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  “Let’s cut the bullshit, Allan. You do know Yana, don’t you?”

  The Judge was bluffing about what he knew. This time it worked.

  “Ahhh, I guess maybe I do, now I think about it. I misspoke.”

  “You’ve met her more than once is what I understand.”

  The look of an animal caught in a trap flashed across Allan’s face.

  “Okay, so I’ve met her a couple of times. What’s wrong with that? She’s unattached. Free, white and over twenty-one.”

  “Is she pretty?

  “Very.”

  “Why the breakup with Carl?”

  “I think Carl just regressed. Forgot how to maintain a permanent relationship with a woman. A female is like a plant. She has to be watered, tended to, nurtured, made to feel safe, special, treasured. She needs to be spoken to, listened to, and taken care of. For females it’s all about the relationship.”

  The Judge wondered what Katy would do if he came back to the boat and watered her. He bet he’d get slugged.

  “And Carl couldn’t provide those things for Yana?”

  “Not anymore.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m not sure. He was growing older. Feeling trapped I think. Feeling he was missing opportunities to have extraordinary experiences and do crazy things. Soon he’d be too old, then dead. He was running out of time. I guess we all feel that sometimes.”

  “When did you meet Yana?”

  “Right after Carl joined the club. She called me. Worried about Carl. She said she wanted advice about Carl and the club. I think she had the wrong idea about the club.”

  “And you gave her advice?”

  “I gave her the best advice I could. And she wanted to talk some more, so we met again for dinner.”

  “More than once?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Oh come on, Allan. That’s not the sort of thing you’d forget. How many times did you and Yana meet up?”

  Allan hung his head now, muttering, “Perhaps five or six”

  “You mean a dozen.”

  “Yes.”

  “What’s Yana like?”

  “She’s young for her age. Beautiful girl. Trusting. A little lost in this country. Russian. Very naïve about business and money. But sweet. Wants to do the right thing. Wants the divorce settlement to be fair. I tried to help her a little is all.”

  “So you discussed Yana’s pending divorce with her? The property settlement? Who got financial rights in the new technology?”

  “Yes.” Another mutter.

  “Did you give advice to Carl as well? About the divorce? About the property settlement? And the new technology?”

  “I might have.”

  “Did you try to pressure Carl to include his new technology in the divorce settlement as community property? Help Yana get her fair share?”

  “What if I did?” Allan showed anger now. “The bastard was sitting on that technology like it was his god damn turd. Wouldn’t license the rights and convert it to cash. A lot of cash. Fighting tooth and nail to squeeze Yana out of any right to share in the proceeds. Was going to leave Yana out without a penny. She was going to end up on the street. Part of the homeless. Carl was an ugly, bitter old man underneath. He deserved what he got.”

  “Were you and Yana were lovers, Allan?”

  Allan opened his mouth but no sound came out. He looked like he was going to be apoplectic.

  “Look, I don’t think I have to answer that, Judge. You’re not the police. You can’t ask me personal questions like that and expect an answer.”

  “I think you just gave me the answer, Allan. Did Carl know?”

  “No.... I mean there was nothing to know.”

  “Still seeing Yana?”

  “We have dinner occasionally. So what?”

  “Who owns the technology now Carl’s dead?” asked the Judge.

  “I’m not sure. I guess perhaps Yana. Carl had no other relatives.”

  “So if the new technology works out, Yana could be very, very rich.”

  “She could.”

  “With Carl dead I can see you and Yana galloping off into the sunset with a lot of money to fund an extraordinary life. Doesn’t that sound like a motive for murder?”

  Allan’s jaw clamped shut. Then he muttered, “I’m not answering any more questions, Judge.”

  The Judge stood up, extending his hand as a peace offering between gentlemen.

  Allan shook it with relief, then sped ahead of the Judge to show him out the door, closing it quickly after him.

  CHAPTER 18

  4:00 PM Sunday

  The Judge returned to The Papillon from his office, his arm reminding him it was time for another pill. And perhaps a nap. He and Katy were to have dinner with his new in-laws tonight. They didn’t even know they were in-laws. They were about to find out. He’d have to be in top form.

