SEVENTY
JORDAN
Enjoy our narrated tours of the glamorous world that is Hollywood. Your ticket includes a scenic drive past the breathtaking celebrity mansions of yesterday and the homes of today’s biggest stars.
—LuxelineToursLA.com
When Sydney was twelve, Jordan and Amber had given in to her begging and brought her to LA. Over the course of an endless three-day weekend, they dutifully marched through Disneyland, Universal Studios, and the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Desperate for some time off their feet, they bought tickets for a bus tour of Beverly Hills. While Amber and Sydney oohed and aahed over the lifestyles of the rich and famous, Jordan couldn’t get past the sheer amount of lawn care each mansion required.
Now that he was actually inside one of them, he couldn’t get over how many hard, shiny surfaces there were to clean, either. Some were probably smudged with Cara Campbell’s fingerprints, but there was no need to lift them: they had video.
“See?” Taylor Campbell stood in the huge entryway, showing Wen, Ellett, and Jordan the security playback on her iPad screen. “The bitch is a redhead now. She’s too old for that haircut, though.”
As Ellett took a picture of the screen with her phone, Wen asked, “Any idea how she got in?”
“I think the fucking handyman let her in. Or maybe he just didn’t lock the door behind him. Either way, I’m not using that company anymore.”
Jordan wondered when the fugitive would finally run out of hairstyles and colors as Ellett started hammering her phone with her thumbs, no doubt blasting Campbell’s picture to the far corners of cyberspace.
“What was your relationship like with your stepmother?” he asked.
He regretted the question as soon as it came out of his mouth. Taylor, Wen, and Ellett all stared at him like he was an idiot.
“What do you think?” spat Taylor.
Jordan held up his hands in apology. “Tell us again what happened. What do you think she was doing here?”
“She was getting my dad’s gun. She threatened me with it, which is why I hit the panic button and ran. You guys better be careful and shoot first.”
“Take it easy, OK?” said Wen. “Let us do our jobs.”
“Where was the gun?” asked Jordan.
“In my dad’s office upstairs, I think. I’ve never actually seen it. I just knew he had one.”
“I’ll take a look.”
As he headed for the stairs, Wen asked, “Can you think of another reason she might have come here? To hide out, maybe?”
“Hell if I know,” said Taylor. “It’s not her house anymore. My lawyer said I can execute the moral turpitude clause in the agreement I signed to let her live here.”
Jordan climbed a glass-enclosed staircase that had to cost more than his pickup truck. The second floor was just as impressive. It was hard to place the dirty, desperate woman he’d chased through the Sierra in this luxurious, modern home.
The study was easy enough to find. The decor looked like it came out of a showroom, just like the rest of the house, but with vintage flourishes like an old leather chair and a hat rack with a seemingly unworn fedora. On a low table, an architectural model of a medical campus was labeledCampbell Cosmetic. Unlike the rest of the house, this room was coated in a fine layer of dust.
Jordan searched the drawers and shelves but couldn’t find anything obviously out of place. He was about to go back downstairs when he noticed a framed, signed print behind the desk—red and black, it looked like a computer-generated tie-dye pattern—hanging off-kilter. He lifted a corner and then took it off the wall completely. Behind it, the wall safe’s door was slightly ajar.
He wasn’t sure it was legally permissible, but Taylor Campbell had implied consent to search the house, so he opened the safe. The first thing he saw was a black plastic Glock pistol case. He lifted it and felt the weight of the gun inside. He undid the catches and opened it, just to be sure. It looked like it had never been fired.
Several file folders had been resting on top of the gun. The first showed investment accounts that appeared to have been drawn down repeatedly over the past several years. Another included a promissory note for a significant sum of money: twelve million dollars. A third held a thick contract for the Magellan, which appeared to be an assisted living home. Amemorandum clarified an agreement to provide care until the end of the natural life of one Evelyn Marsh.
Evelyn Marsh’s benefactor was Karl Campbell.
Who was Evelyn Marsh, and what was her relationship to Karl?
Her care didn’t come cheap, and it looked like Karl had funded it at the same time he was draining his other accounts and going into debt to Gioni Enterprises, LLC, to build a new home for his practice.
Jordan rapped the papers softly against his thigh. The correct move was obviously to bring it all downstairs to Wen. She’d probably find it eventually, anyway. But he was getting sick and tired of being one step behind, tagging along with the US Marshal service only to have Campbell flit away again.
