Grave Endings (19 page)

twenty-seven

DR. LASHER WAS SITTING BEHIND HIS DESK WHEN I ENTERED the study, a wood-paneled room lined with built-in mahogany bookcases filled with a collection of medical and Judaic texts. It's an impressive collection, and Dr. Lasher is an impressive man. He's tall and somewhat hunched, and he has a narrow face and high forehead and gold-rimmed bifocals that he wears low on his nose. He's in his mid-sixties, but looks older, because of his thinning hair, which has more white than gray, and because of the beard he decided not to shave after the thirty days of mourning for Aggie were over.

“It's been a long time since you've been here,” he said when I was seated. “You look wonderful, Molly. You're happy?”

“Very.”

“Good.” He nodded. “I spoke to your
chossen
at the kiddush. I can see why you picked him.” He shut the text that had lain open in front of him. “Mrs. Lasher says you came to talk to me about Aggie?”

“Yes.” Aggie's father had always been direct. Now I was the one who craved small talk. On the way here I'd rehearsed my opening, but it had flown out of my head.

“You're nervous, Molly? Don't be. What do they say—‘I'm a doctor, you can tell me anything'?” He smiled briefly, a forced effort. “Detective Connors told me you're bothered about this man who killed Aggie. You want to know more about him. You want to know what happened.”

“I was at his funeral,” I said. “I was surprised you came. I saw your name in the guest book.”

Dr. Lasher nodded. “I surprised myself. I almost didn't go. Mrs. Lasher and I don't know the family, they don't know us. But we're connected, whether we like it or not. Our daughter, their son. A terrible link, but a link. I wanted to show them I don't hold them responsible for what he did. Why were
you
there?”

“I'm not sure.” Randy's mother, Doreen. It was too complicated to explain. “I didn't see you at the service.”

“No.” He shook his head.

“I talked to Randy's father and sister, Dr. Lasher. They told me Aggie knew Randy, from Rachel's Tent. Did you know that all these years?”

He picked up a letter opener and ran his fingers across the blade. “When Aggie was killed, the police asked us about Creeley. We told them the truth. Aggie never said anything about him. We'd never even heard his name.”

“Why—?” I stopped.

“Why didn't we tell you the police asked us about him? There was nothing to tell, Molly. Creeley had a solid alibi.”

Not so solid, I thought. I licked my lips. “The sister told me Aggie and Randy had a relationship.”

Dr. Lasher put down the letter opener. “And you believed her?” His wise eyes were full of reproach.

My face was warm. “She said they dated a few times. She said Randy wrote to you about it before he died.”

“Detective Connors showed us the letter Creeley wrote to us, and the locket they found on him. The one you gave her, Molly. But you know that.” He cleared his throat. “He was infatuated with Aggie. He probably told her he had feelings for her. . . .”

“Not
that
letter,” I said, wishing I were somewhere else, hating the fact that I'd caught my best friend's father in a lie. “The one he mailed a week before he died. The one where he talked about his relationship with Aggie.”

Dr. Lasher's face was flushed. “There was no relationship,” he said firmly. “The letter wasn't signed. It had just the initial
R.
The writer was sorry for our loss. He meant to write to us when she died. He knew we were good parents, that we wanted what was best for Aggie, that we must have been very proud of her.”

This sounded like the letter Trina had described. I was relieved to know she'd told the truth, at least about that. But I was surprised Randy hadn't signed the letter. “Did you tell the police about the letter?”

“About a condolence letter six years after the fact? I tossed it out.”

“Then why did Randy phone you, Dr. Lasher? I have his cell phone,” I added before he could deny it. I had no interest in trapping him in another lie. “I recognized your phone number.”

Dr. Lasher removed his bifocals and set them on his desk. “You've been in this room many times, Molly. There are hundreds of books here. Medicine and Torah. You think they're just books? They're my
life,
Molly. You think I would spend forty years trying to heal people, you think I would study the Torah for over fifty years, that I would study God's laws and violate them, that I would take a man's life?” He sounded more sad than angry.

“I need to know about the phone call.”

“You
want
to know. You don't
need
to know. All you need to know is that I didn't kill Randy Creeley.”

I thought about the gentle, caring man sitting five feet away from me, about the way he'd kissed the black leather boxes, about the black bag with its syringes and vials.

“About the phone,” I said. “It shows other calls Randy received, and some that he made. They might be evidence.”

“Evidence of what? The police say he overdosed.”

