Page 49 of My Beautiful Sin

I shoot a glance toward Lamar, who knows a cue when he sees one. He steps forward, his own hand outstretched. “Detective Lamar Gage,” he says. “I’m with the Laguna Cortez PD.”

Ortega looks between the two of us. “What’s the police department doing looking into a man dead over ten years?”

“I’m not here officially,” he says, which is true. But having a real live detective at your side can prompt some people into a nervousness that has them spewing truth left and right. “I’m just helping Ms. Holmes out. It turns out that Peter White got on the wrong side of The Wolf, and she’s trying to learn more about that. Are you familiar with that name?”

“Somewhat. A bit off my radar, but now that I think about it, I remember some gossip after Peter was killed. Chatter with a few other customers who knew him. Said he’d gotten mixed up in drugs, prostitution, all that stuff.” He shakes his head, looking truly baffled. “Honestly, that doesn’t sound like the Peter White I knew.”

“Didn’t sound like it to me, either,” I admit. “Do you have contact information for those customers?”

He shakes his head. “Sorry, not a thing. None of them come around anymore, and all my records from back then got fried when my hard drive did. That was before I backed that stuff up.” He looks between Lamar and me. “Not sure what else I can tell you.”

“Honestly, I’m not either,” I admit. “He used your shop when he lived in LA, right? And he kept coming back to you even after he moved to Laguna Cortez?”

“Yeah, yeah. I restored an E-Type Jag for him and a sweet little ’67 Corvette when he lived in LA. He didn’t much work on cars, but he loved driving them. He had a few others he bought in decent condition. I didn’t restore those, but I’d do regular maintenance. Always wondered how he got the money to buy what he did, but I figured construction was the business to be in. LA’s always been a boomtown, right?”

“Pretty much,” I agree. “Do you know if he sold those cars? I only remember a Suburban he used to haul stuff and a Mustang convertible. But it wasn’t a classic.” I wonder what happened to his other cars. Was it a hobby he abandoned? Or maybe he’d used refurbished cars in a money-laundering scheme that he stopped when he moved in with my dad?

I frown, not liking the fact that I’m coloring my uncle with illegal motives surrounding everything now.

“Don’t know what he did with them, honestly. Never came up in conversation.”

“What about after he moved to Orange County? Did he come back up here regularly after he moved? Or did he only come for work on the Shelby Cobra?”

“Couldn’t say whether he came into LA other times,” Ortega says. “But he didn’t come see me unless it was about your car.”

I glance at Lamar, who tilts his head in sympathy. This trail is going nowhere. And because of that, I decide to cut straight to the chase. “Listen, and, please don’t take this the wrong way, but I was kind of hoping that he’d asked you to help out on the seedier side of his business. Like moving parts or laundering money.”

“And that’s not why we’re here,” Lamar says. “Whatever you tell us is off the record. I’m not going to breathe a word.”

“Well, now, I don’t know if I believe you or not about that, Detective. But it doesn’t much matter because he never asked me to do anything like that. I wouldn’t have, anyway. My pa and grandpa both worked in private security. And my great-grandpa was a Pinkerton agent.”

I meet Lamar’s eyes. A cop family doesn’t guarantee someone’s clean, but it sure doesn’t hurt.

“Your uncle knew all that.” Ortega grins. “Maybe that’s why he never asked me. Probably knew he’d have to find another mechanic if I knew what kind of mischief he was involved in.”

Once again, he strokes Shelby’s hood. “You’ve done a good job keeping her up,” he says. He gives me a nod as if we’ve known each other forever, and he’s as proud of me as he would be his own daughter. “Glad you brought her by. It’s always good to see one of my cars again.”

“My pleasure. I’m glad you remember her.” I glance at Lamar, at a loss for anything else to ask.

“Did you ever notice anything unusual?” he puts in. “Did Peter ever bring anybody with him who seemed shady?”

“Shady? No. I can’t say I approved of his girlfriend—can’t blame a man for dating a younger woman, but it never made much sense to me. Rather have a woman I can talk to. But I’m not sure I need to get into that kind of gossip with his niece.”

For the first time, I realize that I rarely saw Peter date—just a few women he’d take to dinner now and then. And as far as I know, he was never married.

“Can you describe her?” Lamar asks.

“She came in with him twice, both times when he was coming to check on this Shelby Cobra. Young woman, blond and blue-eyed, very pretty.” He grins. “I remember wondering if she was old enough to drink.”

“That young?” I repeat, thinking that this girl couldn’t have been much older than me. And now that Mr. Ortega has brought it up, I do have a vague recollection of seeing Uncle Peter once or twice with a blonde not that much older than Alex.

I’d been walking along the beach one time and had arrived home earlier than Uncle Peter expected me. I’d cut my foot on a broken shell, and I’d wanted to get home to disinfect it.

I didn’t get a good glimpse of her, but she was standing on the back porch in a bikini top with a sheer sarong tied around her hips. She wore a floppy straw hat that shaded her face, but there was a blond ponytail. I could tell from her figure that she was older than me, but still young. I even wondered for a bit if she was there to see Alex, and I remember feeling queasy at the possibility that he was seeing someone else in addition to our secret romance.

By the time I got closer to the house, she was gone. When I asked Uncle Peter about her, he said she was a neighbor who had come by on some local business matter. I hadn’t been interested enough to inquire further.

“Do you know her name?”