The Lost Witness (8 page)

“Nice view,” Rhodes said.

“He’s staring at us. You think he’s waiting for Jennifer McBride to come back?”

“She’s not coming back,” he said. “And this is Venice. Let’s keep going.”

They moved into the kitchen. As Rhodes checked the cabinets and drawers, Lena examined the refrigerator and what was left in the coffeepot. When she didn’t find any mold beginning to
collect on the coffee’s surface, her mind turned to Art Madina. The pathologist couldn’t give her an accurate time of death, but thought that the murder occurred the night before the
body was found. Between this and what Jones had told them, Lena now had tangible evidence that the pathologist was right.

Jennifer McBride was murdered on Wednesday night.

Rhodes followed her out of the kitchen. They worked methodically, scouring the small apartment without talking. Lifting seat cushions, searching the foyer closet, sifting through the mail and
finding a utility bill and three credit-card offers from a bank that advertised on television and got people hooked on high interest rates. Reaching the bathroom, Lena noted the shower curtain
fastened to the wall and scanned the tile for blood spatter. When she knelt down to examine the tub, she found a thin film of soap residue and took a swipe with her gloved fingers. The fragrance
matched the bar of soap set on the wall tray, not a detergent that might be used to clean up after dismembering a body.

Rhodes closed the medicine cabinet and they stepped into the bedroom. There was a window on the right, the curtains open. This time the view didn’t face a brick wall or some lowlife trying
to sneak a peek. This time Lena could actually see the Pacific Ocean. Although much of the view was blocked by a condo in the distance, the bed appeared to be set at just the right angle so that
McBride could wake up in the morning and see the beach.

As Rhodes started rifling through the chest of drawers, Lena stepped back and took in the rest of the room. She noted the iPod docking station on the bedside table. Another paperback was beside
the clock radio and cordless telephone. When she went through the closet, she didn’t find anything but clothes.

Jennifer McBride had been abducted in a parking lot and taken somewhere before she was murdered and dumped in Hollywood. But this wasn’t the place. This wasn’t the crime scene.

Lena watched Rhodes search through the bottom drawer as she thought it over and tried to quiet her disappointment. They hadn’t found much. Jennifer McBride may have only been
twenty-five-years old, but all she owned was a single set of sheets. A single set of towels. Her kitchen was stocked with minimal accessories, just enough to get by. She didn’t have a CD
player and speakers. Instead, she relied on an iPod. She didn’t read hardcover books, but went through paperbacks at about one per week.

Money may have been an issue in her life, but there was something more here. Something trying to break through the surface. After a moment, it dawned on her.

Everything in the entire apartment was portable.

With the exception of the furniture that came from secondhand thrift shops and probably cost less than a couple hundred dollars, everything else could have fit into the trunk of a compact
car.

But there was something else. Something more difficult to pin down.

Her eyes made another sweep through the room and stopped on the bedside table. There was a snow globe sitting beside the lamp and telephone. She hadn’t noticed it before.

“Is something wrong?” Rhodes asked.

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t want to lose the thought. Instead, she moved around the bed and picked up the snow globe. Inside the heavy glass sphere was a detailed model of
Las Vegas. When she shook the globe, a thick cloud of snow whirled around the Bellagio Hotel and Caesar’s Palace, then settled down to the bottom where the streets were painted a bright
gold.

She looked over at Rhodes as that stray thought finally jelled.

Everything was portable. But even more important, there was nothing personal here. They had made a first pass through the entire apartment and found nothing personal at all.

Not a single photograph. Not a letter or postcard from a friend. Nothing that would point to the victim’s life. What she cared about or who she loved. Just the books she had read since
moving in a year ago and this snow globe.

The phone began to ring from the bedside table. Lena glanced at it and realized that the message light was blinking. After two rings, the machine clicked and went silent. Thirty seconds later,
the speaker lit up and the caller’s voice filled the room. It was a man’s voice, and he sounded old and more than a little nervous.

