Deception: An Alex Delaware Novel

by Jonathan Kellerman

  "I believe so."

  "Where are they going?"

  "I don't know."

  "How do you know the families are traveling together?"

  "I chitchatted with the boys yesterday. They were in excellent spirits and I find it difficult to believe--"

  "What exactly did they tell you?"

  "Tristram told me. They were going to use the plane. That it would be... wonderful. I believe his term was 'awesome.'"

  "The plane."

  "Mr. Wydette's Gulfstream Five," she said. "It's a marvel."

  CHAPTER

  37

  As I sped to Santa Monica Airport, Milo celled Reed.

  "Nothing, Loo."

  "That's 'cause we may be too late, both families are scheduled to leave for the weekend. Check with the mannequin in the booth and don't take any bullshit. Tell Sean to find out what's happening at Wydette's place. If everyone's gone, we'll go ahead and search the houses and given the size, I'll need a small army, so get in touch with the lab and the duty sergeant and start recruiting."

  Moments later Reed phoned back. "Mannequin's cooperative, ex-Rampart Division, hates the family 'cause they treat him like dirt. He's absolutely certain no one left today except Tristram, after Quinn Glover picked him up in his Hummer. That was an hour and a quarter ago, right before I arrived. They took luggage, Loo. A lot of it."

  The search warrant was extended to the Gulfstream by the time I reached Bundy Drive, takeoff to Aspen aborted by the tower at LAX as I turned onto Ocean Park. As far as the crew was aware, "unanticipated air-traffic buildup" was the reason.

  I got buzzed through the gate at Diamond Aviation by mentioning Milo's name, drove onto the landing field, followed a porter in a golf cart to the G-V.

  The plane's engines were running, as were those of two smaller jets. The noise level was at brain-puree.

  When I reached the plane's left wing and stopped, the pilot looked down from the cockpit, curious, but not alarmed. Milo's badge-flash didn't change that. People who loft tons of metal in the air should take a low-key approach to life.

  Milo motioned him out.

  The engines switched off.

  When they'd quieted to merely deafening, the door opened and the pilot lowered the foldout steps, descended two rungs, turned and shut the door.

  Rock-jawed, the same man who'd flown Edgar Helfgott halfway around the globe and back on high school business. Rawboned, gray-haired, built like a runner.

  Milo introduced himself, shouting to be heard.

  The captain pointed several yards away and the three of us walked until we could hear our own voices.

  The pilot said, "Rod Brewer. What can I do for you, sir?"

  "I've got a search warrant for your plane and arrest warrants for Tristram Wydette and Quinn Glover. They inside?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Who else is in there?"

  "Captain Susan Curtis. Is she in danger?"

  "Anything in the boys' demeanor worrying you?"

  "Not really," said Brewer. "They're spoiled little bastards all caught up with their iPods and the shades are down. But with too much delay they might get curious. Mind if I tell Sue to lock the cockpit?"

  "Good idea."

  Brewer made the call, ended by instructing the co-pilot to answer any questions from the boys with "mechanical problems." To us: "Okay, what do I need to do?"

  Milo said, "Where are they sitting?"

  "First row on either side," said Brewer. "It's always that way. I can be flying over the Grand Canyon, they're into their own thing."

  "The boys or the entire family?"

  "Seems to be a genetic thing."

  "Did you notice anything that can be construed as a weapon?"

  "We've got silverware." Smiling. "Mrs. Wydette just upgraded to Christofle."

  "Nothing else?"

  "Everything's in the hold," said Brewer. "Except their iPods, Hustler magazine, and Silver Patron. They're already half stoned, don't know if that works in your favor or the opposite."

  "They get nasty when they're drunk?"

  "Not really. Mostly they sleep."

  "Parents allow them to drink?"

  "When they're with their parents they drink Red Bull."

  "How many times have they flown without their parents?"

  "This is the first."

  "But Daddy authorized the trip."

  "Mommy."

  "She say why the boys were flying to Aspen by themselves?"

  "No one explains anything to me," said Brewer. "I'm furniture."

  "Furniture who holds their lives in the balance."

  "Lieutenant, people in their circumstances see the world differently. There's them, then there's everyone else."

