Jonathan Kellerman - Blood Test

“The file.” Milo held out his hand.

“Get it.” She ordered and the Jamaican fetched. “Let them look at it.”

Milo took the folder from him and we walked to the door.

“Hey, wait a minute!” she protested hoarsely. “That’s an active one. You can’t take it!”

“I’ll make a Xerox, mail you back the original.”

She started to argue then stopped midsentence. As we left I could hear her screaming at Leon.

According to his file, Doug Carmichael lived in the upscale part of Venice, near the Marina. Milo had me call him from a phone booth near Bundy while he used the radio to find out if anything had come in on the Swopes.

A phone machine answered at Carmichael’s. Classical guitar music played in the background while a rich baritone said, “Hi, this is Doug,” and strove to convince me that receipt of my message was really important for his emotional well-being. I waited for the beep, told him it was really important to call Detective Sturgis at West L.A. Division, and left Milo’s number.

I got back in the car and found Milo with his eyes closed, head tilted back against the seat.

“Anything?” he asked.

“I got a machine.”

“Figures. Zilch from this end, too. No Swopes spotted from here to San Ysidro.” He yawned and growled and started up the Matador. “Moving right along,” he mumbled, steering into the broth of westbound traffic, “I haven’t eaten since six. Early dinner or late lunch, take your pick.”

We were a couple of miles from the ocean but a mild easterly wind was blowing and it wafted a hint of brine our way. “How about fish?”

“Righto.”

He drove to a tiny place on Ocean at the mouth of the pier that resembles a thirties diner. Some nights during the dinner hour it’s hard to find a parking space in the back lot among all the Rolls, Mercedes, and Jags. They don’t take reservations or plastic, but people who know seafood are willing to wait and don’t mind paying with real money. At lunch it’s significantly more relaxed and we were seated at a corner table immediately.

Milo drank two lemonades, which they squeeze fresh and serve unsweetened, and I nursed a Grolsch.

“Trying to cut down,” he explained, holding up his glass. “Rick’s been on my case. Preaching and showing me slides of what it does to the liver.”

“That’s good. You were hitting it pretty hard for a while. Maybe we’ll have you around a little longer.”

He grunted.

The waiter, a cheerful Hispanic, informed us that there’d been a huge albacore run and a prime load had come up from San Diego that morning. We both ordered some and shortly were feasting on huge grilled steaks of the white tuna, baked potatoes, steamed zucchini, and chunks of sourdough bread.

Milo devoured half his meal, took a long swallow of lemonade, and gazed out the window. A chrome sliver of ocean was visible above the rooftops of the ramshackle buildings that hid in the shadow of the sagging pier.

“So how you been, pal?” he asked.

“Not bad.”

“What do you hear from Robin?”

“I got a card a few days ago. The Ginza at night. They’re wining and dining her. Apparently it’s the first time they’ve entertained a woman that way.”

“What is it they’re after, exactly?” he asked.

“She designed a guitar for Rockin’ Billy Orleans and he played it onstage in Madison Square Garden. The music trades interviewed him after the concert and he raved about the instrument and the fantastic female luthier who’d created it. The U.S. rep for a Japanese conglomerate picked up on it and sent it to his bosses. They decided it was worth mass-producing as a Billy Orleans model and invited her over there to talk about it.”

“Maybe she’ll end up supporting you, huh?”

“Maybe,” I said glumly and signaled the waiter for another beer.

“I see you’re real overjoyed about it.”

“I’m happy for her,” I said quickly. “It’s the big break she’s been waiting for. It’s just that I miss her like crazy, Milo. It’s the longest we’ve been apart and I’ve lost my taste for solitude.”

“That all of it?” he asked, picking up his fork.

I looked up sharply. “What else?”

“Well,” he said, between mouthfuls, “I may be totally off base here, Doctor, but it seems to me that this Japanese thing puts a new perspective on your — pardon the expression — relationship.”

“How so?”

“Like for the past couple of years, you’ve been the one with the bread, right? She makes a living, but the life the two of you’ve been leading — Maui, theater tickets, that incredible garden — who pays for it?”

“I don’t get the point,” I said, annoyed.

“The point is that despite your pretending it ain’t so, you guys have had a traditional setup. Now she’s got the chance to become a big shot and it could all change.”

“I can handle it.”

“Sure you can. Forget I brought it up.”

“Consider it forgotten.” I looked down at my plate. All of a sudden my appetite was gone. I pushed the food away and fixed my gaze on a flock of gulls raiding the pier for bait scraps. “You insightful bastard,” I said. “Sometimes you’re spooky.”

He reached across the table and patted my shoulder. “Hey, you’re not a very subtle guy. Everything registers on that lean and hungry face.”

I rested my chin in my hands. “Things were going along so nice and simple. She kept the studio after she moved in, we prided ourselves on giving each other room to move. Lately we’d started talking marriage, babies. It was great, both of us moving at the same pace, mutual decisions. Now,” I shrugged, “who knows?” I took a long swallow of the Dutch brew. “I’ll tell you, Milo, they don’t cover it in the psych books, but there’s such a thing as the paternal urge and at thirty-five I’m feeling it.”

“I know,” he said. “I’ve felt it, too.”

My stare was involuntary.

“Don’t look so surprised. Just because it’s never gonna happen doesn’t mean I don’t think about it.”

“You never can tell. They’re getting pretty liberal.”

He loosened his belt a notch and buttered a piece of bread. “Not that liberal.” He laughed. “Besides, Rick and I are not equiped for motherhood or whatever you wanna call it. Can’t you just see it — me shopping at Toys “я” Us and Dr. Fastidious changing diapers?”

We shared a good laugh over that.

“Anyway,” he said, “I didn’t mean to bring up a sore point, but it’s something you’re gonna have to deal with. I did. For most of my life I made my own way. My parents didn’t give me squat. I’ve been working at one dodge or another since eleven, Alex. Paper routes, tutoring, picking pears, construction, a little time out for the M.A., then Saigon and the force. You don’t get rich in Homicide, but a single guy can get by nicely. I was lonely as hell but my needs were met. After I met Rick and we started living together, it all changed. You remember my old Fiat — piece of shit that it was. I never drove anything but garbage and unmarkeds. Now we tool around in that Porsche like a pair of coke dealers. And the house — no way I could ever have had a place like that on my salary. He goes shopping at Carrols or Giorgio, picks me up a shirt or tie. I’m not a — kept man, but my lifestyle has changed. For the better, but that hasn’t made it easy to accept. Surgeons make more than cops, always have, always will, and I’ve finally accommodated myself to it. Makes you stop and think about what women go through, huh?”

“Yup.” I wondered if Robin had been faced with the type of adjustment he’d described. Had there been a struggle that I’d been too insensitive to notice?