Hangman

by Faye Kellerman

  “Yeah, that’s true. Grossman—Nathan and Lydia. He’s a doctor, so I mostly work with her.”

  “Do you have a phone number?”

  “Yeah…hold on.” Wald checked his BlackBerry, his mustache twitching as he moved his upper lip. “Here it is.”

  Decker copied the number on his notepad. “What can you tell me about them?”

  “He’s around sixty, she’s younger…maybe forty. They have two teenage boys—fifteen and thirteen. I think he also has a son from another marriage. God, this is awful!”

  The dead woman seemed older than her teens, so the boys didn’t pop out as primary suspects. Still, they needed to be looked at. “How old is the son from the first marriage?”

  “I have no idea.” Wald blanched. “Why are you asking?”

  “Routine questions. I’ll want to contact everyone associated with the spot,” Decker said. “Do you know his name?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll get it from the homeowners. Could you to come take a look at the body? See if she looks familiar to you?”

  “Me?”

  “We don’t have her identification yet. Maybe she’s someone in the neighborhood.”

  “I don’t spend a lot of time checking out the ladies. When I’m here, I work.”

  “If you’d just take a look at her, I’d appreciate it.”

  “Oh God.” Wald heaved a sigh. “All right.”

  “Thanks.” Decker walked him over to the crime scene and for the second time in ten minutes uncovered the sheet to reveal the face. She was still bloated and purple, but her features were recognizable as those of a young woman. He could now clearly make out the deep purple ligature mark that had cut into her neck at the Adam’s apple.

  He could now say with confidence that the corpse wasn’t Terry McLaughlin.

  One less thing to deal with…or more to deal with. Terry was still missing.

  Wald gagged and slapped his hand over his mouth. “Never seen her before.” He turned tail and walked away.

  Decker covered her face and caught up with Wald. “Thank you for helping.”

  “Was that really necessary? Now I’m gonna have nightmares.”

  “Did you call the inspector?” Decker said.

  “Oh yeah, let me do that right now.” He punched some numbers into his BlackBerry. Five minutes later, he said, “Can’t get hold of the man. Shit!”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Decker said. “We’ll take care of him. I’m going to need a list of all the people that have worked here. That shouldn’t be too difficult since you’re only at the framing stage.”

  “I’ve had the same guys for three years. It isn’t one of them.”

  “I’ll need that list anyway.” Decker looked around for another notepad and gave it to Wald. “Put down anyone associated with this project starting with the homeowners.”

  “Anywhere I can sit down?”

  Decker rounded up Officer Breckenridge. “Could you escort Mr. Wald to a cruiser so he can write down some information for me?” He heard Marge call his name, turned around, and walked over to her and the crime scene. “What’s up?”

  “Lee Wang called. A nurse who works at St. Timothy’s—which is about six blocks away—seems to be missing.”

  “Oh Lord. What’s her name?”

  “Adrianna Blanc. According to her DMV license, she’s twenty-eight, blue eyes, brown hair, five six, a hundred and twenty-five pounds.”

  “Married?”

  “Single.”

  “Who reported her missing?”

  “Her mother. She went to her apartment to drop off some things this morning and her daughter wasn’t there. Her bed hadn’t been slept in.”

  “Maybe she slept somewhere else.”

  “Her mother has made some calls. Her boyfriend is away with his two best friends on vacation. Her other best girlfriends can’t get hold of her. Apparently, Adrianna finished up her shift at the hospital this morning, but no one has heard from her since. Her car is still in the parking lot of St. Tim’s.”

  “That’s not good.” Decker rubbed his forehead. “Where’s Mom?”

  “Her name is Kathy Blanc and she’s at the station house,” Marge told him.

  “And Lee’s with her?”

  “Lee made the call. Wanda Bontemps is with her now.”

  “Tell Wanda to keep her there. I’ll come in and talk to her.”

