by Delia Rosen
“I wasn’t looking for a ‘loophole,’ only more information about—”
“Don’t tell me you were looking into the chocolate shop,” he said. “That was old the day you ran it up the flagpole. You’ve been looking into the death of my client Mr. Hopewell.”
“All right. What if I am?”
“Leave Ms. Miller out of it.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s suffered enough,” he said. And hung up.
Okay. That wasn’t the fun I expected it to be. It was actually a little scary: I had never heard Solly so angry.
I was about to call Grant when there was a knock at the door. It was followed by Thom poking her head in.
“You’ve got a visitor,” she said.
“Who?”
“Poodle Baldwin.”
“Send her in,” I said, thinking that if she was here by herself it was to discuss something in private.
The young woman entered and Thom shut the door behind her. “Sit,” I said, indicating Thom’s chair. As soon as I said it, I realized she could have taken that as a dig. She didn’t. I guessed she had built up a tough skin in school to all the dog jokes.
The photo on the computer caught her eye. She leaned over, not quite allowing enough clearance for those hair balls. One of them brushed my face and I had to do a cobra-head move to escape.
“Your parents?”
“Yup. High school graduation.”
“That’s so nice,” she said.
Poodle didn’t sit. She stood fussing with the end of the orange pashmina scarf thrown casually around her neck.
“Something wrong?” I asked.
“I heard my mom talking to Helen Russell on the phone this morning,” she said. “I guess you went to see her yesterday. Helen, I mean.”
“I did,” I told her.
“You talked about Mr. Russell—John.”
“A little,” I admitted. I had an awful sense about where this was going.
“I . . . I . . .”
“What is it, Poodle? You want something to drink? You sure you don’t want to sit?”
She nodded and went to the chair. She worked it out from behind the other desk, and sat beside me. “I don’t know you very well, but you come from New York and you probably have a different view of things than people down here.”
“You could say that.”
“Did Helen tell you about John and Mr. Hopewell and the kind of things they did together?”
“A little,” I said cautiously. I didn’t think she was setting me up the way Helen Russell had. She really seemed to be struggling with something. But I didn’t push. I wanted to make sure that she got to where she was going of her own accord. The words, the truth, had to come because she wanted them to.
She sobbed once—it was more like a hacking cough—then caught herself and regained her composure.
“I didn’t know,” she said.
“Know what?”
“That they both liked . . . other girls.” She said the last two words quickly, suddenly, as though she’d sucked venom from a wound and was spitting it out.
“Talk to me,” she said. “It’s okay.”
She sucked down a breath and let it out. “Hoppy . . . was my first.”
“How old were you?”
“Sixteen,” she said. “And two days.”
I didn’t know what the age of consent was in Tennessee, but that still seemed pretty young. Not cut-your-junk-off young, just pathetic.
“Poodle, do you mind sharing something? Can you try?”
She nodded again.
“How did they do it?”
It took a second before she blurted out, “Gift cards.”
“You mean, to stores?”
“Yes. It started as a birthday gift, they said. Mom had put a sweet sixteen notice in the paper. They gave me hundreds of dollars worth of cards.”
What a pair of pricks. But that couldn’t account for Hoppy’s money problems. Besides, Russell was well heeled.
“Go on,” I said. “Where did they meet you?”
“The first time it was at the pool parlor. I went there to celebrate with my friends. After that we’d meet at the mall late in the afternoon. They’d give me my choice of stores and off I’d go.”
“They had a selection of cards?”
“Big-time,” Poodle said. “Hoppy would fan it out like he was a magician or something. They’d wait for me in the food court and when I was done they’d drive me back.”
“Where?”
“To Hoppy’s home,” she said. “He’d pull into the garage, close the door, and we’d go to the den. They’d ask to see whatever clothes or shoes or jewelry I’d bought.”
“You modeled for them.”
