by Dianne Emley
She saw Nacy Dena in the street with the same homies she’d seen with him at the memorial. Nacy spotted her and gave her a look she didn’t like—a knowing, arrogant sneer, as if to convey that he and his homies could go where they wanted. Nan was tempted to pull over and jack him up to remind him that he and his homies didn’t run this city, but she had bigger concerns at the moment.
Not finding a place to park, she parked across the McCarthy-Balsam driveway, blocking several cars parked there, including Leo’s silver Maserati. For the first time she noticed its personalized plates that said LEO BALS2. Parked beside it was a silver Porsche with plates that said LEO BALS3.
She walked down the sidewalk and turned onto a path of weathered brick lined on both sides with narrow flower beds planted with violet pansies. The path rose up a sloping lawn where teenagers were sitting and lying on the grass. Nan jogged up a set of shallow, wide steps of aged, uneven bricks with footholds worn into them and crossed a wraparound porch. Teenagers were sitting on the railing and on wicker furniture, drinking, smoking e-cigarettes or pot, and making out. Seeing Nan, a teenage boy in a group of kids in a corner made a joking attempt to hide the joint he was about to pass to a girl beside him.
The big front door was open and Nan stepped into an entry that soared like a hotel lobby. An inviting light glowed from brass and alabaster chandeliers and wall sconces, reflecting warmly off the exotic woods used in the built-in cabinets, beams, and open staircases. The effect was undone by the revelers and Nan’s growing anxiety. She didn’t see Leo Balsam, his wife, anyone who looked over twenty-five, or Emily.
Off the foyer, the door into a home theater was open and Nan went inside. There were several rows of black recliner chairs. The sound was blasting on the movie being shown, one of the X-Men franchise, which she and Em loved. Nan walked down a side aisle and scanned the people by the light of the movie, causing some to quickly adjust their hands and clothing while others didn’t care. She didn’t see her daughter. Em had never done anything like this before—just disappear and not let her mom know where she was. Nan and Em had an unspoken pact not to cause the other unnecessary worry. The two of them had already endured too much worrying over real danger. Panic swelled beneath her breastbone.
She left. In the main entry, she looked up the staircase to the second floor but decided to first check the backyard. Exiting through open French doors, she stepped onto a courtyard flanked by the two wings of the house. She crossed the courtyard and stood at the top of a grand brick staircase that descended steeply to the grounds below. A brick path leading from the steps passed in front of a carriage house and a cottage to the right. It intersected with a path that meandered across an expansive lawn, ending at a fence that enclosed a rectangular swimming pool. Around the pool were chaise longues and yellow market umbrellas. The pool lights were on, as were the lights of a pool house in back.
Activity beside the pool drew her attention. Three young men were shoving patio furniture out of the way. They then grappled to take hold of someone who was lying on a chaise longue.
Nan descended the brick steps, reached a landing, and walked to the edge to get a better look. The three guys were bent over and struggling with what looked like dead weight. She glimpsed the slender, pale arms of a girl. When the guys managed to lift her over the chair arms, Nan saw long, dark hair cascading down and a lime-green top the girl was wearing. It was Em. She heard one of the guy’s laughter rise above the party noise. When he raised his head, the light caught a tangle of curly hair beneath a black ball cap. It was Ashton.
Nan bolted over a low wall bordering the steps and stumbled when she hit the sloping lawn, her hand on the ground stopping her fall. She sprinted toward the gate in the pool fence, shoving aside people in her way.
Ashton moved one of his arms from where he was holding Em beneath her armpits and started opening the door to the pool house. Each of the other two guys carried one of Em’s legs. Nan heard one of them saying something about “the detective’s daughter” and laughing.
Ashton looked up to see Nan flying toward them and sputtered, “Mrs. Vining—”
“Put her down! Put her on the grass. Right now.”
“Is that her mom, man?” asked the guy who was holding Em’s right leg. He dropped it, letting Em’s heel in her slip-on shoe hit the walkway hard before Nan managed to slide her arms beneath her daughter’s back and thighs.
