The Bequest
Page 3
Nicole awoke to the phone ringing on her night table. It was dark out, and her alarm clock said 6:00. For a moment, she wasn’t sure if it was morning or night.
She picked up the phone and croaked, “Hello?”
“Nicky?” It was Stephanie, her sister. “My god! You sound awful. My friend Becka just called. Take a look at XHN. Did you know that the detective who works for your firm got murdered?”
“Yeah, I know.” Nicole said. “XHN? Hang on, let me look.” She went to the second bedroom, which she used as an office, and turned on her computer. While she was waiting for it to load, she told her sister about finding Robert’s body. XHN—the acronym for the tabloid website Extra Hot News—popped up on her browser. Sure enough, Robert’s death was the lead story. The headline read: “Hero Ex-Cop Slain in Multimillion Dollar Mansion.” There was a picture of Robert in dress uniform from his days on the LAPD, and another shot of the house, taken from the back. The paparazzi must have climbed down through a neighbor’s yard to a spot below Robert’s property. He’d used a wide angle shot, and the house looked enormous.
A link labeled “Police Activity at Crime Scene” was next to the photos. When she clicked it, a video appeared, showing the police and crime scene workers in front of the house. Toward the end, it focused in on Sargosian escorting her to his car. Watching it, she was glad he’d warned her not to look at the cameras. A caption popped up, reading: “Mystery woman escorted from murder scene.”
The story alluded to several things about Robert’s police career that Nicole hadn’t known. He’d been cited for bravery and had solved several big cases. As for the house, XHN said he’d bought it seven years before. There was no mortgage on the property, which meant he owned it outright. The house was valued at $3.9 million. It said that police had questioned a woman at the scene and released her.
The story also went into Robert’s work for Bascomb, Rice, Smith & Di Angelo, “the city’s most prestigious white-shoe law firm.” Then in the next paragraph, the article said, “Police refused to comment on speculation that the murder might be related to organized crime, but the assassination-style murder, a single shot to the head, is typical of a paid hit, such as those used by organized crime. No weapon was found at the scene. XHN’s calls to the law firm, asking for comment, were not returned.”
“My god! How could they possibly find all this so fast?” Nicole said. “Listen, Steph, I’ve got to go. Someone has to get the partners to issue a statement.”
Stephanie was still stuck on the XHN images. “Is that you in the video? I’d never have recognized you.” Then, Stephanie added, “But what happened on your trip? This morning your message said it was a disaster. Did you guys break up?”
“Reinhardt never showed,” Nicole said. “I spent six days waiting. He didn’t call or answer my messages. Look, I have to go. When I’m done, I’ll come over to your place and we’ll talk.”
Three
Nicole called the office just in time to catch Di Angelo as he was leaving for the day. She told him that the firm needed to make a statement to the press about Robert’s death. She urged him to offer a reward for the capture and conviction of the person responsible. Somewhat impatiently, Di Angelo said, “Yes, yes,” then added, “I have to go. We have tickets for the opera. This will have to wait until tomorrow.”
“The sooner we get something out, the better,” she said. “One of the tabloids suggested it was a mob hit and mentioned Robert’s connection with our firm. They also said the firm didn’t return their calls. It will be in the Times tomorrow. We need a statement saying how important Robert was to the firm and that we’re giving the police our full cooperation. Maybe offer a reward for information leading to—you know. I’ll write it and send it to you. I think we have a couple of hours before the Times’ deadline.”
Di Angelo, like the rest of the attorneys she worked with, didn’t regard a call from a journalist worthy of a response. Quite the opposite. His first instinct was to dodge phone calls until the reporter’s deadline passed in the hope of avoiding being mentioned at all. “I appreciate what you’re saying, Nicole,” Di Angelo said. “But one day won’t make that much difference. Now, will it?”
She knew from his condescending tone that he wasn’t about to listen. If she’d learned anything on this job, it was not to argue with the firm’s attorneys. Few of them were satisfied with just winning an argument—which they invariably did, having been trained for this very thing in law school. They also felt the need to stamp the dissenter into the carpet.
“Tomorrow, then,” she said.
After hanging up, she got dressed, packed a small overnight case, and headed for her sister’s apartment in West Hollywood. The two sisters had been through a lot together in the last year: Nicole’s divorce and, around the same time, the sudden death of their father from a heart attack. He’d been in debt, and his daughters had ended up paying for the funeral. They’d had a good relationship before, but these recent events had brought them even closer.
Stephanie met Nicole at the door and pulled her into a hug. “Oh, Nicole,” she said. “Nobody deserves such a crappy week.” Arnold, Nicole’s Australian terrier, who had been staying with Stephanie, rushed up to Nicole and started jumping on her, barking excitedly. Then he turned and rushed down the steps, headed for Nicole’s car. Clearly, he thought he was going home. The two women ran after him, catching him before he got to the busy street. Nicole picked him up and carried him inside.
Stephanie ushered Nicole into her living room where two glasses of red wine were waiting on the coffee table.
