Free Monster by Jonathan Kellerman Page B

we're talking about loneliness and an attempt to fill the void. Some sort of lonely-hearts hookup with the wrong person."
     
     
"A man and a woman?" she said. "A bisexual killer?"
     
     
"That would make Dada gay, and Milo never found any indication of that. Or maybe it had nothing to do with sex-just companionship, some kind of common-interest club. On the other hand, the cases could be unrelated."
     
     
I raised her hand to my lips, kissed the fingertips one by one. "Mr. Romantic. I'd better switch gears before I drive you into isolation."
     
     
She grinned, waved languidly, kissed air, put on her Bette Davis voice. "Pass me the spinach, dahling. Then you can pay the check and sweep me off my feet to the nearest
     
     
Baskin
     
     
Robbins for some jamoca almond fudge. After that, hi-ho all the way home, where you ah cawjully invited to add some entanglement to my life."
     
     
8.
     
     
AT EIGHT P.M. Milo called. "Am I interrupting anything?"
     
     
He'd missed interrupting by an hour. Robin was reading in bed and I'd taken Spike for a short walk up the canyon. When the phone rang, I was sitting out on the terrace, trying to rid my mind of question marks, struggling to concentrate on the sound of the waterfall that fed the fishpond. Grateful because I couldn't hear the
     
     
freeway.
     
     
"Not at all. What's up?"
     
     
"Got the info on Claire and Stargill. Married two years, divorced nearly two, no kids. I reached Stargill. He says the split was amicable. He's a partner in a ten-lawyer firm, remarried three months ago. He just learned about Claire. San Diego papers didn't carry it, but one of his partners was up here, read about it."
     
     
"What was his demeanor?"
     
     
"He sounded pretty upset over the phone, but what the hell does that mean? Said he doubted there was anything he could add but he'd talk to me. I set up an appointment for tomorrow morning at ten."
     
     
"San Diego?"
     
     
"No, he's driving up."
     
     
"Very cooperative fellow."
     
     
"He has business here anyway. Some commercial property closings-he's a real estate lawyer."
     
     
"So he comes up to L.A. regularly."
     
     
"Yeah, I made note of that. Let's see what he's like face-to-face. We're meeting at
     
     
Claire's house. Which she owns. It was his bachelor place, but after the divorce he signed it over to her and agreed to pay the mortgage and taxes in lieu of alimony and her dipping into his stocks and bonds."
     
     
"Who inherits the property now?"
     
     
"Good question. Stargill wasn't aware of any will, and he claims neither of them took out insurance on the other. I never came across any policies; Claire was thirty-nine, probably wasn't figuring on dying. I suppose a lawyer would know how to play the probate process-he might make a case for mortgage payment constituting partial ownership. But my guess her parents would come first. What do you think a place like that is worth?"
     
     
"Three hundred or so. How much is equity?"
     
     
"We'll find that out tomorrow if Mr. Cooperative stays cooperative.... Maybe he got tired of paying her bills, huh?"
     
     
"It could chafe, especially now that he's remarried. Especially if he's got money problems. Be good to know what his finances are like."
     
     
"If you want to meet him, be there at ten. I left a message with Heidi Ott's machine, no callback yet. And the lab sent another report on the prints: definitely only Claire's. Looks like she really did go it alone."
     
     
The next morning I called Dr. Myron Theobold at County Hospital, left a voicemail message, and drove to Cape Horn Drive, arriving at 9:45. Milo's unmarked was already there, parked at the curb. A deep-gray late-model BMW sedan sat in front of the garage, ski clamps on the roof.
     
     
The house's front door was unlocked, and I entered. Milo had reassumed his position at the center of the empty living room. Near the kitchen counter stood a man in his forties wearing a blue suit, white shirt,