“Absolutely, Mrs. Vining.” Ashton again was using both of his arms to support Emily’s upper body. “Where? Here?”
“Emily.” Nan stared into her daughter’s slack face. Emily’s mouth sagged open.
Ashton and the guy who was holding Emily’s left leg helped Nan place her on her back on a small patch of lawn in front of the pool house.
On her knees, Nan lowered her face close to Emily’s to see if she was breathing. She was. “Em, wake up.”
The third guy started backing away.
“You!” Nan snapped at him. “Stay where you are. All of you. Stay right here.” She began patting Emily’s face. The girl’s skin was gray and clammy.
Ashton said, “She had too much to drink, Mrs. Vining. We were just taking her to the pool house so she could sleep it off.”
Still on her knees, Nan looked up at him. “Shut up.” She pulled her cell phone from her pocket, called the Pasadena Police emergency number and requested officers and paramedics.
Chapter 25
Emily’s eyes fluttered open to slits. “Mom?”
Nan breathed a sigh of relief. “Yes, sweetheart. I’m here.”
The girl started coughing and her face grew pinched. Nan quickly rolled her onto her side and grabbed her hair away as she vomited into the grass.
Two of the boys made sounds of disgust.
Nan helped Emily up to lean against her forearm as the girl continued to heave.
Ashton said, “That’s good for her to get it out.”
Nan jerked her head up and glared at the boys, as if daring them to make another sound. She pointed at one of the two she didn’t know. “You. What’s your name?”
“Logan…ma’am.”
“Logan, go in there and get a wet towel.”
He took off for the pool house.
Nan shouted after him, “And a glass of water.”
Still propped on her arm, Em continued to vomit as Nan braced her, holding her hair in one fist. “Go on, sweetheart. Get it all out.”
Ashton made a move toward them with his hands out as if offering assistance.
Nan bared her teeth. “Stay away from her.” She heard sirens approaching.
The third guy again started to slink away.
Nan pointed at him. “Stop. What’s your name?”
“Max.”
“Max, don’t move.”
The goings-on by the pool house had attracted attention. Some of the revelers wandered inside the pool fence but most stayed a safe distance away.
Logan returned with a damp washcloth and a plastic cup of water.
Nan took the cloth. Logan set the cup on the ground nearby and backed away. Nan wiped Emily’s mouth and face with the cloth. “How do you feel?”
“Dizzy. Sick to my stomach.”
“Do you need to throw up some more?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Think you can sit up and have some water?”
Emily nodded and unsteadily pushed herself up with her mom’s help. She supported herself with a hand on the grass, her arm wobbly, and leaned against Nan, who was still on her knees. “Mom, I only had one tiny glass of beer. I swear.”
Nan pulled Emily against her and stroked her forehead. Above her daughter’s head, she glared at Ashton.
“Emily, think you can sit by yourself?” Nan helped her daughter onto her butt with her knees bent and her feet on the grass. “Put your head between your knees.” After the girl was positioned, Nan rose and walked over to Ashton.
The other two guys stepped back at her approach. Ashton didn’t move
but wavered as if wrestling with an impulse to run. “She had more than one little beer, Mrs. Vining. She had one of those red plastic cups and there’s a keg. It’s easy to lose track.”
Nan got into his face, her forehead almost touching the bill of his Raiders cap. “Are you calling my daughter a liar?”
“Well, no…She just lost track, you know?”
“Take that cap off so I can see your face.”
Ashton whipped the cap from his head. “I topped off her glass once. We were just taking her someplace safe to sleep it off.”
The sirens wailed to a stop, followed by the clanging of equipment being put into action and urgent voices.
Nan didn’t turn her focus from Ashton. “Oh yeah? I heard you guys laughing about the detective’s daughter.”
Em weakly raised her head from between her knees and said, “I only had one glass of beer, Mom. I promise.”
