Serpentine

by Jonathan Kellerman

  She said, “Never get this far south. What’s good?”

  Milo said, “Everything, ma’am,” and nudged the charcuterie toward her.

  She inspected the plate, tweezed jerky between manicured fingers, and nibbled. “Yums.”

  “Glad you like it, ma’am.”

  “Ma’am? That sounds like where I’m from.”

  “No geographic boundaries when it comes to manners. Ma’am.”

  Nancy Strattine let out a throaty laugh. Then her face changed, as if suddenly warned to avoid merriment. “I shouldn’t be frivolous, it’s a sad situation with Benicia. Either way.”

  The waiter reappeared. Milo and I had turned down wine but he asked Nancy Strattine if she wanted some.

  She looked at us. “Against your rules?”

  “Unfortunately.”

  “Well…not against mine. I’ll have a glass of Pinot.”

  “Coming up.”

  “Any questions or are you folks ready?”

  Nancy Strattine speed-scanned the menu. “I am. Chicken sandwich.”

  Milo ordered the deluxe burger and I asked for a seven-ounce fillet.

  The waiter said, “No worries,” and left.

  Nancy Strattine said, “Why do they say that? What would I be worried about unless he knows something I don’t.”

  I said, “Generational anxiety.”

  “Ha—and he didn’t say ma’am. In Texas even the kids are polite. So. When you emailed me I got charged up and called the only member of my family who was alive back when Benni—that’s what we called her, two n’s, one i—when Benni disappeared. That’s my uncle Nat, he’s retired police in Austin. He was the baby, born after Benni and my mom. He said he didn’t have anything but then he found what I’m going to show you and sent it. She’s still a kid and her figure was different, but who knows, maybe you can draw a conclusion.”

  Out of the blue bag came an Apple 10 XR in a pink snakeskin case. An image already loaded.

  Outdoor shot, clumped greenery backing a chubby girl sixteen to eighteen, wearing a yellow print dress with puffed sleeves.

  None of the open glee of the smooth-faced blonde in the Azalea shot. This subject was barely able to meet the camera head-on. Long brown hair hung lank. Too-short bangs did nothing for a full face that was lightly spotted with acne.

  Milo loaded the Azalea shot with everyone but the fresh-faced blonde blocked out and we did a side-by-side comparison.

  Puberty, plastic surgery, and long-term aging can alter appearances radically but a handful of unmanipulated years, particularly during youth, don’t have much impact on facial proportions.

  He looked at me. I nodded.

  He said, “Unless Benni had a twin, it’s a match.” He offered Strattine the comparison.

  She said, “My oh my…so Benni did end up in L.A. That’s what people said. But she sure looks different…but yes, it’s her.”

  “Which people?”

  “Let me rephrase. That’s what my mom said. She used Benni as a bad example whenever she wanted me to toe the line. Her claim was Benni had slipped out through a bedroom window late at night and it was obvious where she went because she’d talked about being a Hollywood movie star. Which Mama said was stupid because Benni never acted a whit in school. Didn’t do much of anything in school.”

  I said, “Not a student.”

  “Not according to Mama,” said Strattine. “Stay in school, Nancy, don’t drop out like stupid Benni. Use your time wisely, Nancy, don’t sit around letting your rear get as wide a barn door like fat Benni. Get a respectable job, not like lazy Benni who ended up spreading manure at one of the rose growers. Watch your figure—I know, brutal. I suppose that’s why I went searching for what happened to Benni. Kind of like saving a poor soul.”

  “She and Benni were first cousins?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Any reason for the animosity?”

  “My theory,” said Strattine, “is it was really between their mothers. Mawmaw—my grandma—was religious, a total puritan. Benni’s mom, Great-Aunt Sadie, was anything but. But again, that’s just what I’ve been told. I asked Uncle Nat about it and he had no idea, said he’d never heard about the actress thing, either. The story his dad—Great-Uncle Nathaniel, Sr.—told him was totally different. Benni fell in with a criminal female and likely met a bad end because of it.”

