True Detectives (23 page)

Cupping her chin, he pushed hair away from her face, kissed her eyelids. She was naked above the waist but his hands didn’t explore.

She rested her head on his chest. This time the pelt didn’t bother her. His heart was racing.

“I’m glad, too, Steve. But I really need to be getting home.”

“Where’s home?”

Liana hesitated. He laughed. “Talk about premature interrogation. I don’t even know your last name.”

Now what…

Her silence must’ve stretched longer than it felt, because Steve sighed. His shrug was heavy with defeat. “I’m sure you’ve got a good reason to guard your privacy … is there any way we could do this again? Not come here, I mean. Just go out—hang out, like you said?”

Liana’s mind raced.

His face fell. Backing away into the bedroom, he searched the floor for his clothes. Remembered he’d left them in the living room and passed Liana and retrieved them. “Whatever you’re feeling, Laura, for me it was … sorry. I’ll walk you down to your car.”

Liana stood there.

He dressed quickly and awkwardly. Turning his back, as if struck with sudden modesty. “Laura, if I said something that bothered you … my ex said I was always saying things that upset her, claimed I was pushing her buttons. But God help me, I had no idea, and I guess I’m still clueless.”

Liana looked away from him, into the bedroom. Jumbled sheets. The smell of sex lingered. The washcloth he’d fetched to protect her from “my steel wool” had fallen to the carpet. His idea. Not wanting to bruise her.

Laura …

Hearing the fake name made her feel cheap.

She said, “Let’s sit down.”

D
elaware’s recommendation made sense to Aaron: Keep a close eye on Raymond Wohr, use the pimp to leverage up.

But that put everything in Moe’s lap and left him with nothing to do and when Mr. Dmitri called to ask how things were going, he had to fake.

The Russian wasn’t fooled, telling him, “If something ever happens, tell me. Maitland is not looking happy.”

Click.

Aaron drove to the German, retrieved the Opel, called Merry Ginzburg for the third time, wanting her to press for more on Mason Book’s hospitalization. Still no answer.

Next stop: someone who’d definitely cooperate.

Manuel Lujon’s father and grandfather were skilled gardeners who’d kept up some of the grandest estates in San Marino. Manuel’s three older brothers had continued the family tradition, moving Lujon Landscaping to the Westside where they tended ego-scorecard properties in Holmby Hills and Beverly Park.

Manuel, twenty-five, bright, with no affection for mulch, had gotten a B.A. in screenwriting from the U. that hadn’t landed him anywhere near the Industry. His day job was working in a used-book store on Pico near Overland. Aaron called on him when he needed a certain type of camouflage.

Asking Manuel to just
be
, not do—the kid was too honest to be an actor. Unlike Liana, who could deceive like a pro.

She also hadn’t returned his call, had probably learned nothing during her second trip to Riptide.

His day for being shut out by women. He could always call Mom.

That made him laugh out loud, but the sound felt contrived.

Like I’m an actor
.

The next line, delivered in Moe’s voice: You’re
not?

When Aaron arrived at Once Again Books, Manuel was selling a stack of bruised Elmore Leonards to a stout, bearded guy in an aloha shirt, who’d brought his own plastic covers and took a long time to slip them on. After that, Manuel attended to a kid who paid with crumpled bills and rolls of coins for a Robert Crumb.

No other customers; Aaron drifted forward from the tumbledown plywood stacks. Manuel placed a bookmark in his own reading material.
Gravity’s Rainbow
by Pynchon.

Manuel said,
“Amigo!
Whad chaykin! Ronn por de border!”

“How much to borrow one of your brothers’ trucks?”

“You jest.”

“I jest not.”

“How would I know? And frankly, I’m injured. Usually, you want my thespian skills, not hardware.”

If you only knew
.

Aaron said, “I need both.”

“Me in the truck?”

“Exactly.”

“Ah,” said Manuel. “Where de azalea go, Meester Patron? Onder de weelow or behind de—”

“Could you call now and ask them?” said Aaron. “I’ll pay seriously.” He looked around the empty store. “How soon can you abandon this hub of commerce?”

“To go where?”

“Hollywood Hills.”

“To do what?”

“Sit around looking Mexican.”

Manuel laughed. “Dude, you don’t even try to be politically correct.”

“Neither does the world,” said Aaron. “That’s why I need you.” Touching his own face.

“There are black folk in the hills, Aaron.”

“I loiter too long, there’ll be one less.”

“Same for me,” said Manuel.

“The truck’ll buy you time. Make sure there’s lots of gear in the bed.”

“Churning up sod,” said Manuel. “Another invisible man. Should we toss in a few bags of manure for authenticity? On the other hand, who needs that shit?”

When they both stopped laughing, Manuel said, “What’s the pay scale?”

“The usual.”

“Thirty-five an hour.”

“The usual’s twenty-five.”

