Fever: A Nameless Detective Novel (Nameless Detective Novels) (18 page)

“I’m always in favor of that.”

“Janice Stanley turned up missing and you’re looking for her. You think I had something to do with her disappearance?”

“Did you?”

“Of course not.”

“But she was working for you at the time.”

“Working for me?”

“For QCL then. Hooking for QCL.”

“That’s a ridiculous statement,” Lassiter said. “We’re in the business of lending money, nothing more.”

“That’s not the way I heard it.”

“You think we’re pimps, is that it?”

“For a highly specialized clientele.”

“Even if it were true, you couldn’t prove it.”

“I’m not interested in proving it.”

“No? What are you interested in?”

“Doing the job I was hired to do.”

“Finding Janice Stanley.”

“You wouldn’t have any idea of where she is, would you?”

“No. I’d tell you if I did.”

“Sure you would. When did you see her last?”

He thought the question over before he answered it. “Last week sometime. I don’t remember the exact day.”

“Friday, Saturday?”

“Before that. Early part of the week.”

“Talk to her after that?”

“No.”

“She have any dates scheduled after the one with Jorge Quilmes?”

“Now how would I know that?” he said through his cocky little smile.

“Somebody used her for a punching bag on the weekend.”

“Is that right? Sorry to hear it.”

“Could’ve been one of her johns.”

“Johns? She’s a prostitute, is she?”

“Call girl. I understand there’s a lot of money in that kind of work.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Could also have been someone she knows, someone who set up her dates for her.”

“We’re back to that again. Back to me.”

“I’m just tossing out possibilities.”

“Prostitutes get beat up all the time,” Lassiter said. “Sometimes by their husbands, if they have husbands.”

“Doesn’t apply in this case.”

“Are you sure of that?”

“Pretty sure,” I said.

“Then there’re the creeps,” he said. “Could be one of them.”

“Creeps?”

“You know, the ones who think any hooker is fair game—hassle them looking to get laid. Have you considered that possibility?”

I said, “Maybe I should.”

He said, “There’s one like that in the place she was staying.”

“… The Hillman? Who?”

“Desk clerk. Redhaired little punk named Phil.”

“He hassled Janice Stanley?”

“I wouldn’t know about that.”

“Ginger Benn, then. That you do know about.”

He shrugged.

“She give in to him? No, she wouldn’t. Not her.”

“I wouldn’t bother her about it,” Lassiter said. “If I were you, I wouldn’t bother Mr. Quilmes or any of his friends anymore, either.”

“Or you or QCL.”

“That’s right. Keep off toes that might just get sore enough to start kicking back.”

“Is that a threat, Mr. Lassiter?”

“I don’t make threats. Merely offering some friendly advice.”

Enough. I didn’t want to play with him anymore. I said, “I’ll keep it under advisement,” and got to my feet.

“You do that. Don’t forget.”

“I won’t. I won’t forget you, either.”

“Same here.”

Lassiter stood up slowly, the way he had in the anteroom. The smile was still in place, but a little less suave, a little less cocky. He gave me a mock salute and went out, leaving the door open, in a kind of lazy saunter like a man without a care in the world. But it was pose and pretense now. He was still steaming, still worried underneath.

I sat down again. The tight little confrontation had accomplished something positive, by God. You spend a couple of days running around, talking to a variety of people, and not getting anywhere on the Krochek disappearance, and the one man you least expect to be of help drops the best lead yet right into your lap. And as a throwaway, no less. Lassiter hadn’t been trying to give me anything when he brought up the Hillman desk clerk; on the contrary, he’d intended it as a red herring to focus my attention somewhere other than on him and QCL, Inc.

The connecting door opened. Tamara said, “I was listening.”

“I figured you would be.”

“That’s one sleazy dude under all that cool. You think he’s dangerous?”

“Probably. But not to us.”

“So what’re you going to do?”

“About Lassiter?”

“Him and QCL.”

“Turn over what we’ve got on them, and anything else Kinsella can dig up, to Jake Logan at SFPD. He can pass it on down to Vice. Not much they can do unless Lassiter steps out of line somehow or one of the victims turns on him, but at least they’ll have the information on file.”

“Ginger Benn, you think?”

