Damage Control: A Novel Page 34

  The prosecutor suggested that the police chief had been paid off, but the jury believed the man in a uniform. They found Dumbrowski guilty of drug dealing but innocent of murder. He was sentenced to fifteen years and served seven.

  I thought hard. Dumbrowski had been a drug dealer. Emily Mortimer had procured drugs for her boss, Senator Paxton. Could this be the connection we were all looking for?

  I called Lionel Comstock, who’d grudgingly agreed to give me his number.

  “I was thinking about our meeting, and I had a question.”

  “Look, uh, can I call you right back?”

  “Sure.”

  I hung up and waited. He’d take precautions, not using his own phone.

  Sure enough, when he called back, it was on a different line.

  I said, “Did Dumbrowski go back to dealing drugs after he got out of prison?”

  “His probation officer says he’s clean.”

  “So he’s not the one who sold drugs to Emily Mortimer? And it’s just a coincidence that both Emily and Heidi Magellan were strangled?”

  “That’s what I was wondering too,” said Comstock.

  36

  I tried to wait up for Mom to apologize, but my eyes closed around midnight and I fell into troubled sleep. My dreams consisted of one endless loop: I was having a screaming match with Mom. When she told me her cancer was back, I ran off crying and found myself in the beach house in Playa del Rey where the Barracuda waited at the end of a dark hallway, a cigarette dangling from his mouth.

  When I opened my eyes, it was morning and I’d slept through the alarm. On those rare occasions, Mom usually woke me. Mom! My brain activated, flooding with data. Shame. Disgrace. Regret. Remorse. Love and fear. I reached for the Adderall in my bedside table. Fifteen milligrams. Just enough, at this point, to dissipate the fog. I had to get off it. But not today. Soon. I knew I couldn’t keep this up for much longer. I was approaching mental and physical collapse.

  On my way to the shower, I poked my head into Mom’s room but her bed was neatly made. I looked outside. Earlyn’s car was gone. They’d already left for the harbor.

  Now I’d have to wait three days to say I was sorry. What if the ferry sank? What if their car crashed on the way there? What if she died, leaving me with only ugly memories of how I’d behaved the last time I’d seen her.

  * * *

  After breakfast, I called Faraday and told him I wanted to drive out to Villa Marbella and check on the Paxtons. He told me to go ahead.

  Anabelle’s family took my presence for granted by now. The house felt like a city under siege, and I thought they might welcome the insulation I provided from the outside world. Miranda said hello, brought me a cup of coffee, and told me Anabelle was upstairs.

  Out back, Lincoln was having a tennis lesson. Each time he hit the ball, the nanny clapped her hands.

  Anabelle was standing at her window, twisting the gold curtain sash around her finger and gazing down at her son, her face suffused with tenderness.

  I lowered myself into the brocaded Regency chair with the carved wooden feet. We’d found it at Wertz Brothers on Santa Monica Boulevard for $175. I’d considered that a fortune back in 1992, but Anabelle had blithely handed over her credit card.

  “How’s Lincoln doing?” I asked.

  Anabelle turned. Her face was pale and wan. “He keeps asking when his daddy’s coming back from heaven.”

  “It isn’t something any four-year-old should have to deal with,” I said.

  Anabelle was silent.

  “I’m sorry if this stirs up painful memories,” I said, “but I need to ask you some questions.”

  Her eyes grew wary. She seemed to draw into herself, then peer out.

  “Go ahead.”

  Even years later, it was almost impossible to put the taboo subject into words.

  “Did you ever tell Randall what happened . . . that night in Playa del Rey?” My voice petered out into an almost silent plea.

  “He knew I was raped in high school and that I never reported it. But not the gory details.”

  Her cheekbones stood out. Her eyes were bullet holes in a white wedding dress.

  “I thought it might have been part of your recovery to tell him.”

  “It was. But neither of us wanted to dwell on it.”

  “It wasn’t your fault. And it explains why you might have tried to blot out—”

  “Please don’t make excuses for me,” said Anabelle. “I had free will. I made bad choices. That night had nothing to do with what came later. I’ve buried it so deep I barely remember, and when I do, it’s like it happened to someone else in a long-ago dream.”