“Maybe the usual should change,
amigo”

“Thirty,” said Aaron, touching the Pynchon. “But don’t bring that.”

“You don’t like literature?”

“Today
you
don’t.”

“Jus’ a iggorant cholo churning chayote for chump change.”

One of the trucks was working on Hillcrest Drive in Beverly Hills and just finishing up. For an additional hundred bucks, eldest brother Albert Lujon ordered his men to transfer the keys to Manuel and return home on the bus.

Clear family hierarchy, thought Aaron. Must be nice …

He checked his phone. The only thing he’d received were prerecorded scam texts for cheap phone service and Internet hookup. When the case was over, he’d have to switch his cell number yet again.

When.

If ever.

By three p.m., Manuel, wearing grubby work clothes, nails dirtied by scraping soil, was stationed in the perfect watch-spot Aaron had found after cruising the neighborhood: a construction zone half a block north of Swallowsong, no one working today.

The project was a sharp-edged contempo house, months away from landscaping. Lawn and parkway had turned to weed-strewn meadow. When Manuel began mowing, a woman walking by muttered, “Finally.”

Talking to the air, not to the man pushing the machine.

When she was gone, Manuel phoned Aaron. “I really should be getting thirty-five.”

“Why?”

“I could develop an allergy.”

“To grass?”

“To being a nonentity.”

Aaron drove around the Hollywood Hills, passing Manuel’s truck time after time, liking the ruse he’d set up but knowing it had to end by sunset. Manuel was raking lawn trimmings into neat little piles. Maybe that deserved thirty-five.

At four p.m., Aaron took a break for coffee and a sandwich at Mel’s Diner on Sunset, finding an empty booth flanked by retarded rock-star wannabes whose dialogue consisted of belches and grunts.

All keyed up for no reason, he left most of his food on the table, was returning to the Opel when his cell beeped. Moe.

“Hey.”

“Anything on your end?”

Aaron said, “Don’t have much of an end, Moses.”

“You’re not improvising?”

“Make a suggestion, Moses.”

Silence.

Moe said, “You learn something, tell me right away,” and hung up.

Does he expect me to learn something?
If so, first compliment his brother had ever tossed his way.

He headed back into the hills, ready for yet another circuit, maybe this time he’d actually hazard a pass by the house with the fancy gates.

Before he arrived, Manuel called in. “Got something maybe interesting. Jaguar XJ, long wheelbase, gunmetal gray, lady at the wheel. She went up Swallowsong and something about her intrigued me so I followed and guess where she went? I’m a natural, you need to start thinking about forty an hour—”

“You left your post?”

“You want to bitch, go ahead, but it worked out. I carried a rake and an airgun up the street just in time to see her drive through those crazy gates. No one called La Migra, okay? She definitely went in and she definitely came out. Total time in there twenty-eight minutes. Nice-looking lady.”

“Blonde? Brunette?”

“Gray,” said Manuel. “But nice—like she kept it that way on purpose. When she came out she looked grim. Like whatever had gone on during those twenty-eight minutes hadn’t been fun.”

“Did you get the plates?”

“I’ll give you a two-dollar discount, settle for thirty-eight if I get dibs on the dirty details for a screenplay. Stuff I’ve been working on doesn’t work. Too much Pynchon and DeLillo, not enough
Story of O
.”

“The plates,” said Aaron.

“So it’s a deal? Excellent. Got a pen?”

Aaron used a pay-as-you-go cell to contact his DMV source.

Ka-ching, Mr. Dmitri
.

The tags matched a one-year-old Jaguar registered to Arlene Frieda
Solomon, forty-one years old, brown and green, five two, one twenty. Home address on McCarty Drive in Beverly Hills.

Nice neighborhood, just south of Wilshire, pretty, well kept, two-story houses running three million plus.

Arlene Solomon had let her hair go gray since her license renewal two years ago. Her DMV photo showed a thin-faced, big-eyed brunette.

Real
serious—almost mournful. DMV hassles could do that to you, but still, this one seemed downright morose.

Aaron BlackBerried onto the net.
Arlene Frieda Solomon
evoked over a hundred hits.

Psychiatrist Arlene Solomon cited the rise in eating disorders among younger and younger children as evidence of pressure by …

Arlene Solomon, M.D., a Beverly Hills psychiatrist specializing in anorexia-bulimia, says …

A panel of experts at the Oak Center in Beverly Hills, chaired by Dr. Arlene Solomon, an expert in …

He logged off, phoned Alex Delaware.

The psychologist said, “I’ve heard of her, but don’t know her personally.”

“What’ve you heard?”

“Smart, well trained, knowledgeable. She used to run the eating disorders clinic at the U., may still be doing that.”

“Dedicated, too,” said Aaron. “Nice office on Bedford Drive, but she makes house calls.”

“Her type of patients sometimes need that, Aaron.”

“And patients like Mason Book get all kinds of special privileges.”

