Serpentine

by Jonathan Kellerman

  Bill Des Barres said, “I guess I spoke too soon, I actually do recognize her. Minus the hair, she was blond, they all were. What I remember is she tended to…how shall I say this…use various body parts to be noticed.”

  “Seductive.”

  “Not specifically with me, just an overall manner. A lot of them were like that but she stood out because she seemed to be taking it seriously—no smiles, no flirtatiousness. Like wiggling around was her assignment.”

  “Aimed at your father.”

  “No one else to target,” said Bill Des Barres. “He was sowing a whole lot of wild oats. Kind of a delayed reaction, I guess.”

  “To what?”

  “Getting married young, working like a dog since he was a kid, putting himself through school all the way to Ph.D. I guess he had a right to kick loose.”

  “Any idea where he met all these women?”

  “Not a clue. Maybe cocktail lounges in fancy hotels? It’s not like you could log on and click a picture—look, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea about Dad. He never did anything inappropriate in front of us. Not once. It was just a party scene and it was his time and money to spend. Did it bug me? Sure. The changes in Dad were a little unsettling. But that’s not really why I left. I just wanted to do my own thing.”

  He chuckled. “If anything, the girls would’ve been an incentive to stick around, right? All those bathing suits by the pool, who needs Playboy?”

  * * *

  —

  Milo put down his phone. “Am I the only one hearing ambivalence?”

  I said, “Complicated childhoods for both of them. So now you know Dorothy was definitely there. Small steps.”

  Chomp chomp. “Bathing suits by the pool, place like that there’s got to be a pool house or cabanas. Got your phone handy?”

  As he consumed, I google-earthed an aerial view of the property, studied the image, and showed it to him.

  He pointed to an aqua-colored rectangle. “Big pool. And yeah, this block has to be ye olde changing rooms…and this one, further back…servants’ quarters?”

  “Or a guesthouse.”

  His finger traveled. “Here’s the tennis court…the building behind that is probably a garage…and all the way back here looks like a belt of trees. Plenty of places to get the job done.”

  He returned the phone, got up and paced. Sat back down. “Any suggestions?”

  I said, “Just to be thorough. I’d like to know how Des Barres’s wives died.”

  CHAPTER

  14

  Milo’s detective I.D. turbocharged a county records search, but it still took time. By the time the coffee I’d brewed was ready, he’d copied the info in his pad.

  Helen Archer Des Barres had died fifty-one years ago at Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital. Age, forty-two. Epithelial carcinoma of the ovaries.

  Arlette Melville Des Barres had died thirty-seven years ago in Angeles Crest National Forest.

  Age, thirty-five.

  Accident, unspecified.

  I said, “Interesting.”

  He said, “I call your interesting and raise.”

  * * *

  —

  Obtaining the details was an ordeal. Starting with the coroner’s office, he endured voicemail at the extension of his favorite pathologist, Dr. Basia Lopatinski, then tried the main desk at the crypt. That left him alternating between being put on hold and talking to people unable or unwilling to help him.

  “Damn turnover,” he said. “Everyone I used to work with has retired. Except Basia.”

  I thought, The price of enduring.

  He tried Basia a second time. She picked up, characteristically buoyant, listened to his request.

  “That long ago? Best I can do is probably just a summary like on the Swoboda woman.”

  “I’ll take what I can get, Basia.”

  “Are the cases related?”

  “She’s the wife of a guy Swoboda was living with. Died a year before Swoboda.”

  “Hold on…okay, here it is,” she said. “Fatal equine accident, multiple skull fractures, brain bleed. Sounds like she fell off a horse in Angeles Crest.”

  “Where specifically in Angeles Crest?”

  “Doesn’t say. I know bad guys like to dump bodies out there but isn’t that usually biker-types and gangsters? Did she associate with either?”

  “Don’t know much about her, Basia, but unlikely. Anything suspicious about the death?”

  “If there was it wouldn’t have been signed off as accidental.”

  “How many fatal horse falls have you seen?”

  “Since I’m in the States?” she said. “None. When I was in medical school in Poland, a drunk stole a wagon that was hitched to a beautiful Sztumski—a big dray horse—and crashed it into a wall. Fortunately the horse was unharmed. People do fall off but it’s generally not fatal, especially now with helmets. More often than not when there’s an accident it has to do with racing and the horse is the victim.”

  “So we’re talking a rare occurrence,” he said.

  “Ah, I see where you’re going. Swoboda—there’s a nice Slavic name—was made to look like an accident and so poor Ms. Arlette is gnawing at you.”

  “You should be a shrink, Basia.”

  “Too frightening a thought, Milo. Being bombarded with all that insight. Besides, you’ve got Alex for that.”

  I said, “Hi, Basia.”

  “Hello. I figured you’d be there.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Milo’s gnawing.”

  * * *

  —

  While the two of them talked, I worked my phone. I was still clicking when Milo signed off.

  He said, “What?”

  “Trying to find out how many lethal horse falls occur per year. There’s no precise number, best guess is around a hundred. Back when Arlette died, the country’s population was significantly smaller so the number would probably be smaller unless a behavioral change—helmets, like Basia said—lowered the risk. Hold on…looks like helmets became popular right around the time Arlette had her fall.”

