Jonathan Kellerman - Therapy

I said, “What if he came home a bit earlier and Lisa woke him up closer to one? She browbeat him, got everything off her chest, and hit the sack, left him furious and frustrated, unable to go back to sleep. He got out of bed, left the house, and drove over to someone else who’d frustrated him. High stress is a trigger for some sexual killers. And plenty of organized types maintain outwardly stable marriages while brutalizing other women.”

“Have a tiff with the wife, take it out on the ex.”

I said, “He seems under lots of stress now. A sexually charged fellow back to living with his parents.”

“Gavin and the blonde,” he said. “A couple about to get it on pushes his button because he’s all pent up sexually.”

“His alibi for Gavin and the blonde is even flimsier because he and his parents don’t share a room. He could’ve easily sneaked out without their knowing. Even if they claim otherwise, they’re his parents.”

Nichols continued toward the framework without looking back. We watched him climb up to the second floor, strap on his tool belt, stretch, and pick up his nail gun. He took another stretch- aiming for casual before pressing the gun to a crossbeam.

Snap snap snap.

Milo said, “Let’s get outta here,” and we returned to the car. He got back on Sepulveda and drove north, toward L.A. The boulevard was crammed and slow. The air- hot, unyielding- seemed to press upon the sides of the unmarked. Lots of stares. Everyone knew it was an unmarked. Even if we’d been in a VW, Milo’s restless eyes would have given him away.

He said, “What I’d like to know is why Lorraine and Al didn’t bother putting Nichols in the murder book.”

“You going to ask her?”

“That’s my way, bub. Open, honest, sincere.”

“That should be fun.”

“Hey,” he said, “I’ll be sensitive.”

He flipped on the police radio, listened to felony calls for a few moments, muttered, “I love this city,” and squelched the volume.

I said, “Even if Nichols is innocent, he gave us useful information.”

“Flora’s sexual problems?”

“Maybe the reason she went for therapy. That would explain her not telling Van Dyne. Now that I think about it, he also described her as not very passionate on the surface. The timing fits: She began treatment after getting dumped by Nichols and before meeting Van Dyne. Nichols claims he was gentlemanly, but I’m sure he was brutally clear about why he was ending the relationship.”

“Mr. Tactful,” he said. “ ‘Hey, bitch, unglue your legs or I’m outta here.’ ”

“Once Flora got over the hurt, maybe she decided she did have a problem. Seeking a woman therapist for a sexual issue makes sense.”

“Koppel does sex therapy, too?”

“There seems to be very little she doesn’t do.”

The light turned red, and he rolled to a stop. A jumbo jet swooped down low on its approach to LAX. When the noise cleared, I said, “Assuming Nichols’s alibis do check out, do you have the stomach for another theory?”

“At this point, I’ll take astrology.”

“As part of treatment, Koppel enouraged Flora to be more assertive and adventurous, and she began taking risks. It’s standard operating procedure in cases like hers.”

“What kind of risks?”

“Striking up conversations with strangers, maybe even getting picked up. And she picked up the wrong guy. Which could lead us right back to the parole office. What if Flora connected with a con? Someone aggressive and hypermacho- someone like Roy Nichols but with no boy-next-door history to rein him in. The murder could’ve been a sexual escapade taken too far. Or Flora changed her mind and paid for it horribly.”

“A Mr. Goodbar thing,” he said. “That girl was a teacher, too… but she was single, had a secret life. Flora was engaged to Van Dyne. And she was dating Van Dyne when she got killed. You saying Ms. Prim stepped out on her fiancé with a felon?”

“If it was a felon, she met him before she began with Van Dyne. I’m saying she could’ve kept another man on the side.”

“Secret lives.”

“Or perhaps Flora broke off with the con after she met Van Dyne, but he wasn’t willing to accept that. There was no sign of forced entry. That could mean someone Flora knew, or an experienced burglar. Or both.”

“Flora told her mother and Van Dyne she hated the job at the parole office because of the lowlifes. You think she was lying?”

“People compartmentalize their lives.”

The light turned green, and we rolled along with the traffic sludge. The sky was brown at the horizon, bleeding to dishwater where the sun struggled through. He fooled with the radio dial again, listened to more police calls, lowered the volume.

“Cheating on Van Dyne with Mr. Bad Boy,” he said. “Or maybe Van Dyne found out something he shouldn’t have and went ballistic. Hell, for all we know, Van Dyne’s not as innocent as he comes across.”

I thought about that. “Flora’s mother implied that Van Dyne was less than manly. That could’ve come from Flora. And his alibi turned out to be no better than Roy’s.”

“So maybe the sexual problems weren’t limited to her. What if Ol’ Brian can’t cut the mustard? That could get a quiet boy plenty frustrated.” He turned up the volume, seemed to be lulled by the nonstop patter of the dispatcher. The traffic swell pitched us forward a few more yards, and he switched abruptly to AM. Tuning in a talk show, he listened to the host berate a caller for admiring the president, lowered the volume yet again.

“Ogden and Al McKinley didn’t include Nichols in the file, but they spent two days questioning him. Sweet old Brian didn’t even get that… but what the hell, it’s not even my case. Unless it ties in to Gavin and the blonde.”

He returned to the talk show. The host was berating a caller for not taking personal responsibility for her obesity. He cut her off and on came a commercial for an herbal weight-loss concoction.

He said, “What do you think of these shows?”

“The exuberance of free speech,” I said. “And bad manners. You a fan?”

“Nah, I get enough nastiness on the job, but according to today’s paper, our girl Mary Lou’s scheduled to be on in an hour.”

“Really,” I said. “You going to listen?”

“I believe in continuing education.”

Milo went to talk to Lorraine Ogden while I sat at his desk and reviewed the Gavin Quick murder book. Nothing new. I turned to the Flora Newsome file.

No progress there, either. Milo returned five minutes letter, red-faced, shaking his head.

I relinquished his chair, but he perched on the desk edge, stretched his legs, loosened his tie. “My sensitivity failed. I brought up Nichols and she told me she’d worked the hell out of the case and I had no business second-guessing her. She said I should stick to my own case, the more she thought about it, they weren’t that similar after all, keep her out of it. Then she shoved this in my face.”

He handed me a crumpled piece of paper that I smoothed. Ballistics report from the crime lab, stamped PRIORITY and initialed by Detective L. L. Ogden. Comparisons between the.22 used to kill Gavin and the blonde and the gun that had terminated Flora’s life. A tech named Nishiyama had signed off on the test.

Similar weapons, probably cheap, imported semiautomatics, but no match.

“With a cheapie,” I said, “you could use one, toss it, get another.”

“Anything’s possible, but a match would’ve been a helluva lot nicer. Now I’ve pissed off a colleague and gotten no closer to a solve.”

“She’s a D-II, you’re a lieutenant. I thought the lines of authority were clearer.”