“You were everything to me. You broke my heart.”
“Oh, Ginny. Honey. We have to move on. Life’s full of twists and turns. We can make the best of them, can’t we?”
He still hurt a little. Good. She felt less humiliated about having loved him. “You promised to take care of me. I need you to live up to that promise.” She hung up.
Frustration compressed in her chest, lodging like a jagged rock, and she thought again of the acupuncturist. He should not get off scot-free for what he had done to her. The world would be too unjust to live in if people like that got away with that kind of behavior. She pulled out the phone book, feeling angrier than she had ever been before.
CHAPTER 26
THE TOWN OF SEASIDE LAY NORTH OF MONTEREY IN A PARALLEL universe. Highway 1 ran along the ocean here, physically separating the town from the sand and the frigid sea, depriving it of resort status. Fort Ord had once been its lifeblood, but the base was due to close and a new university campus was planned, so the town was undergoing a lot of transition.
Seaside had none of the romantic pretensions of Monterey and Carmel. Military families bought cheap furniture and crammed it into the single-story wooden houses, and would eventually move on, leaving behind metal bookshelves to gather dust in one of the thrift stores lining Del Monte Boulevard. Farmworkers, service workers, people new to the United States, all might temporarily settle here until they could find a way out, work their way across the money abyss one day to settle in one of the peninsula’s famous tourist towns.
Noting the efficient police cordon at the entrance to Richard Filsen’s apartment building, Paul parked right on the busy street. “Gimme two minutes,” he said to Armano. He drank the last of his coffee and took in the early-morning scene, the market right in front of him, doors wide-open, a couple of kids on skateboards, some neighbors gossiping in clumps. The building wasn’t what he would have pictured Filsen living in. Didn’t even have a pool. Filsen had strutted around as if he had plenty.
Paul made a note to himself to look into money problems.
He had a concern here, and he didn’t want the sheriff to have to find out about it if it wasn’t entirely necessary. He had technically assaulted Filsen that day with Nina and Bob. Had Filsen made notes, left a memo in his desk or something? Probably had, he was a lawyer, wasn’t he?
Not to mention Jack had decked him at the Bar dinner.
And Nina. She had evidently had some sort of physical altercation with the guy, too.
Paul might not be able to investigate this thing at all. He resolved to look around and think about it and tell Carsey if he had to.
As they got out of the sheriff’s vehicle, Paul said, “I talk, you keep the record today?” Armano took out a tattered spiral notebook and the stub of a pencil. Paul reached into his pocket, handing him his gold pen. “Use this. We might need to read it.”
The building’s street entrance, a door opening directly onto a flight of wooden stairs, was beside a busy delicatessen.
“¿Qué pasa? Hey, Armano! How you doing?” A skinny young man came out of the apartment next to Filsen’s.
“Hey, Helio,” said Armano with a slight nod. “So this is where you live. All right. This is Detective van Wagoner. Somebody’s gonna come over and get a statement from you soon, so don’t go anywhere.”
“Okay, but I work the graveyard shift in Marina at the Shell station now, man, so I have to try to get some sleep.”
“You do that, Helio.”
“I got home an hour after the neighbors heard a shot. Gotta be careful here, man. Lotta thieves.” Helio pointed at the scratches around the keyhole of his own door. He watched as they nodded to the patrol officer waiting for them at the door to Richard Filsen’s apartment and stepped inside.
“How do you know that kid?” Paul asked.
Armano said, “My sister’s oldest son. Has a few problems.”
“Don’t we all.” Seaside police had sent over a forensics team, two women criminal-investigations specialists and a photographer named Gabe, who was setting up for another shot. They all nodded at each other as Paul and Armano drew on their gloves. The senior forensics technician filled in the details concisely.
“What’s the sheriff’s office doing here?” she asked. “This happened within Seaside city limits.”
