Beyond a Doubt

by Nancy Cole Silverman

  I glanced at the clock. It was almost ten-thirty. Cate was still upstairs asleep. I needed to call Norma Jean Baker, a.k.a. Holly Wood, or whatever pseudonym she was using, and arrange three tickets for tonight’s pub crawl. Plus, I wanted to talk to Dr. Ericson. I needed to settle the question in my own mind about Gabi’s boyfriend: if he was involved with her disappearance, or if it was related in some way to that of Monica Channing and the other missing girls. Thank goodness college kids sleep late.

  CHAPTER 11

  There’s a grab-and-go on the second level of the UCLA Medical Center. It’s located directly above the staircase near the lobby, and it’s where I planned to meet with Dr. Ericson. He was running late, so I got a cup of coffee from one of the vending machines, settled myself at a small table in the corner directly across from the entry, and prepared to wait. I had called the hospital after I got off the phone with Detective Browne and told him Gabi and I were friends and that I had information, something he might find helpful. I didn’t elaborate. It was a white lie for sure, but enough of a connection that he agreed to meet right away.

  I was halfway through my coffee when Dr. Ericson appeared in the doorway. I could have picked him out of a lineup. Not that he looked guilty, but exhausted. He was dressed in a white lab coat, a stethoscope around his neck, and badly in need of a shave. I figured between Gabi’s disappearance and his nonstop schedule at the hospital, he hadn’t slept in days.

  “Dr. Ericson?” I started to stand. He shook his head, indicating I should remain seated, and grabbed the chair opposite me.

  “Call me Miles.” He took a deep breath and ran his long surgeon’s fingers through his short, stylishly cut hair. “Just how well did you know Gabi? She never mentioned you.”

  “Actually, we were really more like business associates.” I explained how we’d met at a mutual client’s office when I was still working in sales. “Ironic, isn’t it, how Gabi was once on-air, and now she’s in sales and I’m here.”

  “So you’re a reporter then?”

  I nodded.

  “This is crazy. The police think I had something to do with Gabi’s disappearance. But that’s insane. I love Gabi. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt her. She’s everything to me. Smart. Sexy. Funny. This whole thing’s just a mix-up. They’ll see. This’ll all blow over, and she’ll come home.”

  “Has she ever disappeared before?” I was fishing for some nervous twitch to tell me he was lying. I didn’t see anything. His eyes held steady on mine.

  “Sometimes. I told the police she’d left before. Gabi could get frustrated. She was worried about her job—not making her sales quota. She didn’t think her boss liked her—you know how it goes. And with me working all the time, sometimes she’d just take off. She’d go clubbing or to a spa for the weekend. Palm Springs was her favorite. Sometimes she’d visit with her family, but she’d always come home.”

  “Had you been arguing?”

  His eyes flashed to the window. He looked like he might have been recalling a previous experience.

  “We had our problems. First year residency can be tough on relationships. Money’s tight and time even more so. But Gabi was onboard with everything. So we decided to move in together. Gabi’s parents were the problem. They’re old-fashioned and weren’t happy about my moving in. I think her dad was afraid he would be subsidizing my living expenses and that I’d leave when I finished my residency. But that’s not going to happen. Her dad could be a real jerk.”

  “That couldn’t have been easy. Particularly if Gabi was close to her folks.”

  “It was ridiculous. I love Gabi, but if I wasn’t home every night, her folks were filling her head with all kinds of nonsense. And with the pressures of her job, she wasn’t feeling secure about a lot of things, so we argued. Part of it was my fault. I was feeling the pressure, and I’m not in a position to offer her anything. So, lately, I started spending more and more time at the hospital, sleeping there when I really could have come home. I needed to get things straight in my own head.”

  “It got that bad?”

  “Worse. Look, I’m telling you this because if Gabi doesn’t show up soon, I know the police are going to find a reason to arrest me. Right now we’re just talking. I’m their ‘person of interest.’” He finger quoted the words. “I told them I don’t know where she is, that I didn’t have anything to do with her disappearance, but you know how the police are. They’re talking to everybody. Her parents. Her boss. The neighbors. And I can just imagine what they’re saying.”

