Murder With Sarcastic Intent Page 7

  Mary got out of the car and locked it. She walked up the cracked front sidewalk to the crumbling front step. Looked for a doorbell or a knocker.

  Nothing.

  She noted the dead shrubs next to the house. If there had ever been actual landscaping here, it hadn’t been much. This was terrible. Terrible as in the never-been-good category. Was it the plumber with leaky pipes story? Or was Lonzo Vega’s address really the home of rodents the size of piglets?

  She rapped her knuckles on the cracked, wooden front door. A sliver of half-painted plywood fluttered to the ground.

  Somewhere, a dog barked.

  And then a sound came from the other side of the door. It was the unmistakable sound of a shotgun shell being racked into the chamber.

  Mary dove from the crumbling step that fell apart beneath her feet as the wooden door exploded with the sound of a gun booming.

  She hit the ground and felt something brush over her, probably shrapnel from the shotgun.

  Mary realized that the loose concrete, which gave out underfoot and actually caused her to fall quickly, may have saved her life.

  “Fuck,” Mary said. She rolled away from the door, ripped the .45 from her shoulder holster, heard the sound of the shotgun’s slide working again. She glanced back at her car. No way she could get there in time. Her cell phone was in her pocket. Nine-one-one? Not an option.

  The shotgun roared again, and Mary felt bits of debris landing on her back and the top of her head. Someone tried to kick the door open from the inside.

  Mary considered firing back through the door, but instead she crouched and ran. She nearly stumbled over the uneven ground but made it to the back of the house. There had been movement in the window as she ran by.

  She rounded the back corner of the house where another concrete slab lay five feet from the back door.

  Before she could decide on her next move, a man crashed through the back door, a short-barreled pump shotgun in his hands.

  “Freeze!” Mary yelled.

  The man didn’t hesitate. He brought the shotgun to his shoulder and took aim at Mary.

  So she shot him.

  Three times.

  Center mass.

  The shotgun exploded as a round went off, but by then the man had fallen backward, and the muzzle was pointed skyward.

  Mary circled a small patio with weeds growing through the cracked pavers.

  She approached the man. His eyes were wide open. The shotgun was still in his right hand.

  If this was Lonzo Vega, she doubted he was the owner of Sol Landscaping. This guy couldn’t be more than eighteen years old, covered with the kind of tattoos that made Mary think of gangbangers.

  Mary stepped over the dead man, opened the back door, and stepped inside the house.

  It was vacant.

  No furniture.

  Holes in the walls.

  Loose wires hanging from former locations of light fixtures.

  Mary instantly knew two things.

  One, this was certainly not the home of a landscaper.

  And two.

  She’d been set up.

  Twenty-six

  She made the call to 911 herself, figuring in this neighborhood a few gunshots probably didn’t merit notifying the police. Her hands shook a little as she dialed, and she tried to force her heartbeat to slow.

  Mary finished the call, disconnected her cell, and paced in the backyard, occasionally going to the front to check on her car.

  While she waited, Mary made sure there was no trace that she had actually entered the house.

  A quick scan of the surrounding homes, blocked mostly by small, one-car garages and fences, told her witnesses were unlikely.

  Mary wasn’t too worried. After all, she’d gotten the address from a police source, so it was in Oscar’s best interest to play this down.

  She was positive there was a cell phone in the dead man’s pocket, but every instinct told her not to check it. Eventually, though, her self-discipline gave out. Plus, she hadn’t heard any sirens yet.

  She slid her shirt sleeve over her hand and fished out the cell phone that was obviously lodged in the front pocket of the dead man’s jeans.

  “Mind if I borrow this for a moment?” she said.

  Her stomach turned a bit. Death, and the fluids released, tend to be very unpleasant.

  Mary slid the other sleeve down over her fingers and tried to find the call log, using the buttons in an incredibly clumsy method.

  Eventually she found the call records, just as the first faint sound of police sirens reached her ears.

  She scrolled down.

  Although Mary half expected to see Oscar Freedham’s name, it wasn’t there.

  However, she was surprised to see a name she did recognize.

  Vince Buslipp.

  Twenty-seven

  The questioning didn’t take long. They didn’t need to haul her down to headquarters. Mary was pretty sure one of the investigators had called Oscar Freedham just to confirm that he knew who Mary was and that she had been investigating a case.

  It took her an hour or so to answer the questions, and then she was free to go.

  Vince Buslipp.

  It weighed heavily on her mind.

  Suddenly, she desperately wanted to talk to Jake. As hopeless as she knew it was, Mary dragged out her cell phone and tried to call Jake one more time.

  It went straight to voicemail.

  “You are going to pay and dearly for this, Jacob Cornell,” she said.

  Mary negotiated her way back to the 405, and eventually to Santa Monica and Aunt Alice’s house.

  She felt confused.

  The only person who’d had any idea where she was going had been Oscar Freedham. And a Vice cop as old as Freedham would never set her up this way. There were records between her cell phone and his, witnesses to them talking at the bar.

  No, she hadn’t been set up by the cops.

  So who?

  Who had known where she was going?

  The answer was simple.

  No one.