“Here, drink up,” Stephanie said, handing a glass to Nicole. They both took seats on the worn couch with Arnold between them, his head on Nicole’s lap. The women took a moment to get comfortable, Nicole tucking her legs under her and Stephanie reclining with her long legs stretched out in front.
Stephanie wanted to know more about the murder. “What did his body look like? Was it really gross?”
Nicole went through the whole story—the murder scene, Robert’s huge house, the paparazzi, the police detective’s hostile questions, and the way Sargosian had rescued her from the photographers.
When Nicole was done, Stephanie said, “And what about Reinhardt? Have you heard from him yet?”
“Not a thing,” Nicole said. “I left him word every way I could think of, but I haven’t heard back. When I first met him, and he told me he was divorced, he said women can’t take the uncertainty of his line of work. Now I know what he meant.
“On our trip to Majorca in October,” she went on, “that last night, he planned a romantic dinner on the beach. We were just starting to eat, when he got a phone call. It was brief, not even a minute. Then he got up and said he had to go. When I went back to the room, his things were still there. A few hours later, he sent me a message explaining that the hotel bill was paid, so I didn’t have to bother with checkout. He also told me to leave his things, that someone would be sent to get them.
“I hadn’t really heard from him since, except for a few impersonal messages. I had the feeling they were relayed through someone else. And he never responded to my messages asking if we could set up a call on Skype. At that point, I wondered if I’d ever hear from him again. Then, a couple of weeks ago, I got a message telling me to meet him in London, and he sent me a ticket. In all this time, we haven’t talked by phone. Before Majorca, we used to Skype almost daily.”
“Do you think he’s gone off you?” Steph said.
Nicole was silent, mulling it over. “He doesn’t play games. He’d tell me. Maybe it’s his work or something’s happened to him.”
“What are you going to do?”
“What can I do? Sometimes I’m really mad and other times I’m just so damned worried. I guess I’ll have to wait to hear from him, or not. Whatever comes next.”
“You don’t seem that broken up about it,” Stephanie said. “I thought you were in love with him.”
“I thought I was, too
. The problem is that he’s so damned unknowable. I mean, he can be very romantic, and he’s great in bed. But most of the time, it’s like he’s a million miles away, and I haven’t a clue what he’s thinking. Maybe I was starting to accept the inevitable, even before this last trip.”
The two of them were silent for a bit. Then Stephanie announced, “I’m hungry. How about you?” Nicole shook her head, but Stephanie got up and started poking in her refrigerator for something to eat. Finally, she gave up and sent out for pizza.
While they waited for the food to arrive, Stephanie refilled their glasses and settled back on the couch. “So tell me more about the dead guy,” she said. “You never talked about him. Did you know him very well?”
“I guess I never thought about him much outside the office,” Nicole said. “But I did work with him, and I knew him as well as anyone can know a complete introvert. He’s the one who taught me how to do investigative work. You remember. I wanted to add some variety to my job, so I asked one of the partners if he minded if I helped Robert out when my work was slow. He didn’t, but Robert did. In the beginning, he didn’t like it one bit. I pretended not to notice how rude he was when he wasn’t completely ignoring me. But he finally came around. After that we worked well together, and I could tell he appreciated my help.
“Basically, he was a strange bird. Very closed off. Barely talked to anyone else in the office. He seemed completely oblivious to what was going on around him. But the entire time, he was taking it all in. He was a world-class eavesdropper and knew everything that happened: the affairs, the plots, the backstabbings. He knew a lot about the cases our attorneys were handling, which I never heard much about. He’d tell me stuff when we had our occasional lunch. I was surprised to find out how much was going on under my nose. He was a good mimic, too. He’d repeat conversations he’d overheard. We’d both have a good laugh.”
As Nicole thought about Robert and his solitary life, a tear ran down her cheek. “You know,” she said, “it’s just so damned sad. I think I may have been the only friend he had, and I didn’t know him at all.” She paused, then added, “And he did the weirdest thing. I found out that he left his company life insurance to me.”
“He did? How much is it?” Stephanie said.
“Forty-thousand dollars. Not a fortune, but a nice chunk of change. You know how I’ve been struggling to make the mortgage payments since the divorce, and the money will come in handy. But I wish he hadn’t done it. It will make people think there was more to our friendship than there was. And something about it just feels wrong.”
“How so?” Stephanie said. “If he didn’t have any family, and you were his only friend.”
“I can’t explain,” Nicole said. “It just feels…” she struggled to think of the right word. “Creepy.”
The pizza came, and they ate. Nicole was all talked out. Stephanie poured them more wine while she chattered about the eclectic combination of freelance jobs that kept her afloat. She wrote grant proposals for half a dozen nonprofits, composed and assembled press packets for little theaters, ghosted book reviews for self-published authors, and even, at one low point, did telephone sex. The latter she’d given up, mainly because of the disapproval of family and friends. But she said it was the easiest work she’d ever had and the best paid. The only problem was keeping herself from laughing at her clients and the sounds she had to make to simulate sexual pleasure.
She’d been out of college for almost six years and had never looked for a permanent job because, she insisted, she liked the freedom this arrangement gave her. It was hard for Nicole to understand. Stephanie was stuck in a tiny, rundown apartment. Her car was ancient and unreliable. She was always worried about money and scrambling for new gigs when the old ones inevitably ended.
