Motive

by Jonathan Kellerman

  “Wouldn’t that be peachy, Moses? You doubling on Fellinger tonight?”

  “No, Sean takes over and you’re on Sullivan,” said Reed. “At least according to my schedule.”

  Milo checked his own book. “You’re right, congrats on a night off. Got a hot date?”

  “Sir, at this point any date’s fine with us.”

  “I’m ruining your social life?” Milo laughed. “Sorry, go have fun.”

  “The job’s fun, too,” said Reed. “More so if I didn’t need a bladder.”

  On day six, Milo phoned at three p.m.

  “Someone finally misbehaved. Want to guess who?”

  “Easy odds,” I said. “Fellinger.”

  “Shit, you’re no fun. Last night around eight Sean followed him and Mrs. F. to LAX. Ol’ Grant schlepps her luggage, hugs and kisses her and escorts her into the terminal. Then he goes to dinner. Want to guess where?”

  Rising excitement in his voice made those odds easy, too. I said, “Century City shopping mall.”

  Silence.

  “I’m wrong?”

  “No. You. Are. Right. If you’ve got that good of a Ouija board, why the hell can’t you solve the case for me?”

  “No big deduction. He got into it with Deirdre Brand there. I figured he might consider it part of his turf.”

  “Right … okay, whatever, he had pizza and beer at a touristy place but no obvious hunting of humans ensued. He just stuffed his face and emptied a mug then drove to the Norman Hotel on the Strip.”

  “Don’t know it.”

  “Yeah, you do. Used to be a grungy tiki-motel-type dive called the Islander, now it’s a hipster hub, painted white, upside-down signage.”

  “That one,” I said. “Rock stars and actors who last a season.”

  “No paparazzi according to Sean so maybe even the C-list has moved on. Anyway, you wouldn’t figure a place like that for a guy of Fellinger’s age and looks, right? However, turns out there’s another group that frequents the place.”

  “Working girls.”

  “They congregate at the bar wearing mini-dresses and trawling for clients. Our man Grant didn’t take long to rent two lovelies. Light-blond and dirty-blond, per Sean, he said together their ages maybe added up to Fellinger’s.”

  I said, “Did they seem to know Fellinger?”

  “Not that Sean could tell. Brief chitchat, Fellinger pays for a room with cash, rides up to the fifth floor. The girls finish their Cosmos and do the same. Sean drinks root beer and gets all nervous about what’s going on up there, figures he’ll give it forty-five minutes then hazard a look. At forty-one, both girls are back in the lobby, leave the hotel and walk up Sunset. Fellinger appears fifteen minutes later, gets his Challenger from the valet, and drives west. Sean’s choice is either talk to the girls or stick with the surveillance. He follows Fellinger home, nothing else happens all night. I know it’s not profound but it confirms that Grant’s a bald-faced phony. Moment his wife steps into the security line, he’s thinking playmates.”

  “If he can fool his own wife that easily, Kathy and Frankie would be no challenge.”

  “And one more thing, Alex: Sean said both the working girls had tattoos. Maybe it means nothing, lots of people ink up nowadays. But it got me thinking about Frankie. Maybe that’s what turns him on. That’s when I realized I hadn’t checked the other victims for skin work, so I went back and re-read the autopsy reports. Not a dot on Kathy, but Deirdre had some prison ink, no surprise. And guess what: Classy Ursula had a tiny inscription in blue above her left shoulder blade. Pathologist listed it as ‘Chinese characters,’ no translation. I got the coroner to email it to Jim Gee, he’s a robbery D at Hollenbeck. He had no idea but emailed his mother and she said it was some sort of prayer for prosperity. Anyway, three of my victims have endured the needle. Am I making too big of a deal out of that?”

  “It’s worth considering. Going to try to find the working girls?”

  “Sean’s going back to the Norman tonight, see what he can learn. Meanwhile, my night on Sullivan defined stultifying, she was home all night. The guy in the chair’s definitely her husband. Gary Sullivan, also an attorney, now retired. His name came up in our files but not as an offender, as a victim. Nine years ago a drunk driver rear-ended a row of cars at a red light near the Staples Center after a Lakers game. Sullivan got hit hard, his spine was shattered. Flora stuck with him; from what we’ve seen, she takes good care of him, is nothing but a dutiful wife. You still see her as worth watching?”