“In a way. It was kind of a joke. He had this long carpet that was like a runway and I’d walk it like they do on those VH1 shows. Then they’d toast me, we’d all drink a toast. That was how it started.”
“Wine?”
Another nod. Underage drinking; even that didn’t help us. With both men dead, even if Poodle gave a statement to Grant, there wouldn’t be a reason to search Hoppy’s home.
“How often did this happen?”
“Five times,” she said. “About once a week for a month.”
“And then?”
Her miserable expression was my answer.
“You never knew that there were other girls?” I asked.
She shook her head once.
“Did you love Hoppy?” I asked. “Did you think you did?”
“Yeah, I thought I did,” she said with the hint of a smile. “He was fun to be with. John not so much, but Hoppy was funny and attentive.”
“Were you with John too?”
“I was with him mostly,” she said. “Hoppy said he liked to see me enjoying myself.” The little smile turned crooked. “I pretended to. For Hoppy.”
I felt sick now, not because I was a prude, not because the whole May-December thing held any kind of special freak status in my world, and not even because the girls had effectively been turned into hookers. That was scummy, but sort of par for the course where men of means were concerned. I saw a lot of that in cooked books back in New York, though the price of seduction was a little higher—private jets and Mediterranean yachts. What sickened me was that these two bastards had come up with a plan to make this happen again and again. It wasn’t like a CEO with a crush on his secretary or a film producer seducing a day player with the promise of a line or two. It was a program to take advantage of Poodle and other young girls and then not care whether they messed them up.
I took her hand. “Y ’know, I’ve done some pretty nutty things in my life,” I said. “We learn from our mistakes.”
I sounded like a mother, from the platitude to the compassionate tone of voice. I have no nephews or nieces or young employees; that was a first for me. And then I thought something no mother should ever think.
“Poodle, I need to ask you something.”
“Sure.”
“Were you—angry at Hoppy?”
She didn’t answer at first. Her hand suddenly felt clammy. She looked at me with tears in her eyes. “I was when he said he couldn’t see me any more, when he said it was time for me to date young men my own age.”
I didn’t for an instant think he was looking out for her. He was a man and he probably got bored once the novelty of Poodle had worn thin. I didn’t ask if she was angry at Hoppy now. The way she’d said it through her teeth answered that.
“What about your mother?” I asked. “Did she know about—”
“No!” Poodle cried. “At least, I don’t think so! I was so careful. I told her the gifts were from a med student at Vanderbilt who I was supposedly dating. It wasn’t that I was ashamed of what I was doing, not at first, but I knew she wouldn’t approve. That’s why I’m here. I’ve been thinking about that since the night Hoppy was . . . since the night he died. Mother doesn’t like the way I cat around with men. We’ve had some
terrible fights about it. I know she was there, at the party, but I wanted to tell you that I don’t think she knew. And even if she did, I don’t think . . . I can’t believe . . . she wouldn’t do something like this!”
Poodle was full-out hysterical now. I pulled her to me and held her tight. Thom opened the door a crack, making sure I was okay, then quietly withdrew.
The emotional storm passed in two or three minutes. I gave Poodle some paper towels—I didn’t have tissues but I was always spilling coffee on my desk—and she patted her cheeks and eyes.
“I was so stupid,” she said.
“You were trusting, not stupid. We’ve all been there.” I know I was. The big love of my life, or so I thought, was a lug of a jock of an asshole—stop me if you’ve heard this one before—who was three years ahead of me in high school and who happened to have the same dentist, Dr. Murray Stone. And while this gentleman-who-shall-remainnameless wouldn’t be seen dead with a wallflowery type like me around his football buddies, he was only too happy to chat me up while waiting for his time in the chair to get that megawatt smile buffed. We went on a date, I fell for his shoulders and stubble, and when I left his apartment the next morning I never heard from him again—except for one time about a year later when he was horny and drunk. I left the message on my answering machine as a reminder not to not bang guys like him, but not to be surprised when they disappeared.
