Faye Kellerman - The Burnt House

“Welcome back,” he said to Marge.

“Thank you, thank you. We’ve got a scheduling conflict.”

“What’s that?”

“We got hold of Ivan the Terrible,” Oliver said.

“He wasn’t happy to hear from us,” Marge added.

“I can imagine. What’s going on with that?”

“After much cajoling, we got him to agree to meet us at his condo at around six, after he gets off work.”

“But we found out that he usually leaves around four-thirty, five,” Oliver said.

Decker said, “He’s going to show up at his condo early and claim you weren’t there on time and he couldn’t wait.”

“That’s exactly why we’d like to be at his place no later than four,” Oliver said. “Just in case he’s intent on pulling some kind of stunt.”

“If we’re there by four,” Marge said, “there’s no way we’ll be able to take the skull over to the hospital.”

“The skull’s still at the morgue?” Decker asked.

“It was as of four hours ago.”

“Okay,” Decker said. “I’ll grab some lunch, go over to the Crypt, and handle the transportation myself.”

“If you’re in the mood to be a nice guy, you might want to give Mike Hollander a call,” Oliver told him. “I’m sure he’d like a piece of this.”

“Yeah, Mike’s been working hard, calling up factories all morning long to find that Rapid Prototyping machine.” Marge laughed. “He’s working harder than I ever saw him work when he was at Foothill.”

“Back then he was talking about retirement,” Decker said. “Be careful what you wish for.”

“The old guy’s definitely got the fire in his eyes.”

“I’ll give him a ring,” Decker said. “Actually I wouldn’t mind some company over the hill.” He turned to Oliver. “Thanks for setting things up with Koby, Scott, but how about clueing me in next time?”

“I was going to tell you this morning, Loo. I had no idea that the kid could pull strings so fast.”

“Fair enough,” Decker said. “Koby moves fast when he’s motivated.”

Oliver smiled wistfully. “That is a fact that I’m well aware of.”

AT 4:10 IN the afternoon, a black Beemer zipped by the unmarked and pulled into the underground parking lot, bass-thumping rap booming from a fortified stereo. As Dresden blithely drove by, Marge sat up in her seat and rolled her shoulders, exchanging glances with Oliver. “How many minutes should we give him before we meet up with him?”

“If we move now, we’ll probably get to the door around the same time he does.”

“Let’s do it.”

They got out of the unmarked and arrived at the condo just as Dresden was inserting the key into the lock. The broker looked confused as his eyes skittered from Oliver’s to Marge’s face. Addled and nervous, Marge thought, like a trapped rat.

Ivan glanced at his watch. “Wasn’t our appointment at six?”

“We were in the area and thought we’d take a chance.” Oliver inched sideways until Marge and he were flanking Dresden. “We just have a few questions. You might as well get it over with.”

“Do you mind if I open my door first?”

Neither Marge nor Oliver answered the rhetorical question. They continued to crowd him, leaving him little elbow room to open the door. He almost had to sidle in to cross his own threshold. Once he was inside, the two detectives entered without being invited in.

Ivan threw his briefcase and black suit jacket on the couch and left his car keys on the kitchen countertop. Unknotting his red tie, he let it droop around his neck like a scarf and opened the top button of his blue dress shirt. He opened a cabinet and took out a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue. After pouring himself a few fingers’ worth in a cut-crystal glass and adding the merest hint of water, he took a sip, smacked his lips, and smiled. “So…what do you want?”

Oliver said, “Mind if we sit down?”

“Why bother if you’re only going to ask a few questions.”

“You’ve got a point.”

“A good one. What do you want?”

Neither detective answered right away. Marge’s focus drifted from the stockbroker’s face to the walls of the condo. Evidence spoke volumes. It said that Roseanne had flown back to Burbank from San Jose. However, it was silent about Roseanne being in the plane crash. Meaning if she made it back to Burbank and she wasn’t on flight 1324, she had to have made it home.

Somewhere in the condo was her story.

Where were you, Roseanne?

She lowered her eyes to the floor, scanning for bits of blood spray still clinging to the baseboard or stain in the grout between the tiles. Her eyes also swept over the pristine white carpet hoping to find something-a little blob of biological matter that didn’t quite clean out. Doing it as fast and as naturally as she could while Oliver occupied Dresden with conversation.

“The thing is, Mr. Dresden, that there are a few inconsistencies with the story you told us-”

“It wasn’t a story,” Dresden protested. “A story is fiction. What I told you was the truth, so let’s get that straight, okay?”

“Sorry, sir,” Oliver apologized. “I don’t mean to belittle your honesty or anything like that. I’m just trying to get the facts straight.”

“I don’t know how I could be any clearer.” Dresden took another sip of scotch. “I’m not trying to make myself look good. Otherwise I wouldn’t admit to a fight.”

Out of the corner of his eyes, Oliver saw Marge walking around, scrutinizing the place. He needed to keep Dresden’s attention off of her. “The thing is, sir, we don’t think that your wife died in the airplane crash.”

“So you’ve told me before. Just because they haven’t found her doesn’t mean she wasn’t there.”

“Mr. Dresden, we know that Roseanne came back from San Jose to Burbank the morning of the accident. We know that because we have gone up to San Jose and we have talked to people who put her on the flight back to Bob Hope Airport. We also know that she wasn’t working the early-morning flight. We know that because we’ve talked to people who worked for WestAir who said she wasn’t assigned that route and she had been dressed in civilian clothes. Are you with me so far?”

Dresden was silent, nursing his drink. Oliver realized his hands were shaking.

He said, “What we’re all wondering is why Roseanne would go back to San Jose when she just arrived from there if she wasn’t working the route?”

“How would I know?” Dresden’s eyes darkened. “Maybe she got a call from her boyfriend.”

“Who are we talking about? Holmes?”

“Who else? Maybe the rich bastard made her an offer that she couldn’t refuse. Ever think of that?”

Marge spoke from across the room. “As a matter of fact, sir, we did. We interviewed Holmes. He hadn’t spoken to her for the last three months of her life.”

Dresden sneered. “And you believed him?”

“No, we didn’t believe him. That’s why we asked if he would take a polygraph test for us.”

“That’s a lie-detector test-”

“I goddamn know what a polygraph is!”

“So we were kind of wondering,” Oliver said. “Maybe you would do the same thing.”

“Take a polygraph?” Dresden tried to sound incredulous. “For what reason?”

“Just to clear yourself.”

“Of what? First of all, those stupid tests are notoriously unreliable. You know they can’t be used in court.”

Oliver smiled benignly. “Of course. But when a person passes them, well…we like that.”

“I told you before and I’ll tell you again. Roseanne and I had a terrible fight. She stormed out of the house and that was the last time I saw her.”

“Yeah, what time did you and she fight again?” Oliver asked.