Killer Blonde (13 page)

T
here are definite downsides to living in LA: the traffic, the smog, and the inordinate number of women running around in size 2 bikinis.

But on the upside, there’s the beach. There’s nothing quite like driving west through Santa Monica, past tire shops and gas stations and taco stands, and then suddenly on the horizon, there it is, the Pacific Ocean, glistening in the sun.

I took that drive the next morning, awed as always by the sight of the ocean, then headed south to the tiny beachside community of Ocean Park where Eduardo Jensen lived.

Not that many years ago, Ocean Park was a blighted neighborhood. Its Main Street was a scary place where vagrants loitered in the doorways of industrial buildings. Now it’s a hip, trendy place where vagrants loiter in the doorways of latte shops.

I was a half-hour early for my appointment with Eduardo, so I stopped off at one of the latte places and got myself a black coffee and plain bagel. (Okay, so it was a mocha cappuccino and a bagel with cream cheese. Extra cream cheese, if you must know.)

The place was quiet and I nabbed myself a prime seat at the window. As I sat there munching my bagel, I couldn’t help worrying about my parents, what with Daddy heading off to Cousin Cindy’s wedding in his toupee from hell. But as I told Mom, compared to the rest of the Austen clan, Daddy was the picture of mental health.

No, what really had me worried was the thought of Mom and me becoming “roomies.” Mom periodically threatens to move in with me when Daddy’s driving her nuts, but Daddy somehow always manages to worm his way back into her good graces. Nevertheless, I live in fear that one day she’s going to show up on my doorstep, suitcase in hand, expecting me to stay up all night ordering fake diamonds and polyester pantsuits.

I was halfway through my bagel, wondering if I could fib and tell Mom my cable company didn’t carry Home Shopping, when I looked out the window and saw a shabby guy in tattered clothes staring at me. All his worldly possessions were piled into a supermarket cart. His long matted hair hadn’t seen a bottle of shampoo in years.

I averted my eyes, and pretended to be looking for something in my purse, hoping that by the time I looked up again, he’d be gone. But, no. When I sneaked a peek out the window, he was still there, staring at me with the same intensity The Blob used to watch Saturday morning cartoons. Suddenly, I lost my appetite. This poor guy was probably starving. I remembered how I’d been mistaken for a vagrant myself the other night, and how miserable that felt. I wrapped up the other half of my bagel, and ordered another to go.

The guy was still there when I got outside, still staring into the latte shop. I tapped him on the shoulder.

“Here,” I said, holding out my care package, and trying to ignore his heady aroma of wine and urine.

“What’s this?” he asked, eyeing me suspiciously.

“Bagels with cream cheese. I thought you might be hungry.”

He looked at me like I’d just handed him one of Tommy the Termite’s cockroaches.

“Sorry,” he sniffed. “I don’t eat dairy products. Too many toxins.”

Welcome to L.A., where even the vagrants eat organic. I swear, if the Statue of Liberty had been built in Los Angeles, its motto would have been:
Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to eat a macrobiotically correct diet.

Stowing the bagels in my purse, I bid my shabby friend a fond farewell, and headed north a few blocks to the address Eduardo had given me—a cute little $50,000 blue clapboard bungalow now worth close to a million in the maniacally inflated Westside real estate market.

I walked past a picket fence into a tiny front yard and rang the bell. Eduardo answered the door wearing nothing but a towel draped around his waist.

“Sorry,” he said, beaming a seductive smile. “I just got out of the shower.”

Indeed, his fabulous body glistened with drops of water.

“C’mon in.”

He led me into a bright and airy living room. Sleek black-leather-and-chrome furniture stood out in contrast to the bungalow’s quaint architectural moldings.

“Make yourself comfy while I get dressed,” he said, then padded off down a narrow hallway.

Why did I get the feeling that it was no accident that he’d just stepped out of the shower, that this whole Fabio routine was a ploy to woo potential customers? I could easily picture SueEllen’s wealthy girlfriends forking over big bucks for Eduardo’s artwork when what they really wanted was his body.

Minutes later he came back, in shorts and a tank top, still doing Fabio.

“Can I get you something to drink?” he asked. “I was just about to make myself a non-dairy tofu-carob-lecithin shake.”

