Chapter 25
TWENTY-FIVE
Rikki
I could have kissed Lucas for telling me about Julie’s mail. Truth be known, I could have kissed him, anyway, wanted to, more than I’ve wanted anything with any man since that crazy night with Den Hamilton.
There’s a humming in the back of my head now, like a love song playing softly in the next apartment, just loud enough to hear if you stop to listen.
I don’t just look at myself in a mirror now.
I examine—wondering if my minimalist makeup plays all right, if my manicure-scissors-clipped hair is really fun, as my stylist insists, or just weird.
Is my natural peach-fuzz color honest or bizarre?
Then there’s my hair, in general. Should I keep it defiantly short like this, or let it grow?
And my body of course. Damn. I make even myself ill. Thank God no one else can hear my sudden detour into Vanity Land.
I’ve dealt with this delicious indecision only one other time in my life, with Den Hamilton.
And when he became my boss, and that relationship ended before it began, I paid big-time dues.
Swore I’d never revisit that Fantasy Island again.
Now here I am, ready to head there tomorrow, on a sailboat, no less.
It’s the worst and best part of being a woman.
I hate it.
I love it.
And I can’t stop wondering if Lucas Morrison really likes me.
It has to be business today, and I will see that it is.
We are going to Julie Larimore’s home. I’m sure Lucas hasn’t shared those plans with Bobby Warren, but I could be wrong.
Loyalty is his strength, just as tenacity is mine.
It’s good to know your strength, as Lucas pointed out, so that you can also know your weakness.
I meet him there, because as much as I’d like to ride in the same car with him, I feel more secure with my own wheels. Embarrassed that I spent so much time self-evaluating and primping, I pulled on, at the last minute, allblack everything, without stopping to think which or what.
Now I stand outside a discreet condominium complex, vaguely visible through what look like castle gates.
I see his smooth gray little car, something retro that’s supposed to remind those who can remember them and those who’d like to of the Datsun 240Zs.
It slides up beside me; I jump in, smelling crisp fabric and that citrus scent of his before we can as much as look at each other.
“I appreciate this,” I say. How formal and stupid is that?
“I trust you.” I can almost taste the words, and I can feel the sweet decency that caused him to speak them.
“I’ll earn that trust,” I say, looking straight ahead into the jungle of this remote complex. “I promise.”
“Bobby W insisted we pay all of Julie’s bills and her house payment, as well as the lease on her Mercedes, which is a company car, anyway. That’s why I have a key. It’s his way of gambling that she’s coming back.”
“If he really talked to her on the phone, she might be.”
“If.”
Now I have to turn, but his face is stone, all profile and posture. “I’m sure she will,” he says.
I go the friendly reporter route. “I’m glad you’re letting me take a look at it. Once I see the place, maybe I’ll think of something I didn’t before.”
“That’s what I’m hoping,” he says.
He stops to retrieve Julie’s mail, and we pull into the garage in front of the gated unit. He’s dressed down, as well, in a shirt that skims over his muscles and jeans, with which he’s wearing what I can only call boat shoes. The bruise still welts the area beneath his eye.
As if feeling my gaze, he stops, and even with the dark glasses, I can see his eyes soften into the way they looked yesterday when we were on the sailboat.
“What is it?” he asks.
“Nothing. I was just thinking this is the second time I’ve seen you without a tie.”
“But not the last time, I hope.”
His voice makes it sound erotic. I don’t answer, moving instead into the living room.
From the moment we close the door behind us, I feel like an intruder. This sequestered place is not used to visitors. Its white carpet bordered in blush-toned tile is so pristine that it’s disturbing to imagine someone living with it.
I move along the tile, not wanting to sully the carpet with my shoes. The small kitchen, also tiled, with its brushed stainless-steel refrigerator and stove, looks as though it has never been used.
“Julie didn’t do much entertaining, I take it.” I realize I am almost whispering.
“She’s pretty reclusive.” Lucas carries the briefcase he’s taken from the car. “The gym is at the end of the hall.”
I follow him down more tile and into a room that looks larger than it is because three of its four walls are floor-to-ceiling mirrors.
Exercise equipment gleams in the center.
I turn away from my reflection, but there is no place to hide.
On the single unmirrored wall, the Killer Body poster hangs, framed.
You’ve Got to Want the Body. What must it be like to work out here every day with only one’s own reflection and that poster?
“The personal trainer worked with her here?” I ask.
“Yes. It’s not unusual, especially not for high-profile people. Julie’s a perfectionist about her body.”
I survey the minimalist decor. “And apparently everything else.” He’s still holding the briefcase. “You brought her bank statements?” I ask, hoping he hasn’t changed his mind.
“I brought everything.”
He walks past the mirror into the room across from the gym.