  “Think pleather and a tense chat with Fellinger.”

  “Thought you were my friend.”

  I said, “Here’s proof I am: spent a chunk of today calling antiques dealers and thrift shops. No one knew Frankie by name and her description didn’t ring any bells.”

  “No one knew Frankie,” he said. “Guess that was the point.”

  For the next two days, I visited thrift and antiques shops within a mile of Frankie DiMargio’s garage-apartment in Mar Vista. That encompassed a slew of establishments in Culver City, mostly on Washington Boulevard’s newly gentrified design strip. Frankie’s photo sparked nothing from proprietors and clerks.

  The same went for tattoo parlors I found in the neighborhood. When the owner of one shop asked what I did for a living and I said, “Psychologist,” he said, “I can ink Freud’s face on your ass.”

  “No thanks,” I said.

  He smirked. “Afraid of pain?”

  “Too repressed.”

  None of the detectives was successful locating the prostitutes Grant Fellinger had picked up at the Norman. Not one to dither during his wife’s absence, Fellinger repeated the pattern at two other Strip hotels, settling for one woman per night. Moe Reed managed to corner the hooker from the second night, a girl who looked like a high school sophomore and had obviously fake papers saying she was twenty-five. She yawned a lot and described Fellinger as “just a john, nothing crazy.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Suck and fuck, what do you think? I’m not saying nothing more on advice of counselor.”

  Reed said, “Counselor, huh? Like in summer camp?”

  The girl stuck out her tongue and kept her extended middle finger close to her thigh as she wiggled up the Strip.

  On day eight, Fellinger picked up his wife at the airport and took her to dinner at the Hotel Bel Air.

  As the couple dined on Wolfgang Puck creations, Flora Sullivan was having sex with a man in a Rolls-Royce.

  The site of the tryst was a quiet stretch of Hudson Avenue, near the Wilshire Country Club, a short walk from Sullivan’s manse on June Street.

  Milo told me about it, sitting in the garden between Robin’s studio and our house, tossing pellets to the koi. Telling his tale with utter lack of salaciousness and a whole lot of weariness.

  A week-plus of brutally disrupted sleep and little to show for it but garden-variety infidelity.

  “She leaves her house just before nine wearing a loose dress and sandals, circles her own block a couple of times, passes a neighbor walking a dog, makes chitchat, heads back, I’m ready to nod off. But she continues to Hudson and stops at a car parked under a big tree. Black Rolls-Royce Ghost, you can barely see it. Flora lets herself in and stays inside for nearly half an hour, gets out smoothing down her dress. As she’s putting on lipstick a guy exits the driver’s side and walks over to her. Around her age, only thing I could make out was a light-colored shirt and dark pants. The two of them get all huggy and kissy and gropey and then he gets back in the Rolls and drives away and she walks home. The Rolls tags trace to Leon Andrew Bonelli, San Marino. Big-time real estate development, his online bio puts him at Boalt law school the same time as Flora and her husband.”

  “Auld acquaintances aren’t forgotten,” I said. “Any sign of pleather?”

  “Can’t speak for her undies. Normally, I wouldn’t begrudge a girl her fun. Hubby’s incapacitated, she gets lonely, life’s short. But the possibility Sullivan had something t
o do with Fellinger’s game means I’m gonna blame her every chance I’ve got. Where’s that scarlet letter, Nathaniel?”

  I said, “Maybe the tense conversation Reed saw between her and Fellinger means their relationship is fraying because she upgraded to a richer, more powerful man.”

  “She’s in a Rolls, Grant’s paying for sex? Yeah, could be.”

  “If we’re right about Fellinger, he doesn’t take well to rejection.”

  He turned to me. “Flora put herself in the crosshairs? So I keep watching her … he wouldn’t be stupid enough to shoot a second woman in the parking lot.”

  “Not unless he’s disintegrating mentally.”

  “You see signs he is?”

