The Otter of Death

by Betty Webb

  “Well, you never know,” I said. “These things can go sideways on you. Sometimes the police arrest Person A just to lull Person B, their real suspect, into a false sense of security. Given the fact that Person A is already out of jail, I’m thinking that’s what’s going on. Maybe we should get together and see if there’s anything you need to worry about.”

  She gulped. “You think?”

  I tried to sound tough and worldly-wise. “Yeah, I think.”

  Twenty minutes later, still wearing my all-purpose black dress, I was sitting in Amberlyn Lofland’s Point Deem condo located three short blocks from the Pacific Ocean. Not the usual student digs. Although small—a one-bedroom furnished with a queen-sized bed, which I figured ruled out a roommate—the apartment’s location alone must have cost Amberlyn a tidy sum. The light from the large, west-facing picture window revealed that the furnishings weren’t student-salvage, either. Besides a chic chrome-and-glass dinette set, they included two matching peach-colored sofas separated by a large gnarled-oak coffee table. Over one of the sofas hung a brightly colored, signed and numbered, Manfred Rothmore litho, the artist San Francisco Style Magazine had crowned “California’s Reigning Post-Modernist.”

  All this for a UC Santa Cruz sophomore who hailed from the wrong side of the tracks.

  Since I’m a slob, I turned down the glass of merlot she offered, fearing for the life of the pale beige Berber carpet.

  “You don’t mind if I have one?” she asked.

  “Have at it.” In vino veritas.

  Instead of sitting on the sofa across from mine, she settled herself next to me. “It’s awfully nice of you to do this for me, Teddy.”

  I gave her what I hoped was a kindly smile. “I haven’t done anything yet, but I’m here and I’m ready to listen. We girls have to stick together, don’t we?” Especially since the boys so often tried to boss us around.

  “They’re not all as nice as you.”

  Yes, Amberlyn was a beauty with her naturally pale blond hair and eyes such a deep blue they looked almost lavender, but she was also naïve. Surely she didn’t believe that our brief meeting a couple of years ago made me trustworthy. Maybe she didn’t have any close girlfriends. That often happens with beautiful women.

  But not wanting to get sucked into gender politics, I went straight to the point. “Lex said you had something you wanted to discuss.”

  She moved closer, her shapely leg almost touching my less attractive one. “It’s about Stu.”

  “Stu?”

  “You know, Professor Booth.”

  “Oh. Stu Booth.” Where the heck was this going?

  Taking a deep breath, she said, “The police saw those pictures of me on his phone. I thought I was okay when they arrested that Conyers woman, but now that they’ve let her go, I’m afraid they might come after me. Should I talk to an attorney? Somebody like your stepfather, ’cause he’s so brilliant? I want to make certain the checks continue to be sent to the realtor like Stu promised or I’m up shit creek. See?”

  I shook my head. No, I didn’t see.

  “Lex didn’t tell you?”

  I shook my head again. “What was Lex supposed to tell me?”

  “That I was Stu’s Sugar Baby.”

  Sugar Baby? Despite her tone, I almost laughed at her use of the old-fashioned term. But after a moment, the import of what she said sunk in, so I asked, “Amberlyn, are you seriously telling me that ‘Stu’ was, ah, helping you pay your rent?” I gestured with my hand, taking in the big picture window, the nice furnishings, the signed litho.

  When she crossed her arms across her spectacular chest, metallic gold nail polish winked at me, helped along by a couple of diamond rings. Not Harper Betancourt-Booth-sized diamonds, but impressive enough.

  “Helping? As if!” she humphed. “Stu pays for the whole thing as well as my tuition, and a little extra on the side so I can have nice clothes. That’s how the Sugar Baby thing works, you know. So what am I supposed to do now? The new semester starts in a couple of months and I need to find out what he’s already paid and what he hasn’t, and what kind of legal arrangements he’s made for me. The last time he was over here, that’s what he said he was going to do, see? He loved me so much he wanted to make sure I’d be taken care of if anything bad ever happened to him. But I’m kinda scared now that the cops might start looking at me as a suspect, which of course I couldn’t possibly be, because it would be stupid to kill the goose that laid the golden eggs, right? But sometimes the cops aren’t smart enough to figure that out.” She stopped, took a breath, and added, “Your fiancé excepted, of course. I’m sure he’s super-smart. Like me.”

