“Again, we’re looking for very specific items, unless you tell us differently,” he says, his patience wafer-thin.
He follows her to a study, where he notes the computers and other electronics. She points out her husband’s clothing closet, a giant walk-in matching hers, adjacent to the bedroom. She says he played the guitar, then shows Mills a small collection: three acoustics, one electric. Barry Schultz took a pottery class last year, but it turned out he was better at sculpting boobs than clay. That makes Mills laugh, and it finally lightens the air between them.
“Did your husband keep any old memorabilia? Anything from his childhood? From college? From his early days as a doctor?”
She rolls her eyes. “He has a bunch of shit in the attic. A lot of boxes and an old trunk that’s been up there for years. It’s locked, but you’re welcome to break in.”
It takes about a half hour for him to eyeball the attic, rummage through the stacks of boxes, remove several, and haul them down to the foyer. The trunk comes last. “I won’t break into it here,” he tells the widow. He explains that he’ll have people come by tomorrow to pick everything up. “You’ll need to sign some paperwork, acknowledging that you provided the items to us willingly.”
“Of course,” Carla says, then leads him to the front door.
“You’re not omitting anything else?” he asks. “Nothing beyond the tracking device?”
She clears her throat, looking at him with a quivering chin. “No, Detective. I promise not to do anything else to impede your investigation.”
There’s something demure, if not flirtatious, in her affectation. And it is an affectation. Subtle enough for some to miss. But not a detective. “You’ll need to come outside now,” he instructs her. “To remove the teeth of your car from my bumper.”
She’s clearly too far down Klonopin Lane to be much help at this point, so he gets in her car, performs the necessary surgical maneuvers, and separates the vehicles. He mutters, “Good night,” gets into his car, and drives away. He looks at his watch. Fuck, it’s late. Like dinner-cold late. Like piss-off-Kelly late. But before he calls Kelly, he calls over to the precinct at Sky Harbor and reports the likely destination of the Maserati. He asks an officer there, Christina West, if someone can review videotape of cars entering the garages and lots there.
“All garages and lots?”
“Yes.”
At first he’s met with resistance, some moaning and groaning about hours and hours of videotape. But he’s able to mollify the whiner with a specific date and a very specific time frame. One hour of review for five parking facilities. “There can’t be that many vehicles entering between eleven p.m. and midnight,” he tells her. “Once you see the plate go through, you’ll know where the car’s parked. A Maserati should stick out, you know, like a really expensive thumb.”
Christina West exhales like an exhausted smoker and says, “No prob. But given the time, this might not happen till Monday.”
“Unless I come in and do it myself.” Which is exactly what he resolves to do.
21
The first thing Mills sees when he walks in the house is the look. The look, when it lands on Kelly’s face, usurps everything. There’s no kitchen, no dining room. There are no paintings on the wall. No windows. You have to look at the look. That’s all.
“Oh shit, Kel, I meant to call,” he says, his voice trudging its way to her. “I get it. Dinner’s ruined. We’ll have to go out. You get to choose the place. Fanciest place you want.”
He watches as she, and her look, rises from her favorite chair by the fireplace, a chill all around her. “Dinner is the least of our concerns right now, Alex.”
She’s coming at him, her head shaking, so much tension in her face. “Then what’s concerning us most?” he asks, trepidation roiling in his gut. “I told you I’d be late.”
“Trevor,” she says. “I got a call about twenty minutes ago from Dan Heathrow, Lily’s dad. He’s very upset. Apparently, he and his wife walked in on Trevor and Lily having sex.”
Jaw on floor. Eyes out of their sockets. Tongue wagging as he stutters to respond. “What?” is all he can manage.
“You heard me,” Kelly says, meeting him in the kitchen. “We have a situation. They’re not letting him leave until we come over there to discuss.”
Mills leans against the counter. “They can’t just keep him there.”
“They are,” she says, grabbing her keys. “Let’s go.”
The surprise stutters their conversation as they drive. They keep looking at each other, like two living, breathing wow emojis. They take turns saying, “I can’t believe it.”
