Compulsion (24 page)

“So did Hal. So there was no reason to think about what he said. He was off our list.”

Barb said, “But now seeing as that poor girl
was…
”

Milo said, “What’s this guy’s name?”

Susan said, “Our identities will really be confidential unless there’s a trial?”

“One hundred percent.”

Another silent sisterly consultation.

Barb Bruno said, “He’s a real smoothie. Drives a Bentley, wears nice suits. For all we know it’s not even his real name.”

Milo waited.

Susan Appel said, “Tell them.”

Barb Bruno said, “He goes by Nick. Nicholas St. Heubel.”

Milo paced the interview room.

The sisters had just left, reminding him not to forget “our zoning issues.”

He’d pressed them for details on the man they knew as Nicholas St. Heubel. Barb Bruno thought her rude guest played tennis. Susan Appel believed the game of choice to be golf. Both women admired his clothes, but thought him “way too smooth.”

Both had discarded his address and phone number.

Milo cited the Brentwood street where we’d encountered Heubel and the Bentley and they said, “That’s it,” in unison.

He asked for their husbands’ work numbers.

“Mike wants nothing to do with this.”

“Same for Hal.”

“Thanks, ladies, you really are heroes.”

“Heubel.” Working his shoulder and torturing his hair.

I said, “He’s the right age and height. Thinner than the descriptions we’ve gotten of Bright but nothing a diet couldn’t accomplish.”

“Able to keep it off.” One hand grazed his belt. “That alone makes him a goddamn criminal.”

“Tasha described ‘ Tweed ’ as having a puffy face and Heubel has a pouchy mouth, as if someone’s compressing his cheeks.”

“Kissy-poo,” he said.

“Kissing off the world,” I said.

He slapped a wall hard enough to send vibrations through the floor. “Bastard called in the Bentley to stir it up face-to-face. He’s that confident the cops are stupid.”

“He’s been getting away with serious bad deeds since childhood, thinks he’s invincible.”

“No more
St.
Heubel – what’s that, another game?
I’m really not so pure
?”

“It’s all about games,” I said. “He played with the sisters’ heads, returned months later and buried a body under their noses. The image of a backhoe churning up Kat’s bones gave him serious jollies.”

“Putting on the frightened-citizen act, I’m calming him down.” Frown. “I was worried he might know the mayor.”

“He might. Rosalynn Carter partied with John Gacy.”

“Oh, man,” he said.

Three more circuits.

“Asshole stalks Kat in his own wheels, spins a yarn about theft and recovery, leaves blood. All that just to jerk us around.”

“Using his own wheels was the perfect cover,” I said. “The Bentley’s a conspicuous car, even at that hour he had to consider someone might see it. But so what? He’d be the last person to suspect. If he hadn’t made the sisters nervous, he’d never have been connected to any of it.”

“True,” he said. “What
was
that family plot stuff about?”

“Arrogance.”

“Why spook the sisters if he wanted their husbands to invest with him, Alex?”

“By that time he probably knew the husbands wouldn’t bite, and taunting their wives was a subtle form of aggression. Or he just felt like being extra-naughty. What makes him a tough quarry is it’s hard to say
what
he wants. I’m not sure
he
always knows.”

“What do you mean?”

“I see his brain as a battlefield, with logic and compulsion constantly skirmishing. His lifestyle – his ability to adapt, to live simply when he needs to – says logic dominates. Then there are the times he needs to work off a little energy and people die.”

“That
lifestyle
of his was grubstaked by slashing his way to a million-plus inheritance.”

“Most psychopaths would’ve burned through the money quickly. He managed to parlay it into affluence. I wouldn’t be surprised if he really does trade commodities. It’s a loner job with high thrill capacity.”

He rubbed his face. “Eight years between the Safrans and Kat is way
too
occasional.”

“I agree. There’re bound to be more bodies.”

“No other black-car murders so far, but that means diddly,” he said. “Lots of stuff never hits the news.”

“The cars are props,” I said, “not his signature. He uses them in locales where everyone drives. He’s adaptable. Never registered a vehicle in New York.”

