Jonathan Kellerman_Petra Connor 02

by Twisted

  “Like what?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say, ma’am. Sorry.”

  “I understand,” Maria Murphy said. “I discovered Dad’s body. I’ll never forget it.”

  That fact had been in the file. Geraldo Solis had been found slumped over his food at one A.M. Petra asked Murphy why she’d dropped in so late.

  “I didn’t drop in. I lived there. On and off. Temporarily.”

  “Temporarily?”

  “I was married at the time and my husband and I were having problems. I stayed with Dad, from time to time.”

  Petra glanced at Murphy’s gold band.

  Murphy smiled. “That’s from my partner. Her name is Bella.”

  Petra sensed Murphy sizing her up, assessing her tolerance level. “So you and your husband were having marital problems.”

  “I changed the rules, midstream,” said Murphy. “Dave, my husband, was a good guy. I was the one who initiated the breakup. Back then, I was pretty moody.”

  “How’d Dave react to that?”

  “He wasn’t happy,” said Murphy.

  “He get mad?”

  Without missing a step, Murphy turned sharply toward Petra. “It wasn’t like that, don’t even think that. Dave and Dad got along great. You want to know the truth, Dave and Dad had more in common with each other than with me. Any time we had a fight, Dad took Dave’s side. He couldn’t believe what I was doing and why I was doing it. My whole family was in pretty strong denial.”

  “Big family?” said Petra.

  “Two brothers, two sisters. Mom’s been gone for a while. When she was alive, I suppressed myself. Not wanting to hurt her. After I came out, they all ganged up on me, wanted me to see a shrink. Which was exactly what I’d been doing for two years, unbeknownst to them.”

  “You didn’t want to hurt your mother, but your father . . .”

  “You get to a point,” said Murphy. “And Dad and I were never close. He was always working, always too busy. I didn’t resent it, he did what he had to do, we just weren’t close. Even after I started living with him, we had very little to say to each other.”

  She flinched, sucked in a breath, quickened her step.

  “How long did you live with him?”

  “On and off,” Murphy reiterated. “A month or so. I kept most of my stuff at my house, would bring a few changes to Dad’s. The story I gave him was I was working a double shift and didn’t want to drive home tired. Dad’s place was a lot closer to the hospital.”

  Covina to Hollywood was an hour drive, minimum, a lot hairier with traffic. The trip from Solis’s house on Ogden near Olympic was a lark in comparison, so that much rang true.

  “When did you tell your father the truth?” said Petra.

  “I didn’t. My sibs did. A few days before the murder.”

  “What about Dave?”

  “Dave already knew. He wasn’t angry, he was sad. Depressed. Don’t go there. Really.”

  Petra decided she’d be talking to Dave Murphy, sooner rather than later. She nodded at Murphy, tried to look reassuring. “So is there anything about your father’s murder that you’ve thought about since the first detectives spoke to you?”

  “I only talked to one detective,” said Murphy. “Big, heavyset kind of Scandinavian guy.”

  “Detective Hustaad.”

  “Yes, that’s him. He seemed nice. Had a real bad cough. Later, he called me to tell me he had cancer, was going in for treatment. He promised to make sure Dad’s case got transferred to someone else. I felt terrible for him. That cough, it didn’t sound good.”

  “The case was transferred to Detective Weber. He never talked to you?”

  “Someone did call me,” said Murphy. “Once. But a long time . . . years after Hustaad got sick. I’d called the police station a few times—honestly, not a lot, I was dealing with my own stuff. When no one called me back, I let it go . . . I guess . . .”

  “What did Detective Weber tell you?”

  “He said he was taking over Dad’s case, but I never heard from him again. I guess I should’ve followed through. I guess I figured after no clues came up right away, it would be hard to solve. Being a stranger and all that.”

  “A stranger?”

  “A burglar,” said Murphy. “That’s what Hustaad figured.”

  “Did Detective Weber ask you anything?”