“Doubtful. Too afraid of what might happen to her husband. I don’t see Janice Krochek doing it, either—if she’s still alive.”

“She’d’ve turned up by now if she was.”

“You’d think so. What worries me is that she might never turn up again at all, alive or dead.”

Jake Runyon showed up just then and poked his head through the door of my office. “Just the man I wanted to see,” I said. “I was about to give you a call.”

“What’s up?”

“Couple of things. Your pro bono case, for one—I had a talk with Nick Kinsella. The Krochek disappearance, for another. How’d you like to take a ride, put in some overtime?”

“Okay with me. Where’re we going?”

“The Hillman. I’ll fill you in on the way.”

T
here was a different clerk behind the desk when Runyon and I walked into the lobby. Thin, middle-aged, dour. “Phil Partain?” he said. “His shift ends at five. You friends of his?”

“Personal business,” I said.

“Uh-huh. He don’t have many friends.”

“Where can we find him?”

“I think he went out to eat… No, he didn’t. Pretty sure I saw him get into the elevator and he hasn’t come down yet.”

“Where’d he go?”

“His room.”

“He lives here, does he? How about that.”

“Yeah. You want me to call up, make sure he’s in?”

“No,” I said, “we’ll just go on up and see. What’s the room number?”

“Four-twelve. Top floor, rear.”

A bulb was out in the section of the fourth floor hallway where 412 was situated. It was the last room at the end of a
short ell that reeked of disinfectant. There was no peephole in the panel, just the numerals. I ran my knuckles against the door in a steady tattoo until Partain’s voice said irritably, “All right, all right. Who is it?”

Neither Runyon nor I answered. I kept knocking until the lock clicked and the door swung inward and Partain appeared, saying, “For Chrissake, what’s the idea—” The rest of it died in his throat when he saw us standing there.

“Let’s have a little talk, Phil.”

“Why? What do you want?”

“Inside, where it’s private.”

“No. You can’t come busting in—”

We could and we did, crowding him backward. Runyon shut the door and stood with his back against it. My show; Jake was there to make it a power play, two against one.

The apartment was small, two rooms and bath, and a sour-smelling mess of strewn clothing, dirty dishes, empty takeout food containers. A flickery TV set tuned to a sports show yammered in one corner. The hot plate on a table by one wall had caused a fire at some point; the section of wall behind and above it was scorched. Partain was in his underwear, T-shirt and shorts both yellowed and baggy. He backed off from us, stopped in the middle of the room, and stood with his skinny, hairless legs spread and his hands on his hips and his jaw outthrust—the picture of belligerent indignation.

“What the hell’s the idea?” he demanded. “You can’t just push your way into a man’s room …”

“We didn’t,” I said. “You invited us.”

“Bullshit. What you guys want?”

“The answers to some questions. Straight answers.”

“Questions about what?”

“Janice Stanley,” I said.

His head twitched slightly; his eyes flicked aside, flicked back to meet mine again. “I already told you, I don’t know nothing about her.”

“I think maybe you do.”

“Yeah, well, you’re wrong.”

“She disappeared sometime Tuesday. Hasn’t been seen since.”

“Christ, what’s that have to do with me?”

“The last time you saw her—when was that again?”

“I don’t remember. Last week sometime.”

“Last Saturday?”

“No. Before that.”

“You told me you saw her on Saturday.”

“Might’ve been Saturday, I don’t know. My memory’s not so good—”

“How about Sunday? You see her Sunday?”

“No.”

He said that too fast, too emphatically. Flat-out lie.

“Sure you did, Phil. Where was it? In the lobby?”

“Don’t you listen? I don’t work Sundays.”

“Don’t go out, either, not even to eat?”

“At night. I was here all day, right here watching TV.”

“So this is where you saw Janice Stanley. She dropped by for a visit, is that it?”

“No!”

Another lie. There were oily pearls of sweat on Partain’s forehead now. His face had a grayish cast.

“Must be you invited her, then,” I said.

“How many times I have to tell you? She wasn’t here, I never saw her Sunday.”

“Why lie about it, Phil? If you had a date with her, why not just tell us?”

“I never had a date with her. A whore? You think I make dates with whores?”

“How do you know she’s a whore?”

“I know what goes on around here. Her and that Ginger Benn-”

“You think Ginger’s a whore, too?”

