by Marcia Clark
The streets were empty at that hour, and Bailey practically took us there on two wheels. Though I’d fastened my seat belt, I had to hold on to the dash while I made the call to keep from falling all over the car.
The vast Parking Lot C, a cheap option because you had to take a shuttle to the airport from there, was brightly lit. But at this hour, the lot was still and quiet, which gave me the eerie feeling that we were the only survivors in a postapocalyptic world. Bailey drove slowly as we looked for signs of life. Finally, at the far corner of the lot, we saw the blue and red flashing lights of police cars. As we drew nearer, I could see that crime scene tape had been put up to enclose a white vehicle within a twenty-foot radius.
Bailey parked and we walked up to one of the officers guarding the perimeter and identified ourselves.
He lifted the crime scene tape for us and we ducked under. “Officer Bander’s handling the scene. He’s right over there.” He pointed to a short man who was standing near the trunk of the car.
When we got closer, I saw that he was much younger than his voice had sounded on the phone. Bailey and I introduced ourselves again and she asked whether he’d seen anything inside. He handed her his flashlight—one of those super-heavy big black ones that double as a weapon—and I watched as she played the light around the interior of the car.
“I don’t see anything,” I said. “You?”
Bailey shook her head, and I stepped back to give her room as she circled the car with the flashlight. She paused and trained her beam on the trunk area. Still focused on the trunk, she asked, “Who found the car?”
“I did,” Officer Bander said. “I started with the closest lots and worked my way out.”
That was one hell of a lot of canvassing. There were a ton of parking lots. Just covering the closest lots at the terminal would’ve taken a couple of hours.
“And did you stay here after you found it?” Bailey asked.
She was making sure the scene hadn’t been contaminated—at least since Bander had found the car.
“Yeah. I called you right away and had the area cordoned off, just like you said. I’m the only one who’s been this close to the car since I saw it.”
Bailey looked around the lot. “How long since you called for a criminalist?” she asked me.
“About thirty minutes.”
“Did you try the doors?” she asked Officer Bander.
“No.”
Bailey bent down and shined the flashlight under the car. I was about to move in closer and join her, but just then, a beat-up Cadillac pulled up close to the tape. The driver rolled his belly out first, and when he approached us, I recognized the ruddy complexion, heavy cheeks, and small blue eyes of criminalist Ben Glosky. Bailey and I had him on a previous case involving a pedophile who’d done us all the favor of shuffling off this mortal coil. Ben wasn’t Dorian, but he was pretty good.
Ben flashed his ID and struggled under the tape. “Dorian said to tell you she’ll be here in a few and not to pull the same crap you usually do. She also figured you’d need someone who could unlock the doors without damaging anything.”
“You’re a locksmith?” I asked.
“Before I joined SID.”
I guess it shouldn’t have been such a surprise. It’s not like he’d said he used to train poodles for TV commercials.
Ben gloved up, put on the regulation shower cap—though the few hairs slicked back on his head were unlikely to go anywhere—and slipped his shoes into booties. Then he took a small metal case out of his car and set it on the ground next to the driver’s side door. Bailey held the flashlight for him as he examined the interior through the driver’s side window. Ben took the flashlight from her and walked around the car, studying every inch. Bailey moved with him and pointed out various spots on the car. Then he crouched and shined the light under the car, as Bailey had done. He went back to his kit and took out a packet of sterile swatches, distilled water, an eyedropper, and long tweezers. Slowly, he moved around the car, lifting samples as he went.
When he was done, he handed the flashlight back to Bailey and motioned for her to follow him over to the driver’s side. Bailey stood behind him, blocking my view, so I couldn’t see what he did from where I was standing, but two seconds later the driver’s door was open. One second later, the trunk flew open.
And there, lying in a pool of blood, was Hayley.
