Mona Lisa Eyes (Danny Logan Mystery #4) (15 page)

“Told you they’d be pissed
,” Yoshi said quietly.

Ron wiped his mouth with his napkin
. “Sorry about that. I forgot I said that you could
tag along until we were leaving.”

“Yeah, right. Pretty damn
convenient,” I said, a little annoyed.

“Hey, don’t push
your luck,” Ron said. “Remember who bailed your asses out
tonight. Besides, don’t sweat it. Munsen’s not our
guy.”

“Care to explain?”

Ron set his burger down. “First
off, he claims he hadn’t seen Sophie for six
months. I had the guys run a search of Sophie
’s phone records and her e-mail records, and we
don’t see anything to dispute that. No contact at
all. Besides, Munsen alibis out for the night Sophie was
murdered: he was in the hospital.”

“How’s that?”

Ron
continued. “He was in the hospital. Apparently, Munsen has a
heart problem of his own—the same kind of condition
that killed his old man.”

“No shit,” I said. “What
a bitch. Good news: he inherits a boatload of money
from his old man when his old man kicks it
because of a heart condition. Bad news: he also inherits
the heart condition.”

Ron nodded. “It’s a cruel fuckin
’ joke, ain’t it? Guess he ain’t so lucky
after all.”

I nodded too. “So we can scratch him
, then.”

“Looks like. So back to Ryan Crosby and Lucas
,” Toni said. “The records say they both have alibis. How
solid are they? I see you guys have eliminated Crosby
from the list, but I didn’t see anything that
said you’d taken Lucas off.”

“Yosh?”

Yoshi set his
fork down. “Technically, that’s right, we haven’t. But
when we interviewed him, he denied any involvement at all
—said he was just a friend. We checked around and
found that Lucas was playing soccer on the Fourth of
July. We verified it. The Sounders had a game.”

I
waited for him to keep talking, but when he didn
’t, I asked, “So? Wasn’t Sophie killed on July
fifth? There some kind of legal rule that says you
can’t kill someone the day after a soccer game
?”

Yoshi smiled. “No. But there’s a physics rule that
says you can’t be in two places at the
same time. The game that afternoon was in Salt Lake
. The team didn’t return home until the afternoon of
the fifth.”

I looked at him. “But Sophie wasn’t
killed until late that night. Lucas would have had plenty
of time to get back.”

He smiled. “Excellent thinking, detective
. The problem is, Lucas did
not
fly back with the
team the next day. Instead, he took his own charter
immediately after the game. He and two of his buddies
jetted off in the other direction to the Hamanasi Resort
in Belize for two fun-filled days with three Colombian
ladies they’d met in Salt Lake—ladies, I’m
told, who were not their wives. We’ve verified this
with the resort.”

“I shoulda been a soccer player,” Ron
said.

I nodded slowly.

He nodded. “Yeah. We should probably
move him off the list, but if we do, there
won’t be many left.”

“Great. What about Crosby. We
saw he passed a polygraph.”

He shrugged. “Yeah. Besides, his
alibi’s solid.”

“You’re going to go talk to
both these guys for yourselves, right?” Ron asked.

I nodded
. “Yeah, if for no other reason than to help us
fill in the blanks about Sophie. They obviously knew her
pretty well. Maybe they can point us in a new
direction.”

“Go for it. Unless something changes, we’re done
with them.”

“What about Margolian?” Toni asked.

“We didn’t
hook up with him today,” Ron said. “Where we at
with him, Yosh?”

Yoshi set his drink down and shook
his head. “Nowhere. He’s a professor at U-Dub
. We’re supposed to talk tomorrow. You guys want to
come along?”

“Absolutely,” I said. “I’ll probably send one
of my guys.” Yoshi gave us the when-and-where
details.

“Anyway,” Yoshi continued, “I think he’s likely to
be the same kind of deal as Munsen—onetime social
date, no contact since Sophie hooked up with Lucas.”

