“Grant was seen in the company of Jordan’s murderer.”

“The kickboxer who left the fingerprints.”

“Milo’s filled you in.”

“I’ve been bugging him to keep me posted. I don’t know if you’ve sensed it, Alex, but he’s done a total turnaround on Patty. At first it was all I could do to get him to take Tanya’s concerns seriously. Jordan’s murder changed his mind, he’s convinced it’s tied to Patty. He’s also convinced it’s his fault because it happened right after he talked to Jordan.”

“Didn’t know it bothered him that way.”

“Guilt’s what Big Guy’s all about…okay, I have entered the General Billing System…looks like I need a code…oh, would you look at this. The codes are listed right out in the open by department, talk about inane…okay, I’m typing in the E.R. code and…here we go: Grant, Moses Byron, male, twenty-six years old, 7502 Los Ojos, Woodland Hills…oh, boy.”

“What?”

“Looks like he was one of ours. Came into the E.R. for hypoglycemia.”

“When?”

“Two and a half months ago.”

“Right before Patty got sick.”

“The hairs on my neck are standing up, Alex.”

“Did he come in alone?”

“That wouldn’t be in the billing records unless someone else guaranteed payment…let’s see…the account was settled in full, $869.23, no insurance co-pay or Medi-Cal. Either Grant’s check was good or he paid cash. Let me go find his chart. That could take a bit, would you prefer bad music or silence?”

“I could use some quiet.”

Moments later: “Mr. Grant arrived at our portals barely conscious at three fourteen a.m. on a Saturday night. I was off, the attending was Pete Berger. Let’s check the nursing notes…oh, boy, they’re Patty’s. One of her double shifts.”

“What did she write?”

“Basic intake material…okay, she does mention Grant being brought by ‘friends,’ no names…one of them had communicated to the triage nurse that Grant had taken an insulin shot shortly before feeling faint and nearly passing out. We got some sugar in him, monitored his vitals, found some funny stuff with the R waves of his EEG and recommended admission for further observation. Grant refused, checked himself out against medical advice, we never saw him again.”

“Would Pete Berger remember?”

“With thousands of patients since? No way. And the resident was rotating through from Olive View. Let me try to reach both of them for you anyway, stay right there.”

Ten minutes later: “Neither of them remember Grant, let alone his friends. I’m sure Patty would have total recall, her memory was astonishing.”

“Which could be the point,” I said. “She saw something while taking care of Grant that upset her. Soon after, she got sick, but it stuck in her mind.”

“I guess so, but what could have bothered her that much…I told you she looked worn out two weeks before diagnosis. I’ve been assuming that was the disease taking its toll. You’re saying it could’ve been emotional stress?”

“At this point it’s theory, but it does establish another link between Patty and Lester Jordan. She took care of him and an associate of the guy who killed him.”

“Speaking of which,” he said, “Milo told me your suspicions about Patty pilfering drugs. I went back and checked our Class Three inventories for the last year and nothing looks funny. I’ve always run a really tight ship in that regard, Alex. I don’t delude myself that anything’s perfect and a twelve-month check says nothing about pilferage years ago but I have to believe that if anything significant was going on, I’d have known it. Beyond that, I just can’t see Patty involved in anything like that.”

“I can’t either.”

“Yet Tanya has a trust fund,” he said. “That’s been eating at me.”

“Milo didn’t tell you the new theory about that?”

“No. I’ve been on for the last two days, haven’t seen him.”

I told him about Myron Bedard’s cash payments to Patty plus five years of free rent.

He said, “That makes me feel a little bit better. What I just said about running a tight ship? I might as well be up front. When I didn’t check the dope cabinet personally, I had Patty do it.”

“There’s no evidence she stole drugs, Rick.”

“I guess I just want to hear you say it. Anything else I can do for you?”

“No,” I said. “Thanks for helping with Grant.”

“Sure. Listen, maybe it’s best if Big Guy doesn’t know the extent of my involvement. He likes to shield me from the bad stuff.”

The meeting took place the following night. Nine p.m. my house; Petra showed up first, at ten to the hour, though she’d driven from San Diego. “Big-rig overturn near Irvine, psycho traffic all the way to Newport and my cell phone battery died. Thank God I left early and changed into car clothes.”

That meant a black cowl-necked top, charcoal velvet sweatpants, and white sneakers. After a bathroom break, she accepted the offer of a phone battery and coffee and began chatting with Robin. When I came back, they were talking handbags and Blanche was on Petra’s lap.

“This one,” she said, “is star material.”

Robin said, “I know ostrich leg sounds gory but I like it better than straight ostrich.”

Petra said, “Is that the one with a larger pattern instead of dots? A little like croc but softer around the edges?”

“Exactly.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s nice. Poor bird-but they say ostriches are mean, so if you want to rationalize, there’s an out.”

“Cows are nice,” said Robin, “but I’m not limiting myself to hemp.”

I left to pour my own cup.

Milo arrived with a corner of a pizza wedge in one hand and tomato sauce stains above his lip. The shoulders and back of his sport coat were coated with fine gray dust and random flecks of paper. His tweed slacks were seasons too heavy for the warm night.

Taking a half-gallon milk carton from the fridge, he ripped at the spout and guzzled.

Robin said, “Want a cookie?”

“Home-baked?”

“Mint Milanos.”

“Kind of you, kid, but my standards are high.”

Robin laughed and took Blanche to the bedroom.

Milo and Petra and I sat around the kitchen table.

She said, “So you found the bullets.”

Milo said, “After two days of digging around. Some genius in the evidence room wrote down a 5 instead of a 3 and then another genius modified that to an 8 and added the wrong year code. They also had it clear on the wrong side of the room, with boxes from ’sixty-two.”

“Maybe they were hoping you’d solve a few cold ones while you were there.” She leaned over and flicked dust from his jacket.

“I got Bob Deal in Ballistics to agree to run comparison tests tomorrow. Anything happen with the airlines?”

“If only,” she said. “Fisk’s name doesn’t show up on any outgoing flights since the day of Jordan’s murder and neither does Moses Grant’s. Plenty of prints in Fisk’s Mustang but so far the only ones that pull up an AFIS match are his. Stu got San Diego to agree to work it over, in the interests of time. They’ve gone over the interior and the trunk, haven’t found any body fluids. I’ve got a nice broad subpoena for all of Fisk’s phone records but I can’t find any evidence of a landline and if he uses a cell, it’s a rental.”

“Bad-guy habits,” said Milo. “Any papers in the car?”

“Old reg, some PowerBar wrappers. It’s neat but not freaky-clean, as if he did a recent wash. Back to our vic for a sec. Lester Jordan had only a landline, but it doesn’t look like he had much of a social life, maybe twenty calls a month. The only long-distances were to lona in Atherton and the last of those was seventy-four days ago.”

Milo said, “Close-knit family.”

“Regular Brady Bunch. The other numbers Jordan called were take-out restaurants and pay phones. The pay calls happened late at night, which fits with Jordan craving dope. Raul did a thorough recanvass of the building. Most of the tenants had no idea who Jordan was, it’s not a touchy-feely place where they greet each other in the hallways. And no one had heard Jordan was the manager, so if Iona’s palming him off as such for tax purposes, she’s scamming. But a few people said they’d noticed lowlifes going in and out of Jordan’s apartment in the wee hours. Still, the H left behind doesn’t indicate Jordan got dead because he was dealing. Or maybe Fisk really can’t stand drugs.”