Grievous Sin (29 page)

“Good.”

“So what did Leek McKay have to say for himself?”

Decker sat on a buckskin chair. Ginger, who had been in the kitchen, made her entrance, prancing over to Decker, then sitting at his feet. He petted the setter’s gleaming fur. “Good to see you still remember me.”

The sarcasm went unnoticed by the animal.

He said, “Well, he admitted embezzling petty cash from the old folks. He also admitted looking the other way when Tandy started using his license number.”

“What about lifting Tandy’s employment records from Golden Valley?”

“He claims he doesn’t have them. He doesn’t know what happened to them. I told him that wasn’t what I asked. I asked him if he filched them. He hemmed and hawed, and the upshot is, he thinks Tandy lifted the records herself.”

“How?”

“Leek didn’t want to go into detail. Lord only knows why. He wasn’t shy about confessing his other crimes. As far as involvement in the kidnapping goes, I don’t have any evidence that points in his direction.”

“But we’ve got him for embezzlement.”

“Yes, we do. But now that we’ve got him, I’m not quite sure what I want to do with him.”

“What do you mean?”

“His arrest record is clean. Which means if the case goes to court, his lawyer’ll plead
nolo contendere.
Which means he’ll probably be sentenced to probation. First thing he’ll have to do is pay back the money he took from the old folks. Unfortunately, it won’t go to them, it’ll go to the home. He’ll probably have to do some community service as well—which in a way, he does anyway. He arranges entertainment for the elderly at the home; he’s in charge of the home’s Halloween party, Christmas party, Easter party—”

“Pete, you are
not
going to let him get away with embezzlement?”

“I’m just saying if he’s sentenced, he’ll undoubtedly lose
his license. Which means the home’ll lose a nurse the old folks are crazy about.”

“Decker, the sleaze can’t break the law.”

“I’m not suggesting for a moment that we let old Leek get off scot-free. But not everything has to bollix up in the courts.”

“Pete—”

“McKay and I took a nice little drive over to the home after confession time was over. I set him up with one of the home’s management and told him to spill out his dirty deeds. Then I left. I’m waiting to hear back from them. If they decide not to bring charges against him, what case do I have?”

“You can press them to charge McKay.”

“If it’s necessary.”

“I don’t believe I’m hearing this!”

“I also told McKay to place a call to the Board of Nurses’ Examiners. Tell the board that he suspects Tandy Roberts of using his license number—”

“But he
knew
she was doing it.”

“So he suddenly got an attack of conscience. Let’s concentrate on what we know. Leek gave Tandy his license number as a way to guarantee her silence. She knew about his embezzling…discovered it by talking to the old folks. At first, Tandy used the information to blackmail him into an affair. Eventually, he got her pregnant.”

“
He
got her pregnant, too?” Marge shook her head. “That’s three pregnancies. Girl’s a fertile Myrtle.”

“Three pregnancies?” Decker said. “When was number two?”

“When she was eighteen, still living in New York.”

“How’d you find
that
out?”

Not wanting to rat on Cindy, Marge smiled mysteriously. “We all have our sources.”

“Margie…”

“It’s not important how I found out. What is important is we now know this girl, Tandy Roberts, supposedly lost three babies in a relatively short period of time.”

Decker said, “Lost them? Leek said she aborted.”

“Lost? Aborted? Who knows?” Marge shrugged. “Tandy sounds unstable to begin with. First starving herself, then eating her way to obesity. And she used to talk to herself. If we throw in all these lost or aborted babies, it adds up to one psychologically compromised girl.”

“You interviewed her, Margie. Did she seem really crazy?”

Marge tapped her foot. “Actually, she seemed very sane. A typical self-obsessed California girl.”

“So where does that leave us?”

“We have a motive,” Marge said. “Tandy doesn’t have children and neither does Marie Bellson, who was going through menopause. They were once great friends. Maybe they became great friends again with a common goal. They both cracked at the same time, each one working up the other one until they both went nuts and did the ultimate grievous sin. Isn’t there a psychological term for that—two nuts working each other up?”

“Yeah, two nuts working each other up.”

Marge gave Decker a sour look. “I’m sure they’re in cahoots together. I just
feel
it.”

“Their bond to each other being they both lost babies.”

