Room for Doubt Read online

  “Hey, remember me? The reporter. I need to talk to someone, can you help me?”

  The peach-faced young rookie approached, then glanced nervously over his shoulder as though he were questioning his orders to keep everyone, including reporters, at bay.

  I prompted him. “I do a lot of work with LAPD. You remember the Hollywood murders…those missing girls a couple months back?” He stared back at me. He had to know the story. In the end, our radio reports made the cops and the FBI look like heroes. I could see he was weighing his decision. “I worked that case. Couldn’t have done it without you guys.”

  Whatever I said, it worked. He punched the two-way radio on his shoulder. There was a brief exchange. I couldn’t hear a word due to the heavy sounds of chopper blades buffeting above my head, but finally, he lifted the yellow crime scene tape and waved me through.

  “You can talk to Detective Riley.” He pointed to the center of the field where a group of cops was checking out the gray Tahoe. “He’s the old guy in the tweed jacket standing next to the police cruiser. He’ll talk to you.”

  Riley was a paunchy, gray-haired detective who looked like he had spent too many hours behind the desk and not enough time in the gym. Or the field for that matter. Judging from the lack of sweat on his brow, I doubted he had been up the mountain to check the scene out for himself.

  I introduced myself and asked if he had any idea who the victim was.

  “Cops up the hill found a driver’s license, but you know the drill. Can’t say anything. Not ’til the family’s notified, and we have a positive ID.”

  “Any idea how he got there?” I gestured with my mic to the top of the hill.

  “No, but I’d say it was a suicide.”

  “Suicide?” I glanced back up at the sign. Rescue workers had already removed the body, and cops in black uniforms were all over the hill, like ants at a picnic. “You think that guy just climbed up there and killed himself?”

  “It happens. Wouldn’t be the first. Guy wants to off himself, believe me, he’ll find a way.”

  “Did you even see the body?”

  I could feel myself growing irritated. The fact that Detective Riley hadn’t moved three feet from his unmarked car since I’d arrived and the body was already being removed caused me to wonder. What was the rush? Was it just a courtesy to a possible suicide victim to remove the body before commuters spotted it on their way to work, or were the police trying to cover something up?

  “From here it looks like he had on a clown nose. You telling me some guy committed suicide wearing a silly clown’s nose on his face?”

  “Look, lady, I don’t explain ’em. I just call ’em. And just ’cause some nut-job climbs up on the Hollywood Sign and chooses to off himself while wearing some stupid clown nose on his face doesn’t mean I understand it. Do us all a favor, will ya? This was a suicide. Plain and simple. Why don’t you be a good little reporter and file your story and get out of here.” Riley sounded as hot as I felt.

  My cell buzzed before I could ask another question. It was Tyler, putting the heat on. He wanted a report for the seven a.m. news break. Other stations were already reporting on police activity in the park, and I needed to hurry it up. News is always about being first and fast. As a result, accuracy sometimes falls through the cracks. But if this really was a suicide, as Riley wanted me to believe, I needed to be extra careful. Ordinarily, news organizations don’t cover suicides. But, in a situation like this, with such a public death, KNST and others in the market would be forced to cover it. There’s an unwritten rule among reporters never to sensationalize anything to do with the taking one’s own life. And, in a case like this, brevity was best. With seconds to spare, I organized my thoughts, while in the background I could hear Tyler as he counted me down.

  “Ten seconds to go, Carol.”

  “I’m ready.”

  Then, “Five…four…three…two…one.”

  “Thank you, Tyler. I’m here in Griffith Park, where a group of early morning hikers alerted police to a body on the Hollywood Sign. Police have identified the body to be that of a white male believed to be in his late twenties to mid-thirties. Investigators say there doesn’t appear to have been a struggle and believe this may have been a suicide. This is Carol Childs live from the Hollywood Sign.”