“I have to give the phone to the police, Dr. Lasher. I wanted to tell you before I call Detective Connors.”

“Are you asking me or telling me, Molly?” He put on his glasses. “If you're asking, my answer is: Do what you think is right.”

What was right? I'd been agonizing for hours over giving Connors the phone and subjecting Dr. Lasher to police scrutiny. I'd eliminated the call to the Lashers, but Connors could get a complete list of Randy's calls from the cell phone company. In a way I'd tampered with evidence—accidentally—but the call was evidence only if there was a crime, which Connors kept telling me wasn't the case. But if Dr. Lasher had nothing to fear . . . ?

“Did you talk to Randy, Dr. Lasher?”

“Will my answer help you decide?” He sounded as close to sarcastic as I'd ever heard him. “Creeley phoned the house the Tuesday evening before he died. Thank goodness I answered the phone, not Mrs. Lasher.”

“What did he say?”

“He told me he was the author of the letter I'd received. For a second I didn't know who he was. Then he said he'd worked with Aggie at Rachel's Tent. He was trying to make amends for things he'd done wrong. He had something of Aggie's and wanted to return it. It wasn't his to keep.”

My heart thumped. “The locket?”

“He didn't say. That's what I assumed. He told me how much he had liked Aggie, how sad he was about what happened. He'd written another letter, but he needed to see me. I told him I'd think about it and said I would call him back. My mind was reeling. How did this man get Aggie's locket unless he killed her? But maybe it wasn't the locket? Maybe he'd taken something from Aggie's desk. Creeley had a solid alibi. He sounded genuinely upset about Aggie. He was almost crying when he talked about her.”

“And then you phoned him back,” I said, phrasing my guess as fact.

Dr. Lasher nodded. “Early Wednesday morning. I was catching up with paperwork at home. He sounded nervous and said he couldn't talk long. He told me again that he felt terrible about Aggie's death. I asked him if he had her locket. He said yes. I asked him, ‘Did you kill my daughter?' It was a surreal conversation, Molly. He swore he didn't. He asked me to give him one day and he would tell me everything. He had to take care of something first, to make sure he wouldn't be putting someone in danger.”

The package, I thought, with a thrill of alarm.

“I didn't know what to believe. I thought, if he
did
kill Aggie, maybe he would confess to me more easily than to the police. Because he phoned me, right? He wanted to talk. Thursday morning I phoned Detective Porter, but he was out. I didn't leave a message. I was going to ask them to put a wire on me, you know? Like in a detective movie. Crazy.” Dr. Lasher shook his head. “A few hours later Detective Connors came here and told my wife that Creeley was dead, and that he had killed Aggie. I suppose Creeley was trying to do
teshuvah.
” Repentance. “I have to give him credit for that.”

“Did you tell Detective Connors about the phone calls?”

“To what end? Creeley was dead.”

“What if he didn't kill Aggie? You said he sounded genuinely upset.”

“That doesn't mean he didn't kill her, Molly. Just the opposite. He couldn't live with the guilt. Connors showed me the letter. Creeley said he wished he could undo what he did.
Halevai.
I wish it, too.”

“But what if he didn't?” I don't know why I was fighting Creeley's guilt. Because of the package, I think. And Trina's trashed apartment, and the redhead in the parking lot. “Don't you want her killer to be caught?”

Dr. Lasher looked stricken. “Can you even
ask
that, Molly?” he said with a profound sadness that shamed me and made me wish I could retract the question. “The first year that was my waking thought, and my last before I fell asleep. I davened to Hashem, ‘Let the police find the man who did this and bring him to justice.' And after that I davened, ‘Let me sleep one night without nightmares, or if not a night, a few hours. Let my wife laugh again. Let her walk into our daughter's room without crying. Let her go to someone's
simcha
and be able to share their joy with a full heart.' ”

I blinked back tears. “I'm sorry.”

“Do I want Aggie's killer caught? I think Hashem caught him. You know how I know? Because Thursday night I slept, Molly. And the next night, and the next. And Shabbos my wife said, ‘Let's go to Molly's
chossen
's
aufruf.
' So we went. And she's thinking about getting a new dress for your wedding. So I
know.
”

I should have left the room then, but I had one more question. “When you phoned me that night, Dr. Lasher, you told me no one had seen Aggie at the vigil.”

“Right.” He sounded cautious.

“You said something I never thought about till now. You asked me if I had any idea where Aggie might have gone. And then you said, ‘If you know something, Molly, please tell us.' And I was just wondering, why would you say that?”