  “Not really—oh, yeah, he did ask about Dad expecting the cable guy. Which I’d already told Detective Hustaad. It was the only thing I did tell Detective Hustaad that I thought might be relevant. Mostly, I was a basketcase. At the time, I mean . . . finding Dad.”

  Nothing hysterical about her now. Talkative woman, calm. Resigned to the fact that her father’s murder would probably never be solved.

  Petra kept walking, waited for more.

  Half a block later, Murphy said, “Detective Hustaad didn’t seem to have much energy.”

  “You’re wondering if he worked the case as hard as it should’ve been worked.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. I guess I’m a pretty factual person.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can accept facts, even if they’re tough. If Dad had been killed by a burglar, the only way they’d solve it was if the same criminal did it again, right? That’s kind of what Detective Hustaad implied.” She turned to Petra. “Is your case a burglar, someone pretending to be a cable guy?”

  “Everything’s preliminary, ma’am.”

  “So I shouldn’t get my hopes up.”

  “It’s a long process.”

  “What was weird to me, if it was a burglar,” said Murphy, “was that the only thing taken was food. A fresh head of lettuce, some whole wheat bread, and two cartons of lemon yogurt. That’s a pretty strange burglar, no? But Detective Hustaad said they do that—eat food, mark their territory. He figured the guy got scared before he had time to steal anything.”

  She shrugged. “Maybe cash was taken, I don’t know. I don’t think so because the moment Dad had any extra cash, like from his military pension, he banked it.”

  Murphy slowed her pace and Petra adjusted. Traffic on Sunset was fast and thunderous and the two of them swerved to avoid some construction workers who’d blown a hole in the sidewalk and set up orange-and-white sawhorses.

  Murphy looked at the hardhats. “Dad did that. Worked construction, after he left the Marines. Then he had his own business. A tire store in Culver City. When that went under, he was sixty-five, said he’d had enough. Mostly, he watched TV.”

  “You’re pretty specific about which food was taken,” said Petra.

  “Because it was my food. I bought it the day before. Dad was more of a chorizo-and-fried-potatoes kind of guy. He made fun of the way I ate. Called it rabbit chow.”

  Pain in her eyes said there’d been more than dietary conflict between father and daughter.

  “Your food was taken,” said Petra.

  “It couldn’t mean anything. Could it?”

  “Is there anyone who’d want to get back at you through your father?”

  “No,” said Murphy. “No one. Since the divorce, everything’s been smooth. Dave and I are friendly, we talk all the time.”

  “Any kids?”

  Murphy shook her head.

  Petra said, “Tell me about the cable call and why you think it could’ve been phony.”

  “That day in the morning, when I left for work—Dad told me the cable company was sending someone out to work on the set.”

  “At what time?”

  “Late afternoon, early evening, you know how they are,” said Murphy. “Dad sometimes napped at that hour, wanted me to wake him by seven.”

  “Were you having transmission problems?”

  “No, that’s the thing,” said Murphy. “Supposedly it was something to do with the neighborhood lines.”

  “He wanted you to wake him,” said Petra. “So you were home by late afternoon?”

  “No. I called at three, told Dad I’d be home late.
He asked me to call again.”

  “At seven.”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you?”

  “I did and he was up.”

  “How did your father sound?”

  “Fine. Normal.”

  “Then you went back to work?”

  Murphy touched her finger to her jaw. “Actually, I’d left work early. It had been a tough afternoon, shuttling back between Dave and Bella. When I hung up with Dad, I was in my car. I took off and went to see Bella. We had dinner, went to a club, did some drinking. Neither of us was in the mood to dance. She wanted me to come home with her but I wasn’t ready for that, so she drove back to her place and I drove to Dad’s. Walked into the house and smelled food—cooked food, bacon and eggs. Which was strange. Dad never ate late. He’d have a beer or two, maybe some chip-and-dip while watching TV, but never a hot meal at that hour. If he ate heavy food too late, he had indigestion.”

  Maria Murphy stopped walking. Her eyes were wet. “This is harder than I thought.”

  “Sorry for bringing it all back.”