“Hard to say, unless we know how she deals with everyone else.”

Doctors. Always protecting each other.

Aaron said, “Your guess was spot-on, Doc.”

Now maybe, you’ll give me another
.

Delaware said, “Sometimes you get lucky.”

“Anything else you can tell me?”

Several beats. “Nothing comes to mind.”

Aaron said, “Well, at least we know why Book was hospitalized.”

“Probably.”

“What do you mean?” said Aaron.

“An eating disorder doesn’t eliminate all sorts of other issues. Book’s nutritional status might be okay, but he still could’ve come in for depression, anxiety, even suicide.”

“Rumor based on truth … I guess starving yourself could be thought of as slow suicide, right?”

Delaware said, “It could. And you guys might end up where you started.”

“Meaning?”

“Guilt.”

Aaron called Dr. Arlene Solomon’s office, got a frosty, male answering service operator.

An unfriendly gatekeeper hadn’t hurt business. The psychiatrist was booked solid, not taking new patients.

Calling himself Clarence Howard, one of his fake I.D.’s, Aaron put a couple of strategic catches in his voice and spun a tragic tale of a teenage daughter out of control and veering toward premature demise.

The operator said, “It’s not up to me, sir.”

“My daughter is really sick and everyone says Dr. Solomon’s the best.”

“I’ll relay your message to the doctor.”

Click.

Aaron sat back in the Opel’s driver’s seat, watched the sky darken over canyons and peaks, the fanciful roofs of distant mansions nailed up in a city with no rules. Manuel had just driven off in the company truck. No one but Dr. Solomon had entered or left the house on Swallowsong.

He was parked atop one of the highest streets in the neighborhood, in front of another construction project. Half the lots up here were in various stages of demolition and rebuilding. High-priced dustbowl. Did anyone in L.A. ever simply
enjoy?

Wanting to soak in some quiet, he’d put his cell on vibrate. He’d just popped a can of Red Bull when it began bouncing on the passenger seat.

Merry Ginzburg. Finally.

“Long time, Ms. G.”

“If you keep calling me, darling, I’m going to start feeling popular again.”

“Busy day?”

“Meetings,” she said. “Then meetings about meetings. An unnamed local station might want me to highlight Industry dirt for their late-news broadcast. Not exactly Carbon Beach and Bentleys, but beggars can’t be yadda yadda yadda. Anyway, I may have found out why you-know-who went to you-know-where.”

“It’s a secure line,” said Aaron.

“Okay, then: My source’s source talked to another source who had a source, so this could end up as one of those games of telephone, but like I said, beggars. What it comes down to is that Mr. Book no longer eats.”

“Really,” said Aaron.

“Anorexia’s no longer a girl thing, Denzel. ’specially in the Industry—all that pressure to be hollow-cheeked. But given someone of Book’s status going cachectic, we’re talking Big-Time Dirt.”

“Ca-what?”

“Morbidly malnourished, darling. It’s a medical term. After I heard about poor Mason, I spent some time exploring the topic. Couldn’t find any cyberlink between him and no-cal dieting, but I did enlarge my vocabulary.
Cachectic
. Nice, no? All sharp-edged, one of those onomato-whatever. Anyway, poor Mason was probably admitted to Cedars for intravenous sushi and Kobe beef. That would explain no meds, right? Maybe
cachectic
people can’t handle chemicals. I’ve started making calls, still trying to find out who his doc is, once I do, I’ll find a way to worm my way—”

“Don’t,” said Aaron. “Please.”

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t take it any further, Mer.”

Long silence.

“Mr. Fox, Mr. Foxy-Fox. Why am I feeling you already know all of this and for some God-knows reason have allowed me to prattle like a meth-addled starlet trying to gain access to Spielberg’s boot-tips?”

“I haven’t,” said Aaron, lying smoothly. “It’s serious info that I appreciate more than you can imagine. Which is exactly why I need you to keep a lid on.”

“Book not eating relates to
murder?”

“I can’t say more, Merry—please don’t jump to any conclusions.”

“Without info, my dear, Merry’s naturally creative mind jumps to all kinds of places.”

“I understand, but at this point, poking around further could jeopardize the investigation.”

Merry let loose with a throaty guffaw that rang in Aaron’s ear and caused him to move the phone away. The same almost masculine laughter he’d heard when they slept together. Post-orgasmic glee, as if he’d just fucked a longshoreman. She was good enough, technically, but that laugh was
wrong
.

He said, “What’s funny, Mer?”

“The way you just got all stuffy, darling. ‘Jeopardize the investigation.’ Right out of a two-bit teleplay.”

“But it’s true nonetheless. I need you to be discreet.”

“Are we planning on solving this little mystery by the sixth commercial break, Denz? ’Cause if not, I can’t see giving up a succulent morsel of dirt that could be peddled to any number of tabloids for considerably more dough than I’d earn in months at a shitty little local station—”