  Katy was gone, but Annie the dog was there, sprawled in the middle of the aft deck like a fur rug, refusing to move. The Judge had to step around her. She perked up as he headed into the galley. She knew full well where the food was stored. The Judge was usually good for a tidbit or two if he was eating. He knew he shouldn’t feed her people food. But she was irresistible and she knew it. She played him like a fiddle.

  His foot crunched down on the remains of a box of soda crackers. Left too close to the edge of the counter, they’d been fair game for the quadruped. Now there was nothing left but chewed cardboard and a lot of crumbs. No wonder her water dish was empty. She much have been very thirsty. He replenished her water and then cleaned up the mess on the floor. With the dog there was always something.

  He washed his pain pill down with a beer. He knew he wasn’t supposed to but Annie didn’t object and Katy wasn’t there. Then collapsed on the semi-circular bed in the master’s cabin, the dog at his feet. The next thing he knew it was two hours later. Katy was climbing aboard, rocking the boat slightly.

  “Hi sailor,” she yelled down from the salon. “Any interest in taking advantage of a poor farm girl? A female bedazzled by sailors?” She giggled.

  Prone on the bed, he stretched his arms out wide, and she came flying down the three steps in a rush, leaping over the ball of fur on the floor and throwing herself onto him. He held her like that for a long time, feeling her heart beat through her breast, listening to her breath, smelling the scent of her hair and her body. Gradually she made soft purring noises. She was asleep.

  Later they made long passionate love, melding their bodies together the way lovers do. Unable to get enough of each other. He left her there spread eagle on her back, drifting off to sleep. He showered, shaved again for good luck, then settled on the settee in the salon to do some legal work before what promised to be a confrontational dinner.

  Sometime later he was immersed in the elements of discovery law when he was jolted out of his online treatise by a screech.

  “Eeee-yikes, Judge, we’re way late,” shouted Katy, hopping up the three stairs from the aft cabin, one heel on, one in hand. “You should have woke me. Oh my God. We’re really late. Mom will be standing outside the restaurant pounding her foot.”

  Ten minutes later the Judge watched scenery fly by like a superfast slide show as Katy drove madly though the small and angling streets of South Venice in her Mustang, running yellows and scattering pedestrians, a determined look on her face. The Judge wondered if he ought to store a crash helmet on her back seat for next time he was a passenger.

  He thought about the checkered history of this small beach community as it slid by. Founded in 1905 as the “Venice of America”. Greedily snapped up in 1926 by the octopus city of Los Angeles. The teens and twenties saw it replete with amusement pier, miniature steam railroad, and Venetian style canals with arched bridges, imported gondolas and gondoliers. The depression hit hard, as did a succession of fires and floods, but Venice recovered in the early sixties with the ‘Beats’ who brought their Bohemian art, poetry and new-jazz to its coffee hous
es.

  The hippies came next, and then the flower children. The 1984 Summer Olympics brought more tourists. Artists, vendors, musicians, body builders, palm readers, sidewalk artists, and all the rest followed, setting up shop on the Venice boardwalks. More recently Google, Snapchat, JibJab Bros. Studios, and a host of other high tech and film companies arrived. Part of the migration to the new ‘Silicon Beach’.

  And with the traffic came the homeless, swelling into a river of light occupation as the Great Recession of the early twenty-first century unfolded, then lingered. Venice now had some of the most expensive beachfront homes in Los Angeles. Yet certain streets were so poor and dangerous you didn’t dare walk them at night. And the homeless were everywhere if you opened your eyes to look. Camped out on boardwalks. In the parks. On the streets.

  “We’re getting close,” Katy shouted, interrupting the Judge’s musings, gunning the Mustang down the final stretch toward the finish line.

  The Judge wondered if little girls grew up fantasizing about bringing ‘the one’ home to dinner to be introduced. Like a proud fisherman, hauling home an enormous carp over his shoulder. The Judge was actually feeling a bit like a fish out of water. Awkward, and queasy. It was a dinner the Judge was not looking forward to. He’d not met Katy's father. But her mother, Florence Thorne, or ‘Flo’, was a pistol. And she didn’t approve of their relationship. Then again, would he, were their situations reversed?

