For Sale in Palm Springs: The Henry Wright Mystery Series (17 page)

He kept looking at the
little name tags on the cubicle walls and saw a lot of names that
he couldn’t pronounce but not Anchula’s.There was a glass door to
what looked like a conference room that had a bunch of people in it
looking studiously at what a short heavy set guy with long black
hair tied in a ponytail was writing on a white board. Henry opened
the door and poked his head in; “I’m looking for Amit Anchula; can
any of you help me find him?”

The long haired man that was
standing in front of the white board looked at him with wide eyes,
threw the marker that he had been using at Henry and leaped for the
other door in the conference room that headed directly outside.
Henry left the general commotion of the others in the room behind
as he took off after what was obviously Anchula running through the
door. He pushed past the people in the room and went through the
door just a few seconds behind Anchula. He was outside now in a
little courtyard that had a bunch of chairs and a low wall
surrounding it. Anchula was climbing over the wall but he was not
as fast as his pursuer and Henry caught up to him just as he jumped
down on the other side and started running across the lawn. Henry
leapt at him, caught him around the mid-section and tumbled on the
grass holding onto Anchula.

“
Goddamn man, get the hell
off of me. What the fuck do you want from me anyway?” Anchula was
breathing hard and swearing worse. “Why are you running?” Henry was
sitting on top of the sturdy man and reached inside his jacket for
his handcuffs. “Well, shit don’t shoot me for chrissakes.” Anchula
obviously mistook Henry reaching for his cuffs as him reaching for
a weapon. “Put your hands behind your back, I’m going to cuff you.”
Henry pulled the cuffs out and showed them to Anchula. “Did they
send you all the way from fucking Palm Springs to pick me up and
bring me back? Ouch, shithead, you’re hurting me!” Henry put the
cuffs on Anchula’s wrists and patted him down for weapons. The only
thing he found were Anchula’s wallet and keys which he put in his
own jacket pocket. “Quit your complaining and answer my question,
why are you running?” Henry stood Anchula upright as a lot of his
coworkers were yelling at them across the low wall. “I’ll be all
right you guys, go back to work. I’ll be back in an hour.” Anchula
yelled at them, at which they went back inside the conference
room.

“
Let’s go over to my car and
talk, I still want to know why you started running.” Henry led
Anchula around the side of the building and back across the street
to his car. He opened up the rear passenger door and helped Anchula
inside. It was obvious that Henry had helped a lot of suspects into
the backs of cars, and Anchula went in without any trouble. Henry
flipped the small child safety lock on the back door to prevent
Anchula from getting out before climbing into the front passenger
seat of the Taurus. He turned around and looked at Anchula, raised
an eyebrow and said “Well?”

“
Look asshole, I got scared
ok. I thought you were someone else, who the fuck are you anyway?”
Anchula had settled down somewhat, Henry figured he probably always
talked like that. “You’re partially right, I am from Palm Springs.
My name is Henry Wright and I’m on assignment to the Palm Springs
Police Department, I want to talk to you about the murder of Rex
Thornbird.” Henry explained. “So you’re not with the goddamn
Immigration Service?” Anchula seemed to breathe a sigh of
relief.

“
Immigration? No, of course
not. Whatever gave you that idea?” Henry was puzzled. “And the Palm
Springs fucking Police didn’t send you up here to get me deported?”
Anchula looked questioningly at Henry. “Is that why you started
running, you’re afraid of getting deported?” Henry asked. “Yeah,
long fucking story. So you want to know about the fucking real
estate guy’s body in the goddamn house, right?” Anchula
asked.

“
Yes, I want to know about
the body. I want to know everything that you know. And at some
point I want to know why you’re worried about being deported as
well. I have all night.” Henry looked straight at him. “Oh fuck
whatever. You gotta know that I didn’t do it. I’m actually glad to
get this whole fucking thing off my chest, it’s been hanging over
me since it happened. Not here though, let’s go someplace, I’ll buy
you dinner and I’ll tell you the whole fucking bit. But you have to
take these goddamn cuffs off.” Anchula leaned forward to take his
weight off his handcuffed hands.

“
Ok, for some stupid reason
I believe you. I’ll take the handcuffs off at the restaurant. I
don’t want you taking off again – besides, you know I can catch
you.” “Shit, ok man, whatever. As long as you’re not with
Immigration, I got no fucking reason to run.” Anchula settled back
in the seat.

