Compulsion (8 page)

“So this is within her usual pattern.”

“Does that mean you won’t do anything?”

“No, I’ll look into it, ma’am. Did Beth Holloway say how Katrina happened to be separated from her friends?”

“She did after I asked twice. The plan was for Rianna to be the designated driver but they went in Katrina’s car because this Rianna girl’s car was broken. Rianna and Beth got picked up by two men and asked Katrina if it was okay for them to go their separate ways. They claim Katrina was fine with that. That’s the last time they saw her.”

“You have doubts that Katrina was fine with the change?”

“My daughter does not take well to disappointment, Lieutenant. Low frustration tolerance her teachers called it. What concerns me is that she decided to do them one better by meeting a man herself. Then ran off to God-knows-where.”

“Without her passport.”

“If you’re out for fun, you can find it anywhere,” said Monica Hedges. Relaxing her posture for a second, as if reminiscing.

Milo said, “Rianna being the designated driver meant Katrina was drinking that night.”

“And Katrina loves her Long Island Iced Teas. Which is a hodgepodge cocktail, just a kitchen-sink mess that does God-knows-what to your brain. I always tell her stick with the classics, they won’t pollute your mind. Martini or Manhattan, never on the rocks. That way you know how much you’re getting. But try telling Katrina that. To her, anything with fruit liquor and a kick is a Martini.”

“Has she been known to overindulge?”

Monica Hedges shifted her weight. “That has happened from time to time.”

“You’re concerned she might have driven home intoxicated.”

“What if God forbid she had an accident? But I called the highway patrol and they reported nothing on the freeway that night.”

“Is the 405 her customary route home?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Easiest way to get to the Valley, isn’t it?” Frowning. “She used to have a place near the U. that she shared with another girl – some Indian student who hit the books all the time. Which isn’t Katrina’s style, it didn’t last long. Katrina complained that everyone in the building was a student and it made her feel old. I suspect her own lack of education embarrassed her. I was hoping that might motivate her but it didn’t. She wanted her own place, said the rent this side of the hill was too steep. I told her I’d help. She never took me up on my offer, just picked up and moved to Van Nuys. Though she keeps insisting it’s Sherman Oaks. Is that logical, Lieutenant? Turning down a sincere offer?”

“Kids,” said Milo.

Monica Hedges puffed manically. “You didn’t answer my question. What
exactly
are you going to do for me?”

“What would you like us to do, Mrs. Hedges?”

That startled her. Ashes dropped to the granite floor. “I’d like you to
detect
where my daughter is. Use that computer you’ve got – tracking airline tickets, credit card receipts, phone usage. Put out one of those APBs.”

“Ma’am, without evidence of a crime, that would be an invasion of Katrina’s privacy.”

“Oh,
puleeze,
” said Monica Hedges.

“Sorry, ma’am, but that’s the way it is. If she were a minor, it would be different.”

“Psychologically, she’s about fourteen.”

Milo smiled.

“You’re telling me there’s
nothing
you can do?”

“We’ll do everything we can, legally. That means talking to her friends, stopping by the club-”

“I already did all that.”

“Sometimes repetition helps, ma’am. We’ll also look for her car. Is she still driving the yellow Mustang that’s currently registered to her?”

“Yes, but not for long. I just got a notice that she’s missed the last two payments. That loan I
did
co-sign for. The agreement was I made the down payment and the payments were to be her responsibility.”

“Give me the finance-company data and I’ll see if it’s been picked up.”

“I did that myself, and no, it hasn’t.”

“Sounds like you’ve accomplished a lot.”

“Want something done well, do it yourself. So that’s all you’re going to do? It doesn’t sound very promising.”

“Let’s start and see where it leads, Mrs. Hedges. Call me anytime if you think of something.”

“Oh, I will, you’d better believe I will.”

She got to her feet, hurried to the door, held it open.

Milo said, “I’m going to ask you one more question that might alarm you, but it’s only routine, in case we do come across accident reports.”

Monica Hedges straightened and sucked on her cigarette. “What?”

“Do you know Katrina’s blood type?”

“That is… eerie.”

“Just routine, ma’am.”

“Some routine you people have,” said Monica Hedges. “I certainly wouldn’t want
your
job.”

Milo smiled. “Most people don’t.”

“And I’m one of them… her type is the same as mine. O-positive. It’s the most popular.”