Ashton took a step back and began looking around as if for help.
Nan took a step forward, staying close to him, weaving her head to match his evasive movements. “Did you give her a roofie?”
“No. Mrs. Vining, I’d never do anything like that. I like Em. A lot.”
Two uniformed PPD officers came through the pool gate. One was Ray Campos, whom Nan knew well. She was happy to see him here. He was a veteran street cop—tough yet diplomatic. She recognized the young male officer with Campos as a rookie she’d seen only in passing. On their heels were more PPD officers and a group of firefighters, including EMTs, some carrying equipment. The crowd parted to let them pass as they crossed the lawn and entered the pool area.
Nan directed the EMTs, many of whom she knew, to Emily, who was still sitting on the ground. “It’s my daughter, Emily. She’s sixteen. I found her unconscious about ten minutes ago. She woke up and vomited a lot. She just drank a little water. She said she had one glass of beer and I believe her. I think she was slipped a roofie.”
Ashton was standing nearby. “Nobody gave her a roofie.”
Nan swung her index finger at him. “I’m not talking to you right now.” As the EMTs attended to Emily, Nan told Campos, “These three young men were carrying my unconscious daughter into this structure.”
“It’s a pool house,” Ashton said. “To keep her comfortable and safe so she could sleep it off. She had too much beer.”
Nan glared at him but said nothing.
The officers started clearing people who didn’t belong there out of the pool area.
Campos pointed at Ashton and his friends and said in a calm but commanding voice, “You three, put your hands above your heads against that fence and spread your legs.”
The freckle-faced rookie with him, whose nametag said T. PROCTOR, urged the boys along. “Hands up against the fence.”
Ashton gave Campos a disgusted look. “What?”
An angry and surprised murmur rose from the crowd of gawkers around the pool.
“Hands above your head against that fence. Legs spread. Do it.” Campos reached for Ashton to move him along but the young man wrenched away and started walking to the fence. His buddies shuffled beside him and followed Campos’s instructions.
Nan stood near Emily while the EMTs took her vitals. The edges of Nan’s lips turned up with satisfaction as she watched the exchange between Campos and Ashton.
Proctor started patting down Logan.
The other officers herded out the last of the gawkers and closed the gate.
The party revelers didn’t go far, bunching outside the pool fence. A crowd that had come down from the house joined them. The darkness was dotted with the lights of smartphones in the hands of the millennials taking videos of the incident, many of which would likely be soon uploaded to social media sites.
Campos ran his hands over Ashton’s torso and legs. “What’s your name?”
“Ashton McCarthy. I live here.”
Campos pulled out the Raiders cap that Ashton had shoved into his back pocket and dropped it onto the ground. He squeezed the outsides of Ashton’s jeans pockets before reaching inside. “Anything in your pockets that will cut or stick me?”
“That’s an illegal search.”
“I’ve got probable cause—an unconscious girl and a mother who says you drugged her.”
“Probable bullshit. Are you being a hard-ass because you’re friends with her mom?”
There was a commotion on the lawn as Leo Balsam and Becky McCarthy burst through the crowd. Balsam came through the gate just as Campos had told Ashton to turn around and was searching his front jeans pockets. Balsam came up to Campos. “Stop what you’re doing.”
“Who are you?”
“Leo Balsam. Ashton’s stepfather. This is my house. I’m an attorney and I demand that you immediately step away from these boys. This is Ashton’s mother and my wife, Becky.”
Becky gaped as she took in the scene. She went up to Ashton. “Honey, what happened?”
Ashton mumbled, “They’re making a big deal…”
Campos told Balsam, “Sir, we have probable cause to believe that these young men spiked that young woman’s drink. Her mother found her unconscious and saw your stepson and his friends carrying her into this structure.”
Balsam said, “That’s a pool house.”
“Leo, she just had too much to drink and passed out on a pool chair.” Ashton’s voice rose as he pleaded his case. “We were taking her someplace to sleep it off when her mom showed up and started going apeshit on us.”