Henry slid over to the
driver’s seat and started the car. He went east for a few blocks
and Anchula gave him directions to a combination beer brewery and
restaurant near downtown Mountain View. Henry parked the car in a
gravel lot behind the restaurant and helped Anchula out of the car.
He unlocked the cuffs put them in the pocket of his jacket and
handed Anchula his wallet. “If you’re going to pay for dinner,
you’ll need this, but I’m going to keep your keys so that you can’t
take off on me.” “Yeah, thanks.” Anchula stuck the wallet back into
his pants and rubbed his wrists where the cuffs had been. “We can
go in the back way.” He walked to a hidden door between some
outdoor tables and umbrellas. They walked past the brew house part
of the restaurant up to the hostess stand.

“
Hey Amit, what’s
happening?” A young kid at the stand greeted them. “Dude, how’s it
hanging? A table near the windows, ok?” Anchula said. “Sure man,
right this way.” The kid picked up a couple of menus and led them
to a table for two next to a window at the front of the restaurant.
“This is fine, thanks.” Anchula waved the kid away and sat down, he
motioned with his head at the departing youngster. “That kid is a
decent programmer, he worked at a startup I was involved with, they
went broke, now he works here. Tough fucking break.”

“
Yeah, I’m sure. Let’s hear
your story.” Henry picked up the menu. “Oh shit man, I was in that
empty house and that dead guy scared the piss out of me.” Anchula
started fiddling with the silverware that was rolled up in a
napkin. “I just wanted to fucking talk to him and he’s laying there
in the largest goddamn blood puddle I’ve ever seen.” “Let’s take
this from the top.” Henry said. “We should start with what brought
you to Palm Springs, how you met Rex Thornbird and why you’re
worried about being deported.” “Ok, ok, I’ll tell you the whole
damn thing.” Anchula put the silverware down.

“
I came over to this country
nine years ago to go to Stanford. I had a student visa that was
good for five years. I got a B.S. in software engineering at
Stanford and four years ago I went to work for a small startup
company. We worked our asses off, and about a year and a half ago,
the company went public. We all got a shitload of
money.”

“
Do you need a little more
time, or can I get you started with one of our homebrews?” A waiter
interrupted Anchula’s story. “Do you drink beer Henry? They make a
good pale ale here.” Anchula looked over at Henry. “That’s fine.”
“Two pale ales, we’ll let you know when were ready to order.”
Anchula told the waiter. “Where was I?” He asked Henry. “You got a
boatload of money when your company went public.” Henry reminded
him.

“
Boatload, oh yeah. Well, we
all had a lot of cash, and some of us took some time off work. Like
I took a fucking year off and traveled around the Southwest, I
originally wanted to go home to see my parents, but I couldn’t
leave the country.” Anchula continued as the waiter set their beers
down in front of them. “You see, my goddamn student visa expired,
the startup wouldn’t sponsor me since they didn’t have the money at
that time, once I had the money myself I didn’t have the time to
deal with the attorneys, so I’m kind of here illegally.
”

“
So basically you’re an
illegal alien.” Henry took a sip of his beer. “You’re right, this
is good.” “Not basically, I am an illegal alien; the Immigration
guys can deport me without as much as a fucking hearing. Anyway,
one of the places I traveled to during my time off was goddamn Palm
Springs. That time I fell in love with the place, now I wish I’d
never stopped there. When I found out that a lot of movie stars had
vacationed there, I decided to buy a movie star house. I remember
Bette Davis from the movies I went to when I was a kid at home, so
when Rex Thornbird told me that he had her home for sale, I fucking
snapped it up. I was shocked at what a shithole she had lived in
but I figured hey, she’s a fucking movie star and they’re
eccentric, right?” “Yeah, I suppose so.” Henry answered.

“
So anyway, I decide to take
a job at Xalaxy at about the same time I decide to spruce up this
shithole house. So I hire this asshole, know nothing contractor
with two first names who can’t read a drawing to save his ass.”
“Howard James?” Henry interrupted. “Yeah, that’s right. James.
Anyway, I hired him and I came back up here to see if I can get
another IPO under my belt.” “IPO, Initial Public Offering?” Henry
interrupted again. “Yeah, when you take a fucking company public
and get shitloads of money for all the goombahs who have been
working their asses off for nothing. Are you hungry?” Anchula
asked.

