Thugs and Kisses (19 page)

“How so?”

“Besides the stress factor, he’s smart enough to plan it and execute it, and he has the resources to carry it out.”

Again he paused. I was beginning to read his pauses and hesitations. A short pause meant nothing out of the ordinary, but a long one definitely called for concern. This pause was neither, so it threw me off.

“I also called with some pretty good news for you.”

“Excuse me.” I quickly blew my nose. “Okay, shoot. I could use some good news.”

“You are officially off the suspect list in the Donny Oliver case.”

“Officially? You mean they think I couldn’t have done it or wouldn’t have done it?”

This time, the pause came with a deep chuckle. “Don’t press your luck, Odelia. They haven’t found any evidence to link you with Oliver’s death. Should that change, you’ll be back in their sights.” A longer pause. “But your pal Sally is still under consideration.”

“Anyone else? Say … his wife?”

“Let’s just say there are a few others, which brings me to another issue.” Another pause—a very long one. Uh-oh. “What the hell were you doing at Donny Oliver’s house with Sally Kipman yesterday?”

Yikes
. That threw me, but only for a moment.

“We went to pay our respects to Donny’s widow. After all, Donny was our classmate and the father of Sally’s son. We even brought her a bundt cake.”

“Yeah, right.”

“It’s true, ask her. Better yet, ask her mother, Mrs. Poppin, Carolyn Poppin, she was there.” Now it was my turn to pause. “Hey, how did you know about yesterday?”

“Let’s just say I got a call from one of my cop buddies telling me to keep my girlfriend in line.”

Girlfriend
? But, of course, I was at the reunion with Dev. The police working Donny’s murder knew that.

“Dev, I was thinking about the murder.”

“I told you to stay out of it, Odelia, and I mean it.” His tone had turned harsh and demanding.

“But —”

“No buts about it. I’ll not have you getting mixed up in this type of thing again. How many times do you have to have a brush with death to understand how dangerous it is or how dangerous your involvement could be to other people? I can’t do my job if I’m worried about you.”

He’ll not have me?
The possessiveness of his tone bothered me. Seems without my permission I had been handed from one man to another, and neither was tolerant or accepting of what I wanted to do. In my heart, I knew they were both right to be concerned about me, and I did appreciate it, but I had ideas and opinions and felt frustrated that I wasn’t able to tell Dev about them. Actually, the frustration came from him not being willing to listen.

After turning down an invitation from Dev for brunch and a movie, I rolled over and tried to get back to sleep, and it was almost mission accomplished when the phone rang again. It wasn’t even ten o’clock yet, and I’d had three phone calls in less than twenty minutes. It must be National Call Odelia Day. I rolled over and answered it.

“Hi, stranger.”

“Excuse me?”

“Don’t you know who this is?”

“Look, I’m in bed, sick, and not in the mood for games. Tell me or buzz off.”

The caller laughed. “Just as charming as ever, I see. It’s Tom Bledsoe.”

“Huh?”

From the other end, I heard him laugh again. “I knew you’d be surprised.”

Surprised wasn’t the word. I shot straight up in bed so fast Seamus scurried for cover. “Tommy?”

“Hope you don’t mind, Odelia, but I got your phone number from Karen. She gave me three of them … home, office, and cell; thought I’d start with your home number.” He paused, probably waiting for me to say something, but I was still too stunned. He continued. “Wow, what a coincidence, huh? I’m engaged to your boss’s ex-wife. What are the chances?”

Finally, I found my tongue. “Sorry, Tommy—I mean Tom—but I’m still in shock. Aren’t you in Japan?”

“I came home yesterday, a few days early. Karen is quite upset about Mike being missing.”

“Did she also tell you about our thirtieth reunion?”

“Yes, of course. Between the reunion and Mike, you’ve had quite a time. Too bad, though, that I missed the reunion. I wouldn’t have minded seeing Donny with a bullet in him.”

It seemed that Sally and Cindy weren’t alone in their celebration of Donny Oliver’s death. As much as I detested Donny, I still thought his death a tragedy. Was I being too naïve, too much of a goody two-shoes, or just in denial about my own deep and true feelings about his death? It made me wonder what it would take, what boundaries someone would have to cross, for me to wish a person dead. And how does one properly wish someone dead? Is it done while blowing out birthday candles or upon seeing the first star of the evening?

