After getting nowhere again, Hondo said he was hungry for Moroccan, so we left the office and drove in my truck to Tagine on Robertson Boulevard. It’s in Beverly Hills, and as usual, we got a few stares at Shamu. We finished lunch and Hondo was working on dessert when he said, “We can check the credit cards, see if there’s been any activity.”
“Yeah, maybe check the bank for ATM withdrawals or checks written.”
“I can do those. You going to check with the Meadows woman again?”
“I think so.” I thought for a moment, “There’s something about her I can’t quite place. I’ve seen her somewhere before, or heard her name, but can’t pin it down.”
Hondo chewed, swallowed and said, “Was her maiden name Savitch?”
It clicked. Bond Savitch. That was her, all right. Maybe five, six years ago. She had been a blond then, and wore dark sunglasses everywhere except the courtroom. The trial lasted six months, with extensive coverage a la OJ. In the end, she was found not guilty in the killing of her lover, but the public perception was not as clear-cut. There were vague circumstances and evidence not adequately explained, forensics experts spoke with eloquence for both sides, and the jury deliberated two days before reaching the verdict. Many people thought she got off with murder, but being LA and the fact that she was so beautiful, others said, “What do you expect?”
I hadn’t followed the case and didn’t know how he’d died, but with courtroom scenes on the news every hour of the day, it was impossible not to know of the trial.
I said, “So, that’s her.”
“I think so.” Hondo said. “Be aware of that, uh? She killed him with a bottle of Cristal.”
“She forced him to drink a bottle of champagne and it killed him?”
He stopped chewing and looked at me.
“Nooo. She hit him with it. Knocked him down and shattered the bottle. While he was on his hands and knees, she jabbed the broken half at the side of his face and cut his jugular. Guy bled to death in about ten seconds.”
He took another bite, then pointed with his chin to indicate something over my shoulder. “You’re going to have to move Shamu again.”
I turned to look and Ryan Gosling walked into the restaurant, smiling and talking to everyone but looking around.
“Oops,” I said.
“I told you not to park in his space.”
“It’s not like there aren’t other places he can park, jeez.”
“He’s one of the owners.”
Gosling spotted us and put his hands on his hips. I waved at him and he didn’t smile, just jerked his head to the side. I can read head-language, so I said to Hondo, “I’ll just go move the truck, be waiting for you outside.”
Hondo grinned as he forked up the last bites. “Oh yeah.”
**
I ran some errands in Hollywood and called Bond’s cell phone from the truck. She said she would be waiting for me at home. I asked which home and after a second’s silence, she said the one in Beverly.
Driving from Hollywood into Beverly Hills is the American statement to everyone where the line between the haves and have-nots begins. On the one side are shops, small homes, old cars, lots of pickups and lowriders, Mexicans, blacks, derelicts and winos, with a smattering of tourists and gawkers, out of work actors. Lots of unkempt lawns are around, as are children and young people.
The moment you cross into Beverly Hills, it’s like black and white Dorothy opening the door and seeing Technicolor Oz. Emerald green lawns and hedges manicured and worried to perfection, large trees and exquisite landscapes showcasing huge, beautiful homes that cost more than a thousand of the have-nots combined would make in a hundred years.
There were no old cars, no trash, no dusty streets, and only occasional glimpses of children. It was stunning and remote, an urban Eden, showing the drive by gawkers with every passing block how far apart their worlds were from those who lived behind the ornate doors and gates.
As I pulled up to the Meadows’ gate and punched in the numbers Bond had written down, a five-year old station wagon with Oklahoma plates and what must have been a husband and wife and forty kids, judging from all the arms and legs I saw sticking out of the windows, slowed to a stop and stared at me open-mouthed.
I guess I have that celebrity look. As the gate opened, I waved at them and started my pickup forward. One of the kids yelled something that I couldn’t make out, so I stopped and put my head out the window so they could go back and tell their neighbors they visited with a famous star at his home.
“You the gardener?”
“What?” I said.
“Are you the gardener? Which star lives here?”