  “So, the last time you saw her, you argued?”

  “Yes. It was a Sunday. I had the day off. We were finally going to have some time to ourselves, but we got into this stupid argument, and I left. I’m sure the neighbors heard. The apartment walls are pretty thin.”

  “And when you came home, she was gone?”

  “I didn’t come home Sunday night. I went back to the hospital and didn’t come home until Wednesday morning, early. I was planning on taking a nap and making dinner. I wanted it ready and waiting for her when she came in. I had been doing a lot of thinking and decided I needed to make more of a commitment to Gabi. I felt it would help her with her parents and make her feel more secure if I did.”

  He paused and looked like he was considering what to say next.

  “So what did you do?”

  “This.” He reached inside the pocket of his pants, took out a thin yellow receipt, and slid it across the table. “I had been carrying around my mother’s wedding ring for better than a month. She left it to me when she died five years ago. It’s all I have left from her. Finally, I decided to have it remounted to fit Gabi. I wanted her to have it as an engagement ring. I was going to give it to her next week.”

  He stared down at the receipt, his eyes distant.

  “And when you came home Wednesday morning, that’s when you realized she was gone?”

  “By the time I got back to the apartment, Gabi’s car was still parked in the drive. She should have been at work, so I checked to see if there was a problem, but the tank was full, and it started up okay. I figured she couldn’t have gone far, maybe walked around the corner to the store. Her purse was gone and the newspaper was still on the front porch. It didn’t make sense. So I called her work, and they said she hadn’t come in. Hey, I was the one who reported her missing. That ought to say something, shouldn’t it?”

  I took a sip of my coffee and considered what Miles had said. He looked tired, the lines around his eyes strained, and not just from lack of sleep, but worry. He didn’t look like a guilty boyfriend. At least not to me.

  “You said Gabi liked to go clubbing...that sometimes she’d go out by herself.”

  “Yeah. She’d go to the clubs on Hollywood Boulevard. It’s close to the apartment, and one of the clients she had on the air is the old Roosevelt Hotel. They’d comp her dinner on occasion. Last week, before all this happened, we went together and afterwards walked down the boulevard to Hemingway’s.” He looked down at the table again, his shoulders slumped, his eyes closed as he recounted the memory.

  “Did you meet anyone there?”

  “No, it was just the two of us.”

  I paused. I needed to know exactly how much he knew about Monica Channing’s disappearance. If he also thought they might be related.

  “I’m sorry to ask, but you were gone a lot, working long hours. Did Gabi maybe fill her time surfing the internet? Maybe have online relationships? Someone she might have met from time to time, or gone clubbing with?”

  He looked at me like I’d just slapped him across the face.

  “Did she say that?”

  “No. No, not at all. It’s just, Monica Channing, the judge’s daughter who disappeared last week, she looked a lot like Gabi. They lived in the same area of town, and the police believe she was carrying on with someone—”

  “No way.” He sh
ook his head. “Absolutely not. Gabi wasn’t playing around online or meeting up with strange men. We loved—love—each other.”

  He stumbled and paused. His hands clasped together before his face, his knuckles white.

  “But you’re not a hundred percent certain, are you? And the police aren’t listening to you?”

  He shook his head. “No. They’re not. All I know is that Gabi’s smart, and that whatever happened, I want her to come home. I love her.”

  He sounded convinced. He had probably replayed every conversation and analyzed every nuanced move she had made before her disappearance a thousand times in his mind. He was clearly searching for answers. I felt for him. I believed him. Dammit, if he had told me red velvet crumb cake was calorie free, I’d trust the man. As far as I was concerned, both Dr. Miles Ericson and my favorite dessert were guilt-free.

