Riverstar

by Tess Thompson

  “He did not,” said Bella, as firmly as she could.

  “How do you know?” asked Jose.

  “I just know.”

  “Look, guys, we’re looking for any kind of lead. There could be a connection between the blackmail scheme and her murder. Do you have any clue who the men were that were being blackmailed?” asked Peter.

  Matt shook his head. “Ms. Zinn only told us that there were four of them. She didn’t give us their names. She’s careful to protect the anonymity of her clients.”

  “According to Ms. Zinn, you guys went back to the Second Chance Inn after you were unsuccessful in making contact with Tiffany that night,” said Peter. “Is this correct?”

  “Yes,” said Matt. “We intended to talk with her in the morning and gently persuade her to give us what belongs to Ms. Zinn.”

  “This clears you of any suspicion,” said Peter. “The murder was committed by someone staying at the lodge.”

  Neither man showed any sign of relief or even acknowledgment. Matt sat forward slightly, his eyes livelier than the moment before. “The book wasn’t in her room, at least not that afternoon when we searched it.”

  “Wait a minute, you were in her room earlier that day?” said Bella. “How did you get in? She didn’t say anything had been disturbed.”

  Matt interlaced his fingers on the desktop. “We’re professionals, Miss Webber. How we got into the room isn’t the point. We were there. There will be no fingerprints to prove it but we were there just the same. We searched the room thoroughly. The book was not there.”

  “That means whoever searched the room later didn’t find it either,” said Peter, almost under his breath. He looked at Bella. “We have to get the names of the four men being blackmailed.”

  And where was the book?

  They stood. Peter shook first Matt’s hand and then Jose’s. “Thank you, gentlemen, for your help. Please call me if you think of anything else.”

  Jose walked with them to the door. “You know, Mr. Ball, there’s a way to get Ms. Zinn to give you the names of the men being blackmailed.”

  “What’s that?” asked Peter.

  “Tell her you’ll get her book back if she tells you who they are.”

  ***

  Chris met them outside his trailer. “She’s in there. I got her to come by promising to play backgammon with her.”

  “She plays backgammon?” asked Bella.

  “I know. Weird, huh?” said Chris.

  Jocelyn Zinn appeared nonplussed to see them again, her eyes skirting to them and back to her game in a matter of a split second. “You again?”

  Peter proposed Jose’s idea to her.

  She didn’t take her eyes from the board. “What makes you think you can find it?”

  “My gut tells me at least one of these four men knows something that will help us locate it.”

  “You’re a cop. You really think I’m going to trust a cop with my client list? If you could even find it, which I doubt.”

  Peter paused for a moment, surveying her, before seeming to come to a conclusion. “I’m going to level with you, Ms. Zinn. I’m not actually assigned to this case. A good friend of ours has been accused of Ms. Archer’s murder and I’m trying to clear his name. I have no interest in making trouble for you. They’re threatening to try him for the death penalty.”

  “And I’m not a cop. I’m a makeup artist,” said Bella.

  Jocelyn Zinn looked up then, her impenetrable eyes softer for the first time. “I thought you looked familiar.”

  “I can’t emphasize enough how little interest we have in causing you or your clients any troubles,” said Peter.

  “The man accused is my boyfriend. I’m desperate.” Bella’s voice caught. She swallowed against the lump in her throat before continuing. “I’m trying to help him. He’s a good person who was at the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  Jocelyn looked at Peter. “And you’re sure this dude didn’t do it?”

  “We are,” said Peter.

  “Well, shit, I know how it feels to be falsely accused of something. Plus, I don’t think an innocent man should die, especially over something like this.” She put her hand out, with an open palm. “Give me your notebook. I’ll write the names down. But you cannot tell them I told you. You’ll have to say you uncovered the blackmail plot when she was murdered.”

  “Fine,” said Peter.

  There was nothing but the sound of the pen scratching on the paper for a moment. She handed the notebook back to Peter.

  His face showed no emotion as he scanned the list. “Are these all current clients?”

