“So Will was seeing Ruth when he was arrested,” I said.
“Yes,” she said. “In fact I’m certain the arrest was a set up.”
“What makes you believe that?”
“The people who set him up were trying to damage Ruth’s reputation because she’s famous and they figured to do it by smearing Will’s name.”
I didn’t bother pointing out to her that Will was dealing steroids.
“So have you any idea who set Will up?” I asked taking another bite of my sandwich.
“I don’t know who exactly, but I do know it was a woman,” she said.
“How do you know that?”
“I read the police report that Mr. McCallister had obtained from the D.A.”
“And what was in the report that lead you to the conclusion that it was a woman behind Will’s arrest?”
“The police had recordings of a woman who was calling in giving them anonymous tips that named Will.”
“Do you have any idea who would do that?”
She stopped eating and looked me in the eye and said, “Marge Mason.”
“Who is Marge Mason?”
“Marge Mason is married to the head of the studio that films that awful soap opera that Ruth Addems is on,” she said.
“And Will left Marge for Ruth,” I said.
“Yes.”
“And Marge couldn’t risk going after Will herself for fear of exposing the affair between her and Will and her husband finding out about it.”
“You talk very well for a young man who dresses like a gang member,” she said.
“Hooked on phonics worked for me,” I said with a smile.
She actually smiled at that.
19
As it turned out I wasn’t going home as soon as I thought. Mildred had a little pull so she arranged for me to meet with a guy named Jasper Phillips. If that wasn’t a Hollywood name I don’t know what is. Jasper was the guy who hooked up Ruth with Will when she was looking for a personal trainer.
I met Jasper on Rodeo Drive in front of a boutique with a name I couldn’t pronounce. His bangs were covering his left eye and had blond highlights, his eyebrows, or at least the one I could see, were arched and his lip gloss was, well, glossy. His clothes were a little too tight and he was soft in the middle with skinny legs.
“Rey,” he said when I introduced myself and we shook hands. “Mildred said you were a looker.”
Mildred hadn’t mentioned it to me. I just smiled.
“I love the whole urban look you have going on,” he said waving his hands around as he spoke. “Where do you live?”
“Oakland California,” I said.
He stopped moving and looked at me and said, “Oh.”
“So Mildred tells me you introduced Ruth to Will,” I said.
“Yes, yes, that was me,” he said. “Don’t know what she saw in him. I’m not into the whole muscle thing. But, to each her own.”
“Yes,” I said.
“So what is it you wanna know,” he said.
“Whatever you want to tell me,” I said. “I just listen and see if anything useful comes out of conversation.”
“How boring,” he said.
“Not really,” I said.
“Let’s walk,” he said. “I have some shopping to do.”
“What do you do?” I asked.
“You know how all those actors and musicians dress in all the latest clothes that become so hot for that season?” he said.
“That’s you?”
“That’s me,” he said holding his hands out as if to say Ta-Da!
“Wow,” I said.
“It’s a living,” he said.
We walked past the restaurant Ashley and I had eaten at when I was there last.
“Can’t stand that place,” Jasper said.
“Neither can I,” I said.
“You’ve been there?” he said looking at me.
“Once,” I said.
“Maybe you have better taste than I thought,” he said under his breath.
Along the street I saw more Roll Royces and other luxury vehicles than I had in my whole life.
“I met Ruth first,” Jasper said as we walked. “She’s a nice girl but she has her ways.”
“What do you mean?”
“Some days she was nice and cheery and the next she was moody and just nasty,” he said.
“Aren’t all actresses like that?” I asked.
“Not like this one,” he said. “I remember once she gave a party and didn’t even invite me even though the day before I was the one who went shopping with her so she would look hot for it.”
“Why the snub?”
“I should hire you to find out so we’d both know,” he said.
“So how do you know Will?” I asked.
“Let’s just say he knows a lot of the same women I do,” he said.
“And you thought it would be a good idea to introduce him to Ruth?”
“She was looking for a trainer and he was always looking clients.”
“Makes sense.”
“Turns out they kind of fell for each other,” he said.
“What do you mean ‘Kind of’?”
He stopped walking and looked at me and said, “This is Hollywood, where the people are faker than three dollar bills.”
“True,” I said.
“Anyway,” we started walking again. “Some days she loved him and others she didn’t.”
“Sounds confusing.”
“Right,” he said. “Can’t imagine why he would stay with her after what she did.”
“What did she do?”
We stopped at a red light and he looked at me with surprise on his face and said, “You really don’t know?”
“Know what?”
“She suspected him of cheating on her so she made an anonymous call to the police about his, shall we say, steroid business.”
“She called the police on him?” I asked not able to hide my shock. “Why would he stay with her?”
“Wait,” he said. “Will is still with her?”
“Yes.”
“I’d heard he didn’t know it was her but I didn’t think he was that dense,” he said.