“Your boss called my boss. He’s tired of waiting around for your investigators, who are still tied up with the triple shooting on Broadway, so here we are. Happy to help.” Paul had heard gossip about Filsen, about his many successes. Why did he live in such a crappy neighborhood?
Looking around, Paul decided it was because Filsen was a phony. He could afford a large place here, but couldn’t in Carmel or Monterey.
Richard Filsen lay with his arms straight out from his body, legs curled to the side, knees together. Blood covered his torso and the rug beneath him. He wore black silk underwear and a white cotton robe with the logo of the Pebble Beach Hotel on it, open now so his long body was displayed.
“Fancy,” said Armano, pulling on his gloves and squatting down and fingering the fabric of the robe. “Not the norm in this building.”
“He was a lawyer,” said the Seaside patrol cop who had just come in, as if to say, they are all such poseurs. He told Paul and Armano how the call had come in at 6:11 a.m., a woman reporting two shots in or near apartment 2A. This person had refused to give her name and hung up, and the team on dispatch arrived at a sleepy apartment house, woke the manager, and went in. They had searched the area and the car parked down below on the street, where they found the lawyer’s attaché.
A snazzy racing bike stood in its support stand against the wall behind Filsen. No blood on it.
“Shot twice at close range, not more than six feet,” said the senior technician. About forty, businesslike, she wore goggles and gloves. “Both bullets are still in him.”
“Weapon?”
“None found. We already did a preliminary inventory.”
“Too bad.”
They searched the apartment. Paul checked the usual hiding places, under the toilet lid, behind pictures tacked and curling on the walls. In the desk, he reviewed the papers, mostly bills—but then, oh, Jesus—he found an old photo of Nina Reilly at some beach.
He fought against an impulse to slip the picture into his pocket. The idea that Nina could have anything to do with this was nonsensical. She’d be all right, and besides, it was a crime to obstruct justice and tamper with evidence. He stuffed what he had found into one of the evidence bags he had brought in his pack and labeled it, fumbling in the latex gloves.
The attaché from the car was not locked. Inside they found several business files and utility bills, also unpaid, along with a round-trip ticket for a flight to Reno.
Were there other files?
They moved around the place in accordance with protocol. Filsen’s car keys lay on a table by the door. He had lived alone with his bicycle, his big TV, and his bottles of Jim Beam.
Selecting handholds away from the bloodstains, Paul pulled down the yellowed shades for prints.
“Already checked ’em,” Armano said, grinning.
Time to check out the neighbors and Filsen’s office. The county coroner, Susan Misumi, a young physician with improbably shiny black bangs, had arrived but had little to report other than the probable caliber of the bullet: “.357 Magnum. Dead about two and a half hours now.” They all followed her gaze to the body, with one of its eyes half-closed. It made Filsen look half-asleep, as though he were no longer interested in this business of the body he had left behind. In death, he looked uncertain, his mouth askew.
The photographer and the coroner finished their work, saying little. The morgue crew loaded the body on a gurney and filed out ahead of them. Dr. Misumi gave Paul a wink. Armano locked Filsen’s door, taping it off.
They went into the hall. Paul tapped on the door across the way.
A young Latina woman answered. A baby with a little pink bow gathering
a wisp of cowlick clutched her blouse. As her mother spoke, the baby grabbed a wad of her hair, yanking and twisting. Mom patiently uncurled the baby’s fingers, only to have her move in for another attack.
“I’m Detective Paul van Wagoner and this is Lieutenant Hernandez. The man across the hall from you, Richard Filsen, you knew him?”
Her face collapsed. “He’s really dead? The police wouldn’t tell us anything.”
“Yes.”
“God rest his soul. I suppose you already guessed that I’m the one that called the police. I’m Barbara Santiago.” She caressed her baby’s head. “I have a lot to tell. I was Richard’s best friend and I heard the shots.” Paul slid a sideways glance at Armano. She would be protecting herself, but she might know something useful.