Nicole dozed off as her sister talked. She woke up when Stephanie jostled her shoulder. “It’s 10:00, sleepyhead,” Stephanie said. “Let’s get you to bed.”
Nicole woke up around 5:00 a.m. in her sister’s second bedroom—an untidy combination guest room and office.
The dog followed her while she brushed her teeth, retrieved her iPad from its charger, and tiptoed into Stephanie’s tiny kitchen. Stephanie and her two cats were still asleep. Nicole fed Arnold, then made coffee.
She sat down at the table and turned on her iPad to wait for the L.A. Times website to load. There, the front page screamed a headline almost identical to the one XHN had run the day before: “LAPD Hero Slain in Sunset Hills Mansion.” Along with the photo of Robert in his LAPD uniform, the story held many of the same details she’d seen on the web, although it qualified some of the unverified facts, attributing them to XHN.
Nicole scrolled down to finish the story and was startled to see a photo of the building where the law firm’s offices were, along with one of Robert’s house.
Just then Stephanie walked into the kitchen. “You see the Times?” Steph said.
“I’m just reading it,” Nicole said.
The Times provided a bit more detail about Robert’s work as a detective on vice than the tabloids had. “Blair was recognized in 2006 by the Los Angeles mayor for discovering a shipping container with forty women, all illegal immigrants. Two were dead from starvation. The FBI took over the case, and three accused human traffickers were convicted of murder and false imprisonment, as well as immigration-law violations. They received long prison sentences. Blair also uncovered a network of businessmen who lured young girls into prostitution. “He was one of the finest of our finest,” said LAPD Chief Ray Spalding.
“It is unknown,” the story went on, “how Blair could afford a multi-million dollar house. He was an investigator at the law firm of Bascomb, Rice, Smith & Di Angelo in Century City. Investigators generally earn…”
She closed the iPad and stood up. “OK, Steph. I’m going in early to write that statement for the press.”
She got to work around 6:30 a.m., when the office was still deserted. As soon as she walked in, she spotted the flowers on her desk, an extravagant arrangement of yellow roses, white lilies, and blue delphiniums. She knew right away they were from Reinhardt. The arrangement was larger and more striking than any he’d sent before. With a rush of relief, she plucked the card from where it was stuck between the blossoms. But the message was identical to the notes that always accompanied his flowers: “With all my love, R.” No explanation, no apology. Here was yet more disappointment. This told her nothing about why he’d stood her up. Worse yet, for the first time, she realized that the flowers she received every couple of weeks were a standing order—not a spontaneous gesture that meant he was thinking of her.
She crumpled up the note and threw it in the wastebasket. Then she went to work on the firm’s statement for the press. She included an offer of a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Robert’s murderer. When she was done, she emailed a copy to each of the firm’s senior partners for their approval. Three of them would ignore the message, but Di Angelo would read it and get back to her.
She was catching up on her own email—several hundred had stacked up since she went away—when the staff began arriving. Most of them stepped into her office to say how sorry they were about Robert or to ask how she was doing. She realized, with some dismay, that they were treating her as if she were the bereaved. They really did think she and Robert were involved. She flushed at the thought. Had there been gossip about them in the office because they lunched together sometimes? More likely it was because he was so unfriendly to everyone else.
Every time she looked up from her work, she noticed a couple of coworkers staring at her. They’d quickly look away, and their attention was making her uncomfortable. Finally, she got up and went to Di Angelo’s office.
“I saw the Times this morning,” he said. “I didn’t like the way they hinted about mob connections and mentioned the firm in the next sentence. It makes us look bad. Your statement is fine. Go with it.”
“Is the $50,000 reward OK?”
Nicole stared at him. “Why?” she said. “I’m perfectly OK. There’s no reason for me to take off work.”
“I’m just afraid the press is going to come around and start bothering you,” he said. “You know, disrupting things.”
“We have security outside. Nobody can even get into our elevator bank. Besides, if they’re writing about the law firm, they’ll be doing that whether I’m here or not.”
“You have a point. Let’s see how it goes. We’ll revisit it in a day or two.”
Instead of going back into her office, she stood in front of the glass partition and announced to the staff, “If any of you have questions about Robert’s death, I’ll be happy to answer them.” Most of them had noticed her return from the partner’s office and were watching her. Now the others looked up.
“I don’t know much more than what you’ve seen in the news,” she added, “but I’ll try to answer what I can.”
There were a few solicitous questions—“How are you?” and “What was it like finding him?”
Then someone said, “Is there going to be a funeral?”
“Robert didn’t have family, so I imagine the firm will take care of arrangements, but we can’t do anything until they release the body. I have no idea when that will be.”
Then one of the paralegals raised the question that was on everyone’s mind. “Were you and Robert friends or what?”
“We were just friends. Nothing more,” she said. “I don’t think my love life is anybody’s business, but I was never involved with Robert. I am seeing someone who lives in England.” She gestured toward the flowers in her office. “I think most of you know about that.”