Twisted Hunger (18 page)

He gulped. “Levitt. Henry Levitt. I… I would have come in sooner, but I was in Las Vegas for the last week… on vacation. You know how they don’t even have clocks in the casinos so you’ll lose track of time. I didn’t know about Stewart until I got back last night.”

Levitt looked emaciated, his blond hair was thinning and his skin had an unhealthy color. Terrell had seen other men who were dying of AIDS. They made good witnesses; they had nothing to lose. “Were you and Stewart friends?”

He shook his head. “Not really. We have, er,
had
some mutual acquaintances, and I’ve been a customer in his store for years. I went in to buy a new outfit for my trip. I’ve lost a little weight recently.”

“When was that?” Terrell asked, poising his pen to jot down the date.

“It was the day before I left. Friday, May 17. I was told Stewart was killed that night, mutilated…” He shivered. “I can’t believe anyone would do that to him.”

“We were told there was a jilted lover in the picture. Do you know anything about that?”

“You’re talking about Corey, but that wouldn’t make sense. Stewart kicked him out because he found out he was cheating on him with some doctor, a neurosurgeon, I think. Corey walked out of Stewart’s house and moved straight in with the doctor. He isn’t the type to hold a grudge when the result is financially advantageous to him.”

Terrell scribbled a note to follow up on that information. “Did you speak with Stewart that day?”

He nodded. “That’s actually why I’m here. He told me something that might be important.”

“Go on,” Terrell prodded when Levitt was slow to explain.

“When I walked into the store that afternoon, Stewart was talking to a well-dressed blonde woman. I’m sure the pink suit she was wearing was an original design. Their faces were sort of close together, almost like they were about to kiss. She seemed very embarrassed when I walked up to Stewart to say hello, and she left seconds later. When I teased him about being too old to switch, he just laughed. See, the attractive blonde wasn’t a woman at all.”

Terrell straightened in his chair. “You mean it was a
man
? In drag?”

Levitt gave him a crooked smile. “I’ve seen plenty, and I’ve got to tell you, this guy had me fooled. He had obviously intrigued Stewart too, because he said they had a date that night. I could be completely wrong, but if Stewart did go out with him the night he was murdered, I might have seen his killer.”

Terrell’s mind whirled. After all these years, someone besides Luke might have gotten a good look at The Eye Doctor. To counter that positive note was the fact that Levitt’s statement supported Luke’s new theory that the psycho whore was really a cross-dressing man.
Damn!
He could just imagine Luke’s reaction to this. “Can you give me a description now? Then if you have some time, I’d like you to talk to our police artist.”

“I have plenty of time,” Levitt said. “But I’m not sure how much help I’m going to be. I mean, he must have been wearing a wig—although it was an excellent one—and he had rather large sunglasses on.”

“What about height and weight or build?”

Levitt frowned in thought. “I guess he was about my height or a little taller. I’m five-eight. I think he was wearing heels, but I didn’t really notice how high they were. I’m afraid I was checking out the cut of the suit jacket. It was very flattering for a full-figured woman, which is what I thought he was. The blouse had a high collar with a soft chiffon bow that pretty much concealed his whole throat. He didn’t have a beard shadow. I can tell you that for sure. So he might have been a natural blond.”

“How about an age?”

“Sorry. I couldn’t begin to guess. Bangs covered the forehead, sunglasses covered the eyes and gloves hid his hands.”

Two hours later, Terrell was staring at the police artist’s sketch of the man-woman Henry Levitt had seen. He didn’t need to compare it with the one Luke had to know that the lower part of the face was similar. Even the police artist made a comment about it. Damn Luke for asking him to do that second drawing and calling attention to himself.

Terrell had Levitt read and sign the report he’d completed while Levitt was with the artist. “I would strongly suggest you not speak to anyone else about this, especially not the media. If you saw the murderer, we don’t want him to find that out.”

Levitt looked at him directly. “Do you think he might kill me too?”

Terrell heard the words he didn’t say aloud. Levitt would not object to a swift death at this point rather than the slow deterioration he was experiencing. “You may be our only witness, Mr. Levitt. We need you alive. In fact, I’d like to make arrangements for someone to stay with you.”

He shook his head. “If I don’t have to have someone strange hanging around, I’d rather not. I had been thinking of visiting my brother in San Francisco for a while. Would that be okay?”

“Actually, that’s a very good idea. Just give me his phone number and address in case I need to reach you.”

After Levitt left, Terrell placed a call to Sheriff Patterson’s office. That was another unusual thing about this case. He’d been given a written instruction to call the sheriff directly with any new piece of information. Something was up, and so far, he couldn’t see what it was.

One thing was certain. He wished to hell Luke hadn’t come to Los Angeles, hadn’t met the senator and had never seen that stupid picture in the paper. His idea that Theodore Jones could be The Eye Doctor was completely off the wall. Impossible. But because Luke had said it aloud, Terrell couldn’t seem to forget it. And it didn’t help that the police artist noted that the jawline and mouth of the woman Levitt saw looked similar to the one he’d drawn for “Mr. Brown” last week.

With the sheriff’s special interest in this case, how long would it be before he heard about that other sketch and questioned Terrell about Mr. Brown? How would he explain why he didn’t write up an official report on that man’s complaint?

Thank God Luke had taken his advice and returned to North Carolina while he still had the opportunity.

* * *

On the drive back to the motel, Luke’s mind finally stopped racing enough for him to sort out the events of the last hour. He never realized the human body could experience so many different emotions all at the same time without breaking down.

Running into Jones unexpectedly, and having him recall that he’d been seated next to the detective handling the Neuman murder, still had his stomach churning. And having another opportunity to look into that man’s eyes at close range reinforced the possibility in his mind that he, or rather his brother, could be The Eye Doctor, no matter how crazy it sounded.

