The split-second decision was more a five-second deliberation, but I eventually reacted. I unnecessarily dove back towards the lobby even though I could have casually walked over and still made it safely out of the way of the oncoming car. I crumpled onto the asphalt as the car swooshed by, missing me by a wide margin. Pulling myself together, I looked over at Hector. He hadn’t moved. He stood there with his arms crossed and a blank stare. I detected a smile.
The shame for how I reacted hurt more than the scrapes on my hands. I was angry at Hector and I was angry at myself. But I was also angry at the person who tried to run me over.
There was no mistaking him. It was the face in the photograph I got from Jeanette’s room — Nelson Portillo.
ENVIRONMENTALISTS AND TEACHERS
The standstill traffic across the Valley granted me sufficient time to process the events of the last few days. One of the few benefits of the relentless traffic in Los Angeles was it allotted you the quiet and mental lawn to just think.
I had little hope that a call from Jeanette’s father was going to bring her home. The more I learned, the more I felt there was something else driving this saga beyond a mere teenage spat with her parents. A troubled girl sought out a relationship with her grandfather’s ex-wife. It was important enough that her boyfriend felt the need to protect it by trying to run me over. And then there was the curious man driving me all over Los Angeles. I concentrated on the black mass that was the back of his head where even the hairs low on the nape of his neck were dyed. I stared into this void hoping to penetrate the impenetrable but got nothing more than I already knew. He was too comfortable with a knife for my liking and he had a reputation that went back decades. Neither sat well with me.
I pulled my gaze from Hector’s head and realized we had pulled off onto Van Nuys and were heading towards the hill. This was nowhere near where my car was parked in my office downtown.
“Where are we going?” I asked but didn’t receive a reply. As we turned onto Mullholland Drive and began the winding path towards Benedict Canyon, the answer became clear. But I wanted Hector to say it. I wanted him to know that I knew where we were going and wasn’t happy about being summoned like a bellhop. “Where are we going?” I repeated multiple times like a petulant child until I got the answer I wanted.
“Mr. Valenti wants to see you,” he answered dully.
As we passed through the electric gate, I watched groundskeepers take down dozens of “Vote Yes on 57” placards. Someone apparently wanted to take the message on the museum fight straight to Valenti’s door.
The house was as I remembered it. The structure loomed out on the hill’s edge. At night, as when I first saw it, the house resembled an architectural monstrosity. During the day it was just ugly.
Hector parked the sedan on the right edge of the gravel drive and got out. By the way he walked purposefully around the front of the car and into a shaded arbor, it was clear that I was intended to follow him. But I didn’t like being led around like a flunky. Even if I was at Valenti’s beck and call and slavishly followed the money lurking behind those calls, it didn’t mean I had to willfully participate.
I remained in the back seat with my arms crossed defiantly like a child. Like other people with no power, I clung to some vague demand for “respect.” If only I had chosen a better spot to make my stand. The car’s interior grew increasingly hotter with no air conditioning and with the black paint absorbing every last ray of the sun’s light. Beads of sweat dotted my forehead and two separate streams trickled down my back and pooled at my beltline. I began breathing with my mouth open and the air was hot going in and hotter coming out. Dignity came at the cost of heat exhaustion and a dress shirt stained dark with sweat.
Hector mercifully returned before I required a trip to the emergency room.
“Please follow me,” he grumbled reluctantly.
“Thank you,” I said hoarsely, emerging from the sweltering car. Before I could get my second foot out, Hector flicked the door like he was about to slam it closed on me. He was hoping for a flinch and got a gross over-reaction instead. I threw out both arms to stop the door from crushing me and nearly fell out when it never came.
“Where is he?” I snapped but didn’t wait for his answer and stormed off into the arbor.
Valenti sat at small, wrought iron table with an ice bucket chilling a bottle of white wine. He flicked through the LA Times and only put it down a good minute after I had settled into the chair opposite him.
“Why are you wasting time meeting with my ex-wife?” he began. “I’m not paying you to dig into my past.”
“You haven’t paid me anything yet.”
He let that one go.
“What led you to seek her out in the first place?”
I told him about the article I found in Jeanette’s bedroom and how she and Sheila had been meeting regularly for a year and a half. I also explained that it looked like Jeanette had initiated the contact, but for what reason I wasn’t sure. Suddenly feeling pressure to explain my lack of progress in locating his granddaughter, I rambled through all the work I had done so far, but Valenti already knew the details.
“If you want more regular reports,” I told him, “I am glad to provide them. All you have to do is ask.”
“Don’t be hurt,” he said, picking up on the irritation in my voice. “I demand information on everything I do and get it from any source I can. Do not be annoyed by Hector. He’s only doing what I ask of him. He’s there to help you.”
“Help? Or watch my every move?”
“Maybe both.”
“Do you trust this guy?” I asked.
“With my life,” he stated firmly.
It was clear Hector was giving a blow-by-blow account of the work, or lack thereof, to Valenti. I was curious how detailed those reports were.
“Did he tell you about the encounter with the brother of Jeanette’s boyfriend, the one who collected the money?”
“He told me you didn’t get your hands dirty,” he countered.
“Your ‘driver’ looks pretty comfortable with a switchblade in his hands. It’s a curious trait for someone who just needs to wait outside buildings while you have meetings.”
“Yes, he has some rather unique and valuable skills.” Valenti folded the newspaper and placed it on the empty seat next to him. The action signified he was finished with the topic of his driver and wanted to move onto something else, the real reason he summoned me to his canyon-top retreat. “What else did my ex-wife have to say?” he asked casually.
“She didn’t tell me too much,” I replied. I didn’t want Valenti to know what she told me about his past but I also didn’t want him to think that she told me nothing. He got the message.
“But she told you something.”
For one of the few times in the relationship, I felt like I held the trump card. This card featured a young Valenti in overalls picking up table scraps to feed a swine business. I imagined him in the pens with the beasts, stomping through the mud and pig refuse, and having that odor which somehow gets into your skin and can’t be washed off with soap no matter how hard you scrub. With his manicured nails and silk ties and perfectly chilled bottles of Sancerre I was sure it was an image he’d prefer was relegated to the deep recesses of memories euphemistically known as the “early years.”
“Of course she told you about the pigs,” he smiled.
And the trump card was summarily plucked from my fingers.
“What pigs?” I played dumb, but he saw through it.