Celebrity in Death

17

Roarke lingered over his wine while Eve updated her board.

She seemed relaxed in the work, and despite the manner of her waking that morning more rested than she’d been since their return from Dallas.

Her wounds had healed. He thought—hoped—the wounds that didn’t show had begun their healing as well.

“I can hear you worrying from over here,” she told him.

“Actually I was just enjoying the view of my wife, and thinking she looks well.”

“It’s the first solid workout I’ve put in since … awhile. I needed it.” She continued her update. “I talked with Mira a little.”

“Did you?”

“She gave me some things to think about, and I will. I’m dealing, Roarke.”

He got up, walked behind her, wrapped his arms around her. “So am I.” He kissed the top of her head, then stepped back. “If I didn’t think you were dealing, I would’ve let you beat me in the game.”

“Like hell.”

He laughed, hugged her again, harder. “You’re right. But that just shows I’d never pander. I have too much respect for you.”

“And the shit keeps rising. You have too much ego to take a dive.”

“My ego and my respect both cast long shadows.”

“What shape is the respect shadow?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Because the ego shadow’s shaped like a penis. So I wondered.”

He turned her around, flicked a finger down the dent in her chin as she sent him a big, sunny smile. “I believe I’ll take the shadow of my penis to my office. Is there anything in particular you want me to look for?”

“Sex and money.”

“I thought we’d done talking about my ego.”

“That’s a good one. Sex and money as applies to Steinburger and/or Valerie. Because there’s something there. She looked too damn smug this morning. Like she’d just got laid, or got a big bonus in her paycheck. There’s something.”

“I’ll see if I can find the something.”

“One thing I’m chewing over. If the killer arranged the meet with Asner with murder in mind, he’d have taken a weapon. But he used a statue—Maltese falcon.”

“Really? Killing the erstwhile Sam Spade with the black bird. It’s very nice irony.”

“I don’t imagine Asner thought so, but yeah. Point is, either the killer opted for the irony and the convenience, or didn’t bring a weapon. If no weapon, the meet wasn’t about murder. It just ended up that way.”

“Another fork in the road, another choice.” Roarke nodded. “Maybe the meeting was to be a negotiation, and the killer didn’t care for the terms.”

“So, the hell with it. I’ll just bash your brains in. Killing comes easier the second time for a lot of people. Once it’s seen as a solution why not use that solution again?”

She studied the crime scene stills of both victims.

“I don’t think either of these murders was planned as much as decided on the spot. Back to the game again. Once you make one turn, you have to make another, or backtrack. You can’t unkill, so he made the next turn.”

“And there’s usually another to come. If it’s Steinburger, and he’s used Valerie for cover, she’s another threat. Another turn may be to eliminate that threat.”

“Yeah, it might. Taking it now, that’s very risky, but down the road, at another fork. He might see it as another viable choice. I need the why. I can pressure him with the why. Otherwise all I’ve got are impressions.”

Hands in her pockets, she rocked back on her heels thinking about turns in the road, choice, consequence.

“For an amateur he’s done a good job of cleaning up after himself. So far.”

“Maybe he’s done it before,” Roarke suggested. “Taken this fork, made this choice.”

She stopped, turned. “Done it before? Wouldn’t that be interesting? Could that be the why? Sex and money,” she said to Roarke as she strode to her desk. “I’m going to take a deeper look at his background, see who else might be dead.”

“That’s perfect, isn’t it? I’m sex and money; you’re dead bodies. What a team we are.”

“Best to stick with our strengths.”

What if he had done it before? she wondered. Accidental, deliberate, momentary impulse.

And got away with it.

And what if, she continued, Harris either knew or suspected—had Asner working on digging deeper.

Eve sat back a moment. And who was running down a fork in the road now? A waste of time, a rush to nowhere if she was wrong. But with no evidence, what choice was there but a walk in the dark?

“Computer, search for Steinburger, Joel—as identified in these files. Match with any deaths associated with him.”

Acknowledged. Working …

“Secondary task. Search for any unsolved murders in which subject was detained, questioned, or connected. Further task, search for any self-terminations or accidental deaths connected to subject or Big Bang Productions.”

