Above Suspicion (26 page)

It was some time before the assistant manager was available to see them. He was very diplomatic and very evasive; he said he was unable to give them any details of any guest staying presently or in the past, as it was against hotel procedure.

Langton flashed his ID. ‘I understand you must guard your guests’ privacy, but since this is possibly a police matter, it would be diplomatic of you to assist me in every way you can. I don’t want to have to return with LAPD and with uniformed officers and patrol cars.’

They left fifteen minutes later with the information that Alan Daniels had been staying at the hotel, in one of the secluded, private bungalows. He had stayed for five weeks, covering the period that Maria was murdered. He had used a hire car during his stay. It was a Mercedes-Benz.

As they drove away, down Sunset, they passed the Blues Club again, a short distance from the Chateau. Langton raised an eyebrow.

‘Very convenient.’

His mobile phone rang and he patted his pockets to look for it.

‘It can’t be London, it’s after three a.m. there.’ He opened his phone. ‘Hello? Hello?’

‘Who is this?’ said a female voice. ‘You called my cell phone; didn’t leave a message. I just dialled re-call.’

‘Ah yes, are you—?’ He covered the phone and nudged Anna. ‘What was the name of the fucking witness, the Maria case? What did he say her name was?’

‘Angie Dutton,’ Anna said.

Langton went back to his call. ‘Is this Angie?’ he asked smoothly.

‘Yeah, who are you?’

Anna listened as he gave as little information as possible and said that he would like ten minutes of her time. After a lot of batting to and fro, he said he would meet her at ten. He snapped the phone shut and grinned.

‘Well, Angie has a very sexy voice and probably some vital information. She’s working at a club: Sequins … Takes her break at ten.’

‘Can we eat something before then?’

‘We can. But you aren’t coming with me. This one I do on my own.’

Anna gave him a look, but he didn’t catch it.

‘You know, I think my luck is changing.’

He decided they should go back to the hotel and freshen up. Anna had just pulled into the appropriate lane of traffic when Langton gave a sudden laugh.

‘What?’

‘I thought everyone here in LA worked out.’ He laid his arm flat along the back of the seat, so his hand almost rested on her neck. ‘How about the walking pimple and his hair-weaved gov, Mullins?’

Anna gave a rueful smile. She felt really tired after the long drive from San Francisco and then around Los Angeles. He picked up on her mood fast.

‘What’s up?’

‘Nothing, just flagging a bit.’

‘How about we take a trip to Santa Monica, get a bite to eat there? No, on second thoughts, we won’t have the time.’

‘I’ll get something in my room.’

‘Hell, no. Why don’t we go and eat somewhere famous? You’re not in LA every day.’

‘I don’t really have anything suitable to wear, but—’

‘OK, hotel it is then.’

In her room she showered and blow-dried her hair again. With all the showering and the swimming, her curly hair was getting difficult to control. She headed down to the lobby just after eight o’clock. She was surprised to find that this time Langton had pulled out of his ever expanding wardrobe a light sweater and casual jeans.

‘Turns out they don’t do real food here, just sandwiches, so I booked us into a place the manager said was OK. Don’t worry, Travis, I’ll drive.’

He was an appalling driver and nearly killed them both just pulling the car out of the residents’ car park and on to the wrong side of the road. On two occasions he almost drove over the central line. After that, the car slowly crawled along the road, looking for the right address.

Once inside the restaurant, Langton almost became a gentleman, guiding Anna to the table with his hand on her elbow. He seemed in a really good mood. A phone call from a sexy-voiced woman can do that to a man, Anna reflected.

‘This is all right, isn’t it?’ he grinned, looking around once they had ordered.

‘Anything come in from the station?’ she asked.

‘Let’s, for half an hour, not discuss work.’

Surprised, she picked up her wine. ‘Cheers!?’

It was so perfectly chilled and delicious that, after a few sips, her mood lifted too.

‘Did you and old Jack get along, then?’ Langton asked her suddenly.

‘Yes. Oh, yes, he was a great dad. Not at home a lot, but when he was we had his complete attention, me and my mother. He was always arranging outings, you know picnics, theatre, that sort of thing. And he always turned up to watch me at gymkhanas. I was obsessed. I wanted my own pony so much, but we could never afford it, of course, with the upkeep, stable fees, horseboxes, all the stuff that goes with it. But I’d ride every Saturday afternoon.’