  I looked out the window, where a soft breeze was swaying the poplar trees.

  Choosing my words with care, I said, “I understand that Randall was looking into a connection between the strangulation murder of Stephen Ivan Dumbrowski’s girlfriend and the murder of your dad’s aide, Emily Mortimer.”

  Anabelle turned. There was reproach in her eyes and a flash of something else—anger. I thought she might deny it, or play coy and ask who Dumbrowski was.

  Instead, she said, “Who told you that?”

  “It’s not important. What’s important is that we both know who Stephen Ivan Dumbrowski is. And”—I took a deep breath—“I think we need to tell Faraday. The police are probably going to ask you about it soon.”

  A wounded, accusing look came into her eyes.

  “I didn’t tell anybody anything, Anabelle. But apparently Randall told a colleague the odd way you behaved when you saw Ivan’s photo.”

  “There’s nothing to connect any of it,” Anabelle said.

  “Not yet. But maybe Ivan knew Jake Slattery. Or Emily Mortimer. Maybe he strangled both those girls. Maybe he and Slattery did it together. If they knew about that night, it might help the police . . . I don’t know if you ever ran into him after—”

  “No! There is no connection. And it’s none of anybody’s business. Please, Maggie, I spent ten years of my life blotto, trying to erase what happened that night. And I’m not going to have it dredged up and reexamined. This family has been through enough.”

  I was too much of a friend to point out that she’d just told me her addiction had nothing to do with her rape.

  “I Googled Dumbrowski’s murder trial,” I said. “His alibi seemed highly dubious. He could have easily killed his girlfriend. And if there is something you know that—”

  “I read those stories too,” Anabelle said, “but I can’t help you. Nothing I know will solve anything. Besides, I can’t go back to that . . . place in my head and relive it. It was bad enough seeing Ivan’s photo. It was like a freight train slamming into me. I thought I might lose my mind that night.”

  “Anabelle? Where did you go, when you told Randall you were going to the gym?”

  She looked shocked. “How do you know about that?”

  I stood my ground, stared at her steadily. “I just know.”

  Her face softened. Her demeanor changed. She walked toward me, as if eager to confide in me. She sat on the bed and reached for my hand.

  “I had all these emotions churning inside me. I needed to be alone. But I didn’t want to upset Randall. So I told him I was going to the gym.”

  “But you never made it?”

  “No. I drove through Portuguese Bend, up and down those roller-coaster streets, faster than I should have. Then I parked along the cliffs and listened to the surf.”

  “That’s all?”

  “You’re starting to scare me. Where do you think I went?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe you went to confront Ivan?”

  She drew back in appalled disbelief. “How would I know where he lives? Even if I did, wouldn’t that be dangerous? I told you, I just want to forget that night ever happened. Please, Maggie, this is crazy. You sound like a cop, interrogating me.” She drew herself up. “And I don’t like that.”

  I said, “What happened in the past may be co
nnected to this somehow. Cops are clever, they’ll put all the pieces together and figure it out. We need to tell them.”

  “I forbid you.”

  I dropped her hand as if stung.

  “Forbid me,” I said softly, crossing my arms.

  “I beg you,” she quickly amended. “Right now, I’m struggling just to hang on. And it’s so hard. The idea of going back to the house where Randall . . . I just can’t . . . I’ve been clean a long time but . . .”

  “Mommy?” said a small voice at the door. It was Lincoln. Behind him hovered the nanny. The boy was red cheeked and sweaty, dressed in tennis whites and clutching a tiny racket.

  “Scott says I have a powerful backhand,” he announced proudly.

  “Darling,” said Anabelle, kneeling and opening her arms wide. “How wonderful.”

  He ran to her with his awkward four-year-old gait, and the racket clattered to the floor. Anabelle wrapped her arms around her son and pressed her cheek against his damp blond hair.

  “Where’s Daddy?” Lincoln asked.

  “Oh Lincoln, my bugaboo. I told you. Daddy went to heaven.”

