by David Chill
I sighed. “I’m assuming you heard what happened. This morning on PCH down in the Palisades.”
“Nope. Just got up.”
“Okay,” I said slowly, and paused to prepare her for some devastating news. “Your sister is Lauren Crum, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I’m sorry to tell you this. But she was involved in what appears to have been a robbery early this morning. She was killed inside of her car. Someone shot her to death. I’m surprised no one has contacted you today.”
She gave me a puzzled look, and it was not the type of look someone would give when learning their twin sister has just been murdered. It was more of a blank expression, one that made me consider if I was communicating properly. After a long moment, she turned around and looked back into her living room.
“Hey, Laurie. I got a surprise for you. This guy here says you’re dead. Said someone killed you last night.”
“Really?” came a voice from inside.
“Yeah. How about that. You get a chance to go to your own funeral.”
Chapter 7
Considering she had a utilitarian apartment in a working class section of the Valley, Jacquie Crum’s furnishings were surprisingly nice. The sofa was white leather, and it looked soft and stuffed. It also looked remarkably clean, and fairly new. There were no telltale traces of wear, nor were there any spots of spilled coffee or wine. A pair of white leather recliners sat opposite the sofa, and they also looked new and fresh. An oval coffee table made out of glass and distressed metal took center stage in the middle of the room, and two mugs of steaming coffee sat there unattended.
I sat down in one of the recliners. Jacquie and Lauren sat on the sofa across from me, both wearing sweats that might well have served as pajamas, looking as if they had just woken up. Neither offered me any coffee.
“Okay. Who shot me?” asked Lauren, employing the same sardonic wit as her sister. Lauren was clearly the prettier one, even sans makeup, and not having run a brush through her hair yet. She had the type of model-like features you see among women featured in fashion magazines, the smooth skinned face, the pronounced cheekbones, the clear blue eyes. She also seemed to have a dazzling smile, although I only caught a flash of that, in what was most likely a moment of utter disbelief. It did seem though, that the bizarre reality of being connected with a murder was sinking in.
“There are no suspects yet, not to my knowledge,” I said. “Do you mind if I ask you a few questions? I’m sure you’ve figured out this is a highly unusual situation.”
“Why on earth would we think that?” asked Jacquie, the sarcasm oozing out of her.
I nodded and took a breath. To see the two of them sitting side by side, twins that shared the same DNA but who had surely been leading quite different lives. Their physiques were very similar: curvy around the hips, flat stomach, ample chest. But Jacquie’s face indeed looked affected, as Harold Stevens had mentioned, the end product of having gone through a windshield face first, and receiving an inexpert level of reconstructive surgery. Her skin was pockmarked, her nose was uneven, and her teeth were not straight. Even the eyes, blue as her sister’s, were saddled with the sagging hint of disappointment. She was not unattractive, but her looks did not shout beauty queen.
“Okay, Lauren,” I said, “Tell me about what you did yesterday. Did you just come straight up here?”
“Not at first,” she answered. “Curtis, look, I found out about him and his latest skank. I’ve gotten sick of his sneaking around on me. Stepping out. I’m not the first woman to be cheated on. But at some point, I just needed to get out of there. I felt like I couldn’t breathe.”
“Where did you go at first?” I asked.
“I went and got a drink. Local place in Brentwood. I had a glass of wine and then thought, well, if I’m going to get wasted, I better not be behind the wheel. I drove back home, called an Uber and headed up here. Jacquie’s always up for a drink or two. Or ten.”
“Right. What next?”
Lauren shrugged. “We took another Uber to this bowling alley in Reseda. They have karaoke there. I just felt like letting loose. Some guy actually recognized me. Said he had seen me on tour opening for Garth Brooks a few months ago. At that point, he started buying us drinks and insisting I do a set. It was kind of fun. Took my mind off of things.”
“Okay. When did you leave?”
Jacquie broke in and gave a laugh that turned into a cough. “We closed the bowling alley at about one-thirty. But we chatted up this cute bartender, and he knew an after-hours place. A few more drinks, we probably rolled in around five.”
