The Spellman Files Read online

  SIMON & SCHUSTER

  Rockefeller Center

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2007 by Spellman Enterprises, Inc.

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  SIMON & SCHUSTER and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication

  Lutz, Lisa.

  The Spellman Files : a novel/Lisa Lutz.

  p. cm.

  1. Private investigators—Fiction. 2. Domestic fiction. I. Title.

  PS3612.U897S67 2007

  813'.6—dc22 2006049161

  ISBN-10: 1-84739-620-8

  ISBN-13: 978-1-84739-620-4

  Visit us on the World Wide Web:

  http://www.SimonSays.com

  Contents

  PROLOGUE

  THE INTERVIEW

  CHAPTER 1

  Part One Antebellum

  A LONG TIME AGO

  THE FIRSTBORN

  THE INTERROGATION ROOM

  1799 CLAY STREET

  THE FAMILY BUSINESS

  DO NOT DISTURB

  OLD UNCLE RAY

  THE THREE PHASES OF MY QUASI-REDEMPTION (AND LOST WEEKEND #3)

  THE INTERVIEW

  CHAPTER 2

  RAE SPELLMAN

  ONE YEAR AND EIGHT MONTHS AGO

  CAMP WINNEMANCHA

  THE INTERVIEW

  CHAPTER 3

  Part Two The Spellman Wars

  THE SUGAR WAR

  THE RA(E/Y) WARS

  THE WAR ON RECREATIONAL SURVEILLANCE

  CHAPTER 1

  THE TENNIS WAR (TENNIS 101)

  THE SKIRT WARS

  THE INTERVIEW

  CHAPTER 4

  THE WAR ON RECREATIONAL SURVEILLANCE

  CHAPTER 2

  THE DENTIST WAR

  THE WAR ON RECREATIONAL SURVEILLANCECHAPTER 3

  THE BAR WAR

  THE DENTIST WAR,

  THE SHIRT WAR

  (AND CAR CHASE #1)

  Part Three Negotiating Peace

  ONE LAST JOB

  MISSING PERSONS

  THE RANSOM

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 1

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 2

  THE LAST TENNIS MATCH

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 3

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 4

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 5

  THE DOT

  THE DRUG DEAL

  ISABEL SNORTS COCAINE: THE MOVIE

  THE INTERVIEW

  CHAPTER 5

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 6

  ONE TRUCE

  (AND A FEW MORE BATTLES)

  LOST WEEKEND #25

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 7

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 8

  GONE

  THE INTERVIEW

  CHAPTER 6

  MISSING

  THE SNOW CASE

  CHAPTER 9

  BREAKING AND ENTERING

  THE FINAL BATTLE

  EPILOGUE CRIME AND PUNISHMENT

  THE LAST LOST WEEKEND

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  For David Klane

  THE SPELLMAN FILES

  PROLOGUE

  San Francisco, Night

  I duck into the parking garage, hoping to escape. But my boots echo on the slick cement, broadcasting my location to anyone listening. And I know they are listening. I make a mental note to myself not to wear these shoes again if there is a chance I’ll get involved in a pursuit.

  I start to run up the spiral driveway of the garage, knowing they’ll never match my pace. The sound of my strained breath now masks the echo of my footsteps. Behind me, I hear nothing.

  I stop in my tracks to listen more closely. One car door, then another, shuts and an engine turns over. I try to predict their next move as I scan the lot for Daniel’s car.

  Then I spot it—a midnight blue BMW—eclipsed on either side by two enormous SUVs. I rush to the newly waxed four-door sedan and put the key in the lock.

  The scream of the car alarm hits me like a punch in the stomach. I’m breathless for a moment as I recover. I had forgotten about the security system. I drive a twelve-year-old Buick that unlocks with a freakin’ key! the way it’s supposed to.

  My thumb fumbles with the remote device until the siren stops. I can hear the other car inching up the driveway, moving slowly just to torture me. I finally press the button that unlocks the door.

  Car Chase #3

  The nondescript Ford sedan cuts past my vehicle, giving me enough time to screech out of the parking space before it blocks my path down the driveway. As I zoom out of the garage, I check my rearview mirror and see the Ford right on my tail.

  I shoot across the street, making a sharp left. My foot hits the floor. I am surprised by the smooth, rapid acceleration of the luxury vehicle. I realize there are reasons people buy these cars beyond concerns of vanity. I remind myself not to get used to it.

  The speedometer reads 50 mph in no time flat. The Ford is about a hundred meters back, but closing in. I slow down to get them close on my tail and then overshoot the right turn onto Sacramento Street, but they know all my tricks and stay right behind me.

