6


JACK TILL LEFT Linda Gordon’s office and walked to his car, thinking about all the reasons Linda Gordon had not to believe him. He had no way of explaining to a young, ambitious prosecutor why an old homicide cop would make the decisions he had made: why he would help Wendy Harper disappear, and why he would go to the DA’s office six years later and admit it. Linda Gordon just hadn’t lived long enough yet.

He sat in his car, took out his cell phone, and punched in the phone number of his old office in Parker Center. “I’d like to speak to Sergeant Poliakoff, please. This is Jack Till.”

In a moment, Poliakoff’s voice said, “Jack?”

“Yeah.”

“How’s it going?”

“I can tell from your voice that you heard already. Did Linda Gordon just call you?”

“Yeah. She wanted to know if you were a good guy or a bad guy. Have you decided yet?” Till could picture him sitting behind the old dented steel desk he had inherited when Till had retired. He was three inches taller than Till, so he had to adjust his chair low and sit in a crouch to fit his knees under the desk.

“After you told her I was the best of the best, did it sound as though she would consider dropping the charges?”

“I’m sorry, Jack. The way I read it, there’s zero chance unless Wendy Harper walks into her office. She doesn’t think you’re lying, so your record isn’t the issue. She just thinks you’re wrong about what happened after you weren’t around.”

“I had to ask.”

“I know. At the moment, I agree with her, but one of us is going to be surprised, and it could just as easily be me. Maybe we can share leads, like the old days.”

“Can you give me some help finding Wendy Harper?”

“That I can’t do. That suggestion just got covered. The defense will have to pay you to do it.”

“Who is Fuller’s attorney?”

“Jay Chernoff of Fiske, Chernoff, Fein, and Toole. I’ll give you his number.”

Till listened to the number, then said, “Thanks, Max. See you.”

Till made the call to the law office, then drove to Beverly Hills and parked at the end of Brighton, past where it met Little Santa Monica. He walked past the shops along the street until he found the small red-brick building where Fiske, Chernoff, Fein, and Toole had their offices. He entered the narrow lobby and glanced at the directory on the wall, then stepped between the polished brass doors of the elevator and pushed the button for the third floor.

The law office was decorated with framed papers and trimmed with maple, so it had the atmosphere of a courtroom. He stepped toward the desk of the woman who presided over the waiting room intending to introduce himself, but before he got there, a short, middle-aged man with curly red hair and a severely receding hairline came out of a door behind the woman, and said. “Mr. Till? I’m Jay Chernoff.” He held out his hand and Till shook it. “Thank you for coming.”

“Thanks for seeing me.” He let Chernoff lead him inside, then around a corner to an office. When they arrived, Chernoff pulled a chair away from the wall, set it in front of a couch, and motioned for Till to sit on the couch. Till sat, and waited until Chernoff had settled in the chair, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

Chernoff said, “You said you have information about the Wendy Harper murder?”

“Yes. It’s not a murder. The reason I’m here is that she’s not dead.”

“Not dead?”

“No.” Till held up the wallet with his private detective’s license and the card that showed he was a retired police officer. “About six years ago, she wanted to disappear. I helped her do it.”

“Oh, my God, I can’t believe it!” He looked elated. He actually leaned back in his chair and chuckled. “Have you told the police yet?”

“When I got to my office this morning, I looked at the paper and saw that Eric Fuller was being charged, so I went straight to the DA’s office and told Linda Gordon. I just came from there.”

“You saw Linda Gordon? What did she say?”

“She recorded my statement, then showed me police photographs of what she thinks are Wendy Harper’s bloody blouse and a couple of murder weapons belonging to your client. She hasn’t decided yet whether or not she believes I really did help Wendy leave town. She thinks that if I did, then Fuller found Wendy a short time later and killed her.”

Chernoff took a deep breath and let it out in disappointment. “I might have known. Why did you help Wendy Harper leave town?”

“Somebody beat her up. She thought it had to do with a man who had been dating one of her waitresses at the restaurant. The girl disappeared, and Wendy thought he might have killed her. She looked into it, and one night when she came home, there was a different man waiting for her with a baseball bat. When she got released from the hospital, she came to see me.”

“Of course Eric told me about the waitress and the beating, and that Wendy had been in the hospital. All this time he’s thought that man must have tried again and killed her. Why didn’t Eric know she was leaving voluntarily?”

“That’s the way she wanted it. She believed there was nothing he could do to protect her, but he would try, and it would get him killed.”

“There was a police report filed after the attack, but I didn’t see anything in it about a second man she believed was really behind it. Why not?” Chernoff’s frustration was beginning to show.

“She thought she was being practical. In a way, she had a point. If she didn’t know the man, then the police had nobody to look for, and waiting around was just giving him another chance to kill her. She felt the only way out was to get beyond his reach.”

“So the victim is alive and I have an innocent client.”

“Yes.”

“And the evidence in Eric’s yard. Do you have a theory on how it got there?”

“The guy who attacked her had the bat, and he must have torn the piece of cloth off her. I don’t know why he kept them. Maybe he was supposed to kill her and then use them to frame Eric Fuller at the time. Maybe he hid them and remembered them later. I would guess they were planted within the past few months—just long enough ago so the ground didn’t seem disturbed.”

“Do you have any way of proving what you did?”

“No. Six years ago I tried not to leave any evidence that I had ever seen Wendy Harper. We traveled by car, mostly late at night. I made cash transactions when I could. I burned receipts. I didn’t want somebody to search my office someday and find papers that would tell him where I took her. I taught her how to get a new name, but made sure I didn’t know what it was. When I left her, I wouldn’t let her tell me where she was going.”

Chernoff pursed his lips and stared past Till for a few seconds. “What do you think we should do?”

“Linda Gordon has physical evidence, and I have nothing to counter it. The only way Linda Gordon will drop the charges is if Wendy Harper walks into the police station.”

“Do you think she would come back?”

“I think if she learns what’s happening, she’ll try to save Eric Fuller. She cared a lot about him six years ago. But remember that the only one who could have planted evidence in Fuller’s yard is the person who had it. I think the man who wanted Wendy dead six years ago is trying to lure her back.”

Chernoff looked worried. “We can’t expect the DA’s office to help us. They’re trying to make a case against Eric Fuller.”

“Max Poliakoff, the detective in charge of the case, is an old friend of mine, but he can’t help with this. We’ve got to proceed without help,” Till said.

“Proceed to do what?”

“Get word to her that Eric Fuller needs her, and hope we can keep her alive when she comes.”

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