“Pretty late,” I said.
“Well, it was still dark out,” Jacquie added. “But yeah. We kind of slept the day away. What happened with the woman who got killed? Why would they think it was Laurie?”
“The woman was in that green BMW. No ID in the car. And she was shot in the face multiple times, lots of blood, which meant recognition was a problem. She was blonde, and the cops put two and two together and came up with six. It happens sometimes.”
“You said it was a robbery?” Lauren asked.
“That’s what the police are thinking right now.”
“Shit,” Lauren said, her eyes widening and reality really setting in. “I mean, that could have been me.”
She looked down at the floor, her feet square on the carpet, her elbows resting on her thighs. She put her face in her hands and shook her head slightly. The blonde hair fluttered softly. Jacquie reached over and picked up one of the mugs of coffee and took a sip.
“You think someone’s after you?” I asked.
“With Curtis, well, I don’t know,” she said, not bothering to lift her face up from her hands. “We’ve been having a lot of problems.”
“That usually doesn’t add up to murder,” I said.
“Wouldn’t ordinarily think,” she answered. “But someone fired a shot at us the other night. In our own backyard.”
“You were with Curtis, though. He couldn’t have been doing the shooting.”
“Yeah,” she said, finally looking back up at me. “How did you know about that?”
“All part of the investigation. I’m trying to piece a bunch of things together here,” I said with a shrug. I gave a long pause and watched her. “Tell me about Brady.”
Lauren frowned. “What’s to tell? He was inside doing something. Or so he said. Playing video games, that’s his thing when he’s not working out.”
“What’s your relationship like with him?”
Lauren gave me a strange look. “Why are you asking me about Brady?”
“Just routine,” I said, wanting to hold off on asking the inevitable, and needing to observe her response carefully. Thus far, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
“He’s my stepson, which is weird, since I’m only a few years older than him. But this is L.A., so it’s maybe not all that weird. I met a girl recently who had an uncle that was younger than she was.”
“Uh-huh,” I said, and then decided it was time to unleash the scuttlebutt I had learned from Derek Altman. “There are some rumors going around about the two of you.”
“What?! What rumors?”
I shrugged again. “That you two were … involved.”
“Me and Brady?” she shot back with a rising note of indignation, which could have been outrage but it also could have been bluster. “Involved with that little shit? Oh for fuck’s sake. That’s ridiculous. Where are you getting this nonsense from?”
I felt like shrugging should be part of my regular routine. Or maybe keeping a sign handy that read “I don’t know.” I looked over at Jacquie, who was smiling and seemingly enjoying the entire spectacle enormously.
“Hey, Laurie. You already have a rich husband. Are you gonna go two-for-two? Brady’s going to be richer than his daddy soon. Think of it. Double alimony.”
Lauren Starr glared at her sister and didn’t seem to find this topic as amusing as she did. Her hands began to
ball into fists, and her mouth tightened. Having a wise-cracking girl for a sister might seem fun to an outsider, but it didn’t seem like fun to Lauren right now. I looked over at Jacquie.
“You think your sister had a thing with Brady?”
The intrigue on her face didn’t tell me much. The shrug didn’t either. “Who knows?” she said in an amused way.
“Any thoughts on why someone might want your sister dead?” I asked.
Jacquie’s smirk slowly disappeared, as a darker reality began to settle in. She took a nervous glance at Lauren. “I can’t imagine.”
I took a deep breath and looked back and forth at the two of them. Nothing insightful registered. I got the feeling something odd was going on beneath the surface, but didn’t think I was going to uncover it today. I felt my stomach rumbling, and realized I hadn’t eaten anything since my Starbucks scone at breakfast. I decided to try one more angle.
“Let me rephrase this,” I said, turning back to Lauren. “Do you have a reason to believe anyone would want your husband dead?”
Lauren looked at me and sat back on the sofa. Her eyes searched the wall behind me. I turned around. All I saw was a large mirror.
