Dream House

by Rochelle Krich

  “The day I drove him here, I noticed that Professor Linney's legs were all bruised.”

  Reston frowned. “So you're saying what? That the caregivers were hitting him?”

  “Or someone else was.”

  “Like who?” Recognition dawned. He cocked his head and stared at me. “You think I was hitting him? I never laid a hand on the old man, Molly. Anyone who says otherwise is lying. Oscar had Parkinson's. His balance wasn't great, but he insisted on doing things himself. So he fell a lot.”

  It was plausible. And it could be a pack of lies. I recently read that 4 percent of people sixty-five-and-over in this country are victims of elder abuse or neglect, mostly by family members, and experts believe that only one out of five cases is reported. I pictured Oscar Linney's frail, shrunken frame. From what I'd seen myself and heard from others, he'd been irascible, demanding, a daily pain in the neck to the mountain of a son-in-law he made no pretense of liking. Which didn't prove anything.

  “It must have been tense,” I said. “The three of you living under one roof.”

  “Ya think?” Reston smiled again. “He wasn't happy with me, and he let me know it. He'd make fun of me. Hank the Tank, he called me. Most of the time I'd take it, for Maggie's sake. She'd tell him to stop, and he'd get defensive. Sometimes I'd lose my cool. Then Maggie would get upset with me. It was rough for her, being stuck in the middle like that, but we had no choice.”

  “Did you consider placing Professor Linney in an assisted care facility?”

  “I considered it. Maggie didn't. So I didn't push it.” He shrugged. “It was her father, her call. And I knew she'd be miserable if I talked her into doing it.”

  “But after she disappeared?”

  “I felt I had to do what Maggie would've wanted, hard as it was. And believe me, it was no picnic.”

  “You said your wife was stuck in the middle. Maybe she ran away because she couldn't handle it?”

  “And leave her father?” Reston shook his head. “Never. And whatever people have told you, she loved me. We were finishing our dream house. Why would she run away?”

  “I understand that she didn't really want to move.”

  “Oscar didn't want to move. Maggie did. She didn't want to live in her father's house. She was having a great time working on the new place. She designed it, along with the architect.”

  “Jeremy Dorn. I saw him the other night at the HARP meeting. Very good-looking. They must have spent a lot of time together, working on the house.”

  Reston gazed at me with quiet menace. “Maggie would never cheat on me, and I don't take kindly to people who hint that she did.”

  “You were away a lot on business,” I said, leaving the intimation unspoken.

  “That's what businessmen do. That doesn't mean I liked it. Where'd you find the planner, Molly?”

  The question, out of left field, took me by surprise. “In your wife's nightstand, like I told you. Why?”

  “Because it disappeared when Maggie did. It was her bible. She didn't make a move without it. It's one of the things that had me thinking she was still alive.”

  I was speechless, which for me is unusual, as you may have noticed.

  “I saw it the morning before she disappeared,” Hank said. “I was getting ready to leave. She was in bed, but not asleep, because we'd just . . .” He was blushing. “Anyway, she asked me when I'd be back, and I said, ‘Friday afternoon, why don't you pencil me in for Friday night and all day Saturday?' Joking around, like we did.” He smiled, as if remembering. “So she took the planner and flipped to Friday, and she wrote in what she had in mind for us, and I said, ‘God, what if your dad sees this, he'll have a coronary, or we'll be arrested,' and she ripped out the page. We were both laughing.”

  He had a vulnerable look on his face—part wistfulness, part heartbreak. It was an intensely private look, and I felt more like a trespasser than before.

  “I searched all over for the planner after Maggie disappeared,” he said. “The police searched, too. It wasn't anywhere in the house. And now it's back.”

  I thought about the person at the window but decided not to say anything. I needed to think things through. Like the possibility that Reston had taken the planner and returned it. And if so, why had he taken it, and why had he returned it now. True, he'd looked surprised when Modine had handed him the planner. But surprise can be rehearsed.

