Jonathan Kellerman - Blood Test

She remained behind the desk and didn’t invite us to sit. Milo sat anyway, stretching out his long legs and yawning. I sat next to him.

“Leon told me you were very rude,” said the woman. She was about forty, chunky, with small muddy eyes and short pudgy hands that drummed the marble. Her hair was cut blunt and short. She wore a tailored black business suit. The ruffled bodice of her white crepe de chine blouse seemed out of character.

“Gee,” said Milo, “I’m really sorry, Ms. Rambo. I hope we didn’t hurt his feelings.”

The woman laughed, an adenoidal growl. “Leon’s a prima donna. I keep him around for decoration.” She pulled out an extra-long black cigarette from a box of Shermans and lit it up. Blowing out a cloud of smoke, she watched it rise to the ceiling. When it had dissipated completely she spoke.

“The answers to your first three questions are: One: They’re messengers, not hookers. Two: What they do on their own time is their own business. Three: Yes, he is my father and we talk on the phone every month or so.”

“I’m not from Vice,” said Milo, “and I don’t give a damn if your messengers end up giving fuck shows for horny old men snarfing nose candy and playing pocket pool.”

“How tolerant of you,” she said coldly.

“I’m known for it. Live and let live.”

“What do you want then?”

He gave her his card.

“Homicide?” Her eyebrows rose but she remained impassive. “Who bit it?”

“Maybe no one, maybe a whole bunch of people. Right now it’s a suspicious disappearance. Family from down near the border. The sister worked for you. Nona Swope.”

She dragged deeply and the Sherman glowed.

“Ah, Nona. The red-haired beauty. She a suspect or a victim?”

“Tell me what you know about her,” said Milo, taking out his pad.

She removed a key from a desk drawer, stood, smoothed her skirt, and went to the files. She was surprisingly short — five one or two. “I guess I’m supposed to play hard to get, right?” She inserted the key in the file lock and twisted. A drawer slid open. “Refuse to give you the information, scream for my lawyer.”

“That’s Leon’s script.”

That amused her. “Leon’s a good guard dog. No,” she said, taking out a folder, “I don’t care much if you read about Nona. I’ve got nothing to hide. She’s nothing to me.”

She settled back behind the desk and passed the folder across to Milo. He opened it and I looked over his shoulder. The first page was an application form filled out in halting script.

The girl’s full name was Annona Blossom Swope. She’d listed a birthdate that made her just twenty and physical measurements that matched my memory of her. Under residence she’d claimed a Sunset Boulevard address — Western Pediatric Medical Center — with no phone number to go along with it.

The eight-by-ten glossies had been taken in the office — I recognized the leather furniture — and they’d framed her in a variety of poses, all sultry. The photos were black-and-white and shortchanged her by their inability to capture her dramatic coloring. Nevertheless, she had what professionals call presence and it came through in these pictures.

We thumbed through the photos — Nona in a string bikini rolled down over her pelvis, Brazilian style; Nona braless in a sheer tank top and jeans, nipples budding through the fabric; Nona making love to an all-day sucker; Nona, feline, in a filmy negligee with a fuck-you look in her dark eyes.

Milo whistled softly. I felt an involuntary tug below the waist.

“Quite a gal, eh?” asked Jan Rambo. “A lot of skin passes through these portals, gentlemen. She stood out from the rest of them. I started calling her Daisy Mae because there was a naive quality to her. Limited life experience. Despite that, she was a little girl who knew her way around, know what I mean?”

“When were these taken?” asked Milo.

“First day she got here — what’s it say, a week ago? I took one look at her and called the cameraman. We shot and developed ’em the same day. I saw her as a good investment, started her off on messenger service.”

“Doing what, exactly?” he pushed.

“Doing messenger work, exactly. We’ve got a few basic skits — doctor and nurse, professor and coed, Adam and Eve, dominatrix and slave or vice versa. The old clichés, but your average yahoo can’t break out of clichés even when it’s fantasy time. The client picks the skit, we send out couples, and they do it like a message — you know, Happy Birthday, Joe Smith, this is from the boys in the Tuesday night poker group and, presto, the show is on. It’s all legal — they joke around, but nothing that challenges the penal code.”

“How much does that run the poker buddies?”

“Two hundred. Sixty goes to the messengers, split fifty-fifty. Plus tips.”

I did some quick mental arithmetic. Working half-time Nona could have pulled in a hundred dollars a day or more. Big bucks for a country girl barely out of her teens.

“What if the client is willing to pay more to see more?” I asked.

She looked sharply at me. “I was wondering if you talked. Like I said before, the messengers are free to do what they want on their own time. Once the skit is over, it’s their own time. You like jazz?”

“Good jazz,” I answered.

“Me, too. Like Miles and Coltrane and Bird. Know what makes them great? They know how to improvise. Far be it from me to discourage improvisation.”

She took out another Sherman and lit it from the one smoldering in her mouth.

“That’s all she did, huh?” asked Milo. “Skits.”

“She could’ve done more — I had plans for her. Movies, magazine layouts.” The meaty face creased into a smile. “She was cooperative — took off her clothes without batting an eye. They must raise ’em wild in the country.” She rolled the cigarette between stubby fingers. “Yeah, I had plans but she split on me. Worked a week and—” She snapped her fingers — “poof.”

“Any word where she was going?”

“Not a hint. And I didn’t ask. This is no surrogate family. It’s a business. I don’t play mommy and I don’t want to be treated like one. Skin comes and skin goes — this city’s full of perfect bodies who think their buns are gonna make ’em rich. Some learn faster than others. High volume, high turnover. Still,” she admitted, “that redhead had something.”

“Anyone else who’d know anything about her?”

“Can’t think of anyone. She kept to herself.”

“What about the guys she messengered with?”

“Guy. Singular. She was only here a week. I don’t remember his name offhand, and I’m not gonna comb through the files to find it. You guys have just been handed a big freebie.” She pointed to the file. “You can even keep it, okay?”

“Tax your memory,” pressed Milo. “It’s not like it’s a big deal — how many studs do you have in your stable?”

“You’d be surprised,” she said, stroking the marble desktop. “Meeting adjourned.”

“Listen,” he persisted, “you’ve been minimally helpful but it doesn’t make you Suzy Citizen. It’s hot outside, you’ve got great air conditioning in here, a fantastic view. Why sweat it at the station, waiting who knows how long for your lawyer to show up?” He held out his hands, palms up, and gave her a boyish grin. “Want to try again?”

The muddy eyes narrowed and her face turned nastily porcine. She pressed a button and Leon materialized.

“Who was the guy teamed up with that redhead, Swope?”

“Doug,” he said without hesitation.

“Last name,” she snapped.

“Carmichael. Douglas Carmichael.”

Turning to us: “Okay?”