The wave of near panic should have been strong enough to wipe out everything Ellery had him feeling, but it wasn’t.

His first impulse upon seeing her again was to drop to his knees at her feet. Remembering how futile that approach had been Saturday night, however, he purposely did the opposite. He knew he had taken quite a risk to try the tactic of finding fault with her, but for a while there, it had looked like he’d accidentally found the magic key.

He had been elated to see her interest in him developing during lunch, and thoroughly frustrated to see it wiped out again because of his need to hide the real reason for his being there. Jones’ “perfect timing” had been a disaster for Luke.

He had done his best to recover the lost ground with Ellery by tossing out another challenge, but she obviously wasn’t vulnerable enough to fall for that trick twice.

What was he to do now?

His fingers tapped the folder of information Ellery had given him. Hopefully, there was enough inside to provide him with a definitive answer one way or the other.

* * *

“I’m Diane Oliver. I have an appointment with Senator Jones at four o’clock.” She handed Ellery her card.

Ellery smiled up at the woman who appeared to be even taller than she was. “You’re a little early. The senator should be back from his meeting in a few minutes though. Please have a seat.”

The senator only told Ellery about Ms. Oliver’s appointment that morning, and she had to do some quick rescheduling to make room for it. When he’d explained that she was an image consultant and personal trainer, whom his mother had referred to him, she pretended to be surprised that his mother felt he needed that sort of assistance. In truth, she herself had recently thought he could use a few tips to improve his appearance on camera as well.

Apparently, Ms. Oliver had been satisfactorily employed by an acquaintance of Mother Jones, and the senator felt compelled to accept the offer of professional assistance.

Ellery couldn’t help but be impressed by the woman. Not only did she appear to be close to six feet tall, she exuded confidence from her short, simply styled, dark brown hair, to her American-manicured nails, to her medium-heeled white pumps. Her red and white sleeveless turtleneck sheath showed off a perfect figure and highly toned calf and arm muscles. She clearly practiced what she preached.

Although Ellery had tried not to be obvious in her scrutiny, Ms. Oliver seemed to have no such qualms. She was openly staring.

“Would you mind standing up and walking for me, Miss Winters?” she asked after a few more seconds passed.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude, but I can’t seem to stop looking at you. I hope you don’t mind my saying this, but you are one of the few women I’ve met whose appearance could not be improved with a suggestion or two. As you’ll see on my card, my slogan is ‘Only angels need no improvement’. I’d hate to have to reprint all my stationery because you’ve made my slogan a falsehood.” She was smiling, but also sounded completely serious.

Ellery chuckled. “I assure you, I am far from perfect.”

“You’ll have to prove it before I’ll relax.”

Senator Jones buzzed Ellery from his office in time to spare her from deciding whether to humor the woman or tactfully refuse. She picked up the phone and told him, “Ms. Oliver is here, and Sheriff Patterson and Senator Zang each called while you were out. The sheriff said he had something interesting to pass on, but he’d only be in his office until four.”

“All right,” he replied. “Please get him for me and tell Ms. Oliver I’ll just be a few minutes. I know why the senator is calling, and it can wait.”

Afraid that the woman would pick up where they were interrupted, as soon as she put the sheriff through to the senator she asked Ms. Oliver to tell her how she became an image consultant.

“The official answer to that is, I modeled from the time I was a baby, combined that with a degree in business administration then a few years of marketing experience with a public relations firm, and ended up with the skill and knowledge to offer something that people with money need.”

She smiled broadly. “The truth is I fell into it by accident. I gave some tips to a few friends for free and the next thing I knew, I was getting paid for doing something that came naturally. It really is a wonderful career for me. I get to meet all sorts of interesting people, and I do quite a bit of traveling.”

Ellery noted the address and phone number on Ms. Oliver’s card. “If my career allowed me to live anywhere in the country, I’m not sure I’d choose New York.”

Her expression suggested that she agreed with Ellery’s opinion of that city. “For me, it’s centrally located between Europe and California. I call an apartment in Manhattan home, but I’m only there about one week out of four, if that.”

Ellery always enjoyed meeting new people, and with each passing minute she was enjoying Ms. Oliver a bit more. She had the feeling that she was a woman she could become good friends with. “It sounds like you’ve found a way to combine career and pleasure. Not many people ever do that. Have you worked with any movie stars? We had a hotel full of them Saturday night.”

“A few,” she said with another smile. “Unfortunately, they prefer not to have anyone else know about it, so I’m not at liberty to brag about some of my finer accomplishments. But speaking of interesting careers, are you planning to follow Senator Jones to Washington?”

* * *

“A transvestite?” Abraham asked with considerable surprise in his voice. “That doesn’t seem to tie in, unless there was some personal motive. But you say the jilted lover angle doesn’t look very justifiable. And I suppose it might tie in if you are to consider that
other
possibility we discussed last week. Ah, but consider this. What if it wasn’t a real transvestite or a homosexual bent on drawing attention to his cause, but a man who hates homosexuals to such an extent that he would be willing to dress up as a woman to kill one?”

“Interesting that you should suggest that. Detective Harris mentioned a theory along that line.”

“Smart man, Detective Harris. I was glad I had the chance to meet him Saturday night.”

“He was very impressed with you too. It sounded like he was taking your suggestions to heart.”

Abraham relaxed back into his chair. “Just out of curiosity, Frank, what was the witness’s name?”

“Henry Levitt.”

“You said he was a local man. Did you mean local for you or me?”

“Local here. West Hollywood, to be exact.”

“Was he also a homosexual?”

“Harris believed he was.”