Nan stomped over to him, her arms rigid at her sides. “You think that’s apeshit, my friend, you have no idea what apeshit is.”
Balsam walked toward her. “Is that a threat, Detective?”
“Mr. Balsam, you’re acknowledging that there’s underage drinking going on at your house,” Campos said, interrupting the confrontation.
“I’m not acknowledging anything,” Balsam said. “She could have been drinking someplace else. The people here are my twenty-one-year-old son Connor’s friends from college. There’s no underage drinking going on here.”
Campos asked, “Where were you when this party was going on at your home?”
“We were having dinner with friends at the Parkway Grill. It’s just a few blocks from here,” Balsam added condescendingly, since the local cop would likely be familiar with the long-standing Pasadena restaurant. “Like I said, my twenty-one-year-old son Connor invited his fraternity brothers over. He texted me about some trouble here and we came home.”
“Where’s your son Connor?” Campos had taken out his field notebook and was taking notes.
“He’s around.” Balsam shrugged.
“Somebody put the party on Twitter and all these people showed up.” Becky angrily flung out one of her thin arms to indicate the crowd outside the fence. “You know how these things happen these days. You can’t blame these boys.”
“I know what I saw and these boys know what they did,” Nan said.
“Ashton did not give your daughter drugs,” Becky said. “That’s ridiculous.”
“A urine test can quickly determine whether Emily was given a roofie.” Nan’s tone was matter-of-fact but still tinged with hostility. “Then we’ll see where we take things from there.”
Becky planted a hand on her hip and said to Nan, “What do you mean by that?”
Balsam raised his hand and warned his wife, “Becs…”
Nan looked at her steadily. “Just keep your son away from my daughter.”
Emily was now strapped onto a gurney with a blanket covering her. One of the EMTs came over. “Nan, do you want to ride in the van with her or do you want to meet us there?”
Campos told her, “I’ll get someone to drive your car over to Huntington. Go with your daughter, Nan.”
“Thanks, Ray.” She found her car key in her pocket and handed it to him.
Campos was stern as he spoke to Leo and Becky. “We’ll further investigate the drug issue depending on the results of Emily’s toxicology tests. We’re going t
o take Ashton, Logan, and Max to the station for questioning. For now, Mr. Balsam, I’m citing you for permitting underage drinking on your property and for disturbing the peace. I want to speak with Connor, your adult son. He needs to share in the love here too.”
Ashton said to Nan, “You want me to stay away from Em?” He curled his upper lip and arrogantly tilted his head back, no longer looking like an earnest young man alleging that he was only trying to do the right thing but like a practiced liar covering his tracks. “I’m not the one who’s bad for Em. Em’s told me about you. You’ll never win Mother of the Year.”
“Don’t talk about my daughter.” Nan shot forward, clearing the several feet that separated her from Ashton. She was about to jab her finger against Ashton’s chest when Campos grabbed her arm.
“Hey!” Leo stepped forward. “You’re out of line, Detective.”
Campos steered Nan away from Ashton.
Em weakly called out to them from the gurney. “Mom…Ashton, stop.”
Nan, now a safe distance away, again pointed at Ashton. “I’m not going to say it again. Don’t talk to Emily or go near her.”
“Or what?”
Balsam warned, “Ashton…”
“Don’t test me.” Nan gave him a long look before turning. She rushed to catch up as the EMTs took Emily away.
Chapter 26
While Emily slept in a curtained examination room in the Huntington Hospital ER, Nan stepped out and called Jim Kissick in Washington, D.C., waking him up not too much before he normally rose for his early-morning workout.
She briefed him on what had happened. “Emily’s still sleeping. They have her on IV fluids. We’re waiting for the preliminary toxicology report to come back. If it doesn’t show anything serious, we’ll go home.” She was finally able to let her armor down. She was too exhausted to cry. “I almost lost it with Ashton. Thank goodness Ray Campos was there.”
