Kill Shot (28 page)
“So that’s it? You never want to see me again?” She drew back in amazement. “What does that little bitch do for you that I can’t do better?”
Oz looked at her and smiled. “She’s just Micki. She’s mine and I love her.”
“I mean in the sack. What does she do for you in the sack?”
Oz couldn’t keep the half smile at bay. “She lets me love her.”
Fawn drew back her hand as though she meant to slap him, but changed her mind. She took a breath and turned back to face Eddie. “How much do I owe you for the mirror and the booze?”
Oz slipped off the stool and joined Vinnie at the end of the bar.
Vinnie shook his head, grinning. “You’ve got ‘em throwing themselves at you.”
“I don’t want anything to mess up what I have with Micki now. Can you take Fawn home?”
“I will if she wants me to.”
“She wants you to.”
#
Oz stared down at Micki, still asleep. He left his tee shirt and pants in a pile beside the bed with his shoes.
When he slid into bed beside her she opened her eyes.
“You smell funny,” she said, her voice thick with sleep. “Cigarettes and something nasty like cheap perfume.”
It figures. I try to do something nice and get nailed for it.
“Sorry,” he said. “I had to go out.” He thought he’d better not reveal his mission, since Micki still had a sore spot where Fawn was concerned.
But she had eased back to sleep in his arms. He took a thankful breath and snuggled next to her. If he never had to explain this night’s actions it would be too soon.
The next morning, Oz slipped out of bed before Micki awoke and stuffed the clothes he’d worn the previous night into a plastic hamper with his other dirty clothes. He resolved to take them down to the laundry room as soon as possible to erase any traces of his whereabouts.
He gave himself a mental head slap for even responding to Eddie’s phone call. In the future he wouldn’t react, even if Fawn lay bleeding in the street.
He shook his head to erase that image, acknowledging that he felt guilty. Guilty for letting himself become involved with someone he didn’t care about and guilty for hurting her. He knew, first hand, how it felt to be rejected by someone you loved.
He remembered when Vinnie and the other guys had taken him out for his birthday. They’d started out at Eddie’s and Oz had drunk more than usual, but it was his birthday and the guys were buying.
Vinnie had seemed intent on getting him plowed, probably hoping to heal his heartbreak over Micki. They took him to the strip club where he’d leaned on the stage-side bar with the other guys, whistling and clapping along with them.
When Fawn danced, she’d paid particular attention to Oz, grinding her voluptuous body in his lap. When Vinnie took him home, he’d dropped Fawn off with him.
Oz remembered telling her that he was tired and drunk, but since Vinnie had left her, she insisted on going inside to call someone to pick her up. That’s all he recalled of that night. When he awoke the next morning she was in his bed and, after that, he couldn’t seem to convince her that he’d never be in love with her.
When the guys he worked with found out Fawn was after him, they gave him a hard time, but it was clear that they were envious. Considering the beating his ego had taken when Micki dumped him, it was little wonder that he’d gone along with it.
Oz jumped in the shower and reached for the deodorant soap. He lathered it on his chest and arms to erase any lingering trace of Fawn’s perfume. He was acting like a guilty man and he’d only gone to Eddie’s to keep him from pressing charges.
“Hey!” Micki pulled back the shower curtain and joined him. “Did you go out last night, or did I dream it?” She reached for the shampoo.
“You dreamed it.” He reached for her and pulled her into a tender kiss.
#
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
Oz eyed the mountain of papers. They had been taken from the Jobe offices and residence and wound up in the lab, not because they were anticipating finding any trace evidence, but because the lab had the biggest tables for sorting.
It appeared that the man didn’t use a computer as his correspondence had been dictated to one of several secretaries. His files contained very few hand-written notations either.
His financial statements were being thoroughly scrutinized by experts in the field of forensic accounting.
Oz commandeered Hobart Jobe’s rolodex. He’d seen one like it in Micki’s father’s studio. Oz stored all his phone numbers in his cell phone and couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen an address book that wasn’t online.
Examining every card, Oz looked for anything out of the ordinary. He’d reviewed the vast business holdings, mostly real estate, but Jobe also held an interest in a wide variety of other businesses, such as restaurants, night clubs, travel agencies and trendy little boutiques.
He pulled one card off its track.
Extermination Services
with no address listed, just an eight hundred number. It was odd that it listed no contact name. He considered it for a minute, but thought that with all his properties Hobart Jobe might have reason to employ an exterminator and slipped the card back among the others.
Lieutenant Qualls walked through just often enough to make people nervous. He kept asking each of them what they’d found, but they mostly had nothing. Other than the payment to Keanes in the exact amount of Luka’s bail, there was nothing in his financial records to indicate any ties between the two men.
Oz set the rolodex back on a table. Maybe someone else would find something of interest.
“Hey Aida,” he said, entering her cubicle. “I’d like to look at all the park photos Micki shot.”
Aida flipped through a file drawer and pulled out a large manila file. “Knock yourself out, Oz man. What are you looking for?”
“I don’t even know,” he said. “I keep hoping something will jump out.”
He pulled out two photographs showing Laurel and Jason embracing and holding hands. He examined the rest with a magnifying glass to make sure he hadn’t missed anything.
“I’ve already done that,” Aida said.
“This guy.” Oz stabbed his finger on the face of a man who appeared on Micki’s second memory card. “This guy is in this family photo in the Jobe’s chauffer’s room. Why would he be there on the same day Luka shot out Micki’s car windows?” He handed Javier’s framed picture to Aida.
“And on the day his relative’s boss-lady was meeting her lover in the same park?” Aida said.
Oz held up the photo of Lissa sitting with young Trey on a bench in the children’s section. “The only one missing was daddy.”