  CHAPTER 12

  Eric called when I was in the car. I was surprised to see his number come up on the Jeep’s hands-free screen. The Sea Mistress is loaded with high frequency radio transmitters and the fact that he was calling via his cellphone and not on one of the free channels assigned for ship-to-shore communications made me wonder if he might actually be home. Unfortunately, I wasn’t alone. Cate and Sheri were with me. It was almost nine o’clock, and we were dressed for a girls’ night out, headed to the pub crawl on Hollywood Boulevard.

  “Hey, babe, it’s me.” Just the sound of his voice, like velvet, triggered a warm visceral reaction. My heart started to beat a little faster, my palms sweating. He sounded like he was almost purring. “What are you wearing?”

  I gripped the wheel. In the rearview mirror I saw my daughter, eyes wide, her hand over her mouth, laughing. Sheri, riding shotgun next to me, turned with her fingers to her lips and indicated for Cate to zip it.

  “Actually…” I cleared my throat. “I’m dressed in a short black cocktail dress with heels, and…Sheri’s got on a little sequined number and Cate, she’s here with us, too, and she’s wearing…” I looked back at her reflection in the mirror. “Just what is it you have on, Catie?”

  Eric laughed. “So you’re not alone?”

  “That would be a good assumption on your part.”

  I could picture Eric on the deck of the Sea Mistress, her white sails billowing beneath a full moon with the wind in his hair, leaning against the ship’s wheel, the black water slipping like moonlit glass beneath her hull.

  “Sorry ’bout that. I didn’t realize I was interrupting.” He added that they were just north of Puerto Vallarta and wanted to call to say hello. He was thinking of me.

  I explained I was doing some research. Monica Channing’s disappearance had now turned into a full-fledged murder, and I was investigating a possible connection to several other missing girls and the Hollywood nightclub scene. Hence, we were headed for a pub crawl.

  “And Sheri and Cate didn’t think I should be out all by myself—not on a Saturday night—so they came along.”

  “Sorry I can’t be there.”

  I quickly changed the subject and mentioned I’d run into Mark Delfino at the press conference. “He said to say hello; however, I think he really misses Sheri’s cooking and was looking for an excuse to get together for dinner again. You know, a home cooked meal.”

  “Dinner, huh?” I could tell Eric had been missing more than dinner, but he covered politely and added, “Tell Sheri we’ve got a boatload of tuna. She can make up some of that guacamole tuna she likes, and if I get back early, maybe the four of us can set sail for Catalina before I have to go back to work.”

  Catalina? Sheri mouthed the word and muffled a laugh. Both she and Cate knew just the thought of sailing caused my stomach to churn.

  “Sounds like a plan,” I said. I hung up the phone and rolled my eyes. Eric’s Sea Mistress was like the other woman in his life. He’d bought her at auction after she’d been confiscated from drug smugglers and took great pride restoring her to her full glory. He wanted so much for us to all get along. I couldn’t wait to see Eric, but the Sea Mistress…I’d almost prefer if she were another woman—at least that I could handle.

  My instructions for the pub crawl required we meet Holly at her office on Gower, just south of Hollywood Boulevard. Her note indicated it was walking distance from the famed intersection of Hollywood and Vine and that we’d find plenty of parking in back of the small white craftsman cottage. A fence post sign next to the drive read “Holly Wood Tours.” Both the house and the white picket fence that surrounded it looked out of sorts for the neighborhood that was mostly office buildings and high-rise complexes. But what really surprised me was the brand new Rolls Royce parked out front. Not that a Rolls is unusual in Hollywood, but I didn’t think it belonged to Holly.

  Equally as surprising was the young woman who stood on the porch to the house. Holly waved as my red Jeep pulled into the lot. This wasn’t the Norma Jean Baker I’d met just a little over twenty-four hours ago. Instead of the Marilyn Monroe lookalike, standing on the front porch, wearing a short, plaid, pleated skirt with red suspenders and combat boots with her dark hair spiked like a rocker, was this new persona, Miss Holly Wood.

  “Holly?” As I approached I noticed a nose ring and a tattoo on the back of her neck. Something she must have covered with heavy makeup yesterday.