  “Either way,” he said, “it didn’t help her. Dorothy, Stan Barker, now Arlette. People who associate with Dr. Des Barres tend to lose out to gravity.”

  I said, “Getting rid of a wife in order to start a harem I can see. I can even see paring down the harem if a member grew troublesome—demanding more than a casual relationship. But why, years after Dorothy left Barker, would he be targeted?”

  He checked his notes. “Seventeen years. Good point. Fine, let’s put ol’ Stan aside—though as you pointed out, he didn’t look like the outdoors-type and fatal hiking falls are super-rare. We’ve still got two dead women who lived with Des Barres kicking it prematurely a year apart and one’s a verified homicide. Galoway said Des Barres didn’t shuffle off the coil until nearly twenty years ago from a disease. Guy outlives his victims and dies in bed. Reassuring, Alex.”

  I said, “What is?”

  “Validation of my credo.”

  “Life’s not fair.”

  He bared his teeth. “How’d you guess?”

  * * *

  —

  He searched for accounts of Arlette Des Barres’s death, found only a paragraph in the Pasadena Star-News.

  Hollywood Woman Suffers Fatal Fall from a Horse

  A woman riding alone at the western edge of Angeles Crest National Forest plunged to her death after falling or being thrown from her own horse. The body of Arlette Des Barres, 35, was found by park rangers after she failed to return from a ride last Sunday.

  The horse, housed at Agua Fria Stables in Pasadena, was found a half mile east of the body. Purchased a year ago by Mrs. Des Barres, it was described by stable owner Winifred Gaines as “young but well-behaved.” Mrs. De
s Barres was described as an experienced rider. She leaves behind a husband and three children.

  I said, “Three children, two of whom remember their father fondly.”

  Milo said, “Maybe Dr. Tony doesn’t? I’ll try him again.” Another call. Same message.

  He looked up Agua Fria Stables. No current listing. “Same old story. Okay, tomorrow the archive. I find anything, you’ll be the first to know.”

  His phone played something I didn’t recognize. He checked the screen and ignored the call.

  I said, “Who was that?”

  He said, “Ellie Barker. She’ll be the second to know.”

  * * *

  —

  I heard nothing the following day. At eight p.m. on the second day, he phoned. “Any chance I can pop by, toss some stuff around?”

  “When?”

  “Now-ish, I’m a hundred feet from your ranchero.”

  * * *

  —

  I was waiting on the terrace with Robin and Blanche as he drove up in his personal ride, a white Porsche 928 he and Rick have shared for years. Un-Porsche-like with its front engine but with its own sense of style and freakishly reliable. Like me, the two of them appreciate loyalty.

  We were outside relaxing, Blanche chewing a jerky stick with Gallic flair, Robin and I sharing a bottle of Israeli Cab-Merlot a wine-auctioneer friend had gifted us for Christmas. In my free hand was a glass for Milo.

  He made his way to the top of the stairs and took it. “What’s the occasion?”

  Robin said, “Another day aboveground.”

  “Your age, you’re thinking like that?”

  “Have been since I turned ten, Big Guy.”

  “What happened when you were ten?”

  “I grew up. Taste, it’s great. From a forty-year-old vineyard where they found a two-thousand-year-old wine press.”

  “France?”

  “A hill near Jerusalem.”

  He swirled and sipped. “Very nice.” He gazed off into the trees that curtain the front of our property. “You know, I think I’ll finish and be on my way.”

  I said, “Thought there was something to toss around.”

  “It’ll keep, don’t want to ruin the festive mood.”

  Robin took his arm. “C’mon, we’ve got some leftover rib-eye.”

  “Oh, ye Jezebel,” he said. “Will temptation never cease to plague me?”

  * * *

  —

  Eating and drinking in the kitchen loosened him up. He removed his jacket and slung it over a chair, smiled as Blanche toddled over and settled at his feet, and dropped her a small piece of meat.

  I said, “What’s up?”

  “Nothing. Literally.”

  “Dead end at the archives?”

  Blanche was on her hind paws, panting with lust. “Okay to give her another?”

  Robin said, “We get to be the bad parents? Just a smidge and make her sit.”

  Blanche obeyed the command before Milo had a chance to instruct her. He laughed and his arm lowered and the wet sound of ecstatic, slobbering bulldog jaws filtered up.

  Then, cat-purrs.

  I said, “The archive.”

  “Better organized than I expected. Lev always impressed me as kind of a stoner but apparently before he went back to Harvard, he whipped everything into chronological order and the new guy hasn’t had time to screw it up. So finding the book shoulda been easy. But nothing there. Lev’s system cataloged chronologically from the time each case opened officially. Sometimes the 911 call, sometimes when the detective logged it. Ten hours before Dorothy’s coroner’s summary, a stabbing went down in Watts, and five hours after there was a fatal downtown liquor store 211. In between? Air. Just to make sure, I spent the entire damn day looking over every case five years before and after. Then I expanded to twenty years either way. Zilch. It ain’t there.”

  Robin said, “Someone took the file and didn’t return it. Do people often get careless?”

