You think you know me pretty well (an Alex Sedaka thriller)

by David Kessler

  “I know now that there’s a limit to what you can wash away. There were probably traces of my father’s brains on the T-shirt. The trouble was, while I was over the hysteria, Dorothy had just hit panic mode.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she’d remembered that she’d loaded the revolver. Her prints were on the shells. And I’d left it there!”

  22:28 PDT

  Nat was driving frantically, trying to put it all together. Alex had decided on the spur of the moment to go to Jonathan’s place. Why? Something was going on … but what? Was Juanita holding something back? Why was she being cagey?

  By this stage, Nat was panicking himself. He had to find out.

  With a press of a button on his cell phone, he called Juanita again.

  “I was just wondering if we’d heard any more news from David.”

  A pause.

  “Why do you ask?”

  She sounded suspicious.

  “Well the way I see it we’ve run out of options unless David can come up with something that we can take to the governor.”

  “David was attacked in the lab. Or just outside it.”

  “Holy shit!”

  She told him the details as Alex had described them to her.

  “So now we’ve got nothing,” Nat said, sounding sorrowful.

  “Not unless Jonathan gives us something. Oh … and the other platter.”

  “What other platter?”

  “Well whoever attacked David didn’t know that one of the platters from the hard disk was still inside the microscope.”

  22:32 PDT

  “I wanted to go back and retrieve the gun – or go there with gloves and wipe her prints off the shells,” Jonathan said. “It was a revolver so we’d have had to take each of them out and wipe them.”

  “That would have been risky wouldn’t it? I mean they might have found the body already?”

  “I know. I mean, Dorothy realized that at the time. That’s why she wouldn’t let me do it.”

  “And that’s why she had to flee?”

  “Exactly. She knew that they’d dust the shells for prints and it would only be a matter of time before they matched the dabs to hers.”

  “Did she have a rap sheet?” asked Alex, surprised.

  “No, but we figured they’d check with the CDMV.”

  Alex nodded approvingly at Nat’s sharp logic – or possibly Dorothy’s. The California Department of Motor Vehicles kept thumbprint records of drivers licensed by the State.

  “You think they’d check?”

  “Sooner or later. And with murders, they always consider other members of the family and check their prints. They’d know it wasn’t a robbery, because nothing was taken.”

  “But I don’t understand one thing. Edgar Olsen’s death was accepted as suicide. How could that have happened if neither of you went back to stage the crime scene and make it look like suicide?”

  “I don’t know. That’s something that I’ve never been able to figure out. All I know is that, up until the time Dorothy left, the police and the coroner were staying tight-lipped. After she fled, I found out that they were treating it as suicide. But by then it was too late to tell her. I’d lost all contact with her.”

  “And did they say why they accepted it as suicide?”

  “Well the entry wound was in his right temple. I mean, that makes perfect sense ’cause he turned away just before I fired. But there was something else … something that didn’t make any sense at all.”

  “What”

  “They said the gun was in his right hand.”

  “But you said you dropped the gun on the floor after wiping it?”

  “I did!”

  “Then someone else must have put the gun in his hand.”

  22:36 PDT

  Juanita had isolated the strips that she felt were most likely to form part of the fax from London and was now making the first strides in sticking them together. Because she had been so careful about skimming the strips off the top of the pile, she was actually finding it surprisingly easy. The hardest part was sticking the strips together.

  So far she had managed to align fourteen strips. They appeared to be from the left of the page; they included the signature. The signature itself was illegible. But the name typed underneath it was unmistakable: Stuart Lloyd. And underneath that was the title “Chief Administrator.”

  So that nurse was wrong. He hadn’t gone home early. He had sent them this letter.

  22:41 PDT

  “Look, Jonathan,” said Alex quietly. “I meant what I said before: I can’t condemn you for what you did. It it’s not my place to judge you. But what you did then was on the spur of the moment. And it was against a man who had wronged your sister. But I haven’t wronged Dorothy… or you.”

  Jonathan looked at him, confused.

  “I never said you did.”

  “Then would you…?”

  He raised his restrained hand as high as the handcuff could allow. There was a tinkling sound as the other cuff rattled against the radiator pipe.

  “Oh! Yes… sorry!”

  Jonathan crouched down with the key and unlocked the handcuff round Alex’s wrist. Alex rubbed it.

  “Look, Jonathan. I can’t represent you myself. There would be a conflict of interest. But I have friends in the legal profession and I can get you a good lawyer.”

  “Thanks,” said Jonathan absently. He seemed to be in a trance.

  “I don’t suppose I could have my phone back?”

  “Sure,” said Jonathan, handing the iPhone back to him. Alex switched it on and noticed that there were several messages. He called his voicemail to hear them. Several of the messages were from Juanita. She didn’t say what she wanted, just asked him to call her whenever he could. There was no particular urgency in her tone.

  But then there was one from another familiar voice.

