All Things Considered Read online

  The Asian policeman bent his head to hear Jericho, and an image flashed: Stone in bed. His head bent at that unnatural angle. The blood on his shirt—

  “You ready?”

  She jumped, the image faded. When had Danny moved? She hadn’t heard or sensed him standing next to her. She pinched the bridge of her nose, parked the sunglasses on top of her head, and turned in a full circle, calling for Maj.

  “Telling Beau will be easier with her along.” She peered at the far corner. Stone’s ghost wavered and then vanished.

  Seated on the sofa with the Asian, Jericho asked, “There a problem?”

  “Hey, Jericho. Any chance Miz Davis can search for her cat in the guest bedroom?” Danny turned toward the hall.

  “Search for her—” Jericho smirked at his sidekick, silently telegraphing, Now I’ve heard it all.

  Aware she’d teetered into mental quicksand, Ryn said, “Or you can go into the bedroom, Lieutenant.”

  When shovelers in hell ask for more coal.

  His laugh made him sound almost human. “I’m a dog guy. Two German Shepherds. As it is, they’ll smell your cat and make me sleep in the doghouse.”

  The humor was lame, but she found herself laughing, too, as a quick image flashed of him in a doghouse.

  He narrowed his eyes and studied her as if searching for a sign she was laughing at him—maybe trying to put something over on him. Feeling like the fly trapped in the window, she allowed his scrutiny. He was her best hope of finding Maj. Piss him off and she had no doubt he’d morph into a real hard-ass. So far—whether Stone’s fame and money or for some other reason, Jericho had let her off easy.

  “All right, Miz Davis. But the master bedroom’s off-limits. My team’s not finished in there. Officer Wong will accompany you. Leopold, you stay with me.”

  “C’mon, Jericho. For god’s sake,” Danny blustered. “Whattaya think? She’s gonna slip in and pass me the gun she hid under the bed?”

  Ryn touched Danny’s elbow and talked over Jericho. “I’m ready, Officer Wong.” Not true. She didn’t want to walk past the master bedroom, but she was grateful she didn’t have to make the trek alone.

  Eyes straight ahead, she put one foot in front of the other and shuffled down the middle of the spacious hall. Patches of sunlight streamed through the skylights. The soft apricot walls glowed. The forty-eight feet of carpet stretched out like forty-eight miles. Her heart thrummed in her ears as they passed the closed master bedroom door. He’s gone. He’s not in the bed.

  She swallowed the taste of salt and welcomed Wong’s silence. Had he, like Jericho, already judged her guilty?

  The way you judged OJ?

  The thought caught her off guard, but a high yowl pierced the quiet and offered escape. No need to consider her own embarrassing question.

  “Maj!” She jogged the distance, calling, “It’s okay, Maj. I’m coming.” Over her shoulder, she said to Wong, “That second door’s a bathroom. Go in and grab a large towel. I’ll wait to open the door.”

  Without demanding a fuller explanation, Wong slipped into the bathroom and emerged with a towel just as Ryn reached the guest door. Maj was scratching and shrieking as if she was being tortured.

  Ryn took the towel and opened it lengthwise from her chin to her toes. “Stand behind me,” she ordered Wong. “Don’t let her get past you.”

  “I should’ve brought two towels,” he said.

  “I’ve done this before. Visits to the vet.” She put her hand on the door handle. “I’ll crack the door one inch. And then, I immediately drop the towel over her and push her back into the room. Once I wrap her in the towel, we’ll be on our way.”

  “If you say so.” Doubt infused Wong’s response, but he sidled up behind her.

  “Ready? Here we go.”

  And the plan went exactly as she had imagined. Maj screamed, but Ryn swept her feline companion into the towel and crooned Maj’s name repeatedly. Toenails dug into Ryn’s chest. She gave Maj a peephole and hummed nonsense that finally calmed The Fanged Beast.

  “Lieutenant Jericho owes you.” Ryn took the first step into the hall. She averted her head as she passed the master bedroom and picked up her pace.

  Sure the smell of Stone’s blood still hung in the air, Ryn wanted out of the house. She reached the stairs and stopped. Jericho and Danny stood at the bottom of the staircase looking up at her.

  “Wong! What the hell’s all the noise?” Jericho demanded.

  “It’s not his fault.” Ryn shifted the towel. “Maj is upset.”