  “I haven’t thought about Dad for a while. I should think about him more.” Murphy pulled a hankie out of a dress pocket, patted her eyes, blew her nose.

  When they resumed walking, Petra said, “So someone had cooked.”

  “Breakfast food,” said Murphy. “Which was also weird. Dad was a very disciplined person—ex-Marine, very regimented. You ate breakfast food in the morning, sandwiches at lunch, a main meal at supper.”

  “You don’t think he cooked the food.”

  “Scrambled eggs?” said Maria Murphy. “Dad didn’t like scrambled eggs, he always had his eggs fried or soft-boiled.”

  She burst into tears, walked faster, at a near-run.

  Petra caught up. Murphy threw up her hands and ground her jaws.

  “Ma-am—”

  “His brains,” Murphy blurted. “They were on the plate. Along with the eggs. Pilled on top of the eggs. Like someone had added lumpy cheese to the eggs. Gray cheese. Pink . . . can we please turn around, now? I need to get back to work.”

  Petra waited until they were back at Kaiser to ask her if there was anything else she remembered.

  “Nothing,” said Murphy. She turned to go and Petra touched her arm. Solid and sinewy. Maria Murphy tensed up. Rock-hard.

  Looking at Petra’s fingers on her sleeve.

  Petra let go. “Just one more question, ma’am. The date of your father’s murder, June 28. Did that have any significance to you, or to anyone in your family?”

  “Why would you ask that?”

  “Covering bases.”

  “June 28,” said Murphy, weakly. “The only thing significant about that is Dad was murdered.” She sagged. “It’s coming up, isn’t it? The anniversary. I think I’ll go to the cemetery. I don’t go very often. I really should go more.”

  Interesting woman. Going through major life-stress at the time of her father’s murder. Not getting sympathy from the old man, quite the opposite. Pulled in all directions, having to return to the old man’s house. A father with whom she’d never been close. An ex-Marine whose sensibilities she’d recently offended.

  It had to have been a tense situation.

  From the feel of that iron-arm, Murphy was a strong woman. More than enough strength to bring a stout piece of pipe down on an aged skull.

  Murphy’s food, taken. Healthy stuff that the old man ridiculed.

  Maybe the old man had humiliated her one time too many. Dumped lesbian daughter’s victuals in front of lesbian daughter and that had driven her over the edge.

  Petra had seen people killed with a lot less provocation.

  She pulled into the station parking lot, sat there imagining.

  Murphy comes home from a self-described rough day—driving back and forth between hubbie and lover. Calls dad, allegedly to wake him from his nap, but he gives her flack. She hangs up, goes dining and clubbing, has too much to drink. Returns home, craving a one A.M. nosh, finds dad up, waiting for her.

  They argue. About her alternative lifestyle.

  Her rabbit chow.

  Dad scoops up the nutritionally virtuous stash, tells her what he thinks about it.

  Murphy was a dietician. The gesture would have been laced with extra symbolism.

  An argument ensues.

  He screams, she screams. She picks something up—maybe a spare pipe, who knows what. Brains the old guy, sits him at the table. Cooks up some of the high-fat crap he calls food.

  Pushes his face in it. Eat that!

  Then she makes up a phony cable story to distract the easily distracted Jack Hustaad.

  Some melodrama. And no evidence.

  And if Maria Murphy had murdered her old man, what did that say about Marta Doebbler and the other five June 28 killings?

  She’d follow up on Solis, talk to Murphy’s ex-husband, the long-suffering Dave. But something told her it would be a waste of time.

  Kurt Doebbler for his wife, Maria Murphy for her dad.

  Meaning no connection.

  No, that felt wrong. If Isaac was right, and she was moving toward confidence that he was, this was something quite different from family passion gone bad.

  A woman lured from the theater. A hustler pulverized in a back alley. A little girl brutalized in the park. A sailor on leave . . .

  Eggs and brains on the plate.

  This was calculated, manipulative.

  Twisted.

  CHAPTER

  18

  When she got back to the detectives’ room, the place was bustling with phone talk and keyboard clacks. Isaac was at his corner desk, writing something in longhand, one hand cradling the side of his head.

