“How long has this been going on?” Alexander asked, his voice strained.
“About three months. Alexander, your brother is thirty-one, he’s matured, and, I might add, he is stable and has his life together. He told me how much he’s missed all of us. He’d like to see everyone again.”
Alexander said, both his face and his voice expressionless, “Don’t you think it’s more than possible that Rob is the one trying to poison you, Grandmother? Unlike any of us, he’s actually come into contact with low-life criminals like this Willig.”
Venus arched a perfect eyebrow. “Then your brother would have to be a magician, would he not? He’d have to have slipped into two different restaurants unnoticed, and then the third time, into this house, and somehow put arsenic into my food or drink.
“Yes, I can see from your faces that you’re wondering why I wanted to contact Rob. That’s easy enough—he’s my grandson and I’m getting older, and I wanted to see what sort of man he’d become. Then his email arrived and I decided fate had taken a hand.”
Alexander shrugged. “Like fate would care about my worthless brother. I’ll bet old Rob leaped at the chance to ingratiate himself to you, didn’t he, Grandmother? He always was bad news, you know that, all of us do. People like that don’t change. Have you forgotten what he did? He should have gone to jail. I hope you won’t encourage him further. I, for one, have no interest in seeing him again. You shouldn’t either, Father.” Guthrie stared down at his Italian loafers. “He’s a criminal and a loser.” Alexander shot a look at Savich. “And he should be your top-running suspect.”
Venus’s voice was like a soothing oil. “I knew you’d hardly approve, Alexander. But as I said, Rob has made quite a transformation. You’ll be surprised.”
“I’ve actually heard of his girlfriend,” Hildi said. “Marsia Gay. She works in metals, very modern sculptures, mostly human figures. She’s considered something of a wunderkind, being so young.”
Venus said, “I haven’t met her yet, but it seems it’s serious. And I haven’t had a granddaughter-in-law since you and Belinda divorced, Alexander.” She smiled over at Hildi. “It might be nice to have another artist in the family.”
Hildi beamed back at her. “I always liked Rob. Such a vibrant boy, so full of promise. Such a shame what happened.”
Glynis said, “I can’t wait to see Rob again. Do you know he kissed me once? We were seventeen, I remember, and even though I didn’t want to, I had to tell him to cut it out, we were first cousins, and kissing was against the law, or something. I know better now. Imagine, Rob’s not in jail or dead. That’s wonderful.”
“You can tell Rob that yourself, Glynis,” Venus said. “I’ve just decided to invite him and his girlfriend to dinner tomorrow night. I expect all of you to be here and to welcome him home.”
There was steel in her voice again. Savich had no doubt every single Rasmussen would be front and present. As for welcoming Rob home—who knew?
12
* * *
LOST HILLS SHERIFF’S STATION
CALABASAS, CALIFORNIA
TUESDAY MORNING
Sheriff Dreyfus Murray had been notified by Special Agent Richard—Duke—Morgan, Criminal Division Unit chief, that one of Morgan’s people was coming from Washington to assist in the Serial case. Assist them, now that was a joke. A Fed was coming to take over the case, more like. He hadn’t been told a name. He spotted her the second she walked through the door. He could tell from twenty feet away that she was a looker, tall and fit, striding like she owned the world, and looking like she could outrun him when he’d been twenty. She was wearing dark blue pants, a tucked-in white shirt, a red blazer to cover her Glock, and black banged-up boots with a high shine.
Then Dreyfus Murray did a double take.
“Cammie, is that you, girl?”
A smile bloomed. “Dreyfus! How lovely to see you.”
He hugged her, then set her back, shaking his head. “Of course I knew you’d gone into the FBI, but—look at you, here you are, the bigfoot Fed sticking your nose in my business. What’s it been, three years since I last saw you?”
Cam smiled. “Nah, I’m no bigfoot, my feet are princess-size. Well, maybe a nine isn’t all that small, but still, even my toes have no intention of wriggling under your tent. Yeah, about three years, it was Mom’s birthday and you brought her balloons and cupcakes. Speaking of Mom, after I told her I was coming, she laughed, said I should surprise you, and that’s why I didn’t call.”