Then Kelly takes a breath so deep it makes Mills nervous. Finally she exhales and says, “But we can believe it, right? I mean, he’s seventeen. I’m not making excuses for him, but it’s not unusual for kids that age to experiment. I’d like this to not be happening, but . . .”
“I’m inclined to believe he was more than experimenting,” he says. “I’m not shocked, but still, Trevor? Our Trevor? When did he get the kind of penis that does that kind of stuff?”
Kelly laughs. She explodes with laughter. Which prompts Mills to laugh. Soon they’re both hysterical. Kelly almost runs a red light. She slams on the brakes and asks, “Is it bad that we’re laughing? ’Cause I’m not happy about this.”
Mills assures her it’s an emotional necessity. Then he hears a sniffle, like a weepy sniffle, and he turns to her just in time to see her wipe a tear from her eye. “Hon, come on, it’s not that bad. I’m not saying we throw a party, but this was bound to happen.”
“That’s not what I’m crying about.”
“Then what?”
“I don’t want to be old enough to have a kid who’s having sex.”
They arrive at the home of Trevor’s girlfriend, ring the bell, and wait to walk the unhappy gauntlet. Dan Heathrow opens the door and guides them inside. He introduces them to his wife, Corinne. She looks like a younger version of Martha Stewart, and her house looks like a page out of a Martha Stewart magazine. Right down to the baseboards. Dan reminds Mills of a sitcom dad, with the sweater, the receding hairline, the hunched shoulders. “Your son is in our study,” he says. “We wanted him to stay until you got here to resolve this. Let’s sit, shall we?”
He leads them to the dining room table, where the four of them take a seat.
“We were on our way out of town, heading to Sedona, when I noticed the car was driving funny,” Dan says. “Luckily we weren’t that far, so we turned back. Not so lucky for your son. We came into the house and found him having sex with our daughter. In our bed! Premarital sex!”
“We know they’re not married,” Mills tells him.
“Don’t be flip, Detective.”
“Uh, you can call me Alex. I’m not here on police business,” Mills says.
“Alex, I want your son to stay away from my daughter. Period. He’s never to see her again.”
“They go to school together,” Kelly reminds him.
“I’m aware of that,” Dan says. “But outside of school he better stay away from her.”
“Fine,” Mills says. “We’ll advise him. If that will be all . . .”
“What?” the man thunders. “Are you kidding me? That’s it? No punishment?”
Kelly sits up straight and in her courtroom voice says, “We think punishment is between Trevor and us, privately. I hope you understand.”
Dan pounds his fist on the table. “Oh, no!” he yells. “No way! We want to know exactly what you’re going to do to your pig of a son!”
“Would anyone like coffee?” Corinne asks. “I have a fresh pot.”
Mills ignores her. “Did you just call my son a pig?”
“What would you call him?” the man asks, still frothing.
“I would call him a typical teen. And I’d call your daughter a typical teen, as well.”
Dan roars with laughter. “Of course you do. Let me guess, you two are some kind of libera
l Democrats who support Planned Parenthood and hate family values. Right?”
Kelly, calmly, says, “I don’t think our politics are relevant here.”
“Well, in this house they are,” Dan insists. “We’re a good Christian family raising good Christian children.”
“We admire that,” Kelly tells him. “But I think we need to deal with this privately as two separate families.”
Dan rises, then slams his chair against the table. “You need to tell me right now what you’re going to do to that kid. He’s lucky my gun is locked up in the cabin.”
“Honey,” Corinne says tentatively, “that’s not necessary.”
“Nor is it advisable to discuss the threat of using weapons against my son,” Mills adds. “How old is Lily?”
“She’s seventeen,” Corinne replies.
“So, they haven’t done anything illegal,” Mills says. “At least nothing I can think of.”
“What happened here in my house may not be illegal, but it’s immoral. Something tells me you people wouldn’t know about that,” Dan says. “But I know about your son, Mr. Mills. I read about the drug ring at the high school. I know he sold pot.”