Henry looked at his watch,
it was eight thirty. “Yes, I think I’ll have the fish and chips. I
know what an IPO is, I never looked at it that way though.” “I said
I was buying, you can have fucking steak,” Anchula waved at the
waiter who came over right away. “Two steak dinners, make mine
rare, his is?” “Medium.” Henry answered. “And an extra side of
French fries.” Anchula told the waiter who was writing as he walked
off towards the kitchen.

“
So after I hired this James
guy, he told me that he worked on Bette Davis’ real goddamn house
while she lived there sometime during the sixties. So I figured
Thornbird snookered me for some fucking cash and I wanted to talk
to him about it. Anyway, he didn’t call me back and I figured I
couldn’t do a damn thing about it.” Anchula stopped talking long
enough to take a sip of his beer.

“
So anyway, last week I flew
down to Palm Springs to check on this James asshole and wouldn’t
you know it, I’m driving back from downtown towards my house and I
saw Rex Thornbird’s car parked on the street in front of one of the
houses he had for sale.” “Go on, what did you do?” Henry encouraged
Anchula. “Well, I wanted to give him a piece of my mind, tell him I
was on to his little scam, so I parked behind his car, the front
door of the house was open so I walked in to talk with him.”
Anchula shook at the memory. “That son-of-a-bitch was lying face
down in the biggest fucking puddle of blood that I have ever seen.
I was grossed out and scared. I figured if I called the cops, they
would find out that I’m an illegal and would deport me.”

The waiter arrived with
their steaks and the extra basket of French fries. He set them on
the table and walked off without a word. “I ran out of the house
and came back up here a day earlier than I had planned hoping that
you guys would never find out that I was even there. When I saw you
poke your head into the conference room, I knew that you were from
Palm Springs, and I knew that you were going to deport my ass, and
that’s why I ran.”

“
How did you know I was from
Palm Springs?” “Well, you look like a cop and the tan gave it away.
Cops up here don’t have tans like you do.” Did you touch anything
in the house?” Henry started cutting his steak. “Fuck no man, I
watch that show on TV, you know those CSI guys can get fingerprints
off a candle flame. My prints are on file with the Immigration
guys.” Anchula started in on the French fries.

“
Did you close the door on
the way out?” Henry asked.“Well, not directly, no. I ran into it as
I was running out, it bounced off the wall behind the door and it
slammed shut behind me. It scared the shit out of me as I was
running for my car. I thought the killer was still in the house and
was coming after me.” Anchula cut off a big piece of his steak and
started chewing on it. “I got the hell out of there.”

“
What day was that?” Henry
asked. “Day, day? Shit, I flew down on Wednesday, so this had to be
Thursday morning.” Anchula answered. “You know, as odd as it
sounds, I believe you.” Henry said putting his fork down. “Hey look
man; I want to stay in this country. I don’t want to be deported,
there’s no fucking way I’d kill a guy, even for the few grand that
I overpaid for that little cracker box house there.” Anchula
grabbed some more French fries, “Hey I got these to share you
know.”

“
Thanks. I appreciate that,
but the steak is plenty for me.” Henry drank some more of his beer.
“Amit, what are you worth?”

“
Shit, I don’t know man. Ten
maybe twenty?” Anchula shrugged. “Twenty million dollars?” Henry
asked, pausing his fork midway between his plate and his mouth.
“Yeah, something like that, north of that I think.” Anchula
finished his beer.

“
So why don’t you hire an
Immigration attorney and get rid of this sword of Damocles hanging
over your head? The government likes immigrants with large bank
accounts. You should be able to get a permanent visa based on your
bank account alone. It’s not going to take you any more time than
one phone call.” Henry put his steak into his mouth. “You think so?
Will the government overlook the time that I was here without a
visa?” This time it was Anchula who paused his fork midway between
his plate and his mouth. “Yeah, you might have to pay a fine or
something but I think you should definitely make a couple of calls
to attorneys who specialize in immigration law.” Henry said. “Wow
man, if that is so, that is certainly worth the price of a fucking
dinner!” Anchula raised his glass to salute Henry.“Money talks!”
Henry raised his glass to Anchula’s.