Jonathan Kellerman - Heartbreak Hotel

“Burked?” said Milo.

“Same as what was done to your Victim Mars.”

“You didn’t use that term with her.”

“It’s not medical, it’s idiomatic,” said Robaire. “On reports I stick to technical terminology.”

“What is it?”

“A method of murder that originated in Scotland, the 1820s. What one of my professors called the Case of the Two Nasty Billys.”

“A team?”

“A deadly duo, Lieutenant. William Burke and William Hare were a couple of Irishmen who moved to Edinburgh and made a living supplying cadavers to the university med school, during a period where there was an acute shortage of bodies. Other suppliers got naughty but only to the extent of digging up corpses that hadn’t been donated to science — body-snatching. Burke and Hare took it a step further and hastened the process along in living people. They worked as a team, one guy sitting on the victim in order to immobilize, while the other pinched off the nose and held the mouth shut. They chose asphyxia because it created a fresher body that simulated common natural causes of the day — pneumonia, bronchitis, other respiratory ailments.”

Milo said, “Birkenhaar.”

Laura Robaire said, “That’s right.”

“This is something else. Birken haar. ” He spelled it. “We’ve got suspects who registered at the hotel under that name.”

“Oh, my,” said Laura Robaire. “That is chilling.” Her pretty face knitted in concentration. She smiled. “So I really have come up with something.”

We left the crypt, stunned. Milo was the first to speak.

“Burking. They made a joke of it, the premeditating bastards. What, I’m dealing with students of history?”

I said, “Couple of cellies with lots of spare time? All those books in the prison library.”

“Probably true crime,” he said. “Convicts love that stuff.”

“Thalia didn’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“Not a single volume of it in her collection, just fiction.”

“Yeah, well, these guys are into reality. Or Pretty Woman’s the reader and she told them about it.”

“Team effort,” I said. “Killing Thalia was a collaboration from the beginning. They did Burke and Hare one better, made it a three-way. One to immobilize, another to close off her airways, the third to search for treasure. Like Burke and Hare they wanted to make the death appear natural. A victim that old, who’d suspect? Like Burke and Hare, they failed.”

“Four on the team,” he said, “if DeGraw was in on it. Can you see any other reason they’d do him?”

I said, “It explains how they got in. Who better than the manager to provide a master key?”

“Asshole. Never liked him.”

I said, “Be interesting to have a look at his phone records and his computer.”

He phoned Culver City PD and asked for Detective Gottlieb. The receptionist said, “Patricia or Leonard?”

“Leonard.”

Dead air. Then: “He’s out, sir, I’ll give him the message.”

We got back in the car. I said, “The three of them could’ve assumed they’d gotten away with it until you showed up and DeGraw told them. He seemed an excitable type, being drawn into a murder investigation could’ve panicked him. His mistake was showing that to the others. Maybe even pressuring them for his share. So they cut him from the team. Or like we said about Waters, it was a matter of economics and DeGraw was doomed the minute he got involved.”

“Pie divided two ways,” he said. “Or only one if someone else bet wrong.”

I drove out of the lot. He said, “This team concept could get out of hand. What about Ricki S. and her dinner companion?”

“All we know is she had shared a booth with someone.”

“Yeah, but she was way too touchy about Gramps and maybe that was because she was also involved. What we said before. Siphoning dough out of Thalia’s estate and Thalia found out.”

“Thalia wouldn’t have taken action?”

“Maybe she started to, Alex. Step one, she calls you and starts talking about criminal tendencies — Ricki being bent just like Grampa Jack. She didn’t turn Ricki in right away because the two of them went way back, she knew Ricki as a kid. The point of hiring you was to get her own priorities straight. But what if, after your first session, she felt clarified and confronted Ricki?”

“What, then?” I said. “Ricki just happens to know a murderous trio already staying at the hotel?”

“True,” he said. “That doesn’t work.”

“If Ricki was involved, it had to be well before the Birkenhaars checked in. If you can find something linking her to them, you’d be in great shape.”

“Neither of them sounds like the guy in the restaurant.”

“For all we know, that was a blind date.”

“She never had another one.”

“Not at High Steaks.”

“Yeah... I’m not thinking straight... I’ll have Sean or Moe do a loose watch on her for at least a coupla days. An older dude shows up at her doorstep, we can at least find out who he is.”

The return trip was automotive atherosclerosis for ten miles. A hundred minutes later, we were pulling up to my house when Milo’s phone signaled another text. “Hope that’s Gottlieb.”

He read, took a deep breath, loosened his tie, punched a number, and said, “That’s it? You’re sure? Damn. Okay, thanks.”

He hung up. “That was Jake Lev, the archive zombie. Nothing on Leroy Hoke except a folder on the LaPlante heist and it’s thin. He’s making a copy, will fax it over tomorrow.”

He phoned Detective Moses Reed, asked for the tail on Sylvester and gave specifics.

Reed said, “Sure, L.T.”

Click. “Great kid.”

I turned off the engine. He looked at his Timex. “Enough for one day. Let me take you guys out to dinner.”

“Why don’t we have something here?”

“We put in a full day and I’m sure Gorgeous did, too. Name the cuisine — I can even try Rick, see if he’s free.”

“If Robin’s up for it, sure.”

As we climbed the stairs to my front terrace, he phoned Dr. Richard Silverman at the Cedars-Sinai E.R. Head-on auto crash in the Fairfax district, Rick and two other surgeons busy repairing.

Milo said, “No big deal, three of us. The Virtuous Team.”

Robin was in the kitchen reading American Art Review. Blanche snored at her feet.

“Hi, guys. I went to Trader Joe’s and bought three huge steaks ’cause I figured you’d be beat after the drive. Let’s barbecue.”

Blanche opened one eye and purred. Robin smiled. “We just finished a long walk, she’s bushed, but I’m sure she won’t mind a rib to chew on.”

Blanche got to her feet.

Milo said, “She understands Culinary?”

“And a whole lot more. Alex, how about getting the grill going?”

I said, “He offered to take us out.”

Milo said, “A serious offer.”

“That’s sweet of you, Big Guy, but I’ve already begun marinating and what’re we talking about — putting meat on iron?”

“Think about it, kid. How often do I get generous?”

She kissed his cheek. “Like always — okay, you make a salad, Alex tackles the grill, and I’ll sit here and drink a Gimlet with my girlfriend.”

“Tackles? Your grill has an electric starter, it ain’t exactly Boy Scout wisdom.”

“Sometimes it jams,” she said.

I said, “I can always find two sticks or a piece of flint.”

His phone rang. “Sturgis. Oh, hi... yeah it is crazy... yeah... makes sense... when?... sure, thanks, half an hour tops, probably less.”

Click. “Sorry, kids, gotta not eat and run.”

I said, “Gottlieb?”

“None other.”

Robin said, “Who’s Gottlieb?”