  CHAPTER 3

  It was nearly eight a.m. by the time I got home. The police had blocked off my return route through the canyon, and traffic coming and going from the Hollywood Sign was rerouted onto the freeway. By the time I entered the front door, Charlie had already left for school. And at that point, all I wanted was a hot shower and to wash my hair. I had just started the water—my hair full of shampoo—when I heard the French doors in the kitchen downstairs slam shut. I froze, my hands on my head. I had left the doors partially open, with the screen latched, when I came in. At least I thought I had. I wanted to air the house out as much as I needed to wash my hair and clear my head of this morning’s suicide. I stood for a moment, hearing nothing and thinking perhaps a breeze had jostled them. But then I heard something else. A loud scraping sound. Someone was in the house, downstairs, in the kitchen. It sounded like one of the barstools was being dragged across the kitchen floor. I turned off the water. Grabbed my robe, and with my hair sopping wet, tiptoed from the shower to the top of the stairs.

  “Charlie?” I leaned over the banister and peaked down the stairway. One of the kitchen cabinet doors was standing wide open, and I could hear someone or something shuffling around. “That you?”

  No response.

  “Charlie, you home?”

  I wasn’t expecting Charlie home until tomorrow evening. He was spending the night with his dad while I prepped for tomorrow’s party.

  Still no reply. Quietly, I took two steps backward and reached inside Charlie’s bedroom door for his baseball bat. For once I was thankful my son hadn’t listened to me and put it away in his closet. Armed with the bat for self-defense, I approached the top of the stairs again. With one hand on the railing and the bat in the other, I slowly descended the staircase.

  Suddenly, like a flash of light—quicker than I could have snapped my fingers—a cat raced up the steps. Its long hair brushing my bare legs sent chills up my spine as it disappeared into Charlie’s bedroom. Bossy Pants? I hadn’t seen the mixed Calico in months. He had vanished one day, and I thought we’d seen the last of him.

  “Hello?” I yelled again, and continued slowly down the stairs, toward the kitchen.

  The noise from the kitchen was getting louder. Whoever or whatever was in my kitchen was making no attempt to hide their presence. As I approached the bottom of the steps, I heard the refrigerator door open. I raised the bat to a slugger’s position.

  “Who’s there?”

  No answer.

  I stepped forward, both hands gripped tightly around the bat, and stared into the kitchen like a slugger waiting for a fast pitch. There, bent over in the refrigerator with her backside to me, her long floral skirt not quite covering her dusty moccasins, was Misty Dawn.

  “Misty?” I hadn’t seen Misty Dawn since we’d parted ways after my next-door neighbor, Samantha Millhouse, had moved. Sam had been an invaluable source to me when I first started my job as a reporter. She was the niece of a big Hollywood agent who had been murdered. Misty had been her aunt’s client—a kind of psychic to the stars—and over the course of the investigation, we had become friends, sort of. “What are you doing here?”

  Misty turned and stared at me, her face frozen like a deer in headlights. Silence passed between us. I dropped the bat and steadied my shaking legs against the weight of it while I willed my heart to slow down. Misty appeared exactly like she had the last time I’d seen her. An aging hippie dressed in a long cotton skirt and a tie-dyed t-shirt. On her wrists and up and down her arms she wore enough beads and bangles, it was no wonder I’d heard her rustling in my ki
tchen. Her jewelry jangled with her every move like an early warning system. And in her long wavy gray hair, which I doubt she had ever cut, she wore synthetic feathers dyed pink and blue. But it was her blue eyes, the color of a spring sky with thin milky white clouds, now covered with cataracts, that stared back at me. I felt as though she could see my every thought.

  “Oh, dear.” She patted herself on her shoulders, then to her breasts to her waist, as though she was feeling for something that might help her to remember why she was in my house. “I suppose I should have called. I’ve been thinking about you. Didn’t you know?” She paused, glanced back at the refrigerator, then said, “Anyway, I was listening to you on the air this morning, about that young man on the Hollywood Sign, and—”

  “Misty.” I snapped at her before she could ramble on any further. Misty could take forever to make a point. “Why are you here?” My next question was going to be, In my house? But she beat me to it. She answered like she had read my mind.

  “I suppose you could say the cat let me in. I was out back, lounging on the patio. I was going to wait for you there. I must have fallen asleep, and when I woke, I saw the cat go in through the screen door. It wasn’t latched, and, well, I—”

  The cat? I took two steps to the door, and it slammed it shut. So much for airing the house out. The spirits—although I didn’t believe Misty was one—had already invaded.