‘Did you win things?’ he asked, draining his glass.

‘Yes, I did. Once, Dad pinned my rosettes all over me, covering me from top to toe and took a photograph: firsts, seconds and thirds, all different colours,’ she smiled.

‘My daughter, Kitty, wants to take riding lessons, but I know what you mean. It costs. Then you’ve got to get jodhpurs, hard hats and stuff.’

‘You can usually get second-hand kit from most stables that teach.’ She paused. ‘Does your wife ride?’

‘No.’ He paused. ‘Kitty was eighteen months old when we married. I adopted her. Whenever I think I shouldn’t really have got married, I remember Kitty. She’s an important part of my life.’

She took a bite, thinking him finished and was surprised to find him actually continuing to discuss personal topics.

‘When you lose someone you love unexpectedly like that, you get confused by your grief. When it doesn’t go away, you start to look for something, anything that’ll ease the pain. For a while the second marriage did that for me, especially having Kitty around, but …’ He sighed. ‘I’m sorry, Travis. You’re too young - and you don’t know any of this. My first wife died of a brain tumour. One night she goes to bed with a bad headache. Next morning, it’s still there, but she goes to work. Anyway, she collapsed the next morning. Two hours later, she died.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Anna said, gently.

He smiled, painfully. ‘So am I.’

When the first course arrived, the conversation ended. She’d never seen anyone eat so fast. She’d only had a few mouthfuls by the time his plate was empty.

‘Do you have a train to catch?’ she teased. He looked puzzled and just refilled their glasses.

‘My mother used to say that to me, when I ate too fast.’

‘Oh, sorry,’ he grinned. ‘Tell me about your mother.’ He tore off some bread and smothered butter over it. ‘Isabelle, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Was she a good cook?’

Anna laughed. ‘No. She was good at other things, but she was not a good cook.’

He leaned back, allowing the waiter to remove the dishes. ‘So who cooked?’

‘My father. He was brilliant.’

‘Really?’ he said, surprised.

‘Yes, really good. We had home-baked breads and pies …’ She paused as her salmon and Langton’s monkfish were served.

He actually chewed slowly this time, savouring the taste. Then he went for it at his usual rate of knots. By the time Anna had finished her main course, his hands hadn’t stopped flying; he seemed to have eaten the entire bread basket and he had refilled their glasses several times. Then as the dessert trolley was wheeled to their table and Anna was looking on it with interest, he checked his watch. ‘No time; we’ve got to go.’

They arrived back at the hotel at a quarter to ten. If Langton had driven, it would have taken another half hour. As Anna got out of the car, he slid over to the driver’s seat.

‘Are you all right to drive?’ she asked, worried.

‘No, Travis, I’m paralytic. Just go to bed. I’ll see you in the morning. Eight o’clock, in reception.’

She watched him drive away, hoping she hadn’t been too boring. Perhaps the gymkhana conversation had gone on a tad too long. She had enjoyed being with him, though she doubted he felt the same way. As Anna entered her room, the phone started to ring. Alan Daniels’s dentist was downstairs. Anna hurried down to meet him.

Arthur Klein was small and tanned. He wore dark glasses and smiled briefly as she shook his hand and thanked him for coming. He carried a large brown envelope and seemed ill at ease. ‘I had arranged to meet, erm, Detective Langton here in the morning, but now I can’t, I have a seven o’clock.’

‘You schedule dental appointments at seven in the morning?’ she said, surprised.

‘It’s an emergency. Lady bit on a nut and cracked a front cap - one, I hasten to add, I didn’t fit, but when you work on movie stars’ teeth, the hour is immaterial.’

He had an air of wealth about him: neatly pressed trousers, cashmere jacket and a top of the range Rolex which he glanced at constantly. She remembered that the cost of Alan Daniels’s new teeth was more than any of them earned in a year.

‘Is there somewhere we could talk? I only have ten minutes.’

The small annexe was full of cactus plants and the wicker chairs had seen better days, but it was empty. Klein refused a drink and sat, pinching at his trousers, looking around distastefully at the stained chair cushions. He tapped his thigh with the envelope.

‘I have never been to this hotel.’

From his expression, Anna was pretty certain he wouldn’t be back if he could help it.