“No,” she finally said. “Where are you coming up with this stuff?”
“I’m just trying to look at all angles.”
“And you think maybe they thought Curtis was driving the BMW? And they were really after him?”
“What do you think?” I responded, answering a question with a question.
Lauren shrugged. I turned to Jacquie, and she shrugged as well. The three of us reminded me of that old Hollywood line, that no one knows anything. Maybe that was true here. But there was clearly something else lurking unsaid.
I stood up and handed them my card. “Call me if you think of anything. Anything at all.”
Jacquie fingered the card. “Hey, you’re not a cop.”
“Not any more.”
“What the hell were we doing talking to you then?” she demanded.
“Damned if I know,” I said, and walked out of the apartment.
I got back in my Pathfinder and retraced my steps to the Smokey Mountain Grill in Northridge, and got there a little before three. I ordered a barbecue chicken sandwich with extra barbecue sauce and fries, and about 20 minutes later, I got a fried chicken sandwich overloaded with a creamy white sauce. A bowl of cole slaw came on the side. At this point, I was famished, and didn’t bother to send the order back. The sandwich wasn’t bad but it wasn’t good either. I didn’t eat it so much as I inhaled it. One bite of cole slaw was all I needed to not try a second bite. I washed it all down with two cokes, and sat back and waited.
Anna’s shift started at five o’clock, meaning she would have arrived at four-thirty. I waited an extra hour, but I knew it would be in vain. The hostess came over and apologized for Anna’s tardiness and said this wasn’t like her to not show up for work, or to not call. I didn’t know whether to agree or not. Getting up, I tossed some bills on the table, and included a generous tip. There was only one other table filled by five-thirty, and it didn’t look as if many others would be filled tonight. I drove back to the Westside, and I called Detective Marc Knapp. My call went straight to voicemail. I left a message that the woman in the green BMW was not Lauren Starr, but it might have been an employee of her husband. I told him Lauren Starr was alive and somewhat well. Detective Knapp did not return my call.
*
I got home in time to shower and put on a nice suit, one of just two that I owned. I made a mental note to buy a one or two more. The suit was navy blue, my shirt was a pale blue, and the tie I grabbed with complete randomness had red and blue stripes. I looked good, but in a nondescript sort of way, the type of posture I thought a political spouse should have. Not that I had any real idea what posture a political husband had, what they really did, or what they wore. My main goal was to look presentable, try and remain in the shadows, and simply not get in the way. I reasoned that the best publicity a political spouse should get is no publicity at all.
It took a good 40 minutes to drive to the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, and after circling the block a few times, trying in vain to snag an open parking space, I caved and waited another 10 minutes for the valet to take my car. At least he smiled and welcomed me to the hotel, not once sniffing at my Pathfinder, which I had neglected to wash in weeks, and I’d just noticed a thin layer of grime forming along the exterior.
The Beverly Wilshire is a grand hotel, built almost a century ago, and situated on an ideal parcel of land at the corner of Rodeo Drive and Wilshire Boulevard. It was in Beverly Hills, a city separate and distinct from Los Angeles, even though it was completely bordered by Los Angeles. A hundred years ago, this real estate was actually home to a speedway. It was difficult to imagine auto racing in the 1920s, mostly because cars were not able to generate the high speeds we’re used to today. At some point, an enterprising soul figured out that a speedway was not the best thing to have in the heart of Beverly Hills, with pretty much anything else you could dream of being a superior business opportunity.
After walking through the majestic lobby toward the ballroom, I followed the signs directing people to the L.A. Blue Fundraiser, one of which had photos of Gail, Arthur Woo and City Councilman Neil Handler. I then needed to go through a metal detector, then do it again, the second time without my keys, phone, wallet, pens or any spare change. I fortunately had left my .357 in the car, tucked well under the front seat where a valet, even a sneaky one, was unlikely to look. The security guard who was working the metal detector line acted professionally, but I noticed a pair of men nearby in cheap, dark suits, who I assumed were off-duty LAPD officers, moonlighting for extra income. You never know when you’ll run into cops.