  Enrique stood in the circular driveway with the back passenger door wide open. Ryn ducked her head and stepped into the limo. Leaning into the buttery leather seat, she slipped out of her body and watched herself as if she was starring in an old-time movie: Jerky, uncoordinated movements made removing Maj’s towel feel out of control.

  Maj growled and nipped her numb fingers, drawing a tiny drop of blood. The red hibiscus exploded. She blinked twice. The image vanished. Maj flicked her tail and jumped onto the other seat and curled into a ball.

  The partition between Ryn and Enrique was open. He checked the rearview mirror. “You okay?”

  Dry-mouthed, she managed a single nod but made no attempt to compound the lie with a smile.

  “Meester Leopold say to take you to Meester Beau’s.” Enrique followed Danny’s red Porsche to the back gate. He adjusted the A/C, flipped off the CD player, glanced at her again in the mirror, and announced, “There ees fresh chooz and mineral water.”

  They stopped behind Danny, waiting for the black wrought-iron gates to slide open. Unable to speak, Ryn opened the mini-bar. Dammit, why didn’t Danny tell Enrique about Stone?

  Maj soared across the space separating the two seats and bumped Ryn’s arm to inspect the juice container. Satisfied the contents weren’t fit for feline consumption, she returned to her spot in the opposite corner. Ryn filled her glass and swallowed the OJ—Beau’s favorite drink after milk. How long before Jericho interviewed Beau? She tried to imagine that scenario, but her mind went blank—like a TV screen turned off.

  Without warning, the limo rocked back and forth.

  “Santa María. Qué es esto?”

  From behind the tinted glass, Ryn stared at the mob. TV reporters, cameramen, at least two neighbors, and dozens of fans. In a wave of gyrating hands, feet, and moving bodies, they poured into the driveway and surrounded Danny’s Porsche. Fingers on the door handles, mouths open, they ducked their heads to peer inside.

  Danny tapped his horn. Like leeches, they clung to his car, caught between the open gates. Overhead, a helicopter’s blades whapped.

  “Enncierra las puertas y ventanas.” Ryn shoved her half-empty juice glass back in the fridge.

  “Sí, claro.” The locks on the doors clicked into place at the moment a video camera came down onto the windshield. Enrique slammed the sun visors over the upper quarter of the glass. Ryn twisted her head to one side. The faceless cameraman repositioned the lens lower.

  Someone tugged at Ryn’s door hard enough to rock the Mercedes. Maj opened one eye and meowed. Media vultures formed a circle around both cars. Danny was talking on his cell phone as three policemen charged into the fray.

  One cop dragged the paparazzi of Ryn’s hood. The other two uniforms herded the rest of the crowd back and motioned Enrique forward. White- knuckled, he held the steering wheel steady, riding the brakes and inching toward the street.

  “Ryn! Ryn! Look this way, Ryn!” Her stomach lurched as she shielded her face with one hand. Stone had taught her this trick years earlier.

  Enrique swore in Spanish as he navigated through the gate. Stone’s ornately engraved black initials came together—locking the mob inside and shutting her on the outside.

  Danny was waiting for them on Avenida Jacaranda. He rolled down his window and motioned Enrique and Ryn to do the same. “Make sure you call Jericho from here on your way back. Otherwise, you’ll never get through the gates.”

  �
�All right.” Ryn turned her face to the sun. She couldn’t stop the clack of her teeth. Danny kept talking, but she couldn’t make sense of his jumbled words. Does he remember Stone’s dead?

  Behind them, a silver Bentley pulled up. Ryn touched Enrique’s shoulder and rolled up her window. Sorry, Danny.

  Speaking in Spanish, she asked, “Did you visit your sister last night?”

  He responded in English. “Sí. Eet was my sobrino’s eighth birthday. Sobrino … nephew, right?”

  “Nephew,” she repeated.

  “We celebrated so long I passed the night with my sister.”

  “In East LA?” It was a rhetorical question, but she was so glad he had an iron-clad alibi, she asked anyway. For a split second, Stone’s face disappeared.

  “Yes. Too far to come back after so many beers.” Enrique slowed for the car in front to turn into a driveway. “We stayed up past midnight listening to Miguelito play the guitar el señor Stone sent. It was a birthday gift.”