Kelly bristles. “That was a while ago, and the charges were dropped. And if you know so much about Trevor, you know that he and his teammates were being bullied and exploited by a coach.”
Mills gets up. “I think we’re done here.” He yells for Trevor. He yells several times before his son ducks into the room, sheepishly, red marks on his face.
“Let’s go,” Mills tells his son.
“They took my keys, Dad.”
“What happened to your face?” Kelly asks.
“Mr. Heathrow hit me,” Trevor says flatly, as if he deserved it.
Mills rushes to Dan, grabbing him by the collar. “What the fuck, man? A good Christian dad with good Christian values couldn’t resolve this without violence?”
“Looks like you’re the violent one,” Dan sputters. “I shouldn’t have hit your boy. I’m sorry. It was an instant reaction.”
“Let him go, Alex,” Kelly shouts. “Come on, Trevor. We’re leaving.”
“But they took my keys,” Trevor repeats.
“And we’ll give them back when we know what your punishment is,” Dan insists.
“Bullshit!” Mills roars, backing the man into the wall. “That’s bullshit. Give us the keys now or I’ll put your head through this fucking wall.”
“Alex,” Kelly warns.
“Tell me your punishment plan,” Dan insists, turning his head to Kelly.
“None of your business,” she says. “Give us the keys.”
“Here,” Corinne says. No one, certainly not Mills, had realized she slipped out of the room. “Take the keys. Take your son away from here. He’s not welcome back.”
They drive home, Trevor tailing them, Mills boiling. They say nothing. Not a word. They slip into the garage. Trevor enters the house a few steps behind them. “You’re too old to be told to go to your room,” Mills says to him. “But, please go to your room; we’ll talk about this later.”
He showers after Kelly, then lands in bed a few minutes later. She grabs his hand, stroking his arm. “And when we talk with him later, what are we going to say?”
“I have absolutely no clue,” Mills says with a heavy sigh. “But I need to sleep on it, Kel. I really do.”
The talk did not come the following morning. Or the morning after that. They dodged the idea of later, avoiding each other, and avoiding the subject, like some people who step over cracks in the sidewalk. Mills knows the dance is dysfunctional but his partners are willing.
Even now, on Saturday morning, at the beginning of what could become an intractable weekend, they hesitate. Breakfast is a convenient procrastination. So is the run to Safeway, the stop at the dry cleaners. Trevor needs a new pair of shoes. Mills needs to trim the Oleander. They accidentally convene around three o’clock, and there’s no getting around the discussion.
“You have to be careful, Trevor,” Mills says when they’re all sitting in the living room. “I can’t sit here and say what’s wrong and what’s right.”
“Neither can I,” Kelly says. “The fact is, part of becoming an adult is finding out what’s wrong and what’s right for yourself and facing any consequences of your decisions.”
“Yeah, I know,” Trevor says. “But everyone’s doing it. You know, like everyone in high school is having sex.”
Mills offers a chuckle. “Yeah, well, that doesn’t seem like the basis for a good decision.”
“You may be physically old enough to have sex, Trevor. But that doesn’t mean you’re emotionally mature enough,” Kelly says. “Or Lily, for that matter. She may not know yet how emotional it can be to be so intimate with someone.”
“But I’m sure you two weren’t thinking at that level,” Mills adds. “You were just having sex. Right?”
“Yeah. I guess,” his son says. His face now sports a purple bruise from Lily’s father.
“Were you using protection, Trevor?” Kelly asks. “Against pregnancy and STDs?”
“Yes.”
“Good. But nothing is fail proof,” Kelly says. “So you both need to be emotionally ready to handle unintended consequences. I’m not sure either of you are. Something to think about.”
“I get it,” he says.
“Okay, then,” Mills interjects, “tell us what you were thinking having sex in Mr. and Mrs. Heathrow’s bed?”
“It was Lily’s idea. She hates her parents. They’re so strict. They don’t let her do anything.”
