Strange Bedfellows v5

by Paula L. Woods

  “We’ll meet you in the lobby.” I grabbed Madame Chair by the elbow, not caring if I was a little rough. “Or, if the lobby isn’t grand enough, perhaps you’d prefer our offices downtown.”

  “You expect me to come to downtown Los Angeles?” I figured the mere thought of leaving Orange County would be enough to get her moving, but Lippincott couldn’t resist a parting shot at her marital successor. “This bedside vigil you’re keeping is quite touching, honey, but I’m onto your game. You’ve bled poor Chuck and our company dry enough.”

  “You and your narrow-ass daughter beat me to the trough on that one!” the younger woman snapped. Then she took a deep breath as if counting to ten. “Just go, Renata. Talk to Chuck’s lawyer if you’ve got any other complaints. I’m sure you have the number.”

  Lippincott looked as if she wanted to slap the taste out Alma’s mouth. I tightened my grip on her arm. “I’ll be waiting in my car, Detective,” she said to Thor, intentionally ignoring me. “It’s the black Bentley parked near the emergency entrance.”

  “I’m sure we won’t miss it.”

  I hustled Lippincott to the elevator and made sure she was on her way down before rejoining Thor and Alma. Standing near the door, I wished I had some sage to burn out the nasty vibe left in the room.

  “I doubt if I’ll be able to help you, Detective Thorfinsen,” Alma was saying. “Although I was facing south, Chuck and Malik were blocking my view of the street, so I never saw the car coming. The last thing I remember was Chuck turning around pushing me as we were waiting for the valet to bring our car.”

  “Which way did he push you?” Thor asked. “Toward the building or the street?”

  “I don’t remember,” she said, her voice snappish. “I told Detective Justice before: that’s about when my memory of that night runs out. Does it matter?”

  Thor ignored the question and made a note. “And you remember nothing after that?”

  “Not until I woke up in the hospital a couple of days later.”

  “And since then?”

  Frustration clouded her face. “Nothing! The doctors call it post-traumatic stress disorder.”

  So far, her statement was consistent with my earlier interviews, but Thor was undeterred. He murmured sympathetically as he pulled out his notebook and started making a sketch. “If the Oviatt Building is here, where were you standing, Mrs. Zuccari?”

  Alma shot me an irritable glance. “D-didn’t we cover this when you talked to me last year?”

  Curious why she was growing so agitated, I had pulled out my notebook as well and had started making quick notes. “Yes, ma’am, we did, but Detective Thorfinsen—”

  “We’ve put fresh eyes on the case, Mrs. Zuccari,” he interrupted, “to see if we can uncover anything new that will help us nail these lowlifes who shot your husband.”

  “And my daughter.” Alma’s shoulders began to tremble as her eyes filled with tears. “Don’t forget my daughter. She didn’t deserve what they did to her.”

  Chuck Zuccari stirred again, his head lolling toward us, his fixed smile in mute agreement. I averted my eyes from the disturbing sight, and my gaze fell on the bedside table. Get-well cards from friends and well-wishers were crowded around a color photograph of a relaxed and smiling Chuck Zuccari, posing with Alma and his son at what I assumed was a toy convention, given the colorful outfit Alma was wearing and the display in the background. Zuccari looked radically different from the portrait I’d seen in the company’s offices or in magazines when we were doing background on the family. In the portrait and the photos, he was somber, almost morose. Here Zuccari was happy, almost giddy. Had Alma Gordone, with her flashing eyes and ready smile, really transformed her stiff, navy-suited husband? Could the fierce love and devotion she displayed now bring him back to life?

  Wondering why the photo was here, I realized that it was all Alma Zuccari had left of her life before. In the photo, surrounded by dolls and a giant mock-up of a handheld gaming device, the unlikely couple looked as if they had a limitless future ahead of them, like the photo of Keith and me at that long-ago Fourth of July barbecue.

  Before and After was the way I had come to measure my life, the space between them an abyss I’d struggled for years to cross. I knew firsthand how happiness could be destroyed and our souls sent to hell in an instant by a loved one taking the wrong flight, driving a different route to work, or getting caught standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. Through my career in law enforcement I’d managed to climb out of my personal hell and, in the process, find meaning in my life. And while I couldn’t get Alma Zuccari a job in the LAPD, maybe I could give her a glimpse of a better After.

