Pumped for Murder (30 page)

“It’s true,” Helen said. “It’s all true and you know it. You knew those two trainers used steroids and gave them to poor Debbi. The whole building knew why they went outside at three o’clock every afternoon.You should have barred them from the gym. But you kept silent because you wanted their trophies in the Hall of Fame case downstairs.

“You knew Logan did sleazy things to sell memberships, but you ignored the complaints.You didn’t care and you didn’t stop him.You wanted those sales.

“Poor little Evie was railroaded into jail with your help while those two steroid-using monsters roamed free in this gym.You didn’t care about that, either.

“So, yes, I did it. It was the right thing to do. I don’t understand why you’re firing me.”

Derek’s voice dropped to a deep rumble. “Because of you, I’ve lost my best salesman. Because of you, members are quitting this gym by the dozen. Because of you, Fantastic Fitness is associated with murder and drug use. Because of you, my gym gets more bad publicity with every news update on Channel Seventy-seven. That’s why I’m firing you. Besides, you’re fat. You were supposed to lose weight and you didn’t. Those are the reasons why you’re being fired. Got it? Get out.
You’re fired! Fired! Fired!
”

Helen opened her cell phone and said, “See that? You’re looking at TV reporter Valerie Cannata’s personal cell phone number. When I call her, she’ll listen. She got two good stories from me this week. Let’s go for three. If I tell her I was fired because of her investigative stories, she’ll plaster this gym’s name all over the television for a week. You’ll have seven solid days of local coverage.”

Helen pressed the CALL button.

“Wait!” Derek said. “Stop! Don’t call that reporter. What do you want? Your old job back? I can give it to you. I’ll even give you a fifty-cent-an-hour raise.”

“I want the raise,” Helen said, “but you can keep the job. Give them both to Evie Roddick when she gets out of jail.You promised to find her work here if she went quietly with Detective Evarts Redding. She kept her end of the deal. Now you keep yours.”

“I don’t know if she’s qualified for a job at this gym,” Derek said.

“You definitely need someone to answer the phone and take messages,” Helen said, looking at the blinking lights. “Evie’s skinny, so she’ll fit your important employment criteria.”

“There may not even be a gym for her to work at, thanks to you.” Derek sounded bitter.

“She’ll have a fresh job for her résumé,” Helen said. “You aren’t going to close next week, or even next month. Maybe if you hire Evie, you’ll get some positive press from Valerie. Evie could save this gym.”

“But—” Derek said.

“You don’t have to thank me,” Helen said. “But there is one more thing I want to make clear: I’m not fat. Got that? You’ve been spending too much time around gym rats. This is what a normal woman looks like.”

Derek managed a nod.

“Good-bye,” Helen said. “I’ll check back in a week and make sure Evie has her job. If you’re lucky, you’ll never see me again.”

Helen ran lightly down the stairs. The front door
whooshed
open. Helen hoped she was walking through it for the last time.

H
elen was so happy to be out of the gym, she skipped to her car. Unfortunately, the Igloo skipped, too. The Cruiser hesitated when she hit the gas pedal.

Helen checked the gauges, but they looked normal. The car didn’t make any strange noises, and it got her home. Helen hoped that meant the problem wasn’t serious. She patted the faithful Cruiser on the fender and ran upstairs to the office of Coronado Investigations.

Phil looked up from his computer and smiled. “That was fast.”

“It didn’t take me long to quit—or get fired,” Helen said. “I’m not sure which it was. Either way, I’m free of that place. One case down, one to go. You were supposed to get the fax from Sunset Palms this morning. Did Danny Boy’s sister have the clerk send those two pages?”

“I got one page. The great Linda Cerventi faxed it with her own two hands,” Phil said. “Looks like the real thing, too. It’s from Mark’s police report.”

“Where’s the second page?” Helen asked.

“She says she’ll have it this afternoon.”

“Hah!” Helen said.

“I suggested that Linda might want to watch Channel Seventy-seven, especially the exposé by Valerie Cannata. Linda promised I’d have the other page by one o’clock.”

“And you believe her?” Helen asked.

“Valerie is doing hourly updates of your story. She had live coverage of Evie leaving jail. Evie personally thanked you for saving her from death row. We’ll have that paper from Linda in time. Meanwhile, there’s plenty here. I’ve made you a copy. Read it and see if you reach the same conclusions.”

