Bones

CHAPTER 28

I drove a block west of the strip mall where Alma Reynolds lunched, circled a few times before scoring a parking spot with an unobtrusive view of Cocina de Cabo.

Reynolds left fifteen minutes later, walked back to work on foot, taking long slow steps, looking grim. I trailed her as slowly as I could, stopped half a block from the medical building.

She bypassed the front entrance, walked down the ramp to the sublot.

I didn’t have to wait long before a dented, old yellow VW Bug putt-putted up the ramp. Reynolds slanted forward as if urging the little car faster. Dark smoke belched from the exhaust. Tsk tsk.

She headed straight for a pea-green apartment building on Fourteenth Street, just north of Pico. The numbers matched the home address Reed had given me. The place was ill maintained, half hidden by shaggy palms, the stucco molting.

The less glamorous side of Santa Monica. Even here, membership had its privileges: resident permit parking only. I hung back.

Alma Reynolds struggled a bit to wedge the Bug into a tiny space, bumped cars on both ends without apparent remorse. Slamming the door hard enough to vibrate the VW, she entered her building.

I stationed myself in front of a hydrant, listened to music. Thirty-five minutes later, I decided Reynolds was in for the day and drove home.

On the way, I tried Milo again, left a message. Just as I reached Westwood Village, my cell beeped.

“Hi, Doc, it’s Louise from your service. A Dr. Rothman just called.”

“Nathalie Rothman?”

“She didn’t give a first name, said call as soon as you had a chance. Something about a Mr. Travis.”

I hadn’t spoken with Nathalie Rothman in years.

She said, “I’m tied up with patients, Alex, but if you want we can talk later.”

“You know Travis Huck?”

“Know? That’s a bit-sorry, Alex, hold on…” After several moments of dead air: “One of the residents just had a baby and we’re hellishly short-staffed and the moment I’m free I need to leave. I can spare you the time it takes me to wolf down dinner-say six?”

“You don’t want to give me a hint?”

“Too complicated. Does six work?”

“I’ll call you at the stroke.”

“No, let’s do it in person. Jarrod, my oldest, has a basketball game at seven, I promised him I’d absolutely attend this one. Are you still in the Glen?”

“I am. This is a lot of intrigue, Nathalie.”

“Right up your alley, no? I’ll meet you anywhere near Jarrod’s school.”

“Where’s the school?”

“ Brentwood,” she said. “ Windward Academy -how about a Thai place I like? Bundy off Olympic. Pad Palace. Know it?”

“I’ll find it.”

“Quality, low-fat grub,” she said. “I get takeout there. Way too often.”

Another strip mall; maybe one day real estate would be too expensive to make them viable.

Pad Palace made the most of what it was: a storefront with a limited design budget. Screens and pine tables aimed for elegant simplicity. Walls were painted in variants of honeydew green. Slender, shy young Asian women waited on loud, cheerful Anglo hipsters.

The menu was vegetarian with eggs, vegan on request. Lots of virtue making the rounds in L.A. I half expected Alma Reynolds to bop in. Or maybe she’d always been into the pound of fish-flesh.

Nathalie Rothman’s white BMW ragtop pulled in five minutes after I’d settled with a pot of tea. She entered like a bullet: tiny, fast, direct.

All of four ten and ninety muscular pounds. Her face was soft and smooth as a teenager’s under a cloud of careless brown hair. Forty-two and the mother of four boys, she was married to a developer who owned chunks of Wilshire Boulevard, had been in charge of emergency services at Western Pediatric Medical Center for a decade. I’d met her when she was a brand-new Yale-educated resident. Then chief resident, then fast-track to faculty.

A lot of important people at the hospital considered her curt and abrasive. I could see their point, but I liked her.

She waved a finger at me, bounced over to one of the waitresses. “I’m Dr. Rothman. Is my food ready?”

By the time the girl’s head stopped nodding, Nathalie had plopped down opposite me. “I call beforehand. Hi, Alex. You look handsome, the criminal side of life must be agreeable. Ever think of coming back and doing your real job?”

“Good to see you, too, Nathalie.”

