Obsession

by Jonathan Kellerman

  “Kyle’s diagnosis seems right-on.”

  “Animal guts on his weenie goes beyond basic sociopath, Alex.”

  “Plus-four sociopath,” I said. “He was giving out some serious danger signals early on and no one bothered to care.”

  “Glommin’ Mommy’s photos.”

  “His entire childhood was eroticized. Sex and violence could’ve gotten blended. That makes me wonder if Patty’s ‘terrible thing’ was related to a lust crime. What if she really did kill someone—a bad guy she considered a threat to Tanya?”

  “Some scuzzy pal of Pete’s?”

  I nodded.

  He said, “Scary pedophile crosses Tanya’s path and Mommy uses her little .22. Why tell Tanya now?”

  “Maybe she was frightened because she hadn’t finished the job.”

  “Sparing De Paine,” he said. “Years later she runs into him at the E.R. and he makes a threatening comment. But if he’d collaborated with another lowlife on something unspeakable, why would Patty off his buddy and give him a pass?”

  “Because he was young,” I said. “Eighteen years old when Patty and Tanya lived on Fourth Street. He was also the son of a man she’d cared for. And possibly cared about.”

  “Everyone else despises Jordan but she had a soft spot for him?”

  “She watched over him as if she did. It’s also possible killing once traumatized her and she didn’t have the stomach to repeat it. It can be like that for good folk.”

  The breeze blew harder.

  “Okay,” he said, “for whatever reason she doesn’t shoot little Petey. Why not report him to the cops?”

  “Because she’d eliminated his accomplice and didn’t want any contact with the cops.”

  “Theoretical accomplice,” he said. “Given your logic, someone older. Now all we have to do is conjure this phantom out of the ether. And unearth some unspeakable sex crime no one’s ever heard about. Also, if Patty was worried about De Paine hurting Tanya, why not come out and warn her explicitly?”

  “I don’t know. It’s possible the disease did affect her thinking. Or she didn’t want to terrify Tanya—or have Tanya go it alone. By being ambiguous and directing Tanya to me, she hoped Tanya would get help from both of us.”

  “I guess.”

  “It worked, didn’t it?”

  He put his hands behind his head. “Imaginative, I’ll grant you that.”

  I said, “When Tanya told me she felt Patty was trying to protect her, I put it down to romanticizing her mother. But maybe she had it right.”

  He closed his eyes. The dash clock said one forty-six.

  “It also fits Lester Jordan’s murder, Milo. What if Jordan knew Patty had spared his son? We come by asking about her, he gets jumpy, wonders if Junior’s finally going to pay. Or if Junior’s into something new. He calls Junior, maybe warns him to stay away from Tanya. Or sends the warning through Mary. Either way, De Paine wonders if Jordan can be trusted to keep his mouth shut. That tops off the rage he’s felt toward his father his entire life. He pays a social call on Dad in the guise of bringing over product. Jordan fixes up, nods out, De Paine lets in Robert Fisk.”

  “Oedipus wrecks,” he said.

  “You don’t need to be Freud to see it in this family. One of De Paine’s earliest sexual charges was looking at his mother’s movie stills. Feeding his father’s habit put him in the power chair.”

  “Do sociopaths dig irony?”

  “They process it differently than the rest of us.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Shark-eats-minnow is good!”

  “How does Moses Grant fit in?”

  “Nothing we’ve heard about him so far indicates criminality, so maybe he was an oversized minnow. He gave up his day job and his apartment to run with De Paine because he believed De Paine would help his deejay career. Along the way, he saw too much, reacted with fear or revulsion. That kind of weakness would be a danger sign to De Paine and Fisk.”

  “Cleaning house,” he said. “You’re figuring Grant was also there when they did Jordan.”

  “Fortuno called him a lackey and whatever else he is, Fortuno’s perceptive. We know Grant drove the Hummer so maybe that night he was the wheelman, waiting somewhere up the block.”

  Another long silence.

  “You do have a flair for the dark side,” he said, looking past me at the mansion. “Start the car, Jeeves. This zip code’s raising my blood sugar.”

  Two twenty-three a.m., lights off at my house. When I stepped in, sounds from a corner of the living room made me jump.

