“We’re not going to let them walk all over us,” Joel said to his wife.
Paula kept explaining to Waldo and Lorena. “They start demanding all these things you can’t give them. Paternity leave? Really? I mean, okay, if people are gay and they adopt, I get it, but how do you decide which parent should get the leave? I mean, why should that fall on us? Like if one works on our farm, and the other works on a golf course or something.”
“We’re not going to give them paternity leave.”
“But if they strike . . .”
“They’re not going to strike.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because if they strike, we’ll just sell to Dole.” He turned back to Waldo and lowered his voice again. “We won’t—not really—but we’ll make them think that.”
“Fuckers,” said Paula.
“They’re not going to strike.”
“Fuckers,” she said again. Then, realizing the fuss she was making in front of strangers, she said to Lorena, “I’m sorry. But this one guy Kekepania we met with when we were out there? He is not a good person.”
“Um,” said Lorena, “is Stevie here?”
“I don’t know,” said Paula. “We haven’t checked.”
“We just got home,” said Joel, telling them again.
Paula looked at a wall clock, said, “She’s usually back from school by now. I’ll go up and look,” and left the room.
“So,” said Joel, “did I hear you say you were doing something with Stevie?”
Lorena said, “Yes, but let’s see if she’s—”
“I don’t want you to have to tell it twice. Let’s wait until Paula comes back.” He turned to Waldo. “Can I ask you a question? Has anyone contacted you about TV rights? To your story—the Pinch case, I mean. And the other stuff, as background. Is it true that you live in a tree house or something?”
“No, I haven’t talked to anybody about TV rights.”
Joel perked up. “Really?”
“I wouldn’t be interested.” He’d taken some money for the rights to the original Lipps case; it had become one more thing to regret.
“Are you sure? You could give the money to charity. You know, some of it.” He actually winked. “I’m a TV producer. Well, you already know that; I mean, you’re here.” He dropped into the conspiratorial voice again. “By the way, we got picked up for two more seasons. That’s not for public consumption yet, but you’ll see it in the trades this week.”
Waldo said, “I’ll look for it.”
Lorena said, “What’s the name of the show again?”
Joel Rose’s face froze for a fraction of a second. She had quietly wrecked him. “Malibu Malice.”
“Oh yeah,” she said, putting on enthusiasm, though all three of them knew she’d never seen it.
Paula returned. “She’s not here.”
Waldo said, “Any idea where she is?”
“I checked my phone—she didn’t leave a message or anything. But she usually doesn’t. She might just be running a little late. Her friend’s mom drives her when we’re away.”
Lorena said, “Mr. and Mrs. Rose—”
“Paula and Joel. Please.”
“We should tell you what’s going on. Your daughter called me while you were out of town and hired us to look for her brother—”
“Her brother?”
Joel said, “I talked to her brother this morning. He’s in Chicago.”
Lorena said, “She made up a whole story—that you two had died in a car crash, and that her brother was only a little older, and lived here, and went to UCLA, and was Stevie’s legal guardian. And that he was missing.”
Paula said, “Why would she . . . ?”
Joel said, “And she paid you?” He looked at Paula. “With what?”
Paula said, “I always leave her some money for emergencies.”
Waldo said, “What she really wanted was for us to go talk to Victor Ouelette. She was frustrated because your conversations with Sebastian Hexter didn’t go anywhere.”
The Roses squinted at him in matching confusion.
“Do either of those names mean anything to you?”
Joel said, “Say them again?”
“Victor Ouelette, Sebastian Hexter.”
“Wait!” Paula said, pleased with herself like she was about to nail the Daily Double on Jeopardy! “Sebastian Hexter—he’s the headmaster at Stoddard.”
“Have you ever gone to talk with him about a problem Stevie was having with a teacher?”
Joel said, “Never. She’s a great student. She’s made honor roll.”
Paula snickered. “Honor roll? Like in fifth grade.”
Joel said, “Not fifth grade. Junior high.”
Paula said, “Fine,” and rolled her eyes.
Waldo said, “So, Victor Ouelette—that name doesn’t ring a bell?” They both shook their heads. “She had him for history last year.”
Joel said, “Oh, then I’m sure we met him. We always go to back-to-school night.” He asked Paula, “Was he the African American fellow? I liked him.”
“No, that was Mr. Bynoe. Algebra.” She said to Waldo and Lorena, “There are so many teachers every year, you meet each one for ten minutes.”
So Stevie had gone to the headmaster about Ouelette but hadn’t mentioned him to her parents. Even the story under her story was springing fresh holes by the second. Lorena said, “You left Stevie alone while you went to Hawaii?”
Paula said, “We’ve always tried to nurture her independence.”
Waldo said, “How’s that working out?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Is it possible she’s a little too independent?”
“There’s no such thing.”
“There’s a lot out there that kids get exposed to . . .”
“Sex and drugs are part of kids’ lives. Parents who think they can hide all that from them are just fooling themselves.”
“All of them are doing everything,” said Joel. “The trick is to get them to be responsible about it. That’s truly all you can ask.”
