She looked up, surprised, and O’Neill saw the question run through her head before she worked out the obvious answer.
‘I’ve been okay. I guess it’s been playing on my mind. What you and your partner said about Ethan. About what he might have done. You do think he’s killed someone, don’t you?’
The correct answer was that she couldn’t comment. Or some well-practised play about procedure and process and an ongoing investigation. She looked at Marianne Ziegler’s tired eyes and decided to take a different path.
‘Yes. Yes, we do. We may be wrong, and we still have a lot of work to do, but we think it’s likely that your exhusband was directly involved in one or more homicides that we are currently investigating.’
‘One or more?’
‘Yes.’
‘My God. How . . . how many?’
‘I really don’t know. I couldn’t tell you if I did but I genuinely don’t know. We have a lot we still need to learn. And we need your help.’
Ziegler sat open-mouthed, tears not far away. For the first time, O’Neill noticed red scratch marks at her wrist and saw her reach for them again, left on right and right on left.
‘Anything. I’ll do anything I can. What do you need to know?’
‘We asked you before about the place that Ethan might have spoken about near Barstow and you told us about the waterpark he used to visit as a child – Lake Dolores.’
‘That was it. I knew it was a woman’s name.’
‘Right. That was a big help, Marianne. Really, it was. I’d like to ask you about some other places that Ethan might have had an attachment to. Do you think you might be able to pick some out if I ran them by you?’
‘I guess. Maybe. He was more of a talker in our early years together. Maybe some of that will have stuck with me. Are you going to tell me what these places are, why you’re asking about them?’
‘I’m sorry, but no. I will when I can, I promise you.’
Marianne blew out a long, slow song of air. ‘Okay. Okay. That’s um, okay. Try me.’
‘Thank you. How about the Vista Theater on Sunset? Do you remember Ethan ever mentioning it?’
‘The Vista? Sure. We went there together quite a lot. It was his favourite movie theatre in the city. He liked a couple of others, the Orpheum on South Broadway and sometimes the Aero in Santa Monica but the Vista was easily the number one choice. He hated the new cinemas, like the ArcLights. He’d much rather have watched an old movie in an old theatre than anything new in a new one.’
O’Neill felt her pulse quicken but told herself not to get ahead. It was one place.
‘That helps, Marianne. Thank you. What about the former Griffith Park Zoo? Was that somewhere that Ethan might have known well?’
Marianne’s eyes narrowed in confusion. ‘Yes. How do you know this?’
‘I don’t. We’re guessing a bit. But is it right? Was the old zoo somewhere that meant something to Ethan?’
‘Yes. Quite a lot. I really don’t understand what’s going on here. I don’t mind telling you I’m scared. This is overwhelming.’
‘I’m sure it is. And I don’t blame you for being scared. It’s a lot for you to take in. Tell me about the zoo. Please.’
The woman’s eyes were red now, but she nodded acceptance.
‘Ethan said the last memory he had of both his parents together was at the old zoo. It was just before they broke up and just before the zoo closed down. I think in his head, the two things were somehow linked. Like the ends of two eras. When he was older, in his teens and even once we were married, he’d hike up to the park and wander around there for hours.’
‘Did you ever go with him?’
‘Once. I really didn’t like it. It’s such a creepy place. The old enclosures and cages are still intact and it’s like a ghost town, except for animals. He knew I didn’t like it and he got angry, as if I wasn’t sharing in his thing. But it was weird how he liked the place and that freaked me out a bit too. We never went again but he’d go up there when he wanted to get away from things. Including me.’
‘Did he ever go there with anyone else? Maybe show people around the zoo?’
Marianne shrugged. ‘I think maybe, yes. Yes, he did. I didn’t pay much attention but one time I do remember him telling me how much someone had liked the place. I’ve no idea now who it was. I just remember him telling me as if pointing out that I’d been wrong. That was very Ethan.’
‘What about Angels Point?’
‘Where?’
The very question punctured O’Neill’s growing confidence that they were on to something.
‘Angels Point. It’s a lookout point in Elysian Park.’
Another shrug. ‘I’m sorry. No. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of it. Should I have?’
‘Perhaps not. It’s on a hiking trail. Was hiking a big thing for Ethan?’
‘Not really. The zoo was the only place I can remember him hiking to. I’m sorry, Detective. It might have been a place he went to, but I don’t remember him ever mentioning it.’
‘It’s a public art installation,’ she persevered. ‘A platform on the edge of the point? It directly overlooks Dodger Stadium.’
‘The Dodgers? Well, yes, in that case I wouldn’t be at all surprised. He was crazy about the Dodgers. Had been since he was a kid. A real ball team in a real ballpark, that’s what he always said. These new franchises and new stadiums, he’d get all angry and say how they weren’t real, just corporate America and all about the money. It didn’t matter to Ethan that the Dodgers had been ripped out of Brooklyn. They were in LA when he was born and that was all that mattered.
It wasn’t Angels Point at all, O’Neill realised. It was the stadium.
‘So, Ethan wasn’t a fan of change in the city?’