I
nodded. He was probably right. I looked down at the
photos and pointed to the mystery ex-con. “That leaves
this fellow here. Number five. He shows up in the
photo with Lucas and the one with Crosby.”

“Yeah. The
new guy, Mr. Ink. We got nothing on him today
,” Ron said. “Nothing at all. We’re spreading the photo
around to see if anyone recognizes him. You said you
’re making progress?”

“Some. The bouncer at the Genesis recognized
him. Said he thinks his name is Josh. Thinks he
might work at UPS. And, believe it or not, Oliver
Ward recognized him too. Said he thought the guy used
to hang around the Foundation office.”

“Humph,” Ron said. “That
a fact? Josh. No last name.” He thought for a
few seconds, then he shrugged. “Well, it’s better than
nothing. Yosh, you suppose we can run that name through
the database tomorrow and see how many Joshes we turn
up?”

“Sure. Probably only thirty, forty thousand of ’em.”

“So
what are you guys planning with this guy?” Ron asked
.

“We were trying to get started on IDing tonight at
the Genesis before a couple of the patrons got a
little testy about my not wearing black leather. We’ll
show his picture around—see if anyone recognizes him. If
he moved in Sophie’s circles, maybe someone will be
able to ID him for us.”

“Maybe someone at the
Foundation,” Toni added.

“Good plan,” Ron said. “While you’re
doing that, try not to get busted again.”

We finished
dinner, and I picked up the tab.

“Thanks again for
springing us,” I said. “We appreciate it.”

“No problem,” Ron
said as he put his hand on his chest and
suppressed a belch. “We’re here to serve, ain’t
that right, Yoshi?”

Yoshi nodded. “What he said.”

As we
were walking out, the crowd seated at the bar suddenly
groaned. I looked up just in time to see the
Lions score a touchdown with thirty seconds left in the
game to ruin the Bears’ shutout. Looked like it was
a helluva game.

C
hapter 8

“DOC, YOU AND KENNY
NEED TO
be at Ron’s office this morning at
ten,” I said. “He’s interviewing this guy,” I pointed
to the photo number three. “Gary Margolian. He’s a
physicist who went on at least one date with Sophie
last year. Might come to nothing, but I want to
make sure that we don’t miss anything.”

“Both of
us?” Doc asked, a little confused.

“Yeah. Special Agent Hale
here can use a little introduction to interrogation methods, SPD—
style. You guys will be on the other side of
the mirror, observing, but I want him to watch.”

“Cool,”
Kenny said. Doc gave me a look that made it
clear he didn’t think it was cool at all
and that he was aware I was essentially asking him
to babysit Kenny. Still, Doc’s a good soldier and
didn’t complain. At least not out loud.

I leaned
back and looked at the timeline on the case board. “
Well, we’ve been on this for a few days
now. Anybody got any bright ideas? Any theories?”

“My early
guess is that it was a complete stranger. So far
everyone who knew her seems to have loved her,” Toni
said. “We’ll know more after we talk to Sophie’
s coworkers at the Foundation tomorrow.”

“What about the phone
call at the bar?” I ask.

“Coincidental,” she said. “Work—
related.”

“Speaking of work, could it be some sort of
Foundation business gone wrong?” Richard asked. “Maybe an investor gets
disgruntled and decides to get even with the person who
convinced him to invest?”

“It’s not an investment,” I
said.

“It’s a contribution,” Toni added. “There’s no
dollar return to be disgruntled over.”

Richard nodded. “True.”

“Boyfriends?”
Kenny asked.

“SPD’s cleared them,” I said, “but we’
re looking too. Toni and I are going to talk
to these two today.” I pointed to the photos of
Ryan Crosby and Lucas Santos. “Neither one of ’em is
a suspect—they’ve both got solid alibis. But they
were close to Sophie, so we’re hoping maybe they
can tell us something that might open up a new
door. Meanwhile, this guy here—Munsen—he was in the
hospital when Sophie was killed—got a problem with his
ticker.”

