Dream House (6 page)

C
HAPTER
E
LEVEN

Saturday, November 8. 5:53
P.M.
1800 block of Edgecliffe Drive. Two assailants approached the victim on foot. “Don't be a chump,” one of them said. “I know where you live. I'm gonna burn down your house.” (Northeast)

T
HE TWIN FLAMES OF THE BRAIDED LAVENDER-AND
-white havdalah candle became one and leapt to life. My dad handed me the candle, and raising a footed silver cup, he recited the blessing that separates the Sabbath from the rest of the week—“between the holy and the secular.”

On a scale of “holy” I'd scored a five out of ten this Shabbat at best. Probably a four. Yes, I'd observed all the rules. Even when I'd bolted from Orthodox Judaism, I'd observed the rules at my parents' home out of respect for them. Yes, I'd prayed next to Liora this morning at shul, and I'd participated in the family discussion of the weekly Torah portion at lunch. But my mind had turned again and again to Oscar Linney and his death.

My dad finished reciting the final havdalah blessing. I handed him the candle, and while Joey shut off the overhead kitchen light, my dad poured Glenlivet onto a plate and touched the candle to the liquor. Crowding near the counter, we watched tiny hot blue ghostly acrobats dance and leap along the alcohol trail, sometimes in pairs, sometimes alone, until the alcohol was consumed and all the acrobats took their final bows and disappeared.

Today's Torah portion, in fact, had reminded me of the professor.
Lech lecha.
“Leave your country,” God had instructed Abraham. Abraham, who, the commentaries say, was thrown into a fiery furnace when he wouldn't bow down to idols. Abraham had survived a furnace. Oscar Linney hadn't.

As a child I thought my dad was a magician, making fire dance on liquid. Sometimes he uses wine instead of liquor. When he does, he presses the torch into the shallow pool that has spilled onto the chalice's tray, and the flame sputters and hisses as it dies. I was grateful that tonight he'd used the Glenlivet. I'd had a restless night, imagining the old man trapped, hearing in my mind the sounds of his fiery death.

Thinking about Oscar Linney wasn't the problem. The problem was that my preoccupation with Linney had marred the beauty and repose of Shabbat that I treasure. If I'd listened to Liora and stayed home, Linney would still be dead, but I wouldn't have been itching all day for the “holy” to end so that I could rush into the “secular” to find out the what and how of what had happened, the why.

I'd been tempted to ask questions at the scene. I'd like to think I would have gone home with my questions unasked if Noah hadn't been there, but I'm not sure. And I envy people like my sister who are never tempted.

My dad began singing “HaMavdil” in Hebrew, and I joined the others. Then Bubbie G, her voice thin and wavery but still beautiful, led us in the Yiddish “Gut voch.” A good week. A week filled with
mazel,
luck. I hoped so. I tried to stay in the moment, but my mind was on Fuller and the questions that had troubled me all day.

“I still can't believe the Professor is dead,” Tim Bolt said. “I keep thinking, what if I'd told the firemen Linney might be inside? But I didn't see him arrive. None of us did. And there were no lights on in the house.”

Bolt had been startled and a little uncomfortable to see me on his doorstep. After a slight hesitation he'd invited me into a living room done in tones of ocher and sand livened by a startling splash of blues and reds in the oil painting of a woman above the stone fireplace. The room was heavy with the smell of a floral air freshener—to cover the smoke, Tim had explained before I'd asked.

I made myself comfortable on a taupe chenille sofa. “Did the police say what happened?”

Friday night, prompted by my brother and my conscience, I'd left after overhearing the news. I still hadn't phoned Connors. Even if I'd dared bother him on a Saturday night, he wouldn't have information about a case outside his jurisdiction. Porter would know, but the odds of his talking to me were slimmer than Calista Flockhart.

“The fire department is handling the investigation,” Tim said. “Hank told me they're pretty sure it's arson.”

“He didn't know his father-in-law was missing?”

“He was on an overnight business trip. The caregiver didn't show that morning, and Hank couldn't cancel, so he asked the housekeeper to stay until he returned Saturday. She claims the Professor told her Hank had phoned and said he was returning Friday afternoon. He'd seemed fine and insisted he'd be okay for the hour or so he'd be alone.”

I wouldn't want to be in the housekeeper's shoes. “You seem close to the family.”

“We've been neighbors since I was a kid. This was my parents' home.” He waved his hand around the room. “Peggy and I moved in after my parents died. When I was a teenager I mowed the Linneys' lawn, and the Professor helped me with my history papers. Mostly, he told me how terrible they were.” Tim's smile turned into a sigh.

“Was Linney's daughter on the local HARP board?”