She smoked and watched us walk to the elevator. As we stepped into the lift, I heard her say, “
There
you are,
darling.
Is everything
working
?”

The door slammed.

Milo had asked the condo valet to keep the unmarked close. When we got to the front of the building it was gone and the valet was poking a BlackBerry.

A high-decibel throat clear made the man look up.

“The Crown Victoria?”

“Had to move it, too crowded.”

No other cars in sight.

Milo said, “Could you get it?” Adding a “Please” that made the valet flinch.

The guy ambled off toward the subterranean parking lot.

Milo said, “The Shonsky girl’s been missing over a week, Mommie Dearest sees it as playing hooky, wants me to be her personal truant officer.”

“Or she’s in deep denial.”

“She says she’s nervous but all I heard was anger.”

“Anger can mask anxiety,” I said.

He looked at his Timex. “Where’d the hell he park it, Chula Vista… First Tony and his mom and Hochswelder, now this harmonious bunch. Any happy families left?”

“With our jobs we’re not going to meet them.”

“So what do you think of our missing girl? With her history of cutting town on impulse, how far do I take it?”

“O-positive,” I said. “Same as in the Bentley.”

“Didn’t you hear Mom? It’s the most
popular
type. Like it’s a contest. Growing up with someone like that, I can see needing to escape.”

“That kind of rivalry could also make Katrina vulnerable.”

“To what?”

“Bling. Mom marries rich but Katrina works a low-paying job. If she left the club woozy and feeling abandoned by her pals, two hundred grand worth of car rolling up would’ve seemed heaven-sent. Talk about something to one-up Mommy.”

“
If
she was picked up, I don’t see it happening at the Light My Fire. I was there last year, chasing a dead lead on a drug murder. The male clientele’s acrylic shirts, too much hair gel, and dance moves worse than mine. Someone drives up in Heubel’s Bentley, the bouncers and everyone else would’ve noticed, and by the time the guy hit the floor, fifty women woulda been all over him.”

He phoned the club, asked to speak to the manager, looked at his watch again, scowled. The line clicked in. A brief conversation followed.

“Guy laughed, said what do you think this is, the Playboy Mansion? He also said nothing unusual happened at the club that night, he already said so to the ‘nosy mother.’”

“If Katrina was upset about being ditched by her friends, she could’ve hit another club, tried to redeem the night. Or she drove home drunk, had some sort of mechanical problem. We just heard she’s impulsive. And she’d stopped making payments on the Mustang. Both of which raise the chance of poor maintenance. For all we know, she simply ran out of gas, got stranded somewhere.”

“Drunk girl, alone late at night, Mr. Moneybags cruises by and says hop in. Or she’s in Hawaii.”

“She guarded her privacy with her mother,” I said, “but her friend worried enough to call Mom.”

“Breaking down on the 405, even late, someone would’ve seen her.”

“With several drinks in her, she could’ve been intimidated by the freeway, chose an alternate route.”

“Or she got totally lost and headed south, Alex. Which could’ve put her in some seriously nasty territory.”

“Why not start with the simplest assumption? When I’m heading north and want to avoid the freeway, I take the Sepulveda Pass. Late at night, once you get north of Sunset, it’s a fast ride, pretty much empty. But that also means breaking down in an isolated area.”

Engine noise sounded from the mouth of the sub-lot. The same valet rolled up in a baby-blue Jaguar sedan, got out and stood by the driver’s door.

Milo walked over to him. “If you insist.”

The valet said, “Huh?”

“I’ll take it in trade if you throw in the extended warranty.”

The valet gaped. Milo got an inch from his face. “Where’s the Crown Vic, friend?”

“I got a call from a resident.”

Milo took out his cell phone. “Want me to call you, too? What’s your number, pal. And while you’re at it, show me some I.D. for an official police investigation.”

The valet didn’t answer.

Milo flashed his shield. “Get it
now.
”

“Mr. and Mrs. Lazarus are coming out in a-”

“I’ll help ’em.
Go.
”

The valet hazarded eye contact. Whatever he saw made him scurry off.

Milo eyed the Jaguar. “Budget wheels,
pshaw.
If Katrina did break down and got picked up, think Mr. Bentley Thief was stalking her?”

“Or cruising for a victim and she fit his appetite.”

“Sexual psychopath,” he said. “What’s the link with Ella Mancusi?”

