by Dianne Emley
She released him and set the photo back in its exact spot, which she identified by a small layer of dust behind the frame, showing where the housekeeper had cut corners.
A chilly wind blew through the open windows, as if a reminder of the bleak task that had brought them there. The wind billowed the drapes and gave flight to papers stacked on the nightstand.
Kissick picked them up. “Looks like Tink was involved with something called Georgia’s Girls.”
“I’ve heard of that. I think it’s a place for women prostitutes and drug addicts who were living on the streets that’s run by Georgia Berryhill, the self-help maven.”
He looked through the documents. “Profit-and-loss statement. Plans for a fund-raiser. Gig Towne’s slated to be the emcee.”
“Gig Towne the actor?”
“Must be.” He shuffled through the pages. “Wolfgang Puck is going to cater.”
“Fancy.” Vining went to the windows and closed them. The sills were wet from rain. She reached to pick up something from the floor that Kissick had missed. “Here’s the brochure from last year’s Georgia’s Girls fund-raiser.”
On the cover of the multifold brochure was a black-and-white shot of Georgia Berryhill arm in arm with two well-scrubbed, smiling young women. On the inside cover were two more photos of young women. One was vacant-eyed and filthy on a mattress on the floor of what looked like a crack house. The other was standing on a curb tricked out in trashy provocative clothing. Captions identified them as two of Georgia’s success stories who were pictured on the cover. Vining looked at the cover again. The transformation was remarkable. There were also photos of celebrity supporters, including Gig Towne, with rescued young women.
“Tink’s listed as one of their top donors,” Vining said.
She handed him the brochure and started opening dresser drawers and rifling the contents.
Kissick looked through the other materials on the nightstand. A pair of reading glasses with purple plastic frames were on top of one of Georgia Berryhill’s books: The Method and You: Happy, Healthy, and Whole!
In the nightstand drawer he took out a white plastic bottle with a raspberry-colored top. “Berryhill brand herbal sleep enhancer. Nighty Night.” He looked at the remaining gel caps inside and dropped the bottle into a manila evidence bag.
“Her medicine cabinet is full of over-the-counter sleep aids,” Vining said from the bathroom. “I’m not surprised that Tink had sleeping problems.” She tossed items into evidence bags.
The well-appointed closet was packed with designer clothes, shoes, and accessories. There was a freestanding jewelry cabinet. In the lock was a small brass key attached to a fob of dangling glass beads that spelled: “Girlfriend.”
Vining opened the shallow drawers, which were packed with real and costume jewelry. “Wow.” She picked up a flashy cocktail ring and looked at it in the light. “Those look like real diamonds. My mother always talked about Tink’s beautiful jewelry.”
She opened drawer after drawer, ogling the treasures. “If Tink surprised a burglar, he hadn’t gotten far. Wonder if she always left the key in the lock. Can’t imagine she’d trust Cheyenne.”
She shook her head and said, “I still can’t figure out why she let Cheyenne live here.”
They looked through the other rooms on the upper floor, finding Cheyenne’s room on the opposite end of the hall from Tink’s bedroom. It was cheerful and comfortable. A leather satchel was on a bench at the end of the bed. Inside was women’s clothing sufficient for a weekend away. The small closet held a few garments and pairs of shoes. The contents of the dresser drawers were also sparse. The adjacent bathroom had the bare essentials of personal products.
“Cheyenne said she was living here,” Kissick said. “Looks like she was stopping by.”
Vining unzipped a pocket on the back of the satchel. Inside was a creased and faded color snapshot. “Look at this.”
He walked over to see.
The photo showed three girls who might have been older teenagers standing on a wooden deck beside water. It looked like a party. Clutches of people were in the distance. Lit paper lanterns were strung above. The girls wore skimpy dresses in shiny fabrics and bold colors, flashy costume jewelry, and high-heeled sandals. They had their arms around one another and were half-standing and half-leaning against each other. One girl was holding a cigarette. All of them had big, loose grins and one was caught in mid-shout.
“That’s Cheyenne in the middle,” Kissick said.
