Keith collapsed onto the chair next to her and lit up, of all things, a clove cigarette. I hadn't seen one since Kajagoogoo clogged the airwaves.
"Meet Trista Koan, my lifestyle coach." Keith set a hand on her smooth thigh.
She unceremoniously removed it. "I know. The name's a laffer. My parents were hippies and shouldn't be held accountable."
"What's a lifestyle coach do, exactly?" I asked.
"We're working on reducing Keith's carbon footprint."
"I'm gonna save the whales, dawg," Keith said. His teeth appeared seamless; the sun off them was squint-inducing.
My expression made clear I was missing the connection.
"L.A. is all about environmentalism, right?" he said on the inhale.
"And hair restoration."
"So we gotta get people thinking that way everywhere." Inspired, he swept his arm to indicate, presumably, the world beyond the park-size backyard. The grand gesture was undercut by the jet trail of clove smoke left behind. "It's about constant awareness. I was all into the electric-car thing first, right? Even ordered a Tesla Roadster. Clooney ordered one, too. They inscribe your name on the sill--"
"But the problem is . . ." Trista said, keeping him on track.
"The problem is, electric cars still plug in to the grid and suck energy. So then I bought some hybrids. But they still use gas. So I switched to"--a glance to Trista--"what're they called?"
"Flex-fuel vehicles."
"Why not take a bus?" I thought it was pretty funny, but neither he nor Trista laughed. I said, "Whales, Keith. This started with whales."
"Right. They're using this high-intensity sonar, it's like three hundred decibels--"
"Two thirty-five," Trista corrected.
"You know how many times louder that is than the level that'll hurt humans? Ten."
"Four point three," Trista said, with faintly disguised irritation. I was beginning to understand her role better.
"That's as loud as a rocket blasting off"--he paused to look at Trista, but evidently he'd gotten this one right--"so it's no wonder whales are beaching themselves. Bleeding out their ears, around their brains. The sonar also gives them, like, air in their bloodstreams--"
"Emboli," I said, figuring Trista might need a break.
"--so imagine how much other sea life is killed we don't even know about." He was waiting for my reaction with an almost sweet eagerness.
"The mind boggles."
"Yeah, well," he said, as if that were something to say. "So I'm a dumb-ass actor. I'm twenty-six, and I make more money in a week than my dad made his whole miserable working life. It's a miracle, and I know I don't deserve it, because no one does. So what? I can still tune in, make a difference. And this movie's really important to me. A passion project." He looked to his life coach for approval, which Trista withheld.
He'd leapfrogged our animosities, momentarily, for a pitch and some pious confabulation. He was using me to work out his new material, the green-friendly repackaging of Keith Conner, which would give him the edge on the red carpet, where it really mattered. But now playacting was over and it was time to get down to business. Sensing this, Keith held out his arms. "So what the hell are you doing here, Davis? Aren't we suing each other?" He flashed his camera-ready smile. "How's that going, by the way?"
"I'm here to take possession of the house."
Trista didn't look up, but she touched a fist to her lips. Keith smirked and beckoned for me to talk.
"I have something of yours." That got his attention. I removed a DVD, a matching one from my office, and held it up.
"What is it?"
"It looks like a disc, Keith," Trista said.
I liked her as much as I liked looking at her.
"Yeah, but what's on it?" he asked.
"I don't know," I said. "Didn't you have someone leave it for me?"
"Me send you a DVD? Davis, I haven't thought of you since you got kicked off my movie." He gestured around, appealing to an invisible supporting cast. "They said you were a little nutty, man, but hell." His stare hardened. "What's on it? Is this some bullshit from that paparazzi ass-suck who's stalking me? You here to fucking extort me?"
Maybe he was a better actor than I gave him credit for. "No." I flipped the case to him. "It's blank."
Trista was finally interested enough to set the magazine down on her tan knees.
Keith was getting worked up. "What'd the delivery guy say?"
I rolled with it. "That he was told to bring it by, since you were shooting pickups in New York."
"No, I've been right fucking here, cranking preproduction on The Deep End. It's a race against time, man."