“Yep,” Marge said. “We’ve got to start looking into Tandy’s background. She was born in Berkeley, moved to Manhattan when she was a kid, had a lot of connections in the fashion industry….” She paused, then said, “I’ll do a complete background on her. In the meantime, what are you going to do about Leek? You can’t let this little piece of
navel lint
get away with stealing.”

“I’m going to let the home decide how they want to handle it. If they want to prosecute, I’ll testify to back them up. But if they want to handle it more discreetly, I’ve got better things to do than come down on a nurse who changes bedpans for the elderly. It’s in the home’s hands.”

“I don’t understand you!” Marge was frustrated.

“Drop it, Marge!”

They both were quiet for a moment. Then Decker said, “Okay, so you’ll do a thorough background check on Tandy. See if we can dig up more links between her and Marie. But we’d better move quickly. The feds were called in this morning.”

“You’re kidding!”

“Wish I was. They just can’t wait to play big shot.”

“Bastards!” Marge tossed the newspaper off her lap and began to pace. “How about this for a link, Pete? What if Marie was Tandy’s mom and gave her up for adoption?”

“The timing doesn’t work, Marge. Marie was still living at home with her mother, and Lita’s
sure
her daughter never became pregnant as a teenager.”

“And you trust Lita’s memory?”

“No, not entirely. But she seemed cogent.”

The front door opened. Ginger stood and wagged her tail, jumping on Cindy as she came through the door. With Cindy was a girl around the same age, both of them slightly sunburned and with wet heads.

Cindy kissed her father’s cheek. “You remember Lisa Goldberg, don’t you, Dad?”

“Hi, Lisa,” Decker said. “How are you doing?”

“Not bad.” Lisa smiled and shrugged shyly.

“We went swimming,” Cindy explained. “I just came back to change. We’re having a one-year mini–high school reunion. A bunch of us are going to dinner and the movies tonight. I should be home at one, maybe two at the latest.”

“Take the car phone,” Decker said.

“My
lifeline
to the outside world.”

“Don’t be fresh.”

“I know it’s because you care.” Cindy sneaked a look to Marge, who winked. “See you all later.”

As Cindy left, she mouthed a thank-you to Marge. Decker caught it. “What’s that all about?”

“I’ll tell you later.”

“No, tell me now. What are you and Cindy planning behind my—” Decker interrupted himself. “I just thought of
something. About two years ago, when Tandy was pregnant with Leek’s baby, she was still very good friends with Marie, right?”

“I think so,” Marge said. “Why?”

Decker smiled slyly. “You and my daughter can keep secrets—so can I.” He picked up the phone and, as soon as the line connected, asked for Dr. Meecham, telling the receptionist his call was an emergency. Meecham picked up the call within minutes.

“What’s up, Sergeant?”

“I’m about to ask you to compromise your ethics again.”

“Sergeant—”

“It’s less painful if you remember a baby’s life may be at stake. Listen, let’s just play it theoretical….”

“Sergeant, I thought you said this was an emergency. C’mon! I’m a busy man!”

“A missing infant is an emergency.”

“Get on with it, Sergeant.”

Decker knew he was putting Meecham in a precarious position and felt bad about it. But not too bad.

“Suppose I assume that about maybe two years ago, your patient, Marie Bellson, brought you a young, distressed obese woman who had a problem.”

Meecham paused. “Go on.”

“Let’s just suppose that this young obese woman was in the family way and came to you for a possible termination of pregnancy.”

“I don’t think that’s a good supposition at all, Sergeant.”

Decker waited a beat. “Okay, perhaps this girl may have had her pregnancy terminated by someone else. Maybe he even did a botched job, and Marie brought the girl in to you to fix up someone else’s butchery.”

“Interesting theory. Unfortunately, it’s fiction.”

Decker tried to organize his thoughts. “Okay, suppose this obese woman miscarried—”

“I don’t like that supposition, either.”

Decker thought. Tandy didn’t miscarry; she didn’t abort.
That left just one more option. “Perhaps you became this imaginary young woman’s obstetrician and delivered her child at term.”

“Perhaps I didn’t.”

“Maybe someone else did?”

“No.”

Confused, Decker was silent. Then he said, “Thanks for your forbearance, Doc.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help you with your dilemma. Now I really must go.” Meecham paused a moment. “On a conversational note, Sergeant, did I tell you I attended a very interesting lecture last month as part of my continuing education? It was on
Pseudocyesis.
”

“Pseudo—what?” Decker took out his notebook. “How do you spell that?”

