No Place Like Home - A Camilla Randall Mystery (The Camilla Randall Mysteries) (26 page)

"I doubt Ronzo is laughing." Marvin seemed to be fighting anger, too. "And he's not in New Jersey. He was supposed to meet me on Tuesday. Near San Simeon Cove Beach. He never showed up. He doesn't answer his cell. Hasn't picked up since Monday when he left the message to meet him."

Silas harrumphed. "That doesn't mean much, if he's north of San Simeon. Reception is terrible up there. I own an old motel about ten miles north—near Ragged Point, and we can never get cell reception. One of the many reasons the place is worthless."

Marvin dismissed this with a wave.

"That doesn't explain why he didn't show. Or why he didn't call me from a landline. It's been over forty-eight hours. He must be in trouble. And now… people are missing. Everybody's going missing. The only information I could get was from the Thrifty Motel. They told me Ronzo's girlfriend took his things. They gave me this address. Here I am. This is the only lead I have."

"I'm not his girlfriend." Now I was feeling embarrassed about the whole thing. "But I had to pretend to be in order to get my things out of his room."

I hoped Plant and Silas weren't angry I'd given their address to the motel manager, but when I picked up Ronzo's things this morning, I didn't yet know what a creep he was.

Something about Marvin was creepy, too. He had an unnerving habit of never looking me in the eye. Something about him was familiar—as if I might have known him in another context. But not in an entirely friendly way.

Still, I felt I should be polite and ask him why he was so sure Ronzo was in trouble.

Marvin took a deep breath, then spat out a series of jerky phrases.

"Ronzo and I found proof. Proof that Tom is dead. Tom's been missing since the day before the fire. We're pretty sure he was murdered…by Harry Sharkov. Harry is alive. Ronzo thinks so too. He thought I was nuts, but then I convinced him. He said in his message he knew Harry was alive and he was going to get proof."

Silas let out a belly laugh. "Harry Sharkov? Alive? Have you seen that house?"

Plant's reaction was more sarcastic. "You and this guy discover a murder, and now the guy's disappeared? Why are you here? Call the police."

"I think you know I'm not all that fond of cops." Marvin's voice hinted at dark secrets they somehow shared.

The doorbell rang and Silas jumped up, obviously relieved to have an excuse to get away from Marvin's histrionics.

I could hear Lureen's high-pitched voice coming from the front hall. The woman always sounded as if she was trying to make a sale, even after she'd succeeded.

"Marvin, none of this is making any sense," Plant said. "Even if Ronzo thinks Harry somehow survived that fire, why would he go looking for him in San Simeon? It's not likely that a wanted man would find a place to hide near Hearst Castle. It's a State Park. Very well guarded. And the beach is even more unlikely. All they've got there besides Sebastian's Deli is a kayak rental on the beach. I seriously doubt Harry Sharkov tried to paddle to Costa Rica."

"The deli. That's where he told me to meet him, but he didn't show." Marvin's words kept coming at us like buckshot. "But there's a car in the parking lot. His car. I think it is. That rented Ford."

Plant stood, obviously tiring of the drama, too. "I don't suppose you bothered to get the license? Or call the rental company?"

"They're closed until tomorrow. I hoped maybe Camilla would remember something. Anything. Something that might help."

Plant looked at me. "Fine. But I think I'd better go help Silas with the paperwork." He turned back to Marvin. "Please feel free to use our landline to call the police."

I should have been doing the paperwork too. Buying my new business was much more important than some missing blogger whose life seemed to be made up of a series of lies.

I started to get up, but Marvin's hand clamped down on my good arm.

He pulled me close and whispered—

"Camilla. It's me. I was terrified you'd recognize me, back at that wine tasting, but now we have to work together. We've done it before. Ronzo's life is at stake. Ronzo and maybe…other people."

I looked into the man's eyes and got that sense of familiarity I'd felt before, but nothing emerged from my memory.

Except a powerful sense of danger.

Doria collapsed on the bed in the guest room, terrified. That was definitely Marvin's voice at the front door. How did he know she was here? What did he want?

She pulled off the wig. Maybe he wanted his Manners Doctor outfit back.

Or maybe something more sinister.

The one thing she knew was she did not want to deal with the man.

She took deep breaths. She wasn't really drunk. It was simply all the stress. She needed to get away from the stress. Out of here. Somewhere safe. A nice motel room where nobody knew her. Too bad she'd left Betsy's credit cards in the Mercedes. She might have been able to fool somebody into accepting it for a few nights. But where the hell could she go with no money?

She sat up and tried to listen to the conversation. It sounded as if Plantagenet was trying to get rid of Marvin. Maybe he would. Then it would be all right to stay the night.

She tiptoed to the door and opened it a crack, straining to make out the words.

Damn. Marvin seemed to be joining the party out on the patio. Camilla was doing a Manners Doctor thing. The perfect hostess. How annoying.

Doria opened the window. It was close enough to the patio that she could hear the voices. She shivered. There was no way to know what Marvin wanted with her, or what he'd do to her. She should at least change out of Mistress Nightshades' clothes. Hopefully into something warmer. She opened the closet, hoping to find something of Camilla's, but it was jammed with sports equipment. All she found in the way of clothing were running suits, ski parkas, golf shirts and tennis outfits.

Camilla was still chattering away. Luckily, she had no reason to connect "Dorothy" with Marvin, so Marvin had no reason to come in here.

Deep breath. She was probably perfectly safe. This was a small community. People knew each other. Marvin's visit probably didn't have anything to do with her. She should lie down, get some sleep, and hope the man would be gone when she woke up.

But just in case, she decided to borrow something to wear and take off Marvin's clothes. A jogging suit would do. She took off the Manners Doctor outfit and laid it carefully on the bed.

