“Nope, they didn’t talk at all. He just kind of nodded at her and she nodded back.”
“Did they leave together?”
“I can’t say for sure. I drove off first and didn’t see.”
Sheryl Passant picked up the photo. “I wouldn’t call her hot.”
Milo said, “How long ago did this happen, Bettina?”
“I can’t tell you exactly when but it was way before GHC closed down, I’d guess two months, maybe a little longer, like two and a half.”
“Anything else you can tell us, Bettina?”
“No, sir.”
“Okay, thanks, you’ve been really helpful. If you think of anything else, here’s my card.”
“She won’t think of nothing, trust me,” said Passant. “And give me one of those, too.”
We watched them leave, Passant yammering as Sanfelice stomped ahead of her.
Milo said, “Blondie was nudging up against you pretty blatantly.”
“You have no idea,” I said.
“Serious footsies?”
“Beyond.”
“Oh.”
“I’ll send the department a bill for freelance decoy work. Did Passant have anything to add when you got her alone?”
“Nada, she’s an airhead. Though she did try to fool with my desert boots. If only she knew, huh? What about Sanfelice over by the john?”
“Please don’t tell Mom. Looks like Des was a creature of habit.”
“That
“Italian?”
“You’re hungry?”
“I assumed you were.”
“Yeah, I could ingest, we could even stay here. Alternatively, we could go for the mixed antipasto, that headcheese with delicate but smoky overtones, the fried artichokes Roman-style, nice salad with thin-sliced Parmesan and pepperoncini and intensely cured black olives, the big, hot bowl of baked ziti with the bread crumbs sprinkled on top. If there’s still room, there’s always the double-cut veal chop with the Sicilian sauce, wedge of spumoni, triple espresso, pump in the caffeine.”
Sliding his bulk out of the booth. “Not that I’ve been thinking about it.”
Out in the parking lot, I said, “Nice lateral pass on the interview.”
He grinned. “Nice catch. I figured psychological sensitivity was called for.”
“Flattered.”
“It had nothing to do with the fact that I don’t sleep with women.”
“That never occurred to me.”
“No?”
“Who is more aware than I of your painful shyness?”
“To be honest, Alex, if we were dealing with men, I’da come out and asked. Because men can’t wait to talk about their sex lives. I figured women were different, it would be like oral surgery, but go know. Sorry for your having to deal with Blondie’s lack of filter.”
“Mercy me, the trauma,” I said. “Where’s the self-help group?”
He laughed. Turned serious. “A married woman old enough to be his mama, a wild girl, and a shy, nerdy type. Guy was all over the map.”
“What strikes me,” I said, “is that none of them seem particularly impacted by his death. There was initial shock but once that wore off, all three discussed him objectively. Same way they did at the cocktail lounge. He meant very little to them emotionally and probably vice versa, but what if Jane Doe was different?”
“Someone Don Juan actually got involved with. Maybe. When you factor in the zip code, he did take her on a fancy date.”
Several plates full of Italian food later, I drove back to the city over Benedict Canyon while Milo phoned a judge known to skim rather than read and requested a victim search warrant for Desmond Backer’s residence.
The next call was to Santa Monica PD, making nice with the day-shift homicide lieutenant by promising not to tie up her detectives and convincing her to send a locksmith to Backer’s apartment as soon as possible.
We reached Santa Monica at the end of a nice beach day; tourists and wild-eyed homeless people divvied up Ocean Front Boulevard. Backer’s building on California was four stories of rain-streaked white stucco pimpled by juliet balconies too small to be functional and bottomed by a subterranean lot. The view was the massive, five-story condo across the street.
Three blocks east of the beach bought you the smell of the ocean but no big blue kiss.
The building’s interior was cool and gray and sterile. The locksmith was already in place at the door to Backer’s second-floor flat, looking sleepy. He said, “Murder case, huh?” and opened his bag. Milo gave him latex gloves and sheathed his own hands and mine. The locksmith said, “Must be a biggie,” and got to work. The deadbolt yielded quickly, a receipt was signed, the locksmith tossed his gloves onto the hallway carpet and left.
I waited until Milo called out the all-clear.
Desmond Backer had been trained in structural design and aesthetics but he’d lived in a plain-wrap one-bedroom, one-bath, had made no attempt to personalize.
Brown cloth sofa and matching love seat in the living room, cheap bamboo tables, framed generic photographs of trees, lakes, foxes, owls, eagles. A cinder-block-and-glass-shelf bookcase housed architecture texts and a few large-format paperbacks. Population control, biodiversity, tropical reforestry, renewable fuels.
Plastic-wrapped six-packs of generic springwater filled the upper shelf of the low-profile fridge. Three bottles of Corona below, along with unopened salad bags and a vacuum-wrapped package of organic trout. The fake-granite counter of the mini-kitchen held a coffeemaker, a juicer, knives in a block, yesterday’s paper, still folded and rubber-banded.
No disorder, no obvious blood. No woman’s presence.
Same for the puny, dim bedroom nearly filled by a king-sized bed in a black wood frame. A single high window framed the blue flank of the building next door. A birch cube nightstand hosted a gooseneck lamp, a box of tissues, two more books on forestry. No dresser, but part of the closet was sectioned into drawers. Not a lot of clothes, but what was there was high quality. Two cashmere sweaters, navy and chocolate brown, same style as the black one worn by Backer on his last breathing night. Italian loafers and a pair of New Balance running shoes.
Milo inspected the soles of the runners. “Sand in the grooves, probably jogged on the beach.”
A you-build desk next to the closet hosted a silver iMac and a second adjustable lamp. In a top drawer, Milo found condoms, boxes of them, in a variety of brands, styles, and colors. Below all that, several pages printed from the Internet. Straight sex, athletic positions, women in ecstasy, genuine or not, nothing cruel or outre.
I said, “He practiced safe sex but left semen on Jane’s thigh and no condoms at the scene.”
Milo scratched his nose. “Maybe a box of rubbers was another take-home goodie for Baddie.”
“Jane’s purse, whatever bedding Backer brought, the BMW,” I said. “Interesting haul.”
He got down and peered under the bed.
I said, “Catching Backer in the act of unpeeling a condom would be a perfect time to make your move.”