I said, "The Deep End?"
"I know," Trista said. "Keith's manager's title. We had to agree to it before Keith came on board and got us the green light."
I said, "Producer-lifestyle coach? That's an unusual hyphenate, even for this area code."
Keith said, "She's hooked in with the environmental group behind the production company. She knows everything about this stuff, so they flew her in as a, you know . . . resource."
The picture resolved, their relationship finally becoming clear to me. Trista's job was a new version of my old job. Monitor Keith so he didn't get caught looking too hypocritical or saying anything too stupid. I'd rather push a boulder uphill in Hades, but maybe that's why I was teaching screenwriting in the Valley and Trista was reading glossy magazines next to an Olympic-size tiki pool.
Keith tossed the jewel case back over, giving me a nice clean set of prints. I wanted them on record in case he vanished behind locked mansion doors or hopped a carbon-free jet to Ibiza.
"I wouldn't send you shit." He leaned forward. "Not after you assaulted me."
For the thousandth time, I replayed what I'd reconstructed of the phone conversation between him and Ariana. I pictured the words going in, straight to the pit of her gut. Everything that had followed. Until I lowered my guard and took a step back, I didn't realize how badly I'd wanted him to go for me so I could knock in those shiny teeth. I wanted it all to be his fault.
I slid the DVD case into my back pocket, careful not to smudge it too much with my own fingerprints. "Don't get worked up, Keith. I'd hate to see you lose another fight with a countertop."
He nodded at the double doors behind me, where Bree had materialized, a clipboard-wielding apparition. "She'll see you out."
Chapter 17
An officer accompanied me up to the second floor, where Sally Richards sat at a desk, intently focused on her computer screen. I crossed and set a Costco box of Sweet'N Low beside a picture of her holding a toddler.
She glanced over at my offering and bobbed her head, amused. "Great. That'll get me through lunch tomorrow."
"This a bad time?"
"Sorta." She nodded at the monitor. "A Japanese guy pulling a live snake through his nostril on YouTube." She shoved back and folded her arms. "A new disc show up on your doorstep?"
"No. Did you manage to retrieve anything off the old ones?"
"Totally wiped. Though our tech-head could tell there'd been something burned on them once. He said the data was totally obliterated by some self-devouring software program. He's never seen anything like it."
I chewed on that dread-inducing tidbit a moment. "Any prints?"
"Just yours. Your wife's. You're in the database for background checks for community service you guys did in college?"
I nodded.
She continued, "And the discs have some marks consistent with latex gloves. In other words, fucking smudges."
I handed her the DVD case from my back pocket. "This has Keith Conner's fingerprints on it."
"Wonder what you could get for it on eBay."
"I was hoping you'd pulled a partial and we could use this for a match."
"A partial? Easy there, Kojak."
I pressed on: "Even if Keith had someone else do the drop or break-in, I figured he might have touched the disc at some point. He's not the br
ightest bulb on the string."
"You don't say." She followed my gaze to the picture of her with the toddler. "Artificial insemination, since you asked. Miracle of life, my ass. The nausea alone." She whistled. "If I had it to do over again, I would've adopted from China like any self-respecting daughter of Sappho." Her voice rose. "Now, Terence there, Terence has four boys. Four. Imagine that." Valentine paused at the top of the stairs, regarded us with sad, tired eyes, then trudged up a corridor. Sally said, "He loves having me as a partner. Makes him the envy of the squad room."
"I would've thought it was his ready smile."
She said, "Sit."
I obeyed, easing into the humble wooden chair at the end of the desk. On her blotter was a to-do list. Call gopher guy. Rebate on dryer. Sitter for Tues night shift. The glimpse into the cogs and gears of her life struck a chord. Perhaps it resonated with the banal tasks I'd been crossing off my own checklist while my insides crumbled.
I kept my gaze on the floor. "Ever feel stuck?"
"Like that U2 song? Part of being a grown-up, I suppose."
"Yeah, but you always hoped it wouldn't be you."
