Mary was on the move as she soon as she made up her mind. She raced back to Mitchell, avoided looking at what was left of his face, then patted him down. The cell phone was in the inside pocket of his sport coat.
She slipped it into her pocket and ran for the house.
The lemonade glass. Mary ran back to the table and used a napkin to wipe off any prints she may have left on her lemonade glass. She felt like spitting on McAllister’s dead body, but decided not to. DNA.
Elena. There was nothing Mary could do about her. She raced back inside and then stopped. Mary knew Mitchell was involved, especially because of the way he had turned on her in the last seconds of his life. He had lured her out to the garden, had planned for the shooter to kill her, but instead, he’d been shot.
Mary hurried back through the living room and out the front door to her car.
She jumped in, ignitioned it, and took off.
She was only a half mile from the house when Mitchell’s cell phone rang.
Chapter Seventy
She hesitated for a second. Answer it, and the caller knows something is wrong. Let it go to voicemail, well, the caller might think something is up, but wouldn’t know for sure.
Mary let the call go to voicemail and she drove straight to her office.
Years back she had subscribed to a number of services that were on the questionable side of legality. It’s like the Spy stores that sell hidden cameras even though secretly videotaping people is technically illegal.
Same idea.
But one of her favorites of the services was the phone number database. Rather than calling an operator and trying to con him or her out of an address, which Mary had become quite adept at doing, now she simply had to open up the database, type in a phone number, and it would spit out an address. The database itself was updated frequently, one of its key selling points.
Now, Mary took out Mitchell’s cell phone and accessed the phone log. The first number listed was the most recent call. Mary checked the voicemail indicator — it showed no message waiting.
She wrote down the number, then typed it into the database and waited while the system did its things. Moments later, an address popped up on her computer screen. She jotted that down beneath the phone number.
It took nearly two hours to go through Mitchell’s entire phone library. Most of the numbers and their matching names and addresses she was able to cross off the list, obviously things like Mitchell’s office number, his own home phone, and his voicemail. She recognized one number Mitchell had repeatedly called and its corresponding address: the apartment right across from hers. A spy. That’s all McAllister had been. Either an employee of Mitchell’s or a private investigator. Mary forced it from her mind or she would start crying immediately, and she had work to do. She studied the list and the other addresses she recognized as Mitchell’s colleagues or other businesses.
She had a handful of names and addresses that she was not able to eliminate from the list of possibilities.
Mary accessed a second program, another premium software and Internet package, that let her do people searches. She fed the remaining names and addresses into this program and waited for the response.
When they did come back, Mary was able to eliminate most of them quickly.
It was the entry without any history that caught her eye.
It was listed as a J. Venuta. The address was in Venice. The name rang a very distant bell in Mary’s head. She knew she’d heard it from somewhere.
A J. Venuta living in Venice, with virtually no history as a human being.
Mary knew she was close.
Chapter Seventy-One
Jake’s name appeared on her cell phone moments after the first ring. She was exiting the 10 freeway and taking 4th Street when she punched in.
“Hi,” Mary said. “I can’t come to the phone right now so leave a message, or for more options, stop playing with your nuts, hang up, and try again.”
“Cute, Mary.”
“Thank you,” Mary said. “That’s actually the system greeting.”
There was a pause as Jake said something she couldn’t quite make out.
“What do you need, Big Boy?” Mary said. “A career advisor?”
“You know, a crime scene just isn’t the same without you, Mary,” Jake said.
Mary paused before responding. Her nerves were frayed and she wanted to clue Jake in on everything that had happened, but she was worried that if she did, he’d tell Davies and there’d be an APB out on her instantly.
“And the underwear section of a Walmart flyer just isn’t the same without you, Jake,” she said, after a deep breath. She had to stay strong for just a little while longer. A homeless man’s shopping cart shot out into the street, and Mary swerved to avoid it. Her tires squealed and she hoped Jake hadn’t heard.
“So somebody blew Harvey Mitchell’s head off,” Jake said with a tired voice.
“I bet his hair is still perfectly in place.”
“Actually, not. Most of it is gone along with chunks of his head.”
“That’s too bad. And you thought his monologues were bad before,” she said.
She heard Jake sigh on his end of the line.
“Where does Mitchell live, anyway? On Crenshaw?" Mary said.
She swung onto Ocean Park Drive headed for Venice’s Main Street. Her heart was racing right along with the engine of the car. It was a challenge to keep her voice level.
“No, Mary, he actually lives in Malibu. I’m surprised you forgot so soon,” he said.
“What the heck are you talking about, Jakie?” Mary said.
“Well,” Jake said. “It seems there was somebody here when Mitchell was shot. And the physical description sounds an awful lot like you.”
“A total hottie with an ass you could bounce a quarter off of?” Mary said.
“So I take it you’re not coming over to chat with us?”
“Hey, I’m working and I don’t even know where this Mitchell guy lives. I’m way out here in Long Beach,” Mary said. “But let me tell you with utter sincerity that it really chaps my ass I can’t help out you and Davies in some way.”
“You realize that if we get anything more conclusive, you’ll have to come downtown,” Jake said.
“Oh, of course,” Mary said. “I love to go downtown. Maybe we can get some tacos somewhere?”
“Mary,” he said.
“Gotta run, honey!” she said. She thumbed the disconnect button on her cell, and tried to ignore the fact that her hand shook in the process.
Chapter Seventy-Two
The house was shabby chic. Whitewashed brick with white windows and light blue shutters. The landscaping in front was nice, if overgrown. There was no car in the driveway and the mailbox was empty.
J. Venuta. Mary realized the name was still bugging her. Where had she heard it? At her office? On the Internet in one of the articles she’d read? At one of the comedy clubs? Mary shook her head. It wouldn’t come to her.
So she focused back on the house.
No lights on in any windows. But she knew someone lived here, at least recently. Someone who used a cell phone and called Harvey Mitchell, probably more than once.
Someone named J. Venuta.
Mary reached inside her sportcoat and loosened the.45 in its holster. She was still mildly fearful of knocking on strange doors, after the one at the old guy’s apartment had proceeded to be blown to smithereens. Her breath was rapid and shallow, so she forced herself to take a few deep breaths.