“Look it up, Sergeant,” Meecham said.

And with Meecham’s parting line, Decker was on the receiving end of a dial tone.

“Pseudocarp, pseudocarpous, pseudoclassic,
pseudomorph, pseudonym…” Decker bit his lower lip. “Pseudonymous, pseudopod, pshaw, psi…what is this
bullshit
Stan’s giving me? How can I look it up if I can’t find or spell it?” He picked up another dictionary and flung it open, flipping through the pages until he came to the
P
’s. “Pseudocyesis…Do you think
cyesis
is with an
s
or a
c
?”

Cindy and her friend Lisa came into the living room. “It’s with a
c
, Dad.”

Decker looked up. “You know what pseudocyesis means?”

“It’s false pregnancy.”

Decker put down the dictionary. “Where’d you learn about that?”

Cindy said, “English history. Queen Mary Tudor, better known as Bloody Mary, had a false pregnancy. She was married to Philip the Second of Spain, who was much younger than she was. A couple of months later the State announced that the queen was with child, to the cheers of her good countrymen. After a full ten months of so-called pregnancy, Mary gave birth to a lot of bloat and gas. Philip was not pleased. He left England for his beloved Spain and never returned.”

Decker shook his head. “Just shows the difference between a high school and college education.”

“And here you were, wondering about the high price of my tuition,” Cindy said.

Decker thought about that: fifteen grand a year to learn about Bloody Mary’s psychological problems.

Marge said, “By false pregnancy, do you mean the woman fakes being pregnant? Or does she honestly
think
she’s pregnant?”

Cindy shrugged. “I don’t know. I learned about it in history, not in psychology.” She turned to Lisa. “You’re premed.”

“I’m still mastering the Krebs cycle, Cin,” Lisa answered. “You need a medical textbook. Or just call up any ob gyn. They should have the information you’re looking for.”

“Who had a false pregnancy?” Cindy’s eyes brightened mischievously. “Is it our friend?”

“Don’t you just love how kids butt into conversations?” Decker said. “Good-bye, Cindy. Have a pleasant evening.”

“I didn’t
butt in.
You
engaged
me.”

“Cindy…” Marge said.

“Don’t worry, Marge, I remember my
promise.
”

“What promise?” Decker asked.

“I promised Marge I wouldn’t interfere with your investigation.”

“When was this?”

“Now who’s butting into whose conversation?”

Lisa said, “I’ll wait outside for you, Cin.”

“Good idea.” After Lisa closed the front door, Cindy said, “You know, Dad, you have a double standard….”

“Cut it, Cynthia. You and Marge are keeping something from me. I want to know what it is
right now
!”

Cindy ran her toe along the seam of the Navaho rug. “I paid a visit to Silver’s Gym….”

“You
what
!” Decker homed in on Marge. “And you
let
her?”

“I saw her coming out, not going in.”

“But you didn’t
tell
me.”

Marge shrugged. “No, I didn’t, Pete.”

“How could you do that!” He glared at Cindy. “And how could
you
do that! Between the two of you, I don’t know who I’m more pissed off at.”

“Why don’t you save your anger for assholes like Leek McKay?” Marge said.

Decker remembered Rina was sleeping and lowered his voice. “What exactly are you saying, Marge? You’re keeping secrets about my daughter from me because you’re pissed at the way I handled Leek McKay? That makes a lot of sense.”

“It’s not that,” Marge retorted. “You’re frustrated, and you’re taking it out on the
wrong
people—”

“Hell, yeah, I’m frustrated. Especially when my partner colludes behind my back—”

“I wasn’t colluding—”

“The hell—”

“I’ll see you guys later,” Cindy said.

“Don’t you move a muscle, young lady,” Decker said. “I’m not done with you.”

“Daddy, Marge dressed me down enough for the both of you. Believe me, I’m very sorry I butted into your affairs. It was dumb but I did it because I cared. I cared about the baby, I cared about Lourdes Rodriguez, I cared because it could have been Hannah. I almost blew Marge’s tail on Tandy, and I feel very foolish about it. I didn’t ask Marge to keep it a secret, but she did. And I appreciate that—her trust in me. I was going to tell you. I was just trying to find the right time.”

Cindy sank into one of the buckskin chairs. “Stop growling at me, Daddy, I’m just as worn out as you are.”