  Oh, dear Lord. After I recovered from my shock, I remembered reading about the “Sugar Baby thing” in the San Sebastian Shout, the area’s free alternative newspaper. According to the article, sharply rising tuition rates—more than a thousand percent in the past four decades—had necessitated unusual financial arrangements for an increasing number of coeds.

  It worked like this:

  An attractive young woman needing tuition assistance posted her picture and a brief bio on websites such as SeekingSugarDaddy.com, then waited. Once a well-heeled man responded, the so-called interview process began, ending in a trial run at a nice hotel. If the trial run proved to be to both individuals’ liking, the financial arrangements were finalized, usually by contract. According to the article, approximately two to three million coeds were already reaping the benefits of debt-free education, thanks to their Sugar Daddies. In turn, the Sugar Daddies received unlimited companionship from beautiful coeds. The article’s writer had interviewed one of them, a sophomore at UCSC who preferred anonymity but, for the article, wanted to be referred to as “Dolly.”

  Singing the praises of the Sugar Baby/Sugar Daddy arrangement, “Dolly” said, “It’s not just about sex, because you don’t really have to sleep with them, not if you don’t want to. But gee, you want to make them happy, don’t you, because what young woman wouldn’t want to have a really, really wise older man in her life? My Sugar Daddy—I’ll call him Jim, but that’s not really his name—he’s, like, my best friend, so of course I sleep with him.”

  I must have been frowning because Amberlyn said, “It’s not just about sex. Stu and I really, really respect each other. He’s, like, my best friend.”

  Suspecting that I was talking to the mysterious “Dolly,” I said, “Respected. And was.”

  “Huh?”

  “Past tense, since he’s dead.”

  “Well, you know what I mean. Really, what’s the difference between me and your mom, because she…?”

  I stood up. “Don’t. You. Dare.”

  She flinched. “Well, uh, I’m sorry, it’s just that… it’s just that…I…I really, really miss Stu, you know? And now, what am I going to do about next semester?”

  “Accumulate a mountain of debt like everyone else.”

  “But then I’d be working for something, like, ten or twenty years just to pay it off! You know my parents can’t help out, and God knows I don’t want to wind up like them, working on some artichoke farm until my arthritis got so bad I couldn’t work anymore.”

  I’d been about to leave, but sat back down.

  Despite Amberlyn’s nasty crack about my mother, I saw her point. The Sugar Baby article had pointed out that the national student debt load had crept past one-point-five trillion dollars, to my mind an obscene amount. Yet it was almost impossible to get a decent job without a college degree, so what was a young person to do? Only the best and the brightest were able to get full ride scholarships, which meant that most either had to work part-time jobs or rack up a terrifying amount of debt. Unless, that is, they were lucky enough to have wealthy, or at least middle class, parents. Which Amberlyn didn’t. What she did have was beauty.

  After thinking over everything she’d told me, I said, “You said Stu promised he was going to make some sort of financial arrangement for your, ah, protection. When was this?” />
  “Last week.”

  “What day last week?”

  “Tuesday, I think.”

  Eight days before he was killed, enough time for him to have seen a lawyer. Then something else struck me. “Wait a minute. You’re saying he paid your tuition and your rent, plus gave you a little extra besides, but you hadn’t seen him in over a week. Considering your arrangement, doesn’t that sound strange to you?”

  She flushed again. “We talked on the phone a lot.”

  “What’s ‘a lot’?”

  “Almost every night.”

  “Last week, too?”

  She looked out the big picture window. Over the top of the next condo and off into the distance, you could see a thin sliver of the blue Pacific. “He, uh, he didn’t call me last week.”

  “You didn’t call him?”

  “He told me never to call him. See?”

  I saw. God forbid Stuart Booth’s wife, Harper Betancourt-Booth, intercepted her call and found out about the Sugar Baby/Sugar Daddy arrangement.