I wish I may,

I wish I might,

See [fill in the blank] killed tonight.

I didn’t equate telling Donny to eat shit and die as being the same as wishing him dead in a serious way. But seeing that no cosmic wisdom was providing me with a solid answer, I turned my attention back to Tommy Bledsoe.

“The suspect list is impressive, even I made it, but I’ve since fallen off the hit parade.”

Hit parade,
strange choice of words
, I thought to myself. Obviously, I was still thinking about the idea of a contract killer.

“Did you kill Donny, Tom?”

“Me? I was in Japan, you know that. And so do the police. They tracked me down and asked me questions.”

“Then let me rephrase the question. Did you have Donny killed?”

He laughed, not a little chuckle or a smirk that could be heard in his voice but a full-out laugh. “Wish I had thought of that, Odelia. I would have considered it a good investment.”

He paused. What’s with men and their pauses? It’s as if they’re setting the stage for some sort of verbal brilliance that never materializes.

Okay, yes, I’m being cranky. I’m sick and people keep calling—I’m entitled.

“Odelia, may I ask you a question?”

“Of course.”

“How many people do you come right out and ask if they’ve killed someone?”

The question made me wonder if Tommy knew of my experiences as a corpse magnet. “More than you would imagine.”

“Uh-huh.” He laughed again. “And how many of those people would you expect to answer you truthfully if they did kill someone?”

“Maybe I’m hoping I’ll shame someone into telling the truth.”

Tom Bledsoe laughed harder. “Halloween’s in two days, Odelia. Make sure you go as Diogenes. You can wander Southern California in search of an honest man.”

“Or woman.”

“The number you have dialed is no longer in service. If you feel you have reached this recording in error, please hang up and dial again.”

True to my word to Zee, I had stayed home all day Sunday, doing laundry and taking care of my cold. I had to admit, I did feel much better. Sunday I made two calls to Let Mother Do It and received no response. Monday morning I tried the number again, then again shortly after ten o’clock. Now, for the third time, a canned voice was telling me that the number for Let Mother Do It had been disconnected. Three strikes, I was out. What the hell was going on?

I had hit a wall on both Donny’s murder and Steele’s disappearance. Instead of narrowing down the suspect list, with the idea of a contract killer I had expanded it to virtually anyone who currently had or ever had a grudge against Donny Oliver. Considering what a jerk he was, that could encompass most of Los Angeles and Orange Counties, with San Diego County thrown in for good measure. But to be realistic, I think whoever killed Donny had some very personal reasons. Not that humiliating me and Tommy wasn’t personal, but that was thirty years ago. The embarrassment might still be alive and well in our minds, but both of us had pretty much moved on. Tommy wasn’t totally in the clear, but I doubt if being pantsed and dumped in a fish tank when he was eighteen held much importance to him now that he was a gazillionaire, though I’ve been known to be wrong before about people. And even though I still cringe and want to crawl in a hole every time I think about my prom, it wouldn’t be enough for me to seek revenge three decades later. Had I wanted revenge, I would have carried it out a long time ago when the wounds were fresh and bleeding, and certainly not by way of a bullet. Even though what he did to me is unforgivable in my eyes, I hadn’t joined the Rah-Rah, Die, Donny, Die club. No, there were others with much more current and personal axes to grind.

As much as I was getting to know and like Sally, she still could be the killer. She certainly had motive. And Cindy Oliver certainly had motive. And what about Victor Morales? Did he do away with Donny to help Cindy in her quest to be free? And were Cindy and Victor being honest about their romantic relationship being in the past? Maybe Victor and Johnette weren’t doing so hot as a couple, and Cindy and Victor joined forces to get Donny out of the picture and pave the way for their own relationship?

Or was I meowing up the wrong scratching post?

Maybe there was still someone else not yet unearthed who wanted Donny dead more than those already under the shadow of suspicion.

Questions, questions, questions—they gave me the urge to go home and settle under the covers with Seamus and a good book, preferably not a murder mystery.