Paula added, “You need to be open; that’s the key. If your child feels they can do anything at home that they’d want to do anywhere else, then they don’t have to keep secrets. And they’re less likely to get into some situation that they can’t handle.”
Lorena said, “Listen, Stevie’s in some trouble. She wanted us to talk to that teacher, Victor Ouelette, and shortly after Waldo went to see him, he was murdered.”
Paula said, “Murdered?”
“The police want to talk to Stevie.”
Joel said, “How was he killed?”
“He was shot.”
Joel said, “Oh,” and the Roses looked at each other, relieved. Joel said to Waldo and Lorena, “Our family is totally anti-gun.”
Paula said, “I’m on the board of the Center for Sensible Handgun Policy. I got Lady Gaga to sing at our benefit at the Beverly Hilton—I know her manager.” Waldo began to wonder how close the bathroom was and whether it had a big enough plunger to pull this lady’s head out of her ass. She said, “That poor teacher, though. The police really have no idea who did it?”
Joel, who was starting to understand, snapped at his wife. “They think Stevie may have done it.” He turned to Lorena. “That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?”
“They want to talk to her.”
Joel was getting more agitated and turned on Paula. “Goddammit. We should have insisted that boy stay here.”
Waldo said, “What boy?”
Paula ignored Waldo, answered Joel. “We didn’t have a choice. His parents said no.”
“We should have called and talked them into it.”
“Stevie didn’t want us to.”
Joel shift
ed in his seat, distressed. “This is our fault.”
Paula got short with him, too. “She didn’t shoot anybody. This’ll get straightened out.”
Lorena asked the question again. “Who’s the boy?”
Joel said, “This new boyfriend Stevie’s got. I wanted him to stay here while we were in Hawaii. Truth is, I don’t like leaving her all by herself.” He shook his head and added, “But apparently his parents wouldn’t go for it,” sneering bewilderment in his voice.
Lorena said, “What’s this boy’s name?”
“Koy.”
Joel said, “I thought it was Ky.”
“No, Koy. I think Koy.”
Lorena said, “Last name?”
“Ling. Or maybe Lee. Ling or Lee.”
Lorena wrote down all four names. “I take it you never met him.”
“No, I met him,” said Paula, with tone, clearly irked by the implication of irresponsibility. “I wouldn’t ask a high school boy to stay alone with our daughter in our house if I hadn’t met him.”
“Of course not,” said Waldo. He didn’t give them time to decode his tone. “Look, the police have given us a window to keep a little control of this thing. If we don’t, they’re going to find Stevie and bring her in without us. She won’t return our calls; could I ask you both to try her, and text her, and let her know it’s critical that she come back here right away?”
The Roses nodded and sat there looking at him, earnest.
Waldo said, “I mean, now.”
“Oh,” said Joel, and they took out their phones and dialed.
Paula said, “She never answers.”
Joel said, “And her voicemail is full half the time.”
Lorena said, “That’s why you should text, too.” She and Waldo waited while Joel and Paula simultaneously listened to Stevie’s outgoing message, then watched them both text. Waldo said, “Why don’t you try calling the school, too? Maybe she’s still there.”
Paula dialed and walked into the other room to talk. Joel said to Waldo and Lorena, “She’ll probably be home from school soon. You could wait if you want. I think Naomi Shapiro’s been driving her.”
“Who’s that?”
“Her husband’s a feature lit agent.” They looked at him patiently until he understood that that description wasn’t pertinent. “Her daughter’s a friend of Stevie’s. They live on Dixie Canyon.” He said, “How serious is this? I mean, do you think Stevie’s actually involved?”
Waldo didn’t have an answer for him.
Paula returned, worried. “Stevie didn’t go to school today, or yesterday.”
Joel asked Waldo, “When was the teacher killed?”
Waldo said, “The night before that.”
TEN
Girl’s fucking poison,” said Lorena under her breath. The two of them were alone in the living room, Joel and Paula having gone upstairs to talk privately. “I’ll be lucky to come out of this without losing my ticket.” Waldo didn’t see how any of this would actually jeopardize her PI license, but both Cuppy and Wax had threatened it in the last twenty-four hours and by now everything about Stevie Rose set Lorena’s teeth on edge. “Soon as they come back,” she said, “we’re out of here and we’re calling Cuppy. Tell him everything we know, and then cut this whole fucking family loose.”
Waldo didn’t like the idea of Stevie in the wind. But Lorena was right: the girl was as unstable as a homemade nitrogen bomb, PETN with a belly ring. And in the end, she wasn’t their responsibility. She had these parents, and they had her. Good luck to them all.
Joel and Paula swept back into the living room like the power couple they were, Joel saying, “The truth is, it isn’t that unusual for Stevie to drop off the radar. Sometimes she’ll just go off to a friend’s for a day or two without telling us.” Good luck to them indeed.
Lorena, already starting for the door, said, “Yeah, I’m sure she’s fine—”
Joel wasn’t finished, though. “Still, we’re thinking we should treat this more seriously. Given the situation with the teacher.”
Paula said, “We want to hire you to find her.”