  She shrugged and tossed her hair. “Depends on what you mean by current. I’m technically not in business any longer.”

  “No need to play games, Ms. Zinn,” said Peter. “I could care less about whether or not you’re currently in business. We’re here to solve a murder, not pass judgment on your business. Honestly, I don’t know why anyone gives a crap about prostitution considering the real crimes being committed.”

  Jocelyn appeared to consider him. Was it Bella’s imagination or did she shift her perspective of Peter just then? She got up from the table and sidled up next to him, tapping the book twice. “These two are no longer clients.”

  “Why’s that?” asked Peter

  “The first one was too rough with my girls. The second one found Jesus when he married America’s Sweetheart.”

  “Thanks for this,” said Peter, closing his notebook and stuffing it in his jacket pocket. “Come on, Bella. We’ve got work to do.”

  “Remember, keep me out of it,” they heard Jocelyn say as the trailer door slammed.

  Now we’re getting somewhere, thought Bella. Ben, just hang tough. We’re going to figure this out.

  Peter was quiet until they got to the car. He opened the passenger door and she slipped inside the warm car. Specks of dust had settled on the black dashboard. It smelled of new car and leather. Silently, Peter handed Bella the list. There were four names, all with phone numbers.

  Cash Cutler. He was the lead actor of a popular television show and well-known bad boy about town. No surprise there.

  Connor Jenkins. CEO of a major discount grocery store chain.

  Austin Blu. Lead singer for the rock band Crazy House. Married to popular movie actress Carlie Cullen, nicknamed America’s sweetheart. Classic nice girl marries bad boy.

  The last name on the list caused her to gasp.

  Rawley Hough. Los Angeles Assistant District Attorney.

  “Holy shit,” said Bella.

  “Yep,” said Peter. “And he’s the one who was too rough with the girls.”

  They drove south toward Los Angeles. The late afternoon sun was bright on the asphalt, and the brown hills in the distance seemed stark and barren to Bella after the lush green of the dramatic Oregon mountains. “How do we get them to talk to us?” This seemed impossible.

  “Leave that to me. How do we get to your apartment?”

  ***

  In Venice, they turned onto Bella’s street, parked in her garage, and took the elevator up to the third floor. Once inside, she opened the screen door to the deck. The ocean breeze brought all the familiar smells of home. Or was it home? Perhaps home was up north now with the swaying firs and rushing river.

  “Cute place,” said Peter almost absently.

  Peter went out to the balcony. She shivered when she saw him lean against the ledge. Averting her eyes, she called out to him. “You want something to drink?”

  “You have any tea?”

  “Like iced?”

  “No, like green.”

  “Seriously, you’re like a chick.”

  “And you’re kinda like a guy.”

  “I know. I’m badass.”

  She heard him laugh as she put the kettle on. “You’ll have to come inside to drink this.”

  From the balcony, “Why’s that?”

  “I never go out there. I’m afraid of heights.”

&nb
sp; He came inside. “Is that why there’s no furniture out there?”

  “Right.” She set a cup of tea on the kitchen table for him.

  Peter paced in front of the sliding glass door, pausing every so often to gaze out toward the water. Finally, he perched on the edge of the table, pulling out the list from his pocket. “Okay, I’m going to make some phone calls. See if we can get these guys to meet with us.”

  “I’ll leave you to it. Think I’ll take a walk out to the boardwalk.” Reaching into the coat closet by the front door, she slipped off her heels and into a pair of athletic socks from the pile she kept in a basket and then into her tennis shoes. “Call me when you’re ready for me to come back.”

  But he seemed not to hear, already dialing the first number on their list.