  Speeding over two hills, the BMW, followed by the Ford, reaches downtown in record time. I check the fuel gauge. Maybe an hour of high-speed driving left. I turn right into an alley and sweep through to the other side, making a left turn onto a one-way street, going the wrong way. Two cars sound their horns and careen out of my trajectory. I check my mirror, expecting to have made some headway, but I can’t shake them.

  Driving south of Market Street, I accelerate one last time, more as an act of showmanship than an attempt to escape. I follow it up by slamming on my brakes. I do it just to rattle them, just to remind them that I am still in control.

  The Ford screeches to a halt about ten feet behind the BMW. I turn off the ignition and take a few deep breaths. I casually get out of the car and walk over to the sedan.

  I knock on the driver’s-side window. A moment passes and the window rolls down. I put my hand on the hood of the car and lean in just a bit.

  “Mom. Dad. This has to stop.”

  THE INTERVIEW

  CHAPTER 1

  Seventy-two Hours Later

  A single lightbulb hangs from the ceiling, its dull glow illuminating the spare decor of this windowless room. I could itemize its contents with my eyes closed: one wooden table, splintered and paint-chipped, surrounded by four rickety chairs; a rotary phone; an old television; and a VCR. I know this room well. Hours of my childhood I lost in here, answering for crimes I probably did commit. But I sit here now answering to a man I have never seen before, for a crime that is still unknown, a crime that I am too afraid to even consider.

  Inspector Henry Stone sits across from me. He places a tape recorder in the center of the table and switches it on. I can’t get a good read on him: early forties, short-cropped salt-and-pepper hair, crisp white shirt, and a perfectly tasteful tie. He might be handsome, but his cold professionalism feels like a mask. His suit seems too pricey for a civil servant and makes me suspicious. But everyone makes me suspicious.

  “Please state your name and address for the record,” says the inspector.

  “Isabel Spellman. Seventeen ninety-nine Clay Street, San Francisco, California.”


  “Please state your age and date of birth.”

  “I’m twenty-eight. Born April 1, 1978.”

  “Your parents are Albert and Olivia Spellman, is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “You have two siblings: David Spellman, thirty, and Rae Spellman, fourteen. Is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Please state your occupation and current employer for the record.”

  “I am a licensed private investigator with Spellman Investigations, my parents’ PI firm.”

  “When did you first begin working for Spellman Investigations?” Stone asks.

  “About sixteen years ago.”

  Stone consults his notes and looks up at the ceiling, perplexed. “You would have been twelve?”

  “That is correct,” I respond.

  “Ms. Spellman,” Stone says, “let’s start at the beginning.”

  I cannot pinpoint the precise moment when it all began, but I can say for sure that the beginning didn’t happen three days ago, one week, one month, or even one year ago. To truly understand what happened to my family, I have to start at the very beginning, and that happened a long time ago.

  Part One

  Antebellum

  A LONG TIME AGO

  My father, Albert Spellman, joined the San Francisco Police Department when he was twenty and one-half years old, just as his father, grandfather, and brother had done before him. Five years later he made inspector and was transferred to vice. Two years after that, while telling his informant a joke, Albert tripped and fell down two flights of stairs. The fall left him with an unreliable back that would cause him to collapse in pain without warning.

  Forced into early retirement, Albert immediately went to work for Jimmy O’Malley, a one time robbery inspector turned private investigator. The year was 1970. Although Jimmy was nearing eighty, O’Malley Investigations was still pulling in a respectable caseload. With my father on board, the business took off. Albert has an unusual gift with people, a goofy, affable charm that elicits immediate trust. His sense of humor is purely cheap vaudeville, yet everyone falls for it. Some of his routines—like sneezing Eastern European names—he never grows tired of. Only his children have suggested he work up some new material.

  At six foot three and two hundred twenty pounds, you might imagine his physique would intimidate, but his easy gait always masked the strength beneath. His face seemed to defy description with features so mismatched, they looked like a collage of other faces. My mother used to say, If you stared at him long enough, he was handsome. And my father would continue, But your mother was the only one who had the patience.

  In 1974, during a routine insurance-company surveillance that concluded in Dolores Park, Albert spotted a petite brunette lurking behind a set of bushes flanking the Muni tracks. Intrigued by her unusual behavior, he dropped his paid surveillance detail to follow this mysterious woman. Within a short time, Albert determined that the suspiciously behaving brunette was doing some surveillance of her own. He came to this conclusion when she pulled a camera and an enormous telephoto lens out of her purse and began taking snapshots of a young couple embroiled on a park bench. Her camerawork was unsteady and amateurish and Albert decided to offer some professional assistance. He approached, either too quickly or too closely (the details are now a blur to both parties), and got kneed in the groin. My father would later say he fell in love as the pain subsided.