Waldo should have seen it coming, but it wasn’t in him to think like a hustling PI, with an eye for the next gig. And Lorena hadn’t seen it coming because she didn’t want it to come.
Waldo said to the Roses, “Given everything, you should probably talk to the police and report her missing.”
Joel said, “No—dead teacher and Stevie disappears? That’s a bad look. Better to find her before they know she’s gone. I assume you do missing persons.”
Lorena turned to Waldo for help, but he wouldn’t give it; he wanted the job. Lorena said to the Roses, “Could the two of us have a minute now?”
Paula said, “Sure. You can use one of the guest bedrooms.”
She led them to it, smallish for a house this size, dominated by a four-poster queen bed laden with lacy pillows. But one of—how many guests bedrooms did these people have?
Lorena waited for Paula’s footsteps to recede down the hall, then spoke in a harsh whisper. “We are not doing this.”
“Because . . . ?”
“Because she killed him.”
“They’re asking us to find their daughter. Not to prove she’s innocent.”
“That’s next. And you know she did it.”
“I don’t know that,” said Waldo. “I don’t lead with conclusions.”
“What happened to all that high-minded cop bullshit from when you were turning me down on Pinch? ‘Catch the bad guy.’”
“Wait, look at you: you don’t want this one because you think she did it, but Pinch was a dead lock for guilty and all you saw was a business opportunity.”
“I’m a businesswoman. And this case doesn’t even have that going for it.”
“No? Keeping a fifteen-year-old from getting pinned with a murder she didn’t commit? L.A. Times’ll like that story.”
“‘A murder she didn’t commit.’ Sure sounds like we’re leading with a conclusion.”
“You said I can pick the cases I want to work on. You want to team up, here’s where we start.”
She chewed on that, giving Waldo enough time to ask himself just what was compelling him to stay involved with this girl, but not enough time to answer.
Lorena said, “Did you really get two thousand a day on Pinch?”
He nodded. “But I gave the money to charity.”
“Yeah, well. We’re not doing that.”
“We’ll see.”
“How’d you get them to give you that much?”
“I told them that’s what it would take.”
“That’s it? And they just said yes?” He nodded.
Lorena turned and left the bedroom. Waldo followed. He assumed this meant he’d won, though it didn’t feel like it.
They followed the Roses’ voices to the kitchen, where Paula was opening a bottle of Cabernet. Lorena cut right to it. “We get three thousand dollars a day, plus expenses. For that you get Waldo full-time, me part-time, plus all other resources my agency provides, as needed. We want one week’s fee as a retainer, the unused balance to be returned if we find her sooner.”
Joel said, “Credit card okay?”
Lorena said, “Sure.” Waldo knew she was kicking herself for not asking for four.
Paula, pouring, said, “Red all right?”
Lorena and Waldo declined, so Paula poured a third of the bottle each for herself and Joel.
Then they all went to the living room and Waldo and Lorena began their work, collecting background on the family. They learned that Joel was sixty-five, Paula forty-three, and that they’d been together for seventeen years.
Joel said of their courtship, “It was your classic Hollywood location affair, with all the usual drama.” It was hard to tell whether the
irony in his voice was self-awareness or theater. “I was running this procedural I created called Sea Legs. It was about this disgraced FBI agent, total hard-ass, nobody’ll hire him, so he goes to work as the head of security on the biggest cruise ship in the world—sort of Love Boat meets The Shield.” War stories about a long-dead series weren’t going to help anyone find his daughter, but somehow he couldn’t resist sharing. “The network never got behind it. You know who we had as the guy—?”
Lorena steered him back toward port. “So that’s where you two met? On that show?”
Paula said, “Yes. He was the boss, and I was as far below the line as you can get.” Waldo didn’t know what that meant. Paula explained: “‘Below the line’—it comes from budgeting on shows. The producers, the actors, the director, we’re all ‘above the line.’ ‘Below the line’ is the rest of the crew.”
“So you weren’t a producer then.”
Paula said, “Hardly. I was a PA—I brought Joel his latte every morning.”
Joel said, “But you could tell she was a Ferrari going ten miles an hour.”
“I was totally smitten. But he was totally married.”
“Not totally married. It was all but over.”
“Of course, he didn’t tell me that when we started. He was telling me that they were happy. I think it was his way of keeping himself ‘emotionally unavailable.’” She said it with affectionate indulgence and ruffled his hair. They’d obviously told their origin story together before and seemed to think it was adorable.
Joel said, “Next thing you knew, the show was canceled, but we were living together.”
Paula said, “I was his midlife crisis.”
“You still are.” They both chuckled. Yeah, thought Waldo, many times before.
Lorena said, “And you had Stevie . . .”
“Two years later. You should see our wedding pictures. I was in this white dress, out to here.” She held her hands out in front of her, fingertips together.
Joel explained, “We had to wait for the divorce to finalize.”
“But we wanted Stevie to be ‘legitimate.’” Paula turned to her husband. “How old-fashioned were we?”
Joel said, “That’s us.”
Waldo said, “Has Stevie been going to Stoddard all the way through?”
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