  “Whoever put the planner back in the nightstand had it all along.” Hank was clenching and unclenching his fist, the way you do when a nurse is taking your blood. “I want you to find out who he is.”

  “I'm not a detective,” I said.

  “You're a reporter. You can find out stuff from people who don't want to talk to the cops. I'll pay whatever you want. I need to know what happened to Maggie.”

  “I thought you said you believe she's dead.”

  “I know it here,” he said, tapping his temple. “But until I see her body, I won't know it here.” He thumped his chest. “I need to get on with my life. Right now part of me is waiting for her to walk up these stairs. I guess that's why I haven't touched her things. You probably think it's dumb.” His dark brown eyes dared me to agree.

  In my mind I saw the white satin slippers at the side of Maggie's bed. “It's hard to let go,” I said, thinking of my friend Aggie. I still dream about her, and waking brings with it the sharp pain of renewed loss. I can't begin to imagine how her parents cope.

  “The police will want to see the planner,” I said. “It may give them new leads.”

  Hank grunted. “The police have given up looking for the kidnapper. They think I killed Maggie. I figure they're watching me and tapping my phone like they did with Scott Peterson. They usually suspect the husband. Doesn't seem to matter that I have a solid alibi for the night she disappeared.” He shrugged and flashed a half smile, inviting me onto his team.

  “And for the night your father-in-law died?”

  That erased the smile. I tried to read his expression. Surprise, mostly. Some irritation, a hint of amusement, a little grudging respect. If there was fear, I didn't see it. But Reston didn't strike me as the kind of man who would show fear, even if he felt it.

  “You're not one for subtle, are you?” He nodded. “Yeah, I have a solid alibi. I didn't think I needed one. I thought the fire—” He stopped. His forehead was creased in bewilderment—real or feigned, I couldn't tell. “Are you saying someone torched the house to kill the Professor?”

  “Not necessarily.” Porter or Hernandez would be pissed if they found out I'd suggested the possibility to someone who was, after all, a prime suspect. They'd probably want to witness his unrehearsed reaction. “But you have to admit it's a little odd, your being away both times.”

  “Only if someone murdered Linney,” he said slowly, thinking it through. “But why would someone kill him?”

  I shrugged.

  “I didn't kill him,” Reston said. “I didn't kill Maggie. I loved her. We were going to live happily ever after. Isn't that how the story goes?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  EDIE TOOK THREE MAH JONGG TILES FROM MINDY, WHO was sitting to her left, and placed them on her rack. “You're actually considering working for this guy?” she asked me.

  We had finished the first game, and while setting up for the next, I'd told everyone about Reston and his request. Maybe that hadn't been such a good idea.

  “I'm not working for him. I'm investigating his wife's disappearance. As a journalist, not a detective. Which I know I'm not.”

  She frowned at her tiles. “He's giving you a photocopy of her planner. He's letting you look through her stuff, and her father's. He'll expect something in return, Molly.”

  “He's not my type. Which is too bad, 'cause I haven't had sex in two years, and it ain't gonna happen anytime soon with Rabbi Zack.”

  Mindy laughed. For a moment she looked less tired, the bags under her brown eyes less pronounced. My sister-in-law Gitty giggled shyly and cast an anxious
glance at the doorway. She has blue eyes and the most gorgeous red hair, most of it covered now by her navy snood in case Norm, Mindy's husband, came into the room.

  Edie scowled. “Don't encourage her, Mindy.”

  “To have sex?” she said with a straight face.

  We often tease Edie. As the oldest sibling, she can come across as patronizing and annoyingly motherly, but she does everything out of love.

  I reassured her. “I made it clear to Reston that I don't owe him a first look, and that I can't promise I won't share what I find with the police.”

  I exchanged three tiles with Gitty, who was sitting across from me, and scooped a cup of popcorn still warm from the microwave.

  Edie said, “I'll bet he calls you nonstop. At least he doesn't know where you live.”

