Therapy (21 page)

“She advised you not to file.”

“I was ready to do it, I really was, but she said life would get really complicated faster than I could imagine. So I allowed the bastard to come home, but he’s not allowed to touch me, and I don’t talk to him unless the kids are present.”

Milo said, “That was a month ago. Between then and the night Dr. Koppel was killed, have you driven past her house?”

“All the time.”

“How often?”

“Every other day,” said Patty Gull. “At least. Sometimes every day. It’s on my way to go shopping, whatever, so why not? I figure if I do serve Franco, I might as well pile up the evidence. My friend says even with no-fault divorce, the more you can get, the better.”

“Have you seen his car there, since?”

“No,” she said. “Unfortunately. Maybe they’re doing it in the office. Or at some motel.”

She clenched her eyes shut.

Milo said, “You do think they continued their affair after you discovered them.”

Her eyes flipped open. “That’s what Franco does. Fucks and fucks and fucks. He’s sick.”

“How many other women has he—”

“No,” said Patty Gull. “I don’t want to go there. Some things are private.”

“Were any of them his patients?” said Milo.

“I don’t know about that. Franco’s business was his domain. That was the deal.”

“The deal.”

“The marriage deal. I gave up my career and my entire life for him and had kids, and he went out and provided.”

“He provide pretty well?”

She waved a languid hand around the dark, floral room. “He did okay.”

“Nice place.”

“I conceived it myself. I’m thinking of going back and studying decorating.”

“Mrs. Gull, in terms of the other women—”

“I said I don’t want to go there, okay? What’s the difference? I don’t know if he fucked his patients. I
do
know he fucked
her
. But he didn’t kill the bitch. I told you, he wasn’t there that night. And he doesn’t have the guts.”

“Where was he that night?”

“Some hotel, I forget—ask
him
which one.”

“How do you know he was there?”

“Because he called me and left his room number, and I called him back and he was there—the place on Beverly and Pico, used to be a Ramada, I don’t know what it is now.”

“What’d you guys talk about?”

“Nothing pretty,” she said. “Now please leave. I have things to do.”

“Don’t be offended by this question, ma’am, but where were you—”

“I didn’t kill the bitch either. Guns scare me, I’ve never even touched one. That’s one thing Franco and I have in common. We’re for outlawing guns, just despise what guns have done to our country. Besides, that night Franco
wasn’t
there with her, so why would I bother paying the bitch a visit?”

“You had reason to resent Dr. Koppel. Why not have a chat?”

“At that hour?”

“You were out driving at that hour.”

“Five minutes, back and forth,” said Patty Gull. “Just to see. I looked for his Benz, didn’t see it, drove back home, took an Ambien, and slept like a baby.”

Milo said nothing.

“Detective, if resentment was enough of a motive, I’d be killing tons of women, not just her.” She laughed, this time with genuine glee. “I’d be one of those serial killers.”

*

Out came the picture of the dead girl. “Know her, ma’am?”

Patty Gull’s bravado crumbled. Her mouth opened and her jaw shook. “Is she—she is, isn’t she?”

“Yes. Do you know her?”

“No, no, of course not—is she one of Franco’s—did he—”

“Right now, we don’t know who she is.”

“So why are you showing it to me—take it away, it’s horrible.”

Milo began to comply, but her hand shot out and held the photo in place.

“She looks like me. Not as pretty as I was at that age. But pretty enough, she’s a pretty girl.” She placed the photo in her lap, continued to stare.

“She
looks
like me. It’s
horrible
.”

CHAPTER

24

W
e left Patty Gull sitting in the room she’d decorated.

Outside, Milo said, “Scary lady. Am
I
sweating?”

“She hates her husband but is sure he didn’t kill Koppel, provides what she thinks is an alibi. But her not seeing Gull’s car at Koppel’s the night of the murder says nothing. It’s a two-car garage, he could’ve moved his inside. Especially after being caught once. Or, he made sure to park several blocks away. A third possibility is he checked into the hotel and took a cab.”

“Hell,” he said, “he could’ve walked, it’s a mile and a half.” We headed for the car. “If he did call a taxi, I can find out. Gull interests you, the way he does me?”

“He’s smart enough to cover his tracks the way our boy’s been doing. And even if Patty’s exaggerating, his record with women is interesting. Also, he and Gavin didn’t get along. What if it was more than poor therapeutic rapport? What if Gavin learned something that made him a threat to Gull?”