“Walking the Safrans somewhere and doing them… then what, off to Europe? Something he actually told the truth about?”

“Good liars mix it up. He used his own name in New York but adopted a new identity when he returned to California. That could be covering his tracks for the bad deeds he pulled off during the interim.”

“Nicko St. Heubel, continental naughty boy… wonder where he came up with the name.”

“Could be the old-fashioned way.”

He plugged
Heubel
into criminal databases, came up negative. A Web search proved no more fruitful.

“Okay,” he said, “the
antiquated
way.”

The chief’s secretary said the boss was in Sacramento, smoking cigars with the governor, she’d pass on the message.

I called Sal Polito and he greased access to his brother-in-law the Manhattan deputy chief. The D.C.’s secretary took down the information and ten minutes later a clerk in Albany phoned.

Nicholas Heubel, born in Yonkers the same year as Ansell “Dale” Bright, had died of meningitis at the tender age of five. No Social Security number issued until twenty-five months ago.

Milo wrestled with the IRS for half an hour in order to learn that Heubel had filed tax returns for the last two years.

I said, “Six years he’s out of the country. He comes back, goes the legal route.”

“I’ll get an Interpol thing going, but with the focus on terrorism, it’s gonna take time. Meanwhile, Tricky Nicky’s having leisurely breakfasts at the Brentwood Country Mart.”

He stood, grabbed his jacket, checked the magazine of his gun, and holstered up.

He asked the watch commander for six officers in plainclothes and three unmarkeds. That took another forty-five minutes to put together and it was nearly two by the time we convoyed to Brentwood.

No SWAT team because that would’ve been too conspicuous in Nicholas Heubel’s leafy, lovely neighborhood. But bulletproof vests for everyone, shotguns and rifles at the ready.

Milo had the other cars hold back a block, parked ten houses up from the vanilla house, told me to sit there and proceeded on foot.

Ambling, as if this were a casual visit.

He made it past six houses. Stopped. Pointed.

For Lease
sign staked in the lawn of the vanilla house.

Taking out his weapon, he held it close to his pants. Dark pants, the gun was barely visible. Brief stop at the front door and a bell ring.

The inevitable silence. He walked around the side of the house. A similar foray last year had resulted in a date with a shotgun.

I sat there.

He reappeared, shaking his head. Weapon back in the holster.

Cell phone in his palm. He punched it hard enough to kill it.

Ten minutes later, a white Jaguar drove up to the house and a short, dark woman in an eggplant-colored pantsuit got out.

Milo greeted her. “Ms. Hamidpour?”

“I am Soraya. You are the lieutenant?” Straightening the
For Lease
sign.

“Lieutenant Sturgis, ma’am. Thanks for coming.”

“You say there is a problem with the house, I come. What is the problem?”

“How long has it been for lease?”

“Two days.”

“How long has it been vacant?”

“The owner doesn’t know exactly. What is the problem?”

“When’s the last time the owner heard from the tenant?”

“The owner doesn’t hear from the tenant. It’s a managed property.”

“Your company.”

“Now it is us.”

“Who was it before?”

She named a competitor.

Milo said, “Owner’s not happy with their performance.”

“Not at all. The tenant left without giving notice. Two months’ unpaid rent. At least he left it clean.”

Milo rubbed his face. “Have you cleaned it further?”

“Yesterday,” said Soraya Hamidpour. “The usual.”

“Vacuuming?”

“Carpet shampoo, to make it look extra-good. It’s scrubbed down pretty nice. Most of the rooms don’t even look as if they were lived in.”

“Who’s the owner, ma’am?”

“He lives in Florida.”

Out came the notepad. “Name, please.”

Soraya Hamidpour scrunched her lips. “It’s a little… tricky.”

“How so?”

“The owner likes to stay private.”

“Hermit?”

“Not exactly.” She turned back to the sign, scraped something from a corner.

“Ma’am-”

“Do we need to get into that?”

“We really do, ma’am.”

