Shadows of Doubt (35 page)

Since they had opted to skip breakfast until after their visit to Spank Me, they headed to their favorite pancake joint on the west side. Halfway through her short-stack, Lou got a text back from Frank with the name Toby Bender. As luck would have it, Mr. Bender just so happened to reside within ten miles of the diner.

“Guy’s name sounds like he should be in porn. How’d you come up with that info before me?” Vinny asked as he tossed the tip on the table.

“A hacker friend. Techs will come up with it eventually but this gives us a head start.” Lou yanked the check out of Vinny’s hand and raced for the cashier.

“Hey!” He shouted after her, but he was too late.

When they pulled onto Bender’s street they saw several LAPD black and white’s as well as the coroner truck.

“Uh oh.” Vinny said under his breath.

Lou nodded in agreement as they parked then got out of the car. When they flashed their badges and informed the uniformed officer at the perimeter why they were there, he directed them to apartment 4C, which just so happened to be the apartment of one Mr. Bender. They rounded the corner just as Carpesh was coming out of the apartment, barking orders at the techs and nearly running into Vinny’s chest.

“What, watch where you...” When Carpesh registered Lou’s presence his demeanor changed instantly. “... Detective Donovan!” He smiled at her brightly. “Er... and Detective DeLuca. What a surprise to see you here. Forgive me, I wasn’t watching where I was going.”

“No problem, sport.” Vinny hulked his shoulders to appear more intimidating to the rather small Carpesh. “You okay there?”

“Oh yes, no damage!” Carpesh chuckled nervously.

“What’s going on here Carpesh?” Lou interrupted Vinny’s alpha-male act.

“Ah, oh! Toby Clifford Bender, deceased. Isn’t that odd that his first name is actually Toby? Not Tobias? With such a formal middle name?” Carpesh wandered off topic.

“Yes, that is odd but how is he deceased?” Lou brought the apparently A.D.D. Carpesh back to the question.

“Oh yes, yes! So far I would have to say a clean cut case of suicide. Hung himself from the curtain rod in the only bathroom of the apartment. Quite a sturdy curtain rod for such a shabby place, don’t you agree?” Peter Carpesh was a pleasant man but Lou could see now why Vinny had his slang name for him.

Vinny rolled his eyes. “Yeah, you’d be right about that. Who’s the lead officer on this? Do you know?”

Carpesh turned and stuck his head back into Bender’s apartment and called out to someone inside. Turning back to Lou and Vinny he smiled again, very brightly at Lou. “Peretta is the lead, he’s coming. I best get back to work now. Its a pleasure seeing you both again. Let me know if I can be of any assistance.” Carpesh scooted past them and disappeared around the bend.

Moments later a mountain of a man came out of the apartment, peeling off his gloves. He was classic Latin coloring with eyelashes that looked like they were fake, they were so damn thick. Lou couldn’t help but stare.

“Detective Donovan?” The LAPD homicide detective extended his hand to her immediately and she broke from her eyelash envy to shake the man’s hand.

“Yeah, this is my partner, Vinny DeLuca.” She pointed and the man offered his hand to Vinny.

“A pleasure. I bet I can guess what brings you to my crime scene.” He said with a blinding smile. “Let me get you some gloves and booties then we can get you inside.” Detective Peretta walked around the corner then came back within moments holding out the required accessories.

When they entered the apartment, Lou instantly felt the strong urge to shower. It was not dirty as in dust or grime, it was dirty as in creepy twisted pervert lived there, which was obviously the case.

“Whoa.” Vinny gawked at the images of Katarina Purrs that were hung, taped or tacked to nearly every inch of wall space.

“Yeah.” Peretta nodded. “That’s exactly what I said when I walked in.”

The images of Purrs appeared to be blown up stills from her older films that depicted her in assorted lewd positions. Bender had obviously taken great care to pick all his favorites, even having some matted and framed. The studio apartment was small and dark with what little you could see of the walls being painted a ruby red. The brown shag carpet was strewn with black area rugs that appeared to be homemade cut outs of over-endowed women, like those mudflaps you see on eighteen-wheeler trucks. Nearly every counter top, table top or other flat surface had some sort of naked lady kitsch on it. Even the lamps that sat on each of the black plastic tables flanking the heavily abraded sofa were in the image of naked women holding umbrellas.