  So had she been followed?

  That fucking Chevy Tahoe had been nowhere around, and it would have stuck out like a sore thumb in that neighborhood.

  “Shit,” Mary said.

  She hated not knowing the answer. She wasn’t sure if that’s what drove her, or if it just drove her insane.

  One way or another, she was going to figure out who wanted her killed. And if that person turned out to be Vince Buslipp, his ass was history.

  But it was while she was exiting the freeway that a different idea hit her. In some ways, it made a lot more sense.

  It started with the premise that the killer had been planning an ambush.

  But what if the ambush hadn’t been for her?

  Twenty-eight

  Mary had spent a sleepless night, tossing and turning despite several glasses of wine and a sleeping pill.

  Every time she would close her eyes, she was back at that house, the shotgun spewing out metal and splintered wood.

  At six in the morning she called it a night and got out of bed, brewed some horribly strong coffee, and thought about the case.

  She knew she was running out of direct leads to Nina Ramirez.

  Elyse Ramirez, or whatever her real name was, was dead. Asshole Buslipp was involved, but the direct approach was not going to work.

  Trey the agent was no help.

  Only one person had shown any sign of cooperating.

  The boyfriend, Archer DeLoof.

  Mary called him, and after some pressuring, he agreed to talk to her that afternoon. He gave her his address, and after a morning at the office accomplishing very little, she fought her way through traffic, finally arriving at a small house in Los Angeles proper.

  Mary rang the bell.

  DeLoof answered, wearing jeans, a T-shirt with a light sweater, and a straw hat.

  “Come in, I guess,” he said.

  “Thank you, I will, I
guess,” Mary said.

  DeLoof crossed the small living area and went to a small kitchen. He cracked the fridge, grabbed a bottle of Bud Light, and looked back at Mary.

  “Want one?” he said.

  “Absolutely. Drinking on duty is a strict policy.”

  He handed her the beer. She twisted the cap off and held it up.

  “To Nina,” she said.

  DeLoof ignored her and went to a small table that sat next to the living room couch. He pulled out a chair, sat down, and took a long drink from the beer.

  “So have you found her yet?” he asked.

  “Not yet.”

  “So ask your questions, I guess,” he said.

  Mary idly wondered if he ended all of his sentences with “I guess.” She imagined him at his own wedding: “I do, I guess.”

  “Do you know where Nina is?” Mary said.

  “Don’t know, don’t care.” He took three nervous sips of beer in quick succession.

  “Why not?” Mary said.

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  “I can tell you still care about her,” Mary said. Actually, she couldn’t. But it sounded good.

  DeLoof slumped a little bit.

  “I really don’t care, for the most part,” he said. “She wanted to move on to better things, she told me. And after I introduced her to Vince—”

  “You introduced her to Vince Buslipp?” Mary said. “And you cared about her?”

  “She insisted. Said even though Vince did mostly porn that he might have connections. I think he introduced her to Trey. She kept hinting there was something special they saw in her, and one day, Vince told me he was going to help with her acting career. ” His voice got especially sarcastic on the word “acting.”

  “You don’t believe he was on the level?” Mary said.

  “Oh, I’m sure he would get her into films. But not the kind she wanted.”

  “So porn?”

  “Hell yes, porn. What do you think I’m talking about?”

  “Maybe you meant Hallmark movies—a woman on the Great Plains falling in love with a Sioux warrior.”

  DeLoof drained his beer and got another one.

  “Not hardly,” he said. “That was right around the time I started seeing less and less of her. It took her longer to return my calls, then eventually she stopped altogether.”

  Mary drank from her beer.

  “So how did you and Nina meet?” she said.

  He rolled his eyes. “What is this, Dr. Phil?”

  “No, it’s Dr. Mary. Just answer the question, Arch.”

  “I don’t have to!” he said.

  “No, but you want to,” Mary said, “especially if something bad has happened to her. You want to get your story straight as soon as possible.”

  “Do you think something bad happened?” he said. His eyes were suddenly wide, and Mary now knew that Archer DeLoof still cared about Nina Ramirez.

  It was Mary’s turn to shrug her shoulders. She let the silence hang.

  “We met at a screening,” he said. “Some horrible action movie a producer gave me tickets to. I told her I was in the film business, we got drunk, and were together for a while.”

  “Did you ever meet her family?” Mary said.

  “No, she had her own place.”

  “Really? At her age?”

  DeLoof smirked at her. “This is LA, remember? It was a really nice apartment in Bel Air too,” he said. “I don’t know how she could afford it, but it was pretty cool. We used to hang out at Styx. It’s a club near her place.”

  “What else?” Mary said.

  “What do you mean ‘what else?’” he said. “That’s it.”

  “Come on, there’s got to be more. What was she like? Where did she hang out? Who were her friends?”

  DeLoof shook his head. “She loved movies and wanted to be a star, that was it. Movies, movies, movies. I never met her family or any friends.”

  “How is that possible?” Mary said. “You said you were an item.”

  “She was very private. I wouldn’t hear from her for long stretches of time. Weeks. She wouldn’t return my calls. Then she’d reappear and act like she’d never been gone.”