“This is Jim, uh, Dolson,” the man was saying. “I’m trying to reach Jennifer. I’m in town from Cincinnati and, uh, saw your ad in the
LA. Weekly.
I’m
definitely interested in some of that massage therapy—if you know what I mean. I’ll be here for a couple more days. If you’re available on short notice, please call me back.
I’m staying in Century City at the Plaza.”

The phone clicked. Then the room filled with dial tone, and all the innocence was gone.

R
hodes pulled the telephone closer,
examining the keypad.

“It’s digital,” he said. “Looks like
six messages.”

Lena moved within earshot as Rhodes found the right button and hit
PLAY
. Except for the voices, the first five messages were pretty much the same as the last. There was Jim Dolson from
Cincinnati. But there were three more men from out of town staying at various hotels on the Westside. The fourth was from some guy claiming to be on vacation with his wife and asking if McBride did
three-ways. And then the fifth, this time from a woman, wondering if McBride was bisexual.

All six messages referred to the victim’s ad in the current edition of the
LA. Weekly.
According to the time stamp, all six calls were placed after McBride’s body had been
discovered in Hollywood.

Lena grabbed the
LA. Weekly
off the foyer table and quickly returned to the bedroom. Paging through the back of the paper, she sat down beside Rhodes and began sifting through what
appeared to be several hundred classified ads for escort services, phone sex, and massage parlors. McBride’s ad was in the middle of the pack on the second page.

Lena reread the ad, then opened her cell phone and entered the number printed in the newspaper. When McBride’s phone rang on the bedside table, she didn’t close her cell even though
she had confirmed the match. Instead, she let the machine pick up and listened to the outgoing message. It wasn’t the default message that came with the phone. It was Jennifer McBride’s
voice. She wanted to hear it. Absorb it. The voice of the victim before she was murdered.

Lena could feel the hairs behind her neck standing on end. An ice-cold chill fluttered up her spine. It was a simple message. Direct and to the point. McBride greeted the caller using her phone
number rather than her name, then promised a callback to anyone leaving their contact information. The message ended with an easy
Thanks.

Lena paused a moment before closing her cell—McBride’s voice now seared into her memory and a part of her being.

“Jones told us that he never saw her with anybody,” she said. “And I’ll bet he spends a lot of time by that window.”

“She didn’t bring them here,” Rhodes said. “She went to them. Somewhere around here she’s got a bag of tricks.”

“I didn’t see it when we went through the place.”

“We weren’t looking for it,” he said. “If she didn’t take the bag with her, then it’s here.”

They checked underneath the bed and behind the hamper in the bedroom closet. It took them ten minutes to find it. A small black duffel bag in the foyer closet right beside the front door. Rhodes
carried it over to the coffee table in the living room. Ripping the zipper open, he turned the bag over and shook the contents out.

Lena knelt down on the floor, picking through the lingerie and thinking about the small heart-shaped tattoo she had seen between McBride’s shaved vagina and her bikini line. She counted
three transparent baby-doll negligees with matching G-strings, a variety of push-up bras, a sheer robe, and a pair of black panties. But there was something else here: a white skirt and matching
top. Lena held the blouse up for a better look, eyeing the low neckline and the red cross that had been embroidered over the left breast pocket.

“She wore a costume,” Rhodes said. “She played a nurse.”

“Looks like it, huh.”

Lena returned to the duffel bag, giving it a lift and measuring its weight. Spinning the bag around, she opened the first side pocket and fished out an array of scented oils, three different
kinds of condoms, a vibrator, and an extra package of batteries.

She looked over at Rhodes on the couch. He was reaching down for a cosmetic case that had fallen on the floor. As he unzipped the case and split it open, his eyes danced over the contents and
widened some.

It was a cache of pills.

Rhodes cleared a spot on the table, shaking the plastic bottles and reading them off one by one before setting them down. The list was impressive and seemed to cover a client’s every want
or need. Viagra and Cialis were here. But so were ample supplies of Xanax, Valium, Vicodin, and Oxycodone.

