Blood Defense

FIFTY-THREE

I asked Rick Saunders to meet me at Mel’s since I was already there and it was close to his station. I was glad I’d saved myself a trip. He didn’t know Ignacio. He offered to ask around about him, but generating talk about my alibi witness was the last thing I needed.

By three o’clock, I was ready to go see Chas Gorman. I wasn’t supposed to get to his place until five o’clock, but I had a feeling he’d be around. Chas seemed like the kind of guy who was always around. And I was right.

As an added plus, he was almost sober. Either he was getting a late start or his stash was running low.

Chas smiled when he opened the door. “Hey, thanks for coming over.”

“Hey, thanks for having me.” He’d offered to bring the phone to me, but I wasn’t about to take any more chances with the damn thing.

He led me to the living room and gestured for me to take a seat on the lumpy brown couch. “I’ll be right back.”

He was as good as his word. In less than a minute he was back, an old flip-style cell phone in his hand. It looked like the one Scott’s siblings had shown us.

“Just so you know, I had no idea Scott did that burglary. I was really pissed when I found out.”

I opened the phone and checked out the photos, just to make sure it was the right one. It was. “How long have you guys known each other?”

“A few years. And I’ve never known him to do shit like that. But I think he got himself in debt to some heavy dudes, and it’s making him act crazy.”

I could well believe it, but I didn’t care. His “crazy” had landed Alex in the hospital. Screw him. “Thanks, Chas.” I headed for the door.

He followed me. “The press was all over this place a few days ago.”

That would’ve been the first day of trial. I paused at the door. “Anyone try to talk to you?”

“Not that day, no.”

“But another day?”

“Yeah. Not sure if it was a reporter, but it was right after Alex came by.”

I’d sent Alex to the building to find out if Chas and Scott were friends. “Who was it?”

“Dunno. But whoever it was banged on my door for, like, a half hour. It was really weird.”

“Male or female?”

Chas shrugged. “Female? No, male.” He sighed. “I’m not sure.”

“He didn’t give you a name?”

“No. I didn’t answer the door, just played dead.”

As always, talking to Chas was an exercise in frustration. His fried brain coughed up tantalizing fragments, but they never coalesced into a solid piece of information.

I thanked him again and left. When I got to my car, I opened Paige’s phone and checked her voice mails. Nada. There were a few texts between Paige and Chloe sent a couple of days before they died. But they were just mundane messages about picking up the dry cleaning and Taco Bell for dinner. I went through the photos.

Again, nothing intriguing. Just Paige and Chloe horsing around and joke-posing. I felt a pang of sadness looking at their young faces. I scrolled more quickly. I didn’t need any more reminders of what a tragedy this was. And then I found a photograph that got my attention. It’d been taken two months before the murders.

I looked at my watch. It was three thirty. The perfect time to go see Alex. I’d been planning to check in on him, and I knew he’d want to see this photo.

Alex’s uncle, Tomas, lived in Arcadia-about fifteen minutes northeast of downtown. In rush hour, that fifteen minutes could easily turn into an hour. But I thought if I got on the road right now, I’d beat the worst of it.

I didn’t. It took me more than an hour to get there.

Alex’s uncle lived in a modest fifties-style ranch on Bella Vista Drive, a quiet suburban street that hadn’t changed much since the homes were built. An older woman who said she was Maria, the housekeeper, ushered me into the living room where Alex was set up on the couch. She told me Tomas was at work but he’d left instructions that Alex was not allowed to move. I took that as the warning it definitely was and promised her I wouldn’t even let him leave the couch. She nodded. “Bueno. Can I get you something to drink? Or eat? Are you hungry?”

“No, thank you. I’m good.”

Alex looked 200 percent better than when I’d last seen him. Which wasn’t saying all that much, since the last time I’d seen him, he’d looked like roadkill. His dark skin hid some of the bruises, but his lips and right eye were still badly swollen.

I sat down in a chair next to the couch. “I hope you feel better than you look.”

He deadpanned, “Let me say on behalf of the world that it’s probably a good thing you chose the law instead of medicine. Your bedside manner sucks.”

“Seriously, how are you feeling?”

Alex blew out an exasperated breath. “Bored. Nobody lets me do anything, and really, I’m fine. I’m just sore. I can move around. I can drive-”

Maria called out, “No you can’t!”

