Lalla Bains 02 - A Dead Red Heart

by Dahlke, RP

  "But surely the VA looked at his heart problem?"

  "They said it was a pre-existing condition, but that was just an excuse so they wouldn't have to pay for his treatment. And then they said he had mental problems, another pre-existing condition."

  "But, how could this have been leaked to the press? I thought donor and recipient information was sealed to the general public."

  She threw out a hand at the pile of hate mail on the couch. "Well, missy, I guess someone talked, didn't they?"

  I stood up, put the bag on the floor and took a step towards the door. "Well, thank you for your time, Mrs. Dobson."

  "Not so fast," she said, leaping to grab my arm in her bony hand. "Since you've already talked to my sister, where the hell is she?"

  "Well, uh, I was hoping you knew where she was. As for the leak, I suppose you could sue the Star to find out."

  She gave me a sour look. "My lawyer already tried that. But not if I get my hands on him first."

  Now she'd lost me. "You mean the lawyer?"

  "Not the lawyer, dummy. I'm talking about Del. He's always resented my Billy Wayne, that he was tall and so smart looking in his uniform. Del Potts couldn't even pass the physical for the Marines; too short, too fat," she said, touching the bright metal cap on her head.

  Then I remembered our conversation in Del's car, that Billy Wayne had befriended him when they were kids. "Del said you were neighbors?"

  "Del wasn't the only talented one, you know. Billy Wayne was famous, too. I'll show you." She picked up a magazine, ragged at the edges from use, and opened it to a marked page. "His poetry was published in the Midwest Weekly when he was in high school. Stockton always had better schools than Modesto, you know. And he could've had a scholarship to college if he'd wanted. Instead he chose the military."

  The magazine was old enough to have been printed when Billy Wayne was in high school.

  I said, "I've read some of his poetry Mrs. Dobson."

  She sniffed. "Yes, of course you have. He thought he was in love with you. Misplaced affection, if you ask me."

  "Misplaced, yes, but in love with me? Sorry, no." Then I remembered his final words to me and wondered if the answer could be found in his writing. "Mrs. Dobson, could you show me his other poems?"

  "Why? So you can make fun of those too?"

  "I would never make fun of Billy Wayne, and I only want to see his poems so that I can understand him better." That and see if there was some clue that might help me find his killer.

  Her eyes brimmed with tears. "I burned them all. This morning. I did it so nobody can hurt my boy or make fun of him ever again."

  "Please, Mrs. Dobson, I'm only trying to see if his last words to me were a clue to his killer. He said, 'The more there is, the less you see.' Does that mean anything to you?"

  "It probably meant he was disappointed that you didn't see him as anything but a crazy homeless boy. He wasn't homeless, you know. I kept his room for him here, just as he left it before he went into the Marines. He just couldn't sleep, poor darling, all those horrible memories so he walked and walked—sometimes all night."

  I thought of the inside of Merriweather Cook's neat little house and the photos—two sons, two mothers. He's not the only talented one.

  "Mrs. Dobson, are Del and Billy Wayne related?"

  "I told Merri it was a good thing we had a nice family name like Cook—who in their right mind would want a name like Potts?"

  "Potts? Del Potts is—he's Billy Wayne's cousin?"

  "You are having a hard time keeping up, aren't you?"

  They were more than just neighbors, they were cousins. So that's why Del was so interested in this case.

  Mrs. Dobson was becoming agitated again. "Everybody says he's totally lost his mind."

  "Del? I don't think there's any reason to be afraid of Del, Mrs. Dobson."

  "Oh! Do you think so?" she cried. "He's really off his rocker, you know. If she's sober and she called you, then she wants help. She'll talk to me, I know she will, if she can just get away from that nut case son of hers. Get her away from Del, Miss Bains, before he does something terrible to her."

  Easing out of the tight grip she had on my wrist, I said, "I'll do everything I can. If you hear from her, please call this number, Sheriff Caleb Stone. He was a fellow Marine, you can trust him."

  I slid out the door and hurried to my car. Billy Wayne might have had his troubles, but his mother was definitely off her rocker.