“The problem with the house is…”

“The tenant’s not a nice person.”

“I see
… my
problem is the owner… a certain type of exposure, he likes. But…”

“Loo?” A big, blond cop wearing an untucked denim shirt and jeans waved from ten feet away. As he got closer, the shirt’s flap billowed, exposing his sidearm.

Soraya Hamidpour seemed entranced by the weapon.

Milo said, “What’s up, Greg?”

“Sorry to bother you but calls are getting heavy and watch commander wants to know how long you’ll need us.”

“One car stays for right now, the rest of you go. Call for a crime scene team. We’re going to tear this place apart.”

“Tear?” said Hamidpour.

Greg said, “The warrant-”

“Signed, sealed, delivered.” Wink wink hidden from the Realtor’s view.

Greg grinned. “You got it, Loo.” He hustled back to the convoy.

Soraya Hamidpour said, “You can’t tear it up.”

“This could be a crime scene, ma’am.”

“Oh, no. Couldn’t be, it’s so clean-”

“We’ve got chemicals that go beyond the surface.”

“But I already have someone interested-”

“We’ll be as quick as possible, ma’am.”

Soraya Hamidpour threw up her hands. “This is a disaster.”

“Tell you what,” said Milo. “If we could speak with the owner, get some details on the tenant, it might mean less of a-”

“The owner is – I can get you details but the owner doesn’t like…” She took a deep breath. Recited the name of an A-list movie star.

Milo said, “Did he know Mr. Heubel?”

“No, no, never. It’s managed. He lives in Florida.” Cupping her hand around her mouth. “Something to do with community property. The last divorce. Also, he gets a place to park his airplane.”

A call to the company that had leased the house to Nicholas Heubel firmed up the details.

A-List Leading Man had owned the property for five years, purchasing it as part of a divorce settlement with his fourth wife. The plan had been for her to live there, but she’d changed her mind and moved to Colorado with a younger actor, where A-List bought her a ranch. Upon the advice of his business manager, the house had been converted to a rental.

Since then, three tenants had been in residence.

Two young families with “industry connections” and, for the past twenty-two months, Nicholas Heubel.

Heubel had cold-called the company, representing himself as a freelance investor, produced a bank account “more than substantial enough to qualify.” He’d paid first and last months’ rent plus a damage deposit with a twenty-four-thousand-dollar money order.

The leasing agent, still miffed about being fired, promised to fax over Heubel’s rental application and any other paperwork in the file.

Milo said, “Time to talk to Tony Mancusi.”

As we set out on the drive to Hollywood, he phoned Sean Binchy. “Forget the paint-and-chrome stuff. Here’s something real you can do.”

Spelling out the precise wording of a warrant for the vanilla house, he named a judge likely to speed things along. “See if you can get a current photo of Heubel. Asshole’s a shape-shifter but maybe we can get a decent likeness… Yeah, it is weird. And all your fault, Sean… I’m
kidding.
You did good.”

Tony Mancusi’s Toyota remained where we’d last seen it.

No answer to the bell ring.

We squeezed through a cramped walk-space narrowed further by ragged planting and made our way to the back of the building. A slim rear door looked out to a Dumpster-lined alley. Garbage overflowed the containers and specks of trash had blown up the asphalt.

I said, “This reminds me of something. The back of Leonora Bright’s salon.”

“That so.” He scrutinized the alley, stepped to the door.

Solid-core, hefty deadbolt.

Please Keep Locked at All Times
sign affixed dead center.

The knob turned easily. The door swung open.

Mariachi music from somewhere upstairs was loud enough to soundtrack the hallway. Bright white hallway, carelessly painted blue doors.

As we reached Tony Mancusi’s apartment, a woman stepped out of another unit carrying two see-through plastic bags.

She shot us a look, continued toward the front door.

“Ma’am?”

She stopped.

The badge made her flinch. Fiftyish, short and solid, with nutmeg skin and black hair tied in a tight bun. The bags held party favors and bags of candy.

Milo pointed.
“¿Señor esta aqui?”

She shook her head, left hurriedly.

