by David Chill
“I don’t like private investigators,” he snorted, then crumpled the plastic wrap into a ball and threw it at a wastepaper basket. It hit the rim and dropped onto the linoleum floor. He looked back at me.
“Would it help if I told you I used to be on the job?” I asked. “LAPD.”
“Where?”
“Mostly Broadway Division. And North Hollywood. For a while I worked for the guy who wound up becoming chief, Pete Bates.”
“That supposed to impress me?”
“Probably not. I don’t think I impressed Pete much, either.”
He gave a quick, snarky laugh, a feat he managed to achieve without smiling. “So you’re a friend of Roberto’s. Tell me what you know first, hotshot. Then maybe I’ll share something. If I feel like it.”
I ignored the crack. “I’m just trying to learn more about the case.”
“Trying to do our job for us?”
“Nope,” I said. “But I recognize you probably have a long list of cases you have to clear, most of which you’re not going to get to. That’s the reality, I’m not cracking wise. I can help. And I’m happy to share whatever I learn with you.”
“Such a nice guy.”
“I think so, too. But you’ve been up to the Starr house in Mandeville. Which means you know Curtis’s son Brady lives there. And he was there when the gunshots were fired the other night.”
“So what?” he yawned. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
“That Brady was rumored to be having a fling with his stepmom. Did you know that?”
He stopped and gave me a long look. Apparently I had broken through. “No. I didn’t,” he mused. “But, yeah. There was something weird going on, I couldn’t put my finger on it. That may explain it.”
“What’s that?”
He leaned back and seemed to relax. “I went over the surveillance tapes,” he said, looking up at the ceiling. “Starr and his wife were in the Jacuzzi. He was getting romantic and she was having none of it. Pushed him away. Can’t blame her entirely. You ever try to screw in one of those things?”
“Can’t say as I have,” I offered.
“Don’t bother. Waste of time. More effort than it’s worth.”
“Thanks for the tip,” I said, trying to sound grateful, and most likely failing. “How’s that relevant?”
“Maybe speaks to the wife’s state of mind. You know, within the marriage. And why the husband might be ticked off at her. And if Curtis knew his wife was doing the wild thing with his own son? Might have brought out the worst in him.”
I nodded. “The spouse is always the first suspect.”
“Absolutely,” he said. “Especially in cases like these. Random shooting? My sixth sense tells me it’s not.”
“Uh-huh. What else about this case should I know?”
“I don’t know what you know.”
I took a breath and wondered if baseball tickets would work to loosen things up here, but I had a funny feeling they would not.
“I’ve been brought in to figure out if Curtis’s life is in danger. An unexpected piece of this is to do the same for his son, Brady, who I gather is going to be worth a lot more than his dad soon.”
“And now that his wife has been bumped off, you think the dad is still in danger?” he asked.
“Maybe, maybe not. He has a neighbor problem. Gavin Yunis. And also, when I spoke with Brady, he seemed detached. Didn’t seem to care much that shots were fired. I thought that was a little strange. Just an observation.”
Knapp shrugged. “Not sure how that fits into all this. Unless there’s a motive on the kid’s part. But I’m not sure what that could be. Doing his stepmom? He certainly has some issues with his dad then. No kid in his right mind is going to be taking that leap, even if the stepmom is hot and willing.”
“Sure. So is there anything you can tell me about the shots fired the other night?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Then I don’t know either.”
“Okay,” I sighed. “How about telling me which direction they came from.”
Knapp shrugged. “They came from the direction of the neighbor. Yunis. From his side of the fence.”
“You know this for sure?”
“We found a bullet hole in the Starrs’ other fence, the one behind the Jacuzzi. It’s on the other side of their property. Which meant it came from the Yunis side.”
“Did you find the bullet?” I asked, hoping that might detail the type of gun.
