Three shirt deal

Chapter 42

It was still early when we pulled into our driveway in Venice. The sun was down, but in June the sky in Los Angeles remains light until after nine. We unlocked the front door and walked inside.

The house was hot and I instantly knew nobody had been there in a while. Delfina and Chooch had obviously returned to school directly from Santa Barbara. I checked outside and refilled Franco's food bowl while Alexa went to the fridge and got us a couple of cold ones. Before heading out to the backyard I went into the living room to put on some music. When I turned on the stereo, 93.9 FM started playing. Country radio. I looked at the dial, puzzled and then I retuned it to 103.5, a station I knew Alexa preferred.

I wandered outside and sat down as the music drifted through our patio speakers.

Alexa handed me a beer and we clinked bottles.

Almost immediately, Franco appeared from around the corner of the house and jumped up onto Alexa's lap, turning around three times before dropping anchor.

"When did you start listening to ninety-three point nine FM?" I asked, wondering if her taste in music had also changed.

"That's a country station, isn't it?"

"Yeah."

"I never listen to it. Why?"

"The tuner was on that station."

"Maybe Chooch or Delfina?"

"When did those two ever listen to country?"

"Yeah, you're right." She fell silent, thinking about it while she ruffled the fur behind Franco's ears, then she said, "If it's not one of us, who turned it there?"

"Back in the early nineties, when I was on patrol in the Valley, Brian Devine was our urban cowboy. He was always listening to C and W."

"You think he came in here and played our stereo while he went through our things?"

"I think Brian Devine is crazy. I wouldn't put anything past him."

We sat for a moment thinking about that, and then, almost in unison both turned and looked back at the house.

"How do you want to do this?" she asked.

"You take the front rooms, I'll take the back. Meet you in the middle."

We got up and went inside. I started with our bedroom, looking for anything that was out of place, or might have been moved. I knew it wouldn't be an obvious mistake. Brian Devine was a pro and had probably done his share of unauthorized, warrantless shakes. He knew how to toss a room and not leave any obvious telltale signs. But no matter how careful someone is, there's always something.

The closet looked okay. The medicine cabinet and bathroom drawers checked out. I looked in Alexa's alcove at her desk, but decided I'd have to leave that to her. It was so messy these days it was hard for me to tell what, if anything, was out of place.

In the kitchen, the scratch pad I'd used to write down the names of Church's crew was missing. I wondered if, after the attack in the mountain, Brian had removed those names so they wouldn't become part of a future investigation. Then I pushed a button on the phone caddy. It opened to the W's. The last number I had looked up was the Police Officer's Association. If Alexa hadn't moved the dial, and if Chooch and Delfina hadn't been here, then maybe Devine had been checking out my phone numbers. Nothing else seemed out of place. I couldn't shake the strong suspicion that Brian Devine had been in here poking through our lives during the ten days Alexa and I were up in Santa Barbara.

I walked into the front room to ask Alexa if she had changed the phone dial or removed the scratch pad. I found her sitting in a chair at my desk. She had one of my spiral notebooks in her lap. As I got closer I saw that it was my Alexa Journal. I had recorded all my doubts about our relationship on those pages, remembering as Dr. Lusk had instructed to include my innermost feelings.

She heard me behind her and turned to look up at me, a stricken expression on her face. "Oh my God, Shane, is this what you really think?"