She pushed up as the computer acknowledged the tasks. She went into the kitchen, programmed coffee, and took it with her back to her board.

Facts, she thought. Harris threatened Marlo, Matthew, Julian, Preston, Andrea, Connie.

Harris had words or confrontations with Matthew, Julian, Andrea, and Connie on the night of her death.

Harris spent time in the dome on the roof, smoking zoner and herbal tobacco.

Harris incurred an injury due to a fall on the back of the head.

Death by drowning.

It was only supposition that she’d had a ’link in her bag, and the preview of the recording as well. Solid supposition, high probability, but not fact.

Dome partially opened.

Blood washed away with bar rag and pool water.

As she went through it again, Eve fiddled with the arrangement on the board.

Harris hired Asner to plant recorders in the loft shared by Marlo and Matthew.

Asner did so, retrieved same, provided Harris with a copy.

Again, it was only supposition he’d retained the original.

Witness statement rather than hard fact had Asner tagged on his personal ’link, then making arrangements for a meet.

Asner met the killer in his office. That was fact.

Asner died as a result of multiple, violent blows with a bronze statue.

Killer, because who the hell else, removed all records and electronics, using Asner’s car to transport.

Asner’s vehicle found at marina.

Task one complete …

“Okay, let’s see what we’ve got. Data on-screen.”

The list was long, but she’d expected it. She’d deliberately aimed the first search wide.

Three out of four grandparents, his father, a stepmother, one sibling—various cousins, aunts, uncles, and one ex-wife. She ordered family members as a subset.

Nonfamily made for a longer list. A college roommate, several actors, other industry professionals, his gardener, his longtime family doctor, a business partner, his current wife’s former voice coach (retired at the time of her death).

Eve ordered subsets of professional associates, another of nonbusiness or nonindustry connections.

She then ordered the computer to cross-reference any connections on or between subsets, and to generate another subset with those results.

As she studied the list, the computer informed her there were no unsolved murders, other than those currently under investigation, connected with the subject.

“That’s too damn bad,” Eve muttered.

Accidental or self-termination proved a different matter. There were plenty.

Eve got more coffee and began to sift through.

At some point Roarke sent her the record of a transfer, the evening before, of fifty thousand from Steinburger’s to Valerie’s accounts.

She copied it to her file before starting a second board.

She believed coincidence was as rare as an honest thief, and that if she scraped away long enough, thoroughly enough coincidence revealed pattern.

It was pattern she saw now as she took a step back from the new board.

“Son of a bitch.” She walked over to Roarke’s open office door. “Come have a look at this, will you? I need a fresh eye.”

“I have two you can borrow. I’ve just been playing around a bit with the financials,” he said as he rose.

“There may be more of that to come.”

“I do love the legitimate opportunity to poke into other people’s private affairs. It keeps me honest.”

“More or less.”

“You’ve expanded, I see,” he commented about her second board. She’d centered Steinburger’s ID shot, fanned out others from it. Below each circling photo was a date.

“What do these people have to do with Steinburger, and your current case?”

“Oddly? They’re all dead. Chronologically. Bryson Kane, college roommate. They, along with two others, shared an off-campus rental. Kane died as the result of injuries sustained in a fall down a flight of stairs. His death was ruled accidental, the high level of alcohol in his system a contributing factor. Due to a similar intake of alcohol, the other roommates, including Steinburger, slept through the sound of the fall. The body was discovered by one of the other roommates in the morning. Kane was twenty.”

“Young.”

“The next wasn’t so young. Marlin Dressler, eighty-seven, greatgrandfather of Steinburger’s fiancée at the time—and first ex-wife. Also a bigwig in Horizon Studios, where Steinburger had his first job in the industry—basically an assistant to Dressler’s assistant. Dressler had a getaway place in Northern California. He fell off a cliff.”

“Is that so?”

“He was an avid hiker, an amateur botanist. He had, allegedly, hiked up the canyon from his getaway place, collecting samples. He lost his footing, broke his leg, a couple of ribs, incurred internal bleeding. The ME estimated it took him twelve hours to die. After Dressler’s death, Steinburger moved a couple rungs up the ladder.”

