CONSUELA ORTIZ WAS STILL WEEPING AT the dining room table, attended by a young female uniform who awkwardly stood beside her uttering occasional words of consolation in Spanish.
Nolan sat down across from her. “Ms. Ortiz, do you think you could answer some more questions?”
She blotted her eyes and nodded.
“Are you absolutely positive the door and deadbolt were locked when you arrived today?”
“Yes, absolutely positive.”
“Did you notice anything out of the ordinary when you were cleaning, maybe things missing or out of place, disturbed?”
“No, ma’am. Señor Gallagher, very neat. Today it was very neat like always. Everything looked normal, except the shades weren’t down.”
“The window shades?”
“Si. He always puts them down when he leave. But he didn’t leave today…” Fresh tears started dribbling down her cheeks and she crossed herself.
“Was it unusual that he didn’t leave today?”
“I guess so, I never see him. I only met him once, when he interviewed me.”
“And he gave you a key at that time?”
“Si.”
“Could anybody have taken your key?”
She looked puzzled. “No, I have it, I use it today.”
“I mean in the past. Could somebody have taken it at some point and made a copy?”
Her puzzlement transformed to incredulity. “No, never, ma’am! My keys, all very important, my clients, they trust me with them.”
Nolan understood. Her story was one of thousands like it in the city, invisible people entrusted with keys to literal kingdoms in some cases. A big part of their jobs was keeping them safe. It wasn’t a burden she’d ever want to take on. “How long have you been cleaning for Mr. Gallagher?”
“A year, I think.”
“Have you ever encountered any of his friends or associates during that time? Maybe they showed up here while you were cleaning?”
“No ma’am, I never see anyone.”
“Was there any sign that he’d had a visitor? A guest?”
Her eyes drifted toward the kitchen and she nodded. “Wine glasses. Two, in the dishwasher.”
“Are they still there?”
“No, ma’am, it wasn’t enough to run a load. I washed them by hand and put away.”
Nolan looked up at Crawford. More evidence potentially destroyed if Consuela Ortiz was as diligent as she seemed to be. “Would you show me where?”
She sniffled and rose from her chair, pointing to two sparkling glasses hanging from the ceiling-mounted lattice. Nolan felt a sting of disappointment. Any DNA they may have held was down the drain and polished away. “Thank you, Ms. Ortiz.”
She started to wring her hands in distress. “I have another job, can I go now?”
“Please write down your contact information first, then you’re free to go.”
And then came the next steps: the canvass, the interviews, the forensic disassembling of somebody’s life after death as you tried to figure out who might have wanted them dead and why. Sometimes things were obvious, sometimes they weren’t. It was a puzzle to be put together piece by piece. Nolan relished the work but hated the disappointment of finding some banal reason for a death, which was what usually happened. Ryan Gallagher had pissed somebody off and got shot because of it. Most murders ended up being sorry, prosaic events; but they mattered, every single one of them.
Chapter Nineteen
SAM HAD A DISMAL REVELATION AS he walked down Wilshire Boulevard toward Pearl Club. Life didn’t offer a predetermined depth to which you could sink before you started floating back up to the top. As long as you were still breathing, you could hit basement level and the elevator might still keep going down. You could suffer interminably and then suffer some more.
Death, on the other hand, was the definitive last stop, and in spite of everything, he was one lucky son of a bitch. Fucked up beyond any repair, all recognition, maybe—FUBAR, as they said in the military—but lucky. His men hadn’t lived to suffer or to thrive and neither had Katy. He had to remember that.
His initial instinct was to try to scour his mind of Katy because there simply wasn’t enough room for another ghost. But maybe the ghosts were what would keep him company now that he was alone. It was a disturbing thought but one that was also oddly consoling. Maybe if he made friends with the ghosts, they’d stop tormenting him.
He was almost to Pearl Club and still had nearly an hour to kill before work, so he ducked into The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf on La Cienega, his recent home away from home, equidistant between his shrink and his job—sadly, the two places where he spent most of his time these days.
The space was filled with people on their devices—’vices, he called them, because there was hardly a more addictive substance out there than any piece of cheap plastic with a microprocessor. There was the usual mélange of LA coffee shop denizens, all present and accounted for—nascent talent of all stripes, wannabes, flat-out losers wasting time while they waited to win the Hollywood lottery, all of them believing on some level that their time spent here would somehow generate the next hit movie or the next Big Thing.
This city more than any other was still all about face-to-face networking, but you’d never know it in a place like this—none of the people here seemed interested in anything beyond the myopic scope of their electronic deities, and his guess was their interactions had nothing to do with business. They were here to be seen, noticed, just like on the beauty gauntlet of San Vicente and Adelaide Drive, desperate and on full display, looking for a taker.
He ordered a double espresso, downed it at the counter, and then ordered another double, pretending they were shots of high-octane whiskey because that’s what he really wanted, what he craved. He found a seat in the back and united with the rest of the zombies around him by digging his phone out of his backpack, simply for a distraction from the deeply disturbing day.
It had been a bad idea—far from being a mindless diversion, it only served as a reminder of what had happened since he’d gotten out of bed this morning. There were two texts from his mother, one telling him what he already knew, that she’d run into Yuki at Whole Foods; and a second one inviting him to Sunday dinner at four—surprise guest!—double smiley face sticker—and a less enthusiastic Yukiko is welcome to join us.
Yuki obviously hadn’t shared her new life plan with Mama Bear Easton, which had been wise on her part; otherwise, she wouldn’t have made it out of the store alive. She’d never entirely trusted Yuki’s prickly personality or her commitment to her son. She’d never said as much, but she didn’t have to. The separation had galvanized her suspicion, and if his marriage somehow managed to survive, holidays were going to be tense.
It was tempting to think that she’d been right all along, but Mama Bear had no idea what Yuki had gone through and the sacrifices she’d made to help him after he’d come back wounded. Destroyed. That was another secret he was keeping from another person. Christ, the list was getting long and confusing.
After some consideration, he accepted on the condition she reveal the identity of the mystery guest, said he was looking forward to the drive to Pasadena (which he wasn’t) and Yuki was so sorry but couldn’t make it (total lie). He toyed with the idea of asking about her golf handicap, then decided she might take his gentle riposte seriously and pick up the thread in earnest on Sunday.