“I don't know what you mean.”

There was a warning note in his voice, my last chance to back off. “Why would you think there was something I would keep from you and Mrs. Lasher? Unless you suspected that Aggie was seeing someone you wouldn't approve of, that she told me what she couldn't tell you.”

Dr. Lasher was looking somewhere beyond me. Then he smiled, and shook his head.

“I always told my wife, ‘Molly is bright, she doesn't miss anything.' ” Now he was looking at me, and I could see deep pain in his eyes. “A few months before she died, Aggie wasn't herself. I asked her what was wrong. She said the job was making her stressed. But one night I picked up the phone and heard her talking to a man, laughing with him, arranging a date for Saturday night. I waited for her to tell us about the date. She always told us. But she didn't say anything, not to me, not to my wife. Saturday night she said she was going with a friend to the movies. Which friend? I asked. Oh, you don't know her, another social worker.
Her,
not him. The next week she had to stay late for a meeting at work. How was it? I asked when she came home. Again, I knew she was lying, she was dating a man she couldn't bring home. And then all of a sudden it was over, and Aggie was Aggie again. I don't know what happened, why it ended. I didn't ask. She never said anything to you?”

I shook my head.

“Two dates, three dates—that's not a relationship. In the end Aggie knew what was right for her. She made her own decision. Creeley is dead, it's over. I'm not interested in finding out why he killed her. He loved her, he hated her.” Dr. Lasher shrugged. “It doesn't make a difference. I don't want Aggie's name in the papers. It's a good story. A sheltered, beautiful young woman falls in love with a handsome drug addict who kills her because her Orthodox Jewish parents forbid her to see him and six years later kills himself because he can't live with the guilt. It's not exactly the truth, but it's a good story. Maybe they'll write a book, or make a television movie. Is that what you want, Molly? For Aggie, for her mother?”

twenty-eight

Monday, February 23. 9:12 A.M. 1200 block of North
Vermont Avenue. A man walked up to a woman on
the street and said, “You're gonna be sorry, you and
your wonderful family,” then fled. The suspect is described as a 49-year-old African-American man standing 5 feet tall and weighing 165 pounds.
(Northeast)

HORTON ENTERPRISES OCCUPIED THE TENTH FLOOR IN one of those large office buildings on Wilshire east of Vermont, halfway to downtown and a block from the old Bullocks Wilshire where my mom bought the Priscilla of Boston wedding gown that none of us Blume girls would have worn even if it hadn't turned yellow in the garage.

The reception area was sleek—gray leather chairs, glass-and-chrome coffee and end tables, abstract art on walls papered in pale gray with a subtle burgundy stripe. The receptionist, an attractive woman in her thirties with shiny auburn hair and cognac-framed glasses so narrow that I wondered what she could see through them, offered me magazines and a cup of coffee.

“It might be a while,” she said.

From the apology in her voice I sensed I'd be in for a long wait, but after five minutes and only a few sips of very hot, very good coffee that I would have liked to finish, she told me Horton was ready to see me.

In person Horton was taller than he'd appeared in the photo in Bramer's office. Nine years had added lines and jowls to a face with a ruddy complexion and had thinned his silver-gray hair, which had been styled to camouflage the thinning. But he had an electric energy—his voice, his smile, the spring in his step—that a photo couldn't capture and that made him appear much younger.

After pumping my hand as though it were an oil derrick, he introduced me to his son, Jason, who was several inches shorter than Dad—around five-ten—with a slimmer face and dark hair. I had a moment of nervousness, but Jason didn't recognize me from the funeral. Both men were wearing navy suits that fit so perfectly they must have been custom tailored.

There were two burgundy leather armchairs. I took one, Jason took the other. Horton sat behind his desk, a beveled sheet of thick glass resting on a charcoal granite base as large as my kitchen which held a computer, a phone, pens, a Rolodex, a notepad, and a framed photo. Other office equipment and photos sat on a black-and-gray granite credenza, in the center of which was a simple tall glass vase with bloodred roses that explained the heady fragrance I'd noticed when I entered the room. Above the credenza hung a portrait of a young woman with curly brown hair and soulful eyes.

“My mother Katie, may she rest in peace,” Horton said with a catch in his voice when I asked him about the photo. “That's a blowup of one of the few pictures I had of her.”

