We’ve learned that Burt had been meeting Marla recently,” I said, turning my attention back to Donna when she was done with the call. “And that you were at those meetings but stayed in the truck.”

  Donna’s mouth dropped. “How could you possibly know that?”

  “Let’s just say we do,” Holly replied.

  “Obviously, those meetings between Burt and Marla Kingston weren’t lovers’ trysts if you were there,” I added. “And witnesses have said that the meetings weren’t always friendly. What were those about?” I asked. “Could that have a bearing on why Burt was shot?”

  “It had everything to do with why Burt was shot,” Donna admitted. “You see, during their brief affair, Marla told Burt a lot of crazy stuff about her husband—stuff he’d done that was crooked and just plain horrible. Stuff that could ruin Kingston if it ever got out.”

  I leaned forward. “Did she ever mention the name Jordon West to Burt?”

  Donna’s eyes widened. “You know about Jordon West?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I even met him recently.”

  “But he’s some kind of vegetable,” Donna said.

  “He’s quite incapacitated physically,” I told her, “but he’s hardly a vegetable.”

  “Marla told Burt that the West guy was a vegetable and that it was because of Kingston,” Donna said. “It was an accident and a coverup that had happened years ago. Kingston paid off the family.”

  “Were the recent meetings with Marla about that?” I asked.

  “Yes, and other stuff,” Donna said. “Burt was blackmailing her. He told her that unless she gave him a half million in cash, he would go to the press with the thing about the West kid and about their affair. One would sink Kingston and the other would sink Marla. If she’s ever found unfaithful, Kingston can kick her out with nothing.”

  “Something’s not right here,” Holly said, leaving her post and moving toward the desk. “Marla Kingston told all this to Burt Sandoval two years ago, but he waited until now to try and put the screws to her?”

  That’s my girl! It was something I was wondering myself.

  “He needed the money,” Donna said. “We needed the money. My husband’s crazy.
Burt wanted me to leave my husband, but the only way I could is if we left the area. To do that, we needed money.”

  My gut was telling me the blackmail plan had been Donna’s idea.

  “Burt had been negotiating with Marla, but she said she needed time to get that kind of money together. The Saturday you rescued the dog was payday for us.” Donna twisted up her face again in my direction. “If you had let the damn dog die, Burt wouldn’t have offered to help and he and I would be out of the country by now, starting new lives.” She plucked a tissue from a nearby box and blew her nose.

  “So what did Burt expect from Greg?” I asked.

  “Help, I think. After he got the death threat, he had no idea where to go for help. He couldn’t go to the police because he’d been blackmailing Marla. In one of the articles he found on you, there was a suggestion that you had connections with some unusual people in the underground. He wanted to see if Greg could hook him up with a way to get us safely out of town, money or no money.”

  So Burt had stuck around long enough to hear the officers talk about our identities, particularly mine, and had been curious enough to check us out. Then he drifted away while the attention was elsewhere.

  I really need to Google us and see what’s out there about our past activities.

  “Burt knew some other people who might be able to help,” Donna continued, “but he said he didn’t trust them not to sell us out to Kingston for cash. He said there was something he trusted about you and your husband, so he wanted to start there.”

  “So whoever was after Burt followed him to Greg’s business and took him out,” Holly said. “What exactly did the death threat say?”

  “I have it here,” Donna said. She opened a lower drawer in her desk and pulled out a large crumpled piece of paper. She put it on the desk and pushed it across in my direction.

  There was no way I was going to put my fingerprints on that thing. I looked around for something to use to open it without touching it when Holly pulled a pair of latex gloves from her go bag and handed them to me. “Here, use these.”