  “I know, Momma. But when’s he coming back?”

  They remained entwined, and Anabelle’s nostrils flared as she breathed in the boy’s warm, sweet essence. Her hand reached out to caress his head.

  “He lives in heaven now,” she said, her voice muffled.

  “But I still want him to live with us.”

  “I know, sweet boy. But he can’t. He’s in heaven.”

  Lincoln squirmed closer to his mother and as his head shifted, Anabelle’s face was revealed, her eyes scrunched tight, her cheeks damp, clutching her son, both of them clinging to each other like they were dying.

  37

  When I got home that night, I lay on the living room floor under the fan, eating a candy bar and going over the day’s events.

  Secrets. We were all keeping secrets from one another. So many secrets that they threatened to overpower and drown us. Sooner or later, I would forget and tell the wrong person the wrong thing, and then the entire thing would collapse like a house of rotten cards.

  The chocolate was soft from the heat and stuck wonderfully to the roof of my mouth. When it was gone, I licked the foil like a dog, then crumpled up the wrapper and went upstairs with a fashion magazine.

  I found myself lingering at a spread of incredible punky-glam-Goth couture dresses by a couple of Pasadena sisters who called themselves Rodarte. Anabelle and I would have drooled over such dresses as teenagers—the ruffled, strappy, mesh, peekaboo, sheer, body-clinging Rococo over-the-topness of it all.

  It didn’t matter that I had nowhere to wear such an outfit, and couldn’t afford one anyway; just feasting my eyes on these Goth confections kindled something magical inside me that I hadn’t felt for a long time.

  It was still hot and the ceiling fan only whipped the tired dead air around the room. Even at eleven at night, the city still felt like a furnace. Up to the north, the hills glowed a reddish orange. In its own horrible way, the fire was beautiful. Nature’s neon. I made sure the window was open all the way to catch the breeze that would kick in before dawn and went to sleep.

  Thud.

  I awoke to something hitting my chest. Hard.

  Startled, disoriented, flailing madly, I screamed.

  Whoever had hit me was hiding in the shadows, waiting to strike again. I was on my feet now, panting, trying my damnedest to pierce the darkness. A pair of eyes glowed across the room, just above my head.

  “What do you want?” I said loudly, groping for the police Maglite I kept by the bed.

  There was no answer.

  At the same time, I snicked on the bedside lamp. As the bulb dispelled the shadows, I looked in vain for an intruder. Only Earlyn’s cat Bandit, perched on my bookshelf, his fur standing up like a Halloween cat.

  “Mrrrrrrreeep,” said Bandit.

  “Jesus Christ. You damn cat. Nearly gave me a heart attack.”

  For a moment, we regarded each other with equal resentment.

  Then I put out my hand. “Here kitty, kitty.”

  Bandit hissed and darted across the room. With a flying leap, she was out the window. I heard her land with a thump on the deck and then she was gone.

  Dawn was streaking across the sky before I finally dozed off. The alarm woke me an hour later.

  I took an Adderall.

  38

  I’ve got some news,” Detective Delgado said.

  It was the next morning. The Paxton brothers and I sat in the living room of Villa Marbella with the cops, who’d shown up unannounced. Miranda was out and Anabelle was upstairs with the bedroom door closed. The maid said she was indisposed.

  Simon Paxton cleared his throat. “Should our lawyer be here?”

  Delgado pulled his mouth back in what might have been a smile if it exposed less of his gums.

  “That’s completely up to you. But I’m giving out information today, not asking for it.”

  “Go ahead,” the senator said in a resigned voice.

  “Neither of you fathered Emily Mortimer’s baby.”

  If either the senator or Simon felt relief to learn that DNA testing had absolved them of paternity, they hid it well.

  I found this interesting. Senator Paxton had always denied an affair with Emily, and Delgado’s news certainly bolstered his claim. But Simon Paxton had been sleeping with the dead girl. Why wasn’t he relieved? It struck me, then, that the brothers somehow already knew that neither one of them had fathered Emily’s child. But how could they be so certain?

