The Third Rule of Ten: A Tenzing Norbu Mystery

by Hendricks, Gay

  Worse, I had been keeping things from her for months—things I did, things I felt—because I didn’t want to upset her. But the more I hid this growing pile of issues from her, the more compelled I was to find fault with her. My mind marveled at this mechanism, all the more amazing because I hadn’t been aware of it until now.

  And she’s been doing the same with me.

  I breathed in the painful truth of this and exhaled.

  Heather and I were victims of the same patterns, pre-programmed to create the same cycles of suffering in our relationship. Somehow both of us got love and pain entangled at an early age and felt bound to keep repeating the same equation over and over and over again. But it was a lousy form of arithmetic: Love + Pain = Life.

  I was way too familiar with this formula. In fact, only one woman had ever offered me an alternative, and I had run Julia off before we could test whether hers might lead to a happier result. The tears finally flowed, for Heather’s wounds as well as my own, and the release made room for a sense of calm I hadn’t felt in some time.

  I put on a clean pair of jeans and a sky-blue dress shirt Martha had given me last year. She’d told me Bill didn’t like the color, but I knew better. Bill hadn’t worn a shirt this size in decades. Martha was sick of seeing the same three T-shirts every time I came over for dinner. I tucked my shirttails in and added a belt. It was a little warm for the cashmere blazer, but I set it on the bed to take anyway. I felt as if I was getting ready for a first date, rather than a probable breakup, but I wanted to look my best, even if I was heading for the termination of our romance. All rites of passage deserve respect.

  I still had two hours—and the unexpected gift of calm. Who knows how long it would last? I moved to the deck and sat in the afternoon haze, mentally sorting through all the recent twists and turns of this case. For a detective, this, too, is working. I had a real mess on my hands. Time to try and make some order out of it and, if I was lucky, work out what to do next. Tank jumped onto my lap, and I let him stay, digging my hands into his soft blue-gray fur. His heartbeat was strong and steady, and his purr sounded like a tiny buzz saw.

  Here’s what I knew:

  CLARA FUENTES. Status: missing, but still alive as of this morning. Last seen in the apartment of her relative, Sofia. Clara’s last call on the day she went missing was from her iPhone to an untraceable cell number. (I should call Mike to check on his progress tracking down that number.) Clara had made another call to her boss this morning, a cry for help. This time, the number was blocked, possibly also untraceable.

  SOFIA, LAST NAME UNKNOWN. Worked for GTG Services, Inc., as a maid and, apparently, a high-end drug courier. May have been chipping the product. Fled her apartment, which was ransacked. Shot in the back of the head, execution-style. Tongue removed, indicating she had probably talked out of turn, possibly about her employer’s illegal activities. I was guessing that the someone she talked to was her cousin, Clara Fuentes. But how had Sofia’s killers found out?

  MARK GOODHUE. Bets McMurtry’s go-to man and an executive at GTG Services, Inc. Perhaps the head of the hydra, but I had my doubts.

  TENZING NORBU. Hired to find Clara Fuentes. In the course of his investigation, stumbled (coincidence?) onto the seemingly broad-based and highly illegal shenanigans of GTG, for which he currently has next to no proof. Still no closer to finding his missing person and has no indication other than intuition that the two incidents are connected.

  BETS MCMURTRY …

  My iPhone erupted with pealing bells, inside the house. I stood up, dumping Tank onto the deck, and walked to the kitchen to grab my phone.

  Mac Gannon had finally surfaced.

  “Hello?”

  “Where th’ fuck’ve ya been? And what th’ fuck’re ya doing, ya stupid fuckin’ chink?” he slurred. It occurred to me that on location might be Mac’s pretexting code for on a binge.

  “Bets lef’ me a message; sh’wuz bawlin’ like a baby,” he went on. “… th’ fuck m’I payin’ you for?”

  “Mac, where are you?”

  “None’ve yer goddam biznizz. Goddamn chinks, takin’ over ev’ything.”

  I didn’t have the strength to remind him of my Tibetan heritage. Mac was too far gone to hear me, in any case.

  Now he was saying, “Wha’re you … ? Stupid bitch! Gimme tha’—”

  “Is this Mr. Norbu?” I heard. I recognized the Irish lilt, though Constance O’Malley’s voice was pitched an octave higher than the first time I’d spoken with her.