  Robin said, “Hi, honey.”

  As my eyes habituated, I made out her form. Curled on a sofa, concealed by a blanket but for curls raining on a silk pillow. Blanche nestled in the triangle defined between Robin’s belly and arm. The TV remote sat on the floor.

  She switched on a low-voltage lamp, squinted, sat up knuckling her eyes and pushing hair out of her face. Blanche curled a tongue and smiled.

  I turned the light off, sat down on the edge of the sofa, kissed her hair. Her breath was the sweet-sour of lemon yogurt.

  “I was watching a show, guess I conked out.”

  “Must’ve been fascinating.”

  “People looking for new houses. Thrilling.”

  “Real estate,” I said. “It’s the new sex.”

  “The old sex ain’t out of commission, yet…in principle…what time is it?”

  I told her.

  “Oh, wow. Big night?”

  “Nothing dramatic,” I said. “Sorry for not calling.”

  “S’okay, I had my home-girl here, we had plenty to talk about.”

  “Such as?”

  “Girl stuff; you’ll never know. Help me up, Caballero. I need to stretch out in a real bed. Blanchie can stay with us if you want.”

  “She snores.”

  “So do you, darling.”

  “I do?”

  “Just once in a while.”

  “Is it disruptive?”

  She pecked my cheek and got to her feet. I walked her, still wrapped in the blanket, up the hall.

  “Do I keep you up, Rob?”

  “I have a technique.”

  “What?”

  “I kick your butt, you roll over, you’re fine.”

  “Any excuse,” I said.

  She laughed. “Who needs one? By the way, I’m still asking around about De Paine. No one in the biz takes him seriously and no one’s seen him for a while. One other person had that same rumor about the house in the hills but you’ve already dealt with that.”

  I kissed her. “Thanks for trying.”

  “My middle name.”

  I called Tanya at eight thirty the next morning.

  She said, “I just got off the phone with Kyle. I know you think I was stupid for confiding in him, but I really know him. He thinks whatever Mommy remembered could’ve had something to do with Pete Whitbread and that sounds logical to me.”

  “What do you remember about Pete?”

  “Not much. I used to see him on the block but we had nothing to do with each other.”

  “Did he hang with anyone in particular?”

  “Never saw anyone. What I do recall is that Mommy didn’t like Mary Whitbread.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know, but I could tell from the way she acted when Mary dropped by to collect the rent. It embarrassed me a little because Mary was nice to me, sometimes she’d bring me candy. I admired the way she looked. By then I was out of my Barbie stage but I thought Mary looked like a Barbie Mom—glamorous, ultra-feminine. The times she came by, I sensed that she wanted to socialize, but Mommy never invited her to stay. Just the opposite, she seemed to want her out as quickly as possible. One time Mommy had just brewed fresh coffee and Mary remarked how great it smelled. Mommy said, ‘It’s old, I was just going to dump it.’ It was such an obvious lie. Mary left with a look on her face as if she’d been slapped—oops, look what time it is, I’ve got to get going, Dr. Del
aware.”

  “Another study group?”

  “No, that’s later. Ten o’clock lab. I don’t know if any of that was helpful, but it’s all I remember. Thanks for not being mad about Kyle.”

  “How’re you doing with the self-hypnosis?”

  “Great, excellent, I practiced yesterday. Ran through it a dozen times.”

  “Ah,” I said.

  Nervous laughter. “Was that too intense?”

  “Practice is great, but you may not need that much.”

  “You think I’m hopeless.”

  “Just the opposite.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I have high hopes for you.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Delaware. I needed that.”

  At ten twenty-eight, Detective Raul Biro phoned to ask if I could make a one p.m. meeting at Hollywood Division.

  “Progress?”

  “Nothing I’ve heard about. Petra just said she wanted a sit-down. She’s over in Records, figures to be clear by one.”

  “I’ll be there. How’s the Whitbread surveillance going?”

  “I’m a block up from her place right now. So far, it’s real quiet.”

  “Thanks for calling, Raul. See you at one.”

  “I won’t be there,” he said. “I’m sticking to Whitbread like Krazy Glue.”