“But it was stupid,” Mills says. “Really stupid. And it was wrong. Don’t you ever think of doing it in our bed, Trevor. Or you’ll be sleeping out in the yard. No sex in this house.”
“When we’re home,” Kelly adds.
Mills turns to her. “When we’re home? No, I mean ever.”
She shakes her head. “So he’ll go have sex in a car and get arrested? No, thank you.”
“When we’re home,” Mills says to his son. “Have some respect.”
He then declares the meeting over. His head is throbbing. He needs a nap.
A nap, a vague memory of dinner, and a decent sleep later, it’s Sunday and Mills calls over to the airport precinct to check in on the videotape.
The tapes have been pulled, but nobody has looked at them. Un-fucking-believable. He’s all but wringing his hands. The precinct isn’t overflowing with cops or support staff, but what the fuck else is going on over there? The thing is you never know. He doesn’t know. His head throbs. He massages his temples. He drops a few more f-bombs. His tail between his legs, Mills shuffles over to his wife and delivers the bad news that he has to spend a few hours at Sky Harbor.
“Alex, this is probably one of those days you should be around your kid.”
“I said it’s only for a few hours.”
“Nothing is for a few hours,” she says. “Decide what’s important.”
“Hey, that’s not fair.”
She walks out of the room. He’s too tired to follow and argue. Instead he yells, “Sorry, babe, tell him to vacuum the house while I’m gone.”
She reappears, laughing. “Vacuum? Are you serious? Is that his punishment?”
“I’m not punishing him,” he says. “I’m keeping him busy while I’m gone.”
“Oh, I have plenty of chores for that,” she assures him.
“There, then, it’s settled.” But he looks at her, and her face looks anything but settled. It looks pained still. Disappointed, disapproving. Her mood crawls under his skin. He calls Jan Powell, tells her about the Maserati, and asks if she’d mind meeting him at Sky Harbor.
“Because I have no life?” she asks.
“Never mind,” he says. “I’ll call Preston. I’m sure he has no life.”
“Just messing with you. I’ll meet you in the precinct office.”
She gets there first and has a thin smile when she greets him. “How long do yo
u think this will take?”
“Just fast-forward between cars,” he tells her. “I doubt there’s a lot of traffic going in at that hour. I’m betting we’ll be done with the search in forty-five minutes. Give or take.”
There are two computers in the corner of the office. She sits at one, he at the other. At a ninety degree angle apart from each other, he senses that vibe of camaraderie. It’s just there. They slip in the thumb drives. He takes the West Economy lot and terminal 2 and terminal 3 garages; she takes the East Economy lot and terminal 4 garage. As he suspected, there’s not much traffic and, thus, long durations of video where nothing happens. Not even a passing bird looking to park. So, it is, indeed, an exercise in shuttling the videotape from one car to the next: a Honda SUV . . . eight minutes later a Honda Civic . . . ten minutes later a Toyota Camry . . . twenty-two minutes later a Ford Explorer. And so on.
“Anything over there?” he asks his colleague.
She coughs up a laugh. “A lot of shuttling. Not so many cars. But a very nice Porsche. And a guy with a bumper sticker that says, ‘Honk if you are Jesus.’”
He leans back. “Close, but I think Schultz’s would say, ‘Honk if Jesus needs a facelift.’”
A patrol officer walks in. “Jesus needs a facelift? I was in church this morning. No one said a thing.”
They laugh if only to break the monotony. The officer is a young guy named Sloane. Kevin Sloane. Mills has never met him. “I started walking the garages yesterday,” the officer tells them. “Didn’t see a Maserati, but I was only at it for maybe twenty minutes before I got called to deal with an unruly passenger.”
“Unruly?” Powell asks him.
“He was pissed off about missing his flight. Wanted the airline to charter a plane for him.”
“The airlines don’t do that,” Mills says. “That’s ridiculous.”
Mills is back at the computer screen searching. He’s almost done with the garage structure.
“Not to mention,” the officer says, “he was not just late for his flight; he was four hours late.”
Dig Your Grave Page 20