  “No, but if he starts taking crazy risks, you might have to warn her.”

  Fish burbled. I threw in pellets.

  Milo took the bag and tossed a few more. “Flora as Ursula Redux. That damn parking lot bothers me, if the morons would install cameras, it could make all our lives easier.”

  I said, “Why not offer to provide the equipment if Al Bayless gets authorization?”

  “The barter system.”

  “It worked for a helluva long time.”

  Bayless thought it was a great idea. Then he backtracked. “Got to clear it with the bosses and they take their time.”

  We were half a block from the building, sitting in the arena-sized lobby of a tourist hotel, ignoring ESPN on multiple screens and nursing soft drinks.

  Milo said, “What’s to clear, Al? You’re scoring freebie hardware.”

  Bayless picked at the lapel of his uniform jacket. “You know how it is.”

  “Not really.”

  “C’mon,” Bayless insisted. “Those guys live for rules, everything needs to go through channels.”

  “We’re talking cameras installed unobtrusively that you get to keep, not a penny outta your budget.”

  “Yeah, that’s another thing. Unobtrusive. You’d have to do it after hours, no way I could agree to disrupting business.”

  “We’d want to do it after hours.”

  “That costs,” said Bayless. “Opening up the building.”

  Milo glared at him.

  “Okay, okay, I’m just being honest. And where would the feed go?”

  “To you and to us,” said Milo. “Which is the definition of a high-end system, right? Anyone else you know feeds directly to the cops?”

  “Yeah, but that’s not going to be forever,” said Bayless. “Your investigation ends, you cut off the feed.”

  “But we’ll leave the damn equipment, Al. Talk about the ideal partnership between private and public sectors. One day you can run for mayor.”

  “Oh, great,” said Bayless. “How about just shoot me, now—Look, I’m sorry for being a pain, I just can’t promise more than I know I can.”

  “Do your best, Al. But quickly.”

  Bayless sipped his diet Sprite. “You seriously think it could happen again? Another shooting down there? ’Cause that would not be good.”

  “I can’t rule it out.”

  “Why?”

  “Better you don’t know, Al. Trust me.”

  “Damn … when I say it has to be done after hours I mean like one, two a.m. I’d have to come in, too.”

  “Pacific Dining Car’s open twenty-four hours. I’ll buy you a big steak afterward.”

  Bayless cracked his knuckles. His shoulders bunched but his eyes were submissive. “You bribing me, huh?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Bayless snorted. “I’m a slut, ready to bend over, and spread for prime rib?”

  “I was thinking the big surf-and-turf combo, that potato they have the size of Idaho, sour cream, chives, salsa if you’re into that. Also Martinis, wine, cognac with the dessert. My preference is the pecan pie. Goes well with cognac.”

  Bayless rolled his eyes. “I’m getting reflux just listening. Dining Car on Sixth Street or Santa Monica?”

  “Take your pick.”

  “It’s not a matter of food, Milo, but yeah, I’ll try to get it nailed down A-sap.”

  “Appreciate it, Al. And do let me buy you dinner.”

  “Thanks but no thanks,” said Bayless. “Stomach isn’t what it used to be and the idea of cholesterol clogging my pipes terrifies me—tell you what, bring some herb tea, I’ll supply the hot water.”

  “You’re destroying me, Al.”

  “Wish I was the man I used to be,” said Bayless. “Make it decaf chamomile, no mint, mint reminds me of toothpaste.”

  “Oh, Lord,” said Milo. “My mood’s dropping beyond Prozac territory.”

  “Hey,” said Bayless, “we actually save someone’s life, your mood’ll be fine.”

  CHAPTER

  23

  The purchase:

  1. Seven aluminum signs, @ $10.45 each, discount for quantity order: $65.84

  Yellow triangle within a white rectangle bearing a message:

  You’re on Film! CCTV Cameras in 24 Hour Use

  2. Ten Night Owl Security Cameras, @49.99 each, with discount: $449.91

  Subtotal: $515.75

  Ca. State Sales Tax @ 9.00%: $46.42

  Grand total: $562.17

  Milo wrote a personal check.

