Skies of Ash (24 page)

“Certainly,” he said.

“So why commodities?”

“I like making money, but I also like predicting
what
will make money. I like tangible trading—items people use every day rather than numbers and theory. Feels more…
honest.
Back when I was getting started, I didn’t care about buying yachts and fancy cars. I enjoyed learning about the world and predicting whether or not I was right in what I’d learned. Of course, I never admitted that to my parents. I told them that I wanted to go into finance to help churches and poor folks.” He placed his bare feet on the coffee table. “You know: level the playing field for the Lord’s people.”

“A Christian Warren Buffett,” I said.

“I’m not that bright. I simply invested my parents’ money and tripled it in rice, wheat, and gold. Then, they’d tithe ten percent, put more into the plate for the church’s building fund, and save the rest. Yeah: I made them a lot of money. To be completely honest, I’m shocked that I’m still doing it. I’m tired of it, frankly. Maybe I’m too old. And now, with tsunamis and superstorms and droughts, it’s getting harder to predict with any accuracy. More than that, I don’t have that
hunger
anymore. I thought I’d be out of it by now, but what can I say? I love the game but hate the people.”

“Ha. I can say the same.”

He smiled. “Guess you could.”

I narrowed my eyes. “If you hate it, why do you do it?”

“My wife.” He gave a one-shouldered shrug. “And if
you
hate it, solving murders and dealing with the worst in society, why do
you
do it? I’m sure your husband isn’t forcing you to risk life and limb every day.”

I faked a grin—I didn’t hate it. I loved it, and the promise of making someone’s family whole rocked my boat. But when in Rome… “Correct: My husband isn’t forcing me. He wanted me to be a lawyer. So did my mother. She didn’t get over my decision. I thought he had, but…” I shrugged.

“My wife wanted me to be a broker more than
I
wanted to be a broker,” Chatman said. “If I had quit, she would’ve gotten rid of me. I guess that will change. Unfortunately. I can quit anytime I want now. Didn’t want to end it like this, though.”

“Get rid of you,” I said. “What do you mean by that?”

“It’s a joke, Detective,” he said with a grin. “I married up in some ways, and so I don’t always think that I deserved her. My job was the only interesting thing about me. Without that, why would she stay?” His smile widened. “You’ve been married for how long?”

“Not as long as you,” I said.

“With
your
job, though, I’m sure you two never run out of things to talk about. Your job is the stuff that makes TV and movies.”

“You’d be surprised.”

He rolled his eyes. “You’re attractive and brave and good at what you do. I’m sure your husband thinks, How did I win the grand prize? Will she find out I’m a fraud, a fake? And when she does find out, will she leave me?”

My chest tightened—I no longer believed that to be true. “Things change.”

“They do.” He saw something in my expression, and he frowned.

I shifted in my seat—there had also been a flicker in his eye, and I saw my chance to open the door and peek into his failing marriage. “Little did I know back then… Life was supposed to be romantic dinners, roses, and vacations…” I shook my head. “Things change. I said that already, didn’t I?”

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “The last time my wife and… I know: TMI, but she’d just
lain
there, not moving, hating me for wanting her. Used to be that she couldn’t go a day without touching me. Things change, as we’ve said three times now.”

“It’s like, don’t they realize?” I said. “There are countless people who would trade spots with them just like that.” I snapped my fingers.

“I wanted to tell her just once,” he said, “ ‘
You
need
me
.
You’d be lost without me
.’ There can only be one flower, though. But that flower still needs a gardener to tend to it, to water it, to put it in sunlight. You could say that the gardener is God.”

I covered my throat with my hand so he couldn’t see my pulse pounding in my neck.

“I did everything I could to make her love me,” he said as he stared at the last splash of salmon-colored soup in the bowl. “Even on Monday night. She’d made roast for dinner. Oh my
Lord
, I hated her roasts. She never flavored or basted the meat, and then she cooked it until it was so dry, it could tear out your teeth.”

“Bet you never told
her
that,” I said, forcing lightness into my tone.

He grinned. “Hell no. I ate it because that’s what husbands—and wives—do. Eat shit like quinoa and eggplant and meat that defangs…” He jerked, suddenly aware of his candor.

