Claire McNab: The Dingo Dilemma

"What about cell phones?"

"Cell phones? No security at all. Child's play to pick up the signal. And if you're using it in a car, the transmission's transferred from cell to cell as you drive, so tracing the vehicle's route is simple."

This was not welcome news. I told Lonnie about Dingo's call to me on my cell phone. "So now you're telling me that anyone could have listened in."

"Sure, but who'd be interested in calls you're receiving, any-way?

"Maybe the same people who had a lash at bugging our building. Any idea yet who they are?"

"I'm on it," said Lonnie. "I traced the limousine company. Just waiting to hear from a contact in the business. I should know later this morning who those guys were working for."

I thought I'd escaped the Pauline question, but Lonnie fixed me with a soulful look. "I know you saw Pauline yesterday. Did you ask her?"

"Sort of."

"What did she say?"

I looked at his hopeful expression and my heart sank. I couldn't lie to him, but I also couldn't be cruel and tell him how Pauline had hooted scornfully at the very idea of a long-term relationship with him.

"She said you were a sweet guy, but…"

An anxious frown appeared on Lonnie's chubby face. "But what?"

"Pauline said opposites attract."

"It's true we're opposites-we could hardly be less alike. That's good, though, isn't it?"

It wouldn't be fair to let him get his hopes up, so I said, "In the short-term it is good, but not in the long-term."

He looked stricken. "Pauline said that?"

She hadn't put it in those words, so I evaded a direct lie by saying, "It's what she believes."

Lonnie's shoulders drooped. He tossed the doughnut he'd been eating onto the counter. "So she didn't say she loves me?"

"No, she didn't." I felt dreadful. I said bracingly, "Live for the moment. Seize the day."

"Pauline said that?"

"Not exactly, but she said you were having fun together. I think that's what she really meant, Lonnie-that you should enjoy your time together and let the future take care of itself."

Lonnie was obviously not going to let the subject go, so I started getting ready to provide additional tactful paraphrasings. I was saved by Bob Verritt, unshaven and rumpled, who came into the kitchen saying, "Christ, what a night."

"Quip's been found?" I asked.

"The good news is yes, Quip's turned up."

"And the bad news?"

"It looks like he's going to be charged with murder."

An anonymous phone tip at two-thirty this morning had led the police to Quip. Dazed and confused, he had stumbled out of a large self-storage complex not far from Bellina Studios. There had been blood on his clothes, and a search had revealed Yancy's body inside the half-open roller door of one of the storage units.

His full name, I now discovered, was Yancy Grayson. His head had been hit with such force that his skull had broken open. A heavy steel crowbar lay beside the corpse, the hair and clotted blood on it indicating it was almost certainly the murder weapon.

Quip claimed to only hazily remember getting into Yancy's car. After that everything was a blank until he came to on the floor of the storage unit. There had been enough illumination from the security lighting outside for him to see that Yancy had been seriously hurt. He'd tried to find a pulse without success, then, feeling sick and dizzy, he'd attempted to go for help.

"There's no way Quip's a murderer," I said. "It's a set-up."

"He hasn't been charged with anything yet," said Bob, rubbing his eyes and yawning. "That's because Quip's got Sidwell Porter in his corner."

"Does Harriet know?" Lonnie asked.

"Harriet arranged it."

"I don't believe it," said Lonnie. "They haven't spoken for years."

"Who's Sidwell Porter?"

They both looked at me. "The best defense lawyer in Los Angeles," Bob said. "The go-to guy for every celebrity in trouble."

"And Harriet's estranged father," Lonnie added. "He can't cope with the fact she's gay, and worse, that she is openly living in a lesbian relationship."

"Fran woke Harriet up and begged her to approach her father," Bob said. "I've never heard Fran so close to hysterical. Harriet finally said she would, although she told Fran it was unlikely he'd agree. Seems she was wrong-Harriet called back to say he'd represent Quip."

"Why the change of heart?" Lonnie said. "Porter's daughter hasn't stopped being gay."

Bob shrugged. "Maybe the fact that she's about to make him a grandfather. Harriet's his only chance of that, as she's his only child."

Lonnie nodded moodily. "I'll never be a grandfather," he said.

Bob's long, thin face split with a grin. "You're putting the cart before the horse. You have to be a father first."

"That too," said Lonnie. "I won't be a father, either." He picked up the bag of remaining doughnuts and handed it to Bob. "Want these? I've lost my appetite."

Head down, he shuffled out of the kitchen. Looking at Lonnie's retreating figure, Bob said, "What's the matter with him?"

I wasn't going to betray a confidence, so I said, "Search me."

Bob tried a doughnut. "Hey, these are good. Want one?"

"No thanks. Bob, can I ask you something?"

He laughed. "Nothing's ever stopped you before."

"It was so nice of you to stay all night with Fran."

"I wasn't alone. Fran's mom turned up just after twelve, so there were two of us rallying around."

"Still, it was bonzer of you."

He gave me a shrewd look. "You're thinking Fran and I don't always see eye to eye, aren't you?"

"It did cross my mind."

His expression bleak, Bob said, "I've experienced what Fran went through last night. I know what it's like to be frantic with worry, and what a comfort it is when someone's there to share the waiting. And at least Quip's alive."

"Who was it?"

"My sister. Fifteen years ago. She was going to have dinner with me. She left work, got in her car, and simply vanished. There was no suggestion she'd disappeared voluntarily. Kerrie was in good spirits. She'd just got the promotion she'd been working hard to achieve, and was engaged to someone she adored."

I was chilled by the forlorn sorrow on his face. "She was never found?"

"Never. It was if she'd never existed."

Lonnie reappeared, even more doleful. "You'll never believe it, but those two clueless guys, Morgan and Unwin, are with Homeland Security." He paused, then added dramatically, "And they're investigating Kendall & Creeling as a terrorist organization."

It was mid-morning, and Melodie, Harriet, Lonnie, and I were holding down the fort. Bob had gone home to snatch a few hours sleep, and Fran, of course, was occupied with Quip's dire situation as chief suspect in a violent murder. I hadn't heard from Ariana and had decided not to try to contact her, but to let her decide when she wanted to talk with me.

Murders were not a rare occurrence in Los Angeles, so it took something extra to get the media's concentrated attention. Unhappily, Yancy's death had two media bonus points. First, he had a connection to real estate mogul Norris Blainey, and second, the chief suspect was not only involved in the entertainment industry, always a point of keen interest in this city, but also happened to be writing a novel skewering a thinly disguised Blainey. The fact that Quip was married to the daughter of the well-known artist Janette-like Cher, Janette only used her first name-gave the story an added boost.

So Yancy's murder got the full media overkill, and Darleen's snatching became very much yesterday's news, even though a quarter-million-dollar reward had been offered, and the dingo-snatcher had been named definitively as Douglas "Dingo" O'Rourke.

Quip's connection to Kendall & Creeling through Fran had been discovered, and the phone rang constantly with requests for "background" on Fran and Quip, a camera crew appeared in the street outside our building, and we were forced to put a sign on the front door stating firmly that there would be absolutely no interviews granted.