  The conference room at Hollywood Division smelled like a catering truck.

  On the wall was a poster of Bin Laden wearing a cartoonishly dirty diaper. The caption said, Someone get me out of this dump.

  Milo wrestled with a sumo-sized double chili-cheeseburger, Petra nibbled on curly fries and a Mexican salad, Dave Saunders and Kevin Bouleau chopsticked pork lo mein from paper plates.

  A wrapped parcel sat in front of an empty chair.

  Petra said, “Got you a steak sandwich but I can’t vouch for the quality.”

  “Or the species,” said Saunders, twirling a stick.

  I thanked her and sat down.

  She said, “It’s been a good morning, thanks to our Central brethren.” Flourishing a hand at Saunders and Bouleau.

  Saunders’s mouth was full. Bouleau said, “We found Grant’s kill-spot, abandoned building on Santee. A homeless guy who crashes nearby remembers seeing a Hummer pull up and some guys getting out. He isn’t sure if it was two or three and doesn’t know when they left because he was stewed on Night Train. To be honest, this isn’t a person who’s totally sane. But the fact that he spotted the Hummer’s decent evidence, not too many of those cruising that neighborhood.”

  Saunders swallowed. “They left blood on the floor and the walls, but took the casings. Initial scrapings are O-positive, which is Grant’s type and common, but I’ll lay odds with anyone who wants to bet against the DNA.”

  I said, “Leaving a Hummer in full sight says they were confident about not being discovered.”

  Saunders said, “No one’s around there at night and guys who’d shoot their own compadre in cold blood probably figured they could handle a car-booster.”

  I thought the topic merited more discussion but kept silent.

  Milo said, “Excellent work.”

  Bouleau grinned. “It’s what we do.”

  Saunders said, “No luck finding any of Grant’s relatives, yet. But we’re relentless.”

  “We roar like lions but we dig like moles,” said Bouleau. “And wait, kids, there’s more, little surprise at the autopsy. Mr. Grant was shot to death but first they tried to strangle him. Coroner found a ligature mark around his neck. Grant being so big, it was obscured by fat folds when the C.I. looked him over. No rupture of the hyoid, but there was some bruising and petechial hemorrhaging in the eyes—in the corners, you’d have to be looking for it.”

  Saunders said, “Like you said, they tried to choke him out, dude was too big, so they shot him.”

  Petra said, “Any sign of a struggle?”

  “Nope. And given Grant’s size, a frontal attack would have produced upwardly angling pathways. The tracks in Grant say he was probably prone when he got drilled. The room was basically an empty shell, big cold place, some discarded rusty engine parts in a corner, it used to be a machine shop or something.”

  Milo said, “Big guy like that just lies back and takes it?”

  “Coroner wonders if he was tranquilized, let’s see what the tox screen says.”

  I said, “Choking’s more personal. More of a thrill.”

  “My thought exactly, Doc,” said Bouleau. “But his neck was too thick so practicality won out.”

  Petra said, “Attempted strangulation could also mean two people. Meaning Fisk’s car left near Lindbergh Field could’ve been a ruse.”

  “He drives down there, comes back some other way?” said Saunders. “If he knows he’s being looked for, why would he return?”

  “Because De Paine needed him,” I said.

  “Dude must pay well,” said Bouleau.

  Milo said, “Dude has income, from trucking heroin, dirty pictures, anything else people lust for. He does well enough with dope to leave behind a grand worth of H at Lester Jordan’s. We know he used speed and booze as a kid, but with that kind of self-control, he probably doesn’t shoot smack. But maybe Moses Grant was into H and that incapacitated him same as Jordan. When’s the tox coming back?”

  Saunders said, “Couple of days, three, four. We were lucky to get the autopsy prioritized.”

  Petra said, “How’d you pull that off?”

  “To be honest, we had nothing to do with it. Coroner saw lig marks in addition to bullet holes, got curious, put Grant at the top of the pile.”

  I unwrapped my steak sandwich, revealed a three-ounce sliver of something oily corrupting two halves of crumbly French roll. Closer inspection revealed curling cutlet verging on cinder, lettuce in need of Viagra.

