Michael Connelly - Chasing the Dime

While he listened to Wainwright clinking glasses and jarring bottles as he packed the box, Pierce went into the living room and crouched in front of the boxes that had already been packed. One contained dishware and other kitchen items. The other two contained things from the loft. Bedroom things. There was a basket of assorted condoms. There were several pairs of high-heel shoes. There were leather straps and whips, a full leather head mask with zippers positioned at the eyes and mouth. On her L. A. Darlings page Lilly did not advertise sadomasochistic services. Pierce wondered if this meant there was another website out there, something darker and with a whole new set of elements to consider in her disappearance.

The last box he checked was full of bras and sheer underwear and negligees and miniskirts on hangers. It was clothing similar to what Pierce had seen in one of the closets of the house on Altair. For a moment he wondered what Wainwright planned to do with the boxes. Sell everything in a bizarre yard sale? Or was he simply going to hold it while he re-rented the apartment and house?

Satisfied with his inventory of the boxes, Pierce decided to check out the loft. As he got up, his eyes came upon the door and he noticed the dead bolt. It was a double-key lock. A key was necessary to open or close the lock from both sides. He now understood Wainwright's threat to lock the door whether Pierce was done with his search or not. If you did not have a key, you could be locked in as well as locked out. Pierce wondered what this meant. Did Lilly lock her clients inside the apartment with her? Perhaps it was a way of ensuring payment for services rendered. Maybe it meant nothing at all.

He moved to the staircase and headed up to the loft. On the landing at the top there was a small window that looked out across the rooftop across the alley to the far edge of the beach and the Pacific. Pierce looked down into the alley and saw his car. His eyes tracked down the alley to Speedway. He caught a glimpse of Robin under a streetlight as she got into a green and yellow cab, closing the door as it took off.

He turned from the window to the loft. It was no more than two hundred square feet on the upper level, including the space of a small bath with a shower. The air up there smelled of an unpleasant mixture of heavy incense and something else that Pierce could not readily place. It was like the spoiled air in a refrigerator that has been turned off. It was there but was overpowered by the incense that held to the room like a ghost.

On the open floor there was a king-size bed with no headboard. It took up most of the available space, leaving room for one small side table and a reading light. On the table was an incense burner that was a Kama Sutra sculpture of a fat man and a thin woman coupling in a rear-entry position. A long ash from a burned down incense stick lapped over the sculpture's bowl and onto the table. Pierce was surprised Wainwright had not taken the piece. He was taking everything else, it seemed.

The bedspread was a light blue and the carpet beige. He went to a small closet and slid open the door. It was empty, the contents now in one of the boxes below.

Pierce looked at the bed. It looked to have been carefully made, the spread tucked tightly under the mattress. But there were no pillows, which he thought was strange. He thought maybe it was one of the rules of the escort business. Robin had said the number one rule was no unprotected sex. Maybe number two was no pillows -too easy to smother you with.

He got down on the carpet and looked underneath the box spring. There was nothing but dust.

But then he saw a dark spot in the beige carpeting. Curious, he straightened up and pushed the bed against the far wall to uncover the spot. One of the wheels was jammed and he had a difficult time, the bed sliding and bumping on the carpet.

Whatever had spilled or dripped on the carpet was dry. It was a brownish black color and Pierce didn't want to touch it, because he thought it might be blood. He also understood now that it was the source of the odor underlying the smell of incense in the room. He got up and pushed the bed back over the spot.

"What the hell are you doing up there?" Wainwright called up.

Pierce didn't answer. He was consumed with the purpose at hand. He took hold of one corner of the bedspread and pulled it up, revealing the mattress below. No mattress cover or top sheet. No blanket.

He started pulling off the bedspread. He wanted to see the mattress. Sheets and blankets could easily be taken from an apartment and thrown away. Even pillows could be discarded. But a king-size mattress was another matter.

As he pulled the bedspread he questioned the instincts he was blindly following. He didn't understand how he knew what he seemingly knew. But as the bedspread slipped off the mattress, Pierce felt like his intestines had collapsed inside. The center of the mattress was black with something that had congealed and dried and was the color of death. It could only be blood.

"Jesus Christ!" Wainwright said.

He had come up the steps to see what the dragging sounds were all about. He was standing behind Pierce.

"Is that what I think it is?"

Pierce didn't answer. He didn't know what to say. Yesterday he plugged in a new phone.

Little more than twenty-four hours later it had led to this ghastly discovery.

"Wrong number," he said.

"What?" Wainwright asked. "What are you saying?"

"Never mind. Is there a phone here?"

"No, not that I know of."

"You have a cell phone?"

"In the car."

"Go get it."

Pierce looked up when Detective Renner walked in. He tried to keep his anger in check, knowing that the cooler he played this, the faster he would get out and get home. Still, over two hours in an eight-by-eight room with nothing but a five-day-old sports page to read had left him with little patience. He had already given a statement twice. Once to the patrol cops who responded to Wainwright's call, and then to Renner and his partner when they had arrived on the scene. One of the patrol cops had then taken him to the Pacific Division station and locked him in the interview room.

Renner had a file in his hand. He sat down at the table across from Pierce and opened it.

Pierce could see some sort of police form with handwriting in all the boxes. Renner stared at the form for an inordinate amount of time and then cleared his throat. He looked like a cop who'd been around more crime scenes than most. Early fifties and still solid, he reminded Pierce of Clyde Vernon in his taciturn way.

"You're thirty-four years old?"

"Yes."

"Your address is Twenty-eight hundred Ocean Way, apartment twelve oh one."

"Yes."

This time exasperation crept into his voice. Renner's eyes came up momentarily to his and then went back to the form.

"But that is not the address on your driver's license."

"No, I just moved. Ocean is where I live now. Amalfi Drive is where I used to live. Look, it's after midnight. Did you really keep me sitting in here all this time so you could ask me these obvious questions? I already gave you my statement. What else do you want?"

Renner leaned back and looked sternly at Pierce.

"No, Mr. Pierce, I kept you here because we needed to conduct a thorough investigation of what appears to be a crime scene. I am sure you don't begrudge us that."

"I don't begrudge that. I do begrudge being kept in here like a suspect. I tried that door. It was locked. I knocked and nobody came."

"I'm sorry about that. There was no one in the detective bureau. It's the middle of the night. But the patrol officer should not have locked the door, because you are not under arrest. If you want to make a personnel complaint against him or me, I'll go get you the necessary forms to fill out."