‘He wasn’t much of a fan of change, period. He always got very uncomfortable with it and would complain that there was no need for change, that things were better as they’d been. He used to say that Los Angeles was the centre of the world in the fifties and sixties, that it was the place that no one was from but where everyone wanted to be. But then LA kept reinventing itself, kept trying to become the thing it dreamed of without ever knowing what that was.’
‘Who did he blame for that?’
‘Apart from me? He blamed the chasers, that’s what he called them. The people who came out here and just added another car to the road, the ones who chased a dream with minimal chance of catching it. He blamed anyone who came after he did, anyone who changed things, built anything new or said anything new or did anything new. And that’s Los Angeles. It’s built on being different to what it was yesterday. Ethan used to say he loved LA, but the truth was he hated it and just didn’t know it. He loved something that wasn’t here anymore.’
O’Neill nodded sombrely, sure the women’s hostility and her answers were coming from the heart. But she wanted to be sure.
‘Can I ask you about another place, Marianne? El Coyote, the Mexican restaurant on Beverly Boulevard. Was that somewhere that Ethan might have had a connection to?’
Marianne looked doubtful then apologetic. ‘Well, I’m sure it’s the kind of place Ethan would have approved of, being around as long as it has, but I can’t say I remember him ever talking about it as if it held any special significance for him. I’m really sorry, Detective. I wish I could say differently. I’m not sure I remember him even mentioning the place.’
‘That’s fine, Marianne. Don’t worry about it at all. It doesn’t matter.’
It didn’t matter at all and O’Neill felt a stab of guilt at having tried to trick the woman, but she couldn’t take the chance that Marianne was simply saying yes to everything in the hope that it was what she wanted to hear.
‘Okay, let me try one more. There’s a hill in Altadena that the locals call Gravity Hill. Does that name mean anything to you?’
‘Oh God, yes. That’s the place where if you put your car in neutral on the slope it seems to roll up the hill when it’s actua
lly going down, right? It’s some trick of the landscape. That’s what Ethan told me. His dad took him up there in his Chrysler Valiant and pulled the trick on him. Ethan said it blew his mind, especially when his dad told him the stories about it being the ghosts of schoolkids that pushed them back up the hill. Ethan loved that, being how he was. His dad took him a bunch of times before Ethan finally figured out that it was something else at play. I had a young cousin visit from Missouri once, I think Tom was about twelve at the time, and Ethan drove him out to Altadena and showed him Gravity Hill. I thought that was a nice thing for him to do, although I wasn’t happy with him filling Tom’s head with the old stories of dead kids and told him so. He blew up at me, of course, raged at me for days, and told me I didn’t understand kids or anything else.’
Another box was ticked, and O’Neill made it a full set. Five locations that they knew of, four dump sites and a kidnap point, and all five were places that Garland had some sentimental attachment to from his youth.
Was there a sixth place? Yes, she’d no doubt that there was. The trick was going to be finding it. For that, they were going to need all the help that Marianne Ziegler could give them.
‘Marianne, you’ve been really helpful but I’m going to have to ask you for more. I need you to come back to the city with me tonight. Will you do that? We’ll put you up somewhere near headquarters, make you comfortable, and talk to you a lot. Okay?’
She nodded, resigned to whatever it would take.
‘Thanks, Marianne. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t so important. Let me ask you one more thing before we go. You said earlier how Ethan was such a big fan of the Dodgers. That he had been since he was a kid. But how did that happen? Did he ever say?’
‘It was his dad. His old man used to take him when he was a kid.’
His dad. Always his dad.
CHAPTER 39
Why are you talking to me, Matthew?
What do you mean?
You must know that chatting to me is going to get you caught.
It took a while to get an answer even though the screen showed he was writing. She guessed words being written, deleted and rewritten.
Maybe I want to get caught.
It took Narey by surprise and she turned to look at Dakers for confirmation. He pursed his lips and nodded. Could be. She pushed back in her chair and swore quietly before returning to the keyboard.
Well, Matthew, if you want to get caught, I can help you with that.
No answer. She tried again.
Why do you think you want to be caught?
I don’t. It was just a thought. I wonder why I do things sometimes.
Dakers leaned forward in his seat and Narey knew he was interested.
You feel guilty?
No.
Never?
Sometimes, yes. I don’t know. I don’t always know what guilt feels like. Not the way I think other people do.
Do you sometimes wish you hadn’t done it?
Sometimes. Afterwards. Not during. Never during.
She sensed he was open and took a chance.
What about Eloise Gray? Did you feel bad about killing her after it?
I didn’t say I killed her.
Did you?
Long pause.
Yes.
The jump in Narey’s chest was a cocktail. Anger. Satisfaction. Relief. Rage. She swallowed them down and typed.
Prove it to me. Where did you kill her?
Not the Highland Fling. Is that enough for you to know?
It was enough to know it was him, but it just begged more questions.
Tell me about Eloise. Why was she chosen?
She was careless. Made it easy. She left all this information about herself just lying around for anyone to see. He saw her on a dating site we both liked to trawl through. She seemed a likely candidate.
And what does that mean? A likely candidate.
There’s something we can see. A vulnerability, a need that can be exploited. Someone too trusting, too needy. It’s instinctive, maybe.