While she composed herself, Armano poked around the room. Paul watched her stroke the baby and whisper to her. The husband came in. His name was Carlos Santiago and he was off work for Thanksgiving.
The smell of turkey wafted through the room. They tackled the young wife first. “How well did you know Richard Filsen?”
“We’re neighbors. I’m a college student, full-time till I had Lucinda, so I’m at home a lot, studying. Carlos works at Carmel Valley Ranch. Richard was our friend, a good friend.” She sounded sad. For the first time, Paul noticed the darkness around her eyes. She didn’t apologize for the lean-tos of paper and books jamming the small living room. “Let’s sit down.” Using a hand to clear the couch, she set the baby down before a pile of rubber blocks.
Her husband picked up the infant, then said, “My wife and I first met Richard at a free legal clinic when we were having trouble with our landlord. He helped us resolve our problem. Then we referred a bunch of our friends who needed legal advice. We got to know him.”
Paul said to Mrs. Santiago, “Living across the way from him, you probably saw more of his private life than anyone else in the past few months. With your husband gone all day, you’re obviously here alone a lot. You were close friends?”
She was already bridling. Interesting. “Not as close as you seem to imply.”
“Okay.” Paul scribbled Barbara loves Richard in his notebook, trying it out. It rang vaguely true. “But you observed him coming and going?”
Barbara visibly winced, while her husband joggled the baby.
“What I can’t figure out,” Paul said, “is why a guy who obviously cared a lot about appearances and drives a BMW, who seemed to be financially successful, lived here and had an office in Seaside.”
“Not to insult our town or our lives or anything,” Carlos Santiago muttered, rocking his arms while the baby got sleepy. He looked like a guy who worked out, ex-military, beefy but open-faced, not the angry type.
Mrs. Santiago took a few moments to work herself up to her next statement. “Richard gambles.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Mm-hmm, a cardplayer, always in money trouble. I know he was ashamed, but he broke down practically every month, went somewhere, and lost a lot of money. We couldn’t help him with that. When he was with us, he talked about Bob, especially after he got that big scare.”
“What scare?”
“Thought he was dying,” Carlos said. “Pancreatic cancer.” He snorted. “Turns out after the tests came in, he only had an infection.”
“But it affected him,” Barbara said. “There are moments in life that stop you cold and make you look hard at what you might leave behind. He thought of Bob.”
“Are you talking about Bob Reilly?”
“Right. His son by that girl. Nina Reilly, her name is. Have you talked to her?”
“I will be talking to her for sure.”
“But you know her, don’t you? Richard mentioned she was dating a tall cop with blond hair.”
Filsen gave a damn about Paul’s blond hair? Paul felt strangely flattered. Armano’s eyebrows had flown to his hairline.
“He meant you, didn’t he?”
“Richard took quite an interest in this ex-girlfriend, didn’t he?”
“He wasn’t in love with her anymore, if that’s what you’re suggesting.”
“And you know that how?”
“The way he talked about her.” She blushed. “He said she didn’t satisfy him. She was needy, an intellectual. He wanted someone warmer.”
Oh, Paul thought, I am so onto something with this woman. He held back slightly due to the presence of her husband and baby. He would catch her alone later. Nail her feet to the floor. “What else did he tell you about Nina Reilly?”
“She’s a student at the Monterey College of Law. Her whole family, including her mother, has conspired to keep him away from his son. It hurt him so much.”
“It’s my understanding he had no interest in Bob Reilly until very recently. The boy is four years old.”
She nodded. “So you do know them.”
“What did he specifically tell you about the kid?” Paul asked.
“That he didn’t go see his little boy at first because they weren’t getting along, and when they split up, he had sort of given up.” Mrs. Santiago shook her head. “Even though Richard made that mistake at first, that is so wrong. To let a little boy grow up without knowing his father—
“So we talked a lot about it, and I explained how important fatherhood is, how he needed to involve himself and how I felt he had a right—”
“He decided to see the boy because you talked him into it?” asked Armano.
