"Oh, hi, faigela." I loved it when he used my bubbie's pet name for me-"little bird." Bubbie was more like a mother to me-cooking, cleaning, and keeping a kosher house. Uncle Isaac was more like a father. He owned a tailor shop and never came home at the end of the day without a piece of candy for me. He brought me sc.r.a.ps of couture material so I could sew clothes for my dolls.

On the other hand, my mother didn't come out of the bedroom until ten every morning, walking around in a daze smoking cigarettes and listening to the top ten hits on the radio. When I was little I rushed home after school and went straight to where she sat in an attempt to get her to notice me and love me.

"Mommy, mommy, look what I drew." Or, "Mommy, look. I got an A plus on my spelling test."

The most I ever got in return was a brief glance and a vacant smile. "That's nice." Then she'd turn away and go back inside a secret world that no one else could enter.

Once I asked her, "Who's my daddy? Where is he?"

"His name was Quinn. He died before you were born. You look like him."

"That's enough, faigela," my bubbie warned. "Leave your mommy alone now and come into the kitchen and help me make dinner." That was as much as I ever learned. In my house, the subject of my father was verboten.

Uncle Isaac's voice brought me back to the present. "Are you okay? How's my Quincy girl?"

"We're fine. I just talked to her. I wanted to check in and see if you needed anything."

"No. I'm fine, but I can't talk. Morty and the boys are here for poker. We're really livin' it up. Got a six-pack of Budweiser and a bowlful of popcorn."

I chuckled. "Go for it, Uncle. I love you."

As I cleaned up the kitchen, the doorbell rang. The digital clock on the microwave showed twenty minutes after eight. The doorbell rang again, and someone knocked loudly. I hurried to answer the door. "For heaven's sake, who is it?"

An unfamiliar voice barked, "Los Angeles police."

I looked through the peephole, but all I could see was a silver and bra.s.s badge. "Step back and let me see your face."

CHAPTER 17.

I opened my door to two uniformed officers. "Can I help you?"

Their bra.s.s name tags identified them as Garcia and Cheng. "Are you Martha Rose?"

"I am."

"Would you step outside, please?"

"What for?"

Officer Cheng pointed to a blue Ford Mustang parked in my driveway. "Detective Kaplan would like to speak to you."

I recognized the young man getting out of the driver's seat. He came with Detective Beavers the day we discovered Claire's body. He approached with a swagger and handed me a paper. "Mrs. Rose? This is a warrant to search your house."

I wasn't sure I heard him correctly. Why in the world would anyone want to search my house? "You're kidding, right?"

"Just step aside, please."

Another little bully. This was getting beyond tiresome. "What are you looking for?"

He indicated the paper in my hand. "It's spelled out right there."

"Where's Detective Beavers? Aren't you his partner?"

"Beavers isn't here. Step aside, please." He brushed past me.

I couldn't believe he was being so rude. I was going to give Detective Beavers an earful about this.

Officer Cheng stayed beside me in the doorway while I scanned the warrant. I came to the part that read: stolen property, one laptop computer belonging to Claire Terry. "This is bogus! Why don't you just ask me for her computer? Why use a warrant?"

Cheng was silent.

I looked up to see a group of neighbors cl.u.s.tered under the streetlight, seeming to strain to hear what I was saying. Sonia Spiegelman, the neighborhood yenta, was already whispering behind her hand to several of the curious. Sonia lived across the street from me and patrolled our neighborhood at least twice a day looking for morsels of juicy gossip like a c.o.c.kroach crawling through garbage. In her gauzy blouses and dangly earrings, she reminded me of some of my fellow travelers in the antiwar movement in the 1970s. She didn't seem to realize the world had moved on and I always felt vaguely embarra.s.sed for her.

She broke away from the group and started walking toward me with a smile designed to make me believe she was only there to help. She craned her neck to look into my house. "Martha dear, is everything all right?" Like I was going to confide in her, of all people.

"No, Sonia. They found out about the terrorist cell I've been harboring in my bas.e.m.e.nt." All our houses were built on raised foundations. With the frequent ground shifting from earthquakes and the mild year-round weather, bas.e.m.e.nts were uncommon in California and totally nonexistent in our midcentury homes. I still couldn't resist. "I hope to heck they don't find the a.r.s.enal I've hidden down there, too."

Her eyes shone. "I didn't know you have a bas.e.m.e.nt."

I blinked at her, gave my head a little shake, and walked back inside my house.

Kaplan didn't take long to find Claire's laptop since it was sitting in plain sight on my coffee table. He also found my computer and handed them both to Officer Garcia to put in large plastic evidence bags.

"Hey." I pointed to my laptop. "That's mine. You can't take that."