  “Hi, Alex, listen it’s Lee – Lee Kelly. I’m at the police station again. Look … I’m sorry… I got caught. I mean, Nat caught me.”

  Alex froze.

  “I don’t know if he was suspicious of me. I mean, he called the police and held me until they came for me, but I don’t know how much he figured out. I just wanted to let you know, because he might be onto you. I mean, he might have realized that you’re onto him.

  “But the point is, I found something and it’s something quite incredible. I don’t want to say over the phone, but I just want you to know that I’ve found something that’ll just about knock your socks off! So please get here ASAP!”

  22:46 PDT

  When Alex got into his car, a pair of eyes was watching him. Even if the man who watched him hadn’t seen Alex’s car outside the apartment building, he’d known that Alex was going to be there because Juanita had told him.

  It didn’t take long. Within a few minutes of his arrival, he saw Alex leave the building, get in his car and drive off. Nat waited a few moments longer and then entered the building. He walked up to the third storey and rang the doorbell.

  “Who is it?” asked Jonathan.

  “It’s me,” Nat replied.

  The door opened in a flash and they stood there face to face. There was a moment of tension when neither of them spoke, then Jonathan smiled.

  “Come in.”

  He stepped aside and Nat entered. Jonathan closed the door.

  They looked at each other awkwardly, as if neither wanted to be the first to break the ice.

  “So…” said Nat hesitantly. “We finally get to meet.”

  “Yes,” said Jonathan with a smile. “Finally.”

  Again the awkward silence. Again it was up to Nat to break it.

  “So … er … What did Alex want?”

  “He wanted to know about Edgar’s death.”

  “Does he suspect something?”

  “More than just suspect. He was sure it was murder even before he came here.”

  “And what did you tell him?”

  “I told him the trut
h.”

  “What?”

  “Why not?” There was no life in Jonathan’s voice. “I’m tired of lying. I’m tired of all the secrets.”

  “But you’ve put yourself in jeopardy.”

  “You don’t understand. I don’t care anymore. I just want all this to end.”

  “It is going to end.” Nat looked at his watch. “In just over an hour.”

  “Will it?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Will it end?”

  “Of course it’ll end. No one’s going to campaign for a dead man. No one cares about the dead. That’s why you should have blamed Dorothy for your father’s death.”

  “Why?”

  “Because, Jonathan, it’s always a good idea to blame the dead. They can’t answer back.”

  There was an impish smile on Nat’s face when he said this and, after looking at him for a moment in mild surprise, Jonathan’s face melted into a smile.

  23:02 PDT

  “I didn’t tell them anything. I’m not going to snitch on you! I wouldn’t do that! But you’ve got to help me. I don’t want to go to jail again – not at my age.”

  Lee Kelly was in a state of panic when Alex got to the police station. He hadn’t sounded this agitated when he left his message. Then he was more concerned about letting Alex know what he had found. But now he had had time to think about it and the alarm bells were ringing in his head about the fate that awaited him.

  He hadn’t yet fallen afoul of the three strikes rule, because this was the first time in his life that he had been caught breaking into domestic premises – indeed the first time in his life that he had done it since the three strikes law was introduced. But the fact that they were domestic premises made it likely that he would get at least some kind of custodial sentence. And the fact that he went out and did the job right after being released on bail would also count heavily against him.

  One thing was for certain: he wouldn’t make bail this time. He knew it and Alex wasn’t even going to ask for it. In the meantime, Alex wanted to know what Lee had found that had got him so excited.

  “First of all I found Dorothy’s passport.”

  “Her passport?”

  “Yes. From way back when.”

  “Well let’s see it!”

  “They took it away from me.”

  “Shit! Did they say anything?”

  “No, they didn’t take it away as evidence. They just listed it as one of my possessions and bagged it up with the rest.”

  Alex was relieved. He knew that he could get it. If it was classified as evidence in this case, then he’d have to file a discovery motion and it would take an eternity – far too long to help Burrow. But if it was simply listed as one of Lee’s possessions, then he could get Lee to sign a property release in his favor and they would hand it straight over to him.

  “I don’t suppose you took a peek inside, did you?”

  Lee smiled a mischievous smile that belied his age.

  “Sure did.”

  “And?”

  “It showed a stamp for when she entered England. But I couldn’t see any sign that she ever left.”

  “Then how did Nat get it?” Alex wondered out loud.

  “Could he have followed her there?”

  “That’s what I’m wondering.”

  “There was something else I found. I don’t know if it’s significant. It’s just strange the way I found it.”

  “What do you mean.”

  “Well as I was putting the passport in my pocket, something fell out. I looked down and it was a picture – a photo.”

  “The passport photo? What, like, it was loose?”

  “No, it wasn’t the passport photo. It was another photo. It must have been tucked inside one of the pages of the passport.”

  “Well what was it a picture of?”

  “Just some broad. She looked a bit like the girl in the passport, but maybe a bit older.”

