Jonathan Kellerman - Flesh And Blood

“Nope. She e-mailed me, I e-mailed back.”

“She was into computers,” said Milo.

Gretchen laughed.

Milo said, “What’s funny?”

“That’s like asking if she was into refrigerators.” She reskewered the crayfish.

“Any theories?” said Milo. “About why she quit?”

“Nope.”

“What else do you remember about Lauren?”

“Great body, knew how to do makeup, no need for surgery. Some clients don’t like bionics.”

“Think she might’ve picked up a steady?” said Milo.

“Anything’s possible.”

“Did you know she’d gone back to school?”

“Really,” said Gretchen. “How self-improving.” She folded her hands in her lap.

“When she was working for you, did she complain of problematic clients?”

“Nope.”

“No problems at all?”

“She was good with people. I was sorry to see her go.”

“Did she have any particular specialties?”

“Other than being gorgeous and smart and polite?”

“No kinks?”

Gretchen smiled. “Kinks?”

“Anything out of the ordinary.”

Gretchen laughed. “How could I even begin to answer that.”

“How about yes or no, and if it’s yes, some details?”

Gretchen sat back and crossed her legs. Her back was against the wall, and she seemed to enjoy the support. “The truth is, people are depressingly ordinary.”

“Guys were willing to pay big-time for ordinary?”

“Guys were willing to pay to have it on their terms.”

“So Lauren had no specialties?”

Shrug.

“What about special clients? Guys who requested her specifically?”

Gretchen shook her head. Picked up a crayfish and stared at the crustacean. “Look at those eyes. It’s as if he knows.”

“Knows what?”

“That he’s dead.”

Milo said, “Who requested Lauren?”

“Nothing comes to mind.”

Milo edged his chair closer to her. From the way he talked into her ear and her sudden, warm smile, they might’ve been lovers.

“Help me out here,” he said. “We’re talking murder.”

“I can help if you want to buy a dress.” She drew her head back and looked him up and down. “I don’t think you’d like our styles.”

Milo stayed close to her. “Someone tied Lauren up and shot her in the back of the head and left her like garbage in a Dumpster. Give me a name. Anyone who had a thing for Lauren.”

Gretchen touched his tie, lifted it, and kissed the tip. “Nice syntho. Chez Sears? Tar- zhay ?”

“What about girls she worked with? Friends on the staff?”

“Far as I recall, she went it alone.”

“What about Michelle?”

“Michelle,” said Gretchen. “As in…?”

“A brunette Lauren stripped with – they both did the party scene. Back when you were in business. Was that one of your subsidiaries?”

“Uh-uh. I specialized.”

“In what?”

“Networking. The tools of commerce.”

“Nuts into bolts,” said Milo. “So Lauren and Michelle were freelancing on the side?”

Gretchen smiled again. “You’re cute.”

“Did you have a Michelle on staff?”

“It’s a common name.”

“How about a last name?”

Gretchen placed her lips next to Milo’s ears. Flicked his lobe with her tongue. Gave a soft, dry laugh. “I have nothing to offer because I’m nothing. A speck of lint in the navel of the least important creature in the universe. And that makes me free.”

“You’re anything but nothing,” said Milo. “I’d say you’re a presence .”

“You are so sweet,” said Gretchen. “I’ll bet you treat the girls gently.”

Milo’s turn to smile. “So how about tossing me a bone? Off the record. Michelle what?”

“Michelle, ma belle. Sont les whatever.” Gretchen began toying with the crayfish. “Those eyes . He’s like, Let me sit on this plate dead and get all shriveled up but leave me intact, I just don’t want to be chewed up.”

“Lauren didn’t end up intact.”

Gretchen sighed. “They really should remove the eyes.”

Milo said, “So that’s it? Nothing?”

“Have a nice day,” said Gretchen.

On the way out we met Ingrid returning.

Milo blocked her way. “Lauren Teague was murdered.”

Lavender lips parted. “Oh.” Then: “Who’s Lauren?”

“An old friend of Gretchen’s.”

“I’m a new friend.”

“I don’t think so, dear,” said Milo. “I think you and ol’ Gretch go way back – Ten to one I can get hold of your sheet like that.” Snapping fingers in front of her face. “Seen Michelle recently?”

“Michelle who?”

“My, my, the same old song – Michelle the tall brunette who used to dance with Lauren.”

Ingrid shook her head. Milo’s hand closed around her arm. “We can discuss this in my office or you can continue your meal.”

Ingrid’s eyes burned fiercely. She craned to get a look at Gretchen’s table.

“Don’t worry,” said Milo. “I won’t let her know you told me.”

“Told you what?”

“Michelle’s last name.”

“I don’t know any Michelle. I’ve heard mention of Michelle Salazar – Did Gretchen eat anything?”

“Not much.”

“Damn! She needs to eat . Please don’t bother her lunch again.”

MILO PUNCHED THE MDT’s keypad, ran a search on Salazar, Michelle.

The screen lit up. Three hits: Michelle Angela, 47, with a record for larceny, Michelle Sandra, 22, imprisoned in Arizona for manslaughter, and Michelle Leticia, 26, arrested two years ago for prostitution, a year after that for possession of narcotics.

“There you go,” I said. “The age is perfect.”

“Echo Park. Let’s go – Would you recognize her?”

“No, it was dark,” I said. “Maybe.”

Michelle Salazar lived in a two-story, peach-colored sixplex on a twisting street one block east of Micheltorena and two blocks north of Sunset. A brown sky hung low over the potholes, boxy hieroglyphics sang gang sagas, small children played in the dust. Two doors up a cluster of shaved-head young men in white tank tops and baggy pants crowded an old white van, sharing cigarettes and beer and lean looks.

As we got out of the unmarked, some of the beer drinkers watched us. Milo’s gun hand was relaxed but in the right place as he threw them a salute. Big group effort not to respond. We were in Ramparts Division, where a police scandal had broken a couple of years ago – CRASH officers forming their own criminal gang. LAPD claimed the bad cops had been weeded out. LAPD had denied the existence of bad cops for too long to have any credibility.

The lock on the building’s front door was missing. Inside, a dark central hall was ripe with the gamy perfume of too-old menudo . Mailboxes set into the right-hand wall were padlocked and unmarked. Milo knocked on the first door, got no answer, tried the next unit and received a shouted “Sí?” in response.

“Policía.” Reciting the word quietly, but there was no way to make it inviting.

Long pause, then a woman said, “Eh?”

“Policía.”

“Policía por qué?”

“Señora, donde está Michelle Salazar, por favor?”

Nothing.

“Señora?”

“Número seis.” A radio was turned up loud enough to block out further discourse. We made our way to the stairs.

Different smells up on the second floor: sour laundry, urine, orange soda.

Milo rapped on number 6. Another female voice said, “Yeah?” and the door opened six inches before he could respond. Held in place by a loose chain, bisecting a woman’s face. One watery brown eye, half a parched lip, sallow skin.