  I said, “Either way, Benni was the bad example.”

  “Exactly.”

  Milo said, “Did the criminal have a name?”

  “Not that Nat knows. What Senior said was she was an ex-con, got released and hired to work with the roses. Busy season, the growers brought on all sorts of temporaries. I suppose Benni could’ve met her while spreading manure. But if she made it to L.A., Nat was probably wrong and it was Hollywood she was after. Can I see that photo again, please?”

  Milo handed her his phone.

  “She looks so pretty,” said Strattine. “She improved herself. All by herself.” Fist-pump.

  An exuberant voice said, “Here we go, folks.” Three plates were set down silently.

  Nancy Strattine tasted her sandwich. “Yums.” Then her wine. “Yums, again.” She put her glass down. “It’s sad to think of Benni out there with no family. I suppose after all this time there’s not much hope.”

  “No matter how it turns out, you did the right thing, ma’am.”

  “Thank you for saying that, Lieutenant. Mama would disagree.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “The road to hell’s paved with good intentions, Nancy. Deal in facts, Nancy, not far-fetched ideas.”

  “Whew,” said Milo. “She does sound tough.”

  “Let me tell you, there are times…” Head shake. “That attitude’s part of what makes me want to do right by Benni.”

  Sudden flash of anger. Then a nibble of her sandwich. “This is good.”

  * * *

  —

  As the three of us ate, Milo and I rephrased questions we’d already asked. Nancy Strattine didn’t resist but she had nothing to add.

  Then I said, “Did Benni ride horses?”

  “As a sport? No. Did she ever get on a horse? Probably, it’s Texas. Tyler’s a city but there’s ranchland not too far, that’s where I used to ride with my dad. So maybe Benni did, too. Though I never saw it personally. And her dad—Uncle Loudon—died when she was little.”

  “It was just her and her mother?”

  “And her mother drank. A lot. So did Loudon, that’s what killed him, driving drunk into a cottonwood. They were looked down upon by the rest of the family.”

  The check came. Nancy Strattine reached for it.

  Milo snatched it up and carried it to the host station.

  When he returned, she grinned. “I can’t get into trouble for bribing a peace officer?”

  “Nope, you’re safe.”

  “Can I at least do the tip?”

  “Taken care of, ma’am.”

  “Bummer—okay, can you at least call me Nancy? That way I can pretend this is a social thing and next time it’ll be my turn.”

  “Sure, Nancy.”

  “You’re an easygoing man. Texas would like you.” She reached out to touch his hand, thought better of it.

  The three of us stood and headed out of the restaurant.

  Milo said, “If there’s anything else you can recall or learn about Benni, let us know.”

  “Promise,” said Nancy Strattine. “I’m really a source, huh? My husband and kids are going to get a huge kick out of that.”

  * * *

  —

  She drove away in a rental Explorer.

  I said, “Two positive I.D.’s in one day.”

  “Unbelievable,” he said. “Must be sunspots or something.”

 
“Benni hanging with a bad girl could fit our Queen Bee guess. A tough, more streetwise girl brought her to L.A. and got her into the scene.”

  He nodded. “That’s why you asked about horseback riding. Which she didn’t rule out. Okay, let’s check in with the kids.” He phoned Moe Reed and gave him the news.

  Reed said, “Funny you should say that, L.T. Alicia and I got nearly identical tips from two sources about a girl named Benni. Mine described her as intellectually challenged.”

  “Where are the tipsters from?”

  “Dallas and Boston. Both said they grew up in East Texas, that’s where they knew her.”

  “They have anything else to say?”

  “Just that they thought they recognized her.”

  “How much info is left to go through?”

  “At least a day’s worth,” said Reed. “Maybe some spillover tomorrow.”

  “You need a break from weekend work?”

  “Nope, Alicia and I are charged up. The rookie’s kind of bummed because none of her stuff has panned out but that’s good training, right, L.T.? Getting used to failure.”

