Crime Scene

by Jonathan Kellerman

  The daughters, I hoped, were away at school.

  No need to embarrass the old man unduly.

  I went to his house.

  The same silver BMW sat in the driveway, beside a Lexus SUV. I trotted up the front walk a few minutes after eight p.m.: late enough for them to have finished eating but before they got too far into whatever show they liked to watch together.

  He would groan, hit PAUSE.

  She would start to get up off the couch.

  He’d stop her.

  Better he go, that hour.

  I stood at the door, listening to faint, lilting voices.

  I rang the bell.

  The sound cut off.

  Inside: Let me.

  Footsteps. Porch light coming on. Interval, as an eye flitted behind the peephole.

  I already had my badge up.

  The door swung wide. “Yes?”

  “Dr. Vannen?”

  “Yes.”

  “You don’t remember me,” I said, so that he would.

  And he did. He drew back half a foot, seeking the safety of his domain. “I told you before, I can’t help you.”

  “Actually, that isn’t what you said. I asked you about Walter Rennert and you said you didn’t know him, which isn’t the same thing as saying you can’t help me. Either way, it’s not true. You did know him and you can help me.”

  His wife called, “Lou? Who’s there?”

  “Nobody,” he called. To me: “I don’t know who the hell you think you are—”

  “Are you okay, honey?”

  “One second,” he yelled, his voice cracking.

  “Your name was in Rennert’s phone,” I said. “Two numbers, home and cell. So you tell me you didn’t know him, I call bullshit on you.”

  “This is outrageous,” he said, starting to shut the door.

  “When he asked you for the Risperdal,” I said, stopping it, “who’d he say it was for? I have to think he gave a name, or else you were going to have a problem playing along. You and I both know it wasn’t for him. So what did he tell you? ‘It’s for a friend’?”

  “Lou.” A woman with a pleasant, round face appeared, tightening her bathrobe. “What’s going on.”

  “Evening, ma’am.” I lifted my badge again. “How are you tonight?”

  “Is everything okay?” she said.

  “It’s fine, honey,” Vannen said. “Go back. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  “I’m here about Walter Rennert,” I said to her.

  “What about him?” Suzanne Barnes asked. “Is he okay?”

  Vannen’s mouth compressed into a line.

  “You didn’t tell her?” I said to him.

  “Tell me what.”

  “Dr. Rennert passed away,” I said.

  She gasped. “Oh no. How horrible. Poor Walter,” she said. “Recently?”

  “Few months ago. September.”

  “God, I had no idea.” Turning to her husband. “You didn’t say anything.”

  Vannen said, “I—”

  “I’m sure he was too upset to talk about it,” I said. “I know they were close.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?” Suzanne said to him.

  “I apologize for disturbing you,” I said. “I have a few quick questions for your husband, if it’s all right.”

  She smiled at me. “Of course it’s all right. Would you like to come in?”

  I smiled back. “I’d love to, thanks.”

  —

  PASSING THE DEN, I glanced at the paused TV.

  “Foyle’s War,” I said.

  “Are you a fan?” Suzanne asked.

  “Great show.”

  They saw me into the home office. I asked Suzanne if we might have privacy.

  Vannen waited for her footsteps to fade, then glared at me. “You’re a real asshole.”

  “I’m an officer of the law,” I said, “and you’re writing bogus scrips and lying to me about it. So let’s not start with name-calling.”

  A beat.

  “They weren’t bogus,” he said. “He told me it was for a nephew of his.”

  “And you took him at his word.”

  “I decided that if Walter was willing to go out on a limb, then he had a good reason. Of all the drugs people have asked me for over the years—and they ask, believe me, all the time—that’s not one I’m going to worry about. He wasn’t begging for opioids.”

  “Why didn’t he go to a psychiatrist?”

  “It was a private matter. The kid’s out of a job, no health insurance, estranged from his family. What’s Walter supposed to do, drop him off at the county clinic?”

  Vannen lolled back, laced his fingers behind his head. “He’s a psychologist, not just some layman. I saw I could help and I did. I’d do it again.”

  On the wall hung his medical degree as well as various professional certifications. The desk and shelves displayed a variety of pharmaceutical company swag, including a plastic cutaway model of male genitalia. Half of one bookcase belonged to trophies—tiny, cheerless, golden men swinging rackets.

  He saw me staring and said, “We play once a month. Played.”

  “You and Rennert? That’s how you met?”

  He nodded. “We moved up here in ninety-nine, I joined the club about a year after that, so I knew him—what. Seventeen years, give or take.”

  “Did you socialize outside of tennis?”

  “We might have a drink together after the game, but not much else. I think he liked that I didn’t belong to his usual circle.”

  “How long had you two known each other before he asked you for the drugs?”

  “I couldn’t tell you off the top of my head. A few years.” He smiled to himself. “It became sort of a running joke between us. ‘Gee, Lou, I hate to bother you.’ ”

  “You ever meet other members of Rennert’s family? His daughter? Wife?”

  “No. I think he was divorced by the time we met. Or pretty soon after.”

  “And you never met the nephew in question.”

