Spiral

door when Detective Kyle Cascadden entered through it.
    ”Beantown, you didn’t come visiting without telling me first?”
    ”We found Malinda Dujong’s car.”
    Cascadden stopped. ”And?”
    ”Now your sergeant’s looking for Justo Vega’s.”
    ”Still doesn’t sound like Homicide’s problem to me.”
    ”After talking with Pintana, you might change your mind.”
    A grin. ”Lourdes hasn’t heard my side of whatever you’re pitching yet.”
    I moved by Cascadden. ”Call me later, let me know what she thought of your fastball.”

    Driving back to the Helides house, I tried to reason through the question of who would have sent both notes.
    You think about it, the second note seemed pretty clever, anticipating I’d be there when the trunk was opened. Maybe the killer believed that, after I realized Malinda Dujong was missing, I’d drive around the city, trying to spot her car. But Fort Lauderdale is huge, and I’d have no reason to cruise any particular part of it. So, whoever left that note must have figured that the police would be notified of the yellow Celica and would contact me.
    Which also made the second note seem pretty stupid, too: I could now tie whoever took Dujong—and presumably Justo Vega—to the person leaving that envelope for me at the hotel. If only Damon on the registration desk had noticed who’d delivered it.
    But even if the killer knew he hadn’t been identified there, why leave anything in Dujong’s car that connected her to the person telling me I should ”ask the band about Sundy Moran?” And assuming there was a reason to make Dujong disappear because of what she could have ”sensed” that day at the Skipper’s party, why take Justo as well, giving me yet another connection I didn’t already have?
    None of it made any sense. Who in their right mind would plan so elaborately, and then tip —
    Jesus. Their right mind.
    I pulled to the side of the road and stopped. There was opportunity. In fact, the perfect opportunity, thanks to the party. But an apparent absence of means. And no motive.
    At least, none that I could see.
    Shelving means for a while, I went back over what people had told me about Veronica Held. How manipulative she was in getting her own way. How interested she was in things sexual, including, according to Cassandra Helides, coming on to her. How enticing she was, from Ricky Queen’s ”demographics” explanation to the videos I’d seen myself of the birthday party and Spiral’s ”dry-run.”
    How David Helides, the ”resident expert” on drugs, thought Veronica was under the influence when she gave her performance at the party, an impression borne out by the autopsy report that found cocaine in her system.
    Killing Veronica Held made sense if she really did have some leverage that—under the spell of chemical inducement—she might reveal to the wrong person. Like maybe to her grandfather, since Nicolas Helides held most of the strings to the marionettes of family and band around him. And since Veronica would want to appease the Skipper for having behaved so badly on his birthday.
    Except that given the means, and especially the sexual violation with condom, the killing still seemed premeditated, not something done on the spur of the moment after Veronica ran beyond the range of Kalil’s camera. And why would the murderer tell me through the paste-up notes anything that would lead to Sundy Moran or her relationship with—
    No. No, back up. When I got the note suggesting I ask the band about Moran, I assumed it came from someone other than the killer and pointed toward someone in the band as the killer. Then, when the person taking Malinda Dujong planted that second paste-up in the trunk of her car, the composer of both notes seemed to be the murderer.
    Which went back to handing me connections I didn’t have, scrambling the people potentially having motives.
    I decided to shelve motive and go back to means. If you believe the killer was male, and exclude on...
    Wait a minute. Could that be the key?
    It would explain means, all right. And even motive. In fact, the one would beget the other. But I had to be sure, especially before telling Colonel Nicolas Helides what I suspected.
    Picking up my cell phone, I dialed the Skipper’s house. When Duy Tranh answered, I said, ”Can you give me some directions?”

TWENTY-FOUR

    It lay off a dirt and marl road that reminded me of the one going by Billy’s, the roadhouse where Donna Moran