Expert Witness (6 page)

“It’s Redondo’s jurisdiction,” Archer pointed out.

“Redondo PD has no reason to take it. You want the restaurant to tow it? Let it sit in a lot and leave possible evidence unprotected?”

Archer’s lips tipped. He cast a sidelong glance. “I thought there wasn’t anything to be worried about.”

“Just helping a friend, and protecting my sweet little butt in case there is. Don’t want you suing the city because I was derelict.”

Liz’s wide grin transformed her face. That pug nose of hers looked way cute and the wrap-around glasses didn’t look so ominous. No matter how hard she tried, though, she wasn’t going to get Archer to smile back. He just wasn’t that kind of guy.  Archer snapped one more picture, grateful that the detective was getting a hinky feeling about this too. He dropped the camera to his side and gave Liz’s arm a squeeze.

 “Thanks, Liz. I’ll wait for the truck. You go on and save Hermosa from itself.”

She gave him a friendly slap on the rear and a ‘hang in there’ as she took her leave. Archer watched her go. They had been acquainted a long time but had never really gotten to know one another. Liz Driscoll, he thought, just wasn’t the kind of woman who got to know anyone really well. She probably liked it that way. Then Archer just didn’t think of her at all.

Leaning against the Hummer, running through the images on the camera, he formed a strategy for the next twenty-four hours: check the offices in the adjacent complex, check with the folks at the Blue Fin Grill, follow up on everyone who had contact with Josie in the last week, get a lock on her cell from the provider, get these pictures to someone who could analyze them properly.  His planning was interrupted when the tow truck lumbered into the lot. The guy didn’t say a word as he hitched the car with the winch. Archer stood aside as the Jeep was raised.

“Whoa!” Archer called to the driver. Then he hollered ‘hold it’ when it didn’t stop.

Finally, the winch shut down, suspending the Jeep at a forty-degree angle. Liz hadn’t shut the driver’s side door tight and it was swinging. As Archer caught it, he saw the floor mat had shifted and was wedged between the door and floor. He started to adjust it but stopped. A piece of paper had been exposed when the mat shifted.

Heart pounding, Archer held the door against his backside and photographed what he had found. The color was off-white and the stock was cheap.  Picking it up in his fingertips, Archer was surprised to see that it was smaller than he originally thought it would be. Closer inspection showed the paper had been cut, so somewhere there was a matching piece. It could be stationery, but he doubted it.

Archer backed away, let the door of the Jeep slam shut, and strode to the Hummer. Swinging the back door open, he put the piece of paper on the bed of the vehicle and dug two pairs of tweezers out of his camera bag.  Working carefully, Archer manipulated it. There was nothing on the back and only the printing on the front. He tipped it, and saw there were no watermarks. There was absolutely nothing interesting about the paper. What was written on it, however, was intriguing.

“Hey! You done, man? I got a schedule.”

Archer looked from the impatient driver to the Jeep.

“Yeah, I’m done here.”

Putting the paper in the plasticine envelope Liz had given him, Archer took out a Sharpie and noted the specifics of the find on the bag. The bag went into the breast pocket of his shirt as he climbed behind the wheel of the Hummer, pulled out his phone, connected with the Internet and started to type.

A second later, the cell snapped shut and the yellow Hummer was speeding down Pacific Coast Highway. The first stop wasn’t far.

CHAPTER SEVEN:

An Outbuilding in the California Mountains

It was hard for Josie to swallow and harder still to open her eyes. It was impossible to move her hands, but she could move her legs if she concentrated. That was good because it meant those legs of hers were still attached to her body. And her arms were still there because her cheek brushed against her bicep when she jerked out of whatever sickness had come upon her. She could wiggle her fingers. Her wrists burned. She didn’t feel afraid because sleep came and went, taking with it all opportunity to panic. She was addled. She was forgetful. At least she was awake enough and lucid enough to register the water bottle.

With great effort, she raised her head. Behind her eyes there was an explosion of light and pain. Her head fell and she landed cheek down in the dirt. She was drooling. That struck her as funny. Max drooled.

Max. . .

He was. . .

Who was Max?

Josie threw her head up, balanced her cheek between her upper arm and shoulder, craned her neck and finally managed to get her mouth on the sport top of the water bottle. Clamping her teeth down, she tilted it and dragged it closer. Counting to three, she threw up the bottle. Once. Twice. The third time was the charm, and she balanced the bottle above her. Water flowed. She gulped, and choked and the heavy bottle fell away. Using every ounce of energy, Josie kept her teeth around the top. Once more she whipped it up. The water went down her throat, and she drank like she had never tasted water before.

A Business Complex, Manhattan Beach

Archer walked toward the elegantly appointed building in an office complex peppered with identically well-appointed buildings. Each of the ten three-story structures was set at an angle and separated by well-established greenery: tall trees, lush bushes, and dense ground cover. Archer threaded through it all on a wide stone walk, noting strategically placed pools of water and benches. The only things that set the structures apart were letter designators high up near the roofline. He passed building A and B and F without giving a thought to why F came after B.

Spotting J, his step quickened as he took the three low-rise steps that led him to J’s double glass doors. Archer could see straight through to a back door that led to a garden and a parking lot.  In the space between the two, Archer saw an elevator, two facing couches and a coffee table with a tabletop fountain. There was a chrome-framed legend board.  He pulled the heavy door open and stepped through.

The interior was serene and silent save for the little bubbling fountain. The edge of his lips tipped when he saw that someone had put a penny in the water. They were either desperate for a miracle, or their dreams were as small as the place they left their wishes. Out back there were a couple of cars in the lot: a pearl-white SUV that had seen better days, an old Toyota, two Mercedes and a Lexus.  The Mercedes and the Lexus were in reserved spaces and both were black. The Toyota needed a wash.

