The Museum of Desire: An Alex Delaware Novel(39)

“She’s with a patient.”

“Could you please tell her it’s about Richard Gurnsey.”

“Who’s that?”

“A friend.”

The receptionist cocked an eyebrow. “She’s booked until seven, why don’t you try later?”

“We may have to,” said Milo. “But if you could tell her.”

“The police, huh?” Loud enough for everyone to hear.

“Yes, ma’am. We’d appreciate if—”

“The police,” she repeated, cranking up the volume. As if sharing a joke with an audience. “Hoe-wold on.”

She got up slowly, walked to the right, and disappeared. Half a minute later, the door to the inner office opened. “Must be a good friend. Fifth door to the right.”

Returning to her desk, she shuffled forms and held up a finger. “Ms. Langer? Step back up for a sec.”



* * *



—

The fifth door was open. To the left, the names of three M.D.’s and a trio of racks for charts.

Inside, room for one practitioner at a time. The white-coated woman behind the desk was in her thirties, narrowly built and buttermilk-pale but for the merest sprinkle of freckles across broad, flat cheeks and a nub nose. Cute in an elfin way. A high-backed desk chair made her look small.

She said, “Please close the door,” and avoided looking at us.

The tint of her eyebrows said her hair had probably begun as strawberry blond. She’d dyed it flame orange and styled it ragged and boy-short. Three thin gold hoops glinted in her left ear, four decorated her right.

Once we’d sat down, she aimed rusty-brown eyes at us. One hand drummed a memo pad atop the desk; the other clutched the tubes of a stethoscope. More framed paper than free space on the wall. I found hers on the far right. M.D., Stanford. Internship, residency, and fellowship in high-risk pregnancy, UC San Francisco.

Milo said, “Thanks for seeing us, Doctor.”

“I’m really pretty busy.”

“Then special thanks.”

“The police about Rick? Has he done something?” Ellen Cerillos plucked at a white lapel.

“Doctor, I’m sorry to have to tell you this but Mr. Gurnsey’s deceased.”

Cerillos’s mouth dropped open. Smallish, misaligned teeth. The lack of childhood dental privilege said maybe a poor girl who’d worked her way up. “I don’t understand—deceased? How?”

“I’m afraid he was the victim of a homicide.”

“Oh, my God.” Cerillos sank back in the enormous chair.

Milo said, “You asked if he’d done something. What came to mind?”

“Nothing. It’s just…if the police were here…I mean I didn’t assume anything had happened to him.” Both hands took hold of the stethoscope.

“How well did you know Rick?”

A rosy flush climbed up Cerillos’s neck, shooting from the hollow above the center of her collarbone to a small chin. “We dated. A couple of times. How’d you connect me—oh, his phone?”

Same deduction Joan Blunt had made. The cellular age.

Milo said, “Yes, Doctor.”

“This is unbelievable. I’ve never known anyone before who was—Are you here because you think I can help you in some way? I’m sure I can’t.”

“You and Rick dated a couple of times. Literally, as in two?”

“Maybe three,” said Ellen Cerillos. “Four. That’s it. Four.” The same number of calls between her and Gurnsey.

“Did you stop because of problems?”

The flush took off again, commandeering Cerillos’s entire face. “I didn’t stop, he did. As in see you soon then not calling anymore. I was surprised, there didn’t seem to be problems. At least as far as I could tell.” She tugged at a sprig of red hair. “Talking about my social life with anyone is embarrassing, let alone the police.”

“We’re at the beginning of the investigation, Doctor. If you could just bear with us.” Cerillos glanced at a desk clock backed by a pharmaceutical company’s label. “A few more minutes, I’ve got a waiting room full of patients.”

“We’ll do our best. So four dates, then he stopped calling. Kinda rude.”

“I thought it was. I decided I wasn’t going to call him. Then I relented. For closure, you know? You wonder. I reached him at work, he didn’t sound surprised that I was asking.”

I said, “As if he was used to it.”

“Exactly. As if that was his pattern. So I said to myself, Okay, Ellie, you’ve been played. And proceeded to forget about him. It wasn’t that difficult, there’d been nothing emotional, just…” The blush intensified. “He was just a player. What surprised me is he’d never come across like one. He knew how to act romantic. Emphasis on act. Or I was just gullible.”

“Did he offer you any explanation?”

“He apologized, told me I was a great girl but he needed to move on. Which I took to mean another woman.”

“Did he ever mention other women?”

“Never,” said Cerillos. “Some guys do that, it’s moronic, but Rick never did. Are you saying he mistreated someone and they took it out on him?”