  “I never even learned his name. All I can tell you is that Walter cared about him.”

  “He said so.”

  “He didn’t need to. It was obvious. You don’t make that kind of request lightly. He knew he was making himself vulnerable by asking me. And, look, we didn’t have long discussions, about the nephew or anything else. We met strictly to play. It’s an escape for me and for him, too. Only thing Walter would say was, I was being a big help. Some folks respond better than others to antipsychotics. The kid was one of those.”

  “He’s not getting them now,” I said.

  Vannen nodded. “I realize that.”

  “What do you think’s happening to him?”

  He poked his tongue around in his mouth. “I prefer not to think about it.”

  “Think about it,” I said.

  Vannen stared down at his desktop.

  “That’s why I’m here. I need to find him,” I said. “So whatever you can remember, any hint of his whereabouts—I need to know.”

  I let him take his time. Lot of history to review.

  He said, “There’s one thing. I’m not sure it’ll help.”

  “Go on.”

  “Walter called, once, to cancel our game. This was years ago. Very out of character for him; he was a fanatical player. I’m sure I canceled on him a dozen times or more, but he never did. He sounded pretty bothered, so I asked if everything was all right. He said no, his nephew was in trouble and he had to go out of town.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  “He didn’t say. I said, ‘Anything I can do…’ He told me he had it under control. He canceled the next game, as well.”

  “Out of town where?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “When was this?” Seeing Vannen hesitate, I said: “Around two thousand five?”

  “Could be.”

  “Dr. Vannen, are you aware of what happened in Walter Rennert’s life before you met him? Ho
w he lost his position?”

  “Something about his research,” he said. “I make it my business not to make other people’s business my business. If a person comes to me first, all right. But I don’t like to pry. I wish I had more to tell you.”

  I glanced at the trophies. “You must be one heck of a tennis player.”

  He flexed his hands. “We all do what we can to stave off death.”

  “I spoke to Rennert’s primary doctor,” I said. “He said he played like a maniac.”

  “That’s one word for it.”

  “What word would you use?”

  A long silence.

  “Punitive,” he said. “Like he wanted to punish himself.”

  CHAPTER 28

  In the days leading up to Thanksgiving, we got slammed at work. I spent the holiday on duty, hours taken up by a hit-and-run that left a sixteen-year-old dead and a fifteen-year-old who shouldn’t have been driving on a ventilator. We were short-staffed again, though it wasn’t Shupfer causing the crunch, it was Zaragoza. His wife had prevailed upon him to take time off. He was due—overdue—and nobody could stop him, though Vitti chewed him out about the timing.

  The sergeant prowled around the squad room in a sour mood. His fantasy team sat in dead last, and his admiration for my coaching had curdled into disdain. He made sure to drop by my desk at least once every couple of hours to harass me, swipe my food, tell me to quit spending so much energy on football and get back to doing real work.

  If he only knew.

  Tatiana wasn’t returning my calls or texts. Nor had I heard back from Paul Sandek, Nate Schickman, or Nicholas Linstad’s ex-wife. I was starting to feel unloved.

  I missed Tatiana. The challenge of her personality. The landscape of her body.

  I could understand her reluctance to probe. In the aftermath of death, you flail around, hoarding mementos. You think you want that: Any scrap. But in truth we advance through grief via an act of willful ignorance.

  Take your idea of the deceased. Frame and seal it.

  New information requires you to update the image. It forces you to smash the glass and unfreeze time. It reminds you that, no matter how much you loved someone, there are things about him you will never know. That uncrossable space between two people, painful in life, widens unbearably.

  I’d broken open a disturbing perspective on Tatiana’s father—yet continued to dismiss her beliefs about his manner of death.

  For her, dredging up the past was a no-win.

  But I’d begun. I’d put myself in debt. Not merely to Tatiana. To her father. To Nicholas Linstad. To Donna Zhao. And I knew, better than most, that the dead never forget. On quiet nights, nights of reckoning, they come to collect.

  —

  “CORONER’S BUREAU, DEPUTY Edison.”

  “Yeesss, hello, I need to speak to you, sir, because I have received some very disturbing information, and we need to have a conversation about this, like right away now.”

  “Mr. Afton? Is that you?”

  “Yes and I am sorry to tell you but this is not acceptable.”

  “What isn’t?”

  “I cannot accept this situation and I am very unhappy, very unhappy.”

  “One second,” I said. “Can you hold on a second, please?”

  “Well okay but we need to talk.”

  “We will, I promise, I’m just—gimme a second.”

  I hit MUTE, called up the file on Jose Manuel Provencio, skimmed through it. I unmuted the phone. “Mr. Afton.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Okay, let’s talk about what’s bothering you.”

  “Yes sir, I am bothered because I just went down to the place where they had him and I was informed that he’s not there because they already cremated him already.”

  “You went to Cucinelli Brothers.”

  “Yes sir, and I’ll tell you, I was very surprised because I thought you and me, we had an understanding.”

  “Right, but we also agreed that if I hadn’t heard from you by a certain—”

  “And so that, that is, what. He’s in a jar? I’m sorry, but that is unacceptable, I cannot accept that.”