‘You’re aware, I think, that I am no longer in possession of Daniels’s X-rays, nor the sets of teeth I made up for assessment purposes.’

‘Yes. My superior explained.’

‘The work turned out to be quite extensive: three implants and a bridge, plus every tooth visible on what I call “the smile”.’ To illustrate, he ran a finger along his own top teeth and the bottom row. ‘Now, I have to tell you these X-rays confused me.’ He withdrew from the envelope the photocopies of the dental X-ray removed from Daniels’s Queen’s Gate flat.

‘Confused you? Why?’

‘Well, if these are indeed Mr Daniels’s teeth, then this would have to be an X-ray of work done before I was brought in. I’m speaking from memory, since I no longer possess the X-rays I took of Mr Daniels’s teeth. I did bridgework on both sides, you see, which is not shown here. But when I first examined him, Mr Daniels showed extensive work on the back molar teeth, in fact two gold caps. So, if this is his X-ray, it couldn’t be recent.’

Anna leaned forward. ‘But it could be an X-ray of Daniels’s teeth, just from some time ago?’

‘I would say this is not and never was, Mr Daniels’s X-ray. Whoever these X-rays belong to had quite a distinctive cross bite.’

‘Thank you very much.’

Klein nodded, passing her the envelope. ‘I’m not surprised he’s in trouble with the law. He was exceptionally rude and tried to defraud me. He refused to pay me when I had done the work. It was all very unpleasant.’

‘Was your account eventually settled?’

‘Only after I threatened a lawsuit. And then only on the condition I sent him everything: records, X-rays and teeth impressions.’

He checked his watch. ‘I have to go. I am sorry if I haven’t been very helpful.’ He stood up. ‘Perhaps if Daniels hadn’t been in such a hurry—’

‘Sorry, what did you say?’

‘He was in a hurry. I had to move a whole block of appointments to fit him in. He said the operation was necessary for filming. I only obliged because he was recommended by a very high-powered agent here who sends me a lot of clients.’

In the car park, Anna walked with Klein towards a Bentley convertible, which he bleeped to unlock.

‘When exactly was the appointment made by Daniels?’

Klein opened the driver’s door. ‘Mid-September, initially. It was a long course of treatment. His final appointment was just a couple of months back.’

‘Would you say that Daniels really needed the dental work? Or was it purely cosmetic?’

Klein was fastening his seatbelt. Now he settled back into the leather seat. ‘Well, the back teeth were not in good shape. He said he used to grind them. But the front teeth were not that bad.’

‘So, he didn’t really need “the smile”?’

Klein placed his hands into leather driving gloves and held the wheel. ‘It was a better look. Truthfully, though, he could probably have gotten away with just bleaching them.’

He flashed his own whiter than white teeth in a farewell smile. Anna watched as he drove out of the car park.

Anna stood in front of the mirror and checked her own smile. Perhaps she should switch to that whitening toothpaste? She lay down on the hotel bed. If Daniels was about to undergo extensive dental surgery, he wouldn’t have cared where he left his teeth marks. Could someone be so calculating? So devious?

She recalled finding her father sitting with a glass of brandy and staring in the firelight. She was young at the time and she sat on his knee, trying to draw him back to her from the dark place he occupied sometimes. He gave her a sad smile when she asked what the matter was and gently drew the hair away from her face.

It was inconceivable that something could be wrong with her father. ‘Don’t you feel well?’ she asked worriedly.

He rested his head for a brief second against his child’s shoulder.

‘I’m fine, sweetheart. It’s just sometimes Daddy works with such twisted, devious souls that their sickness clings afterwards, like a bad smell.’

‘What does devious mean?’

He sipped his brandy. ‘Saying you didn’t do something when you know that you did; weaving lies to make everyone believe you didn’t do this thing, but you know that you did and you enjoy the fact that your lies have fooled everyone. That’s devious.’

‘Did someone do something devious to you?’ she asked.

‘Yes.’

He said there was a man who had sworn he never hurt one little girl and because they had believed him, another little girl got hurt.

Years later, Anna found out from her mother that he was talking about a child killer, a case that had traumatized him deeply. Ever since then, the word ‘devious’ had a powerful memory association, which she now attached to Alan Daniels.

The door was rapped so hard that Anna almost shot out of her bed. She had been sleeping naked, so she grabbed a large bath towel on her way to the door.