Killer Ratings: A Susan Kaplan Mystery

by Lisa Seidman

  I turned my head in the woman’s direction. I wasn’t quite sure I had heard her correctly.

  “You saw someone with Zack? Today?”

  The woman switched her groceries to her other hand. The package of Fritos sitting on top bobbled slightly then settled down. “This morning.” She looked at me, a frown line settling between her eyes. “But just because he was black doesn’t mean he killed Zack. And it’s not as if I heard sounds of violence or anything like that …”

  A band of iron started squeezing my chest. I thought I was having a heart attack before realizing my anxiety had come back.

  “What did he look like? Zack’s visitor?”

  But even as she spoke, I already knew what her answer would be.

  “He was one of those Rastafarians. You know, with the dreadlocks. Very thin. I thought he was going door-to-door to collect money for something, but he never came to mine.”

  She looked relieved at the thought, the crease between her eyes temporarily smoothing out. But then she bit her lower lip as a new thought crossed her mind.

  “Do you think I should tell the police?”

  “No,” I said, without thinking. “He didn’t kill Zack. Zack committed suicide.” That better be what happened.

  “Oh,” said the woman, softly, sadly. “He seemed like the last person in the world who would want to do that.” We commiserated in silence before she added, “I mean, he had a great job. He wrote for one of my favorite shows. Babbitt & Brooks.” She looked at me proudly, as if her acquaintance with Zack automatically made her a part of the actual series.

  “Yes, I know,” I said. I walked around to the driver’s side of my car and unlocked the door.

  “You’re sure I shouldn’t tell the police?” she asked after me anxiously.

  “I’m sure,” I said. Or at least not right away. Give me an hour’s head start. I swung open the door and slid into my seat. As I pulled away from the curb I looked at the woman in my rear view mirror. She was still staring at the police, juggling her grocery bag, and I knew I hadn’t really convinced her to not say anything.

  2.

  I pulled into a parking lot behind a Vons supermarket on Ventura and Laurel Canyon and called Sherman. His cell number was programmed into my phone and he picked up after one ring.

  “Sherman, it’s me. Susan.”

  There was a pause as if Sherman was trying to remember who I was, although my name would have appeared on his caller ID. “Susan,” he said. “How are you?”

  “I was just at Zack’s house,” I told him. “He’s dead.”

  There was another pause. A longer one. “I was there, Susan. At his house this morning. But he was alive when I left.”

  I let out my breath. Sherman couldn’t possibly know I had talked with a neighbor who had seen him. His admitting that he saw Zack had to be proof he had nothing to hide.

  “The next door neighbor saw you,” I told him.

  I heard his muttered, “Shit,” before hurrying on. “I told her not to tell the police, but I don’t think I convinced her. We have to meet. Now.”

  “Aw, Jesus,” Sherman said. He sounded ragged and far away. “Yeah. Okay. Where are you?”

  I told him.

  “Come over the hill into Hollywood. It’ll be faster than if I come to you. You know the Denny’s on Hollywood Boulevard and La Brea?” I said that I did. “I’ll meet you there in twenty minutes.”

  I thought it would take me longer to get there than twenty minutes—now that it was the height of rush hour—but I just said, “Fine, see you then,” and hung up the phone. Fortunately, no patrol cars seemed to be cruising the streets looking for me. I got back in my car and made a right on Laurel Canyon, directing my straining car up into the Hollywood Hills.

  The road was lined with large, nouveau riche, bad taste homes until it crested Mulholland. On the downward slope, Laurel Canyon became narrower, twistier, and steeper, the homes older, the foliage thicker. Traffic was bumper-to-bumper heading back to the Valley, but, heading south, I made good time into Hollywood, too concerned about Sherman to give my usual mental wave at Harry Houdini’s deserted mansion.

  Ten minutes later, I squeezed into one of the last spaces available in the Denny’s parking lot and entered the restaurant. Sherman was sitting in a booth in the back, and he lifted a long, skinny arm to catch my attention.