15
As many bodies as I’ve seen, as many crime scenes as I’ve visited, after a while, you get to be immune. But the sight of Hayley Antonovich curled up in a fetal position in that trunk hit me like a lead-handed punch to the head. Tears filled my eyes and my throat tightened with sadness and disbelief. I quickly turned away and blinked until my eyes cleared. Crying at a crime scene was unthinkable.
When I turned back, I saw an ashen-faced Bailey watching me carefully. “You okay, Knight?”
I nodded, but didn’t speak. I didn’t trust my voice.
Bailey pulled out her cell, no doubt to call the coroner. When she’d finished the call, she ordered everyone to move farther back from the tape, then she came to stand next to me. I could feel her still watching me with a look of concern. If Bailey saw it, others would too. I needed to get a grip. So I swallowed hard and blocked the sight of Hayley from my mind.
“Did he buy those two tickets to New York just to throw us off?” I asked. “Or do you think he’s working with someone else?”
“I was wondering the same thing. But he bought the tickets using his real name, so if he was trying to throw us off, wouldn’t he use the one he’d made public out here?”
“Or maybe he was sharp enough to know we’d figure out he was using an alias and he used his real name to buy the tickets—make it look more genuine.”
“That’s pretty smart for a nineteen-year-old kid,” Bailey said.
“And pretty tangled,” I agreed. “But not impossible.”
Bailey sighed. “What is?”
We both fell silent, trying to manage the pain of the unwanted discovery. I’d been so optimistic. Too optimistic. That wasn’t my style. But this wasn’t the time or the place to figure it out. Bailey would ordinarily be the one to make the notification to the family, but since I was in from the jump on this one, I thought I should probably go with her.
“Brian doesn’t know we’ve found her already.” I glanced at my cell phone. It was five fifteen a.m.—eight fifteen in New York. “In about half an hour, I’m going to try reaching the aunt again. When I do, I’m going to tell her we’re looking for Brian and Hayley.”
“So she won’t try to cover for him if he’s been in touch?” Bailey set her jaw and looked back at the trunk. “It’s not a bad idea. But it’s a now-or-never move. Once we make notification to Hayley’s parents, the news’ll go global.”
Bailey looked at the ground and sighed. I knew she was dreading it. So was I. The coroner’s wagon pulled up and a guy in high-water pants and a nylon Coroner’s Office jacket jumped out.
It was Scott Ferrier, the coroner’s investigator who was my longtime “friend with benefits.” The benefits in our case being his willingness to slip me reports on the sly in return for free lunches at his favorite restaurant, Engine Co. No. 28.
No sooner had Officer Bander lifted the crime scene tape to let Scott in than Dorian pulled up in a brand-new forest green Tacoma. Still a pickup, but a lot snazzier than the faded old jalopy she used to drive. There was something comforting about seeing Scott and Dorian. It was like having family show up.
“Hey, Scott.” I waved and stepped closer as he set his bag down next to the trunk and took out a camera.
“Rachel!” He waved back before he turned and started taking photos.
Dorian moved next to the car with her kit, a large toolbox with tray insets that allowed her to store every little thing in its own compartment, perfectly organized, not a single cotton swab out of place. Dorian put the D in OCD. We both watched as Scott finished taking the pictures. Dorian wouldn’t b
e able to touch the trunk until he was done. The coroner, or his investigator, has sole jurisdiction over the body. Until he’s through, everyone else waits.
I greeted Dorian with a simple “Hey,” which was more than she was in the mood for. Never much of a talker, she was even less inclined to shoot the breeze after having been awakened before five a.m.
“Nice wheels,” Bailey said.
“It’ll do.”
Scott had finished photographing Hayley and had gloved up, preparing to deal with the body. He pulled out the long steel needle to take the liver temperature—one method of determining how long the victim had been dead. I turned away. A few moments later, Scott’s assistant rolled the gurney up to the car and Scott carefully examined Hayley with his flashlight, looking for evidence that might be disturbed when he moved the body.
“Dorian!” he called out. “Take a look here.”