  Caleb closed the door, lifted his boots onto the corner of his desk and deftly twirled a pencil between his fingers. "I got a call today from the managing editor of The Modesto Bee."

  "Oh?" I asked pretending to admire his pencil twirling. "What about?"

  "Wanted to know if we had put up a Missing Person's yet on Miss Cook."

  "Did you know that Del Potts is her son and Billy Wayne's cousin?"

  "If you'd stayed in Modesto instead of traipsing off to New York City, you would've known that, too."

  I ignored the sarcasm. "So, have you got an APB out on her yet?"

  "Rule of thumb is forty-eight hours, but we're looking for her and Del Potts, though his editor is sure that Potts will surface in a few days. He does that a lot, or so his editor says"

  "I think Billy Wayne confided in his Aunt Merri, told her something that Del figured would get her killed, so he's got her in some bolt hole where she can't be found. Whatever she knows, it can incriminate the killer, which Del insists is a cop."

  "Damn that Potts! When we do find him I'll add kidnapping to obstruction of justice."

  "No, don't! Don't you see? Del might be right. Billy Wayne's killer just may be a cop. It would be about as effective bringing in Brad Lane, and he's... uh…,"

  His fingers went still, the pencil clattering to the desk. "Brad Lane? That pilot you fired last year? He was abusing prescription meds, wasn't he? What does he have to do with this?"

  "Uh, well…." The juggling act I'd set up to keep all my covert antics in the air and out of sight fell to the floor with a thud. "Well, uh... uh, I guess…."

  "Spit it out, will you?"

  "For the last year Brad's been taking his meals at the Salvation Army and living on the street. He contacted Del saying he had information on the killing. At first it felt like a set up for blackmail, but he was clearly frightened. He said the cops are beating up on the bums and vagrants, and he was sure they were trying to protect one of their own. He wanted me to come back the next night with some get-out-of-town money and then he'd give me a name."

  I didn't add that Brad had been only too happy to finger Caleb as the killer, or that we'd chased him until he was run down by a semi. I also left out the part where Byron almost got to join Del and me in unholy handcuffs.

  "When did you last see him?"

  "Uh, last night? But Brad insisted the killer is a cop."

  "A cop? Brad has had several arrests since you fired him. We can't discount that he'd be out for revenge for the arresting officer."

  "I think whatever revenge he was counting on was going to come from me. He said I was to hand over a hundred grand in exchange for the name."

  Caleb crossed his arms and leaned back. "It was a shake down, Lalla. You've got to know he would be after you for firing him."

  "It could be Rodney."

  He shook his head. "Forget about Rodney for a minute. And you aren't going to pay off Brad. I'll get it out of him."

  "Sorry, but that's not going to happen." Then I told him how Del and I chased Brad into a street where a semi hit him.

  Caleb grabbed my hand. "Jeez, Lalla. For once I'm glad you didn't wait around for the cops. Did anyone see you?"

  "I don't think so." I didn't mention the spilled coffee incident in the alley with Officer Byron, or how Del's skirmish with him helped us both escape. I was also hoping that Pippa had called it right about Byron; that he wasn't the brightest light bulb in the department, and wouldn't think to connect the dots between a homeless man hit by a truck and w
here he'd found Del and me.

  "Well, then," Caleb said, "Let's take a ride over to the morgue and ID the body of a homeless man they picked up last night."

  My just desserts for not telling him sooner.

  On the way over to the morgue, I compulsively spilled, word for word, my interview with Mrs. Dobson, and finally her frantic plea that I should be the one to find her sister. "Those hate letters were post marked after Billy Wayne was murdered. What about the ones that were picked up by homicide, could there be any leads in them?"

  "Nope, but the coroner's autopsy report confirmed his heart transplant." His grin was sardonic. "It goes both ways you know? You tell me what you know, and I give you what I know, okay? The fed in our office is still sifting through the letters to his mother, but I can tell you what I did find; Mrs. Dobson had the American Civil Liberties Union and their pro-bono lawyers threaten to tie the state of California up in court if they denied him the appropriate medical care. As the suit said, he would die without it, and if that happened, his heirs would eventually collect, however long it took. It was several hundred thousand for a new heart or forty million for a wrongful death suit."