Satisfied with the manageable environment, Archer ignored the elevators and took the emergency stairs two at a time. Exiting the second floor, he paused to get the lay of the land.  Four doors.  Discrete nameplates. No windows.  Knowing he would see any challenge before it became a problem, Archer made his way down the hall, counting off the tenants as he went.

Brahms. General Surgery.

Cochran.  DDS.

Fistonich. Gynecology.

The door of Dr. Fistonich’s office opened. Archer stepped aside as a woman the size of a barn waddled into the hall.  He nodded; she flashed him a beatific smile. He nodded again, flustered as only a childless man can be when faced with a woman in the throes of hormonal bliss. When the pregnant lady was well inside the elevator, Archer moved on and found what he wanted.

Young. Daniel P.  Psychiatry.

Archer opened that door.

A young woman with shoulder-length, light brown hair smiled at Archer with practiced sincerity and rehearsed serenity.  She spoke with a voice modulated to a perfect, peaceful pitch.

“Hello there.”

Archer took a second to admire her and her surroundings. In this doctor’s office there was no room divider with a sliding, frosted glass window, no clipboard for him to fill out with his name, time of appointment and his insurance information. There were no chairs lined up against the wall or old magazines to leaf through. This place was a haven for the weary, the wounded, and the worried.

Three of the walls were painted a mole color with an accent of brick red on the fourth. On that wall hung a huge portrait of a woman with moist eyes and expressive lips. A tear of white paint trickled down her cheek to her bare shoulder. Her lips were matte, her eyes sparkled with a trick of technique that made it seem as if she was daring the viewer to look closer and see inside her. Over a couch of saddle leather hung antique baskets and what appeared to be an ancient papoose. There was a walnut table cut from a giant burl. Music played. He couldn’t identify it but it soothed him as intended. And then there was the receptionist, though he doubted she considered herself such.

She was young but not too young; pretty but not gorgeous; interesting without being intimidating. She sat behind a delicate desk with a carved apron that hid all but the lower sweep of her gorgeous gams. Her shoes were expensive, her posture was perfect and Archer imagined she had once been a dancer who had wisely stopped chasing the dream and settled for a regular paycheck. Her hair was stick straight and hung past her shoulders; severe bangs covered her brows so all he saw were those two blue eyes encapsulated by kohl smudges.  Archer glanced at the painting. Those eyes of hers were as daring as those of the woman in the picture. Doctor Young had very specific taste in women.

“May I help you?”  She smiled wider, enticing Archer’s attention away from the artwork. The real thing, she seemed to intimate, was far more interesting.

Archer looked just in time to see her right hand fall gracefully to her lap. Best guess: a panic button was wired somewhere underneath. His hesitation had made her cautious, but her instincts were good.  She gauged that Archer was only the possibility of a threat.

“I need to see Dr. Young,” he said.

“Dr. Young sees new patients on Wednesday.”

“I’m not a patient.” Archer pulled out a card and put it in front of her. That errant hand reappeared. She held the card in both hands. Her nails were clipped short, filed square and buffed to a sheen. Her lips moved slightly as she read and her nude lipstick sparkled. She looked charming until she stopped smiling.

“I’m sorry, the doctor doesn’t partner with private investigators. I could recommend some of his colleagues who do.” She tried to hand the card back, but when Archer made no move to take it she put it aside like a Vegas dealer knowing the house would win.

“This is a personal matter.”

“I see.” She pulled a pad of paper out of a drawer and picked up a Mont Blanc pen. “If you could give me an idea of what this is about, please.”

“I’m looking for Josie Bates.”

The receptionist jotted the name. She looked up from underneath those incredibly sexy bangs.

“I’ll get this to the doctor, but I doubt he can help. The name doesn’t ring a bell.”

“I guess I wasn’t clear. I need to know if Young knows Josie Bates, not you.”

Her lips pulled together in an expression of displeasure. Archer imagined many a man had seen that look at an inopportune moment.

“I would know if Doctor Young knew her. I handle all of Dr. Young’s business – including his personal business.”

“I still need to talk to him. I’ll take a phone number. Let me know where he’s playing golf or having dinner, and I’m out of here,” Archer persisted.

“The best I can do is to give the doctor your card. I’ve put her name on the back, but if you could be more specific about the information you’re looking for it will speed up the process. Otherwise, I’ll have to ask you to make an appointment like everyone else.”

She had the card again, and the pen was poised. It was Archer’s call, and he made it.

“You can ask all you want, but I’m not leaving without a way to contact Doctor Young. This woman is missing, and I have reason to believe that he knows something about it.” Archer leaned toward her. “The woman who is missing is such a good friend that I will do anything I need to do to talk to the doctor sooner rather than later.”

To her credit, the receptionist didn’t flinch. Either Young paid her a heck of a salary or something about the good doc made her willing to fight tooth and nail to protect him. Or, maybe she was like Josie and objected to anyone telling her what to do. Archer pushed a little harder. He pointed to the sofa.

“I can sit there and wait. I’ll come back tomorrow and the next day and sit there until I get what I want.”

Two high spots of color stained the young woman’s cheeks. Before Archer could finish telling her how miserable he was going to make her life, she reached for the phone. Archer knee-jerked and put his big hand over hers, smacking the receiver into the cradle.

“This is no joke,” he growled.

“And that is assault,” she shot back.

Archer twitched. He let go of her hand, more shaken than she by his overreaction. That had never happened before, so he backed off as best he could.

“We’re in LAPD jurisdiction, and the only thing I’ve threatened you with is malicious waiting. It would be easier just to tell me where Young is.”