“That leaves the prison dude,” Doc said.

“Exactly,” I
said, staring at the picture. “Josh, the mystery prison dude.
He might not know anything, either, but we definitely need
to locate him and find out. We’ll ask Ryan
and Lucas if they recognize him when we talk to
them. If SPD forgets to ask Margolian about him, remind ’
em.”

I-5 runs 1,300 miles from San Diego all
the way to Canada, where it joins up with Highway
1 and the Trans-Canada Highway. In Washington, the freeway
parallels the western edge of Lake Washington as it runs
north and south, right through the heart of Seattle. An
alternate route, I-405, is only thirty miles long. This
heavily traveled bypass loop also runs north and south, but
it’s located on the
east
side of Lake Washington.
The Interstate 405 splits off I-5 in the north
near the small town of Lynnwood, Toni’s hometown. Then
it loops east around the lake and runs south through
Bothell, Kirkland, Bellevue, and finally Renton before it swings back
to the west and rejoins I-5 south of the
lake near the small bedroom community of Tukwila. This makes
Tukwila a busy place, being located centrally at the intersection
of the south end of Seattle, the south end of
Lake Washington, and the north end of the Sea-Tac
airport. Which is, along with the normally heavy late-afternoon
traffic, why it took us over an hour to cover
the thirteen miles between our office and the Seattle Sounders
training facility known as the Starfire Sports Complex in Tukwila.
Fortunately, we left at 4:00 p.m. straight up, so
we were still a few minutes early for our 5:00
p.m. meeting with Lucas.

This was my first visit
to Starfire. It’s a large soccer campus and is
truly an impressive place. In addition to being the official
practice and training facility of the MLS Seattle Sounders, Starfire
hosts a bunch of leagues and tournaments pretty much year—
round. There are a dozen outdoor soccer fields of various
sizes including an outdoor stadium field plus two indoor fields.
Of course, the Sounders are top of the roost here,
them being an MLS team and all.

We went inside
and found Café Sienna, a quiet little restaurant that overlooked
the stadium field. Despite the activity below us on several
of the soccer pitches, the café was empty except for
us. A few minutes later, a man walked up wearing
warm-up pants and a dark Sounders T-shirt and
carrying a bottle of blue Gatorade. I recognized Lucas from
his pictures.

“Danny Logan?” he said, walking up to us. “
I am Lucas.” He had a pronounced accent.

Okay, I’
ll go ahead and admit it. Lucas was a good-looking guy. He was probably six feet tall and obviously
very fit. His long black hair was wet and combed
back—just out of the shower after practice, I suppose.
He was deeply tanned and his facial features were strong
and pronounced. His eyes were a steel blue/gray color
that was quite striking. I was surprised at how muscular
he was—I didn’t know any soccer players, but
for some reason I had expected a slim, speedy physique.
Instead, Lucas had arms that rippled with long, corded muscles
as he reached to shake hands.

“Glad to meet you,”
I said. I introduced him to Toni, and glanced at
her as I did. She was trying to play it
cool, but she was impressed. “Thanks for meeting with us.
Are we okay here?” I pointed to a table in
the café.

“Yeah, is good,” he said. “Nice and quiet.”
We made our way to the table. “Lunch and dinner?
Very busy,” he said. “Now though,” he shrugged, “is good.”

“
Good.” We took our seats.

He looked at me sternly. “
You want to talk about Sophie? I talk to the
police already about this. What else you want? You say
you work for family, no?”

“Yes. They’ve hired us
to conduct our own investigation into Sophie’s death.”

He
nodded. “They worry about no . . . no . . . progress?”

I nodded. “They’
re naturally concerned, as I’m sure you can imagine.”

“
I understand.” He shook his head slowly. “Why would somebody
wish to hurt Sophie? I don’t know. Sophie was
a . . . a . . . a very sweet girl.” He paused for a
moment, then he shook his head one more time. “So.
What can I say to you?”