  I slid in across from him. Sherman wouldn’t meet my gaze as he stared into his coffee cup as if searching for the answers to Life. A harried waitress appeared at the table with a coffee pot. She refilled Sherman’s cup as she said, “What can I get you?”

  I hadn’t even looked at the plastic menu sitting in front of me. I wasn’t particularly hungry. Nevertheless, I didn’t think Denny’s would let me sit in the booth drinking water for an hour.

  “A hamburger,” I said. “Medium well. And fries.”

  She turned to Sherman. “I’ll have the same,” he said.

  The woman nodded and moved off.

  “What were you doing in his house, Sherman?”

  Sherman didn’t seem taken aback by my lack of preliminaries.

  “Zack called me. He invited me over for coffee.”

  Sherman’s voice expressed no surprise, no emotion whatsoever.

  “When was this?”

  “Yesterday. Sometime in the afternoon.” Which accounted for one of Zack’s many phone calls.

  “Did he say what he wanted?”

  “Just that he needed to talk to me about a few things. He had heard about my getting fired and said he might be able to help me find another job.”

  “But why ask to see you in person? That’s something he can tell you over the phone. Or in an e-mail.”

  “That’s what I thought, but he also said he wanted to show me something.”

  “Which was?”

  “Rebecca’s car.”

  I sat back in the booth, unable to speak for a moment.

  “He actually showed you Rebecca’s car?”

  Sherman nodded and his fingers were clenched so tightly around his coffee cup I thought the handle would snap. “It was in the garage. He said he found it parked there on Sunday when he came home.”

  No wonder Zack was acting so weird on Monday. But why didn’t he say anything to anybody? And why didn’t he call the police? I voiced that last question to Sherman.

  “He didn’t think the police would believe he hadn’t put it there himself.”

  “Was he blaming you for putting it there?”

  “That’s what I thought when he first showed it to me. I thought he was trying to shock a reaction out of me. But he had an electric garage door opener. How would I have gotten in there in the first place?”

  I explained about the circuit breaker outside the house.

  Sherman looked momentarily taken aback, then shrugged.

  “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “Zack acted like he knew who did it … and that it wasn’t me.”

  I was glued to my seat, eyes wide, wishing I could suck the answer out of him. “Then who?”

  Sherman took a swallow of his coffee, prolonging my agony. When he put the cup back in its saucer, he finally looked at me.

  “Zack didn’t know that for sure. He also wanted to go over everything I did the night Rebecca was killed, trying to jog my memory.”

  “And?”

  Sherman shook his head. “Nothing. The television was on in my office. I was watching some old movie on TV. I probably even dozed off for a while. Nobody came into the main area—or if they did, I didn’t hear them.”

  I slumped back in my seat. The waitress arrived with our hamburgers, asked us if we needed anything else then moved off when we told her no. Sherman suddenly stiffened, staring over my shoulder.

  “What?” I asked in alarm.

  “Cops,” he whispered.

  I turned my head and saw two uniformed officers standing by the cashier. I didn’t recognize them from back at Zack’s house, and really didn’t know whether Lu and Wag
ner would send an APB out on me—or for Sherman if the next door neighbor spilled her guts. The two cops joked with the hostess and moved off to sit at the counter. I turned back to Sherman, who smiled sheepishly at me.

  “Sorry. I thought—”

  I cut him off. “Me, too. Don’t worry about it.”

  But I knew we were going to have to deal with the police sooner or later. They were going to want to know why I took off. Either I told them the truth or I invented a plausible excuse. I wondered if Sherman could be convinced to voluntarily talk to them.

  “What happened after you told him you didn’t remember anything?” I asked before picking up my hamburger and taking a bite.

  “Nothing. Zack thanked me for coming by, said he’d work on getting another job for me, and I went home.”

  “Did he say anything about his argument with Rebecca the night of her death?”

  “No. And I didn’t ask.”

  “Do you think he killed her and then covered his tracks by pretending not to know about the car?”