Helen sat at her desk. The page was a Sunset Palms police form, the “Supplementary Investigative and/or Disposition Report on the auto accident/suicide of Mark Behr.” It was dated July 15, 1986. The short report was written in that stilted police style, as if the officer was testifying. It said:

“Reference to the above incident, Bernadette Behr, sister to Mark Behr, contacted this officer, at which time the following information was obtained from her. Bernie Behr stated that Mark had been depressed and had often talked of suicide. Bernadette Behr stated that about one or two weeks before this incident, Mark had stated something about Ahmet Yavuz being the devil and he could kill Ahmet and then himself and this would stop Yavuz and save the world.

“Bernadette Behr was asked if Mark would have killed Ahmet Yavuz if he had seen him, with Bernadette stating that Mark probably would have. No additional information was obtained from Bernadette Behr.”

The report had four boxes the police could check: “active,” “cleared by arrest,” and “inactive.” Mark’s case was checked “exceptionally cleared.”

Helen read the report twice, trying to grasp it. “I keep reading this, but I’m not sure I understand it. Go over it with me: Bernie told the police Mark was suicidal.”

“That’s what the report says,” Phil said.

“So Bernie stopped the investigation into her brother’s death,” Helen said.

“That’s right,” Phil said.

“That can’t be,” Helen said. “Gus told us his sister had stopped seeing Ahmet a week before Mark’s death.”

“Yes, he did,” Phil said.

“Mark rescued Bernie from the drug dealer’s house. Ahmet took her clothes so she couldn’t leave. Mark wrapped his sister in a bedspread and carried her out of there. The rescued Bernie didn’t want to go home to Mother, so she lived with her brothers in their bachelor apartment. She was too afraid to leave.”

“That’s what Joel told us,” Phil said.

“Is Gus lying?” Helen asked. “Did Joel lie about Bernie’s rescue ?”

“I don’t think so,” Phil said.

“Then what’s going on with this report?”

“If Gus and Joel aren’t lying,” Phil said, “then Bernie is.”

“Bernie was afraid of Ahmet,” Helen said. “She cut all ties with him. Why would she tell the police that Mark wanted to commit suicide?”

“I don’t know,” Phil said.

“Maybe the cops came to the apartment and interviewed her,” Helen said.

“No, she made an appointment and went to the station,” Phil said. “She gave the police a statement that her brother had mental problems and had threatened suicide. That’s when the police stopped investigating his death.”

“But what about the red flags we noticed—the gun, the shell casing and the blanket with the bullet hole?”

“The police ignored them once Mark’s sister gave her statement,” Phil said.

“Why would Bernie stop the investigation?” Helen said. “Why would she brand her brother a suicide? She was Catholic. Suicide is a serious sin in her religion.”

“Bernie was trying to save herself,” Phil said. “Her brother was dead. She was mixed up with a drug crowd. She didn’t care if her brother was labeled a suicide. Bernie wasn’t religious anymore.”

“Where was Mark’s mother?” Helen asked.

“Gus told us his mother was a ghost. She’d lost her husband and her son. She was dying of cancer.”

Helen struggled with this information and still failed to grasp it. The conclusions were too distressing. “What Bernie told the police made Mark’s case go away,” she said. “It was closed. Not just closed—exceptionally closed. Gus was right. Someone in law enforcement was paid off.”

“Not necessarily,” Phil said. “Every case has loose ends. The police know that. This was a small force. Bernie gave them a way out, and they took it.”

“Gus told us Bernie went to a psychiatric hospital after Mark died. I want to ask him about that incident.”

“Why?” Phil asked.

“The hospital visit is a key to this case,” Helen said. “I know it. I want Gus to tell me more about it.”

“There’s the phone. Call him,” Phil said.

“No, I’ll see him in person,” Helen said. “The Igloo hesitates when I hit the gas. I’ll take the car to Gus and have him look at it. Then I can ask him what happened when his sister was in the hospital.”

“Your instincts have been good so far,” Phil said. “I’ll stay here and dig around in the computer for more information about Ahmet. He’s the real mystery in this case.”

Gus was in his office eating a turkey sandwich when Helen drove the PT Cruiser into the Boy Toys Restoration garage. The office was cool, but Gus’s shirt was soaked with sweat.