I said, “Thrill of the hunt.”

“Guess so. Normally, I’d kiss Katrina off as not worth my time. But with two big black cars boosted and blood in the damn Bentley…” He shook his head. “Let’s try to find the Mustang.”

An elderly couple exited the condo, saw him standing next to the Jag. Stopped.

He grinned. “Evening, Mr. and Mrs. Lazarus.” Opening both doors with a flourish, he said, “Have a great time.”

The couple approached the car nervously. Got in, sped off.

Seconds later, the valet roared up in the unmarked and screeched to a stop. Milo took his hand, opened it, and slapped a five in his palm.

“Not necessary,” said the valet.

“Nor deserved. Have a nice life.”

We drove the Sepulveda Pass north all the way to the Valley’s southern border just shy of Ventura Boulevard, continued a few miles beyond. North of Wilshire was the low, flat stretch of veterans’ cemetery, then small businesses and apartments. After that, rolling hillside topped by lights. Traffic was thin. No sign of Katrina Shonsky’s car.

As we returned to the city, Milo said, “Oh, well. If I liked the simple life, I’d be a farmer.”

“There’s always south,” I said.

“A hundred and fifty miles’ worth to Mexico.”

I looked up at the foothills to the east. “Plenty of side streets to explore.”

“What a fun guy,” he growled, turning right and cruising several dark, winding roads.

An hour later: “I’ll have patrol follow up tomorrow, try to get hold of Katrina’s girlfriends. For all we know, they’ll tell us a whole different story. Like she’s with some bum Mommy wouldn’t approve of. And don’t bring up O-positive anymore. I’m not feeling popular.”

Light butterscotched the windows of Robin’s studio out back. I walked past the pond, stopped to check out the baby koi. The antique iron pagoda lights reached down to the floor, giving an easy view of the fish. Three, four inches long, now. Bobbing merrily in the current set off by the waterfall.

I’d first spotted them as larva-sized hatchlings. A dozen little scraps of fishy filament, swimming fearlessly among two-foot-long adults. Koi will eat their own eggs but once the young are born, they’ll never inflict harm. Unlike other fish, they don’t harass sick or dying cohorts. Maybe that’s why they can live over a century.

I continued to the studio, rapped the window. Robin looked up from her bench and smiled. Placed a white rectangle of Alpine spruce to her ear and tapped. Searching for the tones that told her the wood might be suitable as a soundboard. From the size of the plank, a mandolin board.

Her expression as she placed it to the side said no such luck. By the time I entered, she had another piece in hand. Blanche nestled in her lap, serene as ever.

Robin said, “Hi.” Blanche let out a wheezy bulldog welcome.

When Robin kissed me, Blanche turned her head sideways in that bulldog way and nuzzled my hand.

I said, “A blonde and a redhead.”

“Aren’t you the lucky one.”

I eyed the discarded spruce. “No music in there?”

“Even though
he’d
never know the difference.” She eyed a FedEx box in the corner. “Learn anything about that poor old woman?”

“The working assumption is the son had something to do with it but there’s nothing even close to proof.”

“A son doing that to his mother,” she said. “Beyond belief.”

She eyed the box in the corner again.

I said, “New tools?”

“Collection of DVDs. From Dot-com. Ten Audrey Hepburn movies and a note that said I remind him of her.”

Hepburn had been five seven and built like a human clothes hanger. Robin’s five three on a good day, curvy everywhere you look.

“You’re both gorgeous.”

She flexed her fingers, the way she does when she’s edgy.

“Has he ever been inappropriate?”

“Not really.”

“Not really?”

“When I met him at the luthiery show he was a little touchy, but nothing you could say was out of line.”

“Well, then,” I said. “Audrey Hepburn made some good flicks.”

“I’m overreacting, huh?”

“He could be working on a few fantasies. Happens all the time.”

“What do you mean?”

“Men are always looking at you. You’ve got the X factor – pheromones, whatever.”

“Oh, sure.”

“It’s true. You never notice because you’re not a flirt.”

“Because I’m a space cadet?”

“Sometimes that, too.”

“Alex,” she said, “I’ve never come
close
to dropping a hint that this was anything other than business.”

“It needn’t have anything to do with you.”

“Great.”

“Hey,” I said, “what’s the worst that can happen? He makes a move and you gently deter him. Meanwhile you can e-mail him a friendly but formal thank-you note for the movies and tell him you and I are going to enjoy watching them.”