  “Could be.” Sherman chewed in silence for a minute. “But if that’s true, he’s a damn good actor.”

  “But if he didn’t, why did he kill himself? Did he look remorseful to you … or guilty?”

  “No. And who said he killed himself?”

  I can’t say as I reacted with surprise to Sherman’s comment. It had been floating around in the back of my mind the minute the cops pulled Zack’s body out of Rebecca’s car.

  “Do you think Zack invited the murderer over to look at the car—same as he did with you? What if he was testing everyone he suspected?”

  “I think it’s a possibility,” Sherman said. He helped himself to a french fry. “It could be he really didn’t know who the murderer was. He may have thought I was a suspect and was asking me questions to see if I’d slip up.”

  “But who else would he ask?”

  “You tell me,” Sherman said.

  I started to shrug in ignorance, and then I thought of Peggy who had come in late, looking like a great weight had been lifted off her shoulders. Because Zack was no longer alive to accuse her of murder? Was that what he had done when he made her cry?

  “What time did you leave his house this morning?” I asked.

  Sherman screwed up his eyes in thought. “Eight. Eight-fifteen the latest.”

  I told him about my suspicions regarding Peggy.

  “What about Charles and Ray?” he asked.

  “Charles showed up at nine-thirty, nine-forty-five. Ray at ten, ten-fifteen.” I paused, chilled by another thought.

  “What is it?” Sherman asked.

  “Gail didn’t work today. I remember when the schedule was planned, and Patrick told me that Gail would actually have a day off.”

  Sherman and I looked at one another. “You don’t think …?” he began.

  “I don’t know.” I shuddered to think what the ratings would be like should Gail be arrested. I almost believed Ray would frame her for both murders if it meant holding on to that twenty-five share. Then I had another thought. “Couldn’t the cops prove that Zack was forced into the car? I mean, he wouldn’t go in willingly. The killer would have to clunk him on the head first.”

  “There might be signs of struggle. There was nothing obvious when you saw him?”

  I shook my head, not wanting to remember an ashen-faced Zack, dead on the oil-stained pavement of his driveway. Sherman said, “And even if they did find something and that neighbor tells them about me, that brings us back to square one.”

  We sat in silence, contemplating this, unable to finish our hamburgers. “Sherman, does the name Michael Keller sound familiar to you?”

  Sherman shook his head. “No. Why?”

  I told him about the detectives flashing Keller’s photo around the warehouse, and my theory that he was Rebecca’s drug dealer.

  “He was also one of the construction workers, hired through Bob Berg. Rebecca wrote him a check; I saw it on her desk.”

  “Good-looking guy? Slim? Dark hair?”

  “Yes,” I said, starting to get excited. “You did see him?”

  “Maybe. I was cleaning up the bullpen one night. This is before you came on the show. Rebecca was still in her office, but she didn’t know I was there. I heard her talking with someone, and he left with something in his hand that could’ve been a check.”

  “What were they talking about?”

  More silence as Sherman tried to remember. The woman sitting behind me was talking loudly on her cell. I almost turned around to ask her to take it outside but I wasn’t sure if she would or only talk louder.

  “She was mad at him, I remember that much. She’s always gotta chew someone out. She said something like, ‘I got you this job. Isn’t that enough?’”

  “Wait a minute. According to the foreman, Bob Berg got him the job. Do you think she meant the construction job?”

  “Susan, I have no idea what she was talking about. I didn’t even know who the guy was.”

  “Sorry,” I said. “What else did she say?”

  “That’s about it, I think. He said something like, ‘Don’t sweet talk me,’ not taking her very seriously. And then he walked out of the office.”

  “Did he see you?”

  “Yeah, he saw me. But he just smiled and went out the front door. He didn’t seem to care I was there.”

  “So he didn’t get mad at her at all? For chewing him out?”

  “Not that I could tell.”

  But the last person to be with Rebecca had gotten so angry with her he (or she) had taken her Women in Television Award and whacked her over the head with it so many times there was practically nothing left of her skull.