  CHAPTER

  31

  We left the winery and headed east toward the Del Norte on-ramp to the 101. Milo maintained an easy seventy-eight mph all the way to Thousand Oaks, where his phone rang with a text.

  He handed it to me. “See if it’s anything.”

  “Detective Sherry Mulhern, Valley Division. Call when you have a chance, no reason given.”

  He said, “Keeping it brief, sounds like something active. Do me a favor and speaker it, then hold it close enough for me to talk.”

  I put the phone on my left leg, maxed the volume, called the number.

  A tobacco voice said, “Mulhern.”

  “Sturgis.”

  “Thanks for getting back so quick. I’m Valley Burglary, caught one in Granada Hills. Complainant is extremely freaked out, which is understandable. What’s different is she claims it could be related to some sort of contact with you but she won’t say what. Older woman, she seems okay mentally, but I’m no doctor. Deirdre Seeger, did you have dealings with her?”

  “Couple of phone conversations,” said Milo. “Are you at the scene now?”

  “For a while, the techies are doing their thing,” said Sherry Mulhern. “So she’s mentally stable?”

  “Far as I know.”

  “It’s probably shock, then. Can’t blame her, every room was basically trashed, going to take time to get prints and whatever else.”

  “What’s the address?”

  “You’re coming over?”

  “Might as well, I’m in Thousand Oaks, can make it in twenty-five.”

  “Okay,” said Mulhern, sounding amused. She read off an address on Southland Street. “That level of speed, watch out for the Chippies, they don’t give us any breaks.”

  Thirty-one miles to the base of the Santa Susana Mountains, two more miles to reach the crime scene. One CHP car spotted, already ticketing a trucker.

  Twenty-seven minutes.

  The house was a low-slung, white midcentury with a sea-green door on a street lined with mature trees. One of the holdouts; most of neighbors had McMansionized. A venerable lemon tree spread across the left side of a fading lawn, evoking Granada Hills’s orchard origins. Same for the navel orange on the right. Other than the trees, just grass split by a cement walkway. Entry blocked by yellow tape.

  Milo pulled behind a navy-blue Crown Victoria sedan with a sagging rear end and cop plates. Ford had stopped making the big sedans in 2011 but they endured as the go-to unmarked for situations where you didn’t need to be unmarked.

  Behind the Crown Vic was a white Scientific Division van. The scenes I’m called to feature at least two vans. One for the technicians, one for the crypt drivers. Plus the compacts the coroner’s investigators take when they’re dispatched to go through dead people’s pockets.

  The absence of all that did nothing to mollify the woman on the sidewalk weeping into a handkerchief. Small, thin, bespectacled, mid- to late seventies. She wore a stiff, dark-brown bouffant, a blue sweatshirt with the U.’s insignia, white sweatpants, white flats.

  At her side was a gray-haired woman in her midforties no taller but thirty pounds heavier. Cropped, frizzy, utilitarian hair topped sharp eyes, a nub nose, and an assertive chin. Detective badge clipped to the breast pocket of her black blazer. The blazer hung open, revealing a holstered semi-auto.

  Stocky woman but not fat; broad and solid, the kind of body designed for long-term plodding not showy sprints.

  She nodded at us, looked over at the crying woman, flashed a goes with the territory frown, and shifted a couple of feet away.

  Milo recited his name and mine. Sherry Mulhern did the same. No time for handshakes. The older woman had let out a sheep-like mewl and Mulhern rushed back to her.

  “So sorry for your losses, Mrs. Seeger.”

  “Sorry for being a crybaby,” said Deirdre Seeger. “I know it’s just things, not a person. But they’re my things and I could’ve been here except for the grace of God.”

  Mulhern said, “Chances are if you were here, ma’am, they wouldn’t have dared.”

  Deirdre Seeger looked up at Milo for confirmation.

  He said, “Detective Mulhern’s right. Most burglars are cowards who avoid confrontation.”

  Mulhern smiled, grateful for the support. “Anyway, I brought the lieutenant to you like you requested.”