“Nope. Went straight on through. Nestled somewhere in the canyon. Needle in a haystack at this point. But we’re not even a hundred-percent certain where the shot actually came from.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“That part of the property is accessible from the street. With the new house going up, Yunis hadn’t fenced that section off yet. Could have been anyone walking around the neighborhood.”
“That make sense to you?”
Knapp shrugged. “Not a lot about this case makes sense.”
“I’ll say. You speak to Yunis?”
“Did we speak to Yunis?” he repeated. “No, we just ate doughnuts and made up the report in the car. Of course we spoke to Yunis. I was up there that night to look into it. Lieutenant wanted me to go right away, a shooting in a high-end neighborhood is a big deal. Got a few celebrities living up there. So yeah, I spoke with Yunis. Guess what he said? He said he didn’t hear anything. And we don’t have proof to the contrary.”
“You think Yunis could be a suspect?”
“Sure,” he said. “I think you could be a suspect, too. But that doesn’t mean anything. No reason to go any further with him.”
I sighed again. “Is there anything more you can tell me about Curtis Starr? Anything at all? I’m kind of at a dead end here.”
Knapp chuckled, and did so again without smiling. It was not a becoming feature. “Sounds like my life.”
“Okay,” I said, beginning to wrap things up and wondering what to do next, besides think about where to eat lunch. Not having brought a turkey sandwich from home gave me options. “Can you think of anything else that might help here?”
“Nope. Unless someone else on that street up in Mandeville knows something. We didn’t have time to interview every neighbor. And believe it or not, some weren’t home when we knocked on a few doors.”
“Well, I thank you for everything you’ve shared,” I said, hoping it would sound sincere and not sarcastic. I’m not sure I managed to achieve either. He said he was always happy to help friends of his Lieutenant. He didn’t bother to try and sound sincere. I walked away with a nod.
Driving away from the West L.A. Division, I considered where to head to next. Going home, fixing a sandwich, and taking a nap seemed reasonable. But I thought I might go back and take a look at the construction site next to Starr’s house. I didn’t have any reason to think I’d find anything, but I really didn’t have anywhere else to go. And sometimes things materialize when you least expect them to.
I went back up through Mandeville Canyon and it was quiet. Lunch hour on Banyan Drive was over, and the construction crew had gone back to building. The food truck was driving off just as I arrived. I got out of my Pathfinder and walked over to one of the crew, a thick guy wearing a hard hat and an orange vest. He was barking out orders, so I assumed he was the one in charge.
“Hi there,” I started.
“Help you?” he asked.
“Wondering if I can ask you a couple of questions,” I said, flashing my fake police ID.
He stared at me and nodded ever so slightly. “Uh-huh. All my guys are okay.”
“Look I’m not with ICE. I just want to ask you about the neighbor,” I said, jerking my head toward the Starr house next door.
“What’s up?” he managed.
“You see anything strange lately next door? With that neighbor, Curtis Starr? I know he’s been having some problems with the guy you’re working for.”
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“Mr. Yunis? Yeah Mr. Yunis, he hates that guy Starr. Neighbor from hell, a real pain in the balls. We’re doing construction. Not like we can keep things quiet. We hammer things, we drill things. It won’t last forever. But he gets his butt in a wringer all the time. I show him our permit. We have a legal right to work here.”
“Yeah, I’m sure. Listen. Anything unusual going on over there?” I asked, motioning to the Starr house again.
“What do you mean unusual?
“There were shots fired the other night. Fired into that house,” I said. “Maybe came from over here.”
He shrugged. “Don’t know anything about it.”
“Any idea who might.”
He shook his head.
“Anything that seemed unusual to you going on there. Anything at all?”
The man scratched his head, looked at his fingernails, and flicked something to the ground. He thought longer than necessary, and it struck me he wasn’t digging into his memory bank, but rather trying to figure out how to get rid of me. I pulled out my fake badge again and tapped it. That seemed to trigger a response.
“Yeah,” he said. “I noticed something last week.”
“What’s that?”