  “That’s already done,” Marge said. “I used a computer in one of the cruisers to bring up her DMV picture to see if we’re in the ballpark.” She handed him a slip of paper. “Kinda fuzzy, but it’s a possibility. We could bring Mom down for identification in person or we could take some of George’s snapshots to her.”

  Decker stared at the DMV photo. A young woman with long hair was grinning full face into the camera. “Do we have any printed postmortem photographs?”

  “Yeah, these are from George’s camera, printed from his laptop.”

  Decker flipped through them and compared them with the DMV photo. If he squinted hard enough, he could see that the women were one and the same. “Close enough. I’m sending you and Oliver to St. Tim’s. I’ll bring the postmortem to Mom. It’s kinder than doing an in-person ID. Have you finished canvassing the area?”

  “We’ve just started…gone through a couple of blocks when Lee called in.”

  “Call in Drew Messing and Willy Brubeck and have them canvass the area for Oliver and you. They can direct a team of uniforms around the neighborhood. The first thing I want you and Oliver to do is to go to St. Tim’s parking lot with a crime team and work her car over. See if that directs us somewhere. What kind of a car is it?”

  “A 2002 burgundy Honda Accord.” She gave him the plate number.

  “While S.I.D. is working on the car, you go into the hospital and see if you can track Adrianna Blanc’s last movements before she disappeared.”

  “Will do.”

  “The contractor is writing down names and numbers of everyone associated with the project. The homeowners have two teenage boys together. If it is Adrianna Blanc, she would seem to be out of the boys’ age range, but we still need to know where they were last night. There’s also an older son by the father’s first marriage.”

  “How old is he?”

  “Don’t know a thing about him. Call up Wynona Pratt. Tell her to go through the list one by one.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” Marge shrugged. “At least the body’s probably not Terry McLaughlin.”

  Decker exhaled. “All that means is I have to deliver bad news to someone else.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  POSITIVELY THE WORST part of the job was bringing bad news to loved ones. It simply sucked. Kathy Blanc’s hands were shaking when Decker handed her the first picture and all it took was one look before she bolted from his office. Wanda Bontemps was there to direct her to the ladies’ room. Decker sat at his desk with his face in his hands, wondering just how long he could take this kind of stress. And if that weren’t enough, there was a fourteen-year-old boy with missing parents, living in his home.

  Sometimes it isn’t even worth getting up in the morning.

  Five minutes later, Wanda Bontemps led Kathy Blanc back into Decker’s office and seated her across from his desk. Kathy’s complexion had turned the color of eggshell; her eyes were red with black tears streaming down her cheeks courtesy of mascara. Red lipstick had run into the lines atop her mouth. Her body was enveloped with the shakes and she hugged herself in a weak attempt to stop her seizing. The woman’s coiffed blond hair framed a long, patrician face now smeared with makeup. She wore pearls in her ears and had on black knitted pants and a red knitted top. Black pumps on her feet.

  Wanda Bontemps was at the doorway, her dark eyes looking pretty somber. “How about some water and a wet towel?”

  Decker nodded and then faced Kathy Blanc’s imploring eyes. “I’m so sorry, Mrs. Blanc. Is there anyone we can call for you?”

  “My…hus…band.” She opened he
r purse, but Decker was quicker. He handed her a Kleenex. “Thank you.”

  “Do you have a number, ma’am?”

  “It’s area code 213-827…” Her face crumbled and Decker handed her another tissue. She managed to get out the next four digits. When Wanda returned, he handed her the number and told her to make the call. He gave the water to Kathy along with a damp white towel.

  “Is there anyone else you want me to contact?” Decker asked her.

  “I can’t even think.”

  Decker nodded. “I want to let you know that we’ll do whatever needs to be done to find out what happened. We’ve got a lot of people working on this. Are you up to my asking you a few questions?”

  “I don’t…” The tears started anew, but she nodded for Decker to go ahead.

  “Was Adrianna having problems with anyone?”

  Kathy shook her head no.

  “How about a boyfriend? You told my detective that there was one.”

  “Garth Hammerling.”

  “Any problems with him?”

  “Not that I know.”

