Lara Phillips, formerly Lara Krieger, threw a good tantrum of self-pity over the life and death of her sister. I had no reason to doubt her sincerity.
But Lara never asked who Katz Meow was, and she told Journey that a friend of Roxy’s hired me. I had never said the friend was Katz Meow—Lara made that conclusion on her own. Which meant Lara knew Katz Meow.
Plus Lara said Roxy brought disgrace to her family. What family? There was only Lara and Roxy; their parents were dead, and they had no other siblings. Or did she mean the family name? I caught the emphasis when Lara said, “to me.”
That stink-o-meter of mine was back at full tilt.
I drove off and found a café that offered a decent selection of shade-grown coffee. In my car, I mixed Peruvian dark roast with type B-negative I’d brought in a plastic bottle. I thumbed through the day’s issue of the Los Angeles Times to look busy while thinking about what happened at the church.
I didn’t need the nose of a retriever to smell the chemistry between Lara and Journey. He wore a ring to advertise his grief as a widower. How long ago had his wife died? Seven, eight years?
I flipped from the front page to the sports section.
How familiar were the reverend and Lara? Why hide the attraction? Perhaps to prevent the gossip that sprouts when a man—especially a minister—dates a woman less than half his age.
Maybe Lara and Journey were figuring an angle on how to present their relationship. He was widowed, she divorced. Evangelical churches were big on starting over. I didn’t see any reason why they couldn’t go public about their arrangement and not hide the fact they bumped uglies.
But the love life of these two wasn’t my concern except as how it might relate to Roxy’s murder.
I turned from sports back to metro.
Lara Phillips taught exercise classes in Reverend Journey’s church, a man she might or might not be porking. Dr. Mordecai Niphe sneaked here in the middle of the night. Journey bought the land for his church at a distressed price from Lucky Rosario in a deal facilitated by Councilwoman Petale Venin.
Lucky Rosario hobnobs with Cragnow Vissoom, porn king and former boss of Roxy Bronze. Did Journey ever meet with Cragnow?
There were a lot of slippery threads here but nothing tied to Roxy’s murder.
Who would gain the most from her death? Was Roxy killed out of revenge? Or to shut her up? If that was the case, what did she know?
I set the newspaper aside when I caught a name in the obituary. I read the notice, and the surprise made me cough up coffee and blood.
Fred Daniels, Roxy Bronze’s punk of an ex-husband, was dead.
CHAPTER 29
I read the obituary twice to make sure this was the same Fred Daniels I visited last week. The right age. Resident of Rosemead.
How did I miss his death? What happened to his sorry ass? Car accident? Was he murdered? The obituary wouldn’t say. My mistake for not keeping up with local news. Considering all the deaths in L.A., unless it was a celebrity, blink and you’d miss the mention.
The funeral was today at the Eden Memorial Cemetery in Mission Hills. Someone there could tell me when and how Daniels became worm food.
The cemetery occupied the apex of land where the San Diego and Golden State Freeways merged. Hearses and limousines clogged the lanes leading into the cemetery. Never figured on a traffic jam getting into the afterlife.
The parking lot was full, and I left my car down the block. The hot sun bore upon me like an electric iron. Once in the cemetery I paused in the shadow cast by a statue of the Virgin Mary atop a crypt. I removed my sunglasses and contacts. The uncomfortably bright sunlight made me squint as I scanned auras. No orange, only red. A few undulated in grief, most shimmered in boredom, and a couple burned with nervous, distracted thoughts.
I put my contacts and sunglasses back on. I approached a groundskeeper and asked if he knew which of the funerals was Daniels’s.
He shrugged. “Dunno.”
I asked again in Spanish.
“Aya,” he replied. “Con la chichona.” Over there. Where you’ll find the lady with the big ta-tas.
I thanked him and followed the direction of his finger toward a knot of people dressed in black. They faced a cheap casket covered with imitation wood paneling. I couldn’t see if an unusually busty woman was among them. When I got close I heard a balding man in white ministerial vestments—embroidered with sunbursts, dolphins, and marijuana leaves—mention Fred Daniels.