  He gave her a quick wave with his free hand and returned to his work.

  Give me space?

  Maybe last night’s steak and beer had been too much for him. She’d offered to drive him home but he’d insisted on being dropped off blocks away.

  Petra figured he was ashamed of his digs. She didn’t argue and as he trudged away, lugging his briefcase, she thought he looked like a tired old man.

  Give him his space, she could use some, too. She poured coffee and flipped through her message stack. Nothing but department memos. Six new e-mail messages on her computer: four canned department announcements, something from SmallDot@il.netvision she figured for spam, and Mac Dilbeck informing her that Homicide Special would most likely take over the Paradiso case by Tuesday if nothing broke.

  She was about to delete the junk mail when her phone rang.

  A recorded message from the Intramural Police Football team chirped in her ear: “Big game with L.A. County Sheriffs coming up next month, all able-bodied, athletically inclined officers are urged to . . .”

  Her finger drifted to the Enter button and she opened the spam.

  Dear Petra,

  This is rerouted for security purposes, can’t be answered. Everything’s okay. Hope the same, there. Miss you. L, Eric.

  She smiled. I send my L, too.

  She saved the message, logged off. Began looking for David Murphy.

  Common name but an easy trace. The five-year-old Covina address narrowed it right down to David Colvin Murphy, now forty-two. He’d moved to Mar Vista, on the west side. Had registered a Dodge Neon three years ago, a Chevy Suburban twenty months after that.

  No wants or warrants, not even a parking ticket.

  She found his number in the reverse directory. A woman answered.

  “David Murphy, please.”

  “He’s at work. Who’s this?”

  Petra recited her title and the woman said, “Police? Why?”

  “It’s about an old case. Are you familiar with Geraldo Solis, ma’am?”

  “Dave’s ex-father-in-law. He was . . . I’m Dave’s wife.”

  “Where does your husband work, Mrs. Murphy?”

  “HealthRite Pharmacy. He’s a pharmacist.” Saying it with some pride.

  “Which branch, ma’am?”<
br />
  “Santa Monica. Wilshire near Twenty-fifth. But I don’t know what he could tell you, that was years ago.”

  Don’t rub it in.

  Petra thanked her and hung up, looked up the drugstore’s number while glancing over at Isaac’s desk. The kid was still poring over his papers but the hand against his face had dropped and Petra saw a bruise, reddish-purple, high up on the left side of his face, between the rounded tip of his cheekbone and his ear.

  As if suddenly aware, he reclamped his hand over the spot.

  Something had happened between last night and today.

  Rough neighborhood. Walking alone.

  Or worse—something domestic?

  She realized how little she knew about his private life, considered going over to check out the bruise. But he looked as if the last thing he wanted was company.

  She called the HealthRite Pharmacy, Santa Monica branch.

  David Murphy had a pleasant phone voice. Not surprised by her call. The wife had prepared him.

  He said, “Gerry was a good guy. I can’t think of anyone who’d want to hurt him.”

  According to Maria, her father had taken Murphy’s side in the divorce.

  Petra said, “Well, someone sure did.”

  “Terrible,” said Murphy. “So . . . what can I do for you?”

  “Is there anything you remember about the day Mr. Solis was murdered, sir? Maybe something that didn’t come up during the initial investigation?”

  “Sorry, no,” said Murphy.

  “What do you recall?”

  “It was a terrible day. Maria and I were in the midst of breaking up; she was driving back and forth between our home . . . between me and her . . . and Bella Kandinsky. She’s her partner, now.”

  “Emotional day,” said Petra.

  “You bet. She’d come home, talk to me, get upset, run to Bella. Then back to me. I’m sure Maria was feeling like the rope in a tug of war. I was pretty stunned.”

  “Stunned?”

  “My marriage, suddenly over. Over another woman.” Murphy laughed. “Anyway, that was a long time ago. We’ve all moved on.”

  “At the time of the murder, Maria was living at her father’s house.”