The Museum of Desire: An Alex Delaware Novel(6)

“The car was moved here after three. How’d it gain access to the property?”

“Same way you and Mr. Walters did, open gate. Cleaning company asks for that, closes up when the job’s over. Nothing inside, anyway, just cheap rental furniture.”

He pulled a panatela from an inside jacket pocket. Rolled it between thick fingers but didn’t unwrap it.

I said, “Didn’t see any maggots on the bodies.”

“There weren’t any, just a few blowflies buzzing around the driver’s door when we arrived. Walters opened two doors then shut them. After he threw up. Looks like the closed car formed a sealed environment.”

“Any cameras on the property?”

“Not a one.”

“Who owns the place?”

“Don’t know yet, cleaning company punted to a rental agent and she hasn’t answered my call.”

He held up the cigar and squinted, as if close inspection would reveal secrets. “What’d you think about all that blood at the bottom?”

“Doesn’t fit the wounds,” I said. “As if it got poured on them postmortem.”

“Everything’s wrong about this picture, Alex. Holes only in the driver and the little guy? Joe Stud groped by a woman old enough to be his mother, looks like a church lady? What the hell is that, Alex? Something creepy-Oedipal? Or whatever you guys are calling it nowadays.”

I shook my head.

He said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, too early to expect wisdom.”

He looked over at the tent. “When the call came in, four bodies in a stretch, I was thinking, just what I need, a gang thing with a hip-hop angle. Or worse, some kids partying got wiped out by who-knows-who. Then I get here and it’s even crazier.”

He returned the panatela to his pocket. “Everyone’s weirded out, Alex. Even George Arredondo—the big tech—before he went scientific, he was on the job, patrol in the toughest part of Lancaster. Ten years of violent domestics, meth monsters, child murders. Nothing bothers him. This does.”

He got up, paced the pavilion, sat back down, rubbed his eyes. “Don’t hold back, I’ll settle for wild theory.”

I said, “Four victims, variation of method. So maybe they were killed separately, at different locations. At some point, they’re collected, cleaned up and costumed postmortem, placed in the car and driven up here. Then they’re splashed with blood and left to be discovered. It feels like some sort of a production. With all those steps, moving the bodies, probably more than one person. Or one bad guy who had plenty of time, a safe place to work, and the ability to escape on foot. Or he’d stashed one of those mini-bikes in the trunk.”

“A physically fit psycho,” he said. “Or a gang of zombie fiends. Wonderful. What else, keep ideating.”

The cigar made a second appearance. As I thought, he smoked. When I began talking, he stopped.

“We’re talking a killer or killers who knew the gate would be left open with no one around. That could mean a past partygoer. Or someone with a link to either the rental company or the house itself. What about the victim I.D.’s?”

He pulled out his notepad, flipped a page. “The men all had their wallets in their pant pockets, nothing on the women. The driver’s Solomon Roget, seventy-eight. I googled him. Legit livery driver, home address near Pico-Robertson, the limo’s registered to him along with a 2001 Cadillac sedan. The poor guy with his fly open is Richard Peter Gurnsey, thirty-six, Santa Monica, the little guy is Benson Mauricio Alvarez, forty-four, lives near downtown.”

“Victims from all over the city,” I said. “Any purse on the woman?”

“Empty. Got the Gucci clasp but Alicia informs me it’s a cheap-shit copy. No blood on it, so it was placed after the red bath.”

I said, “A prop.”

He frowned and turned pages. “Gurnsey—he goes by Rick on his social media pages—has a law degree and works in business affairs at Sony Studios in Culver City. He put himself all over Instagram. Mountain biking, scuba diving, hang gliding, fooling in the gym. He also liked showing off his matte-black BMW and he likes women. All young and cute, no apparent fetish for grannies. Roget has no internet presence and neither does Alvarez, who’s mentally challenged. I reverse-directoried his address. Group home for people with developmental issues able to ‘mainstream and live semi-independently.’?”

I said, “A mentally slow forty-four-year-old, a narcissistic hotshot, a woman who looks like everyone’s straitlaced aunt, and their chauffeur. It’s like they’re characters in a play. Roget doesn’t advertise?”

“Haven’t found anything yet. He doesn’t appear to work for a company and the limo is registered to him personally so I’m thinking freelance.”

“I wonder how he got business.”

“Maybe word of mouth? Don’t know much about anything, Alex. Let’s go back.”



* * *



—

Reed, Binchy, and Bogomil were waiting for us just inside the tent. Off in a corner, near the limo’s rear tire, stood a coroner’s investigator working her phone. Gloria Mendez pulled down her mask and waved. No trace of her usual smile.

I waved back. Her thumbs stayed busy.

Milo said, “Hey, kids.”