The “minister” babbled in New Age argle-bargle about loss and the deceased moving on to a better place. I stood in the back and scoped out the mourners. Everyone wore the same dutiful somber expression. Mostly women, mid-to-late twenties. Lots of tattoos and piercings. Fellow porn stars, coke heads, or both?
After mumbling his final words, the minister nodded to a pair of men in well-worn suits on opposite sides of the casket. They tripped the lowering device and the casket sank into the grave. Counting me, there were two dozen present and not one sob or moist eye. I surmised the mourners were here to bank karma points so when it was their turn for the big sleep, they wouldn’t get a lonely send-off.
A paunchy, bearded man wearing a ball cap and frayed necktie stood at the head of the grave. Mourners filed past. The minister handed out pamphlets and invited everyone to his “sanctuary.” No doubt the church of the burning doobie.
From within the small crowd, a short blonde so top heavy she looked like an inverted bowling pin came forward. She took a pamphlet from the minister and shook hands with the other man. She attracted the gaze of every male, as if her enormous chest had the gravitational pull of two Jupiters. The woman walked on tiptoes to keep the sharp heels of her sandals from plunging into the sod. She wore sunglasses big as snorkeling goggles and carried a leather purse on a strap looped over her shoulder.
Though I was sure I had never met the woman, she seemed familiar. I followed her into the cool shade of a maple tree. She raised the sunglasses and unmasked her face.
It was JJ Jizmee, retired porn star, famous for her all-natural size 42J bust. I was fifteen and coming to grips, so to speak, with my sexuality, when a high school buddy loaned me a videotape featuring JJ. Since then, those humongous boobs of hers had hovered over my bedtime fantasies like a pair of zeppelins from the planet Sex.
JJ fanned herself with the pamphlet. Moist strands of brassy hair clung to the sides of her face. She wore a black blazer over a matching skirt that fell to her knee. Her gray blouse was open and showed enough cleavage to swallow a man’s head.
Removing my sunglasses, I approached, smiling, which was easy. But it took a Herculean effort to look above her neck. I fixed on her blue-gray eyes and waited for the opportunity to remove my contacts. “I’m Felix Gomez.”
She raised an eyebrow, furrowing one half of her forehead. Her expression indicated, go on. Crow’s feet wrinkled the corners of her eyes, and an uneven tan showed through her makeup. A softening jawline and neck, as well as a thick middle, completed her matronly appearance.
I offered a business card and told her I was a private detective investigating the death of Roxy Bronze.
JJ clasped the card between long ultramarine-blue fingernails. She read the card and pointed toward the grave. “If you’ve come to interview Fred Daniels, you’re a little late.”
“Maybe you can help me, JJ.”
Her carmine red lips curved into that same smile she used to give to the camera before helping herself to a stiff cock. “JJ? I haven’t been called that in years. So you’re a fan?” She dropped my card into her purse and held out her hand. Heavy gold jewelry decorated her thumb, fingers, and wrist. “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Gomez.” Her grip was dry and firm.
“Felix, please. JJ, how well did you know Daniels?”
“I prefer my real name. Polly Smythe. I knew him well enough through the Open Hand in Reseda.”
“Small world.” Its staff was on my list of people to interview. Half of Roxy’s insurance money had gone t
o Barrios Unidos, the other half to Open Hand.
“You’ve heard of it?” she asked.
“Sure have. Could you tell me about the half a million dollars Open Hand got from Roxy’s insurance?”
The question blind-sided her. Polly blinked and worked her brow as her thoughts churned in surprise. “What are you getting at?”
“Someone dies and someone else gets a shitload of money as a result. Pretty strong motive for mischief.”
Polly’s complexion darkened. Her gaze stabbed me. “I ought to kick you in the balls for saying that. You’ve got no reason to be suspicious of me or anyone else at Open Hand.”
I needed to zap Polly and lead her away for questioning. With my peripheral vision, I noticed several people staring at us. “JJ…Polly, I’m here to find out what happened to Roxy, that’s all. I know that Open Hand and Barrio Unidos split the settlement. It’s in your trust accounts.”
