“Where are the boys at this point?”
“Nick’s in San Francisco, working for a brokerage firm. He graduated from Santa Cruz with a degree in accounting. Naomi steered him toward finance and it seems to agree with him. Graham got his degree this past December. He hung around with Nick for a while and then took off. He’s footloose and fancy-free, for the time being at any rate.”
“Sounds like you.”
“He is like me. Nick was always more like Naomi. Her coloring, her temperament.”
“She got married, didn’t she?”
“Two years ago. He’s the one I feel for. Poor bastard. Marriage was a good one from everything I heard. He’d lost his first wife to cancer and he thought he’d survived the worst of it. Then Naomi got sick and now he’s right back where he was.”
“What about you?”
“She was my touchstone—another revelation in the wake of her death. Whatever happened, I knew she’d be there. I couldn’t live with the woman, but we had those two boys and she was part of my life. I probably only saw her every three or four years. I’m off balance. They say it’s like that when you lose a toe. You take for granted you can walk just fine. You’ve been doing it all your life without giving it a second thought. Suddenly your gait goes wobbly.”
He signaled the waitress and I saw her moving toward the table with a fresh carafe of coffee. Dietz got up and retrieved a coffee cup and silverware setup from the table next to us. It was a nice way of creating emotional space so I could absorb what he’d said. I’d never met Naomi. I’d seen photographs of her and I’d been startled by how beautiful she was. She and Dietz had been apart longer than they’d been a couple. They’d lived together for a time, but she’d refused to marry him. Or maybe he’d never asked.
He returned to the table and sat down.
I said, “The minute you walked into Henry’s kitchen, I knew something was wrong. I could see it in your face.”
“Surprised the hell out of me. This is what’s so weird. We were never in love. There was some kind of chemistry I wouldn’t even classify as sexual. It was more fundamental than that. Ours was a bad mix of personalities. We drove each other nuts. Happiest day of my life was when I left her the last time. Then she died and the bottom dropped out.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Being angry with you was a relief.”
“Easier than grief.”
“Right,” he said. “Look, I know you were mad that I left.”
“Don’t project. I wasn’t that mad,” I said.
“Could have fooled me. Times I thought about you, I didn’t have the nerve to call. I figured you’d cut me down and rightly so. After a while, the absence just seemed to compound itself. When Pete didn’t pay me I figured it was your revenge.”
“Too subtle. If I take revenge, it’ll have my name written all over it.”
“So now what?”
“I could use some breakfast. I’m starving,” I said.
Dietz joined me in an orgy of bacon and eggs and all the accompaniments. It was a meal that never ceased to satisfy. I was still munching on a piece of buttered rye toast when he returned to the subject that had brought him to town.
“So here’s what bothers me,” he said. “Pete hires me to do a job and next thing you know he’s dead. What’s that about?”
“Well, it wasn’t quite like that,” I said. “You did the work when, the last weekend in May? The robbery went down in August.”
“I know, but I keep thinking the two might be linked. This isn’t a gig you see much these days. One spouse spying on the other? We live in the land of no-fault divorce, so it struck me as odd.”
“Why’d you take the job?”
“It sounded like fun. I can’t remember the last time I was asked to skulk around a hotel taking pictures with a telephoto lens. I did a damn fine job of it even if I say so myself. Then the guy who hired me gets shot to death and I don’t like it so much.”
“Just because one event follows another doesn’t mean the first caused the second,” I said.
“I get that and I hope you’re right, but as long as I’m here I’d like to satisfy myself.”
“Tell me about the surveillance again. When you talked about it last night I was feeling so defensive I didn’t hear a word you said.”
“I was tailing a woman named Mary Lee Bryce and her boss, a doctor named Dr. Linton Reed. Both work at a local research institute. Apparently, they knew each other years ago and were involved in a romance of some kind. I have no idea if it was serious or not. The point is, her current husband was worried about the two of them in Reno staying in the same hotel.”
“Why’d they go to Reno?”
“They attended a conference over the long holiday weekend.”
“And was she having an affair with him?”
“Not that I picked up on. The two barely spoke.”
“Might be camouflage.”
“I considered that. They ignore one another in public and bang away in private. Problem is they had no personal contact at all. I’d be willing to swear to it.”
“Didn’t you say she met with an old high school friend?”
“Now, see, you were listening,” he said with a smile. “You’re right. A fellow named Owen Pensky, an investigative journalist. I ran a background check on him. Big scandal in his past.”
“What kind?”
“He was fired from the New York Times for plagiarizing someone else’s work.”
“What was he doing in Reno?”
“He lives there. He picked up a job at one of the Reno papers.”
“You think her relationship with him was business or personal?”
“I have no idea. She and Pensky met twice, but I couldn’t get audio. Place was too heavily populated. If I’d known in advance where they were meeting, I’d have planted a bug. I guarantee they didn’t go to his room or hers.”
“But she could have been having an affair with him.”
“If so, the two of them did a flawless job of keeping it under wraps.”
“How did you frame it in your report?”
“I was careful. I drew no inferences and I didn’t offer my unsolicited opinion. Nice neutral language not meant to inflame.”
“What are the ethics in a situation like this? With Pete dead, can you talk to her husband about whether the bill was paid?”
“I’ll have to. I doubt the wife has any idea Pete hired me to keep an eye on her. I tip her off and the situation could turn ugly.”
“I still don’t see what this has to do with Pete’s death. Feels like a fishing expedition.”
“Sure it is, but why not? Somebody owes me.”
“Pete could have collected and just not paid you.”
“In which case, I’m probably out of luck. Meanwhile, I don’t like thinking the guy got killed because of me. If there’s no link, then fine. If I manage to collect my money, it’s better yet.”
“You have a plan?”
“I’m hoping I can talk Pete’s wife into letting us have a look at his accounts. Meanwhile, what’s on your plate?”
“I have to get the Mustang over to the service station. Some asshole drove a roofing nail into my sidewall tire,” I said. “What about you?”
“I thought I’d pay Con Dolan a visit and see what he knows. Maybe the cops have a suspect in sight, or one already in jail. If so, I’ll quit worrying the job was in any way linked to his departure from the planet Earth.”
“You know where Con lives?”
“I do and it shouldn’t take me long. After that, if you’re free, I’ll treat you to dinner at Emile’s.”