Kaplan ignored me. "Until I can determine which is which, I'm taking them both."

"Well, I'll tell you which is which. Anyway, why did you have to create such an embarra.s.sing spectacle? All you needed to do was simply ask me for the computer."

"You don't fool me with your sweet little old lady act, Mrs. Rose. I received information you were in possession of a laptop that might turn out to contain important evidence in the murder of Claire Terry. When I realized this was the stolen laptop, I put two and two together."

I wanted to slap the smug smile right off his face. "First of all, I resent your calling me a 'little old lady.' Second, your report was wrong. I didn't steal her computer. Siobhan Terry, her mother, gave me permission to take it."

"Tell it to the judge, Mrs. Rose." Detective Kaplan grabbed my wrist, spun me around, and handcuffed me. "You're under arrest for theft, tampering with evidence, and interfering with a police investigation."

A fuzzy black circle started closing in on my vision and my ears started to ring.

". . . the right to remain silent. Anything you say . . ."

"Wait. There's been a huge misunderstanding. Call Siobhan Terry. She'll tell you."

"You have a right to an attorney . . ."

My voice rose a few notches. "Call Detective Beavers. He knows I'm innocent."

c.o.c.ky little Detective Kaplan was the conductor of an express train heading straight to jail, and I was his only pa.s.senger.

I'd been briefly incarcerated once before. Back in the early seventies I was arrested at an anti-Vietnam War protest in front of the Federal Building on Wilshire Boulevard. That's where I met Aaron, another protestor. They put thirty of us in a holding cell and Aaron and I talked all night. When dawn broke the next morning, I was in love. Now, however, I was no longer a college student and certainly didn't relish a night in the slammer.

Garcia and Cheng marched me toward the back of their patrol car. One of them put his hand on my head, maneuvered me into the backseat, and fastened the seat belt.

I looked over in time to see Detective Kaplan closing and locking my front door. Sonia walked up to him. She announced, loud enough for the neighbors to hear, "Officer, you'd better check her bas.e.m.e.nt. I happen to know she's hiding guns and bombs down there."

Kaplan looked surprised. "She has a bas.e.m.e.nt?"

For the next ten minutes I rode in a fog, too dazed to speak. Officer Cheng took my upper arm and guided me into the brand new state-of-the-art police station on Vanowen and Wilbur.

The walls of the detention area were painted a cool blue gray, and the lights were dimmed. I stumbled in disbelief toward a row of individual holding cells, all of them empty.

Officer Cheng opened the door to an eight-foot-square cell. "This will be your temporary home for the next hour or two." He unlocked the handcuffs.

With a surprising detachment, I took inventory of the room. I was amazed there were no bars. Instead, the cell was enclosed in Plexiglas, frosted partway up to give prisoners some privacy when using the one-piece stainless steel toilet. The only other place to sit was a concrete ledge built into the far wall.

The fog began lifting from my mind, and I started to panic. Could this really be happening? "What's going to happen to me now?" I ma.s.saged my wrists.

"Detective Kaplan will fill out the paperwork in a room next door. When he's done, you'll be transported to the Van Nuys station where you'll be booked and detained overnight. In the morning you'll be arraigned."

Arraigned? My heart was trying to bang right through my chest wall. I struggled not to let him hear the fear in my voice. "This is totally unjust. There's been a huge misunderstanding here."

Officer Cheng must have heard those words a thousand times before. He just shrugged and turned to go.

I glanced at the hard bench and felt anger pushing at my craw. "I know my rights. I'm ent.i.tled to a phone call. I want to post bail."

"You can invoke your right to a phone call only after you've been booked and processed. That won't be for a few hours yet, so enjoy these accommodations while you can. Compared to Van Nuys, this is a five-star hotel." He locked the cell door.

"Come on! Call Detective Beavers. He can vouch for me."

Cheng just walked away.

In the solitude of my cell, I started to cry. How did I end up here, anyway? I didn't deserve to be here. All I was trying to do was help an old lady through the death of her daughter. What did I get in return? Humiliation and imprisonment. So I fudged a little with the truth about taking the computer. Was that such a terrible thing? It wasn't like I stole it.

Beavers thought the thief took the computer. Then Siobhan told him it was with me. Could he really have told Detective Kaplan I was a thief?

My body began to ache, and my stress headache returned with a vengeance. I attempted to lie down on the narrow bench but my size-sixteen hips were too wide and the bench was too hard to be comfortable. There was nothing I could do but sit up and wait until I could make my phone call. Right then I would have given anything for a diversion, even an out of date issue of Sailing Life from the table in my doctor's office.

I could only think of the injustice of all of this and how surprised I was Beavers resorted to having me arrested. How could I be so wrong about sensing his interest in me? Granted, I wasn't the best judge of men, but I genuinely thought there was a little chemistry between us.