It, too, is immaculate, with an L-shaped glass desk, a computer on the short end of it and three white laminate bookshelves.
I go straight to them—motivational books with titles like Go for the Gold, tapes with similar titles.
I pick up a magazine, her photograph on the cover, then put it back down on the shelf.
She must have photographs, letters, mementos.
No one can live with just books and exercise equipment.
An aluminum-toned file cabinet squats on casters beside the desk.
“Have you checked that out?” I ask Lucas.
“Of course not.” His disapproving look reminds me how much he’s already compromised himself to let me in here, and I don’t want to push it. “The police went through the place, of course, because they wanted to determine if there were any signs of foul play.”
“There weren’t?”
“No. And the Mercedes is gone, as well. There’s no reason for them to think she didn’t leave of her own accord.”
I have to restrain myself from touching the file cabinet. Instead, I ask, “Did you open any of her mail besides the bank statements?”
“Just the bills,” he says. “Bobby W doesn’t want to intrude into her life more than necessary. He just wants to make it as easy as possible for her to return.”
“He’s convinced she’s alive?”
He nods and opens the briefcase. “Since the phone call, more than ever.”
We spread the contents out on the surface of the glass desk. Each bank statement has miniature photocopies of her checks, all neatly printed with her flourish of a signature, a name that is drawn rather than written. Julie Larimore. No middle initial.
Most of the checks are recurring. PG & E, mortgage company.
A second mortgage company. Utilities, routine obligations not so different from my own.
Among them, a credit card payment, several to Whole Foods Market, a couple to a doctor’s office and several made out to Raymond Scott.
I begin to shuffle the statements, checking the dates and amounts. One hundred, two hundred, two fifty.
“This must be the trainer,” I say. “How much does he charge?”
“Probably a hundred an hour, anyway.” Lucas leans over me, and I can feel his breath on my neck. “Yes, that’s Blond Elvis, the personal trainer, although I didn’t know she worked with him that often.”
I look up at him. He still hasn’t moved. “I guess,” I say, “we’d better start making phone calls.”
“It won’t be difficult to find him.”
He straightens up, and I can tell he’s having second thoughts.
“I’d also like to borrow those bills,” I say.
“I don’t know how Bobby W would feel about that.”
“He doesn’t have to know. I’m sure you’re not going to tell him that you let me in here.”
He zips the briefcase as if to protect it from me. “Showing you the condo and the bank statements are one thing. To turn over Julie’s personal mail is another.”
“Why?”
He clenches his jaw. “Because, regardless of how I feel about you, you’re still the press. You’ve written damaging stories about Bobby W’s business, a business that’s helped a lot of people.”
I feel my face get hot and look away from him. I know I’d write those same stories again, given the same circumstances.
“I’m not trying to hurt anyone, and this is what I do for a living, Lucas. I’m used to looking for needles in haystacks. Maybe there’s something in there you missed.”
“There could also be personal information Julie doesn’t want made public.”
“Like what?”
“Her balance at Macy’s, her shoe size. Anything. I told you she’s a private person.”
“We aren’t intruding into her life,” I say. “Bobby Warren wants her found. That’s all we’re trying to do. Just find her.”
“I know.” But his eyes remain unconvinced. “What if she doesn’t want to be found?”
“Is that what you think?”
“It’s what I wonder.” He opens the briefcase again. “Nothing about this is typical behavior for her. There was no reason for her to take off. Bobby W lets her get away with anything she wants.”
“Anything, like what?”
“You name it. She can miss appearances, take off for weeks, months at a time. As long as she checked in with him, and they had their daily conversations, he didn’t care what she did.”
“You don’t like her, do you?”
He starts to deny it, then meets my gaze. “No.”
“Why not?”
“For the usual reason people don’t like other people. She doesn’t like me. Didn’t want Bobby W to hire me and was never happy that he did.”
I feel myself grin. Why am I relieved? “I thought maybe—” I stop, not sure how to continue. “It occurred to me that maybe the two of you might have been close.”
“Never. The only love affair Julie has is with herself. No one else is perfect enough for her.” A smile spreads across his face. Sitting there, at Julie Larimore’s glass desk, in the full light of day, I know I am blushing like an adolescent at her first compliment. “She isn’t my type, Rikki.”
“No?”
He starts to bend down, but I can’t do this, not in Julie’s home, and not now, not with Hamilton still on my mind, unresolved.
I put out my hand, feel his firm body beneath the soft cotton of his shirt. “We’ve got to find this Blond Elvis guy”
He takes my hand, brushes his lips across my knuckles. “Exactly what I was going to say.” He’s still smiling, and although I’m not sure why, I smile, too.
“Twenty-four hours,” he says, his voice low.
“For what?”
“That’s how long you can keep this stuff.” He hands me the briefcase. “I want it all back by this time tomorrow, okay?”