  “Sounds perfect.” She pressed a thumb against her bottom lip. Three hours watching OJ last night. No mention of a guitar. Why didn’t he tell me?

  “Miguelito went loco. El señor Stone promised to give him a lesson before he leaves for South America.”

  Tears clogged Ryn’s throat. She pulled a drowsy Maj onto her lap. “Por favor, Enrique. Pull the car over.”

  When she finished telling him about Stone, no awareness of the words she chose or the order of them, tears ran freely down his face. He repeated his disbelief four, five times and then asked, “How are you going to tell Señor Beau?”

  Chapter 5

  The passing scenery, the traffic, the occasional cough or cleared throat from Enrique remained outside the bubble Ryn occupied with Maj. Shouldn’t she feel something after telling him? Should she tell him she remembered none of what she’d said? The seconds, minutes, hours had disappeared since finding Stone. Should she ask Enrique what—exactly or approximately—she’d said about that moment? The reminder might help her face Beau.

  The car slowed and Ryn floated in the bubble. Maj squirmed, protesting, trying to get away from Ryn. The car stopped. Enrique punched numbers into a security pad at Beau’s gate. Cold sweat slid down her back and sides.

  How does he remember the code? I don’t have any idea …

  Enrique pulled in front of a building vaguely familiar. But Beau “Peep” Scott rolling down the front stairs like a tank was instantly recognizable.

  “Ryn!” Beau pulled open her door and his neon blue eyes widened. “You brought Maj.”

  He reached inside the limo, holding out his huge, dimpled arms. The ball of orange and white fur gouged ten toenails into Ryn’s queasy stomach. Taking the cat, Beau planted a wet kiss on the top of her head. His hair lay in damp, blond ringlets.

  “See, Ryn? I remembered.” He held up a saucer-sized brass-plated key ring. “And Lulu didn’t even have to remind me to bring my keys if I left the apartment.”

  “That’s wonderful, Beau.” Ryn slid out of the backseat. “Where is Lulu?”

  “She went to buy some fresh strawberries. For you, ’cuz I didn’t know you were coming today, and I ate all my strawberries last night after Amber brought me home so I didn’t have any in the refrigerator this morning.” He shook his curly blond head from side to side, his fat cheeks flapping loosely in the breeze he stirred up. “I wanted to bring them for you when I came over to practice this afternoon.”

  “That—that was nice of you. To think about me.”

  “Well, I’m sick of popcorn. Do you think Stone will eat some strawberries?”

  “Permítame.” Enrique twisted the key she was trying to shove into the keyhole. He pushed the door open and stood aside for her to enter.

  On her heels, Beau followed her into the hall and released Maj. “Are you crying, Ryn? I’m sorry I ate all the strawberries, but Lulu will be right back with a bunch more and you can have a whole bowl right now.”

  Ryn put an arm across Beau’s massive shoulders. Heat poured out of his blast-furnace body. Through her tears, she could see the adoration staring back at her from his innocent blue eyes.

  A buzz of anxiety hummed in her throat. She swallowed and almost blurted, No practice today, Beau. Stone’s dead. Murdered.

  Fear was now gnawing away at the adoration in Beau’s eyes. She scrubbed her face and patted the fatty flesh between his shoulder blades. “I’m not crying because you don’t have any strawberries …”

  11:00 a.m. the next day, the Beverly Hills Ritz-Carlton Hotel

  “I understand you intend to have Mr. Wall cremated,” Jericho said to Ryn.

  He makes it sound as if I practice necrophilia. Despite the late morning sun filling the presidential suite, she shivered.

  Slumped in his chair, lizard eyes half closed, Jericho soaked up the sun’s rays.

  “You understand correctly.” Emphasizing correctly. So what if icicles crackled in her voice?

  “Ryn is carrying out Stone’s wishes.” The Consummate Host, Danny raised his bushy eyebrows at her and poured a cup of coffee—his fourth since his arrival at nine o’clock. His call from the lobby had dragged Ryn up from somewhere between drowsiness and waking. Would she ever sleep again?

  She preferred tea in the morning but figured caffeine rushing into her fuzzy brain might remove at least one layer of the invisible cobwebs. They were creeping into the cranial cracks and blocking the light. She nodded. Drinking coffee might keep her from talking. According to Danny, she absolutely had to let him do the talking or she’d end up in jail. The LAPD hates looking like dopes.