“Handy for him.”

“Yeah, isn’t it? Dressler died six years after Kane. Three years later—I’ll add Steinburger had married the fiancée, and had moved up again at Horizon—Angelica Caulfield, an actress—”

“Yes, I’ve seen her work.”

“She was known for her excesses as much as her work. Nobody was particularly surprised when she died of an overdose. There was some surprise that she was pregnant at the time of her death, about five weeks into it. Father unknown. While it was rumored Steinburger might have been romantically involved with her—which he vehemently denied—the rumor was never substantiated, and in fact there were plenty of rumors about Caulfield’s other lovers. Steinburger, however, was one of the producers of her last project, and had, in fact, campaigned hard with the studio to cast her. His wife was also expecting their first child at the time of Caulfield’s death. While her death was officially ruled accidental, there was—and still is—speculation of self-termination.”

“But not foul play.”

“Not yet. Forward four years. Jacoby Miles, a paparazzo who’d hounded Steinburger, among hordes of others, was beaten to death with a ten-pound dumbbell inside his home. All of his cameras and electronics had been taken. Police believed Miles had walked in on a robbery in progress, and in fact, subsequently arrested a B-and-E man apprehended in the same neighborhood a few weeks later. While the B-and-E man denied the burglary and murder, he served twenty-five years for same. Within a month of the murder, Steinburger and his wife separated and filed for divorce. Two days after the divorce was final, Steinburger married his second ex-wife.

“Sherri Wendall,” Eve added, tapping the next ID. “An actress known for her comedic timing and fierce temper. Their marriage lasted four years, was described as tumultuous. Three years after their divorce, Wendall died in what was determined to be an accidental drowning due to a fall and alcohol consumption. It was the tragedy and scandal of the Cannes Film Festival that year. Steinburger attended, as one of the partners in the fledgling Big Bang Productions.”

“She was brilliant, really. You’ve seen some of her vids.”

“Yeah. Funny lady. Five years after the funny lady drowned in the south of France, Buster Pearlman, one of Steinburger’s partners, ingested a terminal cocktail of barbiturates and single malt scotch. The ruling of self-termination was additionally fueled by speculation of embezzlement on his part, and what Steinburger regretfully testified was the threat of internal audit.”

“Yes,” Roarke murmured, “I’ll be looking more at finances.”

“We go seven years. A long stretch, so I’ll be going over the interim again. Allys Beaker, twenty-two. An intern at the studio, found dead in her apartment. She’d slipped in the shower, the report claims, and fractured her skull. Her ex-boyfriend was detained and questioned, but there was no evidence to charge him with anything. He did, in his statement, claim he believed Allys was seeing someone else, an older man, a married man. This supposition was reinforced by a female friend of the deceased, who stated Beaker believed the man she was involved with intended to leave his wife and marry her. Steinburger was two years married to his last ex-wife.

“Which brings us to current events. So, with this data, what do you see here on the board?”

“A pattern. You believe he’s been killing for—Christ—forty years? Without slipping, without suspicion?”

“I stopped thinking it halfway through the forty. I know it. It’s a way to solve a problem, it’s a choice. It’s going to take more to find out what the problem might have been in each case. Some are obvious,” she continued, gesturing at the board as she paced in front of it. “An affair resulting in a pregnancy, and the other party wouldn’t let go. Money difficulties pawned off on a partner, one who might have either been in on the skimming or learned of it. A nosy photographer who saw or photographed something damaging. A stupid young girl who pushed for marriage, likely threatened to tell his wife.”

“Sex and money, as you said all along.”

“Most are violent, somewhat impulsive. A shove, a blow. A cover-up. He might even see them as accidents. Or self-defense in a twisted way.”

Roarke laid a hand on her shoulder when she stopped beside him. “Nine people.”

“Very likely more, but it’s a hell of a start. He’s a serial killer who doesn’t fit the standard profile. He doesn’t escalate, or stick to type, stick to method. His connections or involvements with each pop out when you lay it out, but otherwise, it’s just a four-decade span of accidents, suicide, misadventure. Just bad luck. Who’s going to connect an almost ninety-year-old hiker slipping off a canyon path with a drunk twenty-year-old college kid falling down the stairs six years earlier?”