  “We’ll catch who did this to your family,” I promised her.

  “Tell that to my husband and child.”

  Chuck Zuccari’s face still bore that senseless smile. Maybe it was a change of light in the room, or a cloud moving by the window outside, but for just an instant I could have sworn I saw a flicker of something in his staring blue eyes.

  As Thor and I exited the nursing unit we were intercepted by a third security guard, this one better dressed and more polished than Leykis and Ybarra. “I’m Pete Collins.” He smiled, revealing a set of orthodontist-perfect teeth as he handed each of us a card. “Head of security for CZ Toys. Mrs. McIntyre called to say you were down here.”

  With his sun-streaked hair, even tan, and muscles rippling beneath his jacket, I could imagine Pete Collins catching waves in Newport or Huntington Beach faster than running a security operation for a corporation. Maybe he had driven from one of those beaches to meet us. My little voice told me to check his shoes for sand, but I knew that would be tacky.

  “I see you’ve got pretty tight security on your boss,” Thor was saying.

  Collins flicked an unreadable glance at his colleagues, then turned that dazzling smile back on us. “Mario Zuccari thought we should bring in outside reinforcements as long as whoever did this is on the loose.”

  I voiced the doubts I’d had earlier about the likelihood of a repeat attack on Mr. Zuccari or his family. But my challenge didn’t seem to ruffle Collins’s professional feathers in the least. “I admit it may seem extreme, Detective, but I’d rather we err on the side of caution when it comes to something like this. Mr. Zuccari and his family are much beloved by the company and the toy industry. So we’ve got to take every precaution to protect them, even if it seems to outsiders like we’re going overboard.”

  From what I’d seen and heard today, it was debatable how “much beloved” Chuck Zuccari really was.

  Collins asked whether we needed assistance on the interviews Mrs. McIntyre was scheduling for tomorrow morning. “Robert Merritt, your legal counsel, has offered as well, but we don’t think we’re going to need any help right now,” Thor replied.

  “But we’ll call you if something comes up,” I added.

  Mrs. McIntyre had also told Collins about Nilo Engalla’s reappearance. “Has he said anything about why he took off like that?”

  “Not yet.” Thor pulled out his cell phone. “Which reminds me—”

  “Can’t use no cell phones in the hospital,” Ybarra warned, stubby fingers pointing.

  “Interferes with the equipment,” Leykis added, his smile a sharky version of his associate’s.

  “The hospital’s given us an office on the unit,” Collins said, “if you’d like to use the phone in there.”

  Instead of joining them, I told Thor I needed to make a pit stop. “If I’m not in the lobby by the time you’re done, go ahead without me.”

  Behind Collins’s retreating back, Thor made a face and mouthed: You owe me for this.

  Once Thor had rounded the corner with Collins, I told Leykis and Ybarra where I was headed and was directed to the fifth floor. I walked along the corridor, pausing at the first window on the left. Inside lay half a dozen babies in cute knitted blue and pink caps. Family and friends were clustered in front of various bassinettes, fingers pressed ea
gerly against the windows or filming the momentous occasion with video cameras. I could imagine Alma Zuccari passing this happy fishbowl every day, each trip adding darker and darker circles under her once-bright blue eyes.

  I passed a windowed door and paused to count twelve domed Plexiglas incubators arranged in precise rows, some covered with fanciful baby quilts, others open as nurses hovered, checking monitors, conferring in tight circles with doctors, or encouraging a reluctant mother and father to stroke their baby. I saw an IV taped to one baby’s kicking foot. Another baby jerked spasmodically, a tiny hand hitting a little Beanie Baby bear positioned near its head. A pink-clad angel with a tube snaking down her tiny throat made me want to retch on her behalf. How many times had Alma Zuccari crossed this strange threshold to visit her precious child.

