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“Okay, he’s got short hair since the cap covered it. When he spoke to you, did he have an accent?”
“Yeah, but I couldn’t place it. It wasn’t real thick, like he came to the U.S. when he was young.”
“All right, so you snapped his picture. You said you wrote down his name and phone number off the side of the van. You said there was a motorcycle on the side of the van. Any more writing?”
“Yeah, block printing, all black. ‘Motorcycle Repair.’ There was a drawing of a Harley underneath it.”
“You took a picture of the side of the van?”
“Yes, but he destroyed it, along with everything else, the bastard.”
“Stay with me here, Mr. Hodges. What make was the van? Describe it.”
“An old Dodge van, I think, white but dirty, with windows only in the back.”
“Did you get the license plate?”
“No, I didn’t see it.”
“Okay, then you went back to your apartment, processed the film, and called Mary Lisa, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“How long after you spoke to Mary Lisa did you call Jamie Ramos?”
Puker pleated the thin hospital blanket. “Well, ah, I wouldn’t have called the guy, but I was thinking I wasn’t really sure he was the right guy-you know, the one who tried to run Mary Lisa down. I only wanted to talk to him, make sure before I got him in trouble. I didn’t call him to blackmail him, I didn’t. I wanted to do the right thing. I didn’t want to accuse the wrong guy.”
He looked up for a response from Detective Vasquez, but an arched brow was all he got. “Please continue, Mr. Hodges. You called the phone number on the side of the van?”
“Yes, I’m guessing it was a cell phone. He answered it right away.”
“Do you have that number, Mr. Hodges?”
“It was on the photograph. I’m not sure. Maybe it’ll be on my phone record?”
“What did you say to him, Mr. Hodges?”
“I told him I’d seen him following Mary Lisa Beverly and I wondered if he was the guy who’s trying to kill her. He was silent for at least ten seconds, then he offered to pay me five thousand dollars for the pictures and the film.”
“How’d he know you had pictures and film, Mr. Hodges?”
“Well, I guess I must have told him, you know, in the course of our conversation.”
Mary Lisa snarled.
“So before he went silent for ten seconds, you not only asked him if he was the guy but you told him you took photos of him and his van.”
“Yeah, I guess I did. But I didn’t mean anything by it. I was nervous. I guess I blabbed it out.”
“Then what happened?”
“Well, I told him that wasn’t going to happen, that I didn’t want to see Mary Lisa hurt and I was going to take the photos to the police.”
“Weren’t you afraid of retribution?”
“I didn’t really think about it. Besides, how could the guy know who I was?”
“You think he could have known you’ve been taking pictures of Mary Lisa for the tabloids? Or maybe caller ID?”
Puker looked down at his hands. “Oh shit.”
“And what did he say?”
“He hung up on me.”
“But you didn’t call the police, Mr. Hodges.”
“No, not right away, but it isn’t why you think, Detective Vasquez. I was just taking a little time to think it over, you know? All right, I thought making a few extra prints might be useful, you know, when I took the prints to the police, so I was in the darkroom when the doorbell rang. I thought it was Mary Lisa, only it wasn’t. It was Ramos, and he hit me hard, knocked me down, then he kicked me, knocked me into the living room. I fought back, and we wrecked some of my furniture, but then he hit me with something hard in his hand-a sap, or something-and I was out.”
Jack stood beside Mary Lisa, his hand around her forearm. She sucked in her breath, pulsing with anger, but she managed to be still. He gri
Daniel sighed. “What happened then?”
“Like I said, when he hit me with that sap, I was out. When I woke up, I was in this empty room staring at a blank wall, tied to a chair.”
“Where did he take you, Mr. Hodges?”
“I didn’t know then and I still don’t know. Like I said, when I woke up I was there, tied up.”
“What color are his eyes, Mr. Hodges?”
“I told you, Detective Vasquez, he always wore sunglasses, never took them off, but like I said, maybe he was Hispanic, on the dark side, you know? He didn’t look all that strong-kind of ski
It sounded like the description the California girl had given Jack on the beach yesterday afternoon.
“Was he there when you woke up?”
“No. I was alone, facing that wall. I don’t know for how long, but it seemed like a long time before I heard him come in behind me. He hit me first thing, in the stomach, then in my face-see, I still have bruises on my cheek. He told me I shouldn’t have gotten in the way, that he was going to make me pay for that. That’s when I knew he was going to kill me.”
Puker began to cry.
THIRTY-SEVEN
Mary Lisa looked away from him. It wasn’t Puker’s sniveling she couldn’t stand, it was her own vision of this faceless madman she had dreamed about that Puker had brought to life. She felt her fear digging deep and tried to make it stop, tried to get hold of herself.
Jack whispered close to her ear, “This yahoo isn’t going to hurt you, Mary Lisa. I’ll kill him first. Trust me on this, all right?”
Mary Lisa’s fear, dark and endless as a corridor in a dream, dropped away at the sound of his voice. She looked up at him, saw the utter certainty in his eyes, and slowly nodded. And then it hit her, deep and fierce. “You won’t have to kill him, Jack, I will.”
“Good girl.”
Daniel looked at them a moment, jerked around, as if asking them for silence, and continued quietly, “Did Jamie Ramos tell you what Mary Lisa had done to him to make him stalk her, try to hurt her?”
“No, he hardly talked to me, wouldn’t answer my questions. If I talked too much, he’d hit me. He acted kind of crazy, like he’d walk around hitting his fist against his palm. It was creepy. I was real scared.”
“Did he say if he’d asked her out? That that was why he was angry, because she’d turned him down?”
“He didn’t say. Like I told you, I was scared, you know? I thought he was going to kill me so I kept real quiet. He came and went, tied me up and gagged me when he wanted to. One time he ate a large pepperoni pizza in front of me, drank a giant-sized cola, slurped it right down, didn’t offer me anything. When he was done, he belched and laughed. I asked him what he was going to do to me.”
“And what did he say?”
“He gri
Mary Lisa growled deep in her throat, tried to pull away from Jack. “This time he’s faking it, Daniel. The little weasel.”
Jack placed his palm over her mouth. She tried to bite him. He whispered, “You’re being recorded, Mary Lisa. Can we let Detective Vasquez do his job?”
She nodded finally, reluctantly, relaxed her hands.
Daniel asked, “Mr. Hodges, he kept you tied up in that room for three days. Are you saying you didn’t talk about anything?”
“He wasn’t there that much. I figured he was out following Mary Lisa around, maybe at the studio in Burbank, whatever. Maybe he was fixing a hog or two. I always hated it when he came back because he always came back mad and he’d hit me again, and he’d curse her while he hit me. I hadn’t done anything to him, it wasn’t fair! All I did was take his photo and try to help Mary Lisa.”