  “I don’t mean to sound intrusive, Mrs. Blanc, but did you and Adrianna have the type of relationship where she would talk to you about personal things?”

  Kathy dabbed her smeary eyes with the towel. When she saw that her makeup was coming off, she whispered an “oh dear.” “Adrianna didn’t complain a lot.” She rubbed her face vigorously to get off all the streaked makeup. “But if something was wrong, I think she’d tell me.”

  “What do you think about Garth?”

  She continued wiping her face. “He seemed all right. I don’t think Adrianna was all that serious about him.”

  “Where’d she meet him?”

  “He’s a tech at St. Tim’s.” Kathy looked up. “Why are you asking questions about Garth?” Her eyes filled with moisture again. “Was she…violated?”

  “I don’t know—”

  “I don’t feel well.” She stood up. “I need to use the restroom.”

  “Detective Bontemps will take you.”

  “I know where it is.” She got up and left. Bontemps stepped into the office.

  “Garth Hammerling was Adrianna’s boyfriend.” Decker wrote the name on a piece of paper and gave it to her. “Check him out…although I think Marge said something about his being out of town. Did you contact Mrs. Blanc’s husband?”

  “Yes, I did. I didn’t tell him what was going on, but he knew it concerned Adrianna because Kathy had called him several times.”

  “Where does he work?”

  “Law offices of Rosehoff, Allens, Blanc, and Bellows. Mack Blanc is a senior partner. He’s on his way here from downtown L.A.”

  “We should send a car to pick him up. He shouldn’t be driving.”

  “Didn’t get a chance to tell him too much of anything. He hung up on me as soon as I told him his wife was here.”

  “Give me the number. I’ll see if I can reach him. You go into the restroom and make sure that Mrs. Blanc is okay. Well, she’s not okay, but make sure she doesn’t need medical care. If she does need care, call an ambulance. Have them take her anywhere but St. Tim’s.”

  “THE MOTHER MADE an ID with the pictures,” Decker told Marge over the phone. “That means the car is part of an official crime scene. Are the crime techs there yet?”

  “Any moment now. Are you coming down?”

  “I’m waiting to talk to Adrianna’s father. I’ll come down after that. Have you talked to anyone at St. Tim’s about Adrianna?”

  “Oliver’s trying to get a time frame. It appears she completed her shift. That would mean she left the building around eight in the morning. Things go blank after that. We did find a nurse named Mandy Kowalski who knew Adrianna Blanc for six years. She’s on break in about a half hour and has agreed to speak with us. We’re trying to locate a good spot to talk. It looks like the cafeteria is winning the election.”

  “Who else have you talked to at the hospital?”

  “A little of this, a little of that. People are on shift and seem reluctant to talk.”

  “The hospital isn’t cooperating with you?”

  “The administration’s been all right. We’ll see what happens once they find out it’s murder. Oliver is getting a list of names of the security officers on duty. There are always a couple of guards roaming the parking lots.”

  “What about video cameras?”

  “We’re working on getting the tapes for all the entrances and exits. I don’t know if there’re video cameras in the parking lots, but I’ll find out.”

  “Has the hospital had trouble with crime in the past?”

  “I don’t know. We’ve still got a lot of searching to do. As soon as we get information, we’ll keep you in the loop.”

  “As long as the loop ain’t a noose around the neck.”

  “WE WENT TO nursing school together.”

  Eyes on the tabletop, Mandy Kowalski was staring at bad coffee. Oliver knew it was bad because he was drinking the same swill.

  A cute little thing, he thought, dressed in blue scrubs, with a pixie face, bright red hair, and hazel eyes. A dozen moons ago, he would have asked her out despite the forty-year age difference. But a lifetime of bad choices had finally made him realize that sometimes it was best to keep things on the professional level. He was currently dating a middle-school teacher named Carmen who was much too good for him. By the grace of God, she was able to deflect his neuroses and shenanigans with a knowing look and a laugh.

  “You’re sure she’s gone?” Mandy’s eyes were still downcast. “Sometimes people just leave without telling anyone.”