Polly’s eyebrows slanted outward.
“Don’t look surprised, I’m a PI. Tell me you had nothing to do with her death and we’ll go from there.”
Her complexion lightened. “I had nothing to do with her death. I don’t know who killed her, and you want to find out. Then let me help.”
“You don’t buy how she got killed?”
“There’s a lot about Roxy I didn’t understand. Think about it. Olympic hopeful turns surgeon, then winds up doing porn. Psychologically she must have been all over the map.”
“That your professional opinion?” I asked.
“Only a casual observation from an acquaintance.”
Polly certainly came across as forthright. I’d hold off on the hypnosis.
She fanned herself again with the pamphlet. “Who’s your client?”
Normally I wouldn’t say, but since Katz was missing, maybe Polly would mention if she knew. “Katz Meow.”
Polly folded the pamphlet and shoved it into her purse. “She and Roxy were tight, as friends, I mean. Katz was bi—who the hell isn’t these days—but she preferred men for romance. Roxy, on the other hand, was ambivalent about hooking up with anyone.”
“You knew them well?”
“Roxy visited the clinic to help out and donate money. Katz, only because she hung around Roxy. Most porn stars I don’t see until they’ve got problems.”
“Have you seen Katz lately?” I asked.
“No. Why? Haven’t you?”
“Not for a few days.”
Polly’s chuckle turned into a stinging laugh. “What kind of a bonehead investigator loses his client?”
“I haven’t lost her…”
“Lost, misplaced, whatever. Hope you find her.” Polly lowered the sunglasses over her eyes and started from the tree back toward the grave. She waved for me to tag along. “All right, Mr. Bad Ass PI. You came to ask about Fred Daniels. Let’s talk to an expert.”
We walked toward the paunchy man with the ball cap.
“You know how Fred died?” I asked Polly.
“An overdose, according to the coroner. Cocaine and that shit Rush Limbaugh was hooked on, OxyContin.”
“How do you know?”
“A nurse on our staff has friends working the morgue.”
“When did Fred die?”
“Wednesday night. Kaput in the men’s room of a dive in El Monte.”
That meant Fred died only hours after Coyote and I had seen him. “Who found him?”
“Don’t know. Read last Saturday’s Times. That’s where I got the news.”
“That’s it?” I asked. “He died of a drug overdose. No foul play?”
“Not according to the coroner,” Polly answered. “Didn’t surprise me. See, Fred’s house caught fire…”
How could I forget? Coyote started the blaze by pissing flames.
“Fred wasn’t much for handling stress,” Polly continued. “The least bit of anxiety would have him reaching for booze, pills, or nose blow. He’d been to my clinic several times.”
“For what? STDs?”
Polly shook her head. “Drug addiction. It wasn’t a problem until he was broke and couldn’t afford them. Then he’d get some money and ditch therapy.”
“What did Roxy see in him?”
“Blame it on timing, I suppose. You know Roxy went through a bad spell. The medical board thing. Fred was there for her. Together they’d start over as the first couple of porn. She thrived in the business while Fred…” Polly’s voice trailed away. “Offstage he was as randy as a billy goat, but aim a camera at his pecker and it wilted like a noodle. His nickname on the set was Lack-of-Wood Daniels.”
The man with the paunch looked glum, uneasy with his role as the recipient of all the forced condolences and feigned sorrow. His face was as weather-beaten as a tree stump. His cap said DANIELS LANDSCAPING and he wore a navy petty officer insignia for a tie tack.
Polly and I halted before him, at the edge of a bubble of stinking whiskey breath. He looked at her face, then her breasts, me, her breasts again, and back to her face.
Polly waited for his eyes to make the round-trip before introducing him as Henry, Fred Daniels’ older brother from Sacramento. She told him my name and business here.
Henry pulled his gaze from Polly’s bosom and stared at me. His eyes were glossy with 150 proof. He sneered. “You wanna know about Fred?”
CHAPTER 30
Henry said, “I’ve been wiping Fred’s ass since his birth. He’s a goddamn pain even dead. Left me with his burned-out house, debts, this funeral.”
