The Cinderella Murder (18 page)

Nicole shook her head.

Laurie got the impression that this subject was making Nicole uncomfortable and decided to approach the questioning from a different angle. “So, when Mr. Pickup Man here threw you his clever line, you were still new to the area?”

Gavin was the one who laughed. “Like, just-off-the-train new. And nervous. She admitted giving me her number, but what she didn’t tell you was that she gave me a fake name.”

“No, really?” Laurie asked. “Why in the world?”

Nicole shifted in her seat. “Wow, I did
not
think we’d be talking about this. Truth be told, I was in that bar with a fake ID. I didn’t want the bartender to hear me using a name that didn’t match the license I’d just shown him. Besides, I can’t be the first woman who made up a fake name with a stranger trying to talk her up at a bar.”

“Certainly not,” Laurie said. But usually the fake name would come with a fake number, too. How many times had a younger Laurie, borrowing the lyrics of an old pop song, scribbled
Jenny, 867-5309,
on the inside of some drunk playboy’s matchbook?

“Anyway,” Gavin said, “it was love at almost-first-sight. We got married exactly six months after we met.”

Nicole smiled and patted her husband’s forearm. “Like I said, life is short.”

“I never realized that Susan was the reason you were willing to jump in so fast,” Gavin said. “In fact, Nicole never even talked about being Susan’s roommate until we happened to bump into Susan’s mother, Rosemary, at one of those huge dim sum places in Chinatown. Remember that, honey?”

Nicole raised her eyebrows but said nothing.

“You remember,” her husband prompted. “Over all that noise from the tables and the food carts, I heard some woman yelling, ‘Nicole. Nicole Hunter?’ That’s her maiden name. And then Rosemary
runs over and gives my wife this huge hug. So, of course, I ask her, ‘Who’s that?’ And then she tells me she was roommates with the Cinderella Murder victim.”

“It wasn’t something I liked to talk about,” Nicole said. “Even now.”

“Anyway, I was the one who went back to Rosemary’s table and insisted that she give us a call.”

Laurie had gotten the impression from Rosemary that Susan and Nicole had been best friends, but now she was learning that Nicole initially did not mention Susan’s murder to her own husband and had no relationship with Susan’s mother until Gavin suggested it.

She had been warned by Rosemary that Nicole could be shy and might even come off as aloof. But sitting here in Nicole’s living room, watching the woman continue that polite smile, Laurie was certain that Susan’s supposed best friend was lying to her.

33

J
erry snapped his seat belt closed and started the engine of the van. “Take one more look at that amazing view,” he said, “because I think that was the only reason to drive up here.”

“No kidding,” Grace said, leaning forward from the backseat. “That was a total bust. Talk about a cold fish.”

So Laurie was not the only one who had noticed that Nicole hadn’t exactly been forthcoming with her memories of Susan Dempsey.

Jerry used his turn signal, despite the absence of any oncoming traffic, and pulled away from the curb. “It’s like she wasn’t even there.”

“I agree,” Laurie said. “She did seem a bit distracted.”

“No, I mean, like she wasn’t even there at UCLA,” Jerry said. “She didn’t stay in touch with her friends. She didn’t offer any stories about Susan other than how nice she was to her. All she wanted to do was talk about everyone else: how strange it was that Frank Parker wanted to meet Susan at his home, how hungry Madison was for fame, how Susan had caught her boyfriend flirting with other girls multiple times. It’s like she wanted us to focus on everyone else except her.”

Laurie was trying to figure out why Nicole might have held back with them when her thoughts were interrupted by her cell phone. It was her father.

“Is everything okay, Dad?”

“All good. I think we’ve got Timmy on a decent schedule after the flight west. He slept until seven thirty, had a big breakfast at the hotel restaurant, then we went down to Fisherman’s Wharf for lunch and had a whole platter of fish and chips.”

“You know you’re not supposed to eat that stuff.” Only last year, her father had been rushed to Mount Sinai Hospital with cardiac fibrillation. Two stents in his right ventricle later, he was now supposed to keep a heart-healthy diet.

“No worries, Dr. Laurie. I got grilled halibut and salad. And—in full disclosure—four french fries.”

“I suppose we can let that slide. We’re on our way back to the hotel now. Dinner at Mama Torini’s?” Laurie had visited San Francisco with her parents when she was considering applying to Stanford twenty years ago. Her best memories of the trip were of Leo locking Laurie’s mother in a cell at Alcatraz and dinner at Mama Torini’s, with its red-and-white-checked tablecloths and heaping portions of fettuccine Alfredo prepared tableside. “I think Timmy would love it.”

“Great minds think alike. That’s why I was calling. I made a reservation at seven. Figured that was as late as we could push it with Timmy but knew you were working.”

Even with Timmy and her father here, she was having a hard time juggling her schedule to see them. She assured her father she’d be back to the hotel within the hour and hung up.

Grace was leaning forward from the backseat again, fiddling with her phone. “Remember that site Who’s Dated Who?” she asked.

“
Whom
,” Jerry corrected. “Who’s Dated
Whom
. I’m going to write them an e-mail, demanding that they add an ‘m.’ ”

“Well, I looked up Susan’s high school sweetheart, Keith Ratner. Get a load of this.” She began rattling off a long list of names of women who had been linked to the B-list actor over the years.