I told him how inspired and moved I was by his story. Horton looked pleased. “I've had my share of rough times. Some people call it bad luck, but I think you make your own luck. And a little help from the good Lord doesn't hurt.” He smiled. “That's why I wrote the book, to give people hope. My mother didn't even have enough food to feed herself, let alone me. I think she would've been amazed and proud to see how I turned out. I just wish she'd lived to know my family. We had this taken Christmas.”

He turned the frame on his desk toward me and identified the people in the photo. His wife, Pam; Jason and his wife, Angie, and their year-old son, Tyler; his daughter, Kristen, and her husband and their two daughters, Nicole and Lisa.

His eyes lit up when he talked about his grandchildren. “They're my future,” he said, gazing at the young faces before he turned the photo around. “So you're writing about Rachel's Tent. I apologize that I'm not familiar with your work, but I did look you up on Google. Well, Jason did.” Horton smiled again. “I have this new computer, but I still prefer pen and paper, and most of what I know I keep up here.” He tapped his temple. “I read that you write true-crime books and a crime column. I'll have to get a copy of your latest, have you sign it for me. I hope you don't think there's anything criminal going on at Rachel's Tent.” He laughed.

“Dad.” Jason laughed, too, but he sounded embarrassed, as though his father had propositioned me.

“Miss Blume knows I'm kidding. Isn't that right?” he asked me.

“Absolutely. And I left my handcuffs at home.” I smiled. “I also write for several papers, including the
Times,
about all sorts of topics. Health, politics, gardening.”

Horton nodded. “Well, I hope your article reaches all the women who don't know about Rachel's Tent but could use help. Jason oversees the funding for the agency, so I thought you'd like to talk to him as well. What would you like to know?”

To tell you the truth, I'd come fishing. Bramer had set up the appointment, which hadn't interested me much until he asked me not to bring up Randy and drugs.

“Background information, for starters,” I said. “I Googled you, too, but I'd like to hear your story in your own words. Tell me about Horton Enterprises.”

“It's an umbrella company for a number of—well, I guess you'd call them enterprises.” Horton chuckled. “I started in property management, found out I was good at it. I'm a saver, Molly. I'm still driving the same Mercedes I bought seven years ago. I saved every nickel I earned, every dime. When I had enough, I invested in a property, then in another. When I had more, I bought a company that sold sports caps. I found out I could cut the price if I imported them. That led to importing other items, and then to other businesses. Jason?”

“We have land investments, an import-export business, oil wells, a printing company, medical supplies,” the son said, like a waiter informing me of today's specials. “We've invested in several tech companies and we're looking into fiber optics and genetic testing.”

Horton beamed. “Jason's my right-hand man. We're a team. Everything I know, he knows. You want to know the two most important rules in business, Miss Blume?” He nodded at his son.

“Diversification, and knowing when to cut your losses,” Jason said, a pupil who had learned his lesson well.

“Diversification, and knowing when to cut your losses,” the father repeated. “That's in my book, but I don't mind giving you a freebie. I've lived by those rules my whole life and I've never been sorry.”

“So you built up this business empire, and then you founded Rachel's Tent,” I said, trying to make a smooth segue. “I've heard some of the success stories. They're wonderful.”

Horton nodded. “It's all about giving back to the community, isn't it? That's what I've tried to teach my children. Pam shares my vision. She's very involved with a number of charities. So are Kristen and Angie.”

“I was interested in the red-thread packets I saw at Rachel's Tent,” I said. “Does one of your companies handle that?”

Horton turned to his son. “Jason?”

I felt as though I were watching a ventriloquist act. Horton pulled the strings, the dummy talked. I wondered if Jason felt the same way.

“We import the threads from Israel and do the packaging,” Jason said. “Our printing company does the envelopes. Rachel's Tent handles the sales.”

“To be honest, it's not a moneymaker,” his father said. “But not everything is about money. That's in my book, too.”

“Dr. Bramer mentioned that a man who worked at Rachel's Tent came up with the idea,” I said. “Randy Creeley?”

Horton looked as though I'd thrown cold water at him. Jason didn't look much happier.

“That's right,” Horton said, subdued. “Randy set everything up and handled it for a while. Then it got too big, so we took over.”

“You must have taken his death especially hard, since you helped him get the job.”

“It's painful,” he said quietly. “I had high hopes for that boy. I help a lot of people, but there was something about Randy. . . . I felt a connection because his mother abandoned his family. I even loaned him money to hire someone to find her. I spent more time with him than with some of the others, had him over to dinner often. I hoped Jason would be a good influence.” He nodded in his son's direction. “But you can't fight drugs. Randy's death is a tragedy for his family and friends. A goddamn waste.”

