Romeo's Hammer

by James Scott Bell

  No.

  It was a knee.

  More digging, more exposure. She had been buried naked. Just like in the video.

  When I got to where the head would be I used my hands to clear away the dirt. I kept thinking of poor Ray Christie and how this was going to hit him. The man put all his hopes on reconciliation with his daughter. And it was too late. What would she look like when he viewed her? I hope he would see in her a little bit of the little girl he once knew.

  But that was not going to happen.

  Not now, at least.

  Because the face did not belong to Brooklyn Christie.

  “NOT HER?” IRA said.

  “No.”

  “Then who?”

  “Her name is Lindsay DeSalvo,” I said.

  “And you know this how?”

  “She was a friend of Brooklyn’s.”

  “But the woman in the video …”

  “That was Brooklyn, no question.”

  “Then how?”

  I started spitballing. “What if they switched the bodies?”

  “For what purpose?” Ira said.

  “You tell me,” I said.

  “There was no other footage on that video,” Ira said. “At least that I found.”

  “Why record it at all?”

  “Visual proof,” Ira said.

  “For who?”

  “That’s the right question,” Ira said, “but we’re in no position to know, even if that’s our working theory.”

  “Think about it,” I said, “as we look for another grave.”

  WE SPENT THE next half hour combing every rock and pebble and tumble-weed-laced patch of that ground. And found nothing like a grave or a mound or a discoloration of ground.

  And as bad as I felt for Lindsay DeSalvo, a little part of me wondered if Brooklyn might still be alive. That Kalolo and Claude had tried to pull a fast one on someone who wanted Brooklyn dead.

  It was a stretch. But I felt like stretching.

  The sun was giving off some heat now. In the distance I could see a truck rumbling along the two-lane blacktop, and a sedan of some kind going the other way.

  Ira said, “It’s time to notify the sheriff’s office in Palmdale. They need to take over. Are you ready?”

  “For what?”

  “To tell them how we happen to be the ones who found the body.”

  “A song and dance?” I said.

  “Be nice,” Ira said.

  IT TOOK A full hour before a sheriff’s vehicle arrived. Two deputies took an initial report from Ira. I sat in his van, on the passenger side, with the door open. Half an hour later, a homicide investigator, a deputy named Givins, showed. He was early forties and had a lean and hungry look. Such men are dangerous. Shakespeare taught us that.

  Ira showed him a credential that Givins took to his car. He made a radio call, returned the credential and spoke once more to Ira.

  While he did that, I tried to make sense of the body-switch theory. Brooklyn could have been drugged. She could have been knocked out. They made the video, started throwing dirt on her.

  But that’s when the video ended.

  She also could be dead and buried somewhere else.

  That last thought hit me hard. What if she was never found?

  This would hurt Ray Christie worst of all. I started to wonder if it would be better to know she was dead than never know for sure.

  When it was all over Ira was driving us back. He told me we’d meet with them in a few days, turn over the phone, and tell them everything.

  “Not everything,” I said.

  “How’s that?” Ira said.

  “We don’t know the ending yet.”

  Ira drove in silence for a few minutes, then said, “That poor girl.”

  “Lindsay DeSalvo.”

  “Any motive you see?”

  “Just that—” Some tumblers clicked into place in my brain. I sat up straight.

  “What is it?” Ira said.

  “A connection. Between Lindsay and Claude and—”

  “Who’s Claude?”

  “One of the guys I left up there in the hills.”

  “Ah. And there’s a third person?”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “And who would that be?”

  “Would you believe Wild Bill Hickok?”

  A LITTLE AFTER midnight, back at the Cove, I jogged along the dark Pacific’s edge.

  This was not exercise.

  It took me about ten minutes to reach my destination. The ski mask and crowbar I held like a baton did not slow me down.

  Jon-Scott Morrow’s beach house had a security system. I’d noticed it when I first encountered his fat butt ten days ago.

  I was going to have to move fast.

  Before pulling myself up onto Morrow’s outer deck, I put the ski mask on.

  Up I went, triggering the motion-sensor light.

  The crowbar got the sliding door open with a quick snap.

  And an interior alarm started shrieking.

  With a pen flashlight I made my way through the house.

  A light clicked on in a room at the end of a hall.

  I turned off my flashlight and stepped into a bathroom.

  A beam of light hit the hallway.

  He had a flashlight, too.

  As soon as the light passed the bathroom I jumped and got who I figured was Morrow in a nasty headlock.

  It took only a second to find the gun in his right hand.

  I took it from him and said, “Turn off the alarm now or I kill you.”

  “Okay, okay! But they’ll come!”

  “Now,” I said.

  He went to a code pad by the front door. He turned on a light. Punched in a code. The alarm stopped.

  “Please don’t hurt me. Or beat me up.”

  “Call the company and tell them it’s a false alarm,” I said.

  “Do you want money?”

  I touched the gun barrel to his head. He yelped. He was wearing a silk bathrobe, open over boxers. I hope never to see that sight again.

  “Call them or you—”

  “Jonny?”