She stroked Blanche. “You’re right, I’m being silly. As they used to say in seventh grade,
conceited.
” She touched a hoop earring. Tossed her hair. Much better from her than from Tony Mancusi.

I played with the top button of her shirt.

She said, “Factor X, huh? Does that make you Mr. Y?”

We picked out two movies and watched from bed.
Roman Holiday
had held up beautifully over half a century.
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
hadn’t and when
The End
finally arrived, we were half asleep.

Cutting the lights, we touched fingertips. I murmured something I’m pretty sure was affectionate.

Robin said, “Audrey Hepburn was beautiful but I’m nothing like her,” and was out.

At ten the next morning, I picked Milo up at the station and drove to Barneys in Beverly Hills.

The ground floor was skinny girls hawking cosmetics. A blonde specializing in nail polish pointed out Rianna Ijanovic.

Tall, narrow brunette, one station down.

She smiled at us through a fragrant cloud. An array of sample atomizers adorned the counter. Shoppers and shopgirls chattered. Everyone chasing the next big thing in self-improvement. Milo identified himself and Rianna responded with the blank, frightened look of a toddler thrown off course.

She was thirty or so, pale and square-shouldered with hard, black eyes, optimistic breasts, and a face rescued from beauty by an off-kilter nose and a too-sharp chin.

“Police? I don’t understand.”

Milo said, “We’re here about Katrina Shonsky.”

“Oh, oh.” It came out
aw, aw.
Faint accent, barely audible over the magpie chorus.

“Could we talk somewhere quiet?”

Rianna Ijanovic tapped another perfume sprayer on the shoulder. “
Cawver
for me, okay?”

We left the department store through the front door on Wilshire, walked around the corner to Camden Drive, passed the entrance to the parking lot.

Milo said, “Ijanovic. Czech?”

“Croatian. I’m legal.”

“Even if you weren’t, it wouldn’t matter. We’re here about Katrina, that’s all.”

“I only know Katrina through another girl.”

“Beth Holloway?”

“Yes.”

“We tried Beth first, but she’s not working today and we don’t have a home number.”

“You wouldn’t find her at home,” said Rianna Ijanovic.

“Where is she?”

“Torrance. She met a man.” Sticking out her tongue.

“You don’t approve?” said Milo.

“I have an opinion, she has an opinion.”

“Are we talking about the same guy she met the night you two went clubbing with Katrina?”

“Yes.”

Milo said, “I heard you met a guy, too.”

Rianna Ijanovic’s black eyes narrowed. “Who told you?”

“Katrina’s mother. Beth told her.”

“Beth talk talk talk.” Folding a hand into a silhouette duck, she flapped her thumb against her index finger.

Milo said, “If Katrina’s hiding something from her mother, we couldn’t care less. Knowing right at the outset would save a lot of hassle.”

“I don’t know about secrets.”

“What’d you just mean about Beth talking too much?”

“I am private person,” said Rianna. “Beth is very American – no offense. Share everything.”

“Any reason Beth shouldn’t have been open with Katrina’s mother?”

“Maybe,” she said, gazing past us.

“What’s that?”

“Katrina hates her mother.”

“Katrina said that?”

“Many times.”

“Rianna, do you have any idea where Katrina is?”

“Uh-uh, sorry, no.”

“And the last time you saw her was…”

“That night.”

“At the Light My Fire.”

“Yes.”

“Tell us about that night.”

“We went to the club, I was the driver, not to drink. Beth met Sean. Sean’s brother is Matt. Beth wanted to be with Sean so I had to be with Matt.”

“Had to.”

“She’s a friend.”

“Where are Sean and Matt from?”

“Torrance,” she said. “They are brothers. Say they own surfboard business. What they own is nothing. Sean make surfboards in a factory. Matt want to be an actor.” She hooked a thumb at the department store. “Everybody here gonna be movie star or model.”

“You, too?”

“No, no, no. I want to
work.
”

“What’d you do in Croatia?”

“Architecture student.”

“So you and Beth left with Sean and Matt. And went…”

“To Torrance.” Another tongue-stick. “I call cab to go home, cost so much money.”

“What time was this?”

“Four in the morning.”

“And Beth?”

“She stay there,” said Rianna. “She mostly there now.”