  ***

  The three-mile beach itself was deserted; lifeguard towers stood alone and barren next to sand the color of Melba toast. The wind, chilly this time of year, whipped the orange flags as if to say, we’re still here, waiting for the months when the sand would be covered with bathing-suit clad bodies. There were several surfers, wearing full wetsuits, sitting on their boards, waiting for the next wave. But the boardwalk was active as ever. She walked past the sign for the Medical Marijuana Doctor, and the skateboard park, never empty, always with the whooshing sound of boards on concrete. Did these lost boys go to school, she often wondered? Soon she came upon the body builders, ever vigilant and shirtless, arm muscles the size of small watermelons bulging and glistening in the sun. She passed various street performers: a mime; the famous roller blade guy playing his guitar and singing; two acrobats, one doing a handstand on his squatting partner’s knees. And then the tattoo shop where the hummingbird had been etched into her hip after she ended it with Graham. She’d wanted a tattoo reflective of freedom and a new start. Gennie sometimes said she was like a hummingbird when she worked and it had seemed like the perfect symbol.

  Her thoughts turned to Ben. Would she have the chance to bring him here one day? She imagined him laughing at the antics, at the murals and shops with everything and anything one could imagine. Everything was big here, and bright, and loud. Ben would love it. He would laugh here. She knew it. They might sit at her favorite bar on a Saturday afternoon, wearing only their bathing suits and drinking beer and sneaking kisses between bites of curly fries and chicken wings. Imagining it, she filled with a physical longing she’d never before experienced, thinking of the life they could share, the way everything felt like an adventure with him.

  She turned around, walking back toward her apartment. Men and women on rollerblades, runners, and bicyclists weaved around her. The sun was on her back now and she was able to gaze at the ocean without squinting. Her mother had loved the ocean, had loved Venice Beach. When Bella was ten and Drake sixteen, they came here for vacation, the only vacation she could ever remember taking. Her mother’s great aunt died and left several thousand dollars to them and instead of putting it in the bank, she’d surprised them both with a trip to California. They’d stayed, by accident really, in a dive motel in Venice that her mother had stumbled into a coupon for. The hotel was no longer there; it was torn down years ago and replaced by a nice hotel. But during the week they’d stayed there it had seemed to them a certain kind of paradise. All three enjoyed themselves, but perhaps her mother most of all. She’d seemed young that week and carefree, surprisingly open to the alternative lifestyles of the residents of Venice. One afternoon, strolling the boardwalk and licking ice cream cones, she’d pointed to a particularly bright mural depicting early California and said, “I dreamt of being an artist when I was a kid. Did I ever tell you that?”

  She couldn’t remember if she or Drake had asked a follow-up question. Perhaps Drake had? He was older and more aware and curious about the time before she was their mother. But Bella was ten and distracted by her ice cream and the sea air that made her feel alive in a way the damp Seattle air could not. She’d vowed after that trip to come back to live with the colorful people and the sunshine and palm trees, which were not native to California, Drake had pointed out more than once. He was so pedantic when they were kids. Well, he still was. People didn’t really change. Bella was still the wide-eyed child she’d been, enamored with the tan sand and blue water and brown and green mountains of the coastline. And Drake was still wise and bossy.

  An image came suddenly of that day with the ice cream. She’d had strawberry, her mother peach (she loved anything peach flavored), and Drake chocolate (he always ordered chocolate). They were all laughing and had stopped to sit on one of the benches that lined the grass and overlooked the sandy beach. Why were they laughing? What she would give now to remember. Her mother wore a yellow sundress and cheap flip-flops she’d gotten at the dollar store before they left. Bella could remember this, she thought, but not what they’d laughed so hard over.

  She could see now her mother’s feet in those flip-flops. Bella had painted her toenails pink like the wild roses that bloomed in August in Seattle. Yes, her mother’s toes. Alice tossed the flip-flops aside and wriggled her toes in the grass. “Oh the grass tickles and this ice cream is so good,” she said, turning to look at Drake and then Bella. “You know something I’ve learned?”

  “What’s that, mama?” asked Bella, biting into the sugar cone, wishing this ice cream could be like in a fairy tale, always refilling as soon as the last lick was done.

  “It’s the smallest moments in life you remember, like this one, just this perfect one with the ocean and the ice cream, and the grass and sitting with my two favorite people in the world. I’ll remember this for the rest of my life.” She stood in her bare feet on the grass and flung her arms wide. “Just take it in, my loves. Just take it in.”