“It was after dark. I had to work really late, pouring cement. We had some delays, and Mr. Yunis said he wanted to finish the patio, he had someone coming over to look at it or something, couldn’t wait until the next morning. I’m used to that sort of thing, guys who own houses like these, they want what they want. Must have been after ten, it was pretty dark. The guy, Starr, he’s the one who owns that bright green BMW. He pulled up and he got out with some girl. They were carrying on, like they were really drunk. You know what I mean? Staggering and stuff. They were hanging all over each other. I know he’s married and I’ve seen his wife. This wasn’t his wife. Kind of similar, but different, you know?”
“Okay,” I said, not really knowing. “What’d she look like?”
“Blonde, good looking. Mr. Yunis told me that’s his type. Starr kept calling her Anna. I don’t know where his wife was that night.”
“Mr. Yunis said that?”
“Yeah, he was here, he saw them, too. He’s normally around a lot. Wants to make sure everything is done to his specification. He’s a perfectionist. That’s part of why this thing is taking so long to do.”
“Okay. Anything distinctive about her? Anything at all?”
“No,” he said. “Wait, yeah. She was wearing a uniform. Like a waitress or something. That’s about all I can tell you. Not much.”
I looked at him. “That may actually be quite a lot,” I mused. “But you say Yunis is around here a lot? I haven’t seen him the last two days. I’d like to talk to him.”
The foreman shrugged. “When I see him, I’ll let him know.”
*
There were three Smoky Mountain Grills in the greater L.A. area, the closest being situated in a Northridge mall in the San Fernando Valley. The Yelp reviews were neither kind nor restrained. The meat was not only without flavor, but there were questions about freshness, and the menu was critiqued for coming adorned with a variety of lackluster sides. What they lacked in taste, they made up for in expanded choices. If that wasn’t sufficient to push a prospective diner to eat elsewhere, the service was considered dreadful and the prices were too high. The one saving grace, as one sarcastic reviewer wrote, was that the portions weren’t all that big.
It took about 25 minutes to drive up into the Valley but it also took quite a bit of searching to find Curtis Starr’s restaurant. Like many places there, it was wedged into in a stylish shopping mall someone branded the Northridge Fashion Center. I drove slowly through what amounted to a small gated community of nationwide retailers. There was an Apple Store and a Macy’s and a clothing outfit called Forever 21. There was a gourmet pretzel shop and a place that made cinnamon rolls, which would undoubtedly spark an interest for Marcus. I noted a Buffalo Wild Wings, in case Gail ever decided to come all the way out here and get a fix for her spicy food addiction. I made a further note when I passed a Victoria’s Secret outlet, a shop that might interest me more than Gail. In short, the mall had just about everything. A sub-par barbecue chain rounded out the offerings, that is, if one took the trouble to actually find it.
I parked and walked inside the restaurant. The interior was stylish, with a series of booths and tables brightly lit from cobalt blue fixtures hanging down from high ceilings. There was a long bar with a colorful array of a hundred different bottles of liquor, all lined up against a mirror. It looked like a perfect chain restaurant, bright, shiny and polished. Posters of a younger Curtis Starr were plastered around the room, Curtis in his football jersey, Curtis grilling a row of steaks, Curtis smiling with an apron on. There was even the faint smell of hickory in the air. The only thing missing were customers. Only one table was filled, a single diner wearing a cowboy hat sat there gnawing on a pork rib, and taking his time to ensure every last morsel of meat was being pulled off the bone.
I approached the hostess, a pretty, slender young woman with smooth auburn hair and a radiant smile. I did not need to inquire as to whether she was an aspiring actress, some things are so obvious as to be blatant, and better left unsaid.
“Hi there,” I began.
“Hello,” she cooed. “Just one today?”
“I’m actually here to see the manager.”
“Well, that would be me,” she replied, with a bit of confidence. “Is there anything wrong?”
“No,” I said, not sure why I was surprised to see she was the one in charge. Given the absence of many customers, there wasn’t a lot here to manage. “I’m looking for a waitress named Anna.”