The smugness of the reply sickened her. Like he was claiming he had a superpower.
When Ethan saw that in her, he went looking for her elsewhere and found her. He looked at her Facebook page, her Twitter account, her Snapchat and Instagram. Her whole life laid out for the world to see. He took what he needed and made use of it.
So, she could have been anyone?
His response took a while. They thought he might be editing, but he was writing chapter and verse.
Anyone who made it that easy, yes. These people forget that they are in a shop window. The whole world is pressing their noses up against the glass, but they never notice. They talk about themselves as if no one else is listening. We’re all listening.
She could hear both his craziness and the sense in what he said. But she still wanted to believe there was more to it. That there was a reason, however illogical, however fucked up.
But why Eloise?
We are predators. Predators take victims. Eloise was a victim.
You utter piece of shit, she thought.
Do you want to know how she was when she died?
No.
She cried a lot. That was quite annoying. I don’t like that much. She cried, and she whimpered, and she begged. Begging I don’t mind. I actually like it when they beg, but the crying becomes a pain.
I don’t want to hear it. Where did you kill her?
I have a place I use. You’ll never find it.
She wanted to kill him. She wanted to rip his throat out. She wanted to tie him up, cut him till he bled to death.
Did you touch her? Sexually, I mean.
No. That’s not what I do.
So, it’s not sexual for you at all?
Pause.
Yes, it is. Probably. But I don’t touch them. I just get what I get from it without doing that. Sometimes, later, I think about it. When I’m alone.
The image that conjured up made her skin crawl.
You don’t get it, do you, Inspector? You don’t understand someone like me. Don’t understand someone like Ethan.
I don’t have to understand you. I don’t want to. And what do you think that is, ‘someone like you’? You keep saying it.
A long pause. Words written and rewritten.
I’m someone you’re never going to catch.
CHAPTER 40
Mike Durrant was a heavyset man of around seventy, broad shoulders and stomach hanging over his belt. His reddish beard had outlasted the hair on his head and the lines round his eyes suggested a man that laughed a lot. But not today.
When he saw Marianne Ziegler for the first time since her wedding day, he smiled warmly and took a step forward, then stopped as if unsure whether to proceed. Marianne stood and moved towards him, both offering then withdrawing a handshake, before transitioning into an awkward hug.
‘It’s been a long time, Marianne. You’re looking good.’
‘It sure has. Thanks, Mike. And you too. You haven’t changed at all.’
He smiled kindly. ‘Well, we both know that’s not true but let’s pretend it is. Are you doing okay?’
She hesitated, trying to work out if she was or not.
‘Yeah. I think I am. It’s been a lot to take in at once.’
It was Durrant’s turn to pause. ‘So, you know what’s going on? Because I sure as hell don’t. I know it’s got something to do with Ethan, but no one’s told me shit.’
Marianne turned to look helplessly at the two detectives. It couldn’t and wouldn’t be her who told him. O’Neill nodded, she’d deal with it.
‘Mr Durrant, why don’t you take a seat?’
‘Am I going to need one?’
‘Please. Just sit and we’ll talk.’
And they did. And Durrant listened, often with his mouth hanging open. He leaned forward in his chair, scratched at his beard and his thinning hair, and turned to look at Marianne for confirmation. All sure signs of growing confusion and nervousne
ss.
Through it all, he didn’t say a word, letting his body language do the talking for him, until Salgado explained the reason for their urgency. The kidnap victim. The ticking clock.
‘Shit.’
By now he was pale, wide-eyed and shaking. When Salgado asked if he was ready to talk and help them with anything he knew, he nodded numbly.
They started him off by going over some of the ground Durrant had already covered with the Carson City sheriff, easing him into it. The family holidays, the tension between his father and his uncle, Ethan’s relationship with his mother.
‘Mike, when you met him that last time in LA, you say Ethan told you he was busy with a new partnership. Did he tell you anything else about what that partnership was all about?’
‘Nope. I got the feeling he regretted even mentioning it.’
‘What about you, Marianne? Would you know what he might have been talking about?’
Ziegler shook her head. ‘I guess it could have been a business thing, but I don’t remember anything. And I guess it could have been another woman, but I seriously doubt it.’
They doubted it too. It was Marr. It had to be.
‘Mike, you told the Carson City sheriff that Ethan blamed his mom. Was that always how he talked about her?’
Durrant looked uncomfortable but nodded. ‘Look, it’s not an easy thing to say.’ He paused and looked at Marianne. ‘Or an easy thing to hear, I guess, but Ethan hated his mother. Maybe not initially but definitely as he got older, after his father left. He blamed her for Zac leaving. He blamed her for everything, including killing herself. You probably don’t want to hear this, Marianne, but Ethan used to call his mother a whore. It was the word he used most often about her and, for my money, it came straight out of his father’s mouth.’
Marianne nodded, sadly. ‘Ethan didn’t talk about his mother a lot. But when he did . . . let’s just say there was a ton of suppressed animosity. Sometimes not so suppressed. If he was lashing out at me then I’d get compared to her. And it wasn’t pretty. Believe me, I’ve heard the word whore before.’
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