  Mary drank the rest of her Bud Light.

  “When was the last time you saw her?” Mary said.

  “Awhile ago,” DeLoof answered. “I can’t remember when. I was at a party, a pretty crazy one thrown by a director who’d just signed a three-picture deal with New Line.”

  DeLoof’s eyes got a bit wistful.

  “And?” Mary said.

  “And Nina was there. With Trey and Vince. And let me tell you something, Nina was totally fucked up. Not on booze, either.”

  “Was she high on life?” Mary said.

  “Not hardly,” he said with a scoff.

  Mary nodded.

  “Thanks for the Bud,” she said and let herself out.

  Twenty-nine

  Mary watched as Trey Williams left the offices of Global Talent Management in his silver Porsche 911.

  She followed him down Ocean until he turned up Santa Monica Boulevard. Williams seemed to enjoy flooring the Porsche whenever he could, and Mary had a hard time keeping up.

  He eventually turned onto Beverly Glen, then followed that into Bel Air before taking a side street and pulling up in front of a two-story building sheathed in polished metal. Probably aluminum. It was mostly painted black and had the faux grunge look Mary despised.

  The word “Styx” was painted diagonally across the front of the building.

  Mary parked two blocks away, made her way back to the club, and went inside.

  It took her a moment to adjust to the darkness. Once her eyes could make out shapes, she immediately recognized the trees. Mary then understood why it was so dark.

  Everything, including the trees, was painted black.

  The trees were black. Black leather chairs and black wood tables were gathered in intimate alcoves, in front of black marble fireplaces with actual wood fires burning. The orange flames were the only non-black items in the whole place.

  Through the middle of the club’s floor ran a river of black water.

  Hence, the river Styx.

  Yes, Mary thought. The line between Earth and Hell. Hmm. She’d crossed that line a few times already.

  Mary made her way to the bar, a long, black object manned by a woman dressed all in black with a pale face and heavy, black eyeliner.

  “Top ‘o the day to you, Miss,” Mary said, sliding onto one of the black leather bar stools.

  The woman said nothing, but slid a coaster in front of Mary.

  “Even though I’m tempted to order a Black Russian, let’s go with a bottle of Heineken.”

  The bartender nodded, popped the top, and slid the beer in front of Mary. Mary slid a ten across the bar.

  “All set,” she said.

  The long mirror behind the bar gave Mary a glimpse of Trey Williams as he sat at one of the little seating arrangements in front of a roaring fire.

  He had a mixed drink in front of him and was chatting on his phone.

  Mary wondered if he was planning on meeting someone here and, if so, who that person might be.

  An agent in Hollywood never wanted to be seen eating, drinking, or simply being, alone. They had to always be seen as a social butterfly. So she knew that the longer Williams sat there by himself, the less happy he would be about it.

  Mary finished her beer, checked her own phone, and ordered another beer. She had no messages, no emails, no missed phone calls.

  She had to get a life one of these days.

  The spooky bartender placed another beer in front of Mary. After she paid her, Mary looked at the mirror and saw Williams heading toward the restrooms, which were down a little hallway to the left of the bar.

  Mary took a moment to send a text to Jake, telling him that unless he answered pretty damn soon she was going to strip him of his manhood, literally, and have it mounted above her fireplace.<
br />
  Hey, she knew a good taxidermist who wouldn’t charge her too much for the job.

  It would probably cost the same as having a small perch mounted.

  Mary put her phone away, checked the table Williams had taken, saw it was empty, and glanced toward the men’s room.

  The door was just closing, and Mary saw the back of a man headed for the front door of the club.

  Something about the way he walked seemed familiar to Mary. Suddenly, she got a bad feeling in her stomach.

  She got off the barstool, went to the men’s room, and knocked on the door.

  There was no answer.

  Mary slid the .45 from her shoulder holster and pushed her way into the restroom.

  “Cleaning service … anyone here?” Mary said.

  The room was empty.

  Except for the pair of feet visible in the far stall. Mary walked toward it.

  She noticed a small pool of liquid near the feet. And that the pool was growing larger.

  She reached the stall and nudged it open with her foot.

  Trey Williams sat on the toilet seat, slumped back, his chin on his chest. A neat bullet hole was perfectly centered on his forehead. Mary quickly left the men’s room and walked to the front door of the club.

  Down the street, she saw the back end of a black Chevy Tahoe turn the corner.

  Thirty

  Jake awoke in the dark with the kind of headache that not even the nastiest hangover had ever approached.

  The pain was at once blinding and mind-shattering. He couldn’t lift his head. It hurt to breathe.

  He had no idea how long it took him to work up the courage to simply lift his head, but once he did, the pain actually diminished.

  Next up, opening the eyes.

  He tried one, then the other.

  It was dark, but there was a faint light beneath the door to whatever room he was in.

  At last, he let himself take a long, deep breath. The pain was still there, but—

  He heard more breathing, but not his own.

  For the thousandth time on this undercover job, he desperately wished he had a gun with him.

  The breathing had stopped, but he was sure he’d heard it. He couldn’t see anything. Was there a vague shape to his left? A person?