She smirked. "The only new surprises are you can't eat Indian on an empty stomach and how expensive patio furniture is."
"Just how it goes, I guess. It's okay. If you like where you are." I looked away quickly; I'd revealed more than I'd wanted to. "No prints at all? Maybe you should've dusted the camera and tripod."
She noted my discomfort, the rushed segue. "Sure. We could shoot an episode of CSI at your house. Maybe call in FBI profilers."
"Okay, okay," I said. "You have limited resources. As of now it's still a camcorder prank."
"Not just that, Davis, but the guy wore latex gloves. The jewel case, sleeve, and discs are totally clean. If we believe your version, the DVDs autoerased like something out of a Bond film. Whoever's behind this went to great care. He's not suddenly gonna push a 'record' button with a bare thumb." She poured water from a bottle into a mug and busted into the Costco box, digging out a few pink packets and dumping the crystals. "Now, I shouldn't tell you this, but you did bring me Sweet'N Low. . . ." She used a pencil to stir. "You have any other cops to the house?"
"That's a question, Sally. You didn't actually tell me anything."
"How 'bout that."
"Why are you asking about other cops?"
She took a sip, leaned back in her distressed little chair. "The boot print came back--"
"Wait a minute. Boot print?"
"From the mud patch by the leaky sprinkler in your front yard. We saw it when we went over to talk to your neighbor." She tugged open a drawer, then tossed down a file in front of me. Numerous photos spilled out. A decent impression of a thick worker's sole, pointed toward the street. Left behind, I guessed, when the intruder split the premises. In a few of the shots, the print was illuminated by a Mag-Lite flashlight, just like Sally's, lying in the grass to give a sharp angle.
"When did you take these?" I asked.
"I didn't. Valentine did when I went back to talk to you."
I pictured Valentine waiting out in the Crown Vic and then her sitting with her tea, holding my attention and keeping me turned away from the front window.
"It's a nice three-dimensional track," she said. "Severe sole wear on the outside by the ball of the foot. Pebble wedged deep in the ridges here in the heel. See?"
"Did you cast a print?"
"Like I said, Kojak, we can't roll criminalists because someone sent you a spooky home video."
"Great. So we'll get slaughtered in our bed and then you'll send a van."
She lifted an eyebrow. "First of all, you'll get slaughtered on your couch. And yes, then we would send a van."
I thumbed through the photos. One was taken from directly above, Valentine's radio lying beside the print. "The radio's for scale?"
"No, for period atmosphere. Yes. Scale. The print's from a size-eleven-and-a-half Danner boot. The make is Acadia, common uniform footwear, eight inches high at the ankle. They're comfortable as hell, and you can resole them. Cops love 'em, but they're twice the price of Hi-Tecs or Rockys, so you don't see them around as much. They're a field boot, for patrolmen or SWAT guys. Detectives wear bad dress shoes." With a grunt, she set her long-suffering loafer on the edge of the desk. "Payless if you're on a single-mother budget."
"So it's a law-enforcement boot?"
"But anyone can order them. Just like handguns. And we all know how deranged members of our society have been known to fetishize police gear."
"Especially when they're already working in law enforcement."
"Don't look at me. I wanted to be an astronaut."
My eyes wandered around the squad room, taking in the black boots of various makes attached to various officers. "What size shoe is Valentine?"
Her lips pursed with irritation. "Not eleven and a half. And he was on shift with me when that footage of you was taken. Surely you can do better than that, Inspector Clouseau."
"Well, there haven't been any cops to our house that we know of. I think ever."
"Like I said, it could be a cop in a cop boot, or it could be a wackjob in a cop boot." She stood, pulled on her jacket, bringing the conversation to a close. "If you want to be doing something useful, you should be thinking about who you've pissed off lately. Or who your lovely wife has."
"I have been," I said. "Where else am I supposed to look?"
"There are rocks everywhere," she said. "We just usually don't kick 'em over."
Chapter 18
Heading back up Roscomare, I called Ariana at the showroom. "I'm going home early."
"You're not going to the movies?" she asked.
"I'm not going to the movies."