“They look drunk.” Vining flipped it over. Handwritten on the back was: “Me, Trendi, and Fallon.” Also written was a date from five years ago.
“Trendi,” Kissick said. “The girl who was found murdered with Vince Madrigal this morning?”
“That’s why Cheyenne was upset. They were friends.”
Vining slipped the photo into her pocket.
Tink’s office was across the hall from Cheyenne’s room. It had a sleek black lacquered desk. The wallpaper had a design that looked like mid-century fashion sketches in charcoal on an antique brown background.
Kissick looked at the wallpaper. “Cute.”
The uniformed officer had found the charger for Tink’s BlackBerry and it was plugged in on top of her desk. On an upholstered chair was Tink’s purse—a small white quilted Chanel handbag.
Kissick opened it and took out her wallet. “She has a bunch of credit cards and about a hundred bucks in cash.”
Vining walked behind the desk. On top were loose cords for a computer. “Where’s her laptop?”
She and Kissick looked around, finding no signs of a computer.
“I didn’t see it downstairs,” Vining said.
Kissick was running his fingers across the folders in a file cabinet drawer. “We haven’t searched her car yet.” He closed a drawer and opened the one below it. “Hmm.” He closed that drawer and opened another.
“Hmm what?”
“The other three filing cabinet drawers are crammed full. This one has a lot of room in it. No gaping holes. The files are spaced out. I don’t know if it means anything.”
“Oh, my gosh.” From a bookshelf beside the desk, Vining picked up a framed photograph. “The four Ramona Girls back in the day. Look at my mother. Red, white, and blue–striped bell-bottoms and big square sunglasses. Straight hair parted in the middle reaching her waist. Hilarious.”
When Kissick came over to look at it, Vining picked up another photo. “Here’s one of the girls today.” She pointed to a woman with thick salt-and-pepper hair who was wearing an embroidered Mexican peasant blouse. “That’s Mary Alice, the artist. She lives in Ojai, where she has a pottery studio and now goes by her given name, Maria Alicia. Story was that her father was Anglo, and her Mexican mother wanted her to pass for Anglo. I keep forgetting to call her Maria Alicia.
“That’s Vicki. Miss No-nonsense. She’s a high school principal in Claremont. Tink was the ambitious one. She went to Notre Dame. That was a big deal for a girl from Alhambra.”
“How did she pay for it?”
“Family savings, I guess. Scholarships. Loans. Her father ran a local insurance agency. They weren’t wealthy. None of the girls were. Tink set her sights high and made it happen. There’s my mom. So pretty. Such a flirt. My mother fared the worst of the four friends. Multiple divorces. Jumped from job to job. Always having a dispute with her boss or a coworker who’s supposedly out to get her. That job at the Estée Lauder counter at Macy’s in West Covina is the longest she’s had anywhere. Always broke. Sells JAFRA on the side. Rents the town house she’s living in.” She sighed.
She opened the frame and took out the snapshot. “This is a good current photo of Tink. I’m taking it.”
Kissick turned on Tink’s BlackBerry. “Tink kept her calendar in here. She had a full day today. Pilates at nine. Hair color at ten-thirty. Seven-thirty tonight, ‘To G.T. discuss G.G. fundraiser.’ Georgia’s Girls? G.T.? Gig Towne?”
Vining drew her index finger ac
ross the spines of a dozen books. “Tink was really into this Georgia Berryhill. Check out these titles: Tick-Tock Therapy—Five Minutes a Day to Heal Your Mind and Achieve Your Goals; Love Yourself Rich; You and Your Shadow—Make Friends with Your Shadow Self.”
She pulled a slender tome off the shelf. “Here we go. Here’s the gold mine. The Berryhill Method. It’s still on the bestseller lists. Guess there’s an endless supply of people wanting an easy explanation of the meaning of life. With Tink losing her son and husband, I can see how she’d be attracted to The Method. Tink treated the Ramona Girls to a retreat at Berryhill. Wasn’t my mom’s cup of tea. Fasting, exercise, no alcohol…Doesn’t look like Georgia takes her own medicine.”