  I wasn't so sure, and I wasn't about to volunteer that Modine had spent a long time studying my driver's license, maybe memorizing my address, which he could pass on to Hank Reston should Reston inquire.

  “So how are things with Zack?” Edie asked.

  I sighed. “‘Inching' along.”

  Mindy flashed me a smile.

  Edie said, “If you love someone—”

  “Are you planning on keeping those tiles, Edie, or are you passing them?” Mindy asked.

  Edie shot her an annoyed look. Which is ironic, because she's the one who usually complains that talking slows down the game. “I'm thinking.”

  “Well, don't think too long. Yitz will be up soon.”

  We generally take turns hosting the game, but since Yitz was born we've been coming to Mindy's. We did the same for Gitty when her now eleven-month-old son Yechiel was a newborn (accent on the second syllable, a guttural ch as in Bach). Gitty has become as committed as we are to mah jongg (the American version), which my sisters and I learned almost twenty years ago from our mom, and has replaced Liora, who never really caught the bug and has been busy of late with her Santa Monica College courses and a succession of dates that move through her life with the speed and single-minded determination of commuters passing through a New York subway turnstile.

  I love mah jongg. There's something inexplicably gratifying and soothing about handling the ivory tiles with their exotic characters, arranging them into double-tiered “walls,” hearing their click, click, click. Many times it's the highlight of my week, and for a dark few months after my marriage died, Monday night was my only respite from the pained, troubled thoughts that dogged me all day and kept me awake nights. It was better than therapy. Cheaper, too.

  “I'm concerned about Molly's safety,” Edie said now to Mindy. “Aren't you? Reston could be a killer.”

  “So could your friend Roger Modine.” I had given an edited version of my encounter with the contractor, leaving out my panic and bound wrists. “I still don't know why he was snooping around in Maggie Reston's bedroom.”

  “For the same reason you were,” Edie said. “Nosiness.”

  I bristled at that. I'm often guilty of being nosy, but not this time. “I'm trying to figure out what happened to Maggie, and Professor Linney. I feel responsible.”

  “Whatever.” Edie passed Mindy three tiles. “And Modine isn't my friend. We just happen to be working together on the anti-HARP drive. I've always found him to be pleasant.”

  “If he's not treating you to his smoker's breath,” I said. Or tying you up. I refilled my popcorn cup.

  Mindy said, “I don't know if he torched the Fuller place, but all those construction delays cost serious money, and he's probably losing business from homeowners who don't want to go through the hassle of remodeling with the Harpies on their backs.”

  “Maybe the vandal wasn't out to do damage,” Gitty said. “Maybe he wanted to scare off the pro-HARP people.”

  “Well, if that was the plan, it backfired,” Edie said, glum. “I heard they're more determined than ever. They're pressuring Harrington to push the HARP status through.”

  Mindy said, “And I heard that a few other HARP areas are considering repealing their HARP status.”

  “Can they do that?” I asked.

  “Apparently if you get enough signatures from the area residents. It's not easy, though.”

  “Is HARP such a bad thing?” Gitty asked, tentative. She's twenty-three years old, married two years to my brother Judah, and it's taken her a while to find her “voice” in the family. We Blumes can be overpowering.

  “Not if you live in an apartment,” Edie said, matter-of-fact. “If you and Judah owned a house, would you want people telling you what you could or couldn't do to it?”

  “Probably not. But I'd hate to see historic buildings destroyed. Like the Ambassador Hotel. Or the Hollywood Bowl. I read they're remodeling it, and maybe getting rid of the amphitheater shell.”

  “They want to improve the acoustics,” Mindy said. “But it would be weird not to see the shell. And L.A. Unified can probably incorporate the Ambassador into the school campus they're planning. If they want to.”