  "Okay, thanks. Pop that door, please."

  "No prob," said Brewer. "Before you go in, you might want to check the hold. This is the first time they insisted on loading their own stuff."

  The two duffels lay on the tarmac, black nylon, all-weather sturdy, stainless-steel fittings glinting in the untrammeled sun.

  Milo had gloved up and unloaded them by himself, continued to sweat and pant.

  Captain Rod Brewer watched him the way an anesthesiologist watches oxygen levels.

  Milo touched one of the duffels. Patted it along the length, repeated the same for the other.

  Arching his eyebrows, he unzipped.

  Inside were layers of thick plastic sheeting, milky and opaque. Kneeling, he peered closely. Took out a pocketknife that he wiped with a sterile cloth.

  Slicing carefully, he peeled back each layer.

  Captain Rod Brewer said, "My God."

  A face stared up at us.

  Young, male, greenish-gray, slack-jawed. Flat, clouded cellophane disks where eyes had once functioned.

  What the techies call a "defect" was visible in the center of the corpse's unlined forehead.

  Entry wound, small and neat, probably a .22.

  The body nested in a cloud of white pellets that began vaporizing the moment they impacted with warm air.

  "What the hell is that, dry ice?" said Brewer.

  "It sublimates," said Milo, wielding his blade and lengthening the slit.

  The pilot blinked, looked away. An unflappable man but something had finally perturbed him and I knew what it was.

  No normal-sized human being could fit into either of the duffels.

  Milo finished peeling back the plastic. Stared.

  Rod Brewer crossed himself.

  The body had been severed just above the hips.

  Not a clean job; the edges of the separation were ragged, bone ends had shredded like used firecrackers, exposed muscle resembled marbled steak, viscera had been frozen mid-action as they tumbled out of the torso, coalescing as horrid, olive-green sausage.

  Something serrated and high-powered; my guess was a chain saw.

  Milo stared, marched to the second duffel.

  Solved the jigsaw puzzle that had once been Trey Franck.

  CHAPTER

  38

  The Gulfstream's cabin smelled of fresh flowers, apples, and tequila.

  Tristram Wydette's long frame stretched the length of a brocade sofa on the plane's port side, a copy of Hustler tented over his face. Breathing slowly, evenly. One manicured hand brushed the carpet. Near his fingers sat a chrome-plated iPod.

  Quinn Glover, larger and heavier in real life, with the bland good looks of a budding politico, sat with his feet up, wearing eyeshades, sucking from a bottle of Silver Patron and bopping in time to whatever tune-buzz his gold-plated iPod was offering.

  Both boys wore camouflage cargo pants and tight black T-shirts that showcased muscular builds. Combat boots and dirty white socks littered the aisle.

  Uniformed for a mission.

  Milo yanked Quinn up first, had him cuffed, belted into his chair, eyes and ears exposed, before his mouth could close.

  Tristram remained asleep. Milo flipped him like a pancake, yanked out his earbuds.

&nb
sp; Both boys gaped.

  Milo said, "You guys watch a lot of TV?"

  Blank stares.

  "I'm sure you know the drill, but here goes: Tristram Wydette, you are under arrest for murder. You have the right to keep your stupid mouth shut, whether or not you talk really doesn't matter squat to me..."

  The evolution of each boy's facial expression was as uniform as their getup: drowsy surprise morphing to cornered-animal shock, upgrading to terror, then tears.

  Milo called for backup and we watched them sob.

  Worth the price of admission.

  CHAPTER

  39

  Battalion One: high-priced lawyers.

  Battalion Two: high-priced publicists.

  An attempt to curry favor at the Times because Myron Wydette played golf with the publisher backfired and the resulting self-righteous indignation was borderline slapstick. Wags insisted the real problem was Wydette cheated at the game and his greens buddy finally had enough.

  The palm print found on Sal Fidella's garage matched Quinn Glover's hand. Faced with that addition to the mountain of eyewitness and forensic evidence, Quinn's legal commandos tried selling out Tristram Wydette in return for a lighter sentence, pushing the notion that Quinn was a weak-willed follower caught in the spell of Tristram Wydette's evil charisma.