“Lisabeth’s a real joker, always having fun, always getting such a kick out of life, even though she didn’t marry me.” He sighed. “Everything turned out for the best. I finally had to admit your dad is an okay guy. He’s never strayed, unusual for an actor, right? Even my wife likes your mom, but not enough to invite her to dinner more than once a year.”
“No, Dad and Mom are a rarity in LaLa Land—happily married for longer than I’ve been alive. Must have something to do with them staying outside Hollywood’s rarified A-list. How’s Suzanne? And the boys?” Cam asked.
Murray shook his head. “Can you believe none of them wanted to be cops? Engineers, the four of them, two of them partners in a company they started up, Murray Engineering, and they’re populating Southern California. We’re up to ten grandkids now.” He turned to his dispatcher. “Hey, Al, a couple of coffees for me and the lady Fed. Still drinking it like a girl—half milk?”
She laughed. “No coffee for me just now, thank you.”
Murray ushered her into his office, sat her down. “Now, you tell your mom to keep out of this. I know she and your dad knew Constance Morrissey, lived what—eight houses down from them in the Colony? They’re to steer clear, all right? I don’t want them dragged into this, taking any chances, and you know your mom, she wouldn’t hesitate.”
“I’m not even staying with them, Dreyfus. They’ll have their ideas about Constance Morrissey, I’m sure, but they won’t be knocking on doors and questioning people.” She paused. “Well, more than they already have. I’ll tell them again to stay away from all this.”
“Well, that’s something. Are you sure they’ll listen?”
“Not really.”
“Don’t know why I asked in the first place. Okay, Cammie, if you’re ready to meet my detective who’s lead on this case, let me take you to Daniel Montoya. He was here for a week when Constance Morrissey was murdered. May 3rd. He’s the one who figured out we had a Serial on our hands.” He sounded like a proud papa, so Cam didn’t bother to tell him she’d already found out everything there was to know about Montoya and she’d read his murder book cover to cover. He’d done all the right things, and more, put the two other murders from different sheriffs’ jurisdictions together himself, and spotted the Serial.
“I’ll be glad to meet him. We’ve got lots to do today. First thing, I want to visit the house where Connie Morrissey was murdered, maybe stop by my parents’ house. Then Detective Montoya and I will head to the new Parker Center for a meeting I’ve arranged with detectives from all four of the jurisdictions the Serial has struck. I’m hoping it will help us all get on the same page, get us working together.”
“It’s occurred to us the Serial may have killed in different jurisdictions to confuse matters, to slow us down. Not only that, three of the murders were in sheriffs’ areas, not LAPD jurisdictions.”
“Could be. Don’t know.”
“You’ll find out. It sounds like quite a big-dog meeting, a real free-for-all.” He eyed her pretty face, her short blond hair as wavy as her mom’s. “I hope you survive.”
She gave him a big grin. “Have some faith, Dreyfus. I intend to herd all those territorial egos into the same holding pen as sweetly as I can, use my branding iron only if they get too frisky. I understand Montoya’s ex–Army Intelligence. I saw from his murder book he knows his way around a computer, has a good brain. I imagine he isn’t particularly happy to have the FBI here in his face, messing with his case. I hope you told h
im to play nice.”
“Daniel’s not an idiot, he’ll cooperate.” He looked at a younger version of her mother, Lisabeth, the woman he almost married. Cammie had her mother’s face and her wide infectious smile, not to mention the dimple identical to her mother’s, adorable when she was seven years old. “But I’ll tell you, Cammie, when he gets a look at your face and that smile of yours, only the good Lord knows what he’ll have to say.”
Cam knew a smile got a woman FBI agent only so far. It didn’t help with perps taking her seriously, or with some male agents and law enforcement, for that matter. She could but try. “Please, Dreyfus, it’d help if you called me Cam. Not Cammie—sounds like I’m still seven and smearing birthday cake all over my face.”