“I wonder if he liked naked women?” Vinny jested, making everyone in the room chuckle.

The coroner techs were just lifting Mr. Bender into the body bag when Vinny and Lou got to the bathroom which was also decorated in the naked lady theme. Toby Bender was five and a half feet on a good day and was just as creepy looking as his apartment led you to anticipate. He wore a 1970’s baby blue tuxedo, complete with ruffles. His hair was slicked to a high sheen and parted severely to the left. The early aroma of decomposition mingled with the overabundance of bad cologne to complete the pathetic scene.

“Guy dressed for the occasion, I see.” Lou had seen enough as the techs zipped him up.

“So over here is what I think you two will be interested in.” Peretta led them to the tiny computer desk in the corner of the main room of the apartment. The evidence marker drawing their attention to a carefully handwritten note on stationery with the same naked lady silhouette as the area rugs. In it, Bender had professed his adoration for Katarina Purrs as well as his devastation over her rejection of him. He further went on to say that he had killed her and marked her so he would be able to recognize her in her angelic form when he met her in heaven. He concluded with a brief notation of how he hoped he looked nice for her as he was wearing his favorite suit.

“Seriously?” Lou boggled over the note. “This twit whacked Purrs then offed himself?” It was very neat and tidy for public consumption and Lou wanted to call it for the crap that she knew it was, but Peretta placed a hand on her shoulder before she could.

“It would appear so.” He said to her, giving her a hairy eyeball to shut her up. It bit at her hard.

“Well hell, that sure brings an abrupt end to this. I was enjoying the freak show, too.” Vinny appeared to be very disappointed.

“I’ll have copies of all this sent to you right away so that you can close your files on it.” Peretta headed for the door and nodded to the forensics tech that was standing by to bag and tag the note.

“Thanks.” Vinny said as he followed Peretta out. “This all works out pretty damn nicely if ya ask me. I got a thing Friday so I won’t feel so guilty taking the time with this wrapped up.”

“You got a thing?” Lou asked as she followed the men. “What thing?”

“Well...” Vinny turned to her with a guilty look. “... I need a favor actually, kiddo.”

“I’ll leave you two to talk while I finish with my guys. Yell if you need anything.” Peretta winked at Lou as he took off around the corner.

“What, Vinny?” Lou grumbled at him even though the source of her ire wasn’t him.

“Well when the Captain called last night, he told me he got me a spot in Friday’s testing for the Lieutenant’s exam.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets and shuffled his feet.

“That’s great!” The reality of things hit Lou and she calmed down quite a bit. The necessity of the cover up coming into focus. “So what’s the problem?”

“Well Vera has had morning sickness ya know only it’s morning, noon and night sickness. Not to mention the friggin cravings! I’m on a first name basis with the guy that works the night shift at the mini-mart. So studying has been hit and miss for me. I was hoping I could take a personal day tomorrow and hide out at you’re uncle’s to study, and you would cover for me so Vera thinks I’m working. I don’t want to hurt her feelings but I’m nervous as hell about this test.”

Lou grinned at her partner and grabbed his arm, linking hers with his. “You bet!”

He blew out a breath, obviously relieved. “Thanks kiddo, I appreciate it a lot.”

They headed down the stairs and toward the car. “No worries. Besides, this way I’ll feel less guilty about taking Friday for this stupid thing I have to go to.” She didn’t think it was stupid at all, but had said that for Vinny’s benefit.

He looked at her with a raised brow. “What thing?” He mimicked her tone from moments ago and she snorted at his uncanny impression of her.

“An art charity fundraiser something or other, with my parents. Caroline is going with her family who came into town for it. She and my Mom want to go to some salon and get all girlied up for it. Bad enough I gotta go after work with Caroline tonight and get some fancy-shmancy dress I’ll only wear once.”

“Hey!” Vinny stopped in his tracks. “Get one you can wear to my kid’s wedding! Get a second use out of it eventually!”

Lou couldn’t help but smile at him. “That is a genius idea. I’ll keep the wedding in mind when I am picking it out.”