Suddenly Will shot back up to the top of my list of suspects. Revenge was a great motive.
I told Jasper that I had a plane to catch and thanked him for his time and caught a cab back to the airport.
20
The whole flight back to Oakland I just kept wondering what Will would gain from terrorizing Ruth but then it dawned on me that sometimes revenge was motive enough to do something like that. Maybe, Will felt he was justified in scaring her. She had after all been the one who informed the police that he was selling steroids because he was cheating on her and it was her phone call that led to his arrest. But why stay with her? Was he that twisted that he would live with her for years before setting his plan into motion? It was hard to believe someone would do that. I didn’t think he would actually hurt her because if that was his intent there had to have been plenty of opportunities to do so. I wondered if Will had thought it through. Ruth was his meal ticket. If she found out what he had been doing to her his free ride was sure to come to an end. Maybe he hadn’t thought it through.
Then I started to wonder what kind of person stays with a guy who has been cheating on her, after she set him up to get busted by the cops.
When the plane landed I called Marv Seville and asked if he had learned anything about Ruth’s father. I remembered she said they grew up in Denver so I gave him that as a starting point. He said that much he knew but he hadn’t really followed up on it but he would. Then he said I was getting too comfortable asking for favors and I told him I’d buy him dinner at his favorite pizza joint.
I left the airport and climbed into my car. While I drove to the office I called Ruth and she said everything was fine and I said I’d stop by in the morning to check on her and hung up.
21
> By the time I got a number for Ruth’s father, whose name was Bert Addems, it was 5:05 p.m. That meant it was 6:05 p.m. in Denver. I called but got an answering machine so I left a message for Bert.
By 7:20 p.m. I still hadn’t heard from Bert so I called back but got the machine again. This time I didn’t leave a message.
Ashley was in Las Vegas so I couldn’t go and see her. I had nothing to do but sit in my office and wait for Bert to call.
At 7:54 p.m. I got a call on my cell from a 310 area code, Beverly Hills. I answered it.
“Hello?” I said.
“Is this Rey?” said the woman on the other end.
“Yes, who is this?”
“My name is Marge Mason.”
The woman married to the studio executive.
“How may I help you?” I said.
“I’ve been informed that you’ve been asking questions around town and talking to people about Ruth Addems,” she said.
I immediately thought about Jasper.
“I’m working on a case for her.”
“I’ve done some checking on you,” she said. “You’re reputation is a good one. They say your word is good and that you are very good at what you do.”
“I try,” I said.
“I figured my name has probably come up during the course of your investigation and I should probably clear up any questions you may have about me before you start asking around town.”
“Well, I’ve heard some things about you but to tell you the truth I don’t know how it plays into my investigation.”
“You’ve heard that I was having an affair with Will Leismuller and that he left me for Ruth Addems, did you not?”
“I did.”
“No doubt you’re curious about that.”
“A little.”
“Then know that I am willing to answer any questions that you may have on the condition that you don’t start dredging up my past and making it public knowledge.”
“I’ll do my best not to let that happen.”
“I was told you never make promises you couldn’t keep.”
“Sounds as if you did your homework on me.”
“I do what I can,” she said. “Now let’s get down to it, shall we?”
“Well I know Will left you for Ruth and that later on he cheated on her and she called the police and tipped them off to his steroid business, but that’s really all I know.”
“So you didn’t know that I discovered Ruth?”
“No,” I said. “I didn’t.”
“I knew my husband was casting for a role on the soap his studio produces and I saw her in a play and knew she would be perfect for the part so I got in contact with her agent, a slimy man whose name escapes me,” she said. “Anyway I got her out of the contract with him and moved her into my house, well the guest house.”
“Why would you do that?” I asked.
“My dear, you really know nothing of Ruth, do you?”
“I guess not,” I said.
“Ruth’s mother died when she was very young,” she said.
“That I knew.”
“Did you know that her father severely abused her?”
She didn’t have to explain that to me.
“No,” I said. “I didn’t.”
“Yes,” she said. “The poor girl finally got away from him and made it out to Los Angeles on her own by the age of fifteen. I met her when she was seventeen.”
“She told you this?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. “As I said she lived with my husband and myself for about four years then she took up with Will and the tabloids can pretty much tell the rest.”
“Did she ever go to the police about her father?” I asked.
“Not that I’m aware of.”
While we were on the phone I had left my office and was in my car heading for Ruth’s house. I had a bad feeling.
“So her father just never got in contact with her again?” I said.
“Not to my knowledge,” she said. “Why do you ask?”
By that time had left my office and was in my car heading for the freeway.
“Ruth is being stalked but there has been no demands of any kind made and her stalker has never revealed himself to her,” I said.
“I thought stalkers craved attention,” she said.
“They do.”
“But this one doesn’t.”
“I think I know why,” I said as I drove on the 13 headed for the 24 then onto the 680.
“You think her father is the stalker?” she said.