“You.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know if I would have. I looked at this—at Harris—as a first kill. I looked at the list of suspects and thought argument, impulse. Period. Panic, cover-up. Mira thought the same, though she did talk about there being two different styles—the impulse, the calculation. I saw it, but I didn’t. Not clearly. Then you said maybe he’d done it before. I never considered that. Never considered this.”

“What do you see now, when you look at the pattern?”

“Ambition, greed, self-indulgence, an obsessive need to preserve status and reputation. Sociopathic tendencies and a need to control, absolutely. He killed Asner rather than pay him off, risking that second kill. But there’s calculation there. He’s alibied, and while Asner was connected to Harris, he was also connected to any number of unsavory types given his line of work. He paid Valerie off for the alibi. He can’t afford a third kill, not now. But eventually she’ll have an accident. He’ll make sure she’s paid and rewarded until he can get rid of her.”

“He killed Harris because she’d seen the pattern.”

Eve nodded. “Or some of it—even one element—and she hired Asner to dig into it. He may have seen more of the pattern. We’ll probably never know the full extent of what he and Harris knew.”

She sat on the edge of her desk, picked up her empty coffee cup, scowled at it. “I can’t prove any of it.”

“Yet.”

“It’s nice having somebody believe I can work small miracles.”

“Every day. It’s likely he’s made other payoffs. I can look for that, near the dates of each of these deaths. I can look into the embezzlement for accounts opened during that period. And starting with the college roommate, into his academic records.”

“I’ve got a couple of ex-wives I can approach, police reports I need to go through again—investigators to nudge. There’s no such fucking thing as a perfect murder. There will be mistakes, more connections. He may have gotten away with this for longer than I’ve been alive, but his time’s up.

“It’s up,” she murmured. “And he’s going to pay for every face on these boards. I need coffee. Then let’s start working some small miracles.”

Cold cases had their own tone, approach, dynamics. Memories faded or altered. Evidence was misplaced. People died.

For once she had an advantage in the time zone area. It was early enough in California for her to start making contacts, asking questions, requesting additional data.

She got lucky with Detective McHone—now Detective-Sergeant—who’d been secondary lead on the Buster Pearlman suicide.

“Sure I remember. Pearlman downed enough barbs to kill himself twice. Waste of good scotch, or so my partner said at the time. He had the lead on that. He’s retired now, lives out in Helena, Montana. Spends all his time fishing.”

“The data I’ve been able to access indicated Pearlman was—allegedly—embezzling funds from the studio.”

“He’d skimmed fifty large just that morning, into an offshore account under his wife’s maiden name. She swore he wouldn’t steal a gum-ball. They weren’t living over their means. Their means were pretty damn good as it was. The funds skimmed came up to ten times what we found. Never could zero in on the rest.”

“What tipped you to the embezzlement?”

“The wife. She and the kids had been visiting her parents for a few days. When they got back, they found him. She said it couldn’t have been suicide. He’d never kill himself, never leave her and the kids. Pushed and pushed. It didn’t take long for us to find the money, or to smell out the problem at the studio. They had an audit scheduled for the next week.”

“Tell me about Steinburger.”

“Is he on your list for K.T. Harris?”

“He was there, so he’s on the list.”

“I remember he was adamant about Pearlman being innocent. About it being some kind of accident. Pretty damn pissed we’d smear a good man’s name, upset his family. Went public on it, too. Got a lot of play for standing up for his friend and partner, trying to support the widow and kiddies.”

“Did it ever angle as a setup to you?”

“It looked straightforward. The rest of the money was a puzzler, but from what the forensic accountants could pull out, he’d been dipping here and there for a couple years. Could’ve washed it a dozen different ways.”

“No records,” Eve prodded. “No second set of books?”

“He’d wiped his electronics. Given every last one of them a virus. We couldn’t do as much back then as we can now.”

“Do you still have them?”

“Jesus, that’s a while—what, fifteen years, give or take. I can’t tell you.”