“Damn right she is.”

“If either of them was hooking,” I said, “it was probably a call-girl kind of thing. Expensive. Discreet. No johns in the apartment here.”

“I got eyes, I got ears—Hey, what’re you doing? That’s private.”

That last was directed at Runyon. He’d left the door to wander casually around the small room looking at this and that, and he’d stopped next to a pile of video cassettes and DVDs. He picked up a handful, glanced at the titles.

“Porn,” he said.

“So what?” Partain said nervously. “Lots of people watch porn flicks, so what?”

“S&M, looks like.”

“Everybody isn’t into S&M,” I said.

“I’m not into it, I just like to watch it sometimes …”

“But you don’t do it yourself.”

“No. Never.”

“And you don’t date whores or call girls.”

“No, no, I told you—”

“You tried to date Ginger Benn.”

“That’s a lie! Who told you that?”

“A reliable source. You know what I think? I think you hit on Janice Stanley sometime Saturday or Sunday and she surprised you by saying yes. She needed money and she didn’t much care how she got it. She’d have gone with you for the right price.”

“No, no …”

“I think she came up here sometime on Sunday and the two of you got it on. Only you like it rough and things got out of hand—”

“No! It wasn’t like that!”

“Then how was it? Why’d you beat her up?”

Partain licked his lips, waggled his head from one side to another, big-eyed, as if looking for a way out.

“Answer me, Phil. Why did you beat her up?”

“She … I … all right, all right, I caught her trying to steal money out of my wallet, all right? Afterward, after I already paid her the fifty she asked for. All right? You satisfied now?”

“You must’ve been damn angry. She was banged up pretty good.”

“Bitch fought me, what else could I do? Tried to scratch me, kick me in the nuts. It was self-defense.”

“What time did all this take place?”

“I dunno what time, late afternoon …”

“And then what happened?”

“What you think happened? I threw her ass out.”

“And she went back to Ginger Benn’s apartment.”

“Yeah, I guess so. That’s the last time I saw her—”

“You’re lying, Phil. Ginger Benn was there on Sunday and she didn’t see Janice Stanley. Nobody saw Janice until Monday morning.”

“I don’t know where she went, how the hell would I know?”

I was remembering those red chafe marks on Janice Krochek’s wrists. “Let’s try this on for size. You caught her stealing from your wallet, beat her up when she fought you, but you were still pissed and you figured it wasn’t enough payback. So you held her here against her will, tied her to the bed, let’s say, and used her while she was lying there helpless, and kept her tied up and kept using her until Monday morning.”

It was the right scenario or close to it. Partain looked sick and panicky. Nerves jumped and crawled in his cheeks like worms under thin white latex.

“And then maybe you decided you wanted more sex, more payback. So you went over to her house on Tuesday, caught her there alone—”

“House? What house?”

“You know where she lives. You could’ve found out easily enough. You went over there, caught her alone—”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“—and she gave you more trouble and things got out of hand. Is that about how it happened?”

“No!”

“Where is she, Phil? What’d you do with her body?”

“Her … body? Jesus, you think I … Jesus!”

“An accident, right? You didn’t mean to kill her—”

“You’re crazy! I never went to no house, I never killed nobody! You’re trying to frame me, you …” The last word caught in his throat; he gagged, coughed up another stream of words. “I can’t listen to no more of this, I don’t have to stand here half-naked listening to this shit.”

Partain stumbled over to an open closet door, dragged a pair of pants off a hanger. He was still at the closet door when he got them on, and when he reached in again I thought it was for a shirt. Wrong. What he was after was on the shelf above.

Gun. Stubby, scratched up Saturday night special.

I froze. So did Runyon. Partain waved the piece back and forth between us, his hand shaking hard enough to make the muzzle bob up and down. “All right, you bastards,” he said, “all right!”

Both Runyon and I had been under the gun before, a couple of times together before this, and I’d been shot once a long time ago. But you never get used to looking down the bore. And the reaction, for me, is always the same: muscles bunching up tight, senses sharpening, a kind of cold calm descending over a thin layer of fear. The fear comes from uncertainty more than anything else; you can’t predict what somebody with a gun in his hand will do, and that goes double for a man in the throes of panic.