Decker folded his arms across his chest and tapped his foot. Finally, he blew out air. “What did you possibly hope to accomplish by going to Silver’s?”

“In my naïveté, I thought
maybe
I could get Tandy to talk to me. And she
did
talk to me. She talked a lot. Unfortunately, she didn’t talk about Marie Bellson or Caitlin
Rodriguez. But she did say she lost two babies in New York.”

With clenched teeth, Decker said to Marge, “So
that’s
where you picked up Tandy’s second pregnancy.”

“We all have our friendlies.” Marge’s smile was tight. “So what do we have? Two pregnancies in New York and a false one that Meecham was referring to.”

“Maybe all of them were false,” Decker said. “The woman has been described to us as a fruitcake. Who knows what the hell we’re dealing with?” To Cindy, he said, “What else did you and
Tandy
talk about?”

“Divorce—her parents’ divorce,” Cindy corrected herself. “She was really bitter over it, still grieving over the ordeal like it happened yesterday.”

“When did it happen?” Decker asked.

“When she was young. I think around five.”

Decker paused. “Tandy’s twenty-five…the divorce would have been around…what? About twenty years ago?”

“I guess.”

“Marie Bellson would have been around twenty back then,” Decker said. “Cindy, did Tandy say where she was from?”

“Oh, no!”
Marge exclaimed. “I must be the world’s biggest
moron
! Marie Bellson went to
school
in Berkeley.” She faced Cindy. “Didn’t you tell me Tandy’s father was a
prof
at Berkeley?”

“Yeah…”

“A prof who couldn’t keep his
pants
on?”

“Yeah.”

“Pete, Lita Bellson said her daughter screwed everything in sight, including professors. Betcha Professor Roberts was one of her past amours.”

“The connection between Tandy and Marie,” Cindy said.

“I told you the girl was a natural,” Marge said.

Decker tossed her a dirty look, which Marge returned in
kind. Cindy felt uncomfortable, knowing she was the reason behind the tension in the room.

She cleared her throat and said, “Once Tandy started on her parents, it was hard to get her to stop. She
hates
them. Just puts them down mercilessly. She kept repeating how horrible they were to her, always screaming at her, telling her how bad she was for getting pregnant.”

“Who’s ‘they’?” Decker asked. “Wasn’t she living only with her mother?”

Cindy just shrugged. Marge said, “Pete, you know we have Tandy and Marie living in the
same
neighborhood when two traumatic things happened in both their lives.”

“What’s that?” Cindy put her hand over her mouth. “Or aren’t I allowed to ask?”

Decker felt a wave of resignation wash over his body. “Tandy’s parents got divorced, and Marie supposedly lost a baby around the same time. Not to change the subject, Cynthia, but I think your friend’s waiting for you.”

“Omigod, I forgot about Lisa!” Cindy kissed her father. “I’m very sorry, Daddy.”

“It’s all right.” He gave his daughter a bear hug. “It’s only because I love you so damn much.”

“I know.”

“Are you going to keep your promise?”

“I swear.”

“Good,” Decker said. “Now go have some fun.”

“Sure. Bye.”

“Cindy, I may have a couple of questions later on for you, okay?”

Cindy grinned. “You call the shots, Father.” She bounced out the door but remembered to close it quietly.

Decker glared at Marge, who returned his angry stare. She said, “If you want me to apologize for not telling you about Cindy, forget it. She’s an adult, Pete. I treat her like an adult. It wasn’t my place to fink on her.”

“You don’t understand, Marge,” Decker said. “It isn’t your
fault, because you’ve never had kids. But your kid is your kid no matter how old she is. And the worrying never stops. Remember how angry you were at your father for not telling you he had surgery for cancer?”

“Sure, I was angry. But it was his choice. He chose not to tell me; he suffered the consequences. If Cindy chooses not to tell you, she’ll suffer the consequences.”

“You don’t understand.”

“So if I’m so dense, why don’t we stop plowing old ground and get on with the case?”

Decker sat on the sofa. “Fine. Get on with the case.”

Marge clasped her hands. A fog of hostility sat between them, but she knew they’d get over it. Just as soon as they concentrated on the case. It was bugging the shit out of both of them. “We have Marie and Tandy in Berkeley. And Marie screwing everyone, conceivably—no pun intended—even Tandy’s father.”

Decker pulled out his notebook. “Conceivably.”

Marge smiled. “We have two traumatic incidents happening to both of them at the same time. So how do we connect the two?”