  The coffee cup rattled in its saucer as she drew them toward her body. Without warning, the LAPD cruisers flashed behind the white Bronco. Unless she’d tuned out everything Stone had said, he intended to write lyrics making the LAPD look inept, incompetent, and inexperienced dopes. How else would lyrics about OJ’s innocence ring true?

  “Seems strange someone so young had made such specific plans about dying.” Jericho backhanded the verbal tennis ball into Danny’s court.

  “His mother was only fifty-two when she died.” Ryn closed her eyes against the memory of going with Stone to the crematorium.

  Jericho sat up, eyes narrowing. “From natural causes?”

  “A car accident. Almost nine months ago.” A kaleidoscope of scenes swirled in Ryn’s mind. Lavender’s 1967 Corvette—a red accordion—stuck to the huge gray live oak tree three blocks from the mansion. The ER nurse sitting with Ryn in a pale pink room explaining again and again until she finally got it. Lavender had been DOA. Arriving at the Bellagio in the purple Las Vegas dusk to tell Stone face-to-face …

  Danny tapped the next verbal lob over the net. “As much as he traveled, Stone didn’t want to make it harder on those who loved him.”

  It harder … Ryn stopped listening to them. The welt on her black and blue cheek—like the one on her heart—never let up aching. Even though she’d refused to go back into the mansion after meeting Beau, she saw Stone’s face everywhere in the hotel suite.

  The same kind of hallucinations had haunted her after Lavender’s death. In a crowd all these months later, she often heard Lavender’s bell-like laugh. About a week ago, pulling into Esperanza House, she’d seen a tall, angular woman with a long brown braid down the middle of her back. She was sure it was Lavender.

  Until the woman turned.

  Stone was now sitting next to Danny, who had taken charge yesterday. Danny had cleared with Jericho where Ryn would stay. Danny had made all the hotel arrangements. Danny had conferred with Astrid on packing clothes and toiletries and Ryn’s other specific requests.

  “The picture of me and Stone on the desk in my study.” Sitting in the Mercedes outside Beau’s building, she saw exactly where the picture sat in its silver frame. Taken the day they moved into the mansion, it was her favorite photo of them together. Like actors in a mouthwash commercial, they stood in the rose garden, arms around each other’s waists, gazing into each other’s
eyes with dopey ain’t-love-grand smiles. “I want Stone’s copy, too.” Kept on the baby grand in his workroom. When they set it there, he’d laughed and said, It will inspire my muse.

  I should feel grateful. Ryn nodded to herself. No one had commented on her demand to bring the blue and red plaid shirt Stone had put on first thing every morning for almost seven years. Drinking his first cup of coffee in it. Wearing it to read the paper. Shaving in it.

  “The best gift you ever gave me,” he’d told her. “The equivalent of a grownup’s security blankie.”

  When Danny brought the single suitcase to the hotel, he announced they hadn’t found the notebook she’d asked for. She took the bag into her hotel bedroom, unpacked the pictures, and set one on the bedside table. The shirt and second picture, she placed under the pillow on her side of the bed. Stone’s scent—mixed with his lavender and citrus cologne—still clung to the soft, floppy shirt collar.

  Wearing it hadn’t helped her sleep in the unfamiliar hotel bed.

  Beau mulishly insisted on staying at the hotel, too. They sat up and talked past two o’clock. From the balcony, they’d watched the necklace of city lights blazing below them and up in the hills—nearly touching the sky.

  They waxed philosophical. (“Can Stone see the lights from Heaven?”) They reminisced. (“Remember when I introduced you to Stone?”)

  “He always said your eyes glowed in the dark, remember?”

  “Absolutely.” Her body quivered, waiting, expecting Stone to come up behind her and whisper the compliment in her ear.

  “Stone always said it was love at first sight.” Beau The Romantic smiled.

  How long since he’d told her he loved her? Ryn tuned out the bickering between Jericho and Danny and let herself drift back to those early days when life seemed too good to believe. Meeting Beau at the Westwood SPCA, where he volunteered once a month. He introduced her to Lavender, interested from the very beginning in computers, challenging Ryn to teach her and Beau. Beau giving her tickets to The Stoned Gang’s LA concert that next weekend. Promising he’d introduce her to Stone. Which he did.