Technically, I supposed you could say I lied when I pretended not to know where Claire's computer was. Would that be enough to charge me with a crime? Would I have to go to trial? What if they found me guilty? Would I have to spend time in actual prison? This would kill Uncle Isaac for sure. If only my quilting were here with me. Nothing could calm me down like the rhythm of my needle as it glided through the fabric.

I thought about who I should call when the time came. I wouldn't call Quincy because she was too far away to help, and I didn't want to alarm her. Uncle Isaac wouldn't know what do and besides, the shock might give him a heart attack. My lawyer did mostly estates and contracts. He wasn't a criminal lawyer. Siobhan had the necessary clout to send a lawyer to get me released, but she might not answer her phone so late at night.

I'd call Lucy. She was likely to answer her phone no matter what time of night, and she'd do whatever was needed. I could trust Lucy with my life.

My throat closed up as I thought about how strong our friendship had grown over the years. I first met Lucy at a PTA meeting. Quincy and I had just moved to Encino and neither one of us knew anyone in her new school. Lucy noticed I was fresh meat and strode up to me with a big smile and an a.s.signment to make one hundred cupcakes for the bake sale.

I thought about how many boxes of cake mix I had to use to make that many. "Seriously? One hundred?"

"Might as well jump in with both feet. I could've asked for two hundred, but I didn't want to scare you off, you being new and all."

"I can do two hundred."

Lucy stared at me for a moment and then gave me a warm hug. "We're going to be great friends. I just know it."

When I finally found a job at UCLA, it was Lucy who insisted on watching Quincy after school until I came home. Quincy loved playing with Lucy's boys, especially Richie. He called her Buddy and taught her how to shoot hoops.

When I took a disability retirement because of my fibromyalgia, Lucy reintroduced me to quilting to help distract me from the unremitting pain. It was through quilting that I met her neighbor Birdie and we started our weekly sewing circle. You couldn't meet weekly with someone and not learn about their struggles and triumphs. Ours became a mutual support society.

When Lucy was diagnosed with breast cancer, I took care of her every day during her chemo and recuperation so Ray could go back to work. Quincy was away at college by then, and only Lucy's youngest son, Joey, still lived at home. Birdie did all the cooking. I helped Lucy pee and eat and shower and throw up. Medical marijuana, a powerful anti-nausea drug, would have saved her from the puke bucket, but weed was still illegal back then.

Yes, Lucy would rescue me from jail. I could count on her.

Around ten, a different patrolman opened the door to my cell. I glanced at his name tag. Officer Yoder looked to be in his early twenties and spoke almost deferentially. "Okay, Mrs. Rose. We're going over to Van Nuys now. Please turn around."

"What for?"

"Handcuffs, ma'am."

"Don't make them too tight." I used as much maternal authority as I could muster.

"Yes, ma'am."

We took Vanowen Street east to Van Nuys. This patrol car smelled strongly of urine and body odor. A spit screen made of stainless steel mesh and crusted with dried phlegm separated the front and back seats and obscured my view out the front window. This was definitely not Lucy's Caddy.

My skin crawled at the thought of the bugs and lice that might be burrowing into my hair and clothes as I sat there. I thought about my fastidious grandmother, who scrubbed and cleaned until you could eat off the floor. Bubbie would die all over again if she saw me now. I leaned forward in the seat, trying to minimize contact with the interior surfaces of the squad car.

I was glad for the darkness of night. With the exception of the earlier scene in front of my house, few people would be able to witness my disgrace. How many times had I pa.s.sed a police car with a prisoner in the backseat and tried to get a glimpse of who he/she was?

We parked behind the Van Nuys precinct and my heart began to pound again. I saw what Officer Cheng meant. The building was at least fifty years old, and the windows were still barred. We took the elevator to booking, on the second floor. The walls were painted an industrial tan and the fluorescent light was relentless. Unlike the new station in West Valley, this place smelled. Bad.

"I don't belong here. Release me at once!"

Officer Yoder walked me over to a wooden bench and unlocked the handcuffs. "Please sit down, ma'am."

I looked him straight in the eye. "I demand to speak to your supervisor."

"Yes, ma'am." He pressed down on my shoulder, forcing me to sit. Then he cuffed my right hand to a steel ring in the bench. He took a sheaf of papers to the desk, handed them over, and pointed in my direction. "Rose, Martha. She's the older lady sitting there."

Older lady my foot! Just because I didn't dye my hair or work out. Everyone in LA had an opinion.

Something cylindrical rolled under my right foot. I looked down. A small disposable syringe with an orange plastic plunger-probably a piece of evidence someone managed to get rid of.

Oh G.o.d, I'm in h.e.l.l.