Toni said, “First off,
thank you for agreeing to meet with us, Lucas.”

He
smiled at her and nodded.

Toni started for us. “And
let me start by saying that the police have made
it clear that you are not a suspect.”

Lucas smiled. “
Me? Why would I be?”

“Exactly,” she said. “But, like
you said, there hasn’t been much progress in finding
Sophie’s killer, either. So now that we’re involved,
the first thing we’re trying to do is talk
to people who knew Sophie, people who were close to
her so that we can try to get a really
complete picture of her and her life. We’re hoping
that by doing that, we can uncover something that might
lead the official investigation in a new direction—something that’
s maybe been overlooked.” She smiled. “So that’s what’
s led us to you. We’re hoping you can
help us fill in some details about Sophie.”

I studied
him while she was talking and watched his reaction to
me, and then to Toni. It dawned on me that
this guy was going to respond better to her than
he would to me—a male/female thing, I suppose.
Whatever—it wasn’t something I was going to change,
so I went with it. Besides, Toni was probably better
at interrogation than I was anyway. I looked over at
Toni and nodded for her to continue.

She turned and
looked at Lucas. “Is that a tattoo?” The edge of
a tattoo was just visible beneath the sleeve on his
left arm.

He smiled. “It is.” He reached over and
pulled up his sleeve to show a full color tattoo
of a jaguar. “It is onça-pintada,” he said proudly. “
It’s where I get my nickname: Onça.”

Toni studied
it closely. “That’s beautiful.” Then she looked up. “Check
this out.” Lucas watched, as Toni rolled up her blouse
sleeve on her left arm, revealing the full-sleeve tattoo
hidden beneath.

When her sleeve was as high as she
could get it, Lucas stared for a few moments, transfixed.
Then he whistled in admiration. “Magnificent!” He nodded his approval
as he continued to study Toni’s arm, transfixed.

“Thank
you,” she said.

Lucas smiled. “The flowers . . . the birds—they
are like the jungle in my country.”

Toni smiled. “When
I was younger, my mom and my sister and I
went to Hawaii. I was inspired by the tropical scenery
over there. See the initials? J-A-R? That’s
for me, my mom, and my sister.”

This confused him. “
You are Toni, no? Which one is you?”

“Toni is
short for Antoinette.” She pointed to the A on her
tattoo.

“Ah, Antoinette, I see.” He was clearly impressed. He
looked for several seconds more. “The azul—the blue color
on the feathers of this bird—they are the same
as your eyes.”

“Isn’t that cool?” She zapped him
with a pretty good smile—I’d say about 60
percent strength. Coming from Toni, that’s a pretty effective
smile—plenty strong enough to work on Lucas.

“Fantastic.” He
was mesmerized—a complete goner.

“Thank you.” She rolled her
sleeve back down.

Lucas leaned back in his chair, and
smiled at her. He looked relaxed and confident. The poor
bastard was probably completely unaware that he’d just been
softened up by a pro. Toni had him right where
she wanted him. “So,” she started, “your name came up
a couple of times as we were talking to people,
so we thought we should contact you.”

He considered this
for a second, then he said, “My name? People talk,
no?”

She smiled. “That they do. You’re quite well-known, you know.”

He nodded. Of course he would.

“When
you go out, people see you. They notice you. Obviously,
you’ve been seen with Sophie, and you were seen
with her by some of her friends.” She was trying
the old razzle-dazzle to distract him.

It worked. He
shrugged. “Is true. Sophie and I were friends. Like I
say, she was sweet girl. We were good friends.”

“How
well did you know her?”

He thought for a second. “
I meet her this year at a party—New Year’
s, I think. It was her sister Nicki the one
who introduced us. Sophie tell me she was new to
the area. She ask me to go with her to
a function.” He shrugged. “I say yes. I like help
young people.”

“Of course. And then?”

“We go to other
functions. Sophie is fun to be with. She’s good
talker—come from good family. When I am in Seattle,
sometimes I see her.”