Bolt gazed at me, curious. “I don't think so, no. The Professor was. He was quite involved. Why?”

“An unusual number of homes have been vandalized lately in HARP districts, and the targeted homes seem to belong to HARP board members.”

Tim frowned. “Really?”

The first time one of my pieces ran in the
Times,
I'd been dismayed to find out that the entire world hadn't read it. I've learned better. “There was an article about it in yesterday's L.A.
Times.
”

“I haven't read yesterday's paper yet. My wife hasn't been feeling well, and I've been playing nurse. Not very well, I'm afraid.” He smiled ruefully. “I'll go get it. What section is it in?”

“‘Calendar.'” A while back it would have been in a separate section called “Southern California Living,” but the
Times
is always changing things around; don't ask me why.

While he was gone, I stretched my legs and took a closer look at the lithograph and framed photos, one of a younger Tim with a pretty brown-haired woman, another of a little girl and boy who looked just like the couple.

Tim came back into the room, paging through the newspaper as he walked.

“Your children?” I pointed to the photos.

“None yet,” he said with some sadness. “But we're hoping. That's me and Peggy. My wife. We were childhood sweethearts.”

He sat on an oversize armchair and read the article. I returned to the couch and waited until he was done.

“Molly Blume,” he said, and looked up. “That's you, right?” He scanned my article again. “So this guy is targeting HARP board members?”

“I thought so. I guess I was wrong.” I tried again to console myself with the fact that Connors had made the same assumption. “If Margaret Reston—”

“Linney,” Tim corrected. “Reston's her married name, but she kept her maiden name for most things.”

Whatever. “If Margaret Linney was never on a HARP board, I don't understand why she was targeted.”

“Maybe it was the Professor who was targeted,” Tim said. “It was his house.”

I frowned. “He told me it was his daughter's house.”

“It was, as of around six months ago. The Professor signed the house over to Margaret when he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. He wanted to put his affairs in order while he still had the mental sharpness to do it. He
loved
that house. So did Margaret. I don't think she wanted to move. Even if the new house
is
in Hancock Park.”

What Linney had said, plus a measure of disdain. “Mr. Reston put the house up for sale?”

“Three months ago, a month before the Muirfield house was finished. The Professor was devastated. He didn't want strangers living in his house. But of course, Hank couldn't let him live there alone, even with a caretaker. I promised the Professor I'd screen the buyers carefully. It's in my best interests. I want nice neighbors.” Bolt smiled.

“You're with Central Realty?” That was the name I'd seen on the For Sale sign.

He nodded. “It's a beautiful house— Well, it was, before the fire. I've been keeping an eye on it, making sure the gardener does a good job, letting the housekeeper in to clean the place every week. It was in immaculate condition and everything was the original work—the tile, the fireplace, the hardware, the moldings. But it's a hard sell, because of Margaret's disappearance.”

This was the sad story. I vaguely recalled reading about a woman's disappearance in a police report a while back, but the reports I get are sanitized and don't have names. And in a large city like L.A., people often disappear, often voluntarily. “I don't remember seeing media coverage about it.”

“There were a few write-ups in the papers, and something on the local TV news. There would have been more, but a little girl went missing, so that took over. But by law we're required to tell potential buyers something like that, especially since it looks like Margaret was kidnapped from the house. At the first two open houses, most of the people who stopped by were from the neighborhood. They weren't interested in buying. They just wanted to snoop. Vultures.” Tim sniffed.

“What happened to Margaret?”

“One day I saw her working in her garden. The next morning she was gone. Just like that.” He was looking somewhere else, not at me, probably lost in the memory. “There were signs of a struggle in her bedroom. And the police found her car at a mall, and her blood.”

“Did she seem different that day?”

“I didn't think so at the time. That morning she dropped off a book I'd asked to borrow, and then I showed her a lithograph I just bought. She paints, so I value her opinion. She couldn't stay, though, because she had a busy day ahead of her. Later, when the police asked me, I realized she was tense. But I have no idea why.”

“When did she disappear, exactly?”

“It'll be five months this Wednesday, November twelfth. The police think she's dead, but her husband hired a detective. He told me he won't give up till he finds her. Dead
or
alive,” Tim added.

“Where was he when Margaret disappeared?”

“Out of town, on business.”

A flicker of disapproval flitted across his face so quickly that I almost missed it. Reston had been out of town Friday night, too. I wondered if the police would find that as interesting as I did. I flashed to Scott Peterson, who had beseeched the public to help him find his missing eight-months-pregnant wife, Laci, and was now awaiting trial for her murder.

“What about Professor Linney?”