  "After going through all of that to save her son, the poor guy is murdered."

  "The woman's a head case. How'd you get her to talk to you?"

  "I speak crazy people."

  "You didn't flash that fake police badge at her, did you?"

  "I most certainly did not." The badge was a bone of contention between us from the last time I used it to get information from a witness, but that information became the key to finding the real killer—so sue me. "She thinks Billy Wayne wouldn't give me the time of day if he'd been right in the head."

  "Yep."

  "Are you talking about his taste in women, or my bad luck with men?"

  He gave me a lopsided grin. "So, what does she expect you to do about her sister?"

  "Who me?"

  His narrowed stare pieced the air between us. "Yeah, you. You got that racehorse just out-of-the-gate look."

  "If you will remember, I'm the one who found Billy Wayne, and there are people who expect me to find his killer," I said thinking of Billy Wayne's aunt and mother. "Not that I intend to do anything that helps Detective Rodney."

  "You got something in mind? Never mind. If I don't know, I can't get in trouble."

  At my surprised look, he said, "You love this stuff, don't you?"

  Flustered, I sputtered, "Caleb Stone, that's not fair! What am I supposed to do? He died at my feet, and my reputation stays in purgatory until the guilty party is in jail."

  "Deny it all you want, but I know you. You got the bit in your mouth, and the chase is on for you, isn't it?"

  I could feel a flush rising up my cheeks. He was right, of course. His words had touched something deep within me and it sounded very much like a starting gun and racehorses pounding on the track. I never felt more alive than when I was this close to touching danger.

  "Look," he said, "you've gotten more in one day than we have all week. It's not a blank check, so don't go overboard and do anything rash. No flashing your fake badge at people?

  "But, Caleb—" I could do without the badge, but it felt good to banter with him again.

  "No buts on this. You refuse to return any of Rodney's calls, so I'll expect you to report to me, preferably at my house every day after work. You can do that, can't you?"

  "Sure, but—"

  He rolled into the county coroner's parking lot, reached over, and holding my head between his hands, looked into my eyes and said, "I want Billy Wayne's killer, maybe more than anybody. I also want you safe, but I know you don't take well to me giving you directions, so we will do this my way."

  Then he leaned in and kissed me. There was a second there where I considered arguing for a nooner instead of identifying a dead body, but there was no dodging this duty. I regretfully whispered into his lips, "You win."

  In that one minute, I loved Caleb Stone more than I could have thought possible and I would do everything I could to ensure that he hadn't misplaced his trust in me.

  But, first I had to ID a dead guy who used to work for me.

  Chapter fifteen:

  After the coroner's office and a quick and reluctant ID of Brad Lane's body, I left Caleb back at his office and left for the newspaper offices, where I hoped to get a lead on where I might find Del Potts.

  Leaving the windows down for whatever breath of air might circulate through the open windows, walked away. Leave a classic car like mine unlocked, windows down? Why not leave the keys in the ignition, too? Because there isn't a soul in this town who didn't know that to steal it would get their ass kicked.

  Inside, I scurried past a harried receptionist cycling incoming calls into a holding pattern and bounded up the stairwell.

  A whiff of Chanel preceded the sound of high heels clattering down the stairs.

  I kept my head down hoping someone was in too much of a hurry to ask if I'd signed in with reception.

  I wasn't going to be so lucky.

  I hadn't seen Janice Bidwell since high school, but she was still daintily curvy in a floral summer dress belted to show off a tiny waist. About to place her sandaled toe down another step, she paused.

  "Lalla? Yes it is. Hey you, don't you stop to say hi to old friends anymore?"

  Caught, I pretended surprise. "Janice? Janice Bidwell. Don't you look wonderful."

  She swept silky dark bangs off her forehead and gave me a dazzling white smile. "Oh, lord, I haven't gone by that old name in years."