  A sleepy woman’s voice coming from the bedroom.

  “Tell her it was a false alarm,” I said.

  “False alarm” Morrow said. “Be right there.”

  “Good, Jon,” I said. “Now you call the alarm company.”

  The theme from The Magnificent Seven chimed.

  “That’s my phone,” Morrow said.

  “Answer it,” I said. “And call them off. Or I shoot you both.”

  We went into the bedroom. I shone the light on the bed. A little blonde with big blue eyes squinted at me. She looked no older than nineteen. She had the black satin pulled up to cover herself.

  Morrow answered his phone.

  “No, I tripped it by accident,” he said. “Sorry. My code is QQ8883 … yes … thank you.”

  “Turn on a light,” I said.

  He did. A painting of nude woman sitting in the lotus position and looking up at a rainbow hung above the bed.

  “What’s your story?” I said to girl.

  “Don’t shoot me,” she said.

  Jon-Scott Morrow gave her a disgusted look.

  “Sit on the bed, Jon,” I said.

  He sat.

  I took off my ski mask.

  “Good God,” Morrow said.

  “Just your neighbor,” I said.

  The girl said, “What’s this about?”

  “Is he paying you?” I said.

  She nodded.

  “Do you have a car?”

  She shook her head.

  “Uber?”

  She nodded.

  “Give her the money,” I said to Morrow.

  Morrow curled his upper lip. Then he opened the drawer to the bedside table. He pulled out a roll of bills, took the rubber band off, peeled five bills and put them on the bed. They were hundreds.

  “Is that it?” I said to the girl.

  �
��Yeah.”

  “Give her a tip,” I said.

  “What?” Morrow said.

  “Another hundred,” I said, and tapped his skull with the gun.

  Morrow plunked down another bill.

  I handed the money to the girl.

  “Thank you,” she said. “Do you party?”

  “Only if there’s a clown making balloon animals,” I said. “Get dressed.”

  I WALKED MORROW out to his living room so the girl could get dressed. I made him sit on the floor.

  “Please don’t let any of this get out, it’ll kill me.”

  “I might do the same.”

  “Please,” he said. “Can I call my agent?”

  “You don’t get to call anybody.”

  “I can’t let anything happen to the movie.”

  I almost slapped him just for saying that.

  I said, “Where is Brooklyn Christie?”

  “I don’t know any … ”

  “You had a party here a couple of weeks ago, isn’t that right?”

  “I have parties sometimes.”

  “Wednesday, two weeks ago.”

  He thought about it. “I had some people over.”

  “Brooklyn Christie was at that party, Jon. Tall, long dark hair. A friend of Lindsay DeSalvo.”

  “I sort of remember.”

  I tweaked his skull with my index finger. “Try harder.”

  He rubbed his head. “Don’t do that!”

  I did it again.

  “Ow!” he said. “Come on!”

  “She tried to kill herself that night,” I said. “Or somebody poisoned her.”

  “Dear God. Not here.”

  “How do you know?” I said.

  “I just … I would know.”

  “Were you drinking that night?”

  “Sure.”

  “Drugs?”

  “A little grass maybe.”

  The girl appeared in the foyer. “The car’s on its way,” she said. “I guess I should wait outside.”

  “Don’t call the police!” Morrow said. “Whatever you do.”

  “You’re not going to shoot him, are you?” the girl asked me.

  “I didn’t see his last movie,” I said. “So maybe not.”

  AFTER SHE CLOSED the door I said, “When I found Brooklyn on the beach, coming from the general direction of your house, she said something odd. It sounded like higog. You know what I think she was saying? Hickok. As in Wild Bill. As in the movie you’re slated to do. Also listed in the cast is Lindsay DeSalvo. Now, tell me again you don’t know who Brooklyn is.”

  “Okay, yes. I remember her. I didn’t talk to her, except to say hello. She was with some older guy.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Can you describe him?”

  “Gray hair, a producer type. I think they had a fight. He left.”

  “Who did you spend your time with?”

  “Lindsay, mostly. We had a thing going.”

  “A thing?”

  “You know.”

  “You’re a real romantic, Jon.”

  “I liked her! I really did.”

  “You gave her a part in your movie,” I said. “Was that for services rendered?”

  “Come on,” Morrow said, almost squealing.

  “How did you meet Lindsay?”

  He didn’t answer. I could tell he could have.

  “Did Claude introduce you to her?”

  “So what?”

  “Do you know about Tanya?” I said.

  “I don’t know these people you’re talking about.”

  “Tanya Camarasa,” I said.

  He shook his head.

  “Don’t lie, Jon.”

  “I’m not! I swear!”

  “Did Lindsay ever talk about an angel named Michael?”

  Jon-Scott Morrow issued a heavy sigh. He shook his head. “Why don’t you just ask Lindsay about all this?”

  “I think you know why.”

  His eyes widened. I saw fear there. Though whether it was out of guilt or confusion I couldn’t tell.

  “Lindsay DeSalvo is dead,” I said.

  “Dear God!”

  “You’ve got that line down, Jon.”