  “Did he seem like a person who would hold it all in until he was at the end of his rope?”

  “Susan, I’m not a shrink. I hardly heard the guy say two words to her before he was out the door.”

  “But we’ve got to find someone with a motive!”

  “Everyone has a motive,” Sherman said. “What we need is proof.”

  Amen to that.

  “So what do we do now?”

  “I’m moving in with my girlfriend. At least until things cool down.”

  I looked at Sherman in surprise. I didn’t know he had a girlfriend, and I felt a sudden twinge of jealousy. What was I? A walking hormone? I sternly reminded myself to keep my mind on business and pushed that unwanted twinge away.

  “Do you think maybe you should talk to Lu and Wagner?”

  Sherman looked at me and laughed without humor. I looked down in embarrassment at the hamburger grease congealing on my plate.

  “It was just a thought,” I said.

  “What about you? What if the cops want to know why you disappeared?”

  “I’ll tell them I don’t remember them asking me to stay.”

  “And if they ask you about your conversation with the next door neighbor?”

  I shrugged. Sherman put down his own hamburger. “You suspect Zack found Rebecca’s car, then called a bunch of people who might know something to his house and confronted them with the evidence.”

  I nodded. “And one of those people killed him.”

  “Then why put yourself in any more hot water. Call the cops and tell them. Better you should go to them first then they come after you.”

  “But what about you? Why don’t we both go to the police? It might help your case if you come to them voluntarily.”

  A corner of Sherman’s mouth quirked. “Look, Susan, you do what you have to. I can take care of myself.”

  I wasn’t so sure. I wanted to do the right thing—for Sherman and for Zack. I looked at Sherman who had pushed his plate away, glancing at the cops at the counter. “You won’t hate me if I call the detectives?”

  Sherman shook his head. “Just give me an hour. I need to find a lawyer.”

  3.

  It was too late to return to work so I drove home. I desperately wanted to talk to Craig, but the lights i
n his apartment were out and he didn’t answer my knock. I wondered if he was out on a date, then remembered he worked Tuesday nights, giving swimming lessons to kids at the local Y.

  Jennifer had left a message, asking if I had found Zack and to call her whether I had or not. Apparently, word wasn’t out yet about his death and I didn’t have the energy to call her and give her the news and deal with her reaction. Wagner also left a terse message, asking me to call him at my earliest convenience. I called him back and got his voicemail. Relieved, I left a message, apologizing for taking off and telling him I had some information for him. I then called Linda Ramsay, Romulus Television’s office manager. Having started out in the Romulus temp pool, she had worked her way up to her present position and pretty much created her own hours. When I temped in the main office, Linda wouldn’t come in until ten or eleven in the morning, but always stayed until eight or nine at night. A night owl, she claimed early evening was the only time she could get any decent work done. She picked up her phone on the seventh ring.

  “Hello?” she answered breathlessly. She had probably been down the hall either going to or from the copy room.

  “Linda, it’s Susan. Susan Kaplan.”

  “Hi. I’ve been meaning to call you.”

  “About what?”

  “About everything. Rebecca’s death. The flood in your office. The main office is going nuts.”

  “So are we. That’s why I’m calling.

  “What’s up?”

  “You’re gonna have to sit down for this one, Linda.”

  “Okay, I’m sitting.” But I could hear a smile in her voice, and I knew she wasn’t taking me seriously.

  “Zack’s dead. I found him in his garage this afternoon.” There was utter silence from Linda’s end of the phone, and then she broke into a peal of laughter.

  “Good one, Sue. I almost fell for it.”

  I gritted my teeth. I hated being called Sue, and Linda knew it. She had probably done it deliberately as revenge for my “teasing” her about Zack.

  “It’s not a joke, Linda. I’m sure it’ll be on the news tonight. He didn’t show up for work today. So I went to his house and found him sitting in Rebecca’s car. He probably died of carbon monoxide poisoning.”