“Cam. Sounds good.” Sheriff Murray led her into the bullpen, not all that large a room, with maybe twelve desks, half occupied, buzzing with low voices. The men and women detectives were on their cells or typing on their computers, one talking with a perp or a victim as he leafed through a file. She smelled bitter coffee, like every other cop shop she’d ever been in. It felt like home, down to the doughnut crumbs and the half, lone bear claw lying on the table next to the pot of coffee, probably strong enough to corrode stomach lining.
“There he is, over there, the guy with the Mac laptop, the cell crunched between his shoulder and his ear, and the bagel in his hand.”
Cam eyed Detective Montoya, then turned when Dreyfus said, “I’ll let you introduce yourself. Keep me in the loop, Cam,” and left her to it.
Cam walked over to Montoya’s ancient banged-up cop desk, stood quietly beside him as he spoke in a slow comforting voice on his cell, maybe talking to a witness or a victim. If he saw her, he didn’t acknowledge her. She watched him take a bite of his bagel, end up with some cream cheese on his upper lip. As he listened, he typed on his laptop with two fingers. He finally looked up at her, jerked his head toward the chair.
She sat down and looked around, fully aware the other detectives in the room were eyeing her, knowing who she was, because there are no secrets in a police station or in a sheriff’s station. Montoya said thank you and punched off his cell. He took the final bite of his bagel, wiped his hands on a paper napkin, and continued to type on his laptop. The dab of cream cheese was still on his lip.
Cam said, “I admire a multitasker. You nearly have that email to your mom finished?”
He didn’t look up. “Been a busy morning, lots to tell her.”
“It’s only eight thirty in the morning, Detective Montoya. You sure don’t look Latin to me. Where’d you get the Spanish name?”
“You could ask where I get the gringo first name—Daniel.”
“Nah, Daniel’s biblical, way back before Latin America was invented. He got tossed into a lions’ den and lived to brag about it. I bet you’ve never even seen a lion.”
“Yes, I have. I was six years old, down in the San Diego Zoo.”
“Are you through?”
“Just one more sentence to Mom, telling her how I miss her chicken pot pie—two crusts. There. All done.” He closed the laptop and slowly rose, eyed her up and down when she stood to face him. “You’re the Fed?” Incredulous voice. Then, under his breath, but not quite low enough, “Oh, joy.”
Cam was closing in on five foot ten in her boots, but came only to the middle of this guy’s nose. “Yeah, I’m the Fed. Big dude, aren’t you?”
“You ain’t no midget yourself.” He stuck out his hand. “I’m Detective Daniel Montoya, as you already know.”
“I’m Special Agent Cam Wittier.”
They shook hands. He looked pissed for a moment, then she watched his face change as he reminded himself to accept the inevitable and settled on resigned. “Okay, the sheriff told me you were coming to take over the case.”
“True. But right now, I’m here to meet to you, see what you think.”
“And then kiss me off because I’m a worthless yahoo without a sentient brain?”
“Depends on the ideas you have about this Serial. Then I’ll assess if you’re worthless. Or not.”
13
* * *
Daniel looked at her short wavy blond hair and into her blue-gray eyes, no, there was hazel in there as well—and a jaw that looked more stubborn than his older sister’s, and that was saying something. She was a looker and wasn’t that a kick in the gut? He had to laugh. Of course he’d been expecting a dark suit, skinny tie, wing tips, a stone-cold face, and a sense of humor like a stick. “I’ll try, Agent Wittier, to make myself both worthy and useful.”
“Hey, that’s the recipe for a decent husband. Well, that and a flat stomach. I was going to buy you breakfast, but you already chowed down on that bagel. You’ve still got some cream cheese on your lip.” She watched him dab the rest of his breakfast away. “There, all presentable again. Like a real grown-up. You ready to talk?”
“We can do that while I drive you to the Morrissey crime scene. What about all the other crime scenes?”
“We’ll begin with Constance Morrissey.”
He nodded. “If we’re going to spend some time there and make it to the Parker Center on time in the L.A. traffic, we should get started. How about I tell you what I think and you tell me if I pass muster on the way over? Oh and by the way, my dad’s still got a flat gut.”