  You have a baby daughter. You nurture her into childhood, spend your life and your money bringing her through adolescence and high school. Fund college. Advise her as she chooses a career, seeks her first job. You hope for a good life for her. A good marriage to a good man. And perhaps if you're lucky, some grandchildren.

  Then your child goes out and falls in love with somebody 20 years older. Hell, when he was born Florence was only seven. He could understand Florence's perspective. He could empathize with her angst. Her doubts. Could a relationship like that last? The dimming prospects of grandchildren. The certainty Katy was throwing half her life away on the Judge. The best half.

  And who knew. Maybe Florence was right. Half of marriages seemed to end in divorce these days. And that was before you factored in their large age difference. A whole generation.

  It didn't help his standing when Katy announced that she and the Judge had moved in together. It would be worse when Flo heard he and Katy were married, having eloped to Vegas a couple of weeks before. Depriving Florence of even the satisfaction of a big wedding where she could swan around amongst her fancy friends, showing off her daughter, if not the aged son-in-law.

  Florence would hardly want to show off the Judge. A worn out and broken down old lawyer who'd somehow captivated her daughter. Beguiled Katy into an April-December marriage doomed from the start. No, his stock was not high with Katy's mother. There wasn’t much he could do about it.

  Tonight was the first part of Katy’s plan. First the announcement they’d married. In a couple of weeks a second announcement that Katy was pregnant. The Judge was all for Katy simply taking her mother to lunch and breaking all the news, leaving him out of it. Katy called his plan for what it was. The Judge was just ‘chicken’. And perhaps Katy’s plan was best. She knew her parents. He was going to have to get along with his in-laws for a very long time.

  Katy said it would be better to make the marriage announcement over a public dinner. Much like the ploy to tell your lover it was over. In a public place there’d be less tears, fewer angry words, and if you were lucky a plate wouldn’t be thrown at you. Or so the theory went. But then again with Florence you never knew. The Judge was prepared to duck.

  He gave a sigh. Katy's small hand immediately shot out to touch his thigh, giving it a reassuring pat. She was trying to buck him up. Well, he needed it.

  Katy screeched to a stop almost in front of the restaurant at 7 p.m. sharp, then fidgeted nervously in her seat, waiting for the car ahead to be valeted away by a tired old valet.

  Chinois On Main was a small satellite restaurant operated by the famous chef, Wolfgang Puck. He showed up from time to time to mingle with guests, dressed in his ceremonial starched white uniform with the button across the chest flap. The Judge had met him twice. A good showman.

  Chinois had gaudy pink and turquoise neon lights spoking out around its front window. Like the Ferris wheel. All floating light and sparkle. Not going anywhere. The joint was tethered to this mixed block on Main Street with its tattoo parlor to one side, and its incense shop to the other.

  Like the Ferris wheel, the Judge wasn’t going anywhere either. Katy was his now, and her old bat mother could like it or lump it. He got out of the car, shoving his hands into his pockets, steeling himself for battle.

  A homeless man was staked out on the pavement a discrete couple of feet from the restaurant door, positioned so you couldn’t miss him as you entered. Unless you really tried.

  The Judge reached into his pocket and dumped a twenty into the small wooden salad bowl beside the man. For luck. The man muttered some sort of blessing under his breath, saluting the Judge with two fingers to his forehead.

  Or maybe it was a spell uttered against the approaching devil. A strident voice rang out behind him. “Hi darling… and, ah... Judge.” Florence had arrived.

  The restaurant was a long narrow retail shop space, converted with a bar down one side. At the far back was an open kitchen where a plethora of white-dressed cooks bustled around sizzling pans and flickering flames. Back to back ovens and stoves anchored the kitchen middle space. Chopping boards and food containers spread around its outer circumference. The cooks worked in the middle on both sides of twin ovens, alternatingly chopping, mixing and cooking. At the front of the kitchen sat a patron bar with high stools towering over the space as an overlook.