  “How?”

  “Claude.”

  “No way! He wouldn’t.”

  “Where does Claude live?” I said.

  “Huh?”

  I tweaked his head again.

  “Ow!” he said.

  “Where does Claude live?”

  Morrow said, “He rents a condo. About two miles from here.”

  “Get your car keys.”

  “What? Wait—”

  “You’re going to drive me there.”

  “I can’t. He won’t like it.”

  “Jon, let me assure you, he is not going to care.”

  I WALKED MORROW to the door connecting the garage. Inside was a beautiful red Ferrari, a car he did not deserve.

  “You drive,” I said.

  On the way there he kept talking, in a high-pitched voice that almost killed some of my brain cells, that he hadn’t done anything wrong, that he was trying to get his life back together, that everything was tied up in this new movie, that—

  “Enough,” I said. “You buttered your bread, now jam it.”

  “What ... does that mean?”

  “Live with the consequences of your actions, and quit whining about it.”

  He didn’t say anything else until we got to a condo complex half a mile off PCH. All was quiet. Morrow pulled into the rear of the complex, pulled up near a back door.

  “That’s it,” he said.

  “Turn off the car.” I said.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Now.”

  He killed the engine.

  “Get out,” I said.

  “Why?”

  I held up my tweaking finger.

  He put his hand up. “Okay!”

  We approached the door together. I had the crowbar with me and got ready to use it.

  “You can’t do that,” Morrow said. “He has guns.”

  “He’s not here,” I said.

  “What?”

  “Be quiet and do what I tell you.”

  I broke us in and turned on the lights.

  THE PLACE WAS neat, which didn’t surprise me. Sociopaths are often the neatest people on the block.

  Living room spacious, with a TV the size of a truck on one wall. Everything was done in dark colors, down to the black carpet. A German Iron Cross medal, framed, hung on the wall opposite the TV.

  “Why isn’t he here?” Morrow said.

  “Because he’s dead.”

  The actor put his chubby hand over his mouth.

  I pulled his arm down and guided him down the hall.

  “But how?” he said.

  I didn’t answer.

  “Did you?” he said.

  Silence from me. I turned on the lights in the bedroom and looked around. There was a set of dumbbells next to the king-sized bed. A desk with a laptop on it, and a poster of skull breaking out of a swastika.

  I grabbed Morrow by his bathrobe and shoved him down onto the bed.

  “This is the last time I’m going to ask you nicely, Jon. Don’t lie to me.”

  “Please, dear God, you’ve got to believe me.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “I don’t know what Claude did on his off time. Please, can we get out of here? I really need to sleep.”

  I backed off and looked down at his pitiful form.

  Then I grabbed the laptop.

  “What are you doing?” Morrow said.

  “Drive me back,” I said.

  In the Ferrari he said, “Please, this can’t get out. I can’t have my name connected with any of this.”

  “If I find out you’re lying, Jon, that will be the least of your worries.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “To you?”

  “Yes!�
��

  “Like a good suspense movie, Jon, you’ll have to wait and see.”

  I GOT BACK to my place at two a.m. Woke up at eight covered with sweat and filled with a Samuel Beckett-type emptiness.

  Waiting for Godot.

  Or the other shoe to drop.

  I got in the shower and listened to my mind. It was a circus in there. I was one of the clowns, running around in a circle.

  Where was Brooklyn?

  Was she dead or alive?

  The last two people to see her were both dead.

  I should not ever be put in charge of witness protection.

  What was up with the video? Why was it made? For laughs? For someone to see?

  Why the body switch?

  Cue circus music, and start it all over again.

  No answers, only questions.

  Just like Socrates.

  Pass the hemlock, friends.

  What did this Tanya the angel-gazer have to do with all this?

  Was Jon-Scott Morrow as innocent as he said he was?

  He still deserved to be punched several times in the face.

  Is that your business, Romeo? Leave those faces alone.

  Can you?

  Make some coffee and figure out what to do next.

  You’re going to need Ira’s help.

  But Ira does not do violence like you do, Romeo. He gave all that up.

  Maybe you should, too.

  But you know you can’t.

  Sophie. What are you going to do about Sophie?

  She’s already decided for you, hasn’t she?

  Love lost. Maybe you should write a damn poem about it.

  The Cavalier poets can eat my shorts.

  I WAS DOWNING that first cup of joe when I heard a gentle knocking at my screen door.

  It was Artra Murray.

  I slid the door open.

  “Morning, Mike.”

  “Artra. Coffee?”

  “No thank you. I just wanted to check. How’s the girl? Brooklyn.”

  “You better have that coffee.”

  She studied my face. “Okay.”

  We sat on the two chairs on my porch. The morning sun was just starting to warm the Cove.

  I gave Artra the story.

  When I finished she shook her head and said, “Evil.”

  “You don’t hear that word much anymore,” I said.

  “It’s a watchword for our times,” she said. “I’ve seen it all my life. What are you going to do, Mike?”

  “I’m thinking that through,” I said.

  “You’re a thinker, I know that about you.”