Fine-Feathered Death (26 page)

Gina’s grin displayed
her
teeth, which were so white that I figured she bleached them nightly. “Ah, yes. I’ve done my homework, Kendra. I’m sure you’re bringing up teeth because you take on cases about dog bites.”

“And get them settled, too, since I find creative ways to make the plaintiff grovel. Did that show up in your research?”

Ah, yes, it was back—my litigator sting! Always presented with a smile, of course.

“Well, there won’t be any groveling here. But go ahead and try to convince us to settle.”

Her clients observed her with apparent adoration. I’d fix that fast by turning the talk back to them.

“Fine,” I said. “Now, as Mr. Shorbel’s alleged heirs, they have taken custody of his dog, Glenfiddich, who was the intended beneficiary, correct?”

“Purportedly.” Gina pushed herself back and studied me with her snide crocodile smile.

“Our first action, if we must go to court, will be for a TRO”—a temporary restraining order—“to stop your clients from mistreating that poor dog. We ourselves observed his quarters—locked away in a storeroom. We also have an eyewitness who’ll testify as to how the animal is abandoned outside in foul weather, left on an unenclosed patio all night.”

“It’s just a dog,” shouted Moe Shorbel, his pale brown eyes clamped on me in an evil glare.

“You mentioned dog bites before,” interjected Myra Shorbel in a much more modulated voice. “I’ve been worried that Ditch will bite my young daughter Ellie. I can’t just let him run loose in the house.”

“He doesn’t bite!” Irma raced into the fray before I could restrain her. “There’s no reason to treat the poor thing like that. Shame on you. Your father was right, leaving everything to the dog instead of horrible children like you.”

I could hear an imaginary judge in my mind if an outburst like that occurred at trial. “Control your client, counselor.”

I didn’t wait for Gina Udovich to suggest the same. “You’re right, of course, Irma. But let’s try to resolve this amicably.” I returned my litigator’s unperturbed attention to Gina. “Ms. Etherton is prepared to make a most generous offer of settlement. First, she wants immediate, permanent custody of Glenfiddich. If that’s agreed, she will reduce her claim on the estate on behalf of the dog to two hundred thousand dollars. The estate amounts to a million or more, and the remainder may be retained by your clients Mr. and Ms. Shorbel.”

I half anticipated an onslaught of objections by the sour siblings surrounding us. Instead, I noted a sly smile insinuate itself onto Moe Shorbel’s face as his sister hazarded a glance at him that suggested admiration. What was going on?

“We discussed this possibility in advance, Ms. Ballantyne,” Gina Udovich purred. “My clients are willing to convey custody of the dog to your client as long as she makes no claim at all on the rest of the estate.”

“I’ll need to discuss with my client whether she is willing to lower her settlement amount to a hundred thousand dollars,” I said, “but she clearly is entitled to some compensation on behalf of Glenfiddich. She will need money to care for him—food, veterinary bills, and so forth, for the rest of his life. He is now six years old and can live another six years or more.”

“Nothing,” Moe Shorbel stated. “She can have the mutt but no money. And if she doesn’t agree, we’ll keep the dog, too. And if you think he’s been mistreated till now—”

“Enough,” Gina said in an attempt to shut up her client.

But Irma had extracted from that exactly what I had. “Did you start abusing that poor animal so I’d agree to take him quickly, without claiming any of the money dear Walt didn’t want you to have?”

This time, Moe stayed discreetly silent. But his slimy smile said it all.

“Forget settlement!” Irma stormed. “Kendra, I want Ditch out of that house now, so get that restraining order first thing. Then I want to sue them for the entire amount of the estate on behalf of Ditch. I won’t care if they spend every cent of it on attorneys’ fees, as long as they don’t get any use of it.”

Gina didn’t appear upset in the least about that idea. “Moe, Myra, I think this settlement conference is over.”

“No,” Myra said with a sigh as she stood. Her pretty face appeared pained. “The dog shouldn’t get the money, of course, and I’m willing to fight in court about that. But I don’t want Ditch around and neither does Moe. Forget about that restraining order stuff. You can have custody of Ditch right away, Irma, as long as it’s understood that we still don’t agree that the damned dog should inherit our dad’s estate.”

Irma beamed. “I’ll come right over for him.”