  "So, you work here, now?"

  "Silly, of course I do, I did the story on the Patience McBride murder last year, but maybe you didn't know because I use a penname, Margarithe Delacourte? Janice Bidwell, sounds so bourgeois, don't you think? But hey, I'm still Jan to my friends, and we are still friends, aren't we?"

  "That was you? Then I should have called, thanked you for the conscientious job you did, making me look like a heroine when all I did was hang on until the fire department arrived."

  She waved away the compliment and tilted her head. "Well, girlfriend, those dark circles under your eyes say you're not getting your share of beauty sleep. It must've been awful finding that dead homeless man in the alley. Of course it doesn't help that Del Potts keeps your name on the front page. So, can I help you with anything?"

  "Del, if I can find him."

  Her pretty face squeezed into a sour expression. "Oh, honey, if you're here to wring his neck, you'll have to get in line. Better yet, take it to our managing editor."

  "The neck wringing is optional. Is he here?"

  The tinkling laughter sounded forced. "After that libelous story he did about you?" She held a pinch of air between her perfectly manicured nails. "He's this close to getting fired for it, too."

  "Really?" I was still feeling magnanimous towards the little twerp, so neck wringing was off today's list. But, then again, the day was still young.

  "I don't even know why he's still on the payroll. Whatever he's doing now to keep his job, I can tell you he's dirt under this girl's sandals. Listen, you don't want Del. You want someone who's on your side, someone who'll do a fair and honest story. Why not let me help?"

  At my hesitation, she tried again. "You said it yourself, it was my story that made you look like a heroine. Del isn't going to give you any of the breaks I can."

  "Let me think about it. Do you have a card?"

  She shook her head, sadly amused at the perverse set of my mind, and handed me a card.

  "Lalla Bains, you got kick-me on your backside, or what? He'll abuse your trust then leave you bleeding all over the carpet like the rest of us who got in his way. Oh, and tea bags under the eyes should help, but s'il vous plait I have the name of a really good plastic surgeon."

  I felt my face redden. "Uh, well, thanks but I'm not sure I'm ready for that yet."

  "Chérie, even in this light I can see the worry lines and crows-feet are winning, né'ce pas? At least
let me give you my dermatologist's number. A little Botox here and there and you'll look good as new."

  "Well, uh, maybe later."

  She shrugged. "Suit yourself, but you shouldn't take the big four-oh without a fight, girlfriend. Hell, thirty-five is hard enough without a little help. Mentioning of which, believe me when I tell you Del is not going to do you any favors. Besides, us girls have to stick together, don't we? Look, I have to run, but just remember what I said about Del—and call me. Use the cell. I'm never home anyway." She turned away, leaving a trail of Chanel, and I watched the flowers on her sundress sway with the motion of her curvy hips as she clipped down the stairs.

  I wondered what heinous crime Del had committed for Janice to hate him so much and why she thought she could convince me she was thirty-five, since we both graduated the same year. Must be the Botox talking.

  "Potts?" replied a harried young man in shorts and Hawaiian shirt. "The great man hasn't shown up yet today. You can ask the chief, if you can get a word in between phone calls." He thumbed over his shoulder to indicate the office with a closed door.

  I knocked once and a deep baritone said, "Come."

  I introduced myself, offering him my hand.

  He winced, but accepted my hand in his big paw. "Let me guess, you're here to complain about Del Potts."

  "No, no. Just talk."

  Signaling that I should take a seat, he sighed deeply and collapsed back into his desk chair. "Sorry, Del can be a bit of a trial."

  "He's that alright, but you don't have to fire him on my account."

  "Fire Del?" His eyes widened. "Why ever would I do that? Sure, he's a bit odd, and he has to be reined in now and then, but have you seen his work?" He waved an arm at the wall to his left. Graphic, daunting, frightening, and awesome were the only words to describe Del's photography. "He's up for a Pulitzer for this one," he said pointing to a particularly gruesome image. "Spectacular, isn't it?

  "But if he's a problem for you, I'll talk to him, tighten his leash so to speak." He smiled weakly.