“No. Mortality shook him up. My arguments amounted to nothing beside that.”
“Did you and he discuss going to court to change the child’s custodial parent?”
“We all agreed Bob needed to be reunited with his father.”
“You and Mr. Filsen did quite a bit of talking,” Armano observed.
“Pretty much every day. He needed a friend. Oh, poor guy. Poor, poor guy.” She choked up. The baby, maybe sensing her mother was upset, began to wail. Her husband took the squalling baby out into the hall.
“Forgive me for having to ask,” Paul said, taking advantage of the moment, “but were you intimate with Richard Filsen?”
“I’m married.” She held a hand over her eyes like a visor.
CHAPTER 27
CARLOS SANTIAGO HAD TAKEN UP A POSITION IN THE GLOOM of the doorway, holding Lucinda in his arms, his expression dire. From her vantage, Barbara Santiago could not see her husband. Her husband on the other hand, observed her with single-minded intensity.
Her words tumbled out. “Richard felt bad about neglecting his only child. He saw an opportunity to make a connection. I saw a picture of Nina Reilly once when he was burning papers in the wastebasket. He said, ‘Why can’t she let me see him? What’s so bad about me?’ He seemed so injured. Tell me, Detective, do you think Nina Reilly killed him to keep him away from her family?”
Maybe you killed him, Paul thought. Maybe he didn’t want to be saddled with a married woman with an infant that wasn’t his own. Maybe he was afraid of Carlos. Maybe he found someone new. Maybe he wanted to mend things with Nina. Damn, no, he didn’t want to think that kind of thought. “To return to today. What did you hear?”
“A shot, then a short pause, then another shot, blasting through the place. Everyone in the building heard them.”
“Anybody cry out?”
She shook her head. “No, no sounds like that.”
“At what time?”
“Well, I was up nursing the baby. It was just after six this morning, I think.”
“Did you look at a watch? Notice a clock?”
“No, but I was going to put the turkey in the oven at seven, so I was up good and early.”
“Where were you, Mr. Santiago?”
“At the gym.”
“Carlos goes to the gym on Thursdays at five a.m. most mornings. He already left,” Mrs. Santiago said.
“Which gym?”
“Gold’s, not too far up the road.” They took down the details. They would check.
“And you, M
rs. Santiago? What did you do after you heard the shots?”
“I was freaked. I mean, gunshots in our building? It seemed impossible. Here’s a strange thing. You hear something like that, you automatically want to know what’s going on. I stepped toward the front door, then realized that was an insane thing to do. I had the baby! I made sure the door was locked. I just got on the phone then and called the police.”
“Smart choice,” Armano said.
“Lucinda screamed and screamed. I’ve heard about stray bullets so I got in the bathtub then in case more shots might come our way. I could see out the bathroom window. I have a view of the entrance if I lean out a little, and that’s what I did. It was only a couple of minutes after the shooting. I saw someone leave.”
“You had time to check the door, call the police, get in your bathtub, and look out the window, all in two minutes?” Paul asked. He was getting excited. A witness!
“I don’t know. Not long. But, see, whoever shot Richard had to get downstairs and out the door. It would have taken some time. Honestly, I’m starting to feel kind of sick right now. It’s all so awful.”
She shook her head, wiped a tear away. Mr. Santiago was putting the baby in her crib, judging from the sounds in the next room.
Paul said, “Okay. Describe who you saw leaving, in the best detail you can.” Armano was taking it down.
“I assumed it was the same woman I had seen knocking on Richard’s door last night, which surprised me.”
“Back up. Who did you see knocking on his door the night before?”
She shrugged. “A woman. She wore pants, a peacoat. A cap over her hair. I was coming home from the store a couple of blocks away, unlocking my door, and he was letting her in. Last time I ever saw him. I can’t believe it.” Her eyes welled again with what seemed to Paul to be genuine emotion.
“What time did this happen?”
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