  Alice’s second toe was slightly longer than her big toe, just like Bella’s. That small thing they shared was something Bella held onto even all these years later. Sometimes in bed, with the windows open and the sea breeze moving the white curtains she’d hung herself, she would gaze at her feet and think, some part of you is still here. It proves you were here. You gave me these crazy toes. Drake’s daughter had had them too.

  Bella’s eyes filled and she walked blindly for a moment until she spotted a bench. She sat and wiped her eyes, watching the waves come in one after the other. The waves are slower here, her friend from Florida had said to her once. They come in less frequently, Bella had replied, but with more strength.

  How desperate her mother must have felt about money, alone with two children. Why hadn’t her mother ever dated? Bella hadn’t really thought of it before but she must have been lonely. Perhaps she never met anyone she liked well enough to bring him into her children’s lives. As it so often did when she thought of her mother’s sacrifices, the hollowness of loss and pain and regret was like something alive, emptying her insides until there was nothing but a cold mist whipping and tugging there.

  Her cell phone buzzed in her pants pocket. Peter. He’d reached each of the men on the phone and arranged times and places to meet them.

  “I’ll be right there,” she said into the phone, leaving her memory of peach ice cream and laughing next to the bench. For now. She would visit it another day.

  ***

  They were to meet Austin Blu first, at his Malibu home. It was four in the afternoon as they headed out, Bella driving while Peter filled her in on what each of the men had said when he called. The coastal highway was surprisingly uncongested and the sun low on the horizon, making diamonds on the blue water. This was one of Bella’s favorite drives. When she was heartsick over Graham, she often drove this stretch of highway on a weekend afternoon, with the radio cranked and the windows open so the salt air could find its way to her. Not that it helped. Nothing had helped. When you love a married man there is no escape from the inevitable loneliness that comes when one chooses to participate in betrayal.

  All the men had been surprisingly open to meeting with him, Peter told her as they approached Malibu.

  “How d
id you get them to agree?” Bella asked, genuinely curious. This Peter Ball was good at his job.

  Peter smiled. “Well, for lack of a better explanation, I kept it simple without revealing I have no jurisdiction over the case. Told them I was a cop and knew they were being blackmailed. They all agreed, rather quickly, to meet with me.”

  “What about Rawley Hough?”

  “He didn’t admit he was being blackmailed, like the others did. He was mostly silent but agreed to meet with us at his home office.”

  “He’s involved, Peter. He has to be.”

  “I agree. There’s no way it’s just a coincidence. Carrot Cop has way too much incentive to pin this on Ben as a way to keep his brother out of it.”

  “Especially if Hough murdered her.”

  “That’s right.”

  Austin Blu lived in a gated community in one of the highest priced areas in the country: Malibu beach property. When they arrived at the gate, a middle-aged security guard with a substantial beer gut came out of a booth with a clipboard. “Yes, Mr. Blu was expecting them,” he said as the gate opened. “Last house at the property. A terracotta with no windows on the driveway side.”

  They found it easily, parking in the driveway near pots of blooming flowers. The house was rectangular and barren, very modern looking, except for white clematis climbing up the side of the house. Perched on the edge of a cliff, like many of the houses along the shore, with a trail around the house hinting at the Pacific Ocean and sandy beach below.

  Bella was surprised when Austin Blu answered the door. She’d expected staff of some kind since the man was listed as one of the richest men in the world. He had the standard long hair of a rocker, although artfully cut so that it lay just so, and blue eyes the color of the ocean outside his magnificent windows. His nose was on the long side but it didn’t detract from what could only be described as attractive of the raw sexuality variety. Why would this man need to visit Madam Zinn’s girls? He could have any woman in the world. And there was his wife, the princess of romantic comedies. She was the girl-next-door daydream of countless men across the country with her blond cap of curls and big blue eyes. And she had the type of personality so many men seemed to like: perky and sweet and nonthreatening. Bella assumed this was close to her real personality because actresses like Carlie Cullen always played characters similar to their own. Regardless, Carlie Cullen was like gold at the box office.