“And I’ll draw up the necessary document to ensure there’s no modification of the resolution of this issue,” I added. “And now, please excuse me a moment while I confer with my client.” I motioned for Irma to follow me out the door.

I scooted her into the nearest empty office and whispered, “You got what you wanted—the dog. Do you want to continue this fight over the money?”

“Yes, damn it,” the sixty-year-old hissed. “Those miserable children purposely mistreated the dog their dad loved to get me to cave and let them keep the money. I meant it. I’ll fight them forever over it, since it’s what Walt would have wanted.”

Maybe, if the handwritten codicil was the key. “I have to warn you that they have a good shot at winning. And then you’ll not only fail to get the million, you’ll be out all the money you pay to me.”

Irma’s smile was wry. “Honey, I don’t need Walt’s mere million dollars. And my own heirs are well provided for even if I spend a million to keep those kids from getting Walt’s. I started my own brand of canned soups about forty years ago and sold my secret recipes for a fortune five years back to one of the majors. It’s a matter of principle, though. I loved Walt, and he loved me, and now his damned ungrateful offspring are going to pay.”

Which meant this formerly suspended litigator was finally returning to her favorite surroundings very soon.
Hello, court. Here I come!

Chapter Twenty-five

I USHERED THE Sorbels and their not-so-smug attorney out the door, then said farewell to Irma. “I’ll get the settlement document about Ditch done right away,” I assured her, “then prepare a complaint to file in court to claim the money.”

As Irma strolled down the Yurick offices’ sidewalk toward the street, I was slightly surprised to see Detective Noralles approach. I’d planned to pop in on him at his office at the North Hollywood Station. My intent hadn’t been for him to insinuate himself here.

Well, I was the one who’d maneuvered this meeting, so why not make it convenient? I’d need to be careful, though, about what he heard. “Hi, Ned,” I said. “Come in. We’ll talk in the conference room. There’s coffee there from my last meeting.”

“Sounds good.” The good-looking African-American cop was clad in one of his characteristic suits, this one tweed with tones matching shades in his multicolor tie. “I’d like to use your washroom first.”

“Fine.”

He greeted Mignon, and I directed him toward the men’s room. Unnecessary, I realized, for me to tell him where to go—at least in this sense. After the multiple murder investigations he’d been here to conduct, he probably knew the location of every nook and cranny a lot better than I did.

While Ned was otherwise occupied, I stuck my face into Borden’s office as a courtesy, to inform him the police were present. Same with Elaine, since as a former lady friend of Ezra’s, she doubtless still teetered near the top of the cops’ suspect list.

“Thanks, Kendra,” Elaine replied after I told her. She sat at her desk, and Gigi perched on her pole.

“Bottles of beer,” Gigi countered, lifting her beautiful blue wings in a quasi-shrug and causing me to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” asked Ned from behind me.

Uh-oh. I’d loitered too long. Before I could turn and usher him in a different direction, he’d pulled open the door and edged in around me.

“I’m just happy that Gigi’s doing so well,” I responded rapidly. “Come to the conference room. We’ll talk.”

“Sure,” he said to me, but instead of accompanying me, he sauntered toward Elaine’s desk. “I don’t suppose you’ve recalled exactly when you first met Corrie Montez, have you, Ms. Aames?”

Elaine appeared unperturbed as she dug in at her desk chair and folded her arms. She’d removed her suit jacket, and today she wore a pearly gray shirt that complemented her short silver hair. “Trying to catch me in a fib, are we, Detective Noralles? I told you already that I can’t recall, but even though we only recently became close, I knew Ezra for ages, from a law firm where we both worked long ago. I visited him occasionally at Jambison & Jetts. I could have run into Corrie there sometime, though I don’t remember meeting her till recently, when Ezra and I both started discussing coming to work here. He mentioned he might invite a young paralegal named Corrie to join us and introduced us then.”

“So you still maintain you’d have no reason to harm either Mr. Cossner or Ms. Montez?” Despite the obvious insinuation in his words, Ned’s voice remained as deadpan as his face.

“As I said, stop trying to rile or confuse me. You have my statement. That’s all I’m saying.” Elaine didn’t sound confused, but Noralles had unmistakably sparked the riling part. Her voice was raised, and so was her body as she stood and shot him an angry glare.