  “Older?”

  Alex was getting excited.

  “I don’t know if it was the same woman. It probably wasn’t. I just thought it was interesting that it was tucked inside the passport. I mean, if the passport is significant then maybe the picture tucked inside it was too. Otherwise why put it there?”

  “Well did you make sure they didn’t lose the picture when they bagged it up?”

  “I did better than that. I got to keep the picture. I told them it was my mom and they let me keep it.”

  For a moment Alex was a bit skeptical about this. But then he remembered how convincing a talker Lee could be. It was the most effective item in his burglar’s tool kit.

  “So you’ve still got it?

  “Sure.”

  Lee reached into his pocket and took out the small picture. He handed it over to Alex. The lawyer took one look at it and froze.

  In an instant, Alex had recognized the woman in the picture: it was a young Esther Olsen.

  23:05 PDT

  Nat closed the door behind him, trying not to make a noise.

  It was sad really. It had taken them so long to finally meet and yet he couldn’t stick round. There was somewhere he had to be by midnight, indeed before midnight.

  He felt guilty about many things. Guilty about hurting people he loved. Guilty about lying to people who trusted him. Guilty about not having made the right choices in life.

  In many ways, he realized, he and Clayton Burrow were kindred spirits. But in other crucial respects they were different. Nat had ideals. Even now – doing what he was doing – he still had ideals.

  Maybe he was making up his own rules, instead of following those of society. Maybe the world would not approve of what he was doing. Jonathan had been right when he said there was sins of omission as well as commission.

  But the one thing Nathaniel Anderson knew was that he had to stick to his path. He had chosen it and now he was going to follow it to the end of the road, regardless of the temptations to stop or go astray.

  The only thing he regretted was that he couldn’t share the end with Jonathan. Jonathan was entitled to witness the crowning moment. But Jonathan couldn’t be there with him.

  As he got in his car and drove off, Nat felt an almost physical twinge of pain in the pit of his stomach at leaving Jonathan in that state.

  23:07 PDT

  Alex was still thinking about the picture as he waited for the case officer.

  To judge by the all-too-familiar Budweiser can in the hand of a toga-clad youth in the background, it looked like it was taken at a frat party. The thought brought back a flood of memories from his own student days – those wild nights of carousing and getting laid – not always with protection. He was never as wild as the worst of the frat boys, but not quite the nerdy scholar that Juanita had imagined him to be.

  Even Melody had been less than an angel, as he discovered when she gave in to his urging in the back of his blue Pontiac Firebird. The resulting pregnancy hadn’t exactly forced them into marriage – that was on the cards anyway – but it had certainly hastened it.

  No, there was nothing unusual in a pretty girl smiling for the birdie at a drunken frat party. The question was why should Nat have such a picture? Where did he get it and why had he kept it? The same of course applied – in spades – to Dorothy’s passport.

  He was still struggling to think of a reason when the case officer entered. Alex was surprised that it was an African-American woman, in her mid-thirties – a tall, striking woman of exquisite complexion with an athletic build.

  “Hallo, Mr. Sedaka, my name is Grace Nightingale. Sergeant Grace Nightingale. I’m the case officer in the Lee Kelly case. I understand you asked to see me.”

  “Yes. Thank you for agreeing to see me at such short notice.”

  Despite his professionalism, he felt a wave of attraction for her.

  “What can I do for you?”

  Alex quickly outlined the background to the Clayton Burrow case, the fact there was circumstantial evidence that Dorothy
had gone to England, the fact that the passport confirmed this and the fact that Nat was actually his legal intern. In his effort to summarize these facts in the shortest possible time, he effectively gabbled and he realized that it probably sounded to Sergeant Nightingale that he was on the verge of hysteria.

  “Look, Mr. Sedaka, this is all very interesting, but I’m not involved in the Clayton Burrow case in any way. And I don’t really see what this has to do with the burglary at Nathaniel Anderson’s house – apart from the coincidence of one of your clients taking it into his head to burglarize the home of one of your employees.”

  Alex shifted uncomfortably. He wasn’t sure how much she had surmised or how far her speculations had carried her.

  “Okay, I’ll cut to the chase. We can use this passport to prove that Dorothy Olsen went to England. So in that sense, the passport is evidence in a capital case and could save a man who is due to be executed in less than an hour.”

  “And you want me to release the passport as evidence in this other case? But why didn’t you just get your client to sign a release for it? Until you told me this, it was listed as one of his possessions, not as an exhibit in the case against him. Now that you’ve told me this it’s a whole different ball game. I have to contact Mr. Anderson and ask him if he wishes to include the passport in the complaint. You can probably file a discovery motion, but I don’t see how we can get anything done in the next fifty minutes.”

  “No, you don’t understand. I’m not asking you to release the passport. If I’d wanted that, I wouldn’t have told you all this. I’d have just got Kelly to sign a release and got the passport that way.”

  “Now you’re really lost me.”