  “At your service.” She bowed. Then looking at me she raised a pierced brow. “You didn’t think I was really a blonde, did you?”

  “Hardly,” I said, and masking my surprise, added, “I was actually thinking brunette. Probably a little more Judy Garland than—”

  “Marilyn Manson?” she laughed, referring to the often controversial musician. “I get that a lot. But, hey, a girl’s got to have a look and for now, this is working for me.”

  I introduced Cate and Sheri and knew instantly there was a problem. Holly looked at me sternly then back at Cate, the commando boots really setting the tone.

  “She twenty-one? ’Cause you didn’t tell me you were bringing a minor.” I could hear the constraint in her voice. Already I was beginning to wish I’d come alone. “’Cause if she isn’t, I gotta give her a pink wristband, and there’s certain clubs she can’t go into—unless you sign a waiver—and then you’ll have to agree she won’t order anything stronger than a Shirley Temple. You okay with that?” She glared at Cate and then back at me, her eyes like steel rods to my own, challenging me.

  I looked at Cate. “Perhaps this wasn’t the best idea, maybe you and Sheri ought to—”

  “No.” Cate stepped forward. “I’m fine with it. Just bring me the silly wristband.”

  Holly looked back to me for verification. I nodded, it’d be fine, and she suggested we take a seat on the porch. Another group was coming in from Universal City via the Fun Bus and would be joining us shortly. They were stuck in traffic.

  “Like, who isn’t in LA?” Sheri joked, trying to lighten the mood.

  Holly shrugged, cocked her head like we were generational disconnects—totally out of it—then excused herself, saying she needed to get us wristbands for tonight’s tour, and disappeared back into the cottage. I could tell we weren’t getting off to the best of all possible starts.

  Moments later, Holly’s Fun Bus, an open-air van, pulled into the drive. The passengers, all young and good-looking, appeared as though they were already well lubricated and were dressed for a night of revelry: the men in sport coats and slacks, the women in anything short and sassy, revealing lots of skin, beautifully tanned or airbrushed, and all wearing impossibly tall heels. Like cattle, they shuttled out of the van, the men stopping to help their high-heeled-hobbled girlfriends down the steps. They joined us on the porch.

  Holly reappeared from inside the cottage. She looked harried and locked the door behind her. Then, pulling a small stepstool out from beneath one of the wicker couches, she stood up on it. The effect gave her small stature the advantage of height over the
crowd. Like a fitness instructor on speed, she welcomed the group and explained our itinerary for tonight’s festivities.

  “Are you ready for an awesome night, folks?” With her hand above her head she pumped the air, while around us, members of the crowd responded enthusiastically. “’Cause we are gonna have one hell of a time.”

  Rules for the crawl were easy. There’d be no lines and no cover charges. All we had to do was wear our green scrunchie wristbands and stick with the group. This was a walking tour. Holly would wave her tour-wand above her head and point out some of the highlights along the boulevard as we passed by, but most importantly, when we came to one of the clubs on tonight’s tour, we’d be fast tracked to the front of the line. There were more cheers at that.

  “And, if you decide you want to stay at one of the clubs, just let me know. I’ll need your wristband back. But until then, keep ’em on.” Holly held up a handful of the neon green bands and started to throw them into the crowd. “So, that’s it, folks. If you’re ready…follow me.”

  Holly tossed me a pink wristband for Cate to wear. “Make sure she stays with you. Last thing we need is another missing girl out here.” She sounded annoyed and pushed ahead, moving the group off the porch and towards the boulevard, leaving me to bring up the rear.

  I stopped next to the white fence post and told Sheri and Cate to go on ahead. I needed to adjust my heels. In an effort to appear stylish I’d grabbed a new pair of shoes, and my feet were killing me already. I leaned up next to the post, massaged my toes and was about to replace my shoes when I noticed a shadow from within the cottage pass the window. Odd. I’d seen Holly lock the door. I didn’t think anyone was left inside. I waited. Then the porch light went out, and a man came outside, stood on the porch and lit a cigarette. For a moment I thought I must be seeing a holograph.