I watched infomercials — Jewelry TV, then the Coin Vault — learned a few things about numismatic proof coins in original packaging, just what to leave my grandchildren. I switched to the Zumba body, the Shark vacuum cleaner, and then the world’s best bra ever!

I turned off the box, but my eyes stayed wide open and I replayed Joe’s messages in my mind.

The first several times he’d called me, he’d been mad. He’d shouted, said that he’d told me the truth, that June had lied, and that my believing her showed I had a profound lack of faith in him. That it was insulting.

He said that he loved me and that I should pick up the phone. “Call me, Lindsay. I’m your husband.”

Next few messages, he said was sorry for yelling. He realized why I was angry and said he wasn’t mad anymore. He wanted to talk to me and he would tell me about every moment he’d spent with June in the last two years.

“There were not very many moments, Lindsay, and none of them were naked. None.”

The last time he called, he sounded empty. He left me the name of the hotel where he was staying, said to call him if I wanted to talk or if I wanted to listen.

I didn’t want to do either.

It was almost seven o’clock when I got up to make myself a cup of tea. When the phone rang, I picked it up, said, “Hello?”

But it wasn’t Joe.

It was Conklin.

“A body washed up in Big Sur an hour ago,” Conklin said. “A surfer, apparently.”

“Marilyn Varick was a surfer.”

“Yeah. This DB is a man. And he’s got a head.”

“So how does this have anything to do with our case?” I asked.

“The guy who called the police said there was a card lying in the sand next to the body. On it was the number six thirteen.”

I stood flat-footed in my kitchen then adjusted my thinking about the remains at the house of heads. I guess I’d thought the killings were over.

“Richie, about Chandler and his boat. We always thought that body dumps were a possibility.”

“Could he really be so dumb as to dump a body with all this attention on him?”

“Let’s ask him.”

Chapter 69

Chapter 69

CONKLIN AND I were in Interview 2, the smaller of Homicide’s two no-frills interrogation rooms, sitting across the table from Harry Chandler and his lawyer, Donna Hewett.

Hewett was a good general counsel, known for her work on estates and trusts, and was reportedly a pretty good tax attorney too. But Hewett was not a criminal defense lawyer and that told me that Chandler didn’t expect to get charged.

Was he bluffing?

Was Harry Chandler so bold or so crazy that he would kill while under the laser focus of national news coverage?