  “Is Mac okay?” I asked.

  “He will be. I do apologize.”

  Why? I wanted to say. He’s the one being a jerk. But in my limited experience, guys like Mac Gannon somehow always managed to find women like Constance O’Malley to take care of them—women who are pragmatic, efficient, yet strongly attracted to craziness, as if by controlling another’s wild side, they can avoid ever acknowledging their own. Just another example of the human heart’s confused relationship math.

  “Not to worry,” I now said. “Maybe you can have him call me another time. When he’s feeling, um, better?”

  The relief in her voice was palpable. “Yes, yes, I’ll do that. Thank you.”

  I checked the time again. I should leave in an hour. The temptation to rehearse my lines was strong, but I knew that in order to be fully present with Heather, I would need to listen with mindful attention and answer with my most open self. Besides, whenever I rehearsed difficult conversations, I somehow always gave the imaginary person on the other side lines of dialogue highly favorable to my own point of view.

  I went over my mental checklist regarding the case and remembered my follow-up question for Mike about these mysteriously untraceable cell phone numbers. But Mike was no doubt dead asleep. I wouldn’t get anything from him for another three hours. I sent him a quick text message instead.

  My restlessness was growing. I decided to leave now and take the alternate Topanga Canyon Boulevard route, over the hill to the 101. There was a Woodland Hills car wash right off the freeway where I liked to get my Shelby bathed and waxed. After several days of surveillance, cars, too, can take on the look of homeless vagrants.

  The car wash was almost empty, and I watched my baby go through the shampoo, rinse, and hand-dry cycles with a weirdly personal pleasure. Car washes were a secret vice of mine—I couldn’t believe it the first time I took my Corolla to one and personally witnessed the mechanical swaying and sudsing and rinsing and waxing, followed by the drying and detailing by human hands. In India, a car wash consisted of one impoverished car-care wallah with a wad of damp rags, which left both you and your sheet metal feeling slightly smeared with guilt.

  I’d just tipped the gnome-like man who tended to the windshield when Clancy called.

  “Good. You’re alive,” I said.

  “Dude, where you at?”

  “Just about to get on the 101 and head downtown.”

  “Perfect. Because I been watching the Aon, like you asked, and the Mercedes left there about half an hour ago. I followed it, and now we’re at some church.”

  “The abandoned one Chuy uses?”

  “What? No, a real one, man, in Echo Park. Catholic. Our Lady of …” He paused, as if to read something. “Our Lady of Loretto, whoever she is. And get this. Some kind of big hoo-ha happening here. Bunch of limos starting to pull up. Lotta fancy threads and bling, you feel me? And your man Goodhue, he just got out of the car, and he’s in a tux. I’m thinking you’d better get your ass over here.”

  “What about you? Can you stay?”

  “I can stay, a’right. But I still look like shit, not to mention bein’ the wrong color for this crowd. Couple of dudes hanging by the front door of the church, they’re bodyguards for sure. No way can I get near the action. Why, you busy?”

  I thought of Heather and our talk. The Year of the Male Water Dragon, of contradictions and mixed blessings, strikes again.

  “I’m in Woodland Hills. I’ll be there in half an hou
r,” I said. “Take lots of pictures.”

  But the contradictory forces had intervened with Heather as well. I was about to call her, when she called me.

  “Hey,” I said. “I was just about to—”

  “Tenzing,” she interrupted, “I’m so, so sorry, but there’s been a huge pile-up on the 105, several fatalities, and it’s all hands on deck here until further notice. Can you forgive me?”

  “Absolutely,” I said. “Good luck.”

  I entered the church address in my phone, double-checked the actual location on Google Maps, and kept one eye on the speedometer and another on the freeway for Highway Patrol cars. Estimated driving time, 30 minutes. I was there in 14.

  As I turned onto the exit ramp, I had to brake behind the long line of luxury cars snaking toward Union Avenue. To my right a tall, modern spire housing a bell and topped by a wrought-iron cross pierced the sky—a marker, I presumed, for our destination.