The tension in the room must have gotten to Gigi, too. She started to squawk in her familiar rhythmic chant effectively designed to drive humans nuts.

Startled at first, I turned toward her and raised my hands in a placating pose. “It’s okay, gorgeous girl. Everything’s fine.” I intended my tone to sound soothing. At least she hadn’t issued an uncanny shriek. But there were other sounds she might make that Ned Noralles shouldn’t hear. “We’ve upset her,” I said. “Why don’t we leave, Ned. I want to tell you—”

And then, there it was. Jeff’s cell phone song, sung in Gigi’s inimitably hoarse rasp.

“Gorgeous girl,” I prompted more loudly.

“Hang on,” Ned said.

I wished I
could
hang on. To Gigi’s large black, menacingly barbed beak, to shut her up. Or to Ned’s arm, to arrange for him to exit this office with me, pronto.

“Isn’t that—hell, yes!” He looked at me, a gleam of excitement emanating from his dark brown eyes. “That sounds like part of Hubbard’s ring tone.”

I knew Noralles had heard that cell phone sound at least once, right here in the Yurick offices when he’d regrettably run into Jeff here. Even so, I said, “I don’t think so. I suppose you could read a resemblance into it if you stretch your imagination, but the notes and rhythm are really different. Besides, Gigi hasn’t the ability of an African Grey when it comes to aping sounds. Macaws have lots of talents, but—”

“I’ve done some reading about birds in the parrot family,” Ned said, his gaze pinning me motionless like a stuck butterfly.

I hazarded a helpless glance toward Elaine, but this time the confusion she had avoided before seemed pasted all over her scrunched-up face.

“You’re right, Kendra,” Ned said. “Some birds are better than others at repeating things they hear under emotional duress. But how often is Hubbard around here?”

“Not often,” I said. “And to teach macaws to say things or sing songs, repetition is the key.”

“Twice could do it. Say, two visits with a lot of duress each time? With the same cell phone ringing in the background.”

“Who would call in the middle of a murder?” I demanded.

“Someone who didn’t know what was happening,” he replied, so smug I could slug him. “Maybe even you. And then when you realized what had happened, you felt stuck. You cared for the guy—note the past tense. In our interrogations of him, he’s seemed pretty bummed out about your relationship. Maybe you are, too. And that’s why you happened to invite me here today and lead me to the macaw, so I could hear her sing Hubbard’s song—allowing you to add another nail into his post-lethal-injection coffin. Assuming, of course, that we get a murder conviction. Thanks to you, we’ve another bit of evidence to add to his bloody jacket.”

With effort, I lured the overly confident cop away from the off-key macaw. I wished the office’s bar was still stocked with booze.
I
needed a good, stiff belt, and maybe a nip would turn Ned’s certainties about Jeff back to mere unsubstantiated suspicions.

Bending his bored ear while we sat in a booth, I disclosed more than I ever had before with this detective. I lavished on him my own inquiries and investigations over the last few days. I let him know I couldn’t buy the too-expedient openness of Bobby Lawrence’s admissions of no alibis. I chose not to spew the same about Millie Franzel. I loathed even the small likelihood that she could have killed anyone and chose not to sic the detective on her further without certainty.

I slipped in a stab at statistics—and how many people, even solely in L.A., had cell phones that could sing similar tunes—not mentioning the uniqueness of Jeff’s.

And Ned’s reaction to my tidy tap dance?

He leaned over the table between us and looked me earnestly in the eye. I tried to ignore the gleam of satisfaction in his oh-so-innocent gaze. “You’re having second thoughts about having handed me this last piece of evidence against Hubbard, aren’t you, Kendra? I understand. You two were really tight for a few months. But you’re a lawyer—an officer of the court, as they say. You should feel damned proud for helping bring a murderer to justice.”

“I do feel proud,” I assented. “And don’t forget I found you
two
murderers—those who framed me and my tenants. Now I’m hunting whoever’s been framing Jeff, and you should be, too.”

Any pleasantness departed from his demeanor. He stood and shot me the evil eye as he stared down at me. “Stay out of it now, Kendra. I warn you, if you do anything to get in the way of Jeff Hubbard’s conviction—”

“Like find the real killer?” My mood had segued from fear for Jeff to fury with this egotistical cop with the single-track mind. Justice? He was letting retribution for old gripes against Jeff get in the way of good cop sense.