The Art of Deception

Two Peas in a Pod

The W’s split-level lobby featured twin stairways that led around an island bearing a flower vase and up to the black lacquer reception desk where young people in black clothing and wearing wireless headsets greeted guests with white teeth and tones of way-too-cool-to-get-excited. The halogen lights were set so low that these receptionists seemed to emerge from the haze.

Hip-hop pounded from speakers in the ceiling.

LaMoia territory, to be sure. He had the appropriate sarcasm and cynicism down pat.

“Yo, yuppie puppy,” he said to the male receptionist, flashing his badge against the request of his interviewee. “April Fools is tomorrow. This is the real thing.” He drew a blank expression from the kid with the wet-look hair and the silver stud in his left ear. The kid wanted him to think he saw such shields all the time. But clearly, he did not.

“Hotel guest, Oblitz. She’s expecting us.”

The black arm-40 percent cashmere-pointed. “There’s a house phone to your-”

“Did I ask for a house phone? That headset must do something, right? Hotel guest, Oblitz.” He barely hesitated, “Now.”

Crisp. His voice echoing off the stone. A few heads in the lobby lifted and turned.

The kid moved his mouth like a beached fish.

Matthews spoke into LaMoia’s ear. “Such bedside manner.”

“Don’t criticize what you haven’t sampled.”

“You really are shameless. Is the whole world a fire hydrant to you, John?”

He flashed her a look that ended it. “A guy’s gotta make his mark.”

From a distance, she saw the figure of a man enter the hotel, look up toward the registration desk, and then leave as quickly as he’d come. The wrong address, the wrong hotel? she wondered. Or had that been the man in the boots outside her mudroom window the night before? Had those boots even been outside her window the night before? She wore her paranoia tightly around the neck.

“Room nine-eleven,” the rigid receptionist said in his best I-want-to-sound-older voice.

Matthews returned to the job at hand.

“Room nine-one-one,” LaMoia repeated. Cocking his head to Matthews, he said, “How perfect is that?”

She said, “The word you’re looking for is ironic.”

“Elevators to your right.” The man-child wanted them gone.

“Chill,” LaMoia barked, keeping the kid attentive.

Matthews explained, “First, we’d like a look at your registration log for the past three months.”

LaMoia added, “And the corresponding billing charges.”

Tina Oblitz had the gray power suit going, a shimmering metallic silver blouse, string of freshwater pearls, silver Tourneau, black pumps. Narrow dark eyes that preoccupied themselves with Matthews. To the left of the desk phone lay a sweet little 9mm semiautomatic clipped into a black leather holster designed to be worn in the small of the back. The holster was weathered and sweat-stained, indicating years of wear. The obligatory lap-top, mobile phone, and pocket PC sat atop the black enamel desk.

“Plain sight,” she said, noticing LaMoia’s attention on the handgun. “I didn’t want any surprises. Permit’s in my purse, if you want to see it.”

“Glock?”

“Glock seventeen,” she answered.

He’d heard of the model but never seen one. “Weight?”

“Light as a feather. Polymer grip. Magazine holds ten. Used to be seventeen but it was heavier, of course.”

“This is not a recent addition to your wardrobe,” he said.

“Did I panic when this Peeping Tom showed up and then run out and buy a gun? I don’t think so, Detective. I believe in a woman’s right to defend herself. In seven years, no shots fired, but it has served its purpose a couple times. It’s never more than a few feet away from me.”

“Lucky it,” he snapped.

“I’m at the firing range once a week. You both know what I’m talking about.”

“It’s sergeant, not detective. And it’s Lieutenant Matthews,”

he corrected.

“My mistake.”

“No,” he corrected, his contempt for the executive set obvious, “your mistake was trying to cancel this harassment complaint you filed. Why the back-pedal?”

“You want a seat?” she asked.

“I’d like an answer,” he said. LaMoia turned to Matthews.

“You want a seat?”

Matthews shook her head, declining.

He looked back at Oblitz. “No, we’ll stand.”

Tina Oblitz took a corner of the small couch, withdrew a cigarette from a fancy holder that lay on the glass table, lit up, and hogged down that smoke like an addict who’d been away from it for years. Her body consumed it. When she exhaled, hardly anything came out. She looked satisfied, like a boozer after a stiff drink.

She said, “The other detective and I … we discussed this.”

“The complaint is still on file, Ms. Oblitz, and seeing as how we’ve got an active case that could use a lift, your cooperation would be appreciated.” He said, “I explained this over the phone.

I believe you know that’s why we’re here.”

“I never agreed to two of you.”

Matthews said, “The department requires a woman officer be present in any interview or interrogation involving a female.”

As she said this, as she looked at this woman, something nagged at her and then danced out of her thoughts as Oblitz spoke.

“You’re the chaperone?” Oblitz asked sarcastically. “Hope you don’t mind my saying so, but you don’t look the part.”

“I don’t mind,” Matthews said, unflinchingly. It took a lot to intimidate the gray-suit set. She asked, “Have we met before?”

“Are you sure you won’t sit down?” The ember of the cigarette went nearly white with the next inhale.

Whatever it was, it nagged at Matthews again, as elusive and annoying as a mosquito in the dark.

