There were already ten messages on her desk: nine sightings of the boy, and a psychic from Fontana claiming to know who'd murdered Lisa. What would the afternoon bring?
Stu hadn't come in yet. To hell with him. Fournier was checked out, too.
She stormed into Schoelkopf's office waving the article. He was sitting at his desk; jumped up and jabbed a finger at her.
“Don't get all pissy with me. The parents blew into town yesterday, went straight to Deputy Chief Lazara- he calls me at ten P.M. I have to come down here to deal with them. The father's an obvious asshole, used to having his way. Who knows what he'll try to do next.”
I tried to warn you, idiot, and you brushed me off.
“You could've called me,” said Petra.
“I could've bought Microsoft at ten bucks- what's the point, Barbie?”
The nickname had never bothered her. Now it was a razor scraping raw nerve fiber. “The point is-”
“The point is I've been running interference on this for you from day one and you've produced squat. I get yanked out of bed, get dirty looks from Lazara because he's working late, he cuts out, leaves me with Mommy boo-hooing, Daddy delivering these fucking speeches: After Menendez and O.J., everyone knows LAPD can't find a felon in the penitentiary. So I give him what I've got, which is this artwork of yours, figuring maybe it'll calm him down. He says okay, what are you doing about it, and I say we're looking for him, Mr. Boehlinger. And he says Doctor Boehlinger, then he tells me it's not enough, he wants some incentives here- post a reward. I try to explain that rewards bring in mostly nuts, and even if we wanted to do that, it would take time. He picks up my phone, calls some lawyer named Hack, and says, Talk to your buddy at the Times and your other buddies at the TV stations. Showing me this Hack's connected. Which he obviously is- it was already eleven and he got the picture in. So sue me, I didn't wake you up at midnight. You think you've got a grievance, file a complaint. Meanwhile, go do your job.”
He waved her out.
A TV cop would have handed in the badge and gun.
A real cop kept her mouth shut. She liked the job and the department was paramilitary, would always be, meaning lockstep rhythm, death of the individual, hierarchies. You pissed down, not up.
Look at Milo Sturgis- she'd worked with the gay detective on one case, had seen him as the ace he was. But before that she'd heard only curses affixed to his name. The highest solve rate in West L.A.; to the department, that didn't make up for sleeping with a man.
She returned to her desk, put aside the ten message slips, and phoned the Nancy Downey Agency in Beverly Hills. A woman with a Latin accent said, “You should talk to Mr. Sanchez. He's at our other office in San Marino.”
San Marino and B.H. Covering the high-priced spreads, east and west.
A man answered there, similar accent.
“Mr. Sanchez?”
“Yes.”
She identified herself, told him she was looking for Estrella Flores.
“I am, too.”
“Pardon?”
“I just got a call from her son in El Salvador. He's worried, hasn't heard from her since Sunday. Is this about Mrs. Ramsey's murder?”
“We'd just like to talk to her, sir. Why's the son worried?”
“Usually she calls him two, three times a week. He said he phoned the Ramsey house but got only a machine. I tried; the same thing happened to me. I left a message, but no one's called me back.”
“Mrs. Flores quit working for Mr. Ramsey, sir.”
“When?”
“The day after the murder.”
“Oh.”
“So she didn't call you about another placement?”
“No.” Sanchez sounded concerned.
“Any ideas where she might be, sir?”
“No, I'm sorry. She worked for the Ramseys for… hold on, let me look… here it is. Two years. Never complained.”
“Where did she work before that?”
“Before that… I couldn't tell you.” Wariness had crept into his voice.
“She wasn't legal?”
“When she came to us, she was legal. At least she presented papers. We do our best to-”
“Mr. Sanchez, I have no interest in immigration issues-”
“Even if you did, Detective, we have nothing to hide. Our women are all legal. We place them in the finest homes, and there must never be a hint of-”
“Of course,” said Petra. “Please give me Mrs. Flores's son's name and number.”
“Javier,” he said, reciting an address on Santa Cristina in San Salvador and a number. “He's a lawyer.”
“You don't know of any other places she worked?”
“She told us she worked for a family in Brentwood, but only for three months. No name- she didn't want to use them as references because they were ‘immoral.' ”
“Immoral in what way, sir?”
“I think it was something to do with drinking. Mrs. Flores is a very… moral woman.”
Petra hung up, thought about the maid's disappearance. If Flores had left of her own accord, why hadn't she contacted her son? It didn't take much morality to be repulsed by murder. Had she seen something? Or been seen?
Where to go with it… more calls to substations, to see if Flores had turned up somewhere as a victim? Unlikely. If she'd been eliminated by Ramsey because she could blow his alibi, he'd have made sure to conceal the body.
Better to scope out RanchHaven, talk to the guard service, ask long-overdue questions. While she was there, she could drop in on Ramsey again, slip in some hints about Flores, see how he reacted.
Wil Fournier appeared in the squad room door, beckoning her with a wiggling finger. He looked angry. Something to do with the boy? She hurried over.
“What's up?”
“Got some people can't wait to meet you.” He angled his head down the hall. Petra looked out and saw a couple in their fifties standing at the far end. Well dressed, backs to each other.
“The parents?”
“None other,” said Fournier. “Schoelkopf snagged me as I came in, said they wanted a firsthand report from all three of us. Where's Ken?”
“Don't know.” Her tone made him stare. “What exactly do they want?”
“Info. Got any?”
“Nope, how about you?”
“Talked to a few shelters, churches, some of our Juvey people. No one knows the kid; a couple of social workers thought they might've seen him around, but he hasn't checked in anywhere.”
“Outdoor kid,” said Petra. Thinking what guts it took for an eleven-year-old to go it alone in the park.
“Let's go do some hand-holding,” said Fournier. “Female D and a coal-colored one. These people look like the type who still think lawn jockeys are funny.”
Mrs. Boehlinger was everything Petra expected- petite, perfectly groomed, handsome; long-suffering Pat Nixon handsomeness. A puff of cold-waved hair the color of dry champagne crowned a roundish face. Contoured eyebrows. Trim figure in a conservatively cut black St. John's Knits suit. Black suede pumps and purse. Red eyes.
Her husband defeated expectation. Petra had pictured a big man, hearty, someone like Ramsey. Dr. John Everett Boehlinger was five-five, 140 pounds tops, with narrow shoulders and a homely face full of homely features: fat nose, small dark eyes, rubber-mask looseness around the jowls. Bald on top, thin fringe of gray at the sides. A clipped stainless steel goatee- he could have played Freud in the country club Halloween bash.
He wore a black vested suit, white shirt, gray tie printed with tiny black dots. White silk hankie in the breast pocket. Onyx cuff links. Cap-tip shoes were polished shiny as motor oil.
Two small people in funeral garb. Mrs. Boehlinger remained focused on the wall in front of her, clenching and unclenching one hand. The other gripped her purse. Her french nails were glossy but chipped. She still had her back to her husband, didn't look up as Petra and Fournier approached.