“Sleeping with a patient,” he said. “Somehow Gavin finds out about it—hanging around the office, being obsessive. He talked about uncovering scandal, now he found one. But then why would Gull kill Koppel? They were lovers.”

“Maybe her indiscretions didn’t extend to murder. She figured out what had happened to Gavin and threatened to turn Gull in. Or the affair was no longer useful to Gull. Or both.”

“You’re talking about one cold guy.”

“Not that cold,” I said. “He sweats easily. I’m talking about a guy who experiences anxiety but still loves taking risks. Someone who sleeps with another woman four blocks from his house, gets busted, and possibly goes back for more.”

“Mary Lou threatening to turn him in . . . she sure wasn’t forthcoming when I spoke to her. Then again, maybe Gull hadn’t broken it off with her, yet. If he did it a few days later, he’d have two scorned women to deal with . . . what do you think about Patty’s seeing a resemblance in the dead girl?”

“It didn’t strike me,” I said. “I saw it as Patty having ego problems, but maybe she’s onto something.”

“Gull murdering the old lady symbolically? Right from the beginning you saw this as a symbolic deal.”

“If Gull’s our guy, it could also tie in with Flora Newsome. She was Mary Lou Koppel’s patient, so Gull would have had opportunity to see her. Combine Flora’s feelings of sexual inadequacy, Gull’s view of himself as a cocksman and the prestige of his position, and you’ve got fertile ground for an easy seduction.”

“Gull does her, then kills her. His lover’s patient, talk about taking risks.”

“By the time Flora was killed, she was dating Brian Van Dyne. Maybe Dr. Gull doesn’t take well to rejection. By a patient or a lover.”

“Evil shrink,” he said. “All that sweating. Someone that calculating, you’d think he could keep it under control.”

“It’s one thing to be cool when you’re calling the shots, be it seduction or murder,” I said. “Setting up the scene, choreographing, dominating because you’ve picked submissive partners. Being investigated by the police changes all that. All of a sudden, he’s placed in the one-down position.”

“My charm intimidates him?”

“Something like that.”

“So the best bet is come on strong with the bastard, bulldoze over him.”

“You got it,” I said. “Method acting.”

“The curtain rises,” he said. “Let’s boogie.”

*

We drove to Franco Gull’s office building, parked in an empty slot next to Gull’s Mercedes, and headed for the rear door. A janitor was vacuuming the ground-floor carpeting. All six doors to the Charitable Planning suite were closed, and the corridor smelled of inactivity and that same popcorn fragrance.

That same feeling of disuse, and I said so to Milo.

Milo hadn’t taken his eye off the janitor. Now, he went over to the guy. Skinny guy, midthirties, with the burnished skin of the hard-drinking homeless, a three-day stubble, lank brown hair, scared-rabbit eyes. He wore a UC Berkeley sweatshirt over baggy gray sweatpants and filthy sneakers. His fingernails were black at the edges. He kept his head down and pushed the vacuum cleaner, trying to pretend a big, hefty detective wasn’t heading his way.

Milo moved in that surprising, quick way he can muster, bending and flicking off the machine. When he straightened, he’d pushed closer, and his smile was all the man could see. “Hey.”

No answer.

“Quiet afternoon down here on the ground floor.”

The man licked his lips. Very scared rabbit. “Yeah,” he finally said.

“What’s Charitable Planning all about?”

“Beats me.” The man had a whiny, congested voice, the kind that makes everything sound evasive. His shoulders rose and fell, rose again, and remained bunched up tight around his scrawny neck. Broken blood vessels explored his nose and cheeks. His lips were cracked and dry, and tattoos snaked their way up his wrist.

Milo glanced at them, and the man tried to slide his hand back into his sleeve.

“UC Berkeley, huh?”

The man didn’t answer.

“Alma mater?”

Headshake.

“Work here long?”

“A while.”

“How long’s a while?”

“Ah . . . mebbe a . . . month, two.”

“Maybe.”

“I do a bunch of buildings for the owner.”

“Mr. Koppel.”

“Yeah.”

“Ever see anyone actually work at Charitable Planning?”

“Ah . . . ah . . .”

“That a tough question?” said Milo. “Required you to think?”

“I . . . ah . . . I want to answer right.”

“Truthful or right?”

“Truthful.”

Milo took hold of the man’s right wrist, slid the sleeve of the sweatshirt up a scrawny forearm. Grimy skin was specked with discs of scar tissue, most of it concentrated in the crook. The tattoos were blue-black sparked with intermittent red blotches, clearly homemade. Poorly rendered naked women with oversized breasts. A dull-eyed snake with dripping fangs.