I nodded to assure him. “But you pretend and eat and dance around the crevasse that’s eating up your life a little bit each day.”

“Amen.”

“Amen,” said the spider to the fly.

He hugged a small pillow to his chest, then rubbed his chin against the nubby fabric.

“Despite the obvious difficulties you and Juliet had,” I said, “hell, that
any
married couple has—would you say that you otherwise had an open, honest relationship?”

He considered me with a lifted eyebrow.

I smirked. “Answer as best as you can.”

He tossed the pillow to the ground. “Okay. Honest relationship?” Head back, he exhaled. “Well… Back when we were young, my wife trusted me and believed everything I told her. Naïveté, I guess. She was too young and too inexperienced to believe otherwise.”

“To believe that you weren’t always as forthcoming as you should be?”

“Good word: forthcoming.” He flicked his hand. “Detective Norton, you know better than that. Everyone lies. Even you.”

“They do,” I said. “Even me. Earlier this evening, I got a call from our forensics investigator.”

He slid his index finger alongside his thumb. “Oh?”

“Back on the morning of the fire, we found blood and needed to know whose it was.”

“Blood? That’s strange. No one was injured…
like that
. Right?”

I touched my forehead like Colombo always did. “Oh, yeah. I should mention that the blood wasn’t found in the
house
. It was found in your
car
.”

He bolted upright. “What? Why? How…?”

“I’m hoping you can answer the what, why, and how.”

Flummoxed, he blinked. “I… I have no idea whose blood it is. My son’s? He was always bustin’ himself up from skateboarding… My wife’s? No. Can’t be, since she never drove my car.” His eyes darted this way and that as his mind turned over every pebble of possibility. “Although she did…” He sat still as the memory gelled. “Two weeks ago, we were going… somewhere and…” His voice trailed off, then he pinched his earlobe and squinted—the memory had been a mirage. “She could’ve had a bloody nose. She’d been having those recently.”

“To help advance the case,” I said, “we need your help with something. We would like a sample of your DNA to match against the blood we found.”

He gaped at me.

“We won’t ask you any questions as the tech takes the sample,” I explained. “And if it makes you feel more comfortable, we can do it here whenever you want. You can even have Ben Oliver or another attorney with you.”

He blinked several times until his brain screamed, “Found it!” and he pushed a smile onto his lips. “If you think it’s important, sure, I’ll do it. No problem, Detective. We’ll figure out a good time.”

That was easy. “A few more questions and I’ll let you rest.”

By now, dark circles had formed in the cloth beneath his armpits. His sweaty face relaxed some, but his left knee bounced.

“You have a storage unit in Culver City,” I said.

Loathing—of me, of this unscheduled chat—gripped his face and clenched his jaw. “Yes, I do.”

“When I receive the warrant to search it, what will I find in that unit?”

His face twitched, and he swallowed several times until those facial nerves had settled down. “Work-related items. Old files. Reference materials. Nothing strange. No bodies, if that’s what you’re wondering. I only rented it once Cody started burning anything that belonged to me.” A chuckle erupted from his gut as anger smoldered in his eyes. “Why do you need to search my storage unit? How is it related to my family’s… to the fire?”

Unblinking, I said, “I’m not at liberty to say.”

There was a knock on the door.

Chatman and I stared at each other until he shouted, “Come in.”

The door opened, and Sarah Oliver, still dressed in white, stepped across the threshold. And the once too-warm guest-house grew as cold as Nunavut in January. “Excuse me for interrupting,” she said, her tone a mix of silk and ice cubes. “But, Christopher, our first guests will be arriving soon and—”

“Right.” To me, he said, “An old friend from UCLA is coming early. He’s the only person I plan to see tonight.”

“Before I forget,” I said. “Do you know where your wife’s car keys are? We’ve been looking but haven’t found them.”

He took a second before he shrugged. “Usually, she left them on the breakfast bar. I think I saw them there before I left the house Monday night.”

I rose from the love seat. “I’ll let you get to it, then.”

“Maybe next time you’ll call,” Sarah Oliver said.

“Probably not,” I replied.

She led me from behind up those slick steps and past the party canopy to the front of the house, all without saying a word. A marvelous trick—I was the Alaskan husky and she was the driver who didn’t need to shout, “Mush!”