“He was asleep for the night, and in the morning, Margaret was gone. He blamed himself.” Tim sighed. “I kept telling him he couldn't have saved her. And if he'd tried, he probably would've been killed.”

And now he was dead anyway. When trouble comes, Bubbie G says, it often doesn't come alone. “Who reported her missing?”

“I did,” Bolt said, somber. “The Professor pounded on my door at six in the morning. He couldn't find Margaret, her room was a mess, he was afraid something had happened to her. He wasn't making sense, and I thought she'd run to the market or something. But then I saw the bedroom.” He grimaced, as though he were reliving the discovery.

“No one on the block heard anything? No one saw any strange people or cars that didn't belong?”

Tim shook his head. “It happened in the middle of the night. Margaret kept her car at the end of the driveway, near the garage. So if she was kidnapped, the kidnapper could have taken her out the back door and no one would have seen.”

Bolt's choice of words interested me. “You're not sure she was kidnapped?”

“I guess she was. They were waiting for a ransom demand—Hank has money—but it never came.”

I sensed he was holding back. Reporter's intuition. That and his earlier disapproval; his slight, uneasy hesitation; the fact that he wasn't making eye contact. I thought about the mocking tone of the woman I'd heard talking to Reston, about Reston's anger directed at her and possibly the architect. What was his name? Dorn. Jeremy Dorn.

“I heard people talking about this case just the other night,” I lied. “I didn't realize they were talking about Margaret Linney. They seemed to think the husband was a suspect in the disappearance.”

Tim shrugged. “You'd have to ask the police.”

Not exactly a denial. “What about Jeremy Dorn? Was there something going on between him and Margaret Reston?”

He stiffened. “I've known Margaret all my life. She was a beautiful person, inside and out. People like to say nasty things, but that doesn't make them true.” His face was flushed with anger.

So there
had
been talk. “Did she know Jeremy Dorn?”

“They both did. Hank and Margaret were building their dream house. Dorn was the architect.”

“The other day Professor Linney asked you if Margaret still hated him. What was that all about?”

“I really can't say.” Bolt glanced toward the stairs visible through the arched doorway and stood. “I'd better check on Peggy.”

Couldn't
say, or wouldn't? I stood, too. “I appreciate your talking to me, Tim. One more question? Was Professor Linney the head of the HARP board when he served on it?”

Tim looked at me with curiosity. “I don't think so. What's the difference? Either way, he's dead,” he said quietly. “That sad old man is dead.”

C
HAPTER
T
WELVE

Z
ACK WAS ROCKING ON MY PORCH GLIDER, HIS HANDS
IN
the pockets of his black leather jacket, when I pulled into my driveway.

He met me at the trunk of my car.

“Another five minutes, and I would've been the first cryonically preserved rabbi. Who said L.A. doesn't get cold?” He smiled. “
Shavua tov,
Molly.” Have a good week.

“
Shavua tov.
Why didn't you call first?”

“I did. You weren't home, and your cell phone wasn't on. Your mom said you left right after havdalah, so I figured I'd pick you up at seven.”

He lifted out my roll-aboard overnighter and wheeled it along the pavement and up the steps to the porch.

I checked my watch. It was five after. “Did we have a date?” I took out a bag with the quart of Baskin-Robbins Pralines 'n Cream I'd bought after leaving Tim Bolt's.

Zack turned and gave me a quizzical look. “We always go out Saturday night. Why would tonight be different?”

I shut the trunk and joined him on the porch. “You didn't mention it on Friday. And you didn't walk over last night, or this afternoon. So I wasn't sure.”

“My cousins are visiting from New York. Remember?”

“Not really.” Now that he said it, I
did
remember something about relatives coming. All that worry . . .

The apartment smelled musty. I opened a window in the breakfast nook, where I left Zack while I wheeled my luggage to my bedroom and took off my jacket. When I returned he was in my tiny kitchen, rearranging frozen vegetables in my freezer to find a spot for the ice cream.

“I need five minutes,” I said. “Where are we going?”

“There's an eight-thirty showing of the new Tom Hanks film at The Grove. How does that sound?” He removed his jacket and slipped it around a dinette chair.

“Fine.”

I'm a big fan of Tom's, though not of war movies, which this was. But it was “kosher”—no steamy sex, no nudity, little or no profanity. Aside from animated films, action flicks, selected thrillers, and romantic comedies (my favorite), there's not much out there for a Modern Orthodox rabbi to see.

“Where were you, by the way?” he asked. “Aside from Baskin-Robbins.”

“Interviewing someone about the death of an old man who died in a fire last night on Fuller. I happened to give him a ride a few days ago.” I told him what had happened, my heart heavy with sadness for Oscar Linney.