She laughed. “No, I’m not on Ritalin, yes, I should be. That smidge of gray is flattering. I tell Charlie the same thing, but he doesn’t believe me. Okay, cut to the chase: I happened to be watching the news, saw the broadcast on Mr. Huck, called the number like a good little citizen. Some police-type named Reed said he was interested in talking to me but I don’t think he really was.”

“Why not?”

“Because when I told him why I’d called, he said he was out in the field, would get back to me. What crops do cops grow in the field? I actually asked him that. He didn’t appreciate my humor. Do you know him?”

“Young rookie detective.”

“Well, he’s got some learning to do in terms of how to treat law-abiding sources of potentially helpful information. He started grilling me: who I was, why I’d called. Like I was under suspicion. When I told him I was a physician at Western Peds, it was like a light going on. He relaxed, told me someone who used to work at Western just happened to be consulting on the case, did I know you. I said sure, we went way back. He said, good, how about I talked to you. No offense, Alex, but I felt I was being shunted. He was supposed to tell you I’d be calling. Did he?”

“Not yet.”

“Figures. Well, I’m following through. Rookie Detective Reed may not want to deal with cognitive dissonance but too bad.”

“Dissonance over what?”

“Mr. Huck.”

“You do know him.”

“That’s too strong a word,” she said. “I met him once. But that was enough for me to see him as a hero.”

A plate of cellophane noodles and tofu chicken arrived. Nathalie ate a few bites, fidgeted with a diamond ring. Big, square stone. Jewelry wasn’t my thing, but Alma Reynolds’s mammoth pearl had gotten me paying attention.

Nathalie said, “We’re talking ten years ago. I’d just taken over out-patient as well as inpatient, was doing the late shift to prove I was of the people. Three a.m. or so, the triage nurse pulls me over. Someone’s brought in a blood-covered infant. At first everyone thought it was going to be an incredible horror story but when they cleaned the little thing up there were no wounds, not a pinprick anywhere. Little girl, seven months old. Except for being cold and agitated, she was fine.”

She chopsticked a cube of tofu. “The good Samaritan was your pal, Mr. Huck. He never gave his name but I’m sure it’s him, that face is hard to forget. He was gaunt, almost feeble, not in good shape at all. I distinctly recall some sort of neuro damage, maybe an old closed head injury or a minor stroke.”

“Off-kilter mouth,” I said.

“Yes,” she said, flashing a victory V. “I knew it was him. His walk was unsteady, at first the triage nurse thought he was drunk, in danger of dropping the baby. Meanwhile, the baby’s wailing, all that blood, it was some scene. The news said Huck was a person of interest for those killings. What does that mean?”

“It means the department’s being ambiguous.”

“Why?”

“Too complicated, Nathalie.”

She gave me a long look. “Fair enough. But off the record, is he a suspect for those murders?”

I nodded.

“Wow,” she said. “I have to tell you, Alex, I never got any ominous vibe from him. He was nervous, timid, probably more scared than the baby. He said he’d found her on the sidewalk while taking a walk, heard the squalling, thought it was a wounded animal. When he saw it was a baby, he grabbed her up and hand-carried her to us. We’re talking from Silverlake to East Hollywood, a good two miles on a chilly night. He’d taken off his jacket to keep the baby warm, had on a T-shirt and these cheap plaid pants-funny the things you remember. Probably thrift-shop stuff, tied at the waist with a rope. His teeth were chattering, Alex.”

“Any reason he didn’t call 911?”

“Maybe he felt he could get her there faster, I don’t know.”

Or he knew that his history would make him an immediate suspect.

Nathalie said, “Did he scare us at first? Of course he did. He had blood all over himself, it was something out of those disgusting movies my kids like. We didn’t want to confront him, but we did try to keep him there until the cops arrived. Once he saw the baby was okay, he bolted past our guard. You remember the caliber of our security.”

“Old, weak, lazy, myopic.”

“On a good day. On top of that, the cops took a long time to arrive and our attentions were focused on the baby. Which is somewhat alarming, now that I think about it. What if Huck really had been a psycho killer?”

“How do you know he wasn’t?”

“Because the case closed right away. That’s the official term, right? Closed, not solved.”

“You’ve been doing your homework, Nathalie.”

“Charlie likes those crime shows.”

“How’d the case close?”