“She knew somebody,” Rhodes said.

Lena eyed the labels. Jennifer McBride’s name wasn’t listed, nor was the pharmacy. She played the victim’s ad back in her head.

The words
relax under my spell
seemed to have a new meaning. A darker meaning. She looked back at the lingerie and costume, at the condoms scattered across the table. She remembered the
belly ring Madina had removed from the corpse at the autopsy. Jennifer McBride had been more than a masseuse. As Lena mulled it over, it seemed clear that the young woman’s apparent innocence
was an asset to her business—something she probably flaunted.

Lena glanced over at Rhodes. His eyes were turned inward; his face, troubled. She wondered if he was thinking about his sister again.

“What is it?” she asked.

“I was just thinking about how this will play with the chief.”

“You mean because of who McBride turned out to be?”

“Yeah. The chief and Klinger. You know what I’m saying. When you’re so straight you’re bent, who gives a shit about a whore on dope?”

“You and me,” she said quietly.

“You and me,” he repeated, still thinking it over. He got up and crossed the room to the window, rubbing his neck and gazing outside. “That guy’s still sitting by his
window,” he said. “Still waiting for McBride to come home.”

“Now we know why. She knew that he was out there and probably liked to tease him.”

Rhodes turned toward her and leaned against the sill. “There was this case in Atlantic City,” he said. “Four prostitutes were raped and strangled to death a couple years ago.
They were found in a drainage ditch. I remember it because the details were so bizarre. The bodies were laid out in a row fully clothed. But their heads were facing east and their shoes had been
removed. I remember it because another murder case was making headlines. Not here in the States, but from a small town outside London. This time it was five prostitutes. Their bodies were found
over a period of ten days.”

Lena knew where Rhodes was going. She actually remembered reading about both cases after an article popped up during a Google search. The story appeared in
The New York Times,
which had
recently opened their archives and made them free of charge. After her last investigation ended so violently, Lena began researching past cases in an attempt to better understand the man she had
chased down and killed. It had been part of her recovery. Dealing with the aftermath of taking a human life. The article in
The New York Times
was a side-by-side comparison of the two cases
Rhodes was talking about.

“In the UK,” she said, “the detectives asked for help and the community came together.”

“That’s right. They put up billboards at the soccer stadiums. They blanketed the streets with flyers. Even the prime minister offered his sympathy to the victims’ families.
What these women did for a living was irrelevant. The community came together because the victims were from their neighborhood and needed help. That’s all that mattered to them.”

“I read about it,” she said. “They closed the case. They caught the guy.”

“He’s going on trial next month. In New Jersey, they don’t even have a suspect yet because no one at the top gives a shit. They didn’t process Missing Persons Reports.
They wouldn’t even let vice detectives knock on doors. They wouldn’t let them do their jobs. The victims were whores, right? Streetwalkers who used drugs. Did you know that all four
victims were mothers and left behind young children?”

Lena nodded.

“Well, no one else did,” Rhodes said. “No one else knew because no one put it out there. The detectives’ hands were tied. Bad things happen to bad people—the
victims probably deserved it, right? And even if they didn’t—even though the guy’s still out there—our neighborhoods are better off without them. Our lawns are greener.
There’s more room on our streets for more luxury cars. If we keep quiet, the casinos won’t lose any money and people will still come to play the slots.”

Rhodes became silent, but Lena knew why he seemed so bitter. Jane Doe No. 99 counted because she was an innocent victim, but Jennifer McBride wouldn’t because she was a whore. If they
worked the neighborhood, no one would care because no one would think that it had anything to do with them. The victim would be seen as irrelevant. The investigation, a needless interruption in
their busy and important lives. Even worse, when the chief reviewed his list of unsolved cases and cut it against the murder rate climbing to five hundred, there was a good chance that he might
reevaluate his resources and spend them somewhere else. The case might be shot down the divisional highway, then dropped altogether and put on ice.