“Oh,” she answered and looked at her watch. “Anna Shevshenko, yeah. Her shift doesn’t start until five. Can I ask what this is about?”
I looked at my watch too, and briefly thought about waiting the three-plus hours in the Valley with nothing to do. I was sure I had seen a Starbucks in the mall, but even still, that’s a long time to sip coffee. I flashed my fake badge. Her confident smile quickly went away.
“I’m looking into something that happened this morning down in the Palisades. You know Curtis Starr?”
She gave me a puzzled look. “Well, of course. Curtis owns the place. He comes by now and then. Not as much lately,” she said a little wistfully.
“Can you tell me about Curtis and Anna?”
The woman gave a shrug. “Not much to tell. They seemed friendly, maybe a little flirty. But that’s Curtis. He flirts with everyone.”
I considered this. If Curtis flirted with everyone, it might not have been something she’d bother to mention in relation to Anna.
“You’re aware of what happened this morning?” I asked.
“No.”
“Curtis’s wife Lauren was killed. Looks like a robbery gone bad. Down on PCH at Sunset.”
She put a hand over her mouth. “My God. That’s awful.”
I nodded. “Does Anna live around here?”
“She used to, but I don’t know where she’s at now. She told me she had recently moved, I guess she dumped her boyfriend and moved out of his apartment, and just found a new place in Hollywood. She hadn’t told us the address. I think she might have moved last weekend.”
“Her boyfriend still live around here?”
“I guess.”
“Okay,” I sighed, thinking I might as well wait around for a while. “I’ll probably hang out until her shift begins.”
“All right. Would you like to see a menu?”
I briefly thought the pretzel shop might be a better choice, but I also felt myself getting hungry. I had worked straight through lunch, and it was almost 2:00 pm. Decisions, decisions.
“I’m okay,” I managed, wondering if there was a toy store here that had any Pokemon items. “I’ll do a few errands and come back.”
“Sure.”
I suddenly thought of something. “Say, I’m just curious. This is a lon
gshot. Would Curtis’s wife ever come by here? Lauren? Might she have met Anna?”
The woman thought for a moment. “No. Although it’s funny you mention it.”
“How’s that?”
“Lauren’s sister, Jacquie, lives nearby. She comes here sometimes for dinner. Curtis lets his friends and family eat for free. I guess she’s having a rough patch now.”
I nodded and thanked her. Back in my Pathfinder, I pulled out my iPad and did a search on Jacquie Crum. She lived in an apartment in Van Nuys, just off of Victory Boulevard and it took ten minutes to drive there. It was in a small building, mostly stucco but with a redwood façade that made it seem more attractive than it really was. I parked and walked over. There was no security gate, and the directory had names stuck on from a label maker. Most names were in black, but “Crum” was in blue, indicating apartment number 4. I entered the courtyard, found her door, and knocked. There was no doorbell.
Initially there was no answer, although I did hear movement inside the apartment. I knocked again, this time with a good bit more effort. A voice inside told me to hold my horses, then I heard a bang that might have been someone tripping over a chair, with both the chair and the person hitting the floor. A muffled series of curses followed, along with a spate of laughter. Finally the door was flung open and a tired-looking woman in her mid-twenties looked blankly at me.
“Yeah?”
I flashed my fake badge. That normally woke people up, but in this case, all I got was a bored look. I’m not sure she focused on what I was holding. I wasn’t even sure she was sober, although she may simply have just woken up. She did look a little woozy.
“I’m looking for Jacquie Crum.”
“Yeah, well, congratulations,” she said with something of a twang. “You found her. Who the hell are you?”
“My name’s Burnside. I’m doing an investigation. Can I speak with you?”
“Yeah.”
“Can I come in?”
“Got a warrant?”
“It’s not that kind of talk,” I said. “And I think you would prefer it if we had some privacy.”
“Why’s that?” she asked, not inviting me in.