  “A wise policy, I’m sure. But Amberlyn, Lex told me Stu’s phone had pictures of you. In the nude.”

  No blush. Instead, she gestured toward the Manfred Rothmore litho “Stu had an eye for art.”

  Which brought up another topic. “I’m sure Stu had a nice salary at the college, but not enough for him to do the things he likes to do, collect art, etc., and support you as well, so where’d the extra money come from?”

  “The Betancourts gave him an allowance. That’s the way rich people do things.”

  Somehow I was able to hide my smile, because sometimes they did, and sometimes they didn’t. These days Caro was rolling in dough, but I supported myself—although I had to admit it was over her objections. The thing was, once you took money from someone, you pretty much had to do what they wanted you to do, and there was no way I would ever let myself in for such servitude. Then I remembered Aster Edwina Gunn’s many demands and the fact that I’d kowtowed to almost every one of them. So who was I to judge?

  Dismissing my own semi-servitude, I asked, “That financial arrangement you said Stu promised to make ‘just in case.’ What’s his attorney’s name?”

  She shrugged elegant shoulders. “If I knew, I wouldn’t be having this conversation, would I? I’d just call him.”

  “Or her.”

  “Huh?”

  “Some lawyers are women. But okay, I’ll make a couple of phone calls, see what I can find out. In the meantime, I’m curious about something.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Is the Sugar Baby thing what broke up you and Lex?”

  She gave me a look of disbelief. “Of course not! And we’re not really broken up. When Stu’s not here…” She paused. “When Stu, uh, wasn’t here, Lex would come by and we’d…Uh, you know. Because Lex is the love of my life.”

  Of everything I had heard today, that comment shocked me the most “Really?”

  “Swear to God! We’ve been together since we were twelve, grew up in the same trailer park. I’ll never love anyone like I love Lex. See?” She crossed her heart with that diamond-encrusted hand.

  Yep. I saw. Kinda.

  Eager to flee this ethics-challenging conversation, I sighed, stood up, and headed for the door. Just before I reached it, I turned around. “By the way, Amberlyn, what’s your major?”

  Her smile didn’t travel all the way to her lavender eyes. “Finance. I need to make money. A lot of money. Because you know what? In fifteen years I’ll be almost as old as you and I’ll start losing my looks. Who’ll want me then?”

  Chapter Nine

  I made it to the Gunn Zoo by two-thirty, where I found a note taped to my locker telling me all my charges in Down Under had been fed, watered, and cleaned up afterwards by other zookeepers. After radioing Zorah to thank her for making that happen, I changed into my uniform and made my way to Colder Climes to see how Magnus was getting along.

  Quite well, apparently.

  The little polar bear cub was sitting on his artificial ice floe, basking in the oohs and ahhs of his admirers. After giving me a brief huff in recognition, he stood on his hind legs and waved his paws, eliciting even louder oohs and ahhs. What a ham.

  Assured that Magnus was settling in well, I headed over to Tropics Trail to take care of Lucy, the giant anteater. I had just finished sweeping up a pile of anteater dung when my mother showed up, still clad in her snazzy funeral attire.

  As I loaded a sack of dung into the zoo cart, she said, “Sometimes I despair of you, Theodora.”

  No news there, since Caro was always despairing of me.

  “You could have behaved better during the Betancourts’ funeral reception! What were you thinking, eating so much? You acted like you were half-starved.”

  I didn’t answer, just heaved another sack of dung onto the cart. I was still smarting over Amberlyn’s final words to me.

  Usually, I’m not happy to have my mother visit me at the zoo, but today was different. Caro had great social connections and I saw a chance to benefit from them.

  “You know Frasier Morgan, don’t you?” I asked her. “He was at the reception.”

  She raised professionally plucked eyebrows. “Well, of course. Everyone knows Frasier. That red nose of his, he should have something done about it. Cosmetic surgeons can work wonders these days. Speaking of noses, why don’t you and I take that cosmetic surgery cruise to Spain I was telling you about? My eyes need work again, and that bumpy nose of yours needs a total rebuild. You get the work done in New York two days before you embark, and recover while you’re…”

  “Do you have his private number? I used to, but somewhere along the years I lost it.”