Poodle and I sat in silence while she collected herself.
“In a way, I have to thank Hoppy for introducing me to sex,” she said. “Otherwise, I would have missed out on a lot.”
She was obviously feeling very comfortable, very quickly, with Ms. With-It New York. I tried to act as cool as she thought I was. Inside, I was hoping that she’d stop there.
“I just wish I had known about the others,” she said, the teeth clenching again. “That’s what really bites.”
Poodle left after securing another promise from me never to tell her mother about Hoppy or John. I promised, though I didn’t tell her that it wouldn’t surprise me if Mollie already knew. One thing I’d discovered down here is that the society rich talk, especially about each other. A lot. And not kindly.
I was back on duty in time for the lunch rush. Breakfast seemed like it belonged to another day.
In about an hour, lunch would seem that way too.
Chapter 21
I had been intending to call Grant all day, but work and then Poodle and then more work got in the way. So I was glad when he showed up shortly after two.
I was wiping a table. The cloth smelled of everything on the menu. He didn’t seem to notice, and my gladness evaporated when, approaching me, his expression stayed fixed in cop-neutral.
“Can you get away?” he asked.
“Sure,” I said. He was clearly not inviting me for an arm-in-arm stroll through Centennial Park. “What’s going on?”
“Lizzie Renoir didn’t show up for work today,” he said. “C’mon. I’ll tell you as we go.”
I held the rag toward Luke, who was about to start his afternoon strum-from-a-stool concert. He set his guitar aside and hurried over as I rushed out, waving to a puzzled Thom. We got in Grant’s unmarked Dodge Charger and he screeched from the curb.
“Lolo called Deputy Chief Whitman when Lizzie didn’t show up,” Grant said. “She lives in that old mansion near the cul-de-sac on South 6th, which is way out of his jurisdiction. He called us and we sent a cruiser over. We found her on the kitchen floor with her head bashed in, one of those blocky, steel hammers beside her—”
“A tenderizer,” I said.
“Right. She was unconscious but still alive. Best guess is that she’d been there for two, three hours. They’ve got her at VU Medical Center. Lolo’s got a research wing named after her.”
That was a lot to take in. I backed up. “If Lizzie lives in a mansion, why—”
“Sorry. You’re so comfortable I forget you’re new here.”
Comfortable? Jeez. That’s one not designed to make you smile when you roll it over in your memory. I backed up over that speed bump and replayed the words he said after:
“It’s not a mansion now, it’s apartments,” he said. “The fourteen bedrooms were converted about three years ago, when Lizzie moved here.”
“From?”
“Montreal.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask why she doesn’t live with Lolo.”
“I didn’t have time to read her interview. The cop who talked to her said she wanted to have her independence. I can’t blame her. Would you want to live with Lolo?”
Probably not. In fact, I wasn’t sure I wanted to live with anyone ever again. Especially not someone who called me “comfortable.”
“Clues?” I asked.
“So far, nada. I’ve been trying to think of a motive. That’s why I hijacked you.”
Would the compliments never cease? What the hell, thought the proactive me. We had a matterat-hand and I was going to focus on that.
I said I’d have to ponder that one. Then I told him about Gary Gold’s visit and what Dag had discovered.
“Anne Miller?” Grant said. “Wasn’t she a movie star?”
“A dancer,” I said. “But it’s not her.”
“Any ideas?”
“None,” I said.
Then, after getting him to swear to keep it confidential, I told him about Poodle.
“I had heard that John Russell had exclusive tastes,” Grant said.
I tensed a little when he said that. Some things just don’t deserve to be euphemized. Taking advantage of defenseless teenage girls was one of those. “Happily,” I said, “that piece of shit is gone and Hoppy won’t be pimping for any more like him.”