  Marge and Oliver exchanged glances. Marge said, “Mandy, we got a recent update, and unfortunately, the news isn’t good. It appears that Adrianna has been murdered.”

  “Oh God!” Mandy gasped and knocked over her coffee cup with shaking hands. She covered her mouth. “Oh no! Oh my God! How horrible! Oh no!” She looked up and tears had sprouted from her eyes. “That can’t be!”

  “We got a positive ID from her mother,” Marge told her.

  “Oh, that poor woman. Poor Adrianna.” She buried her face behind her hands. “I’m sorry. I can’t…”

  “That’s okay,” Marge told her. “Take your time.”

  Oliver stood up. “I’ll get you a glass of water.”

  Marge tried to distract her. “I noticed you’re wearing scrubs. Are you a surgical nurse?”

  “Thoracic.” She wiped her eyes with a napkin. “Anything to do with the chest.”

  “Is that what Adrianna did?”

  At the mention of her friend’s name, Mandy let go with a fresh set of waterfalls. “She’s in the NICU. Neonatal intensive care. She’s a…she was a pediatric nurse. She was great at her job. We used to call her the baby whisperer. But even when she worked with older kids, they loved her.”

  “I see.” Marge took out her notepad. “And you’ve known Adrianna for six years?”

  “Around six years.” Oliver came back with water and a new tissue box. Mandy thanked him for both items. “I was just telling your partner that I knew Adrianna for around six years. We went to nursing school together.”

  “Where at?” Oliver asked. “C-SUN?”

  “No,” Mandy said. “We went to the Howard Professional School. Originally Adrianna was just going for an LVN, but I told her that she was smart enough to go all the way for an RN. It was a lot harder, I’m not going to lie, but I convinced her that it would be worth it.”

  “Wow, that was awfully nice of you,” Marge told her.

  “It was partially for selfish reasons,” Mandy said. “We met the first day of orientation and hit it off right away. I figured it would be easier if I had company. I helped her over a couple of rough patches, but she took her own tests and did well.”

  “You sound like a good friend,” Oliver told her.

  “At that time, we were very good friends.”

  “But not so much anymore?” Marge asked.

>   “You know how it is…” Mandy’s eyes darted back and forth. “Things change.”

  “Like what?” Oliver said.

  “We drifted apart,” Mandy said. “Aside from work, we stopped hanging out.”

  “What happened?”

  “Nothing really…just lifestyle issues. Adrianna has…” Mandy licked her lips. “She has a lot more energy than I do. She likes to have a good time.”

  “She’s a party girl?” Marge suggested.

  “That’s making her sound cheap,” Mandy said. “She liked her fun. I mean, I do too, but I guess I need more sleep than she does.”

  “Did her fun include drugs?” Marge said.

  Mandy hesitated. “I guess she’d be like a recreational user.”

  “Did it ever interfere with her work?”

  “Never!” Mandy was adamant. “She was a miracle worker with those babies.”

  “What do you know about her boyfriend?” Marge checked her notes. “Garth Hammerling. What do you know about him?”

  “He works here at St. Tim’s. He’s a radiology tech.”

  “How well do you know him?” Oliver asked.

  “Casual acquaintances,” Mandy told him.

  But her eyes were elsewhere. Marge said, “Would you know where he lives?”

  Mandy looked away. “Why would I know where he lives?”

  “Maybe you went to a party there?”

  “Can’t recall that.” Mandy looked at her hands. “I could probably get you his address, but you could probably do it just as easy.”

  “Not a problem,” Oliver said. “Just wondering if you knew it offhand because we need to talk to him.” When Mandy didn’t answer, he said, “You know we need to ask all sorts of personal questions.”

  Marge said, “So if I asked you personal information, you shouldn’t be offended.”

  “Because we ask everyone personal information,” Oliver said. “Like I could ask you if you had a thing going on with Garth.”

  “No!” Mandy dried her eyes. “Why would you think that?”

  “Just a question,” Marge said.