Vinnie came into the lab and knocked on the doorframe to Aida’s cubicle. “Oz, you have a visitor,” he said. “It’s Mrs. Jobe.”
Oz went to the front desk to meet her. She, too, appeared to be shrunken by the fact of her husband’s incarceration. She wore little make-up and her face was blotchy and swollen, attesting to a recent crying binge.
“Officer Osmond,” she said. “I have to see my husband.”
“I’m afraid that’s out of my hands,” Oz said. “He confessed to murder and is going to be arraigned tomorrow.”
“But he’s innocent.” Her lips quivered into a grimace, forecasting an impending bout of tears.
“Mrs. Jobe, if you know anything about the murder of Jason Best that will clear your husband, I’d be happy to take your statement.”
“N-No, I don’t know anything about it.” She fumbled in her handbag, Oz thought for a tissue. Instead she brought out a plastic bag full of prescription medications. “My husband is a sick man. These are his medicines. Could you please see that he gets them on time? His doctor is very insistent that he take them precisely as ordered.”
“Yes, Ma’am,” Oz said.
She left the station house and Oz stared at the bag of medications in his hand. He took them to Lieutenant Qualls office.
“What are we? A bunch of damned nurses now?” Qualls tossed the bag on his desk.
Oz frowned and gestured to the assortment of pills. “We don’t want anything to happen to Hobart Jobe while he’s in our custody, do we sir?”
Qualls ran both hands over his head and blew out a long breath. “No, you’re right. Call Jobe’s doctor and confirm the scripts. We can’t be giving out medicine on his wife’s say so.”
Oz headed out with the medications, but Qualls called him back.
“Tell the doc we need his diagnosis for each medicine.”
“Yes, sir.” Oz called the doctor’s office and was told that the information would be faxed immediately.
When Oz brought the paperwork back to Qualls he sent for Hobart Jobe. “Might as well have a friendly chat with him while he’s taking his drugs.”
Oz and Lieutenant Qualls were waiting in the interrogation room when Jobe was brought in on the arm of a large officer who started to shackle him to a chair but Qualls waved him off.
Jobe glanced from man to man. “I didn’t think you could question me without my attorney present.”
“Mr. Jobe, we’re here at your wife’s request,” Qualls said. “She brought your medicine and we have your doctor’s permission to administer it.”
Jobe responded with a thin-lipped smile.
Oz passed him a large glass of water and lined up the medications in front of him.
Jobe stared at the pill bottles.
“Aren’t you going to take your pills?” Qualls asked. “Your wife came all the way down here to bring them to you.”
“You need a little help, Mr. Jobe?” Oz asked.
Jobe nodded.
“Because you can’t open the bottles by yourself, even though these aren’t safety caps.” Oz opened one and shook a capsule into Jobe’s palm.
Jobe put it in his mouth and picked up the glass of water with both hands.
Oz shook another pill out and Jobe repeated the unsteady process.
“Mr. Jobe,” he said. “We printed the photos you were so anxious to get your hands on. Guess what we found?” He placed another pill in Jobe’s hand.
Jobe swallowed the pill without answering.
Qualls slapped the photos of Laurel and Jason down on the table top.
Oz craned his neck to look at the pictures. “Your wife is a fine looking woman, Mr. Jobe. I can see why you’d pay so much to keep these photos out of the scandal rags.”
“But why did you use such a high-priced errand boy?” Qualls asked. “Phillip Luka is an assassin. How did he get involved in your plan to keep Laurel out of the gossip columns?”
“Does it matter who I hired to facilitate the transaction for me?” He sipped more water.
“No sir, it doesn’t,” Oz said. “What seems odd is that you paid one hundred thousand dollars for pictures of your wife and her lover when their liaison was common knowledge among your staff and the people who work in the spa. Mrs. Jobe isn’t exactly subtle with her trysts, is she?”
Jobe swallowed. “My wife is a very young woman,” he said deliberately.
“And a young woman has needs?” Qualls asked.
Jobe nodded.
“When did you first become aware of the affair?” Oz asked.
Jobe sat back and gave him a long look across the table. “My wife’s chauffer, Javier first brought it to my attention. I asked where she was and the poor boy turned the brightest shade of red. I thought he was going to faint right in front of me. About a month later, Jason Best came to me himself and admitted the affair. He thought Laurel was in love with him and would leave me.”
“And you don’t think she intended to leave you?” Oz asked.
“Good heavens, no.” Jobe chuckled at that, triggering a coughing spasm. He sipped more water and sat back with a tight little smile on his lips.
“Because, sir,” Oz said, “isn’t it true that your wife has had numerous affairs over the years?”
“It’s entirely my fault,” he said. “I’m a busy man. I haven’t given Laurel the attention she deserves.”
“And when Jason Best told you she was leaving you it didn’t concern you at all.”
The old man shook his head. “Haven’t you ever heard of pre-nuptial agreements? Ours is iron-clad. If she leaves, she gets nothing, including custody of our son.”
Oz and Qualls exchanged a glance.
“So you knew she wouldn’t leave you for some boy-toy?” Qualls asked.
Jobe coughed and nodded his head.
“So why did you kill Jason Best?” Oz asked.
“Because he threatened to sell his story to the highest bidder. I couldn’t have the Jobe name dragged through the gutter like that. I have my son to think of.”
Oz nodded. “That makes sense. And you’re ready to drag the Jobe name through the mud and pay for your crime by spending the rest of your life in prison.”
“I confessed,” he said. “There won’t be a trial. I am willing to pay for my crime.”
“Even if it means that you won’t see your son again?” Oz gave him a disbelieving look. “If you love that little boy so much, how come you’re willing to rob him of his father?”
Jobe leaned back in the chair and closed his lips firmly.
#