“That poor old man.” Zack shook his head. “People were talking about the fire in shul. According to the news, the police suspect arson. So what was he like?”

“Cranky, confused. Lonely, sad. Looking for a daughter who's missing and is probably dead.” I repeated what Tim Bolt had told me, felt another twinge of pity for the old man.

Zack sighed. “Not knowing is worse than knowing, isn't it? The pain must be unbearable. You hear about people with missing spouses, kids. Look at Yakov and Yosef.” Jacob and Joseph. “Yakov spent twenty-two years mourning for his son, not wanting to accept that he was dead even though he'd seen the blood on Yosef's coat.”

I still have trouble believing that this man who slips so naturally into talk of Judaism and Jewish ancestors was the jock I'd necked with in high school. Zack had made a 180-degree turn. If anything, I'd turned a few degrees in the opposite direction.

He was studying me. “You're frowning. Is something wrong, Molly?”

This is why I can't bluff at poker. “It's my
Times
story.” Not really a lie. “The house that was torched, where the old man died? It was his house, and he was on the HARP board. But I don't think he
chaired
the board.”

Zack looked puzzled. “And that's a problem because . . . ?”

I told him what I'd left out of my piece. “So if Oscar Linney's house was targeted, that doesn't fit the pattern.”

“So maybe the pattern's a little different. It's still a HARP connection, right? And you didn't mention this other pattern in your story, so there's nothing to retract.”

Thanks to Connors. He'd never let me forget. “There
was
a pattern, Zack. Seven out of twelve chairpersons targeted in a two-month period can't be a coincidence.”

“You're right.” Zack rubbed his chin. He does that when he's thinking hard.

“We're not going to solve it tonight. I'm going to change.” I took a step toward the hall and turned around. “Okay if I wear pants?” I could see that the question surprised him. I'd surprised myself.

“You don't need my permission.”

“But would it
bother
you?”

He cocked his head. “Is this a test?”

“It's a question.” I was beginning to be sorry I'd asked. I sat down at the dinette table.

“Well, if you're asking, I'd be more comfortable if you didn't.”

“You were uncomfortable at the HARP meeting when the Hammers saw us together, weren't you?”

“Not in the least.”

He was making me nervous, standing there. “Aren't you going to sit down?”

“Do I need an attorney?”

I felt myself blush. “Sorry.”

He took the seat across from me. “Is that why you were so distant on the way home, and the next night, when we talked on the phone?”

“
I
wasn't distant.
You
were distant.”

“I was trying not to get in your way, Molly. You were thinking about a dead bird. You had a deadline.”

I had to admit that was true. “I told you on our first date that I wasn't right for you.”

“And
I
said, ‘Let's get to know each other, see what happens.' Unless I'm totally clueless, things are great between us.” He gazed at me intently. “Aren't they?”

“Yes.”
God,
yes. My face felt warm. “That first date, were you figuring that if we hit it off, I'd change the way I dress?”

“I wasn't figuring anything. I felt incredibly lucky that we'd reconnected, and then you made it clear you weren't interested. But I couldn't stop thinking about you, and then I saw you in shul. And, well, here we are.”

“And my skirts and sleeves are still too short.” I smiled to lighten the moment.

He smiled, too. “You're hardly Jennifer Lopez in short shorts or a sheer Versace. But you're right,” he said, suddenly serious. “As a rabbi, I'm expected to follow the rules, and people look at who I'm with. Human nature.”

“So what are you saying?”

“I'm saying I believe in the rules. I live my life by them.” He leaned toward me, his arms folded on the table. “I'm saying you're the best thing that's happened to me, Molly, and I can't imagine not having you in my life, and I hope we can work it all out. What are
you
saying?”

He was so close that I could smell the musk of his aftershave. I had an urge to trace the contours of his face with my finger, to lean closer and press my lips against his. What would that feel like after twelve years?

“I'm saying you're the best thing that's happened to me, and I can't imagine not having you in my life,” I repeated softly. My face was tingling. “But I'm not good with having rules forced on me. That's what pushed me away before. And I don't want to give up my individuality.”

“And your individuality is defined by your hemline?”

“Among other things.”

“Orthodox Judaism has a lot of rules, Molly, most of which you have no problem following.” He leaned back against the chair. “Is this going to be a problem?”

“I don't want it to be.”

He nodded. “Maybe this isn't about hemlines.”

Maybe it wasn't. Maybe it was about not knowing whether I could trust my feelings. I'd been wrong before. I'd thought Ron and I would last forever, but our marriage had expired before the warranty on our large-screen TV.

“I guess I need some time,” I said.