Milo said, “Get these at UC Berkeley?”

“Nope.”

“What’s your real alma mater? San Quentin or Chico?”

The man licked his lips again. “Neither.”

“Where’d you do your time?”

“Mostly County.”

“County, here?”

“Here, around.”

“So you’re a short-term guy.”

“Yeah.”

“What’s your specialty?”

“Drugs, but I’m clean.”

“Meaning burglary and shoplifting and larceny.”

The man placed one hand on the stalk of the vacuum cleaner. “Never any larceny.”

“Any assaults or other bad stuff?” said Milo. “You know I’m gonna find out.”

“One time,” said the man, “I did a battery thing. But the other guy started it, and they paroled me early.”

“Weapon of choice?”

“It was his knife. I took it away from him. It was an accident, mostly.”

“Mostly,” said Milo. “You cut him bad?”

“He lived.”

“How about you show me some ID?”

“I do something wrong?”

“Perish the thought,
amigo.
Just being thorough—you know why we’re here, right?”

The man shrugged.

“Why’re we here,
amigo
?”

“What happened to the lady doc upstairs.”

“You don’t know her name?”

“Dr. Koppel,” said the man. “The ex-wife. They got along good.”

“Lovey-dovey,” said Milo.

“No, I . . . uh . . . Mr. Koppel always said just give her what she wants.”

“What she wants?”

“If there’s a problem. In the building. He said we should fix it fast, give her what she wants.”

“He doesn’t do that for all his tenants?”

The man was silent.

“So you’re trying to tell me not to suspect Mr. Koppel for killing his ex because they were still buddies.”

“No, I . . . uh . . . I don’t know nothing about nothing.” The man rolled his sweatshirt sleeve down his arm.

“Any ideas about who did kill Dr. Koppel?”

“Didn’t know her, didn’t hardly never see her.”

“Except to fix things for her.”

“No,” protested the man. “I don’t do that stuff, I call the plumbers, whatever, and they fix it. I’m just here to clean. Mostly I do Mr. Koppel’s buildings in the Valley.”

“But today, you’re on this side of the hill.”

“I go where they tell me.”

“They.”

“Mr. Koppel’s company. They got properties all over.”

“Who told you to come here, today?”

“Mr. Koppel’s secretary. One of them. Heather. I can give you the number, you can check it out.”

“Maybe I will,” said Milo. “Now, how about some ID?”

The man fished in a front pant pocket and fished out a wad of bills secured by a rubber band. He slipped off the band, thumbed through the money—grubby singles and fives—and drew out a California identification card.

“Roland Nelson Kristof,” said Milo. “This your current address, Roland?”

“Yeah.”

Milo scanned the card. “Sixth Street . . . this is right past Alvarado, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Lots of halfway houses there. That your situation?”

“Yeah.”

“So you still paroling.”

“Yeah.”

“How’d you get the job with Mr. Koppel?”

“My PO got it for me.”

“Who’s that?”

“Mr. Hacker.”

“Downtown office?”

“Yeah.”

Milo gave him back his ID. “I’m going to run you through, Roland. Because a halfway-house guy working a building where someone got murdered is something I need to check out. I find out you lied to me, I pay a visit to your crib, and you know I’m gonna discover something that busts your parole, you know I am. So if there’s something you wanna tell me, now’s the time.”

“There’s nothing,” said Kristof.

“You never had problems with women? No bad behavior in that department?”

“Never,” said Kristof. Until then his delivery had been flat, mechanical. Now a hint of outrage had crept in.

“Never,” said Milo.

“Never, not once. I been a junkie since I was fourteen. I don’t hurt no one.”

“Still on the junk though.”

“I’m getting older, it’s getting better.”

“What is?”

“The hunger,” said Kristof. “Days are getting shorter.”

“How’s your sex life, Roland?”

“Ain’t got none.” Kristof’s declaration was free of regret, almost cheerful.

“You sound happy about that.”

“Yeah, I am,” said Kristof. “You know what dope does to all that.”

“No drive,” said Milo.

“Zactly.” Kristof smiled wearily, flashing intermittent, brown teeth. “Something else not to worry about.”

*

Milo copied down his address and allowed him to resume vacuuming.

As we climbed the stairs to Pacifica-West Psychological Services and the roar of the vacuum cleaner faded, he said, “That’s one habitual con.”