Jonathan Kellerman - Bad Love

"How?"

" 'G' may not be a woman."

"You know who it is?" This time her hand did move. Covering mine, taking hold of my fingers. Ice cold.

"That lawyer whose card you gave me- Andrew Coburg? I went over to see him and he told me Hewitt had a friend named Gritz. Lyle Edward Gritz."

No reaction.

I said, "Gritz is a heavy drinker, and he has a criminal record. He and Hewitt hung out together, and now no one can find him. A week or two ago, Gritz told some street people he expected to get rich, then he disappeared."

"Get rich? How?"

"He didn't say, though in the past he'd talked about becoming a recording star. For all I know, it was drunk talk and has nothing to do with Becky. But if "G' does refer to him, it indicates tension between him and Becky."

"Gritz," she said. "I assumed G was a woman. Are you saying Hewitt and this Gritz had something homosexual going on and Becky stepped in the middle of it? Oh, God, it just keeps getting worse, doesn't it?"

"Maybe there was nothing sexual between Gritz and Hewitt. Just a close friendship that Becky intruded upon."

"Maybe…" She pulled out the envelope, removed the notes, ran her finger down the page, and read. "Yes, I see what you mean. Once you think of G as a man you don't have to see it that way at all. Just friendship… But whatever the reason, Becky felt G was hostile to her."

"She was getting between them," I said. "The whole therapy process was challenging whatever Hewitt had with Gritz. How did Becky phrase it in that last note?"

"Let me see- here it is: "Relationship between D and G strained. Me? D's growth?' Yes, I see what you mean. Then right after that, she mentions another p-c- the session where he actually kissed her… You know, you could read this and feel almost as if she was seducing him." She crumpled the notes. "God, what a travesty- why are you interested in this Gritz? You think he could be the one harassing people?"

"It's possible."

"Why? What else has he done criminally?"

"I'm not sure of the details, but the harassment involved the words "bad love'-"

"What Hewitt screamed… Does that actually mean something? What's going on ?"

Her fingers had become laced with mine. I looked at them and she pulled away and fooled with her hair. The flap covered one eye. The exposed one was alive with fear.

I said, "I don't know, Jean. But given the notes, I have to wonder if Gritz played a role in getting Hewitt to murder Becky."

"Played a role ? How?"

"By working on Hewitt's paranoia- telling Hewitt things about Becky. If he was a close friend, he'd know which buttons to push."

"Oh, God," she said. "And now he's missing… it's not over, is it?"

"Maybe it is. This is all conjecture, Jean. But finding Gritz would help clear it up. Any chance he was a patient at the center?"

"The name doesn't ring a bell… bad love… I thought Hewitt was just raving, now you're saying maybe he was reacting to something that had gone on between him and Becky? That he killed her because she rejected him."

"Could be," I said. "I found a reference to "bad love' in the psych literature. It's a term coined by a psychoanalyst named Andres de Bosch."

She stared at me, nodded slowly. "I think I've heard of him. What did he say about it?"

"He used it to describe poor child rearing- a parent betraying a child's trust. Building up faith and then destroying it. In extreme cases, he theorized, it could lead to violence. If you consider the therapist-patient relationship similar to child rearing, the same theory could be applied to cases of transference gone really bad. Hewitt may have heard about "bad love' somewhere- probably from another therapist or even from Gritz. When he felt Becky had rejected him, he fell apart, became a betrayed child- and lashed out violently."

"Betrayed child?" she said. "You're saying his killing her was a tantrum ?"

"A tantrum heated to the boiling point by Hewitt's delusions. And by his failure to take his medication. Who knows, Gritz may have convinced him not to take it."

"Gritz," she said. "How do you spell it?"

I told her. "Be good to know if he was one of your patients."

"I'll comb the files first thing tomorrow, take that damned storage room apart if I have to. If he's anywhere in there, I'll call you right away. We need to know for our own safety."

"I'll be out of town tomorrow. You can leave a message with my service."

"All day tomorrow?" A touch of panic in her voice.

I nodded. "Santa Barbara and back."

"I love Santa Barbara. It's gorgeous. Taking some vacation time?"

"De Bosch used to have a clinic and a school up there. I'm going to try and find out if Hewitt or Gritz were ever patients."

"I'll let you know if he was ours. Call me back, okay? Let me know what you find."

"Sure."

She looked at her salad again. "I can't eat."

I waved Ear over and got the bill.

She said, "No, I invited you, " and tried to take it, but she didn't put up much of a fight and I ended up paying.

She stashed the notes in her purse and glanced at her watch. "Dick's not coming back for another half an hour."

"I can wait."

"No, I won't keep you. But I wouldn't mind some fresh air. I'll walk you to your car."

• • •

Just outside the restaurant she paused to button her sweater and smooth her hair. The first time, the buttons were out of line and she had to redo them.

We walked to the city lot without speaking. She looked in shop windows but seemed uninterested in the wares they displayed. Waiting until I'd redeemed the keys from the attendant, she accompanied me to the Seville.

"Thanks," I said, shaking her hand. I opened the driver's door.

She said, "What I said before still stands, right? About keeping all this quiet?"

"Of course."

"It's nothing Detective Sturgis could ever use, anyway," she said. "Legally speaking- what does it really prove?"

"Just that people are fallible."

"Oh, boy, are they."

I got into the car. She leaned in through the window.

"You're more than just a consultant on this, aren't you?"

"What makes you say that?"

"Your passion. Consultants don't go this far."

I smiled. "I take my work seriously."

She moved her head back, as if I'd blown garlic in her face.

"So do I," she said. "Sometimes I wish I didn't."

Monday morning at nine, I set out for Ojai, taking the 405 to the 101 and making it to the strawberry fields of Camarillo in less than an hour. Migrant workers stooped in the stubby, green rows. The crop became blue cabbage and the air turned bitter. Kissy-face billboards boosted housing developments and home equity loans.

Just past the Ventura County Fairgrounds, I turned onto 33 north, speeding by an oil refinery that resembled a giant junkyard. Another few miles of trailer parks and mower rental sheds and things got pretty: two lanes draped by eucalyptus, black mountains off to the northwest, the peaks flesh colored where the sun hit.

The town of Ojai was a quarter of an hour farther, announced by a bike and equestrian trail, orange groves, and signs directing the motorist to the Ojai Palm Spa, the Humanos Theosophic Institute, Marmalade Hot Springs. To the south were the clean, green slopes of a country club. The cars were good-looking and so were the people.

Ojai proper was quiet and slow moving, with one traffic light. The main drag was Ojai Avenue, lined with the kind of low-rise, neo-Spanish architecture that usually means tight zoning laws. Unrestricted parking, plenty of spaces. Tans and smiles, natural fibers and good posture.

On the left side of the avenue, a colonnaded, tile-roofed building was filled with storefronts. Native American art and antiques, body wraps and herbal facials, a Little Olde Tea Shoppe. Across the street was an old theater, freshly adobed. Playing tonight: Leningrad Cowboys.