  Finally I tore myself away and found the pediatric wing. A white-coated young doctor looked my way and, with a frown that told me he knew I didn’t belong, demanded to know my business. When I produced ID and told him who I wanted to see, he led me to a room close to the nurses’ station. To enter it, I had to squeeze by a couple of monitors stationed outside the door like Chuck Zuccari’s security guards. Inside, even with the light on over the bed, it was hard to find the baby among the welter of tubes and contraptions, all working to keep heart and lungs and other organs functioning.

  After a while, my eyes adjusted to the chaos. “What’s wrong with her?”

  “Right now she’s having some gastric problems related to her last surgery.”

  I could feel my throat closing and the walls moving in. “Will she make it?”

  “She might get over the gastric problems, but she had some bleeding in her brain early on,” the resident conceded. “It’s a common problem in these micropreemies.”

  “So . . .”

  “Brain damage is a distinct possibility.”

  My vision wavering a bit, I stepped back and examined the label at the foot of the bed. CARLA ISABELLA ZUCCARI, it read. I repeated the promise I’d made to her mother that I’d get whoever was responsible for this.

  Her tiny chest fluttered and fell in an unfathomable response.

  7

  Unforgiven

  It was nearly eight by the time I arrived at Aubrey’s hillside home, bone-tired and ready to climb back into the cocoon of steam where I had begun this day. I had pulled off my jacket at the door and was about to remove my weapon and holster when I heard voices coming from the den downstairs. It took a moment before I remembered it was our turn to host Justice Family Film Night.

  I tiptoed down the front staircase to find most of the usual suspects in attendance. My father had planted himself in one of the leather armchairs by the television, my mother was sitting on the sofa talking to Uncle Syl and Grandmama Cile, and my sister-in-law Louise and Aubrey were descending the back stairs with bowls of popcorn. But my brother Perris was nowhere in sight.

  Spotting me, my uncle called out: “There’s my Baby Girl! You’re just in time.”

  Everyone shouted out a greeting except Aubrey, who was concentrating on positioning the bowls on the coffee table. That finished, he moved to give me a perfunctory hug. “It wasn’t right to keep your family waiting dinner for you,” he whispered in my ear; then for everyone to hear, “You want something to eat?”

  Beast ran to my side and leaned into me to be petted. At least my boxer’s affection was genuine. “We picked up something on the drive back,” I muttered, hoping my stomach wouldn’t growl and make me a liar.

  Staccato explosions were coming from the kitchen. “That’s the popcorn,” Aubrey explained, and followed the sound up the front stairs.

  “You missed a good dinner, Baby Girl.” Uncle Syl smacked his lips. “I didn’t know Aubrey could rattle pots like that.”

  “Go up there and see if some’a them buffalo wing appetizers are left over,” Grandmama Cile added. “Although I never knowed buffaloes had wings!”

  My grandmother chuckled at her own joke, while my mother and Uncle Syl exchanged long-suffering looks. “Aubrey mentioned you went back to work on the Malik Shareef case,” my father said as I was on my way to the bedroom.

  I closed the door between us. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  My quick response threw him a bit. “It’s just that . . . you’ve been through a lot lately.”

  I rolled my eyes, dropped my purse, shed my weapon and clothes. Put on my favorite jeans, and decided on a sweatshirt from Sting’s Nothing But the Sun tour to go with it. Checked out my appearance in the mirror, reminded myself to try and get some sun, and reentered the den with a suitable smile. “Don’t worry, Daddy. I’m not lead on the case. They put Larry Thorfinsen in charge.”

  “Didn’t you tell me he was retirin’?” my father said.

  “I thought he was, but I’m beginning to think now that’ll only happen if they carry him out feet first.”

  “Some people would say that about you,” my mother mumbled around a mouthful of popcorn.

  “Joymarie!” my father snapped in warning.

  Before I could launch a retort, Uncle Syl popped up to give me a hug. “Now, Baby Girl, I know you like Sting, but you shouldn’t wear that sweatshirt with the tour dates on them. Tells people how old your clothes are!”

  I disentangled myself from his embrace. The twinkle in my uncle’s eye said, Forget it, she’s not worth it. I retreated to the bar in a neutral corner and grabbed a glass. “You keep promising me you’re going to make a lounging outfit for me, Uncle Syl, but I haven’t seen it yet.”