Putting aside the Donny dilemma for a bit, I thought about Steele. Over the weekend, Carl Yates had sent me an e-mail telling me to continue working on Missing Link as time permitted, but to also make sure I spent time on my other work. In lawyer-speak, that meant it had been downgraded from a category 5 hurricane to a bad tropical storm and no longer merited sucking up all of my billable time. But it also meant that I wasn’t to ignore it. Seems my special assignment was not so special anymore now that they had found Steele’s car and all seemed in order, at least as far as foul play went.

Dev was right; people disappeared all the time, of their own accord, and there was no reason to believe any harm had come to Steele. On the surface, it appeared that he simply decided to vanish from his day-to-day life for a few days, maybe even forever, and that it was his decision. But in my gut, this theory curdled like sour milk.

Picking up my phone, I punched in three numbers to an internal extension. On the second ring, Carl Yates answered. “Yes, Odelia?”

“Carl, I have something you should see.”

“Bring it on down. I’m leaving soon for lunch with a potential client, but I have a few minutes.”

“Actually, Carl, if you don’t mind, I need you to meet me in Mike Steele’s office. It can wait until after lunch, but the sooner the better.”

He mulled it over less than ten seconds before agreeing to meet me in Steele’s office in five minutes. When he arrived, I was waiting inside with the door shut. Carl entered and closed the door behind him.

“Did you learn anything new, Odelia?”

“Not exactly new, but important.” I held out the small key to Steele’s private box. Carl took it.

“It looks like a safe deposit key.”

“You’re close.” I walked to the edge of Steele’s desk. “Open Steele’s right-hand drawer.”

Carl had a puzzled look on his face but he followed my directions. Opening the drawer, we both saw the same well-labeled hanging files I saw Saturday.

“Now push those files back—all the way back.”

He did as he was told and immediately saw the special compartment. “It’s a false-bottom drawer.”

I nodded. “That key goes to that lock. Go ahead, open it.”

Again, Carl did as I asked and soon had the box opened about halfway.

“Steele keeps a lot of his personal papers there. See his passport on the top? Unless he’s traveling under a false name, he would never have left that behind.”

“And if he is traveling under a false name,” Carl said, looking directly at me, “it doesn’t look very good for him.”

“I agree.” I indicated the box. “Go ahead and dig around. There’s a surprise in there for you.”

Carl looked at me with a half-grin. “I’m not going to get bit by anything, am I?”

“I hope not.” I smiled at him. “Bonuses are in a few weeks. I wouldn’t want mine to be fed to the shredder.”

He chuckled, then returned his concentration to the box. Digging inside, he immediately found the file and wiggled it until he could pull it free. After looking inside, he dropped into Steele’s chair.

“These are the missing original documents.”

“All of them?”

Carl fingered through the small stack of signed originals. At the bottom of each was a Bates number. “They’re here, every one of them.” He looked up at me. “But how? And why are they here?”

“What about the ones found in Steele’s car?”

“I never saw those. They were described to me over the phone.”

“This is just speculation, Carl, but Steele had a habit of stashing stuff in here for safekeeping. Remember when Jake Wells brought in all those old bearer bonds?” Carl nodded. “Well, this is where Steele kept them until they could be processed. And Steele knows I have the only extra key to this box.”

I moved closer to Carl and tapped the file folder with an index finger. “I think Steele discovered someone was monkeying around with the documents and put the originals in there to protect them while he figured things out. The documents in the car might have been very good copies of the originals, and they might have been there because Steele was going to review them while he was staying in Ojai. Even his ex-wife said he was preoccupied with a problem with the case.”

“Are you sure you and Mike are the only ones who have a key to this drawer safe?”

“As far as I know, we are.”

“And no one else knows about these papers being here?”

“I don’t think so.” I hesitated, remembering Saturday when Fran barged in on me, thinking Steele was back. “Fran saw me in here Saturday when I was checking the drawer, but I’m pretty sure she didn’t see anything.”

“Good.”

He sat back in Steele’s chair and raised his face to the ceiling. He swiveled and we heard the familiar squeak. After a moment or two, he focused on me.

