Tami Hoag - Secrets to the Grave

He seemed to have a special affinity for refrigerators, which were lined up front to back, row after row, like a platoon of soldiers; and for chest-style freezers, rectangular box after rectangular box, like so many rusty white coffins.

“I’ll buzz him at the front door,” Nasser went on as they followed the narrow path to the house. “Hopefully, he’ll agree to come out. Better if the two of you stay a good ten feet back.”

He hustled up the steps ahead of them.

Mendez glanced at Leone. “What the fuck?”

“He’s a hoarder,” Vince said, looking over the collections through a pair of mirrored aviator sunglasses. “Interesting.”

“It’s part of the obsessive-compulsive disorder?”

“It would seem to be, but there’s a lot of conflicting opinions on the subject. For instance, we’ve already seen that Zahn is a germaphobe, yet hoarding often creates unsanitary conditions. The two seem not to go together, yet here we are.”

“When I was in a uniform in Bakersfield, I had a call-out on a possible missing person,” Mendez said. “A woman reported her elderly mother missing after not hearing from her for several days. She had gone to the mother’s house. No sign of her.

“Me and my partner get there. You can’t believe this place. It was like a landfill inside a building—and smelled like one too. You could hardly walk inside. Every window was blocked. There were mice and rats like something out of a horror movie. Long story short: It took three days and a cadaver dog to find the woman’s body. A pile of stuff had fallen on her and buried her alive.”

Vince looked around at the yard. “At least Dr. Zahn is tidy.”

Contrary to Nasser’s instructions, Vince took the step below him and struck a casual stance with his hands in his pants pockets. The breeze flipped his necktie back over his shoulder.

Zahn’s voice came out of the squawk box on the wall above the doorbell. “Who are you?”

Nasser answered, “It’s me—Rudy.”

“Who’s with you? Someone is with you. Why would you bring someone here? You know not to bring someone here. Why would you do that?”

“They’re detectives, Zander. It’s about Marissa. They need to speak to you.”

No answer.

Vince leaned past a frowning Nasser and pressed the intercom button himself. “It’s Vince Leone, Zander,” he said in a pleasant, casual tone. “We spoke earlier this morning at Marissa’s house. I’m sorry to bother you, but I’ve got a couple more questions you might be able to help me with.”

“I don’t think so, Vince,” Zahn said. “I don’t think I can help you. I’m terribly upset by all of this.”

“I know. So is everyone—especially people who loved Marissa. Imagine what it would mean to her if you could help in any small way to find her killer. You’ve been such a good friend to her.”

No sound came out of the box for moment. Mendez looked from Vince to Nasser and back.

“I do have some good news from the hospital,” Vince said. “I went to check on little Haley, and she’s going to be fine.”

Another moment passed then came the sound of locks being turned on the other side of the front door. Zahn emerged wearing what looked to Mendez like black Chinese pajamas and a pair of clogs.

“Haley?” he said, looking up and just to the right of Leone’s head, as if he were seeing a vision in the sky. “Haley is all right? She’s going to be all right?”

“I spoke to her doctor.”

“Oh my God. Oh thank God,” Zahn whispered, wringing his hands absently as he spoke. “Could I see her? Do you think that might be possible—that I could speak to her and see her?”

“You would have to go into the hospital to see her, Zander,” Nasser said.

Zahn looked at him sharply.

His assistant shrugged. “Hospitals are full of sick people.”

“Haley isn’t sick, though,” Zahn pointed out. “She’s injured. She was injured somehow and her heart is broken. She’ll be heartbroken over Marissa. I’m heartbroken.”

“They won’t want her to have visitors yet,” Vince said. “But I’ll let you know as soon as they give the go-ahead, Zander. You’ll be my first call.”

“Thank you, Vince. I will appreciate that because I will want to see her. I—I’m so upset about what happened. Haley will be also.”

“I understand,” Vince said, nodding, then he glanced around. “Is there somewhere we can just sit down for a few minutes, Zander?”

The idea seemed to startle their odd host.

“I don’t want to add to your stress,” Vince assured him. “I’m just thinking we could sit down for a few minutes and chat. You knew Marissa so well. You might have some useful insights you may not even be aware of.

“Do you know what I mean, Zander?” he asked. “Sometimes we know things that may not seem significant until put into another context. I’m sure it’s the same in mathematics. A number is just a number until you assign it a purpose, right?”

Zahn put his head to one side like a quizzical bird, then slowly began to nod, pleased. “That’s a very interesting statement, Vince. I like that. I like that.”

His face took on a wondrous expression that made Mendez think the guy had some kind of psychedelic kaleidoscope hallucination going on in his head.

“So many people think of mathematics as being very static and absolute,” he said. “But that’s so wrong. It’s thinking in the abstract that frees the mind to the greatest of possibilities.”

He spoke with as much passion and clarity as Mendez had heard out of him. His gaze then became acutely focused on Leone, and he took a step closer to him. “We should talk about this, Vince.”

Vince made a comical grimace. “I’m afraid you’re already way ahead of me on the subject, Zander. Math was never my forte.”

“Because you were undoubtedly taught by people trapped in the pedantic world of what I call ‘base academia.’ And by base I mean ‘low’ or ‘common’ as opposed to bas ic .”

He looked sharply at Nasser again. “Did you hear that, Rudy? Vince’s thought? Contextual mathematics. This is another verbal approach to help us articulate how we want our students to open their minds to our subject. Don’t you agree, Rudy?”

Nasser looked a bit pissed, Mendez thought. Or maybe “jealous” was a better word. His mentor had found favor in someone else. Interesting.

But he covered it well and replied, “It’s brilliant. We should use that in orientation.”

“Brilliant,” Zahn said, tasting the word in his mouth like something buttery and smooth. “And you didn’t think you knew that, did you, Vince?”

“No, I didn’t,” Vince admitted. “See? It’s like I said: You may have some piece of knowledge that—unknown to you—could help Marissa.”

Zahn didn’t seem quite so pleased at having the idea turned around on him, but he couldn’t argue with the logic.

“I have chairs,” he said. But instead of inviting them into the house, he gestured like a bad public speaker at the collection of chrome and vinyl kitchen chairs lined up in five rows of five on his gravel yard.

As Zahn led the way down the path, Mendez leaned toward Vince and muttered, “Do you think he’ll offer us refreshments from one of those refrigerators?”

Leone gave him an elbow.

They sat down in a row like they were going to watch a play. Nasser, Zahn, Vince. Mendez very deliberately picked up an orange chair, pulled it out of line and sat it down facing the others. Zahn looked at him like he was the devil incarnate, but said nothing. Vince watched him, reserving his reaction.

“I’m sorry,” Mendez said, ducking his head contritely. “This is embarrassing, but I’m a little hard of hearing, Dr. Zahn. I had an accident when I was nine. Actually ... my mother struck me in the side of the head. It left me a little deaf. It’s been a problem my whole life.”