Unwanted Company - Barbara Seranella (7 page)

"
How is it that you have this number?" he
asked.

"That's a little complicated," Munch said.
"Look, I'm just looking for this guy. He, uh, owes me money."

"This Raleigh Ward."

"Yeah."

"
Why would you look for him here?"

"
I'm just trying all the numbers I have for
him."

"
When did he rent your limo?"

"Last night. Are you going to tell me what's
going on?"

"
I want you to write down everything you know
about this Raleigh Ward: when you picked him up, where all you took
him, and who else was with him. Do it now while it's still fresh, I'm
going to be sending out a detective to interview you." She gave
him the information he'd requested. "You going to be home for
the next couple of hours?"

"
You're going to send someone else?"

"I'll send Detective Cassiletti. You remember
him, don't you?"

"
I remember everything. How's your dad, by the
way? Are you still living in that train car? I drive by there every
once in a while, but I never see anyone home. What's Mrs. St. John
doing?"

"
I'm right in the middle of something right
now," he said. "I can't talk. We'll make some time later on
and catch up, all right?"

"
Yeah, sure we will."

Mace rubbed his eyes. He seemed to have a knack for
disappointing the women in his life. "No, really, I've been
meaning to give you a call," he said.

"
Sounds great,"
she said without enthusiasm, and hung up.

* * *

"
What was that all about?" Cassiletti
asked.

"Just one of those small-world things,"
Mace said, hoping that was the truth. He peeled off the page with her
address on it and handed it to Cassiletti. "When we're finished
here, go on over to her house and find out everything she knows with
a connection to our deceased." Mace flipped to a fresh page in
his notebook. "Let's go check out the one in the bedroom."

The two detectives walked into the second death
scene. Again, there was a notable absence of blood. Floodlights
illuminated the corpse of the second woman and the odd postmortem
field dressings. She was faceup, lying on a queen-size bed with a
wrought-iron headboard. The bedspread beneath her was strangely
unwrinkled. Her right arm was bent so that her palm was pressed to
her chest. Similar white X's of tape crisscrossed her abdomen and
chest. Conscience or trademark? Mace wondered.

The Band-Aid Killer had evolved. Bringing his own
supplies to the scene showed forethought—organization. Whatever
else this act signified, it also informed the detectives that these
murders had not been a spontaneous act. The killer must have come
with a plan. How else could he have subdued two victims with so few
signs of disturbance? And where had he done his killing? In the
bathtub?

Mace remembered how, back in December, a reporter had
asked him to comment on the nature of the brutal Westwood slaying.
The guy had asked if the murderer was a serial or a spree killer.

Mace's reply had been picked up by the wire services
and broadcast across the country. He'd said then what was still true.

"
Call it what you want," he told them. "I'm
not interested in the latest pop-psychology term. I don't have
college degree upon college degree. I don't know if this guy wet his
bed or how he felt about his mother. I do know one thing. He'll kill
again."

Mace looked down at the
corpse, feeling no satisfaction at the accuracy of his call.

* * *

When Raleigh's phone had rung at eight o'clock that
morning, he'd answered with a groan. Victor Draicu, code name
Gameboy, wanted to drive to Tijuana for the day. Though what the guy
expected to find there, Raleigh didn't understand at first. He'd
tried to explain that there'd be no mariachi bands greeting them or
señoritas in twirling skirts clicking castanets. The border towns
were depressing. Nothing but dirt roads and abject poverty. Was he
homesick? Tijuana was where one went to buy fireworks, horseshit
cigarettes, and cheap pottery. Was he interested in any of those
things?

Victor wanted to see a donkey fuck a woman, he said.
Take him to one of those places.

Raleigh called in to his supervisor for approval.
Document everything he was told, but keep the guy happy. He said,
yeah, he knew the drill. Victor was an Eastern Bloc celebrity—a
former gold-medal winner and currently a minor bureaucrat in charge
of the Romanian Olympic gymnastic team, which gave him mobility and
accessibility. Romania alone had had the backbone, or blatant
self-interest, depending on how you saw it, to break the Olympic
boycott by Mother Russia. The L.A. Olympic Committee was delighted
and showed it by giving the Romanians special considerations.
Transportation was provided, lodging at the USC village. There were
even promises to broadcast television feeds back to Romania. On the
personal front, Victor had some interesting family connections in
Bucharest. He would be a useful asset, and Raleigh had orders to bend
over backward to make sure that happened. Even if all this effort
resulted in merely one defection, it would be a major coup for the
people who kept track of that sort of thing—especial1y in an
election year.

At first the operation had seemed like a waste of
both his time and talent. Escorting Victor while the man fulfilled
adolescent fantasies depressed him no end. It was not an assignment
that taxed his considerable abilities, and it made him give serious
thought to the wide-open world of freelancing. His Green Beret
credentials alone were worth major bucks in the up-and-coming
countries. Hell, he could get good work in Africa, Saudi Arabia, or,
shit . . . even go back to Eastern Europe. But then, just as Raleigh
had almost given way to despair, a remarkable opportunity had opened
up. An opportunity that men such as he often dreamed of. A simple
defection of some low-level Romanian party boy? No, Raleigh's sights
were set much higher.

Victor Draicu had some product he was interested in
selling: four kilograms of weapons-grade plutonium "lost"
while en route to a conversion facility in Bulgaria that would
transform the stuff into reactor-grade plutonium. He came to America
hoping to generate an auction among the intelligence-community
representatives of competing countries. The information and the means
to capitalize on it were going to be Raleigh's ticket out of ex-wife
purgatory.