Milo ’s knock on Mancusi’s door fought the beat of the music. No reply. Harder rapping followed by “Mr. Mancusi, it’s Lieutenant Sturgis,” had all the effect of a foam hammer.

He put his ear to the door. “If he’s in there, he’s keeping it quiet.”

The front door swung open and the woman with the bags came back in.

“¿Señora?”
said Milo.

“I speak English,” she said. “Sorry for not answering, but you scared me. How’d you get in?”

“Back door was unlocked, ma’am.”

“Again. Just what we need.”

“You’ve had problems with break-ins?”

“Someone upstairs got robbed a few weeks ago. I think they were drug dealers because they never called the police and right after they moved out. Before that, there were a couple more incidents. Every time I see the door open, I lock it. But other people don’t bother.”

Milo asked her name.

“Irma Duran.”

“Looks like someone’s having a party.”

“My grandson’s class. Reward for reading accomplishment. I’m a teacher’s assistant at his school, on my way over there. Reason why I came back is someone else was looking for that guy. His mother, she seemed worried.”

“His mother,” said Milo. “When was she here?”

“When I came out to take my grandson to school – around six thirty. Raymond goes to a magnet in the Valley, we need to leave early. She asked the same thing you did – had I seen him. Said she was his mother and he hadn’t called when he was supposed to. I told her I hadn’t seen him and she looked concerned and left. Is he okay?”

“You know Mr. Mancusi?”

“I see him once in a while, we’ve said hello, that’s about it. Mostly he keeps to himself.”

“What did his mother look like, ma’am?”

“I really didn’t get a good look at her, because I was busy with Raymond and his backpack, getting him to eat his sweet roll and drink his milk. She sounded worried, I felt sorry for her. That’s why I came back. So you could contact her.”

“Appreciate it, Ms. Duran. She didn’t by any chance leave a number?”

“No, sorry.”

“Do you remember anything about her appearance?”

“Um… tall. And she had a nice car. White Lexus, I saw her driving away. That was a little surprising.”

“What was?”

“Her having money. Because he looks like he shops at a thrift store. Now that I think about it, she was just the opposite.”

“Well dressed.”

“Classy,” said Irma Duran. “In an old-fashioned way. Like one of those women you see in old movies, all put together. Suit, stockings, shoes, big leather handbag. Like that Agatha Christie detective?”

“Miss Marple,” he said.

“I love those books,” said Irma Duran. “Exactly like that, conservative – sensible. Except for her scarf, that was different – really colorful. Big like a shawl, all kinds of wild colors. Is the son a drug dealer?”

“Why would you suspect that?”

“He doesn’t
do
anything all day. Never had a visitor that I’ve seen – oh, I guess that means he isn’t a dealer. At least not out of his apartment.”

Milo said, “Mom’s his first visitor.”

“Moms care,” said Irma Duran. “She seemed so… as if she’d been putting up with him for a while.”

Milo kicked the door hard. The rip of splintering wood cut through trumpets and
guitarrón
but the panel remained shut. His second attempt broke it free of the frame.

We stood back.

Mancusi’s Murphy bed listed from the wall at an acute angle, propped in place by a nightstand. A pair of arms extended from the sides of the mattress.

Gray mattress except where it was reddish brown.

Most of it, reddish brown.

Splotches the same color topped the nightstand, ran down the drawers, spread on the carpet.

One of the hands was missing two fingers. The severed digits sat in their own pool of blood, shriveled and white, desiccated grubs. A blood trail led to the shabby kitchenette.

Milo got closer to the threshold, kept his feet in the hall but stuck his head inside the apartment.

I heard a sharp intake of breath. Peered around him.

On the counter, next to a box of Advil, sat an empty half gallon of diet tonic water. To the left of the bottle sat a spherical thing on a dinner plate.

Thing with droopy yellow hair.

Tony Mancusi’s eyes were open but his mouth was shut.

The plate made it worse. He’d been served up. A cannibal entrée.

Milo said, “Oh, Lord.”

I had nothing to add.