  I said, “The department wouldn’t have to pay sales tax.”

  “I’ll bring that up when I face Saint Peter.”

  Labor was free; Milo, Reed, Binchy, and I, all versed in the instructions and armed with tools from home.

  Al Bayless and a computer cop named Hal Wiggins made sure the signal fed to Bayless’s console upstairs as well as to Milo’s home and work computers.

  Bayless had made sure no cleaning crews would be on-site but despite that, when the installation was over and we rode up to his lobby-level office, we came face-to-face with a man and a woman toting cleaning supplies across the expanse of granite and marble.

  “What the hell.” Bayless barreled toward them.

  Terrified, the woman dropped a plastic bottle of glass spray. The man just gaped.

  Bayless said, “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Clean,” said the man, heavily accented, barely audible.

  “Without authorization?”

  “We always,” said the man.

  “What do you mean you always?”

  “Clean. Two time a week.”

  “Where?”

  “A’vent, thir’ floor.”

  “Advent Investments?” said Bayless.

  “Yeah.”

  “They bring their own crew in?”

  The man fished a key out of his pocket. Bayless snatched it. “This is for the delivery door out back. You do deliveries?”

  No answer.

  Bayless said, “No one goes in or out of the delivery door unless they’re accepting deliveries.”

  Silence.

  “Comprende?”

  “A’vent give,” said the man. He looked at the woman. She hadn’t taken her eyes off the bottle of glass spray.

  Bayless said, “Go pick that up before someone trips.”

  The woman scurried to comply.

  Bayless said, “Give me your company’s name.”

  The man fished out a business card.

  Bayless said, “Advent owns its own cleaning business?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You wait here while I check.” To Milo: “Keep an eye on these two.”

  The woman began to cry. The man said, “S’okay s’okay.”

  Milo’s smile did little to calm her. The rest of us hung back.

  Bayless returned a few minutes later. “Okay, apparently there’s an arrangement no one told me about. Good night, you two.”

  The couple stood there.

  “Go,” said Bayless. “But you’re not going to be able to use the delivery door anymore, I don’t care what someone told you. Comprende?”

  “Sí.”

  “At least someone gets something.”

  The couple hustled toward the freight elevato
r at the rear of the lobby.

  Milo said, “Who’s Advent?”

  “Subsidiary of the company that owns this place. They take up floors three and four.” He pointed to the directory. “Bastards, you’d think they’d tell me. You probably think I’m an idiot.”

  “I think you work for idiots.”

  “Ain’t that the truth—damn, this is worse than the damn department.”

  Milo clapped his back. “Don’t be hasty in your judgment.”

  Bayless looked ready to spit. “Spare me optimists and people with tiny dogs.”

  “What’s wrong with tiny dogs?”

  “They’re fine, it’s the people. My second wife owned a hairless mutt could fit in her purse. Liked me better than her. Ugly thing but it had good taste.”

  CHAPTER

  24

  Helping install the cameras got me home just before five a.m. I was sleeping six hours later when the phone rang.

  Milo said, “Late enough? I waited.”

  “You pulled an all-nighter?”

  “I crashed at home until nine, then a call came in from Earl Cohen, Corey’s lawyer. He wants to meet, wouldn’t say why.”

  “Where and when?”

  “An hour, mini-park at Doheny and Santa Monica.”

  “See you there.”

  “Hoped you’d say that.”

  The park was little more than a circle of grass centered by an old limestone fountain. A couple of homeless guys lolled, soaking up sun. A woman who looked like a personal trainer put her Labrador retriever through a workout.

  No seating; Beverly Hills’s idea of hospitality?

  I settled on the rim of the fountain and Milo joined me moments later. Soon after that, like a character in a stage play, Earl Cohen appeared, walking eastward from the residential streets of the Beverly Hills Flats, with a slow, unsteady trudge.

  Despite the sun, he wore a full-length black coat over dark slacks and sneakers. His white hair blew in the breeze. A couple of times he looked as if he’d fall. No cane; he used his arms for balance. When he finally reached us, he was breathing hard and sweating, the scooped-out section of his neck glossy and pallid as tapioca.