"Okay. I'll finish up here, too."
There was a courtship excitement to our exchange, unspoken but understood, like we were smitten teenagers planning a second date. It hit me how rarely these past six weeks I'd come home before she was in bed for the night. And now I was nervous but eager, unsure what the evening with her would hold.
Simmering unease eroded my optimism. Ariana's meeting--the one I hadn't picked up the suit for--was supposed to be in the afternoon. So why had she been at the showroom when I'd called? For a half block, I actually debated calling back and checking with her assistant. As Ariana had pointed out, it doesn't take much more than a white handkerchief and a few well-placed nudges. My paranoia, I realized, was bleeding outward, making me question--however stupidly--everything going on around me.
I passed the shopping strip, and the reception bars blinked off the cell-phone screen, offended by the altitude. As I slowed for the driveway, a sense of foreboding seized me, and I couldn't help but crane to see if a new surprise was waiting. The front yard looked normal, and the doorstep was empty. But a ripple at the curtain snagged my focus. I caught a flash of a white hand before it withdrew. Too white.
A latex glove.
It was so odd, so out of place, that at first it stunned me into a kind of mental blankness. Then, through my rising alarm, I registered the figure behind the curtain, shadow-smudged like a fish in murky waters.
My body had gone rigid. But I didn't slow the car further; I rolled right past my driveway and the house next door before pulling over to the curb. I debated hooking back to the grocery-store pay phone to call 911, knowing that the intruder would likely be long gone by the time the cops arrived. Gripping the door handle, staring at my fist-battered dashboard, I fought with myself for several prolonged seconds, but my fury--and burning curiosity--won out.
I climbed out and jogged back. Cutting up the driveway, I slid along the fence, reaching the door to the garage. I paused for a silent twenty-second freak-out, my fists shoved against my head, and then I regained what composure I could muster, slipped my key into the door, and pushed it tentatively open. The garage's walls and ceiling seemed to amplify my rapid breathing. My eyes darted around, settling on the golf bag languishing beneath a veil of cobwebs, where it ha
d lived since my then-agent bought it for me to celebrate the screenplay sale. My hand fussed across dusty club heads, upgrading from wedge to iron to driver.
The door leading into the dining nook had a creak. I knew this. I'd been meaning to WD-40 the hinges for months. I was in the garage; why not do it now? I found the blue-and-yellow can, sprayed the hinges until they dripped. Under the guidance of my white-knuckle grip, the door swung in, slowly, without complaint. I realized, too late, that it could have sounded the alarm, but the intruder had disarmed the system.
A bead of sweat held to the line of my jaw, tickling. I slipped inside, easing the door shut behind me. Setting down my feet as silently as I could, I led with the club, holding it upright, a yuppie samurai sword. I inched around the cabinets, my view of the kitchen opening up.
Across the room the back door finished a slow opening arc, stopping halfway.
I bounded over to it. At the far edge of the lawn, a large man in a ski mask and black zip-up jacket stood perfectly still, facing the house, arms at his sides.
Waiting on me.
I froze, my heart lurching, my throat seizing up.
His gloved hands floated at his sides like a mime's. He seemed to register me not with his dark irises but with the suspended crescents of white that held them.
He turned and ran almost silently through the sumac. Enraged, terrified, I followed. In the sane quadrant of my brain, I noted his bulk and almost military efficiency. And his black boots, which I would've bet were size-eleven-and-a-half Danner Acadias. He bounded from an upended terra-cotta pot to the roof of the greenhouse shed as if off a trampoline bounce, then whistled over the fence. I hurled the club at him, but it hit the wood and rebounded back at me. I slammed into the fence and hoisted myself onto it, shoes scrabbling for purchase. Hanging, the slat edges digging into my gut, I looked up the street, but he'd vanished. Into a yard, a house, around the corner.
I dropped back down with a grunt, fighting to catch my breath. Had I surprised him by altering my schedule, skipping the movies? If so, he sure hadn't seemed concerned. Judging by his build and adroitness, he could have dismantled me. So hurting me wasn't his aim. At least not yet.
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