Alex gave me a pleading look. “If I don’t go back to work, I’ll lose my mind.” He put his hands together prayer-style. “Please tell her you need me.”

“I do. But I’m with Maria and your uncle on this one. You shouldn’t push it. Besides, I’ve got something you can do lying on your back.” I pulled Paige’s cell phone out of my purse.

“Hey! How did you-” Alex sat up too fast. He winced and held his side.

I raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, you’re obviously good to go.” I gave him the whole story and ended by saying, “Our boy Scotty’s going to be in Men’s Central for a good long time.”

“I’d like to be the bigger man and say he shouldn’t have to pay for this, but-”

“But if you did, I’d knock you out myself.”

Alex smiled. He flipped the phone open and examined it. “Just your basic burner. You check for texts and voice mails?”

“Yeah, nothing of interest. But I found a photo.” I held out my hand. He gave the phone back to me, and I pulled it up again and showed him. “It’s a little distorted, but this looks like Marc to me.” It was a selfie taken at a bad angle that made his forehead look huge.

Alex took the phone and studied the photo. “Yeah, it does. That’s the ocean right behind him. Malibu?”

I nodded. “What I was thinking.” I told him about my meeting with Storm that afternoon. “But if he took that photo in Malibu, he wasn’t in the Colony.” Malibu Colony is the most built-up area in Malibu, where all the stores and most of the restaurants are. The area behind Marc in the photo looked less inhabited. And the house behind him looked too modest-and isolated-to be in the Colony.

Alex pointed to his laptop that was on the coffee table. “Could you hand me that, please?” I gave it to him, and he Google-mapped street views of Malibu Colony. I watched as he moved from one block to the next. “You can see he’s standing on a street, but none of these streets look right. Must be farther up the coast.” He studied the photo again. “But this was taken in late January. Almost two months before the murders.”

“True, but Storm said they were heading toward Malibu. So maybe they were going back to that same place the day she died.”

Alex set the phone down on the coffee table. “Maybe. But Paige wound up in Laurel Canyon.”

“So? We’re the defense, Alex. We don’t have to prove anything. All we need to do is connect enough dots to scare the jury out of convicting.”

Alex nodded. “Well, it’s definitely worth checking out. Let me get into this phone and see if I can find anything else. And I’ll do a closer check of Malibu neighborhoods. How much time do we have?”

I sighed. “Zack’s going to wrap up by Wednesday at the latest. So we’ve got to be ready to start calling witnesses on Thursday.”

Alex blew out a breath. “Can you stall?”

“With this judge? Are you kidding? If I ask for more time, I’ll be sharing a cell with Scott.”

“Hold on.” Alex pointed to the television. It’d been playing on mute. “Isn’t that your boy Storm?”

I turned and saw Storm holding forth to a circle of reporters. “Oh shit…”

Alex raised the remote and turned up the volume. A woman I didn’t recognize asked, “Why didn’t you come forward sooner?” She held the microphone up to Storm.

“I did. I called the police right away. I guess they didn’t think it was that important. But the defense attorney sure did.”

The reporter asked Storm what he’d told me, but he shook his head and smiled. “I can’t tell you that. The attorney asked me to save it for the courtroom, and I promised I would. But I can say that my testimony is going to prove for sure that Paige was the real target.”

The reporter turned to the camera and threw it back to the anchor. “This might be a real bombshell, Terry. If you recall, Samantha Brinkman did say in her opening statement that she intended to prove Paige Avner-not Chloe Monahan-was the one the killer was after. If Storm Cooper’s testimony establishes that critical fact, it’s a lot less likely that Dale Pearson committed these murders. And that’s the latest, most up-to-the-minute development in the Dale Pearson case. Back to you, Terry.”

Alex muted the television and threw the remote down on the couch. “Son of a bitch.”

When we’d talked, Storm hadn’t been all that excited about being my witness. I guessed it didn’t dawn on him until after our meeting that being a witness in this case meant free advertising.

“At least he didn’t give up what he told you about seeing Paige and Marc together.”

“Not on camera. But we don’t know what he might’ve told them off the record.”

Reporters could make big promises when a hot story was at stake. Storm wouldn’t be the first to get sucked into telling secrets.

I stood up. “I’d better get back to the office-”

Alex turned off the television. “Can you give me a few more minutes? I need to talk to you about something.”

Alex had an anxious look on his face. Whatever it was, I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like it. I sat back down.