  Tristram, his former best friend claimed, had masterminded the whole thing because getting into Stanford was the most important thing in the world to him, he felt like the stupid kid in the family, Aidan was the brainiac.

  When told that Aidan had also used Trey Franck as an SAT surrogate, the boy was genuinely surprised. "No shit. What was his problem?"

  "You tell me, Quinn," said Milo.

  "He always seemed smart to me."

  "Maybe he just wasn't smart enough."

  "Yeah. Sir. You're right." Laughter.

  "Something funny, Quinn?"

  "I guess he just fucked up. Sir. I guess we all did."

  "That's a fair assessment."

  "Assessment," said Quinn. "That's an SAT vocab word. 'The act or instance of evaluating.'"

  "How do you assess your situation, Quinn?"

  "It was T's idea, sir. I didn't like it, what could I do?"

  "No choice at all."

  "Exactly, sir. T thought of the dee-ice, T put her--Ms. Freeman--in it. He also bashed in that loser's head--we were gonna shoot him--T was gonna shoot him but we forgot the gun at T's house and we already drove all the way there so T said let's just do it."

  "How'd it go down?"

  "Loser came to the door, we--T pushed him in, saw the pool cue and bashed him."

  Milo said, "There was no sign of a serious struggle, Quinn. That means Mr. Fidella was restrained."

  "If you say so, sir."

  "Be a lot easier for two big guys to restrain one middle-aged loser."

  The boy's lawyer, silent and working his iPhone till now, said, "I'd prefer he doesn't answer that."

  Milo didn't protest. "So T bashed in the loser's head. Then what?"

  "Then T got into the Jag."

  "And you drove away in the loser's Corvette."

  The lawyer said, "I'd prefer if--"

  "And I'd prefer not to waste my time, Mr. Neal. Grand Theft Auto is not your client's problem."

  "It's not a matter of that, it's a matter of--"

  Milo stood. Motioned to me to do the same.

  "That's it?" said Quinn.

  "According to Mr. Neal it is, son." To the attorney: "So far, I haven't heard anything of a 'forthcoming nature' and John Nguyen won't take kindly to that. Particularly in light of multiple victims, murder for gain, extreme depravity, lying in wait--"

  "Fine," said Neal. "He drove the car."

  We sat back down.

  Milo said, "You drove off in Mr. Fidella's Corvette."

  "Piece-of-shit wheels," said Quinn. "Made all sorts of noises." Smiling and hoping it caught on.

  "Then what happened?"

  Client glanced at counsel. Counsel nodded.

  "We went to Tristram's house and stored it in the garage. His dad's got a huge garage, twenty cars in there."

  "Then what?"

  "Nothing until the next day, then Tristram took the Jag and I took the piece of shit, I almost thought it wouldn't make it."

  "Make it where?"

  "Pasadena."

  "What's in Pasadena?"

  "His place."

  "Whose place?"

  "Him. The nerd who took the test."

  "Trey Franck."

  "Yeah--yes, sir."

  "Why'd you go there?"

  "T said it was like his mom, she's crazy about being neat, doesn't matter if you leave a speck of cookie on the couch or you take a dump on it, she's going to freak out. So we had to go all the way."

  "No sense leaving a speck of mess," said Milo.

  "Exactly, sir. We had to be thorough."

  "How'd it go down with Trey Franck?"

  "The plan was we were going to knock on the door, say it was a friend or something, but right after we got there, he came out of the building and started walking. We drove up to him, it was dark, no one was around, so we jumped out and held him and cold-cocked him. He wimped out totally, like out."

  "We?"

  "T did the shooting."

  "Who did the cold-cocking?"

  Pause. "I guess that was me. But T held him and kicked him in the balls, by the time I hit him he was pretty much out of it. I didn't hit him that hard."

  "What happened next?"

  "T drove him and I followed in the Corvette."

  "Where was Mr. Franck?"

  "In the trunk of the Jag. T had him tied up with these plastic thingies."

  A fact verified by traces of Trey Franck's saliva and blood in the rear compartment of the freshly vacuumed and detailed car.

  "You were following in Sal Fidella's Corvette."