“Sorry to hear that,” I said.
“Why? It isn’t your problem.” Henry looked through me. He even ignored Polly and her mountains. Fred’s brother seemed content to let his drunken buzz hold the world at a distance.
“I do have a problem,” I replied. “Your brother might have had information about Roxy.”
Henry brought his gaze to my eyes. “About her murder?”
“Maybe,” I replied.
“Meaning you think he killed her?”
“I never said that.”
Henry chuffed. “Fred was too big a pussy.”
He hadn’t had a problem shooting at me. I asked, “Did Fred tell you something?”
The drunkenness ebbed from Henry’s demeanor and he frowned as if the return of sobriety annoyed him. “Fred told me a lot of shit.”
“He ever mention Cragnow Vissoom?”
Henry adjusted his cap and set it lower on his brow, like a gate locking into place.
I wanted to snatch his beard and zap him into answering. But I couldn’t, not here at the funeral, not in front of so many people.
“I’d like to hear what Fred told you,” Polly said. “As a favor to me.”
Henry looked at her. His frown turned up at the corners as he fell under the spell of her breasts.
“Fred was always bumming money,” Henry said, losing himself in her cleavage, “and when he got around to paying me back, he bragged that he scored big from Cragnow.”
“Scored?” I asked. “You mean drugs?” I was certain Cragnow didn’t nurse his high with anything but booze, and pedaling drugs wasn’t on his résumé.
Henry pulled his eyes from Polly and toward me. “Not drugs, money. Like he had something on Cragnow.”
“Something what?”
Henry waved calloused hands to signal ignorance. “I never asked because I didn’t want to know.”
Maybe Fred’s “something” was knowledge of Roxy’s murder and other crimes.
Katz Meow had hired me and now she was missing. Coyote and I went to see Rebecca Dwelling and found her ass-end-up in a Dumpster. We talked to Fred and hours later, he was take-out for the morgue. Someone was making sure that a visit with me was a death sentence.
“Maybe Fred didn’t die of an accidental overdose,” I said, hoping to spur Henry into revealing more.
His eyes narrowed, and I got the impression of a clam closing tight. “I quit worrying about Fred a long time ago.”
“Then you won’t mind if I
look through his house?”
“I do mind.”
“Might be a help to me,” Polly said.
Henry glanced at her face, started to look away, then fixed on her bosom.
Henry closed his eyes. “I can’t. Going through Fred’s things is family business.” Henry faced me. He brought a hand up to shield his face, not from the sun but from her breasts. “If I find anything suspicious, I’ll give it to the cops.” His sneer returned. “Get it from them.”
The minister interrupted. “I need my speaking honorarium. You got cash?”
Henry gave me the shoulder. Even if he had nothing more to say, I resented the brush-off. I’d decide when the conversation was over.
Polly tugged at my sleeve. “There’ll be another time, Felix.”
She was right. I’d drop by Fred’s house later and poke around. If Henry objected, I’d make him squirm under hypnosis.
Polly led me to the pavement and we turned toward the parking area. Her heels ticked a rapid beat across the asphalt.
“Think Fred’s death and Roxy’s have something in common?” asked Polly.
“I don’t know. Anyway, thanks for getting Fred to talk.”
“Don’t thank me, thank the girls.” Polly laid a hand across her breasts.
“Let’s talk about Cragnow Vissoom,” I said. “What are your dealings with him?”
“None. He came on the porn scene after I left, thank goodness.”
“What’s your impression of him?”
“A complete dick-head. From what I’ve heard. We may have been at the same parties or banquets, but I’ve never said as much as boo to him.”
“Let me toss out another name. Lucius Rosario.”
“You mean Lucky?” she asked. “There’s a bottom-feeder for you. He bankrolls Cragnow’s productions and as dividends, snacks on the stray pussy.”
“What about Mordecai Niphe?”
“The doctor? He was the one who got Roxy’s medical license pulled after she snitched on him. Grapevine says he’s helped Lucky Rosario over the years.”
“In what way?” I asked.
“Mostly real estate.”
X-Rated Bloodsuckers Page 17