This was my first time inside the hotel’s ballroom, and it was, to say the least, spectacular. An enormous chandelier, constructed with what had to be thousands of shards of polished glass beamed from the ceiling. Two dozen banquet tables, draped with soft beige linens, lined the perimeter, and a stage was set up. A few people hovered on the stage, adjusting the microphone at the podium. A camera crew was setting up equipment to record the speeches. Clusters of people in suits and slinky dresses mingled. The atmosphere looked festive. Everyone seemed to be having a good time, or at least they were well lubricated. I briefly thought it was odd to host a fundraising event for L.A. politicians in the city of Beverly Hills, but I guess you go where the money is.
I hunted around for Gail, finally seeing her in deep conversation with a dapper-looking elderly couple. The man was doing most of the talking, his hand holding an unlit cigar and making frequent gestures to emphasize a point. Gail looked lovely as ever, stood there smiling patiently and nodding. I wasn’t ready to smile nor was I feeling especially patient, so I walked over to the bar. The bartender looked up.
“What can I get for you?” he asked.
“That depends. What type of beer do you have?”
“Oh, we’ve got a few choices,” he answered and pointed to four room-temperature bottles on the bar, which served as a display. There was Budweiser, Bud Light, Michelob and Stella Armois.
“Those are the choices?” I asked.
“Yes, sir. Pretty good, huh?”
“Absolutely,” I nodded. “I’ll have a Coke.”
He stifled a smirk, turned, scooped ice to fill a plastic cup, twisted open a bottle, and poured. Handing it to me, he asked if I wanted a wedge of lime. I declined.
Walking away, I took a sip and noticed a familiar face nearby. He was surrounded by a group of smartly-dressed people, but rather than listening, he barked directions in a crisp, focused manner. When he was done, Arthur Woo started to walk toward the stage before he noticed me and changed direction.
“Mr. Burnside. So good of you to come,” he said, shaking my hand, putting his arm on my shoulder, and gently leading me away from the main part of the room. His hand never left me, the sign of a seasoned politician, one who knew he would be appro
ached by many people during the evening, and the only way to fend them off for a few minutes was to appear involved in conversation with someone else.
“My pleasure,” I said. “Wouldn’t have missed this.”
“I understand you’ve secured a large donation today.”
“Word travels fast.”
“Indeed it does. L.A. is still a small community. At least in some circles.”
“Our big donor has been very generous,” I said, not wanting to give up Crystal Fairborn’s name, but fairly certain Arthur Woo knew who it was anyway.
“I believe they will need to be more generous as this race comes down to the finish line,” he said, as we stopped in a darkened corner. “I’ve seen today’s tracking poll and it is a concern. Paul Bleeker is inching up on Gail. I’m seeing some erosion in my support, too, but it’s not as severe as with Gail. My opponent doesn’t have the same unlimited resources.”
“And Bleeker’s supporters are not likely to be your supporters.”
“Not in the slightest.”
“Which means the more of them who get energized to vote, the more likely they’ll vote for your opponent.”
He gave me a long look. “You do know something about politics, Mr. Burnside. I see that USC education has served you well.”
I nodded, recognizing that an Ivy League elitist like Arthur Woo was paying me a backhanded compliment. I chose not to take the bait. There were only a few people I did not want to get into a verbal jousting match with, and he was one of them. Another was Cliff Roper. I figured there might be a few more if I gave the matter some thought. I chose not to.
“Makes you wonder why Bleeker didn’t run for mayor,” I mused.
He smiled. “Bleeker has no chance of being mayor. Not now, at least. Even the electorate won’t pass the mayor’s office to an unknown. He’s playing it smart. City Attorney is an office people don’t pay as much attention to. If Bleeker wins, he’ll be looking at stepping up to City Hall in four years.”
“Which is another reason why you’d like to cut him off right now.”
