It was easy to see that Lynn wasn't thinking about calendars. He was looking at money. Ogling, actually. Breda couldn't wait to be rid of this guy.
She said, "Mrs. Devon, this is Lynn Cutter. He's helping me with your problem."
"I thought you worked alone," Rhonda Devon said, not offering her hand to Lynn. She wore an eighteen-karat canary diamond on her left hand. It looked like a popcorn kernel.
"Shall we sit over here?" Breda indicated a banquette in the corner, far enough from the piano.
"Vodka martini," Rhonda Devon said to Lynn, the way she'd say it to a waiter. "Dry, a twist, no olive."
While Breda and Rhonda Devon got settled at the low banquette Lynn ordered the martini, and another Scotch for himself. Then he sat opposite the two women, across a low enameled cocktail table. Rhonda Devon was smoking and looked not at him but at the martini he'd fetched.
Breda noticed. Another rummy, she thought.
Speaking deliberately, having poured too much down on an empty stomach, Lynn described in detail the events of his first day of surveillance. When he'd finished, Rhonda Devon was not quite as contained as when she'd walked into the bar.
Breda detected a perceptible quiver when Rhonda Devon said, "This is unbelievable. I can't imagine it. A young Mexican woman?"
"Probably Mexican," Lynn said. "She was dark."
"Why would he want to have a baby with a Mexican woman?" she asked her martini.
"Why not?" Lynn said. "I wouldn't mind. For starters there's Vikki Carr and Linda Ronstadt. Then there's Millie Valdez, she owns half of a Toyota dealership down in Indio. And there's . . ."
Vowing to cut off his booze, Breda interrupted him. "How about the rusty old Plymouth, Mrs. Devon? Is it familiar?"
"The car, the woman, the dog-none of it means anything to me."
"How about the guy your husband picked up in Painted Canyon?" Lynn asked. "Baseball cap. Husky. Late thirties maybe. Probably another Latino. How about him?"
"I can't understand that either," Rhonda Devon said, and now Breda thought that both her voice and her chin quivered. "The man must've needed a ride. My husband would pick up any stray. He's always been that way. When we're in Los Angeles he gives money to every beggar on the street." Then she said angrily: "He's a child, really. He never had to work for anything in his whole life. He doesn't understand how . . . vile people are. I don't understand what he's doing!"
"He's a man of a certain age," Breda said. "This sort of thing happens, Mrs. Devon."
"But to want a baby when he can't have sex. And with a . . ." Rhonda Devon realized that she'd raised her voice, and covered her discomfort by taking a sip of the martini. Then another. Her hand trembled when she smoked.
"How far do you want us to go, Mrs. Devon?" Breda asked, with more compassion in her voice than Lynn thought she owned.
"I have to know it all now," Rhonda Devon said.
"You're still not ready to confront him and just ask?"
"No. This is his affair ... I guess that's an apt word, isn't it? And . . . he's never questioned me about anything in all our years of marriage."
"Were you married before?" Lynn asked.
"Yes," she said. "Twice."
"And was he?"
"No," she said. "I was his first and only love. He always said."
Lynn glanced at Breda and said, "When Breda phoned you a little while ago and asked you to talk to your husband, did you?"
"Yes, I asked him very casually about his day, after I'd told him all about my rotten day on the golf course."
"And did he tell you he went hiking?"
"Yes," she said, "but not in Painted Canyon. He said he'd driven down to the Indian reservation and hiked in Andreas Canyon. He said it was wonderful because there were no tourists. He said it was spectacular looking at cottonwoods and sycamore and wild tamarack. He said the water in the creek was especially cold . . . and sweet."
Chapter 7
Before Rhonda Devon left the French restaurant, Breda asked her a few more questions about the household and got a list of all service people from the maid to the pool cleaner. After finishing her drink Rhonda Devon said good night, adding that she now wanted progress in a hurry.
Breda's plan for the next day was simply for Lynn to do a reprise. She had a detailed report she had to write for a defense attorney, and had already decided to advise the lawyer to plead the guilty bastard guilty. Breda hated to admit how much she needed Lynn's assistance.
She tipped the valet parking boy for both her car and Lynn's, and her parting shot to him was, "Go straight home for a change. Get a good night's sleep and maybe you can stay awake on a stakeout."