  Henry Paxton leaned forward, hands clasped earnestly between his knees.

  “Did your DNA testing determine who did father Emily’s baby?”

  “Yes,” said Delgado.

  He watched them, saying nothing, still hoping, perhaps, for some kind of tell, some twitch or eyelid flutter or spontaneous confession.

  But the Paxtons sat politely and waited the detective out.

  “The DNA matches samples from a coffee cup and a comb found in Jake Slattery’s van,” Delgado said, choosing his words carefully.

  “So Emily Mortimer was pregnant by Jake Slattery,” I said, making the link for him. “I wonder if he knew.”

  “We’re going to ask him that, and a whole lot else, as soon as we find him.”

  I glanced at Senator Paxton, who had finally permitted himself a look of suppressed triumph. Then he caught himself and his face became a grim mask.

  Delgado said, “We’ve also collected DNA from Emily’s body that might have been left by the killer. No matches with your office there either. Or with Slattery. We’re running it through our criminal database, see if we get any hits.”

  “What’s your theory, Detective?” Simon Paxton said eagerly. “If Slattery is the father, does that make him more likely to have killed her?”

  “We’re not going to speculate. What we do know is that Slattery threatened Emily. We’ve recovered long, rambling voice mails on her home phone. She saved them, maybe she had a bad feeling. The messages suggest that Emily was trying to break it off with him. Slattery was furious. He accused her of cheating on him.”

  “Did the voice mails mention who she was seeing?” I asked, forcing myself not to look at Simon.

  Delgado hesitated. “No.”

  I wondered whether Jake Slattery had killed his on-off girlfriend in a jealous rage when he learned about her affair with Simon Paxton. Or perhaps he thought Simon had fathered her child? My thoughts went round and round and stopped in an unexpected place: What if Simon Paxton had killed Emily when he learned she carried Slattery’s child?

  I kept this speculation to myself. Delgado stood up, shook hands all around, and left.

  I called Faraday and recounted the good news.

  “Draft a statement for the senator’s approval,” he said. “Once he signs off, e-mail it to me and I’ll send it out.”

  “What about a statement from Simon Paxton?”


  “Samantha George will handle it. Just worry about your end of things. I’ll put everything together in my usual seamless fashion.”

  * * *

  The statement I sent Faraday ten minutes later said that U.S. Senator Paxton was pleased that DNA tests and the LAPD’s prompt work had exonerated everyone in his office. He would continue to cooperate fully with the investigation. His thoughts and prayers were with the Mortimer family during this difficult time, and he urged Jake Slattery to turn himself in.

  Before I headed back to the office, I went upstairs to say good-bye to Anabelle.

  Her door was closed.

  KEEP OUT, read a sixteen-year-old sign in Gothic letters framed by grinning skulls and bloodred roses. I hadn’t noticed it on previous visits because the door had been open.

  “Anabelle, can I come in?”

  No response.

  I knocked. “It’s Maggie.”

  From inside the room came a sullen silence.

  “I brought you something,” I said.

  More silence, as she considered it. Then the floorboards creaked and the door opened.

  I was shocked at how her hair hung, lank and unwashed. Her eyes were dull and lusterless. Her skin looked sallow. She wore cutoff sweats and a T-shirt so faded I could no longer read the logo.

  I extended an open palm. Inside was a glass perfume sample. I’d decanted it for her at home.

  “It’s Hermès.” I gave her a lopsided smile. “Un Jardin sur le Nil. It smells like green mangoes and citrus and oceans and salt. Guaranteed to boost your mood instantly.”

  She took it like an eager child, sprayed and inhaled deeply.

  “Mmmm,” she said, in a voice rusty from tears and disuse. “Thanks, Maggie. Very thoughtful. Come in.”

  I stepped inside and she shut the door. Then she retreated to the bed. It bore the hollow imprint of her body, as if she’d lain there, unmoving, for a long time.

  I sat next to her.

  “Did the cops interview you?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Did they ask about Ivan?”

  “I said I’d never met him.”

  “That’s too bad. It might have led them somewhere.”