Dorian, who’d already gloved up and put on her shower cap, moved forward with her kit and peered in. She bent down, pulled out some tweezers, and carefully plucked something too small for us to see from the body. Dorian placed it in a small coin envelope and set it into one of the little compartments in the toolbox. Scott finished his examination and told Dorian she could start on the rest of the car. He and his assistant then lifted Hayley out of the trunk and into the body bag that was on the gurney.
Her beautiful blonde hair was tangled and matted with blood and her pale pink sleeveless T-shirt was soaked in it. Her eyes were half closed, and I imagined her bleeding out, dying slowly in that trunk, alone. The lump re-formed in my throat and I quickly turned to focus on Dorian, who’d begun examining the driver’s side of the car with a flashlight and a magnifying glass.
“Hey, Dorian,” I called out. “It’s a long shot, but can you let us know if you find a laptop?”
“No. I figured I’d just put it on eBay.” She shook her head in disgust and muttered something about “inane questions.”
Bailey almost cracked a smile. I heard the zip of the body bag and the wheels roll across the asphalt to the wagon. Only after I heard them slam the rear door did I risk speaking to Scott. “Can you tell cause of death?”
“Stab wounds. But no murder weapon in the trunk that I could see.”
And I doubted very much that Dorian would find it in the cabin of the car either. One of the many reasons why I prefer gunshot wounds for a cause of death. Between the casings and the bullets, you have something to work with. Knives can never be matched the way a gun can. And criminals don’t get attached to knives the way they do to guns, so they don’t mind dumping them.
Bailey gathered all the officers together and asked them to canvass the grounds for a knife. They all nodded solemnly.
When they’d left, I heard Dorian mutter, “Yeah, good luck with that.”
We were going to need it with a lot of things now.
16
Exhausted and depressed, Bailey and I headed back to the car.
She drove off the lot and pulled onto Sepulveda Boulevard. When she got to a stoplight, she turned to look at me. “You okay, Rachel?”
“Yeah. I’m just…” My voice broke and I felt tears spring to my eyes again. I turned to look out my window.
Bailey was silent for a moment. The light changed and she pulled forward. When she spoke, her tone was gentle. “All the homicides you’ve been to, Rache. I’ve never seen you this broken up.”
“I guess I was really thinking she’d be okay…” I stopped before my voice could break again.
“But it’s a kidnapping. Sure, we were both hoping it’d be different, but kidnappings end this way pretty often. That’s why we run so hard and fast on them. You know that as well as I do. But for some reason, this one knocked you down hard. What’s going on?”
The question was more than fair. What was going on with me? I’d been so wedded to the theory—no, expectation—that Hayley would be okay that I hadn’t even allowed myself to consider any other possibility. That was completely unlike me. Finally, the light dawned. Romy. The hope of finding Hayley alive left me a sliver of hope that the same happy ending could come true for my sister. Finding Hayley in the trunk of Brian’s car delivered a crushing blow on both levels. I told Bailey.
“Makes perfect sense,” she said. “So what do you want to do?”
“Get back to work.”
Bailey gave me a little smile. “That’s my girl.”
I returned her smile as best I could and turned my thoughts back to the case. I’d been planning to do something. After a few moments, I remembered what it was. “Can you get me to a quiet place where I can call the aunt?”
“How about we hit a place for breakfast and you can call from the car?”
Just minutes ago I would’ve gagged at the thought of food. But suddenly the idea of breakfast felt comforting, and I heard my stomach grumble. “Is there an IHOP around?”
Bailey raised an eyebrow. This wasn’t my usual fare. “If not that, then at least its equivalent.”
A few minutes later she pulled into a Coco’s and went inside to score us a table. Trying not to get distracted by the enticing smell of grease and bacon, I punched in Janice Maher’s number. By the third ring I was preparing to leave another message when I heard a click. A distracted-sounding voice said, “Yes?”