  “Hang on, please, Mr. Afton. Let’s review this together, okay?” I moved the phone to my other ear. “Last time you and I spoke, you were getting together funds to cover the cost of burial. You sounded like you were ready to move. I don’t know what happened in the interim, but I get a call from Mr. Cucinelli and he tells me you never followed up.”

  “I was, I was doing that.”

  “I attempted to reach you, more than once. I tried the number I had for you, I left messages. My hands are tied. I authorized them to proceed with a county indigent—”

  “Excuse me, sir.”

  “I’m sorry if you’re unhappy with that outcome, but—”

  “Excuse me. Sir. Excuse me please.”

  “Go ahead.”

  He said, “I was in the process of assembling the funds.”

  “Okay.”

  “And I got, okay, delayed. Okay? So, but I was handling it.”

  “I get that, but if you tell me it’s all set, and then it turns out there’s going to be a holdup, I need to know that. I’m working in the dark here.”

  “I asked you to wait.”

  “I did wait,” I said. “I waited six months. What happened?”

  “I had a situation and I was unavailable,” he said.

  “Why didn’t you call me?”

  “Well, okay, listen, I was not in a position to do that.”

  “Uh-huh,” I said. “Hang on a second, please.”

  I muted him again and clicked over to the main Sheriff’s Department server.

  On October seventh—days after our last conversation, in which he assured me he was on top of things—Samuel Afton pleaded no contest to a charge of possession of a controlled substance and was booked into Santa Rita Jail to begin a forty-five-day sentence.

  I came back on the line. “Hi, Mr. Afton. I completely understand why you’re upset. Unfortunately, this is what we’re looking at. I’m sorry, but I can’t undo it. We do have his remains, and I’m happy to arrange for you to—”

  “What do I want that for?”

  “Well,” I said, “this way you could bury them when the time is right for you.”

  “Did I ask for your advice? I didn’t ask for it. No, you don’t say nothing.”

  I did not reply.

  “Hello?”

  I shut my eyes. “I’m here.”

  He paused. “You did the wrong thing.”

  “Mr. Afton,” I said, but I was talking to a dead line.

  I set the receiver down. Immediately it rang again.

  I jabbed the speakerphone. “Coroner’s Bureau,” I barked.

  “Eh. May I please speak to Clay Edison?”

  It was Paul Sandek.

  I picked up. “Hi. Sorry. I’m here.”

  “Clay? You sounded like somebody else.”

  “It’s been a long week.”

  “Oh. Well, hopefully I can make it better for you.”

  “You got the files.”

  “Only some of them,” he said. “I’m sorry about the delay. It got a bit weird, actually. I’ll tell you about it when I see you. Dinner tomorrow? Theresa’s making stew.”

  I glanced at Vitti, stalking the floor like a big disgruntled toddler. “I might be on the late side.”

  —

  I DIDN’T MAKE it to the Sandeks’ till a quarter to nine.

  “It’s perfectly fine,” he said, dismissing my apology and leading me into the kitchen. “We saved you some.”

  I sat down and right away felt at ease—like putting on an old bathrobe. So many hours spent in this room: studying at the breakfast nook when my apartment got to be too loud and the library felt too lonely. Talking to Paul or his wife or the both of them about the meaning of life. Two smart adults I respected, hearing me out and taking my fears seriously.

  Now I saw the same cream-colored wall tile
s, every third embossed with a different farm animal. An espresso machine, identical to the one in Sandek’s office, had joined other counter appliances lucky enough to have received tenure.

  Theresa Sandek pecked me on the cheek and took a cling-wrapped bowl from the fridge. “Let me heat it up first.”

  Same maternal instinct. Theresa had a doctorate of her own; she taught at the business school. Around me, though, it was always food and comfort.

  “Don’t bother,” I said. “I’m starving.”

  “It’s better hot.”

  “She’s right,” Sandek said.

  “I’m always right.”

  “She’s always right,” he said, taking the bowl and opening the microwave.

  A voice from the living room said, “Clay?”

  I poked my head out. A young woman was coming down the stairs. She wore square-toed canvas slip-ons and jeans, a bright-blue flannel shirt that offset a swarm of glossy blond curls—bobbed, not pulled back carelessly like I remembered.

  She had changed in a lot of respects.

  “Amy,” I said.

  She gave me a hug. “It’s so good to see you.”

  “You too.”

  “I can’t believe how long it’s been,” she said. “How are you?”

  “Busy,” I said. “In a good way. You?”

  “Same.”

  “Your dad said you’re almost done with your doctorate.”

  “You know what ABD stands for.”

  “ ‘All But Dissertation.’ ”

  “ ‘A Big Disappointment.’ ”

  From the kitchen, Sandek called, “Not true.”

  “You cut your hair,” I said.

  “I did?” she said. “I guess I did. It was a while ago. I wanted ‘professorial.’ Instead I got ‘preemptive lurch toward middle age.’ ”

  “It’s nice,” I said.

  “Thanks.” Curls tossed. Teeth flashed. “I’m sorry I can’t stay and catch up. I’m meeting a friend for a drink. Nobody told me you were coming.”