“Odelia, if you don’t mind, I’d like to rescind my e-mail and put you back on Missing Link in full force. I’m beginning to think Mike’s in danger. For what reason, I don’t know, but we need to find out what happened to him. Do you think it’s possible for you to uncover anything new?”

Thinking about Willie, I said, “I have some special feelers out, but I don’t know how long it will take for them to produce anything.”

“I know Joan Nuñez is your friend, but do you trust her completely?”

I thought about that for a second, then answered truthfully. “Yes, Carl, I do. I don’t think she’d do anything unethical any more than I think Steele would.”

“Good, I feel the same way.” He handed me the file folder. “Make copies of these and put the originals back in here for safekeeping. Then I want you to get together with Joan and have her show you the differences between these originals and what is now in our production documents. Maybe the two of you can think of how this happened. Meanwhile, I also want you to keep looking for Mike.”

“The documents haven’t been produced to the other side yet, have they?”

He shook his head. “No, we were about to produce them when Joan started noting discrepancies. I’ve been stalling on the production.”

I walked to the window and stared down at the traffic moving many floors below. I was upset at the thought of Steele being in danger and me possibly being his only hope. Talk about feelings of inadequacy.

Looking back at Carl, I weighed my words carefully before speaking. “Who else had access to these original documents, Carl? Anyone else besides Fran, Joan, and Steele, and, of course, yourself?”

“Most anyone who works here, Odelia, you know that. Ani handled them regularly, as did our copy center and central filing. It’s not like we needed to keep files under lock and key, at least until now.” He stopped and thought a bit. “I’d really rather not think about an employee tampering with important documents, but I don’t know what else to think. If it’s true and it gets out, it’ll be the last straw for our relationship with Silhouette. They are already talking about firing us and hiring another firm. This would send them right over the edge.”

I was shocked. Silhouette had been a client almost as long as I’d worked for Woobie. “Why would they fire us?”

“They want this case resolved one way or the other as soon as possible. And they’re not happy that Mike’s out of the office right now, or that I’ve been putting off moving forward without him. They don’t know the truth about Mike or the documents, so they just think we’re dawdling. There’s a new CEO at Silhouette, name’s Ben Walker, and he’s trying to sell their board on the idea that they need fresh and more aggressive representation, especially since they’re thinking about taking Silhouette public in the near future. He’s been making noise about jumping to Goldberg-Rawlings; says he doesn’t think we have enough muscle to carry the company into the future.”

Goldberg-Rawlings—Tim Weber’s firm. “Carl, have you ever heard of Tim Weber? He’s an attorney with Goldberg.”

He shook his head. “I know most of the partners in their office upstairs and some in their LA office, but that name doesn’t ring a bell. Should I know him?”

I shrugged. “Just an attorney I know from that firm, that’s all.”

After making the copies, I replaced the originals in Steele’s drawer and called Joan. Carl had already given her a heads-up. In a jiffy, she was seated with me behind closed doors at the small conference table in Steele’s office with the documents in question, both her copies and mine spread before us.

It was true, the supposed copies of the documents in Joan’s file did not match the originals. They looked alike and at first glance could easily be taken as true and correct copies, but upon close examination of the text, it was clear that they had been doctored. Key phrases in agreements and correspondence had been altered that totally changed the meaning of the document, and not in favor of our client. Had this not been caught in time it would have damaged our case horribly, perhaps irreparably. We would have produced documents claiming they proved our case when, in fact, they proved it for the other side.

“Whoever did this went to a great deal of trouble and knew what they were doing,” I remarked to Joan. She nodded in agreement.

Upon examination, it was clear that whoever did the tampering knew the ins and outs of office equipment and word processing. They would have had to have scanned the originals into word processing documents, made the changes, and reprinted them, making sure the fonts, line positions, and margins all matched exactly. Somewhere along the line, the originals would have had to have been copied on a high-quality color copier to maintain the color of ink on the signatures and letterhead. The copies of the signatures, letterhead, and Bates numbers were probably then pasted on each new page in exactly the same position, then copied again. With a high-grade copier, the result would be copies that looked like they came straight from the original, until you took the time to read the text. It was genius, and it had been time-consuming.