“He would have thrown it away,” Tess said. “He couldn’t hold on to it, much less try to return it or hock it. The ring would have been key to convicting him. And the murder weapon is missing, too, so that’s consistent.”

“Yeah,” Mrs. Meyerhoff said, sighing and exhaling at the same time. “It all fits. And if it were one of my other boys, I’d say, ‘I knew this day was coming.’ Do you think my temper is something they inherited? Were my boys doomed to be the way they are because of how I am?”

It was a big question, far too large to be answered in a kitchen on Delaware Avenue, over grape soda and Hydrox. Perhaps too large to be answered anywhere, under any circumstances.

Leaving Mrs. Meyerhoff ’s house, Tess decided to call Tull.

“Have you closed Greer’s murder officially yet?”

“No,” he said. “We have to be careful on these things, not rush, even when the outcome seems likely.”

“So when will JJ Meyerhoff ’s things be released? Will his mother get his truck? How does that work?” She wasn’t sure if killers got to keep their property, or if their possessions passed to the state.

“Eventually.”

“Did you go over the truck pretty carefully?”

“Of course we did.”

“And you didn’t find the ring, much less the murder weapon. Right?”

“How do you know the ring was missing? We held that back.”

“The two mothers had… words at the funeral. So, no ring? Are you sure?”

“Look, Tess, this is the least of my problems right now.” A pause. “I mean, it’s not that I have problems, it’s just I don’t have time for this kind of trivia.”

Tull was an interesting case. Face-to-face, he could lie to anyone, about anything. It was the nature of his job after all. But on the phone, without his handsome stone face to carry his game, his words sometimes betrayed him.

“What’s going wrong? I thought the case was a dunker.”

“It is.”

She didn’t say anything, waiting him out. Then, when he didn’t crack, she added: “You owe me. The last time I tried to tell you something important, you blew me off, and someone I loved almost got killed.”

That was a sore point and it seemed to anger Tull – because it was true. “I don’t owe you shit. It doesn’t work that way. You come in here, solve a couple of my open ones, and maybe then I’ll be in your debt. But I’m not accountable to you, or your Hollywood bosses. I know they want this to be all wrapped up. I do, too. But there’s… a complication.”

“About the ring?”

“Not about the fucking ring!” A pause. “Okay, I’m sorry, it’s just you call me in the middle of the shit storm of shit storms, and you have to promise me that this goes no further. I know you got friends at the newspaper-”

“Not too many at this point.”

“Yeah, well if I read this in the paper tomorrow, you’ll never be able to get back in my good graces. The deputy, who brought Meyerhoff down? He’s got a bad habit of shooting too fast. Third time he’s shot someone in two years, although he’s never killed anyone before. I still like Meyerhoff for the Sadowski death, but now we have to wait for Garrett County to investigate his shooting before I can close this out. That’s all.”

“That’s a lot,” Tess said. “Look – pull his clothes. Go through all the pockets again. It’s not like it was the Hope diamond. It could have gotten stuck in a pocket, snagged on a thread.”

“It would make my life… more interesting if we could find it,” Tull admitted.

Good, they were on the same page. The presence of the ring in JJ Meyerhoff ’s effects was the one thing that could persuade police that he didn’t kill Greer, just had a very ill-timed confrontation with her the night she died. No blood on his clothes, his mother had said, although she could be lying. And breaking up with the love of your life was reason enough to disappear for a few days – assuming one was very young.

Chapter 30

Ben stared at his screen, pretending to write. “So you’ve deigned to join us today,” Lottie had said when he arrived at eleven. “I’ve already completed a third of the script,” he had lied, smoothly and automatically. “Besides, I thought you would be grateful for the company.” Lottie blushed, and he almost felt bad, reminding her of the scare she had experienced Friday night, stupid prank though it appeared to be.

Now, after eight grinding long hours, he was just trying to wait everyone out, get a few moments alone. As the evening wore on, he realized Lottie was waiting for him, hoping to walk out together. Even when he logged long hours on a script, he seldom burned the midnight oil in the office, preferring to work in his hotel room. But that was back when there was a chance that Selene might visit. No, there was no reason to be there – and every reason to be here.

“Lloyd,” he said, trying to sound casual, “why don’t you walk Ms. MacKenzie to her car, then head home yourself. There’s no reason for you to be staying this late.”

“But the script supervisor asked for my help.” Lloyd said this as if it were on a par with being asked to storm SS headquarters and rescue a POW general. “We have to get ready for the minipub for one-oh-eight, and Flip is way behind.”

“Well, take a break at least. Walk Ms. MacKenzie to her car-”

“I don’t need an escort,” Lottie said.

“ – and then go to Nasu Blanca and get me some takeout.” How much time would that give him? Hell, he should have thought of some place farther afield, sent Lloyd on a true scavenger hunt for dinner, but now he was stuck. “I want the edamame, the spicy tuna tempura roll, and the Kobe beef hamburger. But what I really want is one of those teas you brought the other day. What did you call it, half and half?”

“I got that over in East Baltimore, near where we was on location for the cemetery. I don’t know no place around here that serves it. You find those at Chinese joints, mostly.”

“Don’t haze him,” Lottie snapped. “Fetching your dinner is enough.”

“Okay, dinner from Nasu Blanca, but get me an espresso from Vaccaro’s, too. I’m going to be working late and need some legal stimulants.”

He watched them leave the parking lot from his office window, then went into the open area where the assistants worked. It was hard to believe that someone had been killed here, not even a week ago. But the police had finished what they needed to do, returning the scattered papers in cardboard boxes that Lloyd was supposed to sort and file, poor kid. No wonder he was excited to be working on the minipub, something actually of consequence to the movie.

Greer’s desk had been left unoccupied for the time being, although that bit of respect would probably disappear the moment Flip found a new assistant. Lottie had suggested – tentatively, deferentially, because it was Flip – that he make it through the final weeks without one, which would be good for the budget, but Flip had said he couldn’t possibly cope without a personal assistant, and Lottie had acquiesced, as she always did with Flip. Ben began opening Greer’s desk drawers, but they were all empty. Of course – Greer’s desk had been plundered the night she was killed, its contents scattered far and wide, along with papers from several filing cabinets. Those, too, were among the papers that Lloyd would have to sort. Hey, maybe Ben should give the kid a head start, begin working on those papers now. He could chalk it up to the procrastination of a blocked writer. And him being such an all-around good guy.

The first cardboard box was filled with the very archival stuff where all the trouble had begun – scripts and stories and correspondence from their early years. Ben had thought Flip was insanely egotistical to think that USC, where they had attended grad school, would want these papers, but he hadn’t seen any reason to object when Flip asked Greer, then just an intern, to start organizing them.