  Petra said, “Ooh. Sorry—share my salad.”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  “Oh, man,” said Saunders, “whatever that is could turn a carnivore into a vegan. Want some Chinese, Doc?”

  “No, thanks.”

  Milo hoisted his burger. “I’m not offering.”

  I said, “This is when you find out who your friends are.”

  “I’m watching out for your cholesterol.” He put down the sandwich. “Westside can’t compete in the evidence department, folks, but there’s more to hear about Mr. Whitbread/De Paine than dope, and it ain’t pretty.”

  Three pairs of eyes sparked with curiosity. Milo told the story.

  CHAPTER

  34

  Petra said, “Animal guts. That is one sick Chihuahua.” She shoved her salad aside.

  Kevin Bouleau said, “It’s nasty but if Grant really was a solid citizen who just happened to hang with two bad guys, I’m not seeing any connection to our case.”

  “So far we haven’t learned anything to the contrary, Kev.”

  “Damn shame. I like it better when bad guys meet an untimely end. More leads and you don’t have to feel as sorry unless they’ve got nice relatives.”

  “Weeping mothers, the worst,” said Dave Saunders. “So where do we go from here?”

  Petra said, “We all have the same goal: find these two sweethearts. Robert Fisk is a gym rat and a martial arts freak plus he likes to dance. But all my inquiries in those directions have gotten nowhere. Blaise De Paine visited his mommy right before Jordan’s murder, so we know he’s on speaking terms with her. Raul’s watching her house as we speak. No luck subpoenaing her phone records, her only crime is giving birth to the little bastard and he hasn’t been formally identified as a suspect. On top of that, everything’s tightened up on data searches because of Fortuno. If you guys learn something that connects Grant to De Paine, I’ll try again.”

  “We will sharpen our claws and dig,” said Bouleau. “If Grant is a citizen he left tracks. So you got a face-to-face with Fortuno, huh? We Downtown folk never get to meet celebrities.”

  “Not an impressive piece of humanity, Kev. You didn’t miss anything.”


  “Maybe so, but I’m still looking for stories to tell my grandkids when I’m drooling on the front porch.” Bouleau turned serious. “Given the Fortuno link and De Paine being a music guy, you see any showbiz connections to any of this?”

  Petra said, “I’ve asked around and so has Dr. Delaware’s girlfriend—she works with musicians, helped I.D. De Paine in the first place. Guy’s not a player, just dabbles on the fringes.”

  “Sounds like ninety-nine percent of the mopes in Hollywood,” said Saunders. To Petra: “No offense, but doesn’t your captain have a SAG card?”

  “He does, but he’s done real work for it.”

  Bouleau said, “Like what?”

  “Technical advising.” Not mentioning Stu Bishop’s minor acting roles.

  “Really?” said Bouleau. “Can he get me a card? I’ll advise anyone about anything.”

  Saunders said, “De Paine lives on the fringe but has expensive wheels registered to a bogus corporation. Dude like that isn’t likely to be crashing in a studio apartment in the middle of the LAX flight path.”

  I said, “Maybe he’s living in a house his mother owns.”

  Petra said, “I’ve already looked into that. Mary’s total holdings are the four Mid-Wilshire duplexes Myron sold her and a six-unit in Encino. De Paine isn’t staying at any of them.”

  “Those are the properties in her name,” I said.

  “She’s got a shadow corporation? I guess anything’s possible.”

  Dave Saunders said, “Time to check the DBA files, Detective Connor.”

  Kevin Bouleau said, “Narcotics have anything to say about De Paine?”

  Petra said, “They don’t know him.”

  Saunders said, “He’s dealing all these years and never got busted for anything?”

  “Apparently.”

  “Lucky boy,” said Bouleau. “Or he’s connected. Fortuno knows lots of criminal lawyers.” Slow smile. “Which is a redundancy, right?”

  Saunders said, “Back to the world of showbiz?”

  “If only, partner.”

  To us: “Kevin wants to be Will Smith.”

  Bouleau said, “Why not? Have you seen Mrs. Smith? But hey, am I off the mark? Fortuno’s a fixer and it sounds like this boy may have gotten fixed.”