  You've probably heard of the Ambassador. It's on Wilshire near Vermont. Though it's been vacant for years, it was one of the two most prestigious L.A. hotels (the downtown Biltmore is the second) and was host to the Oscars and to every U.S. president from Hoover to Nixon. It was also the home of the famed Cocoanut Grove nightclub, and, tragically, the site of Robert Kennedy's assassination.

  “It would be a shame if they tore down the Ambassador,” Edie said. “Mom and Dad were married there.”

  “So if it doesn't touch your neighborhood, you're for historical preservation?” I teased.

  Edie didn't look amused. “You can't compare tearing down the Ambassador or the Hollywood Bowl with remodeling a house that looks just like a hundred others.”

  “But some people build homes that really don't fit the neighborhood,” Gitty said.

  “Which is probably what they said about Frank Lloyd Wright,” Edie responded. She studied her tiles.

  I looked at the three Gitty had passed me. One of them, a one Bam, had a green bird painted onto it. Which reminded me of another bird . . .

  “Is Reston pro-HARP?” I asked Edie.

  “I have no idea. He's never come to a meeting. I didn't know he lived in Hancock Park. I never even heard of him until I read his name in today's write-up of the fire.”

  The Times had run a small article about Linney's death, and had mentioned Margaret's disappearance. A few inches that stated the bare facts and didn't speculate about any possible connection between the two events. I wondered if the omission was Porter's doing.

  In my mind's eye I saw Reston and Modine talking at the meeting—before the fire made Modine's construction services necessary. And Walter Fennel had told me that Reston bought homes, fixed them up, and flipped them.

  “Do you know if Reston and Modine have business dealings?” I asked Mindy. As I mentioned, many of her clients are involved with real estate, so I figured she might know.

  “I don't,” she said. “I can ask around.”

  “Okay, no more talking,” Edie said, ignoring Mindy's raised brow and my snort.

  We played the next seven games without much conversation. Tossing tiles, naming them, taking them to complete a group. The only other sounds in the domed-ceilinged room were the click, click, click of the tiles and the crunching of popcorn and the potato chips and trail mix Mindy had set out for us and was studiously avoiding all night. She complains that she's having a hard time losing the last ten pounds from her pregnancy. I can't see them, but she's following a diet that Gitty, a nutritionist, tailored for her so that she can fit into her lawyer suits. Mindy's willpower is stronger than mine under most circumstances, and tonight I was munching absentmindedly, my mind on Reston and Modine and Margaret's planner. Which is why I tossed a tile that I could have used to redeem a joker that would have given me mah jongg.

  I was still grumbling when Norm came in with Yitz.

  “Right on schedule.” He handed the blanket-swaddled baby to Mindy after she pushed herself away fr
om the table.

  Norm is three years older than Mindy, an inch taller than her five-eight, and several inches wider. He has blond hair to her dark brown, which she wears shoulder length and covers with a wig or hat when she's in public, and blue eyes that their two daughters have inherited, and maybe Yitz, too, although it's too early to tell.

  “Take over my hand, okay, honey?” Mindy said.

  Norm has learned the game, and we call on him once in a while to fill in as a fourth. He sat in Mindy's seat and a few minutes later called “Mah jongg” and collected Mindy's winnings, fifty cents from each of us.

  It was the last game of the evening. Edie and Gitty left after putting the tiles back in Mindy's case. I stayed to talk to Norm. He's in health care (he recently took over the lease for the nursing home where he was the administrator for several years), and I thought he might know something about Golden Vista, which sounded like a retirement home. Being related to a variety of experts is one of the perks of having a large family—or mishpacha, if you want to use the Hebrew/Yiddish term.

  “Golden Vista is assisted living,” Norm told me when I asked. “There's also Golden View, Golden Hills, and Golden Valley. Those are retirement facilities. Golden Valley is for convalescent care, like my place.”

  A lot of gold in them hills, I thought. “I'm interested in Golden Vista.”

  “For Bubbie?” A frown puckered his high forehead. “The macular degeneration's getting to her, huh?”