  While my uncle and I debated the virtues of silk versus cotton knit, I poured myself a Lagavulin, hoping its heavy aroma and smoky bite would blunt the effect of my mother’s barbed observations. My father cleared his throat. “How’d it feel to be back?”

  His tone made me wonder if Chief Youngblood, aka Uncle Henry, had ratted me out about my visit to Chinatown, but there was no way I could find out, with my family waiting expectantly for my response and Aubrey appearing from the back stairs with another bowl of popcorn. “Weird,” I decided on, sitting near my father on the carpeted floor. “I’m not used to having so many live victims, or sort of alive.”

  Plopping down next to me, Aubrey listened while I described the condition of Chuck Zuccari, his wife, and his infant daughter. “When I was working the ER,” he said, “we used to see a lot of gunshot victims who ended up that way. You get to the point you know which ones will end up in the vegetable bin.”

  “Aubrey!” my mother exclaimed, her hands over her ears. “That’s a terrible thing to say!”

  “No worse than cops calling dead bodies DBs or floaters,” Louise reminded her from the armchair where she had settled. “Perris still slips up and says that kind of stuff when we’re watching the news.”

  At the sound of her favorite child’s name, my mother had uncovered her ears. “After all these years?” she asked incredulously.

  “He says it puts some space between him and the ugliness.”

  “Speaking of ugliness, where is my darling brother? Afraid I’ll kick his butt for pilfering Keith’s files?”

  “Leave her alone, Charlotte,” my mother cautioned. “She didn’t have anything to do with those files.”

  “That’s true.” I turned to my mother, glad she’d provided me with an opening. “’Cause the way I heard it, you were the one locked up in Keith’s office with Perris and the files that Sunday, just before he stole them.”

  Cutting her eyes in Aubrey’s direction, Joymarie’s face turned a mottled red, just like Mario Zuccari’s when he was put on the spot by Thor. “W-we were just talking . . .”

  “Come on, Mother! I might have been born at night, but it wasn’t last night!”

  Her eyes darted to my father, who placed a restraining hand on my shoulder and whispered: “Ease up now, Char. We don’t need to dredge up the distant past tonight.”

  “Distant past? We’re only talking about a week ago!”

  “I was trying to talk some sense into him!”
my mother insisted.

  “Get real, Mother! You and Perris have been after me to get rid of the files on Keith and Erica’s murders for years.”

  Her mouth was working, but little sound came out.

  “And since I wouldn’t do it, you took matters into your own hands!” I blinked back the rage stinging my eyes. “You were supposed to be helping me finish packing up the house for the movers, not aiding and abetting my brother in robbing me blind!”

  “Come on, everyone.” Uncle Syl’s tone was cajoling. “Let’s not ruin our first Justice Family Film Night at Aubrey’s lovely home. He might not ask us back!”

  “I just want an answer to my question!”

  Despite the coolness of the evening, a prickly discomfort filled the room. Aubrey got up to load the tape while my father watched, as fascinated as if he were performing a tracheotomy. Grandmama Cile flipped through one of Aubrey’s emergency medicine journals and showed an article to Uncle Syl, who pretended to read it without his glasses. My mother chewed the inside of her cheek while Louise fingered the fringe on a throw pillow.

  It was Louise who broke the silence. “Look, Char, I don’t know why Perris borrowed those files, but—”

  “Borrowed? Let me find my dictionary so you can look up that word.”

  “Why don’t you call and confront him instead of me?” she snapped back. “He’s at home with the twins, nursing a cold.”

  Before I could press her, my father squeezed my shoulder hard. “She can do that later.” He turned to Aubrey, who was moving back to his spot next to me. “What’s on the bill tonight, son?”

  “Unforgiven,” he replied, glancing at me, concern knitting his brow. I nodded a go-ahead while, remote in hand, he cued up the tape in the VCR.

  The irony of the title made me chuckle and take a long sip of Scotch, but Grandmama Cile groaned in response. “Not the one where they cast poor Audrey Hepburn as an Indian?”

  “That’s The Unforgiven, Mom,” my father told her. “And the correct term is Native American, not Indian.”