  “That still doesn’t explain why you’re here, Misty.”

  “Well, I’ve been thinking, and it occurred to me you might need someone. Now that you’re single again, what with Eric off with his Sea Mistress, and you with your new show.”

  I sighed and reached for the coffeepot, pressed the auto fill button and made myself a cup. I could never explain how Misty knew the things she did. She always made it sound far more Twilight Zone than the busybody I knew her to be. In truth, I suspected Misty had actually picked up a phone and called the FBI’s Los Angeles’ bureau and asked to speak with Agent Langdon. As a respected clairvoyant, her services had at times been useful to to the FBI. And I was sure Eric took her call and willingly shared the news about our mutual breakup. There was no reason he shouldn’t.

  “Anyway,” she rattled on, “I thought I’d make myself available. As a housekeeper.”

  “A…housekeeper?” I nearly choked on my coffee.

  I seriously doubted Misty possessed any domestic skills. Her clothes looked like ones she had dug out of the hamper, if she even owned such a thing, and the fringed bag she carried was stained with either red wine or dried blood. I preferred not to think about it. I spilled my coffee into the sink.

  Heaven help me. My day had once again gone from the horrific to the absurd, but if Misty was here, there had to be a good reason. Then, remembering Misty’s penchant for tea, I asked if she had any in her bag.

  “You know I never travel without it.” She reached into her bag and pulled out several small clear plastic baggies stuffed with tea leaves and herbs. “What would you like, dear? Perhaps jasmine, or maybe, ah, I know—I’ve just the thing. Blueberry. You look piqued. That’ll put some color back in your cheeks.”

  I put on a pot of hot water and, once ready, watched as Misty carefully prepared two cups of tea. The act was more elaborate than a Japanese tea ceremony, with the inhaling of the herbs as they brewed in their own little hot baths of water. When they were ready, I suggested we retreat to the living room. With a tray full of store-bought cookies and an extra carafe of hot water, I followed her waddle into the living room.

  Misty took a seat on the couch beneath Bossy Pants, who had returned from Charlie’s room and was now curled up on his former perch beneath the window. It was as though the cat had never left.

  I sat across from Misty in a wingback chair and reached for my tea. “How are things going?”

  “Well, I ’spose one could say I’ve reached a bit of a dry spell. Probably nothing to worry about, but I haven’t worked since…you know…” I knew Misty was referring to the death of her agent, Pepper Millhouse. After Pepper had died, my former neighbor, Sam, had taken over her aunt’s agency and dropped Misty for professional reasons. None of which was ever explained to me.

  Misty took a sip of her tea, then flailed one hand above her head, as though to clear the air of evil thoughts. “Not to speak ill of the dead, mind you, but I do find myself in an unusual situation and an opportunity at the same time.”

  I didn’t have to read between the lines to know Misty’s idea of an unusual situation and opportunity had something to do with me. Just looking at her, I could tell she was homeless, maybe hadn’t had anything more than a spit-shower in days, and was possibly living in her mini-van. I was certain she had nowhere to go. I was her last resort, and she was too proud to ask. I poured more hot water into her tea cup.

  “You know, it’s funny you showing up right now. I could use some help. Tyler’s changed some things around at the station, and as you already learned, he’s offered me a late-night show on Sunday evenings. It’s going to make things a little hectic around here. At least for a while.” As I was saying it, I was thinking about how Tyler had promised to swing a little extra money my way in exchange for my working an additional evening shift. But with the format change and new management, the budget had been tightened, and a raise was definitely not happening. But with Misty’s help, it could be a win-win situation. “If you’d like, I could use a housekeeper. At least temporarily.”

  “Absolutely.” Misty grabbed Bossy Pants off the back of the couch and hugged him to her chest. I could almost hear the two of them purr in unison. “In fact, if you don’t mind I could help with that garden of yours as well. I noticed it’s overgrown and could use some tending.”

  “Help yourself.”

  “Good. My bags are out in my van.” She pointed out the window toward the street. “It’ll just take a minute to unpack. The guest room still at the top of the stairs?”