  Deirdre Seeger said, “What about those home invaders? They just break in, don’t care if you’re home.”

  Mulhern said, “I won’t tell you it doesn’t happen. But not here, this is a really safe neighborhood.”

  As if realizing how lame that sounded, she exhaled and turned to the side.

  Milo said, “What was taken, Deirdre?”

  “My jewelry, my cash—I don’t leave a lot around, maybe a hundred dollars for odds and ends. Then”—she began ticking her fingers—“there’s my flat screen. I just got it for myself last Christmas. Then there’s my iPad—it’s been broken for a while so tough luck for them. Then there’s my wine, four bottles, it’s good wine, I got it on sale at Trader Joe’s.”

  Mulhern turned to us. “The typical stuff.”

  Deirdre Seeger huffed. “It doesn’t feel typical to me, Detective. It feels like a violation.”

  “Of course, ma’am. It’s a terrible violation. As I told you, we’re searching aggressively for fingerprints and any other physical evidence.”

  “What about other burglaries around here?” said Seeger. “Wouldn’t that give you a lead?”

  “It would, ma’am, but there haven’t been any.”

  Seeger’s eyes bulged. “See! I was singled out! It’s me they wanted to violate!”

  “Why would that be, ma’am?”

  Seeger shook her head. Gave Milo a quick peek. Grim, conspiratorial. She folded her arms across her chest.

  Sherry Mulhern’s mouth got tight. “Mrs. Seeger, if you’d rather talk to them alone, that’s fine. I’ve got a few things to do inside investigating your burglary.”

  “Go,” said Deirdre Seeger. As if realizing how harsh that sounded, she followed up with, “Thank you, Miss Mulhern. Appreciate your service. Like I told you, I know about detection.”

  “It appears that you do, ma’am.” Mulhern traded cards with Milo and ducked under the tape.

  Deirdre Seeger said, “No sense involving her, I didn’t want to get in the way of your investigation. Police work is specialized, Phil taught me that.”

  “You think this could be related to our conversations about Phil’s last case?”

  “You just heard what she said. This is a safe neighborhood, I was targeted. I mean, how long ago were we talking—few days and then this happens.”

  A tech exite
d the house with a hard-shell equipment case. “Stomping all over my home.” More tears. “Sorry, I’m such a baby.”

  “Seems like a reasonable reaction to me, Deirdre.”

  “Phil and I bought it for thirty-one thousand dollars. They say it’s worth seven hundred thousand but I don’t care. Where am I going to go, to some rest home where they don’t pay attention and you die in a corner?”

  Biting her lip. “I loved my home. Want to love it again but…like I told her, it’s only for the grace of God that I wasn’t here and who knows what would’ve happened to me.”

  “Where were you?”

  “Newhall, I’ve got a friend there, we play canasta twice a week, have a group, we rotate. The game was Friday night, Ada served snacks and prosecco, really delicious, I overindulged and knew enough not to drive. I was going to try one of those Ubers. Never did it before but what the hey, there’s a first time for everything. Ada said she wouldn’t hear of it, the spare bedroom was already made up, she keeps it that way for when her kids come home and they rarely do now, they all moved out of state, the taxes. So I slept over and then I got the call. From Mulhern.”

  “Any idea when the break-in occurred?”

  “She thinks at night because no neighbors she talked to saw or heard anything. She said it was a real burglary not a staging because in staging the drawers are pulled out but not everything’s removed and at least some valuables are left behind. But what do you think?”

  “That sounds logical, Deirdre.”

  “Well, maybe. But the main thing is where am I going to stay? Even if they cleaned up, which they’re not going to do, I’m not staying here by myself. Not until my mind settles and who knows how long that’ll take? If Phil and I had children it would be a different story but God didn’t shine that light on us.” Brief glance at the sidewalk. “I have nowhere to go!”

  Milo said, “I’ll make a call, Deirdre.”

  “To who?”

  “Someone who might be able to put you up temporarily.”