“Detective Donovan, a word if you could real quick?” Peretta yelled from the steps of the apartment and Vinny looked at him funny.

“Be right back, get the heater running.” Lou jogged back to the steps.

“My sincere apologies that you were not briefed on this. As soon as I arrived on scene and read the note, I called our Dom and informed him.” Peretta scanned the area to make sure that no one would overhear them. “It’s a serious stroke of luck that this freak wants to claim responsibility for Purrs. I was planning on contacting you as soon as I headed back to the station on this but, well, you just showed up!”

Lou looked at Peretta suspiciously. “You mean the note wasn’t a plant?”

“No! Not at all! This is legit all the way.” She could tell he wasn’t bullshitting her.

“Serious stroke of luck is an understatement. Thanks for letting me know.” She turned to head back to the car.

“I look forward to working with you in the future, Detective.” Peretta smiled as she walked away.

As she and her partner drove off, Lou could only think that her selfishness in wanting to scream cover-up almost cost Vinny study time for his test. She knew she would catch the rogue and that Max would make him pay dearly. So what difference did it make if some creepy, greasy freak took the public wrap for Katarina Purrs if it protected everyone all around? She would just have to make sure she caught the true murdering bastard before he could claim another victim.

Lou ducked out
of the building under the pretext of a stomach ache from the pancakes she had for breakfast which baffled Vinny because it was only a short-stack. When Lou felt she was safely tucked away in the back of the parking lot across the street, she called Max’s suite in the hope that someone other than him would answer, that she could throw her fit at and they could give him the message. Unfortunately, Frank didn’t wait long enough for her to get started before he handed the phone to Max.

“I’m certain you think this was staged Detective but I assure you the note and Mr. Bender’s suicide as well as everything you saw at the crime scene was one-hundred-percent genuine.” Max got it all out before she could say one word. It was highly deflating. “Detective? Are you still there?”

“Yes, dammit, I’m still here!” Her tone even sounded deflated and she knew he could tell.

“Good...” Lou could have sworn he sounded a little panicked. “... then to support my case I would suggest you look at Mr. Bender’s rantings on certain blugs so you can see that I am telling you the truth. Frank will text you with the web addresses.”

“Blugs?” She thought for a moment. “You mean blogs?”

“What?” She could hear him muttering under his breath then heard Frank whispering in the background. “Yes yes! Blogs, whatever they are!”

Lou grinned at Max’s obvious embarrassment. “It’s okay, I know old guys like you have a tough time adapting to these newfangled sources of communication and information. You should have seen Vinny this morning with his new headset for his cellphone.”

“Very funny, Detective.” Max grumbled. “And Vinny looks easily fifteen years older than I do. Now take advantage of the bone the Fates have thrown us with Bender and lets focus on the real murderer, shall we?”

She considered for a moment. “Blood-Swear?” She recalled Abby and Caroline telling her it was the most sacred of all swears to the Sanguinostri.

“What?” He sounded surprised by her request.

“Will you Blood-Swear that Bender’s suicide is for real and has no Sanguinostri prints on it?” She posed it clearly for him.

“If that’s what you wish, I’ll come by this evening and do so.” He hadn’t hesitated.

“Nah, that’s okay. The fact that you’re willing is good enough. See you Friday.” She hung up before he could say a word, and headed back across the street.

By the time she got back to her desk Frank had sent her several web addresses to various blogs dedicated to the worship of Katarina Purrs and other vintage porn stars. All of them had Purrs’ murder as the hot topic and there were plenty of comments from readers who both loved and hated the woman. Another consistency was the poster who went by the screen name of ‘Toby_Purrs4Kat’ basically spamming each site right about the time the media broke the story of her death. The numerous posts were filled with his professed love for Purrs and his grief over having had to kill her because he loved her too much to let her go. Apparently, in his mind, as evidenced by much earlier posts that spanned over several months at least, he and Purrs were involved in a torrid romance. His last post on each site was within several minutes of one another and they apologized to everyone for taking such a gift from God away from her fans and that he was leaving to meet her. Lou was willing to bet that Bender’s time of death was right around the time of the last post.