“Makes sense,” I said. “Who else could it be?”
“I haven’t the foggiest.”
Freeway traffic was light.
“Didn’t Ruth’s mother have family she could’ve went to live with after she died?” I asked.
“None that wanted an infant child,” she said.
“Infant?” I said.
“Ruth,” she said.
“Ruth wasn’t an infant when her mother died,” I said.
“Ruth’s mother died giving birth to her,” she said.
I thought back to my conversation with Ruth in her kitchen when she said she and her mother used to talk over milk and cookies after school.
“I’m gonna need to call you back,” I said to Marge.
“Okay,” she said and I hung up.
The next call I made was to Lieutenant Marv Seville of the Danville Police department. I got his voicemail and told him to meet me at Ruth Addems’s house ASAP. I was fifteen minutes away.
22
When I got to Black Hawk I didn’t wait for the guard to clear me. In fact I didn’t wait for the guard to raise the wooden arm, I drove through it with him yelling for me to stop or he would call the police. What he didn’t know was that I wanted him to call the police.
I sped down the streets until I got to Ruth’s house and I drove up on the grass. The lights in the upstairs part of the house were on and the front door was open.
I killed the engine, got out of my car and had my gun in my hand that I had got from my office when I came back from the airport. I also grabbed the mini flashlight that I kept in my glove compartment.
I stopped at the door and listened but heard nothing. I had no idea what Ruth’s father looked like but I knew he was probably there. The lower half of the house was dark so I turned on the flashlight, entered the house and made my way through. I swept the path in front of me as I walked through the house. When I passed the library I shone the light inside and thought I saw something on the floor. The room was dark but I went in and swept the light around the room to make sure that no one was in there waiting to shoot me as I walked past the open door.
Will was laying face down in a pool of blood. I carefully stepped to him and reached down and tried to feel for a pulse in his neck. There wasn’t one.
Then I heard voices coming from upstairs.
I went out into the hall and stopped at the bottom of the stairs. I could make out words.
“Liar!”
“Why are you here?”
“You thought you could get away from me?”
I started up the stairs. The voices sounded strange to me but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
“I hate you! I always have! You’re weak!”
I got to the door of the room and it was open maybe an inch. I used my toe and softly pushed and the door swung open. What I saw made the blood in my veins turn into ice water.
Ruth was sitting in front of her mirror with a chrome .380 pistol pressed to her right temple.
“I’ve always hated you!” she yelled at her reflection with anger in her eyes.
Then the anger changed to fear and she was crying. Her eyes locked on to mine in the mirror and she said, “Rey, please.”
Then before I could do anything Ruth Addems shot herself in the head causing it to snap hard to the left as her brains sprayed the far wall and her body fell to the floor.
I let my gun lower to my thigh and leaned agai
nst the door frame and slid down until I was sitting on the floor. I could hear sirens getting louder.
23
Three weeks later I was sitting in my kitchen with Ashley and Sam Spade. It was 2:03 p.m. and the sun was lighting the whole room. Sam was filling us in on details about Ruth Addems when the doorbell rang and I went to answer it.
I walked back in followed by Mike who owned a restaurant called Rochelle’s. I’d ordered lunch and he was delivering it.
He knew everyone so Sam kept talking.
“As it turns out Ruth’s mother did die at birth and she was raised by her father,” Sam said. “By the way he had killed himself about three days before Ruth did. He had no history of child abuse and as far as I can tell he had never been arrested.”
“You’re talking about Ruth Addems?” Mike asked.
I nodded.
“Marv Seville called me and told me what was going on the day after Ruth killed herself so I called the Denver PD and talked to a cop by the name of Steve Gibson, old timer in the department,” Sam said. “He pulled Ruth’s file and said when she was in first grade her teacher reported that she thought maybe there was some sort of abuse going on but back in those days things were handled differently and no follow up was ever done. Cops asked Ruth’s father about it, he denied it and that was that.”
“How horrible,” Ashley said.
“Yeah,” Sam said. “I had a shrink I know look over what we knew about Ruth, witness testimony about her behavior and whatever else we had. Even though he couldn’t say for sure he said it looked like she was displaying signs of having multiple personalities.”
“How does something like that happen?” I asked.
“One way would be years of severe abuse,” Sam said. “Left unchecked the human mind is fragile. Although the shrink can’t say for sure he said it sounds as if Ruth became two different people to deal with it. One was the victim and one was the Ruth everyone saw on TV. Self assured, in charge and couldn’t be taken advantage of. In other words not the victim. He says there isn’t enough documented information to even make a case for it but the possibility is there.”
I thought about when I saw Ruth working from home. She was everything she needed to be in the Hollywood scene. Plus her aggressive side showed when she had Will arrested when she found out he was cheating on her. I also remembered her writing my retainer check with her left hand then that day at her house while she was handling her business affairs she was twirling a pen through the fingers of her right hand.