“I think I’ve only heard of two of those people,” Laurie said. They were both actresses a good ten years younger than Keith.

“Oh, he’s in no position to land anyone famous anymore,” Grace said. “But my point is that the list is long. Rosemary and Nicole both said he cheated on Susan. Guess a player’s always a player.”

“But cheating’s not the same as killing someone,” Jerry said.

“No,” Grace said, “but if she caught him? I could picture it. Keith could’ve been driving her up to the audition either hoping to get a part for himself or making sure Frank didn’t try to get handsy with his girl. If Susan confronted him about cheating, they could have gotten into a fight. She gets mad and storms out of the car. I know I’ve done it. He starts chasing her. They fight, and things get out of control.”

It wasn’t a bad theory. It would explain how Susan had wound up near Laurel Canyon Park while her car was found on campus.

Jerry stopped at a red light. “Too bad Keith has an alibi, and we don’t have any evidence.”

“It’s like that old game Clue,” Laurie said, thinking about playing the game with her son at home. “We look at every possible theory and try to poke holes in each one. When there’s only one theory standing, we might actually have some answers.”

“And that’s where our dreamy host, Alex Buckley, comes in,” Grace said. “Speaking of which, let’s type his name in here and see what we find. Ooh, he’s no Keith Ratner, but he’s not exactly a monk.” Grace began reading names from Who’s Dated Who. Laurie recognized more than a few: a model, an actress, an opera singer, a morning news anchor.

The light turned green, and Jerry took a right turn. Laurie was so distracted by Grace’s babble that she did not notice that the cream-colored pickup truck that had been parked on Nicole’s street was now taking the same turn behind them.

34

M
artin Collins rested in a rattan lounger on the back deck of his 8,700-square-foot Sunset Strip home. He looked out beyond his infinity pool to the sun beginning to set on the city below. He had purchased this house four years ago for more money than he had ever dreamed of earning. It was a far cry from the fleabag apartment where he’d grown up in Nebraska. He was born to live here.

He returned his attention to the folder of documents on his lap. They were mock-ups of the latest brochures for Advocates for God, complete with photographs of smiling church members handing out canned goods to the needy, family picnics, and Martin throwing a Frisbee for a yellow Labrador retriever. Market research showed that, more than any breed, people associated Labradors with strength and trust. Martin nodded approvingly. These were the kinds of images that new followers could pass on to friends and family members to expand Advocates for God’s numbers. More members meant more contributions.

The moment of optimism was cut short as he remembered that he needed to call Steve Roman for an update on Nicole. He pulled up the number on his cell and hit
ENTER
.

“Good timing,” Steve said by way of a greeting. “I just left Nicole’s house. The TV crew was there.”

“Any chance you know what she told them?”

He felt his frustration rise when Steve answered in the negative. For the past week, Steve’s reports had been abnormally terse. It might be time to send another minion to replace him.

“Is there something you’re not telling me?” Martin asked.

“Of course not,” Steve assured him.

Martin was aware of Steve’s violent past—the robberies, the bar fights, the unpredictable attacks of anger he used to have before finding the church. Still, Steve had never given him cause for worry. More than perhaps any other devotee of Advocates for God, Steve had truly changed. And he was loyal.

“I stayed in the truck while the crew went in the house,” Steve was saying. “It’s a big place. She must have done pretty well for herself—money-wise, I mean.”

“So that’s all you have?”

“For now, but I’m tailing the TV crew. They just dropped off two guys and a bunch of equipment at a warehouse and are weaving through downtown San Francisco now. I figure if I stay on them, I might be able to overhear something. What specifically should I be listening for?”

“You know how we talk about people who don’t understand Advocates for God? Who try to say the worst about our good works? Well, Nicole might be the worst enemy this church has. Given a platform on a national TV show, she may be tempted to attack our beliefs. To make up lies about either AG or me personally. I need to know what, if anything, Nicole reveals about her time at UCLA.”

Though Martin typically gave away no secrets, it had been impossible to rely on Steve as his eyes and ears without trusting him with at least some background information. So Steve knew that Nicole had been an early member of Advocates for God who left on bad terms. He knew that Nicole’s college roommate Susan Dempsey had been murdered, and that her death was the focus of this television show that had Martin concerned about unfavorable news coverage.

Martin had no plans to reveal anything more. After all, that had been his mistake with Nicole—letting her know a side of him that she was not ready to see. At first, when she quit school and left town, he kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, questioning whether he had done enough to ensure her silence. But then months became years, and years became close to two decades.

And now this stupid show. He had watched the first special and knew how thorough they were in their reporting. Would Nicole be able to get through this without her association with AG coming to light?

“But the show is about Nicole’s roommate,” Steve said. “What does Susan Dempsey’s murder have to do with AG?”

“You are asking more questions than you should, Steve.”

Martin spoke with his usual chilly confidence.

“My apologies,” Steve said cautiously. “I’ll keep watching. Wait, they’re stopping now at some high-rise hotel. Yeah, they’re getting out. I can tell which one’s in charge by the way she’s giving orders—a woman in the front passenger seat. I’ll park and get a bead on her on foot. See what I can find out.”

“You do that, Steve.”

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