“No, thanks,” I said, thinking that the bum down on Main Street would probably love some.

He led me into his high tech kitchen, where he tossed a slimy white glob of tofu into a blender. Then he added a raw egg white, some grayish brown carob powder, and the contents of a vitamin capsule.

If that’s what it takes to stay healthy, I’d rather die young.

“Sure you don’t want some?” he asked, pouring the viscous mixture into a glass. “It’s delicious.”

“Looks mighty tempting, but I’ll pass.”

I shuddered as he drank the stuff down in a few gulps.

“Say,” he said, wiping away his tofu mustache with the back of his hand, “you ever do any model-ing? I’d love to paint you some time.”

He flashed me another megawatt smile.

“The only thing I’ve ever posed for is the photo on my driver’s license.”

“Maybe some day,” he said, huskily, “you’ll let me do you.”

The guy was about as subtle as a bazooka.

“In the meanwhile, how about we go out to the studio and take a look at my paintings?”

“I can’t wait,” I lied.

He led me outside past a flagstone patio to his studio, which was housed in a converted garage. Sunlight streamed in through an overhead skylight.

“Voila!” he said, pointing to about a dozen paintings stacked up against the wall.

Holy Moses. I thought I’d died and gone to hell. Every canvas was filled with scenes from your worst nightmare. Dismembered bodies. Fetuses on crucifixes. And a colorful assortment of maggot-ridden corpses. Anyone with a mind this sick, I thought, was capable of throwing a hair dryer into SueEllen’s tub.

“So?” he asked. “What do you think?”

I think I’m going to throw up, that’s what I think.

“How interesting,” I finally managed to croak.

“They make quite a statement,” he said.

Yeah. They’re saying, “Burn me.”

Outside of the contents of an unflushed toilet I’d once stumbled on in Tijuana, never in my life had I seen such nauseating stuff. How the heck was I going to get out of buying one of these monstrosities?

“They’re all so wonderful,” I chirped, “I’d really like to bring my fiancé back to help me decide.”

“Your fiancé?”

“Yes,” I lied. Maybe if he thought I had a fiancé, he’d stop doing his Fabio impersonation.

No such luck.

“Why are all the good ones always taken?” he said with a wink.

I followed Eduardo back to his tiny bungalow. My visit was almost over, and I still hadn’t managed to work SueEllen into the conversation. I had to say something. And fast.

“I can see why SueEllen was such a big fan of your work,” was the best I could come up with.

“Yes, she was,” he said, without a trace of modesty.

“Such a tragedy, the way she died.”

“A tragedy,” he echoed.

By now we were almost at the front door.

“Who on earth would want to kill her?” I asked.

“I have no idea,” he said, a note of caution creeping into his voice.

“Do you know that the police suspect Heidi?”

“No, I didn’t know. But I’m not surprised, given that scene at her birthday party.”

“I don’t think Heidi did it,” I said. “In fact, I’m sure it was someone else.”

“Oh?” he said, his smile frozen.

“I was thinking that maybe somebody had a key to her house, and let himself in while everybody else was gone.”

Note the strategic use of the word
himself.

“Wow,” he said, making a big show of checking his watch. “Would you look at the time? I’ve got to rush to another appointment. You talk it over with your fiancé, and get back to me, okay?”

He held the front door open for me, but I didn’t leave.

“Look, Eduardo,” I said, abandoning my art lover pose, “I heard SueEllen threatening you the night of Heidi’s birthday party.”

“Is that so?”

By now his eyes had lost their sexy glint; they were as cold as the chrome on his high tech furniture. Fabio had definitely left the building.

“I was standing outside the poolhouse. I heard everything. SueEllen said she was going to tell everybody about your ‘indiscretion,’ and that it would ruin your career. And then, the very next day, she died.”

His eyes narrowed.

“What are you implying? That I killed SueEllen to keep her from talking?”

“It’s an interesting theory.”

And then he surprised me. He threw his head back and laughed.

“You’re crazy,” he said. “Yes, SueEllen was a bitch, and yes, she was threatening to air my dirty laundry in public, but I sure as hell didn’t kill her.”

“Just how dirty was your laundry?”

“None of your business.”

“I know, but tell me anyway.”

He laughed again.

