I pulled out my phone, plugged in Winchell’s name, found his Instagram pages. Recent photos—lots of them—showed him with a pretty Asian woman named Randi. The earliest shot featured the two of them having dinner backed by a brilliant Maui sunset.
I showed the screen to Milo. “Backs up his story and they say they’re still together.”
He scrolled, returned the phone, smiled. “You thinking of a career switch to defense attorney?”
“Hey,” I said, “he was an Eagle Scout.”
“Speaking of which, what’s the real reason you quit the Cubs?”
I told him.
He said, “Oh…okay, onward.”
—
Back in the car, I said, “Did you really make beef stew?”
“Hell yeah, and it was tasty. My brothers demolished it. What I didn’t tell my scoutmaster was that I burned Mom’s Dutch oven in the process.”
“Assuming you’ve learned from the experience, one day you can fix it for Robin and me.”
“And Blanche,” he said. “If someone French is happy, I know I’ve aced it. Sure, why not, our place. Once things settle down.”
He pulled away from the curb.
I said, “I’ve been thinking about Martha’s daughter. Maybe one of the detectives Martha worked with knows something about her.”
“I’ve been trying to find out who she paired up with,” he said, “but it’s a long time ago and no luck, so far. Only old homicide guy I found is dead.”
“Maybe she didn’t pair up with anyone.”
“Going solo? Yeah, it happens when you don’t fit the mold.”
“When was her last assignment?”
“She packed it in around six years ago.”
“Maybe one of the fraud D’s can help.”
“Maybe,” he said, switching to a police band and pretending to listen to random calls.
A mile later, he turned it off. “Why not? Nothing else is working.”
Chapter
19
Saturday, he phoned at eleven-twenty a.m. Weekends off isn’t a concept for homicide D’s.
“Good idea you gave me, Mr. Wizard. Took a while but I finally managed to find someone Martha worked with who’s still alive. Not a fraud guy, a homicide D well before my time named Hans Lieder. Eighty-three, lives in Coeur d’Alene, sounds sharp. He was shocked to hear about Martha but had no first-impression suspicions.”
“As in the daughter probably did it.”
“As in. He met the daughter once, didn’t remember her name. His impression was she was mentally slow. But Martha didn’t share anything about her personal life and yes, she did work alone. The only reason he found out she had a daughter was one day after shift, Martha’s car broke down. She was supposed to pick the girl up from some kind of special school and she asked Lieder to drive her. He said she clearly wasn’t overjoyed at having to ask. The school was somewhere in Venice, near the canals. More like a house than an institution. Ring any bells?”
“No, but I can try to find out.”
“I couldn’t find anything that fit the bill but sure, give it a go. Anyway, Lieder lived in Huntington Beach so it was on his way home. He waited while Martha went in, she brought the girl out, Liederdescribed her as quiet, maybe a little sad-looking. He dropped them off and drove home.”