  “Sure,” he said. “But there’s no record of anyone checking that particular file out, so for all I know it was never cataloged in the first place.”

  She said, “Because a rich guy was involved?”

  “Shocking as it may be, darling, cases involving the high and mighty do have a way of veering out of lane. Take O.J. His Defense made a big deal about how he was mistreated by a racist department. Truth is, he was coddled initially because celebrity trumps race and cops are the biggest star-fuckers of all. If Des Barres had enough pull, sweeping up a bread-crumb trail wouldn’t be tough.” To me: “Anything on him from Maxine?”

  “Not yet.”

  “She’s usually quick, bad sign.” He played with his empty wineglass.

  I said, “Be interesting to see if Arlette Des Barres’s file is there. If it’s also missing, you’ve got capital I interesting.”

  “Problem is, Arlette’s file wouldn’t end up there under any circumstance. Angeles Crest jurisdiction is split between the forest service and the Sheriff’s. I have no idea where they keep their relics or if they hold on to stuff, period. Top of that, she was tagged accidental from the get-go so there’d be no real investigation.”

  He tilted the glass toward the bottle. “Maybe a half pour.”

  Robin obliged. “More steak, as well?”

  He smiled and pecked her cheek. “No thanks, Jez.”

  “Then how about we open another bottle and take it out back? Nice warm night, we can watch the fish.”

  Milo looked at me. “You got yourself a girl with good values.”

  We were sipping silently by the pond’s rock edge when his phone interrupted. This time I recognized the ringtone. The first four notes of Debussy’s “Clair de Lune,” over and over. Some sort of rotating classical algorithm cooked up in a Silicon Valley lab full of tone-deaf geniuses.

  Robin covered one ear. “Sacrilegious, slicing it up like that.”

  He said, “Sorry. Lemme snuff it.” Quick look at the screen. “Petra. Gotta take it.”

  Hoisting himself from the pond bench, he walked a few feet away. Did a lot of listening and returned looking shaken.

  “She just picked up a shooting on Franklin. Ellie’s boyfriend.”

  I said, “Offender or victim?”

  “Victim. Serious condition, in surgery at Hollywood Pres. Gotta go.”

  Robin said, “Both of you?”

  I said, “Don’t see what I can add.”

  “The poor girl. First her mom, now her boyfriend? If anyone can use emotional support, it’s going to be her.” She squeezed my arm. “I release you for the public good. With enough wine in me, I’m ready to make the sacrifice.”

  As we headed down the stairs, Milo said, “How much have you imbibed?”

  “Glass and a half.”

  “Three for me.” He cleared his throat. “I also had a beer before I got here. Mind driving? Time it’ll take to get there, I can clear my head.”

  CHAPTER

  15

  The drive to Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center is one I can pull off in my sleep. It’s a venerable institution planted at Vermont and Fountain. Around the corner from the Western Peds campus on Sunset, where, as a newly licensed psychologist, I’d spent long days on the cancer ward.

  I drove to the parking valet where Milo police-tagged my dashboard and told the attendant, “Leave it here, worth your while.”

  He badged us through the lobby and we headed for the ICU. The waiting room was full of miserable-looking people, as ICU waiting rooms always are. A nurse at the desk was prepared for Milo’s badge.

  “Second room to your right.”

  “How’s Mr. Twohy doing?”

  “You’d have to ask the doctor that.”

  * * *

  —

  Second room
to the right was windowless, off-white, and sterile, set up with scarred furniture. A space accustomed to bad news.

  The look on Ellie Barker’s face said she’d heard plenty. She sat on a hard-pack, fake-leather sofa between Petra and Petra’s partner, Raul Biro. Brown sweats, maybe of her own design, bagged on her. Her complexion was one shade grayer than the room, her hair tied back carelessly with a red rubber band.

  She saw us but didn’t move or speak. Both detectives nodded.

  Petra was her usual tailored self, this suit, black crepe. I’ve never seen Raul when his dense black hair isn’t brushed back and sprayed perfectly in place and his suit’s not a masterpiece of tailoring. Despite the blood and gore he encounters routinely, he favors light shades of featherweight twill and remains spookily stain-resistant. Tonight’s one-button was cream-colored gabardine over a starched white shirt and a massively knotted raw-silk tie the color of Japanese eggplant.

  Milo and I pulled up two facing chairs.

  Ellie said, “Thanks for coming.”

  Milo said, “Of course.”

  She shifted to me. “You probably think I need help.”

  Just like the first time we’d met, cool to my presence. She’d spoken of being a difficult teen and I wondered if Stan Barker’s attempts to deal with the issue before sending her away had led her to some bad therapeutic attempts.

  Milo said, “We here to support you, Ellie.”

  “Thanks. Sorry, don’t mean to be snippy.” She lowered her eyes to her hands.

  Petra said, “Let’s step outside, guys.” Unspoken signal to Raul.

  He said, “I’ll be here with you, Ms. Barker. Anything you need, let me know.”

  Ellie said, “I’m okay, really.” Then she burst into tears.

  Raul had a tissue already in hand. A good detective prepares.

  * * *

  —