  “Whose? The surgeon’s? I can vouch for…”

  “Frasier Morgan’s.”

  She blinked thick artificial lashes. “Why?”

  “I just…wanted to talk.” Frasier being close to the Betancourts, there was a chance he knew the name of Stuart Booth’s attorney. Among other things.

  “You just want to talk. Hmm.” When Caro gave me that sideways look, I knew what she was thinking. Frasier Morgan, MBA Stanford. Currently working his way up the corporate ladder at Prime Pacific Oil. Not handsome, and he’ll never be a gazillionaire, but he still has better prospects than that lowly county sheriff she’s engaged to.

  Barging in on her web-spinning, I said, “How did Frasier happen to be at the funeral reception? None of the other Prime Pacific execs were there.”

  “I imagine it was because his father was so close to the Betancourts. They were hunting buddies. Don’t give me that look, Theodora. I know how you feel about hunting, and I can assure you that at least on that one issue, Frasier does not take after his father. He wouldn’t dream of killing an animal. But after his father’s passing, Frasier inherited the membership in the Carmel Oaks Country Club, so now he and Miles Betancourt have a standing Sunday foursome.”

  “With their wives?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Men can’t do business with their wives hanging around. The other two men are also executives with Prime Pacific.”

  Although I hated myself for what I was about to do, I did it anyway. “You know, I seem to remember reading something in San Sebastian Style about Frasier going through a divorce.”

  “Yes, and I think it was very bad form of them to write about it, especially the part where Evelyn threw him out of the house just because he…Well, never mind what he did. Men are men. They do things that make women unhappy. Anyway, just so you know, the divorce is final. But why so curious? You never paid any attention to Frasier before. Oh, wait a minute. Didn’t you date him once before you met…before you met that…” she seemed to be having trouble saying the word. “…sheriff?” She made the word sound like a cat coughing up a hairball.

  Frasier’s Santa Claus nose had never bothered me, but our first date had turned out to be the last because it had been the most boring evening of my life. All he could talk about was finance, which I wasn�
�t interested in. When I’d brought up my own job at the zoo, his responses proved he couldn’t tell a crocodile from an alligator.

  But to my mother, I pretended otherwise. “Things have changed since then,” I told her, “and I was thinking that maybe he’s lonely. So about that phone number. Do you have it or not?”

  Hope glittered in Caro’s eyes. “I have everyone’s phone number. Everyone who counts, that is.” She plucked her cell phone from her sleek Hermès handbag, and after a couple of thumb motions, reeled off the number.

  “That’s his personal cell, Theodora, so you don’t reach Evelyn by mistake. She got the house, you know, including the landline, but she’s still bitter. God knows what she’d tell you about Frasier if you started talking to her.”

  I didn’t care. I only wanted to find out if he knew anything about Stuart Booth.

  Desperation thy name is an unattractive, newly divorced man. Frasier was pathetically eager to meet me for drinks at Fork, San Sebastian’s minimalist-except-for-its-prices eatery. Since I didn’t get off work until six, I had to rush home to the Merilee to shower and change into a somewhat less elegant dress than the little black number I’d worn to the funeral. At least this one was clean.

  Seven p.m. found me standing at Fork’s crowded bar, trying to enjoy the glass of Gunn Vineyards Chablis that Frasier ordered for me. Given my guilty conscience over using the poor guy like this, it tasted like vinegar.

  “…and so you see, regardless of what you might have heard, Teddy, that’s what actually happened,” Frasier finished, after a long and no doubt fictitious, tale of what had happened between him and his ex-wife. He was freshly shaved and showered, the strong scent of his lemony aftershave struggling mightily with the L’aire du Temps worn by the woman standing behind him, and the Eau de Muget on the woman next to me. All in all, the bar smelled like a flower garden that had been watered with Chivas Regal.

  “Evelyn always was difficult,” I commiserated, my fingers crossed behind me once more. I’d only met Evelyn Jennings Morgan twice, and both times she had seemed pleasant.