LaMoia said, “We believe your attempt to withdraw the complaint may have arisen out of your being compromised,” LaMoia said, “or that an attempt was made to compromise you.”

Oblitz wore a lot of makeup, but where her real skin showed, it turned paler. “Is that so?” she said.

Matthews said, “Voyeurism escalates to rape. Rape can escalate to homicide. We’ve lost two women already-they went missing from downtown. How many more until you decide to cooperate?”

“Shit.”

LaMoia reminded, “I mentioned that over the phone … that we had ourselves a situation.”

“We’re not the tabloids,” Matthews said. “Contrary to what you might believe, not every piece of information leaks from a police department.”

LaMoia said, “It’s only the big stuff, and believe it or not, your sex life doesn’t register anywhere on that Richter scale.”

“Shit. Shit. Shit.”

LaMoia asked, “Do you remember anything about it? What he looked like? Where he was at the time? How he might have singled you out?”

“No, it completely slipped my mind.”

They both took the sarcasm as the first step toward open communication.

“You’re married.” Matthews had noticed the showy rings, but Oblitz apparently felt obliged to display them for her anyway. “You were with a partner other than your husband.”

“You know,” Oblitz snapped, “you’re going places, Lieutenant. Sharp as a tack, you are.”

Matthews contained her anger well. “Mr. George Ramirez paid the hotel incidentals, including three room-service charges and an all-day adult film pass.”

LaMoia answered her puzzled and pained expression. “You know what they say? The titles don’t show on your bill? Don’t believe it. An order number does: Sweet Valley Thigh, Ms. Oblitz. Your man-friend talked you into attempting to withdraw the complaint you filed with us. For all we know he talked you into all sorts of things, including the warm chocolate and the whipped cream-room-service order number three, at four-seventeen P.M.

Your business. We could care less. But that peeper is our business and we’ll ride you, Ms. Oblitz, until we come away with whatever you can tell us about it.”

“Two peas in a pod.” Oblitz picked up her cigarette lighter and flicked it so that the flame burned. She held it out between her and LaMoia, peering through its yellow glare. She placed the lighter back down. Somewhere in the process another cigarette lit. Smoked spiraled.

“We’re not looking to indict you for your sexual preferences or practices,” Matthews said. “We’re here because we believe you can aid our investigation, that your experience may be directly connected to at least one of the women who’ve gone missing.” Sometimes it took voicing the words, airing her thoughts.

Her spine tingled and the hair on the nape of her neck stood on end. Change the hair color, and Tina Oblitz looked a lot like Susan Hebringer. Too much like her to be coincidence, Boldt would have said.

Matthews told the woman, “You wear a scarf on your head, or a hat, when you go out.” She clarified, “A dark scarf.”

A sideways glance of disbelief. “Now just how the hell would you know that?”

“May I see you with it on?”

LaMoia gave Matthews this leeway, though he clearly didn’t understand the request.

Oblitz grunted a complaint, retrieved the scarf, and tied it over her head. “My hair doesn’t hold up under your constant rain,” she complained. “Not without spray, and I hate that look.”

“Do you see it?” Matthews asked LaMoia, who continued to look confused. “The resemblance,” she completed.

“Hebringer,” he whispered. More of a gasp. “How could we have missed that?”

“We didn’t miss it,” Matthews said. “It just took us awhile to see it.”

Oblitz looked on, her head tracking them comically like a spectator at a tennis match. She stood by the couch, cigarette flaring, focused on Matthews. “What do I do?” she asked. “To help?”

“Tell us about your day,” LaMoia said. “The run-up to your spotting the peeper.”

“It’s been awhile,” Oblitz said.

“Whatever you remember,” Matthews suggested, a newfound kindness in her voice.

Oblitz settled back into the couch, still wearing the scarf. “I had a few extra hours,” she recalled. “I hit the museum. The Annie Leibovitz show. Some of your tourist stuff.”

LaMoia shot a glance toward Matthews. His normally dull, chocolate eyes were alive with excitement.

They hurried down the dimly lit hotel corridor toward the elevators, when Matthews steered them to the fire door and the stairs.

LaMoia had just been notified that the preliminary lab report on Lanny Neal’s car had come through, and both were eager to learn the results.

“It doesn’t make our job any easier, nor does it make me feel adequate in predicting him.” She held the door for LaMoia.

“Our job?” LaMoia said, stopping only inches from her. “I like the sound of that.”

“Don’t get all mushy about it.” She held her ground, not allowing him to intimidate her with this closeness, her back to the cold metal door, the two of them nearly chest to chest. She said, “Construction sites, tourist traps. I don’t see Hebringer and Randolf fitting into that, both being locals, both living downtown. But I suppose we start there, because it was handed to us.”

“We work well together,” he said.

“Leave it alone, would you?”

“No.”

He headed through the door then and down the first flight of stairs. Matthews hesitated for a second, regaining her composure, controlling herself.

His voice echoed up the concrete stairway. “Chocolate and whipped cream-ever tried it?”

“In your dreams.”

“You got that right,” he said, his shoes slapping faster and more loudly as he continued his hurried descent.