He sounded genuinely upset, and there were tears in his eyes. I debated, a little nervous to broach the next subject, but if you don't stir the pot . . .

“I talked to the manager of the apartment building where Randy lived,” I said. “Apparently he had expensive tastes. Beautiful furniture, a big-screen projection TV, a Porsche. I can't imagine he was earning enough at Rachel's Tent to afford all that.”

Horton tilted his head and stared at me as though I was a dartboard and he was aiming for a bull's-eye.

“I guess I should've paid attention to what I read on Google,” he said with the kind of quiet that's more intimidating than shouting and that told me I didn't want him as an adversary. “I thought you were interested in the women of Rachel's Tent.”

“I am. But I'm intrigued by Randy's story. Do you think he involved anyone else in his drug use?”

Something twitched in Horton's cheek. “Off the record?” he said after what seemed like a minute but was probably only seconds.

Jason had turned white. “Dad—”

Horton silenced his son with a look—the dummy was talking without permission. Then he turned to me. “Well?”

“Off the record.” I would have agreed to pretty much anything if it meant I'd finally be getting information.

“Around a year ago Dr. Bramer came to me in a panic. Someone left him an anonymous note saying Randy was selling drugs at Rachel's Tent. Randy denied it, of course. I was madder than hell. I'd given the guy a chance to make something of himself, taken him into my
home.
” Horton sounded pained. “Bramer worried that if we went to the police, they'd investigate everybody Randy came in contact with, and that would be the kiss of death for Rachel's Tent. And a third strike for Randy, so he might have been in prison for life. As angry as I was, I didn't want that on my head. So we let him go, and said he could tell people he'd quit. We didn't report him, but as far as I was concerned, Randy Creeley didn't exist.”

“You cut your losses,” I said.

“Exactly.” Horton nodded.

I told him that according to Gloria Lamont, Randy had made his major purchases, including the car, around five years ago.

Horton looked thoughtful. “Five years, huh? So he was probably dealing long before Bramer found out. You want to know the truth? Aside from the fact that Randy was jeopardizing Rachel's Tent—and that really hurt—I felt like a fool. I thought I was a better judge of character. I guess I was a bigger fool than I realized.”

I thought about the newspaper clipping. There had been an item about a drug bust that had resulted in a third strike for the offender. Had Randy kept that as a warning to himself? If so, the warning hadn't kept him from reverting to his old ways.

“What about the red-thread packets?” I asked. “Is that how Randy distributed the drugs?”

Father and son looked at each other.

“That's what we suspected,” Horton said. “We never found out for sure. But we took over the whole operation. Like I said, that was almost a year ago. I can promise you that the only thing in those packets now is red threads from the Holy Land. Does that answer your question?”

“Pretty much. I appreciate your candor.”

“Candor, hell.” Horton grunted. “If I didn't tell you, you'd go digging and find out anyway. I care about Rachel's Tent, Miss Blume. It took years of hard work and a lot of dollars to make it what it is today. All it takes is a couple of questions, a raised eyebrow, and the place is history. And then where do all those women go to get help?”

I reiterated that I wouldn't include what he'd told me in an article. A safe promise, since I didn't plan to write one. “Did Randy ever mention a man named Jim?”

Horton shook his head. “Doesn't ring a bell.”

Jason looked equally blank.

We talked awhile about Rachel's Tent. Horton hoped to establish two more centers, one in the San Fernando Valley and one in Southeast L.A. Under different circumstances I probably
would
have wanted to write about the agency.

“By the way,” I said as I was ready to leave, “Randy's sister told me he was trying to make amends for things he'd done wrong. Did he contact you?”

There had been no check next to Horton's name on the list Randy had written, so I assumed that if Randy had written a letter, he hadn't sent it. But there had been the phone calls. I wanted to see if Horton admitted to them.

“I'm glad you told me,” Horton said. “As a matter of fact, Randy phoned the office a couple of weeks ago. I couldn't take the call, and when I returned it, he wasn't in. That was the day he died. What day was that, Jason? Tuesday?”

“I think it was Thursday.”

Horton waved his hand. “Doesn't matter. The point is, when I heard he died, I felt terrible that we didn't have a chance to talk. I guess he wanted to go with a clean conscience. I have to give him credit for that. And maybe I wasn't completely wrong about him after all.”