What could Bob Pena’s assistant tell me, anyway? The facts of Cassy Booker’s death were sad but nonprobative. The poor kid had died alone on a bed in a private dorm, the victim of the same cocktail that had created a national scourge.
Fentanyl, cheap, fast acting, turbocharged, and snortable, was the current rock star of brain poisons, and people of Cassy Booker’s age were a prime audience. Combine that with the discrepancies Basia Lopatinski had noted and there wasn’t much to work with.
Except.
Suzanne had been murdered at the wedding of Amanda Burdette’s brother and Cassy had lived in the same complex as Amanda and been part of the same academic program as Amanda. The girls were close in age, physically similar.
The few leads we had pointed to Suzanne’s murder as a contract killing at the hands of Michael Lotz. But when it came to his own violent appetites, did Michael Lotz go for a whole other type of victim?
Had Amanda been pegged as a victim, only to be saved by Lotz’s inadvertent overdose? Turning it another way, had Suzanne been slaughtered because of a relationship with Amanda?
The Brain.
A mean-spirited, antisocial young woman colluding with the addict in the basement to get rid of an inconvenience?
I tossed that around for a while, decided I had nothing to offer Milo that couldn’t wait until morning.
But he couldn’t.
CHAPTER
28
At nine thirty p.m., I’d just picked up my old Martin and was settling down to play. Robin was showering. While shopping for groceries, she’d gotten an away-from-the-office reply from Sharon Isbin at Juilliard.
Blanche sat at my feet, waiting for her favorite fingerpick, “Windy and Warm.” When I placed the guitar back in its case and reached for the phone, she let out a deep sigh.
I consoled her with a neck rub and clicked on. “Working late?”
Milo said, “Time is an abstract concept.” Lightness in his voice. “The bad news is I can’t find any info on Suzanne DaCosta and her license is only half a year old, so I’m thinking it might be an alias. To balance that out, two big good things: First, I spotted Lotz in one of the wedding photos, I’ll show you when we get together. Second, just heard from Homeland. Garrett B. hadn’t been to Europe. Until today. Not Poland, Italy. He and La Bambina took an Alitalia flight that landed in Rome this morning. Sleepy tried getting their whereabouts from Italian immigration, don’t ask. I’m having Moe, Sean, and Alicia call every goddamn hotel in the city.”
I said, “Accelerated schedule on the honeymoon.”
“Right after we talk to him about Poland. Funny thing ’bout that, huh? And during that period Lotz dies. You talk to Basia, yet?”
“She’ll know more about the autopsy after a meeting tomorrow. Lotz’s bloods aren’t back but the signs of an O.D. are obvious, including lots of track marks. He’s also got what sound like prison tattoos. My big thing is Cassy Booker died of a heroin-fentanyl overdose. Not suicide, undetermined. Basia says without a no-alternative suicide, they do that for the family.”
“I know,” he said. “Either way, Alex, it’s not murder, just a college kid O.D.’ing on the poison du jour.”
I said, “True, but Amanda and Cassie being enrolled in the same program and living in the same complex bugs me.”
“Garrett and little sis are both involved in very bad stuff? Sure, why not? Get me word from Maxine that the girls actually hung out, Amanda goes on the radar. Meanwhile, it’s her suddenly rabbiting brother who interests me.”
“Anything come up on him?”
A beat. “I was afraid you’d ask that. If you must know, he appears annoyingly spotless. Eagle Scout, high school salutatorian, graduated with honors from UC Irvine, got hired by the numbers-crunchers he still works for. I’m gonna drop in at his folks’ place tomorrow, see if we can pry something out of them. Maybe also get a look at Pa Walton’s barn where the animal dope is stored.”
“Calabasas,” I said. “Back to the Valley.”
“That appears to be my current karma. I’m figuring let the traffic fade, we leave around nine. This time I’ll drive.”
We. Assuming I’d never turn down the opportunity.
Ace detective.
CHAPTER
29
In L.A., twenty miles from city center can take you to a world apart.
Calabasas, spilling into the Santa Monica Mountains on the western edge of the San Fernando Valley, used to be a low-key pocket of rustic, horsey serenity. That’s been altered by an influx of retired athletes and celebrities who’ve achieved fame for merely existing, along with the metastatic palaces they erect and businesses that cater to self-love and shallow notoriety.
A few of the old-timers gripe. But real estate prices have skyrocketed and the heirs of ranchers, fruit farmers, and horse breeders are often thrilled to trade acreage for passive wealth.
On a good day, Calabasas is a half-hour drive from my house, and this was a great day. Traffic on the 101 was sparse and rage-free, the air warm and dry and redolent of old wood and new grass, the blue of the sky so brilliant it verged on unlikely.
Surrounding the freeway, russet and olive rolling hills aimed skyward, gilded by splashes of egg-yolk sunlight.
Milo had picked me up five to nine, mumbling something that might’ve been “Good morning,” and handing me a photograph.
The same crowd shot near the bar where we’d spotted Suzanne DaCosta in her red dress. Lots of small heads. Milo had used a black grease pencil to circle one of them.
A man standing to her right, a few feet behind. Nondescript, Caucasian, middle-aged, clean-shaven, wearing a dark suit, white shirt, and dark tie.
Mr. Blend-In. A face you’d never notice unless you knew who you were looking for.
The same went for the trajectory of Michael Lotz’s droopy eyes. Objectively, it was impossible to peg him as watching his victim. But given what he’d done, impossible to think otherwise.
Milo said, “That clinches it, as if it needed clinching,” gunned the unmarked’s engine, and raced toward my gate. I clicked it open just in time for him to speed through. As we sped north on the Glen, I studied the photo some more then put it aside.
A woman, unmindful.
Prey. Predator.
* * *
—
Twenty-eight minutes later, we were exiting the freeway at Los Virgenes Road and driving through a swath of luxury car dealerships, upscale coffee bars and restaurants, plastic surgery practices, day spas, faux-western-wear boutiques, and realtors peddling gated enclaves. Also fast-food joints and gas stations; everyone needs quick fuel from time to time.
It took several miles of climbing the southern foothills to get past that.
First came clumps of the type of house you get near the freeway. Then the terrain unfolded and began to breathe and we were coursing past pastures and soft hills studded with ranch houses, outbuildings, and corrals.
Milo said, “No pumpkins in sight.”
I knew what he was talking about. “So much for the Halloween trade.”
Some people believe Calabasas was named to commemorate a two-hundred-year-old accidental dumping of squash seeds from a Basque farmer’s horse cart. Others are convinced the name honors a Chumash Indian word describing the flight plan of geese. No one really knows the truth but like most California controversies, that doesn’t inhibit strong opinions and the shaming of dissidence.
Currently, squash was winning out.
We rode a ribbon of two-lane highway into the mountains for another quarter hour before reaching the Wagon Lane address of Sandra and Wilbur Burdette.
Easy to spot because a sign on a post featured their name over large reflective numbers. No house visible, just a copse of California oaks and a sinuous dusty drive.
The oaks, gnarled and evergreen, are survivors adapted to drought that predate anyone’s settlement by millennia. During the boom days of West Valley development, entire groves were destroyed without a blink. Nowadays, master planners transplant the trees to golf courses.
Milo said, “Here goes,” and turned onto the snaky road. The curves kept his speed low. A second sign twenty feet in proclaimed: Wilbur A. Burdette, DVM. Ride-ins Welcome.
I said, “No gate. Friendly folk.”
Milo said, “At least for the next couple of minutes.”
* * *