I heard muttering and groans as I climbed over feet to get to Dinah, who was sitting in the exact middle of the row. As I slid into the adjacent seat, she pointed to the row in front of her. Sure enough, I could see the on- screen sunrise reflected on one of the heads. The woman with him was shorter and had some kind of scarf covering her hair. Dinah offered to share the last of her popcorn, but I was more interested in trying to see his face. I wondered whether he was really the guy I was looking for—perhaps Dinah had just overreacted to the first bald head she’d encountered. The movie went to an underwater scene, making it too dark for me to make out any of his features.
A few short scenes later, the movie ended. Most of the crowd started to leave, but the pair in front of us just sat there as the credits rolled. Apparently they were some kind of film buffs or knew somebody on the crew because they sat through everything from the director and main cast list to the assistant to the transportation captain. We stayed there with them.
When the lights came up, the woman stretched and they got up to leave. The bald guy took her hand, and they walked out of the theater without noticing we were mirroring their steps. I finally got a good view of his face and squeezed Dinah’s arm.
“It’s him. It’s really him,” I said in an excited whisper. When I checked out the woman’s face, I realized I’d seen her before, but I couldn’t place her. That happened to me all of the time; usually they turned out to be customers of the bookstore.
We followed them all the way out to the parking lot, and as soon as they climbed in their big white Lexus, we rushed toward Dinah’s car.
“Now what?” Dinah said as she put the car in drive.
“We follow them home,” I said.
“And then?”
“I’m still thinking,” I answered finally.
CHAPTER 16
“WHAT DO I DO NOW?” DINAH SQUEALED AS WE trailed them down Ventura Boulevard. The Lexus had its turn signal on.
“We follow them,” I said, pointing toward their destination.
“I guess they got hungry,” Dinah said as she pulled behind them in the In-N-Out Burger drive-thru line. Ahead they were already ordering, and a distorted voiced repeated back their order loud enough that we could hear.
“Does she really think a diet soda is going to make the burger and fries a lo-cal meal?” I said as they confirmed the order and pulled forward.
“Hmm, a cheeseburger sounds good,” Dinah said, eyeing the menu.
I was glad we were in Dinah’s car. It was a silver Nissan. I didn’t know the model name, just that it blended in with all the other silver compacts on the road, unlike the greenmobile, which never blended in anywhere. We pulled up to the order spot. Dinah decided against the burger; we ordered two coffees, no cream.
They got their food and pulled back onto the main street. We barely stopped long enough to grab our coffees and toss some money at the clerk before zooming after them.
The street was pleasantly empty, which was another of the positive points of the Valley. By late evening, traffic was light on even the major streets. We stayed several car lengths behind them, though I don’t think they had any hint they were being followed. I saw the turn signal go on as they approached Vanalden and nudged Dinah to do the same.
The road stayed level for a while, but then as it twisted around began to go uphill. This area of Tarzana was above where I lived. A whole development of houses had been built on pads on the side of the Santa Monica Mountains. Beyond the houses the land was open and belonged to the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy. When the boys were small, we used to hike along dirt Mullholland and on some of the trails. It always amazed me how we could seemingly be in the middle of wilderness but still just a five-minute drive to Starbucks.
Our couple turned off the main street and we followed. I was a little worried they’d notice us since there was virtually nobody else on the road, so I told Dinah to douse the headlights. I was glad they knew where they were going because I was lost after the second turn. We passed through a maze of streets until I saw a garage door opening up ahead and told Dinah to pull over.
As soon as the Lexus went in and the door lowered, Dinah eased the car forward up the hilly street until we were directly across from the house. Ahead the street ended in a cul-de-sac. I realized that while we were driving I should have been thinking about what we were going to do once we got here because now that we were in front of their house, I had no idea what to do.
“I guess maybe we should just sit here for a while and see what happens,” I said. “Ideally, I’d like to talk to him and ask him some questions.”
Dinah looked at me and then at the house. “I don’t think that’s going to happen.”
“We might as well have our coffee before it gets cold.” I took mine out of the drink holder and sipped it. I usually burned my lips when I tried to drink through one of those openings in the lid, but this time the coffee had sufficient time to cool during our ride and was the perfect temperature. “At least if we could get a name, we’d have something to start with.”
“Do you have any ideas how we are going to do that?” Dinah asked.
I suggested we get their street address. “Peter knows about a reverse directory.” I squinted at the curb across the street. There was supposed to be a white rectangle of paint with the address printed in black. The way the streetlight was reflecting I couldn’t tell whether there were numbers let alone what they were.
“I can’t see much of anything from here,” I said. “I need the window open.” Dinah turned the key without turning on the ignition, and I lowered the window and stuck my head out. It didn’t help. I said I’d have to get out. I opened the door quietly and stayed low, moving along the car toward the front. Then I dashed across the street and bent down to look at the curb. Every year someone claiming to be a student or painter looking for work came by and offered to repaint my numbers for a price. Apparently, these people hadn’t taken them up on their offer because three of the numbers were worn away enough to be illegible.
There was a wood sign hanging on the small entrance porch. I’d seen them at the county fair. The wood plaques were ready-made with flowers or birds and then personalized with the address or a residence name like Home of the Belmonts or Casa de Kennedy. From this distance I couldn’t even tell if the white writing was letters or numbers. I had no choice but to move closer. I was practically on the bottom step, peering up at it when the lights came on in the room that faced the street.
There was nothing covering the window so I had a perfect view of the bald man and the woman I assumed was his wife coming into the room with their burger meals. I was afraid they had an equally perfect view of me. But since they weren’t expecting anyone out there, I thought if I moved very slowly I could work my way into the shadows without being noticed. They put their food on the table and one of them turned on the TV. Meanwhile, I inched away from the pool of light. As soon as I hit the darkness, I skittered across the street to the car and got in.
I leaned back in the seat and let my breath out in a gush. “That was a close one. Any second I thought the guy would look up and see me.”
Dinah urged me to take a sip of coffee, though I didn’t know why—I was more than awake enough from the adrenalin rush. “Did you find out anything?” she asked.
I mentioned the sign I’d almost been able to read. I glanced across the street. The couple was on the sofa. “They’ll probably just eat the burgers and go to bed. If I just got a little closer I’d be able to read it.”
We decided to finish our coffee and wait.
“Why were you at the movies alone?” I asked, wishing we’d gotten something to eat along with the coffee. Didn’t private detectives always have donuts on stakeouts?
“Jeremy said he had a meeting about some business deal.”
“So, Mr. Mom left you with the kids again?”
“Tried to,” she said, taking a sip of coffee. “I told him they were his kids and I was going out.”
“And?”