All that said, Victor was still a royal pain. The
broads had been hired for the whole night, and the asshole takes a
cab back to the hotel in the middle of the night. Was he trying to
get Raleigh written up? What if something had happened to the guy? He
could have gotten mugged or hit by a car. If the asshole died, that
would blow everything.

Mexico. Fucking wonderful.

Raleigh told the limousine dispatcher, a woman with a
Southern accent, that he'd need the car for the whole day. When he
told her that he wanted to go to Mexico for some shopping, she had
laughed.

"
Thanks for the warning," she said. "I
won't send a blond woman. You know what they think of blondes down
there, don't you?"

"
Yeah," Raleigh said, "good thinking.
Don't send a blonde."

Victor would be wanting to
hump her, too, and there were already enough complications. One of
Victor's first demands early in the negotiation process had been that
before and after the sale of the product, he would have full freedom
of movement or no deal. Rules were being bent and broken all across
the board on his behalf. Raleigh went along, knowing that ultimately
he held the trump card. He knew why Victor could never go back home.
Raleigh opened the drawer of his nightstand and perused his
collection of prescription pill bottles. It felt like a
two-Benzedrine kind of morning.

* * *

When the driver appeared with the limousine, Raleigh
was just starting to come to life. The limo company had sent a
different driver—a redhead. He rubbed his temples, hoping she
wasn't a big talker. She was already almost too much to handle this
early in the day, with her flamboyant hairdo, hoop earrings, and
exposed cleavage. He handed her a hundred-dollar bill and told her to
go to the Beverly Wilshire.

She folded the bill and stuck it in the front pocket
of her tight jeans

"Where's Munch today? be asked

"
She took the day off. My name is Ellen. You
just sit yourself back and enjoy the ride, sugar."

"
Call me Raleigh," be told he. "Did we
speak earlier?"
 

"
Yes, we surely did."

"You mind stopping for coffee somewhere first?

"
You are the boss, Raleigh."

He felt the tingling of the amphetamine dissolving in
his bloodstream. A small sigh of appreciation escaped his lips.
Sunshine in a bottle. He moved across the back of the limo,
positioning himself so that he could watch her face. "So how
long you been a chauffeurette?" he asked, taking out his tin of
peppermints.

She hesitated a second, caught his eyes in the
rearview mirror, and said, "Four years."

"Bet you've seen a lot of shit," he said,
popping two Altoids into his mouth and chewing them.

She laughed. "I have had my moments, that is for
damn sure."

He switched over so that he was sitting on the
rear-facing bench seat. He leaned over toward her, his elbow resting
on the sill of the privacy partition. "Where are you from,
Ellen? No, wait a minute, don't tell me. Georgia?"

She opened her mouth wide in amazement, then said,
"Why, you clever thing, you. You are exactly right. Only next
time, put your hand over your heart when you speak of the South."

"I bet you keep your boyfriend on his toes."

She looked at him warily in the rearview mirror. "I
have had my moments with him also," she said, as they pulled
into the parking lot of a small bakery. "Is this all right?"
He followed her gesture.

"
Yeah, this is great. You want anything? Coffee,
pastry, rain check?"

She smiled at the last. "You are not without
your charm, Mr. Raleigh Ward. I can see a girl might have to watch
herself with you."

The limousine eased to a stop, taking up two spaces,
and he jumped out. She didn't know how right she was.
 
 

CHAPTER 6

Before Detective Cassiletti arrived, Munch walked
across the street with Asia and banged on Derek's door. He answered
several minutes later with his shirt off and hair tousled.

"
What's up?" he asked.

"
My limo is gone," she said.

He scratched his chest and stretched. She supposed
the action was his attempt to draw her attention to the well-defined
muscles of his tanned torso. She made a note to herself to warn Asia
to watch out for men with perfect tans when she reached the dating
years.

"Yeah, I know," Derek said, smiling
proudly. "I helped Ellen get it ready."

"You know where she went?"

"
Somewhere blondes shouldn't go."

"
What's that supposed to mean?" she asked.

"
I don't know. I just heard her tell the guy on
the phone that she wouldn't send a blonde."

"You know who the customer was? Did she tell you
a name or anything?"

"No. I knew it was a guy cuz she kept saying,
'Sir.' Is there a problem?"

"
Yeah, there's a big problem. She's not on the
policy. If anything happens to the limo while she's driving . . . "

"
Well, don't get mad at me. I was just trying to
help. You didn't even thank me for bailing you out last night."

"
I didn't want to wake you."

"
And now you're climbing my tree cuz your friend
wanted to make you some money."

"
Derek, I'm not blaming you for anything."
She waited a second instead of blurting out something that would
really alienate him like,
When are you going
to grow a conscience?
Or more to the point,
Why do you always manage to keep track of
every little favor you've ever done for me while conveniently
forgetting all the money and effort I've poured down the Derek drain?
She fixed what she hoped was a nonaccusatory expression on her face,
and asked, "Did she say anything else that you remember? A name,
a place, anything?"

"Nope, she just said 'Adios' and split."

"Adios? You mean, she said that literally?"

"Yeah."

"
Tell me everything she said, word for word."

"
That was about it." He scratched his head.
"Oh, yeah, she asked if I wanted her to bring back any
fireworks?

Munch felt a surge of adrenaline disrupt her stomach.
The blonde thing and the fact that Ellen's note indicated that she
expected to be gone all day and possibly longer had already made
Munch nervous. Now this last bit of information confirmed it. Ellen
had taken the limo to Mexico.

The next call Munch would probably get would be from
some Mexican jail asking her to come down and bring cash. She grabbed
Asia's hand and walked back across the street. There was no way she
could cover herself without getting Ellen in trouble. She would just
have to wait and hope that Ellen didn't do anything extreme. It was a
slim hope.