  I nodded. What had I done? I couldn’t say no. Lost dogs and kittens, I seemed to be a magnet for them.

  Misty got as far as the back door then stopped. “You’re going to be so happy I’m here. I promise. Oh, and Carol, you can put that baseball bat away. You’re not going to need it. At least not for a while.”

  CHAPTER 4

  Saturday night, Tyler was on my doorstep. Charlie’s party was in full swing and the front door was wide open to the courtyard where my best friend Sheri and I had hung colorful party lanterns. Tyler knocked on the doorsill, then spotted me in the kitchen and walked in, oblivious to the festivities. In one hand, he had several rolled up sheets of copy paper. Nervously, he slapped them like a baton against the palm of his other hand as he approached.

  “Carol, I need to see you.”

  “Tyler?” I put my wine glass down on the counter. I hadn’t expected my boss to show up at my son’s birthday party. Despite the fact I had casually mentioned he’d be welcome, I never dreamed he’d actually come. In truth, I thought he would be uncomfortable. I seriously doubted the station’s boy-wonder had ever had a birthday party of his own, much less would want to spend time at a chaperoned kids’ party. “What are you doing here?”

  “We need to talk. It’s about the body they found up on the Hollywood Sign yesterday.”

  I put my finger to my lips, hopeful none of the kids had heard him, and grabbed Tyler by the hand and pulled him toward the French doors. “Tyler, this isn’t the place or the time. There are kids here. Plus the police think it was a suicide, and we don’t do news stories about suicides.”

  “Maybe not, Carol, but look at this.” Tyler thrust the pages he was carrying into my hands. I glanced at a picture of the nude body hanging from the sign. Only the internet would have published such a gruesome photo. Not the kind of thing I wanted Charlie to see. Particularly not today.

  “The police have confirmed his ID. His name’s Bernard Sims, a.k.a. Bruno.”

  �
��Seriously? His name’s Bruno?” I squinted at the pages in my hand.

  “He’s a former stuntman. Twenty-eight. You know how it is with industry folks. Bruno was probably a stage name. Used it so people would remember him. He was also employed as a bouncer for a nightclub on the strip.”

  I pushed the pages away. I didn’t want to look at them anymore. I was still having trouble scrubbing the scene from my mind.

  “Tyler, please, even if it’s not a suicide, you promised me. You gave me the day off, remember? Look around. It’s Charlie’s birthday. I’m not working. Not tonight.”

  Tyler ignored my protests and started riffling through the pages, pointing to the headlines. Bouncer Disappears after Wild Party. Former Doorman Found Hanging on Hollywood Sign.

  “And it’s not just this, Carol. A private eye came to see me this afternoon. He thinks this case is related to several others he’s working, and he wants to talk to you.”

  “Me? Why?”

  “He thinks you might have seen something. And that Bruno’s murder, if it was murder, isn’t just a one-off.”

  I took the pages back from Tyler. If Bruno’s death hadn’t been a suicide and turned out to be part of something more nefarious, like a serial killing, the least I could do was look into it. But not tonight.

  “Fine, Tyler, but please, give me tonight.” I stuffed the papers in my bag beneath the kitchen table, where no one, particularly Charlie, would find them. “I’ll read these later, and if it makes you happy, I’ll call this PI—whoever he is—first thing in the morning. In the meantime, this is a birthday party, why don’t you stay and have a piece of cake? Enjoy yourself.”

  CHAPTER 5

  I had mixed feelings as I dialed the PI’s number Tyler had given me. I knew he would want to meet with me, and I hated the thought of leaving Charlie on a Sunday morning. Particularly the day after his birthday. I felt like I’d barely seen my son for his own party. His father had picked him up after school on Friday, and by the time he brought him home on Saturday, Charlie’s friends had already started to arrive for the celebration. Plus, I didn’t see the point in talking with some PI I didn’t even know about a case the police had already ruled a suicide. I wasn’t at all sure the articles Tyler shared with me about the other dead men were related to the body I’d seen. They read more like exposés. Fake news. Written by bloggers with questionable facts I felt sure hadn’t been substantiated.