  The line of cars inched toward Union, past a squat brick building on the left, its face gashed with the spray-painted monograms of gangbangers, and opposite it, a rundown liquor mart sporting a competing wall fresco, with flames, tusked beasts, and its own set of rival tags. Mere yards away, I turned right onto a neat block of homes and apartment buildings trumpeting their values via well-tended rose gardens, fresh coats of paint, and a small, outdoor shrine to the Virgin Mary.

  As I continued around the block to get a sense of the geography, I counted three churches, including Our Lady of Loretto, on one short street alone. At the end of it, a barbed wire fence, an abandoned warehouse, and a second graffiti-riddled liquor store announced the end of the safety zone. Churches, three: liquor stores, two. For now, this neighborhood was holding its own.

  I drove slowly past Our Lady a second time. The church and adjoining school shared a parking lot, which was already packed with cars, including, I was sure, Goodhue’s Mercedes. More limousines, as incongruous in this simple neighborhood as giant peacocks, unloaded families dressed in their best finery. Women and girls fluttered about like tropical birds in brightly colored gowns, their shoulders covered with shawls of lace and embroidered silk. The men and boys wore too-tight tuxedos and brand new suits, with satin bow ties in pastel blue, pink, and lavender.

  One little girl, urged by her mother, deposited a bouquet of daisies at the base of a life-sized statue of the Virgin Mary on the church’s front lawn. Above the front entrance of the church, another Mary, her hands clasped at her chest in prayer, as if she were about to execute a perfect prostration, balanced on what looked suspiciously like a Viking helmet, horns included. But that couldn’t be right, could it?

  More guests arrived. Was this a wedding? A religious holiday of some sort? People seemed too perky for a funeral. I was really rusty on my Catholic rites, so any guess would be just that.

  With a start, I recognized the two massive men posted at the entrance, stuffed into matching suits the iridescent gray of a shark’s skin. They were my stalkers from the beach. I now had my first definitive link between Goodhue and Chuy Dos.

  I continued up the block to Council Street and parked at the far end. I shrugged into my black cashmere blazer. I found a yellow silk tie rolled up in the right pocket, where I’d stuck it before my meeting with Mac, and knotted it neatly around my neck. I left my gun in the glove box. This was church, after all.

  I made my way on foot to the far end of Mission, where Clancy was stationed with his telephoto lens, digital camera, and laptop.

  “Woodland Hills, my ass,” he said, glancing at his watch. “You juice your ride or what?”

  “I have my ways,” I said.

  Clancy looked me over and nodded appreciatively. “S’what I’m talkin’ about. You’ll pass for sure in there. Why you so fine all of a sudden?”

  “Always prepared, that’s me.”

  Clancy’s eyes widened as he glanced past me. “Whoa. What’s up with that?” He picked up his camera and started firing off pictures like shots from a Tommy gun. I turned just as two white Hummer limousines, each triple the length of an ordinary Hummer, glided up to the church. End to end, they took up a third of the block. The first driver, in a black suit, dark glasses, and chauffeur’s cap, slid open the passenger door with a flourish. Out spilled a clutch of girls, graduated in age from about 5 to 15, dressed identically in short pink dresses slathered with lace and finished off with something frothy. They reconfigured on the sidewalk, smallest to tallest like nesting dolls, as their male counterparts, in matching pale blue tuxedos and ruffled shirts, tumbled out of the second limo. For a moment, chaos reigned. Then a young woman with an iPad emerged from the girls’ limo and briskly paired up the couples.

  I counted 14 girls and 15 boys, which left 1 gangly young man, his tuxedo pants short by two or three inches, standing alone. But not for long. A pale pink ballet flat poked from the passenger door of the first Hummer, followed by a second foot. The driver leaned in, his hand outstretched. After a brief struggle, the owner of the feet emerged in an awkward mass of white shiny material shaped into dozens of roses. The material snapped into a billowing skirt, like an automatic umbrella shooting open.

  The girl’s face was broad, her body blocky and a little stout, not particularly helped by her gown’s tightly laced top and massive skirt. But she had a glorious tumble of black curls, and clutched a small bouquet of pink and cream baby roses. Her dark shining eyes and shy smile made clear to me that this was the most beautiful she had ever felt, and a bittersweet pang unexpectedly invaded my heart area. She lurched over to her waiting prince, who was clumsily shifting from foot to foot. Her dress must have weighed 50 pounds. He reached across the expanse to take her elbow. They were both unable to meet each other’s eyes.