Daniel guided her out of the bullpen, all eyes following their every step, past Dreyfus’s office and outside into the morning sunshine. He led her to a row of Crown Vics parked beside the station, pointed to one that looked as tired as the others. “I haven’t been to the crime scene in over a week. But I agree you should see it even though it’s cleaned up.”
“Forensics came up with nothing?”
“Not a thing, as I’m sure you already know. The killer was careful. All the fingerprints were identified, including the housekeeper’s. When I interviewed her, she told me she liked Morrissey, said she was a sweet, clean girl.”
“So she was one of those women who clean before the housekeeper arrives?”
“I hope that’s what she meant. Most of the fingerprints other than the victim’s belonged to the house owner, Theodore Markham, a big-shot Hollywood producer.”
“You said in your report you believe Markham was more than the owner of that house, that he and Connie Morrissey were probably lovers.”
“That’s the working theory.”
“You interviewed Markham. I read your report, but tell me what you thought about him, stuff that isn’t in your report.”
“I was allowed to speak to Markham one time, his lawyer sitting at his right hand, measuring me for a coffin. The lawyer claimed Mr. Markham was distraught, but Markham reminded me of my grade school principal, Old Stone Face. When the lawyer finally allowed Markham to speak, he insisted he’d picked Morrissey because of her great talent; he’d wanted to nurture her, he said, take away her money worries so she could focus on her career. Markham claimed he wasn’t sleeping with Morrissey, no way. He’s allegedly happily married to his second wife, has two sons with her, both studying computers at UCLA. He was alibied up to his tonsils, at a party at his house when Morrissey was murdered, with his wife and fifty guests. Toward the end, he looked put out at the inconvenience of having to deal with a lowly cop. As I wrote in the report, he could have snuck out of the party because alcohol was flowing freely and some of the guests were frolicking in the swimming pool. Naturally, everyone who attended the party was sure he’d been there every second.”
“From your report I gathered you believe Markham to be a pompous, ruthless jerk. Well, not in those exact terms, but it came through loud and clear. You think he could have killed her?”
“He could have. Say they were lovers and she no longer wanted him—rejection didn’t happen to someone of his stature, so in a rage he killed her. But that would make him the Serial, and I can’t see that.” Daniel shrugged. “You know, of course the Serial took both her laptop and her cell phone, as he always does. We don’t know why yet, but that’s ma
de it harder to track down Morrissey’s personal information.”
Cam nodded. When Montoya turned onto Bleaker Road, she lowered the window and breathed in the soft breeze off the Pacific. “You can smell the ocean from here. I’ve missed that. Now, as for the big powwow at LAPD headquarters, I understand you didn’t have a meeting with the LAPD but Supervisor Elman called you and the detectives at the San Dimas Sheriff’s Department.”
“Yes, he called, even asked for our murder books.”
His voice was neutral, at best. She could imagine how the LAPD folk felt about the sheriffs’ detectives. She said, “I spoke to Supervisor Elman and he thinks a meeting with all concerned detectives would be fine and dandy. Not his exact words.” She grinned at him. “I told him to consider it sort of like an orchestra that’s never played together, and I’m the visiting conductor.”
“My idea of fun. Hope there won’t be too much carnage. Just in case—are you armed?”
Cam laughed. “It’s odd, Agent Savich said the same thing.”
“Savich? I’ve heard of him, he’s the husband of Agent Sherlock of JFK fame, right?”
She nodded. “That’s her. And my Glock’s loaded, no worries.”
“Always smart to be prepared. You never know what could happen with a Fed in the mix. Couldn’t be worse than the navy and the army meeting to plan a mission, could it?” He shot her a look that didn’t seem very full of confidence in her abilities.
She only smiled. “Probably not, but I think it’s worth a try, whatever happens. Now, tell me more about Constance Morrissey.”
Daniel raised an eyebrow, knowing she probably already knew all about her, down to the woman’s birthmark behind her left knee. “Her life was ended on May third and I’ve got nothing, zip, zero. She was twenty-five, divorced going on three years from a real loser—and yes, we checked on the ex-husband, called himself Bravo Morrissey. She kept his name. He was in Chicago on the night she was murdered, playing in an illegal poker game, verified by the seven guys playing with him. She was from Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
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