My tone drew a surprised look from Grant. He was savvy enough not to say anything else on the matter. We drove the rest of the way in silence. Not that I was taking in the scenery. I was thinking about Lizzie and the fact that she wasn’t at the party. What reason would anyone have to take her out, unless she had found something in the house afterwards.
And then did what with it? Tried to blackmail someone? That didn’t seem to fit. Even if it did, if the killer came after her, she or he probably took the thing with them.
I paid absolutely no attention to the rest of the fifteen-minute drive. I missed the house because I was still inside my head—alternately thinking about the attack and how I’d like to never see Grant again—and I didn’t emerge until we were inside the kitchen.
I wasn’t prepared for the crime scene. Yet the sight of blood smeared across the white tile wasn’t the most disturbing thing. It looked like a broken bottle of ketchup. It really did. The watery kind we don’t use at Murray’s. What upset me was the way everything in the place had been overturned.
The apartment consisted of a kitchen—a kitchenette really—a bedroom, a bathroom, and a very small den. Officers and plainclothes personnel, fourteen of them altogether, were moving with silent purpose through the residence. Grant’s arrival was acknowledged, when it was at all, with nods.
Police tape had been strung from cabinets to appliances to mark off the spot where Lizzie’s body had been found. We stepped gingerly around it and went to the den. Grant walked over to a sergeant who was waiting for a photographer to finish taking pictures.
“Sergeant O’Rourke,” Grant said.
“Detective,” the other replied. The burly sergeant gave me a who-the-hell-are-you look but didn’t say anything.
Grant asked, “Who was first on-scene?”
“Officer Bolton,” he said.
Grant looked around, saw the man in the bedroom. “I heard there was a hammer? A tenderizer,” he added.
“Bagged and on its way to the lab,” he said. “But first pass was clean.”
“Thanks,” Grant said, and we went over.
The young officer was moving clothes aside with a pen. They had been spilled from a drawer which lay on a rug.
“Officer,” Grant said.
The yo
ung man stood. “Sir.”
“Anything?”
I have to admit, I wasn’t used to this shorthand. It didn’t strike me as familiar necessarily, but respectful. They were guests in someone’s home and were behaving as such.
“Whoever did this was thorough and quiet,” he said. “The drawers are intact, they weren’t thrown aside.”
“Neighbors might have heard,” Grant said. “Any of them see or hear anything?”
“Melody is taking statements in the rental office,” he said. I gathered that was his partner. “It’s just inside the front door.”
“Yeah, saw it when we came in.”
“I helped get everyone down there,” Bolton went on. “Mix of college kids and the elderly. Everyone seemed shocked as heck—most of them were probably asleep and, like I said, whoever did this was pretty quiet.”
“The door was jimmied,” Grant said.
“That was me,” he said. “It was intact when I got here. Locked but not bolted. The windows were also locked.”
“She let them in,” Grant said.
“That’d be my guess.”
“Video anywhere?”
“We’re running plates that were picked up by the cameras at the stadium,” he said. “That’s the closest.”
That would be Shelby Avenue, where Rhonda and I had our confab. It was a main drag, not likely to tell them anything.
Grant took me back to the den, where we found a quiet corner. “I don’t think she was trying to extort anyone, do you?”
“Not likely,” I agreed. “Where does Rhonda live?”
“Why?”
I told him about our encounter up the road.
“Lockeland Springs,” he told me. “Big place on the golf course east of here. Even if she turns up on surveillance, it won’t mean squat.”
“Fine. That aside, I think it’s fair to say that Lizzie stumbled on a piece of evidence that someone was afraid would implicate them. This wasn’t planned.”
“No,” Grant agreed. “The tenderizer was an impulse.”
It annoyed me how he used that word now, like it had always been part of his vocabulary, like he had known what the hell to call it before I told him. “Comfortable” made bigger waves than I expected.
“She may not have known the item was important and was just being nice,” Grant said. “Maybe they came to pick it up. Maybe that’s when Lizzie realized it wasn’t as innocent as she thought.”