  “You got a clue what we looking at here?” Clancy asked, his camera clicking away. “I’d say wedding, but that girl’s mos’ definitely jailbait.”

  “No idea. But I know someone who might,” I said, as I pressed Carlos’s number. He answered after one ring.

  “Ten,” he said. “I’m glad you called.”

  I felt a pang of guilt. “Carlos, I’m so, so sorry about Sofia,” I said. “I meant to talk to you right away, but this case has been nonstop. I know you cared about her. Did you—?”

  “Yeah. I identified her.” Carlos cleared his throat. “I don’t ever want to do that for a friend again. Ever. Have they figured out who killed her?”

  “Not yet. But I might be getting close. That’s why I called. I have a question for you.”

  “Anything.”

  I described the scene in front of me.

  “Quinceañera,” he answered instantly. “When a girl from our culture turns fifteen, it’s huge. Kind of like sweet sixteen, plus a debutante’s coming-out party, plus I don’t know, maybe a coronation, all rolled into one. I’m guessing you’re outside their family church, probably the one she’s grown up in, for a misa de acción de gracias—you know, a Catholic mass to give thanks for her, welcome her to womanhood, celebrate her purity, that kind of thing.”

  As I watched, the two lines of children processed from the sidewalk to the church entrance, youngest first. “What’s with all the other kids?”

  “Damas and chambelanés,” Carlos said. “They’re friends, cousins, kids of their parents’ friends—each one symbolizes a year of her life—though usually you only have fourteen total, not fourteen of each! They’re like her entourage, you know? It’s strange, though. Usually a quinceañera is on Saturday, so the entire congregation can attend.”

  “Maybe they want to keep it private. That would explain the bodyguards.” As I watched, the birthday girl took a step and stumbled. Her beet-red escort barely kept them both from disappearing into the folds of white satin. My heart went out to them. Fifteen—I wouldn’t go back to that time of my life if you promised me an ocean of bliss.

  “Well, whoever is hosting this quinceañera has dough, for sure,” Carlos added. “I’ve also never heard of stretch Hummers for the kids. That’s go
ing to be some follow-up fiesta.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Oh, the church service is just the beginning. You’re in for a long night, Ten. Hope you’re up for it. You think her dress is big? Wait until you see her cake.”

  “Where do they usually hold these fiestas?”

  “Depends. My second cousin in Mexico had hers outside, at her madrina’s—sorry, godmother’s—orchard. Sometimes people just rent a big hall near their church. But this one? This one sounds like it could wind up anywhere. The richer the parents, the bigger their need to show off. Or maybe the godparents are paying. That can happen, too.”

  The burly bodyguards surveyed the street, finally empty of scurrying last-minute guests, and stepped inside the church. The tall wooden doors closed behind them. I thanked Carlos and hung up. I stared at the doors, my mind racing.

  “Clancy, any idea who the girl’s parents are?”

  Clancy shook his head. “Hard to tell. But I did snap just about everyone who came in. Only one dude wearing a corsage, and his old lady, too. Here, take a look.”

  Clancy pulled up his pictures and scrolled through them one by one. “Here’s Goodhue,” Clancy muttered. Mark Goodhue had arrived solo, looking like a stiff penguin in his tuxedo. The sequence of shots showed him quickly entering the church, head down, not talking to anyone. I kept skimming the long parade of dressy couples. Some went straight inside; others clustered by the entrance to chat.

  “Stop!” I said, pointing. “There’s Chuy Dos!”

  Chuy Dos was almost unrecognizable in his immaculate tuxedo, without his cowboy hat, but his bowlegged, puffed-chest stance gave him away. He held the arm of a slight woman in a long turquoise gown, crowned with an elaborate crest of matching feathers. Chuy Dos was half-waving at someone ahead of them and smiling, but there was something off about his smile.

  “Clancy, can you zoom in on his face?”

  Clancy filled the screen with the narrow features of Chuy Dos. Now it was clear as day. His mouth was as much grimacing as smiling, his eyes wide and frozen. He resembled a mongoose facing a cobra.