“Why not? I’ve got nothing to hide. The truth is, SueEllen caught me having sex with a teenage girl, the daughter of one of my biggest customers. She was pissed that I’d been cheating on her. SueEllen and I were lovers, but you probably already knew that.”

I nodded.

“Everybody knew it,” he said, “including her husband, I’ll bet. Anyhow, she threatened to tell the girl’s mother and everybody else on her Rolodex.

“At first I was panicked. But then, after I thought about it, I calmed down. The kid was eighteen; they couldn’t put me in jail. And so what if I lost her mother as a customer? I had plenty more. And it occurred to me that having everyone know I’d been sleeping with a hot young teenager might lend me a certain air of rakish charm.

“So you see,” he said, smiling smugly, “I had no reason to kill SueEllen.”

“Do you mind my asking where you were the day of the murder?”

“Yeah, I mind. But I’ll tell you anyway, just like I told the police. The day SueEllen was killed I was in Santa Barbara, having lunch with a gallery owner. I’ll give you his card if you want to call him.”

He sounded awfully sure of himself.

“No, that won’t be necessary.”

“I hope that answers all your questions,” he said, opening the front door with a flourish.

“Yes, thanks.”

I walked out of the bungalow with the uneasy feeling that Eduardo was watching me, and headed back to Main Street where I’d parked the Corolla.

When I reached into my purse for my car keys, I discovered something round and warm and wrapped in tin foil. What a pleasant surprise. It was the bagel and cream cheese I’d bought for Mr. Lactose-Intolerant. I could do with a snack. After all, it had been a whole forty-five minutes since I’d last eaten.

So there I sat behind the steering wheel, munching on my bagel and thinking about my meeting with Eduardo. Those paintings of his were truly disturbing. I had no trouble picturing him as the killer. But according to him, he’d been in Santa Barbara at the time of the murder, and had no real motive to kill SueEllen.

Everything he said made perfect sense. But this is the same guy who said his tofu-carob-lecithin shake was delicious. Which puts a bit of a damper on his believability, don’t you think?

I had some time to kill before my appointment with Larkspur, so I stopped off at the bank to deposit Hal’s check. And not a moment too soon. My bank balance was so low, the flowers on my designer checks were beginning to wilt. Until I landed another writing assignment, I’d have to be very careful about how I spent my money. I swore to myself I’d make no frivolous purchases, just the bare necessities.

On my way home, I decided to stop off at Bloomingdale’s—not to buy anything, of course. No, I only went there because I was hoping to run into Ginny. I wanted to see her reaction when I told her that I knew she’d once been engaged to Hal Kingsley. When I got to the hosiery department, though, she was nowhere in sight. And neither was anybody else. I guess you were out of luck if you wanted to buy socks.

I asked a regal redhead in costume jewelry if Ginny was working that day.

“Yes, she work today,” she answered in a thick Russian accent. I had a feeling that at one time in her life, she’d been on the other side of the counter, doing the buying, not the selling. That’s the way it is at Bloomingdale’s. The place seems to be staffed with women, like Ginny and this Russian dame, who’ve fallen on hard times.

“You like this?” she asked, holding up a two-hundred-dollar crystal and pearl necklace. “It will look marvelous on you, I can tell.”

I did like it. A lot. But I couldn’t afford it.

“Sorry, no. I don’t think so.”

“Come on. We just try on. For fun.”

But I was strong. No frivolous expenses.

I walked away from the necklace without a backward glance, feeling quite proud of myself.

But as long as I was in Bloomie’s, I figured I might as well stop off for a lipstick. I was almost at the bottom of my current tube of Frosted Bronze, and I really needed another. So I headed over to the cosmetics counter, where a woman who looked like she could’ve been the former Shah-ette of Iran asked if she could help me.

“I need a lipstick,” I said, firm in my resolve not to spend a dime more than I had to. “That’s all. Just a lipstick.”

Twenty minutes later, I walked away with three hundred dollars worth of cosmetics.

I know, I’ve got the backbone of an egg noodle. But the Shah-ette swore to me that my Magic Restorative Eye Crème would make my fine lines and wrinkles disappear in a matter of weeks. And the way I saw it, I was saving money. When you think of the thousands of dollars it would have cost to have an eye job from Hal Kingsley, I was actually being very frugal.