  Before the brunette could plant another debilitating blow, Albert rattled off his credentials to subdue the surprisingly strong woman. The brunette, in turn, apologized, introduced herself as Olivia Montgomery, and reminded my father that sneaking up on women is both impolite and potentially dangerous. Then she offered an explanation for her amateurish spying and solicited some advice. It was revealed that the man still entangled on the park bench was Ms. Montgomery’s future brother-in-law. The woman, however, was not her sister.

  Albert played hooky the rest of the afternoon to aid and instruct Ms. Montgomery in her surveillance of one Donald Finker. Their efforts began at Dolores Park and ended at an Irish pub in the Tenderloin. Finker was none the wiser. Olivia would later call the day a great success, although her sister Martie would not. Several bus tokens, cab fares, and two rolls of film later, Olivia and Albert managed to catch Donald in the arms of three separate women (some he’d paid) and slipping money in the pockets of two separate bookies. Albert was impressed with Olivia’s acumen and discovered that having a petite, quick-on-her-feet, twenty-one-year-old brunette working a surveillance job was an invaluable asset. He didn’t know whether to ask her out or offer her a job. Too torn to make that decision, Albert did both.

  Three months later, Olivia Montgomery became Olivia Spellman in a small Las Vegas ceremony. Martie caught the bouquet, to her great astonishment, but thirty-three years later would still be unmarried. A year after that, Albert bought the business from Jimmy and changed its name to Spellman Investigations.

  THE FIRSTBORN

  David Spellman was born perfect. Eight pounds even, with a full head of hair and unblemished skin, he cried for a brief moment right after his birth (to let the doctor know he was breathing), then stopped abruptly, probably out of politeness. Within two months, he was sleeping seven hours straight and occasionally eight or nine.

  While Albert and Olivia automatically considered their first child the picture of perfection, it wasn’t until two years later, when I came along to provide a point of comparison, that they realized how flawless David really was.

  David grew more attractive the older he got. While he bore no real resemblance to anyone in my family, his features were a collection of my mother’s and father’s best attributes, with a few of Gregory Peck’s thrown in. He never suffered through an awkward stage, just an occasional black eye brought on by a jealous classmate (which somehow looked fetching on him). David excelled in school with little or no effort, possessing a brain for academics that has not been duplicated anywhere in our entire family tree. A natural athlete, he declined being captain of just about every sports team in high school to avoid the covetous backlashes that would often ensue. There was nothing sinister in his ungodly perfection. In fact, he possessed modesty beyond his years. But I was determined to kick out the legs of every chair he ever sat on.

  The crimes I committed against my brother were manifold. Most went unpunished, as David was never a snitch, but there were others that could not escape the careful scrutiny of my ever-vigilant parents. As soon as I developed language skills, I began to document my crimes, not unlike a shop clerk logs inventory. The record of my crimes took the form of lists, followed by relevant details. Sometimes there were thumbnail sketches of a misdeed, like, “12-8-92. Erased hard drive on David’s computer.” Other times the lists were followed by a detailed rendering of the event, usually in the case of crimes for which I was caught. The details were necessary so that I could learn from my mistakes.

  THE INTERROGATION ROOM

  That is what we came to call it, but it was, in fact, our unfinished basement. Contents: one lightbulb, one table, four chairs, a rotary phone, and an old TV. Since it had the lighting and spare furnishings of a noir film, my parents could not resist staging all of our sentencing hearings in this primitive space.

  I held a long-term reservation on the room, being my family’s primary agitator. Below is a sampling of my basement interrogations. The list is by no means exhaustive:

  Isabel, Age 8

  I sit in one of the unbalanced chairs, leaning to one side. Albert paces back and forth. Once he is certain that I am beginning to squirm, he speaks.

  “Isabel, did you sneak into your brother’s room last night and cut his hair?”

  “No,” I say.

  Long pause.

  “Are you sure? Maybe you need some time to refresh your memory.”

  Albert takes a seat across the table and looks me straight in the eye. I quickly look down but try to maintain my ground.

  “I do
n’t know anything about a haircut,” I say.

  Albert places a pair of safety scissors on the table.

  “Do these look familiar?”

  “Those could be anyone’s.”

  “But we found them in your bedroom.”

  “I was framed.”

  In fact, I was grounded for one week.

  Isabel, Age 12

  This time my mother does the pacing, carrying a laundry basket under her left arm. She puts the basket on the table and pulls out a wrinkled oxford shirt in a shade of pink so pale it is clearly not its intended color.