I wanted to stop in my step and ask, “What the hell is your deal?” But I didn’t.

Once I reached the curb, though, pissiness trumped manners. So I placed my hands on my hips and turned around.

I was standing there alone.

Sarah Oliver had deserted me.

I hadn’t even noticed.

A marvelous trick.

CHRISTOPHER CHATMAN’S STORAGE UNIT WAS LOCATED IN THE INDUSTRIAL
section of Culver City, behind a Sizzler steakhouse and a store that sold custom kitchen counters. As I drove into the complex, I spotted Pepe’s silver Impala. Luke, in the passenger seat, was gnawing on a fried chicken drumstick. Pepe, behind the steering wheel, was smoking and texting on his cell phone. And Colin… was MIA.

“He’s still coolin’ off,” Luke said, climbing out of the car.

Pepe took a final drag from his cigarette and tossed the butt to the concrete. “He’s definitely on L.T.’s shit list right now.”

“He can’t help it,” Luke said. “He’s just a boy.”

“He’s twenty-eight years old,” I snapped.

Luke grinned at me. “Then, it’s something else. What could it be,
ese
, that’s makin’ the young detective loopy and stupid?”

I looked up to the sky—the moon was missing tonight, hidden by a silver marine layer. “To be honest? I’ve run out of fucks to give. Shall we, gentlemen?”

154… 167… 169…
Orange door after orange door. A graveyard for people’s crap. A mecca for people’s mess. I had searched units like these before and had found bikes, dinette sets, bloody knives, and the decapitated head of a hooker shoved into a kitchen trash bag.

Unit 173 looked just like the others. Dirt and dead leaves had piled at the bottom of the door, and no one had rolled up that door in a week or so.

As we waited for the manager of the storage facility, Pepe smoked as Luke picked chicken from his teeth. My mind was clogged with so much space junk that it threatened to blink out. I closed my eyes but couldn’t send it all to my mind’s black hole.

Finally, Sudanek Tomschik joined us. He was a squat man who smelled of cabbage and phlegm. “Please I see the paper once again?” His voice was Slavic and as jangled as keys in a can of nails.

Pepe handed Sudanek the search warrant.

The old man’s gray caterpillar eyebrows lifted and dropped as he read. Then, he pushed out cabbage air from his diaphragm, and said, “
Spasibo.
” He tapped the unit’s combination into a digital keypad. Once a hidden mechanism clicked, he pulled up the metal door. Stale air washed over us.

I shone my flashlight into the darkness.

Box… Box… Six boxes total…

“There a light?” I asked Sudanek.

“
Dah
.” He slapped the wall.

Boom!

Fluorescent light crackled from the grimy tubes running along the ceiling. Nothing changed. Boxes, but no cobwebs, no dinette sets, no bodies… yet.

Pepe walked Sudanek back toward the business office.

Luke and I pulled on blue latex gloves and stared at the space in silence.

My phone vibrated: Syeeda.

“Busy right now,” I told her, “unless you have something I need.”

She chuckled. “Ben Oliver was suspended by the bar ten years ago.”

“For?”

“Withholding evidence.”

I shrugged. “Not related.”

“I’ve also been Facebooking.”

“With whom?”

“A former colleague of Juliet Chatman’s.”

My throat closed, and I croaked, “Go on.”

“Seems she didn’t willingly leave pharma sales,” Syeeda said. “Her expense account was audited in 2004. Many things came up, including two unauthorized stays at the Four Seasons Newport Beach. The colleague says Juliet went both times with someone
not
her husband. The firm didn’t press charges, but she had to pay up and get the hell out.”

“But you’re not gonna write that story,” I said.

“Knowing this helps me and it helps you. Fills out the story.”

“So will you also write that Cody regularly bullied little girls and set shit on fire all the time?”

Syeeda didn’t speak.

“Let’s hold off on character assassinations for the moment, okay? For what it’s worth, everything you told me is good to know. And if you would kindly forward that ex-colleague’s contact information, I’d appreciate it. Thanks, pal.”

She sighed and hung up without saying good-bye.

An affair in 2004
. This happened the year Chloe had been conceived. Did one thing relate to the other? Hell, did one thing
lead
to the other?