The book’s back cover had a photo of Georgia Berryhill sitting on a stone bench in a lush garden. She was in her forties with a zaftig figure, chin-length straight dark brown hair, sparkling brown eyes, and a small-toothed, almost childlike smile that revealed a dimple in one plump cheek. She had the warm, kindly mien of a sorority housemother who keeps her charges in line with good humor and by appealing to their better selves. She looked as if she had a secret that she couldn’t wait to tell you.
“Found contact information for Kingsley Getty.” Kissick was still going through Tink’s BlackBerry. “Address on Wilshire Boulevard in L.A. Zip code puts it in the Westwood area.”
“This book is personalized. ‘To Catherine, my friend on The Method journey. With warmest wishes, Georgia.’” Vining put the book away and pulled out another. “This one’s personalized too.” She pulled out the next volume. “Looks like they all are. Georgia Berryhill has a lot of celebrity followers. Tink’s money must have bought her the celebrity treatment.”
“Speaking of celebrities,” Kissick began, “Tink seemed to know Gig Towne pretty well. She’s got his home information, office, agent…”
“My mother mentioned something about that.” Vining was looking through the desk drawers. Arranged at the top of the desk was a collection of antique fountain pens and inkwells. “Think she tried to finagle an invitation to go with Tink to his house.”
“I’d like to finagle an invitation with his wife, Sinclair LeFleur.”
“Her? She’s so…pale and wispy. Thought you liked your women more robust. I’m not wispy.”
He shrugged, not offering an explanation.
She smirked at him and sat behind the desk.
“They live near here, in La Cañada Flintridge,” he said.
“Odd that this drawer is empty.” She rolled back the desk chair and bent over to look inside the center desk drawer. She started pulling on something. “A paper is jammed in the back.” It came loose, sending her back into the chair with the momentum. She frowned at it. “Look at this.”
He came around the desk to join her. “It’s covered with those funny symbols, like those burnt papers you found in the fireplace.”
“Whoever burned those missed this one.” She carried it to the window. “One of the burnt ones was drawn in this same dark brown ink. Maybe this isn’t ink. Maybe it’s dried blood.”
Kissick unscrewed the ornate silver cap from one of the antique inkwells. He picked up one of the fountain pens, dipped it in, and made a line on a notepad.
“Black ink.” He removed the cap from another inkwell. This time, the line he drew on the pad was crimson. He picked up the inkwell and sniffed the contents. “Blood.”
They looked at each other.
“Is this some sort of witchcraft, black-magic thing?” Vining again looked over the books lining the shelves. “There’s nothing that suggests witchcraft here. But…” She pointed at spaces between books. “Books have been taken out.”
The sunny, spacious kitchen had dozens of cookbooks, including several penned by Georgia Berryhill. A tattered copy of The Method Feast was on a counter as if it was in constant use. The forensics team had left sooty fingerprint dust on many of the surfaces.
A cabinet was crammed with Berryhill brand vitamins and supplements. Kissick read the names aloud. “Energy Please. Amino A-go-go. Berry Blast Antioxidant Booster.”
In the living room, Forensics had removed the burnt contents of the fireplace. As Kissick and Vining headed toward the front door, she stepped inside the office off the entry. From a neat pile of newspapers on a corner of the desk, she picked up a copy of the Wall Street Journal. She set it aside and picked up the paper beneath it, the Los Angeles Times, and the one beneath that, Investor’s Business Daily.
“They’re all a year old. She left Stan’s office intact.” Vining restacked the newspapers as they were before she’d disturbed them.
They left the house and walked down the terraced brick path. She looked at the green lawn with its tender blades of grass and showy flowers. The sun had come out and the raindrops had dried.
They got into their cars and drove back to the station.
EIGHT
After leaving Vining’s car in the PPD lot, Kissick drove them both to Patsy Brightly’s town house in Monrovia.
Vining made a call and asked a Detective Section staff assistant to run a background check on Kingsley Getty.