I introduced myself and explained that I was calling because Hayley hadn’t been seen in the past few days and her parents were concerned. “We have evidence that Brian bought two plane tickets to New York, and told his boss that he was going to visit his aunt in New York for a week. So we thought he was probably intending to visit you. We wouldn’t ordinarily bother you with this, but Hayley is only sixteen and, naturally, her parents are very concerned.”
I deliberately didn’t tell her Hayley’s last name, because I thought she might recognize it. I hoped that if I kept it low-key, the aunt wouldn’t feel she had to lie to protect Brian.
“Well, now I’m concerned too,” she said, without hesitation. “I haven’t heard from Brian for about a month. In fact I was about to call him and check in. No one’s heard from either of them?”
“Not for the past four days.” Could that be right? Only four days? It felt like weeks.
“Do you suppose they ran away together? I can’t believe Brian would do something like that. It’s completely unlike him.” I’d expected that reaction, but she seemed genuinely concerned, and sincere. “Have you spoken to his friends?” she asked, her tone worried.
Based on what we’d learned so far, he didn’t have any. I wondered how well she knew her nephew. No time like the present to find out. “If you have the names of his friends, I’d be glad to take them down.”
“I…I don’t. He never told me about any friends. Only people he worked with.”
I thought we probably already had those, but I took down the co-workers’ names she could remember anyway.
“Did Brian stay with you after his mother died?”
“Yes. He was only sixteen at the time, so I brought him out here to finish school.”
“But he wound up in L.A.—”
She sighed. “Yes. He said he wanted to be a television writer, like his father. His plan was to save up the money to go to college out there and see if he could break in by getting a job as a production assistant. I told him that it’s a very hard road, with lots of competition, but Brian was determined.”
“Even though…?”
“You know about that,” she said flatly. “I never knew for sure whether that man really did steal Tommy’s script. But Tommy became a complete basket case over it…”
“I’m so sorry, Janice. I can only imagine how awful that must’ve been.”
“It was. It was a terrible thing.” Her voice shook a little. “What killed me was that he was a really terrific writer. In fact, I always thought he was better than me. I kept telling him to get out of Hollywood and write novels. But he wouldn’t listen.” Janice gave a heavy sigh.
“I hope you don’t mind
. I’d like your opinion regarding things we’ve heard about Tommy.”
“All right.” But her voice was wary. I’d probably feel the same in her position.
“People who’d worked with him on the show said he complained a lot about other writers lifting his stories and his lines—”
“He wasn’t the paranoid type, if that’s what you mean. If he said it, then I’d bet it was true. Now, I’m not saying he couldn’t have been mistaken at times. But there was probably some truth to it.”
“Did he talk to you about the show, or the other writers?”
“Not much.” Janice paused. “As you can tell, I wasn’t a big fan of Hollywood. He didn’t want to hear me tell him yet again that he should get out, so he didn’t talk about it much. But of course, he did tell me when that man stole his screenplay.”
“So he didn’t complain to you about the other writers stealing his lines or anything?”
“No. He called them untalented hacks, but he didn’t say anything about stealing from him.”
I hadn’t considered the possibility before, but now I wondered whether those stories of Tommy’s constant accusations were just hype generated after the fact to explain his suicide.
“Had you ever known him to be suicidal before?”
“Never. Oh, he could be morose. He certainly had his moods. But suicidal? Not even a hint of it. That’s why I had an investigator look into his death. I thought it might be a homicide that’d been covered up to look like a suicide.”
I thought people read too much crime fiction. Then it occurred to me that Janice might be a thriller writer, so I kept that thought to myself.
“What happened?”
Janice gave another heavy sigh. “He couldn’t find any evidence of homicide.”
“So you have no doubts?”
“He did a very thorough job. Trust me, I made sure of it.” Janice gave a short, dry bark of a laugh. “I wish I did have doubts. But, no, I don’t.”
Neither did I. I’d read the reports on Tommy’s death and there was no indication that it was anything but a suicide.