Sidney Sheldon’s Angel of the Dark: A gripping thriller full of suspense

“Nope.”

“That’s it? ‘Nope’? That’s all you got for me?”

Lindemeyer shrugged. “You asked me a question. I answered it.”

Henning made a lunge for his money. Lindemeyer cringed.

“Okay, okay. Look, Detective, if they was for sale, I woulda seen ’em. I’m the only guy on the West Coast who can move that niche, Victorian shit. You know it and so does everybody else. So either your boy’s skipped town or he ain’t selling. That’s real information, man. Maybe he wanted ’em for personal use.”

A psychopathic, homicidal rapist with a love for obscure nineteenth-century portraiture? Detective Henning didn’t think so. “Maybe he had a buyer lined up already,” he mused aloud. “Then he wouldn’t have needed your services.”

“Mebbe.”

“Do you know of any prominent collectors who might commission a job like this?”

“I might.” Lindemeyer eyed the sergeant’s wallet.

It was going to be a long and expensive afternoon.

“COULD YOU DO ME A FAVOR and check again?”

Detective Danny McGuire flashed the receptionist the same winning smile he’d used on the nurse at Cedars, but this time to no avail.

“I don’ need to check agin. I checked awready.”

Today’s gatekeeper at the government records office on Veteran was black, weighed around two hundred pounds, and was plainly in no mood to take shit from some dumb-ass Irish cop who figured he was God’s gift to women.

“We got no records for no Angela Ryman. Not Ryman RY, not Reiman REI, not any Angela Ryman. No births, no marriages, no deaths, no Social, no taxes. Not in California.”

Danny’s mind was flooded with doubts. One by one, he tried to rationalize them away.

Maybe she was born out of state.

Maybe she and Jakes got married in the Caribbean, or in Paris. Folks with that kind of money don’t just run down to city hall like the rest of us. The marriage certificate could be anywhere.

It doesn’t mean anything.

Even so, walking into the administration offices of Beverly Hills High School half an hour later, the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach remained.

“I need the records of a former student.” He tried to force some optimism into his voice. “She would have graduated eight or nine years ago.”

The male clerk smiled helpfully. “Certainly, Detective. What was the young lady’s name?”

“Angela Ryman.”

The smile faded. “Well, I’ve been here ten years and that name doesn’t ring a bell with me.” He opened up a tall metal filing cabinet and pulled out a drawer marked Ru–Si. “I don’t suppose you have a picture?”

Danny reached into his briefcase. He handed the man a shot of Angela that his officers had taken from the house. She was wearing her wedding dress and looked even more radiant than usual, her perfect features aglow with love and joy, her dark hair swept back from her milk-white face, her chocolate-brown eyes dancing.

The clerk said, “Oh my. Now, that’s a face I wouldn’t forget in a hurry. No, I’m sorry. That girl was never here.”

“YOU’RE HURTING ME!”

Lyle Renalto was gripping Angela Jakes by the shoulders so tightly that his fingernails bit into the flesh.

“I’m sorry, Angel.” He released his grip. “But you have to get out of here. Now, today, before he comes back.”

Angela started to cry. “But I … I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Of course you haven’t,” said Lyle more gently. “I know that. You know that. But McGuire won’t understand.”

Angela hesitated. “Are you sure he won’t? He seems like such a nice guy.”

“I’m sure,” said Lyle firmly. Pulling an overnight bag out of the closet, he handed it to her. “Get some clothes. We may not have much time.”

DETECTIVE DANNY MCGUIRE WOKE AT FIVE in the morning. He’d gone to bed at two and barely slept. His mind was racing.

Angela Jakes had lied to him. About her name and about her education. What else had she lied to him about?

And why?

Why would she fake a name and a past to the man who was trying to catch her rapist and her husband’s killer? A man who was trying to help her? There could only be one reason. Angela Jakes must have something in her past that she was ashamed of. Deeply ashamed of. The obvious thought popped into Danny’s mind:

Had she been a hooker back in the day? Was that the “unhappy life” Andrew Jakes had rescued her from?

It was a familiar enough story in L.A.: young, beautiful, small-town girl comes to Hollywood with dreams of making it as an actress. Falls on hard times. Hooks up with the wrong crowd …

Yet whenever Danny pictured that angelic face, those eyes so full of trust and goodness, he couldn’t bring himself to believe that Andrew Jakes had picked up his bride on Hollywood Boulevard. He hadn’t believed Angela Jakes was a gold digger either, even when all the evidence pointed to it. I was right about that. I gotta trust my instincts more.

But what were his instincts telling him now?

That was the problem. He had no idea.

After leaving the high school yesterday, he’d driven around for an hour, trying to figure out his next move. The obvious way to go would have been to drive back to Lyle Renalto’s place and confront Angela on the spot. With any other witness, Danny wouldn’t have thought twice. But he couldn’t bring himself to grill the lovely Mrs. Jakes in front of her odious attorney, who would doubtless insist on remaining glued to her side. If she did have guilty secrets, and who of us didn’t, she deserved a chance to confess them in private. Danny would understand. After everything she’d just been through, he owed her that much sensitivity at least.

So instead Danny had driven back to the station house to brainstorm with the rest of the team. Only it was actually more of a shit storm. Every lead his men had been chasing seemed to have turned into a dead end. Henning’s Venice art expert had come up with a big fat doughnut on the miniatures. The insurance scam angle looked less and less promising, as the only people who could possibly benefit from a staged robbery would be the Jakeses themselves, one of whom was dead, while the other had given away all her money. Two of Danny’s officers had been checking out the lucky charities on the receiving end of Angela Jakes’s generosity. Both seemed totally kosher, with sparklingly transparent accounts. A sophisticated computer program had gone through every violent rape in the L.A. area in the past five years, looking for any connection with art or jewelry thefts, or any connection at all that might link one of those suspects to the Jakes crime scene. Nothing. It was the same story with forensics. Prints: nothing. Semen analysis: nothing.

Danny pulled on a pair of sweatpants and stumbled into the kitchen to fix himself a strong cup of coffee. It was still dark outside. The tree-lined, suburban street in West Hollywood where Danny had lived for the past six years was empty and as silent as the grave. Was Angela still asleep? Danny pictured her, dark hair spilling over a soft white pillow, her glorious body warm and naked beneath Lyle Renalto’s sheets. Was she in the guest bedroom? Christ, he hoped so.

He remembered Lyle’s contemptuous comment at the hospital: “For a detective, you’re a pretty poor judge of people. Angela and I aren’t lovers.”

Detective Danny McGuire hoped with all his heart that Renalto’s words were true.

He looked at his watch: 5:20.

If I drive over there now, they’ll still be asleep. I can see for myself which beds were slept in.

He jumped into the shower.