When she’d ended the call, Kissick asked, “Don’t you want to call your mom and make sure she’s home?”
“I don’t want to telegraph that something’s up.”
“She has a new boyfriend. Maybe he’s there.”
“Whatever.” Vining closed her eyes. “I try to stay out of it. I just hope I don’t have to go to another wedding.”
“How many would it be?”
“Another would be five. My father was her first and shortest marriage. Stephanie’s dad was the second. That one lasted a couple of years. She married number three around the time I married Wes. No coincidence there, huh?”
“You’re saying your mother was being competitive with you?”
“Oh, yeah. Not so much with Stephanie, though. I don’t know why that is. Anyway, number three was a nice guy. A machinist, like my grandfather. That marriage lasted ten years. It ended because he wanted to move to Vegas, where he had kids, and she didn’t want to go. Ironically, she met number four in Vegas. Bill Brightly. He was a salesman for a medical supply company. I never liked him. A real ladies’ man. She was the one who called it quits, and I can’t blame her, even though it tore her up. She liked his last name, though, and kept it.”
“Interesting that she dumped three and four, but husbands one and two, the ones she had kids with, dumped her.”
“That’s the story.”
“What’s that mean? What other story is there? You’ve never met your father, and neither has Stephanie, right?”
“Correct. Abandonment makes sense. But my mother recently revealed that Stephanie’s father didn’t abandon her. He was in jail on a drug charge and was stabbed to death. My mother made up the deadbeat dad story to shield Stephanie from the truth. And me too. I was four when it happened.”
“Really.” He was quiet for a while. “She could have made up stories that were kinder to her girls, like dying in accidents. Or made them heroes. Died while rescuing a child from a raging river.”
“Guess my mother wasn’t creative. Maybe it was simplest to say they left one day and never came back. Makes me wonder what sort of creep my father was.”
“What about Granny? She must know the truth.”
“I’m sure she does. When I used to ask about my father when I was a kid, she’d tell me to ask my mother, which went nowhere. I finally stopped asking.”
“Why did the truth about Stephanie’s dad come out?”
“Stephanie said she needed to know his medical history for the sake of her two boys, but that’s just the reason she told herself. She was always asking questions about her father, long after I’d given up asking about mine. Her boys got old enough to start asking their own questions. She hired a private investigator.” She chuckled. “Took him about half an hour to find out the truth.”
“You never tried to track down your father? Run a background ch
eck?”
She shook her head.
“You know his name and the approximate year he was born?”
She shook her head faster, as if this was a place she didn’t want to go. “I’ve lived this long not knowing. Even though Stephanie said she’d be okay with whatever the private detective found, she was not happy that the first photograph she’d ever seen of her father was a mug shot. Sometimes the lie is easier to live with than reality.”
“Your mother doesn’t have any photos of Stephanie’s father or yours?”
“She claims she tore them all up.” Vining looked out the window, tiring of the conversation. “It doesn’t matter.”
Kissick got off the freeway. Monrovia was in the flatlands of the San Gabriel Valley, south of the foothills. Like Pasadena, it had been settled by Midwesterners who were drawn by the temperate climate and open land. Once blanketed with citrus groves, the city was now studded with mini-malls.
Kissick remembered the way to Patsy’s, having followed Vining here last night after she’d driven her slightly tipsy mom home.
He parked on the street in front of a sprawling complex of dark wood, sloping shingled roofs, and pine trees. The woodsy design was iconic early seventies. Clusters of two-story units were separated by tree-lined paths. The front doors were painted burnt orange. Wooden flower boxes were attached outside the upstairs windows.
Kissick parked behind another Crown Vic with chrome spotlights—an unmarked cop vehicle.
Vining met Kissick’s eyes and arched an eyebrow.
At the keypad outside the front gate, Vining buzzed her mother’s unit.
When Patsy finally answered, her “hello” sounded strained and tearful.
“Mom, it’s me. Nan.”
“Oh, Nan. Thank God. The police are here, asking me about Vince.”
“Who’s Vince?”
“Vince Madrigal, my new man. He was murdered last night.”