  The space running from the patron bar forward to the large glass window in front was squeezed with too many tables filled with too many noisy patrons, their voices echoing off the open ceiling and exposed ducting. The concrete floor added to the din.

  The patrons huddled together in line to announce themselves to a young hostess, dressed in sort of hippy cowboy leather, black chaps and vest over a short sleeve cream blouse, one arm covered with creeping tattoos. She sported a silver nose stud. The Judge was baffled by the markings and punctures affected by young people. More proof he was growing old.

  After giving her daughter a big hug, Florence formally offered her hand to the Judge.

  The Judge was always surprised by her strong handshake, that of a rancher or a farmer. Florence's blue eyes, similar to Katy’s but a bit paler with age, pinned his with her usual sharp intensity. A line from Don Quixote drifted across his mind: “still strong in tooth and claw.”

  Florence was all that.

  She had just turned her odometer over past 60, but she carried herself well and kept herself up. Her reasonably slender figure and elegant carriage gave her a more youthful appearance. She was dressed tonight in a blue satin cocktail dress that deepened the blue in her eyes, and matching high heeled pumps. A gauzy pale blue scarf hid her leathery neck, covering wrinkles and age spots. A product of too much sun in Palm Desert. Her addiction of choice.

  Their table wasn’t quite ready yet, which was just as well as Daddy Thorne hadn’t arrived. They threated through the crowed tables to the back of the restaurant, electing to wait on the tall stools overlooking the kitchen. They watched the dish preparation frenzy, turning now and then to view the lusty crowd chowing down at their backs. The kitchen was a ballet of pots, pans, multi-colored food stuffs and flame. The staff was all Latino. Scents of fragrant spices drifted up from the sizzling pans and mixing bowls, lending an exotic aura to the jumbled activity and the general din.

  Katy discreetly sat between her mother and the Judge, giving him some buffer. The Judge didn't want to sit too close to Florence. He harbored an irrational fear he might be bitten.

  Apparently Katy's dad, Ralph Thorne, was in route from a downtown meeting and running late.
It would be a schlepp this time of night.

  They watched as a cook pulled a large lobster from a cage. He held it up so it could shake its claws at them. Then plopped it down on his cutting board and with one quick chop, cleaved the creature in half lengthwise. Both sides continued to move in contortions on the cutting board, apparently uncertain what had happened. Thinking it was still alive. It was a sad little dance, interrupted when the cook plunked the two halves into a large hot sauté pan, which immediately went onto a roaring fire on the range top. The halves hissed for a while, a high keening little noise that made the Judge ill. Then the halves went silent, giving up the ghost.

  Florence looked over at the Judge to see what he thought of the show. Why did he feel those light blue eyes were measuring him for similar treatment?

  Thankfully just then Katy's dad arrived.

  He'd been away until just recently on a five-month assignment for the Navy, fine tuning the radar guidance systems on Navy ships carrying nuclear armed missiles. He was an engineer and an inventor, retired from one of the largest aerospace companies. He now spent his time as a contracted consultant for the Navy. Katy had said his work was so secret and his security clearance so high there were many countries he was not allowed to travel to, even on holiday. Surprisingly, they included the U.K., France and Germany.

  The Judge watched him, awkwardly but with good nature, winding his way among the crowded tables to reach their position. He was perhaps six feet, but scrawny. Early sixties. With the lean face of a Yankee Farmer, punctuated by a large mouth that immediately broke into a generous smile upon seeing the Judge, standing off his bar stool to be introduced. A large bony hand shot out to shake the Judge's. Soft brown eyes looked directly into the Judge's with good humor. The Judge liked him immediately.

  Instead of the traditional sport coat sans tie, or the flamboyant casual street attire of Venice, he wore an expensive looking but well used leather jacket over an engineer's blue checked shirt, and designer jeans that did little to hide a scrawny butt. He looked like he'd just arrived on his motorcycle. A Howard Hughes sort of character suddenly thrust into the twenty-first century, comfortable with his personal style and oblivious to what others thought.