“I’d appreciate it if you’d check, D-S McHone. And given what we can do now, if those electronics are still in evidence, you may find something relevant on them.”

“I haven’t thought about this case in God knows. I can check. You’re liking Steinburger for Harris.”

“I am. And if he killed my vic, I’m betting he killed yours, too.”

“Son of a bitch.”

“That’s what I said.”

She talked to more cops, made more notes, drank more coffee.

Roarke came in, eyed the coffeepot on her desk. He went into the kitchen, came back with a bottle of water. “Change it up a bit.”

“What, are you the coffee police?”

“If so, you’d be doing life without parole. I’ve a couple of potentially interesting transactions. One a transfer from an account Steinburger has quietly buried under the name B.B. Joel.”

“Big Bang Joel? Really?”

“Not particularly inventive, but B.B. pays his taxes like a good boy. The day of Angelica Caulfield’s death, he transferred twenty thousand into a new account, one opened by Violet Holmes.”

“The day of?”

“Yes. The body wasn’t discovered until the next day.”

“Possible premeditation. Setting up the alibi in advance. Wait a minute.” Eve swiveled back to her machine, calling up files as Roarke continued.

“Holmes was, at that time, an emerging star—young, fresh, primed for her first major starring roll. Steinburger and Big Bang made her a full-fledged star. He and Holmes have been linked together a few times between marriages.”

“She has a boat, moored at the marina where we located Asner’s car. Peabody and McNab found four possible connections between individuals who have boats here and Steinburger and others on the list.”

“Holmes and Steinburger lived together, for a few months, at one time,” Roarke told her. “Apparently remain friends.”

“Friendly enough I bet he knows where she keeps her boat, how to operate it.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. There was also a withdrawal of ten thousand from the B.B. Joel account the day after the ex-wife drowned. No transfer, but then some people will insist on cash in the hand.”

“Fussy. Where does the money in this account come from?”

“Working on that. Going back, small—under five thousand—deposits were made during the first months after the account was opened. Which was some twenty months prior to the partner’s supposed suicide. They graduated to larger amounts, but still under ten. He taps the account regularly. He may see it as a kind of petty cash drawer. Want a bit of something you’d prefer your accountant didn’t see? Tap.”

“To the public, he lives a high life—power, glamour, shiny friends, juicy travel. But it’s a straight one. Maybe B.B. Joel likes the more sinuous.”

She looked over at her boards. “Time to tie it together so it holds enough weight to convince Whitney and the PA.”

“Eve,” he said when she turned to the ’link. “It’s past midnight. Who are you waking up?”

“Peabody. We need a conference room in the morning, with Whitney, Reo if we can get her, Mira—” She paused, gave Roarke a thoughtful look.

“I have several steps toward world financial domination scheduled in the morning, but—”

“No, who wants to get in the way of that? Can you just copy everything to Feeney? I’ll bring him in, with his favorite boy.”

“I’ll see to it.”

There was a breathy pause on the ’link, then a husky “Peabody,” with blocked video.

“Locate Violet Holmes,” Eve ordered.

“Huh? Who? Oh. Sir?”

Eve ignored the sound of rustling, a slurry male murmur, a quiet, groaning sigh. “Holmes—the boat. I want her location. Arrange a conference room, zero-eight-hundred. Be there. Bring McNab.”

“Okay. What … Sorry, we were just—”

“I don’t want to know what you were just. In fact, I’ll issue a thirty-day rip if you so much as hint what you were just. Holmes, conference room. Report to my office thirty minutes prior for an update.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good work on the boat.”

“Thanks.”

“Go back to just,” Eve said and cut her off.

She sent priority requests to the others she wanted at the briefing, but through message only.

“In case they’re just?” Roarke wondered.

“I’m ignoring that, because I’m not picturing that. I need to put this in solid order. I’m close, but I want to fine-tune.”

“I’ll do the same so Feeney can easily intercept the pass.”

“Appreciate it. I guess I just owe you.”

He laughed, leaned down and kissed her head. “I’ll just have to collect another time. In the meanwhile, lay off the coffee.”

She waited until he’d gone into his office to roll her eyes. But she reached for the water instead.