“Start with the obvious.” Decker tried to control the tartness of his voice. Man, he was
pissed.
“Tandy’s father was a lech, Marie was a wild chick. They had an affair.”

“The affair led to Tandy’s parents getting divorced and possibly to Marie Bellson’s pregnancy,” Marge stated formally.

“I like it.”

Stiffly, Marge gave a little smile. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Decker suddenly bit back a laugh. “All right. Let’s assume Tandy’s all pissed off at her parents’ divorce. And assume that Tandy knew that her father’s affair with Marie was what led to the divorce.”

“Then Tandy would be pissed off at
Marie
,” Marge said. “Not acting like Marie was her best friend.”

“Maybe she was acting all this time, Marge. Maybe Tandy had planned from the start to get Marie.”

“Pete, the trauma happened twenty years ago. Unless Tandy’s the original
demon child
, I can’t picture a five-year-old hatching a two-decade plot. Then we’d have to assume she knew at five that she was going to purposely become a nurse, meet Marie, become her best friend, then pin a kidnapping and murder on her.”

“You’re right. It’s absurd.”

“At least you’re capable of giving me
some
credit.”

“I give you
credit
, Dunn. But you’ve got to see it from my perspective. You and my daughter—two women out of the four I trust implicitly—are keeping
secrets
from me.”

“Rina’s the third—who’s the fourth?”

“My mother. Now what the hell difference does
that
make? Do you see my point, or don’t you?”

“I see your point. Can we move on now, please?”

“You brought it up. Why do women bring up things, then drop them when they hear what they don’t want to hear?”

“Pete—”

“Okay, okay, I’ll cool it.” Decker smoothed his mustache. “Even if Marie and Tandy’s father had an affair, what does that have to do with the price of eggs in Outer Mongolia?”

Marge said, “Let’s suppose this. Suppose Tandy’s father—”

“Guy have a first name?”

“Geoffrey spelled G-e-o-f-f-r-e-y.”

“Veddy English.”

“He’s Cuban,” Marge said.

“How’d you find that out?”

“Cindy.”

“My daughter has become a wealth of information.” Decker paused. “You think it’s a coincidence that the kidnapped baby was a Latina?”

“That’s an interesting observation.”

“I don’t know how it fits, but it’s interesting. So how did Cuban parents come to give their son a name like Geoffrey?”

“Caitlin isn’t exactly a Hispanic name. Immigrants adopt
Anglo names to acculturate.” Marge flipped the pages of her notebook. “Actually, I think Tandy told Cindy her
father
had changed his name.”

“Geoffrey Roberts,” Decker said. “A prof. Think he still lives in Berkeley?”

“We could find out.”

“Let’s do that,” Decker said. “Where were we?”

“Still assuming that Marie Bellson and Geoffrey Roberts had an affair.”

“Okay. Now how about this? Suppose little Tandy, at the age of five, was made aware of this affair by Mom’s yelling.”

“Lots of yelling.”

“
Especially
if we assume that Geoffrey Roberts knocked up Marie. A lot of women can tolerate indiscretion. But getting the other woman pregnant?”

“Fireworks,” Marge said.

“Yep. I can picture the irate wife screaming it for all the world to hear. ‘You f-ing bastard, you not only slept with the little tramp, you got her pregnant.’ That kind of thing.”

“Sounds good.”

“So let’s assume that Tandy, even at five, knew that a Bellson, and/or Marie Bellson’s
pregnancy
, was the reason behind her parents’ divorce. It traumatized her, but maybe she was able to hide it. Kids can hide their pain well. Suppose she could deal with her past by ignoring it. Putting it out of her mind. Then, lo and behold, at fifteen,
she
got pregnant. And all the old traumatic feelings began to resurface.”

“‘A stage-mom bitch,’” Marge read from her notes. “That’s how Tandy described her mother to Cindy. You know, maybe Tandy’s pregnancy brought out old feelings for Mom as well as for daughter. The pregnancy ruined Mom’s life once, now another pregnancy was ruining it again. Especially if stage-mom bitch had a lot invested in Tandy’s modeling career. Can’t you picture Mom screaming at her, ‘You’ve just
ruined your entire life
,’ etc?”

Decker paused a moment.
She seemed so upset when she
talked to herself.
“Tandy talking to herself? Or was she actually talking to someone else who was yelling at her?”