“Heat getting you?” Helen asked.

“Yeah,” Gus said. “It’s brutal. I’ve got to lose weight. Jeannie has me on a diet. This time I’m sticking to it.”

Helen wondered how often he’d made that resolution. His sandwich, a thin slice of colorless meat on whole wheat, had three bites out of it. Gus abandoned his low-fat lunch and said, “Do you have news?”

“Phil will have a report for you shortly. I have a small problem with my car and a question about Bernie.”

“Car first.” Gus listened to Helen describe the car’s behavior, then said, “Sounds like it needs a new fuel filter, but I’ll look at it. Now, what’s the question?”

Gus seemed more comfortable working on the car while he talked, so Helen followed him into the repair area. Gus draped the Cruiser’s fenders with the same care as if he were working on a vintage Rolls.

“After Mark rescued your sister from Ahmet, she came to live with you and Mark,” Helen said.

“That’s right.”

“After Mark saved her, did Bernie ever call Ahmet?” Helen asked. “Did the dealer come see her? Ask after her?”

“Never,” Gus said. “She was frightened. She cut all ties with Ahmet.”

“Tell me about when your sister had a breakdown and went to the psychiatric hospital.”

“Mark had been dead a month,” Gus said. “Bernie was still living with me. Bernie quit eating. She lost, like, thirty-some pounds. She stayed in my apartment all day, holding Mark’s old shirt and crying. She wouldn’t get dressed. I got worried and called Mom. Mom wasn’t doing too well herself. We took Bernie to the doctor. I had to carry her to the car in her robe.

“The doctor said she was depressed and anorexic. He wanted her committed to a psychiatric hospital. Mom hated shrinks, but she didn’t argue with him. She didn’t want to lose another child. Bernie didn’t have the strength to fight anyone.

“After two weeks, the doc finally let her have visitors. She was lying in her bed like one of those stone figures on a tomb in an old English church; you know the kind I mean?”

“Yes,” Helen said.

“She looked half-dead. She was pale and rigid and so thin she hardly made a mound in the covers. Her face was like a skull covered with skin. She was taking heavy drugs—legal, psychiatrist-type drugs—and her eyes were dull. She still had that incredible red hair. It was almost down to her waist, but it was crackly and dry. I couldn’t tell if Bernie was awake or not. I stood there for a long time staring at her. Then I whispered her name.

“She sat up like she was eighty years old. ‘You came to see me,’ she said in this whiny voice. ‘You didn’t have to do that. I don’t deserve it.’ She started crying. I was afraid I’d upset her again.

“I said, ‘Hey, it’s okay.’ I gave her a hug. She was so skinny I could feel her spine through her hospital gown. It was like knobs of bone.

“ ‘ I’m so ugly,’ she cried.

“ ‘ No, you’re beautiful.You just need to gain a little weight.You’ve got great hair.’

“She wouldn’t stop crying. She kept saying, ‘It’s all my fault. It’s all my fault.’

“I tried to say it wasn’t, but she wouldn’t listen. I left her there, crying.

“The doctor said she would get better, and she did. Bernie was released about six months later, and she really straightened herself out. She went to school to become a phlebotomist; then she married a decent guy. Her husband’s an executive. They have a good kid. My nephew’s in college now. Whatever the doctor did to her at that hospital, it was the right thing.”

Gus was poking around under the Cruiser’s hood. Helen thought it was easier for him to examine the inner workings of a car than his own family. “Ah! Just what I thought,” Gus said. “It was the filter. That’s easy. I’ll fix it in a minute.”

Gus returned with the new filter, tinkered with the car again, then shut the hood. “That’s it,” he said, smiling. “Ready to go. Did I answer your question?”

“I still don’t understand,” Helen said. “Why would Bernie say Mark’s death was all her fault?”

“Guilt,” Gus said. “She felt guilty that she got Mark mixed up with that wild crowd. My sister made some bad decisions when she was young, but Bernie grew up. She’s a good person now. You’re good to go.”

Gus wanted Helen to leave.

“What do I owe you?”

“No charge,” he said.

It was almost one o’clock. Phil was supposed to get the second page of Mark’s report. Helen hurried home.

The car was fine, but something was wrong with Gus’s story. Something he couldn’t see no matter how often he looked at it.