A shout from the patio startled her. Plantagenet. He sounded angry. She was pretty sure what he said was—

"Call the police!"

She froze, trapped, unable to breathe. She should have known better than to come here. They were George and Enrique's friends. George and Enrique might have tipped them off.

This place was not safe. She grabbed a navy blue jogging suit. The drab color would be good for sneaking around in the dark. She had to roll up the pant legs about four times, and the sleeves were ridiculous, but it was clothing.

She pulled up the zipper. Something bulky in the pocket turned out to be a ski-cap. Great. It would hide her hair, already matted from that wig. And it would keep her warm.

It was going to be cold out there.

And out there is where she had to go.

Lickity split.

Grabbing the Chanel bag, she headed toward the front door. She'd go out to the street and hitchhike. Pretend to have a broken-down car or something.

She had no idea where she'd hitchhike to. Any place away from here.

The doorbell rang.

Could the police be here already?

People were definitely at the front door. She could hear voices in the front hall.

She couldn't go that way.

She hoped there was a back door that didn't go right onto the patio where Marvin lay in wait. Through the garage, maybe. Yes. At the end of the hall she found a door that led into a dark garage. She squeezed between dusty boxes and shadowy tools and felt around for an outlet to the back yard.

She found a knob, pushed open a door, and stepped out into the night.

Camilla and Marvin were huddled over their wine at the outside table, looking like a couple of conspirators in the glow of the patio lights.

Slithering along the outside wall, Doria hoped the dark would hide her in spite of the nearly full moon. When she reached the corner of the house, she had to choose whether to take a chance of being seen by the maybe-cops at the front door or Marvin and Camilla on the patio. She decided cops were scarier than Marvin and took off running toward the willows by the creek.

She kept running until the patio with its elegant coach-lamp lighting was far enough away that she felt invisible.

But her heel sank into a hole. Damn. She tripped and collapsed onto the soft grass. The dizziness was back. Maybe she should rest here.

And hope there were no wild animals around.

Her mind filled with those stories she'd heard at the homeless camp about lions and bears.

Then she saw one.

A cat. A very big cat. Loping down toward the creek. At least she was pretty sure it was a cat. With tufts on its ears. A mountain lion? A lynx?

She was going to be eaten by a wild beast and nobody would even know.

To the world, she was already dead.

"Camilla, I'm Marva." Marvin's voice moved to a slightly higher register. "You caught me, um, impersonating the Manners Doctor a few years back. Down in Santa Ynez. A little blackmail thing with your ex-husband?"

My breath stopped as I looked into that almost-familiar face. Maybe, with make-up and false eyelashes, in the right light, it might be…

Yes. It probably was.

"Marva! I thought you were going to have an operation. You stole all that money so you could get the sex-reassignment surgery…"

Marvin looked away and gave an embarrassed smile.

"I managed to lose it. They want you to go through counseling before surgery, so I invested the money while I was in therapy. Unfortunately I invested it with Harry the Shark…"

"You too? He seems to have stolen from everybody—he sounds more like an octopus than a shark. Silas and Plant have been almost bankrupted…"

"I know," Marvin said. "I'm the one who introduced them to Harry. Pressured them, even. Harry gave me a nice commission, which of course I 'reinvested'…. Nobody ever won Harry's games but Harry." He glanced toward the sliding doors to the dining room, where Silas and Plant sat poring over papers with Lureen.

Marvin shrugged. "Plantagenet was totally against it—He sensed Harry was a con before any of the rest of us, but I sort of seduced Silas and…"

I held up a flattened hand to stop him. I did not need to hear the story. I knew as much about it as I cared to. I hadn't known the identity of the "little tramp" Silas had been seeing last January, but Plant had moved into my cottage for a week over that particular incident.

"What does any of this have to do with Ronson V. Zolek?"

I used my no-nonsense voice. Marva always had such a round-about way of getting to the point.

Marva/Marvin sighed. "That's my fault too. I got him out here—kind of on false pretenses. He's got a running story on his blog about J. J. Tower, the guitar player. He thinks J. J. didn't die in the fire at that Texas roadhouse in 1992."

I sat up and started paying more attention. Marva was a chronic liar, but this story might contain a grain of truth. Ronzo was definitely into '80s metal bands and he'd talked a lot about J.J. Tower.

"Yes." I gave Marvin a smile to encourage the truth-telling. "He told me his theory that J.J. faked his death and became some kind of traveling minstrel. He said the best J.J. Tower songs were about how fame corrupts and life should be simple. But I'm afraid I never could understand the lyrics. I'm not a heavy metal fan."

"Me, either." Marvin smiled back. A Marva smile. "But Ronzo is a major heavy metal guy. So on his blog, he asks people to send him pictures of people who might be J. J.—it's like Bigfoot spotting, you know? Or UFOs. So I emailed him a picture."

"And why did you do that? Did you actually see somebody who looked like J.J. or were you just fooling an old army buddy into visiting you?"

Marvin gave a masculine snort.

"We weren't exactly buddies. I sort of got him shot. One night I couldn't find my body armor, so I borrowed his, and then the whole squad got sent into Fallujah…I don't suppose you really want to hear this?"

I made an attempt at a smile. "Why don't you tell me about J.J. Tower first?" I could believe Marva might steal armor, but I didn't need to hear the story. I needed to pin down some facts in this increasingly bizarre situation with Ronzo. If the man really was in danger, I should do what I could.

"There is this local homeless guy," Marva/Marvin said. "They call him Hobo Joe. I'm sure he's not J.J.—because J.J. is as dead as Elvis. Seriously. Some people will believe anything. But Hobo Joe looks a little like J.J. might look if he'd lived another twenty-five years. So I took his picture and sent it to Ronzo to get him out here."