  "Yes, sir."

  "Where'd you go?"

  "We drove to this place, T knew it 'cause his cousin has a ranch near there and his dad took him hiking and shooting up in the mountains there when he was little."

  "Not recently?"

  "No way," said Quinn Glover. "He doesn't talk to his dad, hates his dad, thinks his dad hates him."

  "So you're at a spot T knew," said Milo.

  "T pulls him out of the trunk."

  "Was Franck conscious?"

  "Guess so," said Quinn Glover. "He was making these whimpery sounds, all curled up. T rolls him on his back, says, 'Guess you're not so smart, motherfucker,' and shoots him right here."

  Touching the center of a tan, unlined brow. "We tried to push the Vette down into the hole but it doesn't go, so T set it on fire and we booked."

  "After putting a baseball cap on the seat."

  "T's idea. Sir."

  "What was the reason?"

  "Blame it on someone else."

  "Who?"

  "Mexican dude, everyone knew he hated her."

  "Hated who?"

  "The bi--Ms. Freeman."

  "How'd everyone know?"

  "Dude told anyone who'd listen. She didn't like him, either."

  "Elise Freeman complained about Martin Mendoza?"

  "Yeah."

  "To you, specifically?"

  "When we came for tutoring, yeah," said Quinn Glover.

  "How'd the topic of Martin Mendoza come up?"

  "He was leaving and we were coming in, we said, 'You tutor him?' 'Cause she was expensive, you know, and the dude didn't have money. She said, 'Unfortunately. Apparently my job description includes those people.' Or something like that. Sir."

  "Which you took to mean?"

  "She didn't like Mexicans."

  "What'd you say to that?"

  "Nothing," said the boy.

  "But you thought of it later, when you and T decided to blame the murders on Martin."

  "T's idea."

  "What'd you do with Franck's body?"

  "Wiped it off with some rags from the Jag, then
put him back in the Jag."

  "Then what?"

  "You know."

  "I know what?"

  "You saw him, sir. What T did."

  "T cut him up."

  "Yes, sir."

  "But the place you did it was your father's workshop, Quinn. All those tools he keeps back of your property for his woodworking."

  "He makes birdhouses." Muttering.

  "What's that, Quinn?"

  "Nothing."

  "What'd you just say, son?"

  "Lame. Making those stupid birdcages."

  "What use would a chain saw be for making birdcages?"

  "That's for the trees," said Quinn Glover. "We have some land in Washington, lots of trees, he likes to run around with the chain saw and saw them down. Says it's his release. Then he turns them into birdcages."

  "Guess your dad will need a new chain saw."

  "Guess so."

  Neal looked up. "Is this going to take a whole lot longer?"

  Milo ignored him. "Back to something you just said, Quinn. When you saw Martin Mendoza. 'We were coming in for tutoring.' Are you telling me you and T had joint tutoring sessions with Ms. Freeman? 'Cause the records recovered from the laptop we found in T's bedroom at home don't back that up. Same for Mr. Fidella's computer recovered from your room--he had copies of all Ms. Freeman's files."

  Quinn Glover licked his lips.

  Milo said, "You had individual sessions."

  "Yes, sir."

  "So maybe it was you who had that conversation with Ms. Freeman about Martin, not both of you."

  The lawyer said, "Don't answer that."

  We stood again.

  "Oh, c'mon, Lieutenant. You need to balance what he's given you with what he hasn't."

  "I need to?" said Milo.

  "You know what I mean, Lieutenant."

  "You're a lawyer, Mr. Neal. That means no one--including yourself--knows what you mean. Bye."

  "This is inappropriate and... impetuous!"

  "There you go," said Milo. "Two SAT words for the price of one."

  As details of the cheating scandal hit the national news, the Educational Testing Service announced a comprehensive review of all exams administered to Windsor Prep students over the past five years.

  Sal Fidella's computer files showed he'd contemplated finding additional blackmail victims after Elise's death. The files Tristram and Quinn had added concentrated on porn, tunes, photos from exotic car and motorcycle sites. Email correspondence between the boys indicated they viewed their murder spree with hilarity, wondered what it would feel like to do a girl.