“We directed the police to where Huck said he found the baby, they found the blood trail, followed it, discovered a body lying in some bushes. Turned out to be the baby’s mother, seventeen-year-old girl named Brandi Loring. She lived a few blocks away, alcoholic mother and stepfather, half sibs, stepsibs. The baby’s name was Brandeen, miniature Brandi, I guess. The family knew who the killer was. Brandi’s ex-boyfriend, another kid, one year older than Brandi. Apparently, she broke up with him before the baby was born and he’d been stalking her. Soon as the police showed up at his house, he broke down, confessed to beating her to death. He had a broken hand and raw knuckles to prove it, plus they found his blood on Brandi’s face and neck and chest. When the cops asked him why he left the baby there, right out on the sidewalk, he gave them a stupid look. Like, oops, I forgot about that.”

“Who gave you all the details?”

“The detective who did the paperwork. That’s what he called it. ‘Doing the paperwork. This ain’t Sherlock territory, Doc.’ ”

“Remember his name?”

“Leibowitz,” she said. “Jewish detective, who knew?”

Before we parted, I asked her how her son was enjoying the Windward School.

“Interesting place,” she said.

“Interesting how?”

“It’s really two schools-sociologically. Smart rich kids and not-so-smart really rich kids.”

“I’m sensing a common theme.”

“Forty grand tuition makes it common, Alex. Charlie thinks it’s ridiculous and I guess I do, too. As to which group Jarrod falls into, depends what day you catch me. You know adolescents, no impulse control-look at what happened to poor Brandi Loring. I wouldn’t have minded sending him to public school and Charlie definitely wanted that. But our prince yearned to play varsity baseball and was sure he’d never make the grade in public school. I guess that makes him one of the smart ones. Knowing his limitations.”

I phoned Hollywood Division and asked for Detective Leibowitz. The clerk had never heard of him and neither had the desk officer.

“Detective Connor, then.”

“She’s out.”

I tried Petra ’s cell. She said, “Barry Leibowitz, he left shortly after I came on. And don’t be making any causal connection there. Barry was in his sixties.”

I laughed. “Any idea where I can find him?”

“Sorry, no. Can I ask why?”

I told her about Travis Huck rescuing the baby.

She said, “Your bad guy did something good? Ted Bundy worked a suicide hotline.”

Milo said, “Doesn’t mean a goddamn thing. BTK was president of his church.”

Moe Reed said, “That’s what I figured when she called, Doc. I was going to let you know, but I got swamped, going over bus and train records and checking out car rental contracts.”

Milo said, “So there’s no doubt the boyfriend killed the baby’s mom.”

I said, “That’s what Detective Leibowitz told Dr. Rothman.”

“Leibowitz… don’t know him.”

“He retired right after Petra came to Hollywood. I was going to look for him, but if you think it’s a waste of time, I won’t.”

“What would be the point?”

“If Leibowitz managed to find Huck and interview him, it might give us some insight into Huck’s personality.”

“The insight I’d like is what Huck was doing walking a dark, deserted street at three in the morning in Silverlake, but sure, go ahead.”

Reed said, “That time frame, we know he trolls for street girls. Maybe when he can’t connect, he stalks houses, peeps windows, or worse.”

Milo said, “Least now we know where he was ten years ago. Street guy, no Social Security number, so ten to one he was supporting himself illegally. Let’s see what Records can give us on hot-prowl burglaries back then, especially in East Hollywood and Silverlake. I’ll do it, Moses, you keep working the transport angle and taking phone tips.”

“You got it.”

I said, “Huck said he’d walked the baby to the hospital. If it’s true, he didn’t have a car. That could mean his home base wasn’t far from where he found her.”

Reed said, “He stays on the boulevard for fun, crawls back to some hole up in the hills.”

Milo said, “Could be, but forget about canvassing the boulevard. No one from ten years ago is gonna be around. The residential neighborhood could be a different story. We go back to where the baby was found, we might turn up someone who remembers Huck.”

“Better yet,” I said. “Huck remembers and returns there to hide.”

Milo chewed his cheek. “Home is where the heart is, huh?”

Reed said, “Back to the old comfort zone. Might sound appealing when you’re rabbiting from la policía.”