“No,” said Heck. “That’s the thing. Been racking my brains but I can’t come up with anything. You think it could’ve been some new guy Sophie was seeing who got jealous? Because like I said, Sophie and me stayed friends and we called each other but I have no idea who she was dating.”
“How often were the phone calls?”
“Every so often…maybe, couple a month? She was a really nice girl. You think some jealous asshole got hold of her phone and saw my number on it and traced it? That’s so fuckingtwisted.”
“We’ll check out every possibility, Mike.”
Bel Geddes huffed.
Heck said, “Hope you do, man. This is freaking me out.”
“Incarceration can do that to you,” said Bel Geddes.
“That’s not what I mean. The whole thing of spying on me when I had no idea.” He turned to Milo. “You got me totally wrong, sir, but I can see it, you had DNA. But now that we know it was bullshit you need to find out who did it. To Sophie and to me, ’cause it’s obviously the same person.”
“We’ll do our best,” said Milo.
“The royal plural?” said Bel Geddes.
“Anything else you want to tell us, Mike?”
“Can’t think of anything.”
“If you do—”
“He’ll notifymeand I’ll notifyyou,” said Bel Geddes.
Heck’s lips tightened. Not happy being treated as a dependent.
“Okay, then,” said Milo. “That’s it. Thanks, Mike.”
As he began to rise, Heck said, “There is one thing but it’s probably nothing.”
Bel Geddes gave a start. “We need to discuss anything substantive, Michael.”
“It’s no big deal.”
“Michael—”
“I’m not a two-year-old.”
His voice had taken on a hard edge that Bel Geddes didn’t challenge. She looked chastened, even a bit frightened, and I wondered if the lawyerly aggression was a thin veneer.
Milo said, “We’re listening, Mike.”
Heck said, “You know what I do, right? My career.”
“Administrator at a law firm.”
“Exactly. I oversee the basics at Rifkin, Wolfram and Sapir, over in West L.A. Fifteen lawyers, little bit of everything. Before that, I worked for Spitz, DeMarzio, Duncan and Baggs in Century City, they did workman’s comp.”
He leaned forward. “But. Before those two, I worked for Darren Alberts.”
Bel Geddes said, “Be careful, Mike,” but her voice lacked conviction.
Heck said, “I am being careful. I did nothing wrong, why should I be ashamed to talk about it?”
“It’s best, Mike, not to hand bait to a poacher.”
