Paid parking – LAX
The attendant frowned as he examined the car. It had been there days past what its owner had paid for. Abandoned cars were never a good thing around an airport – especially one as busy as LAX. "Guess I'd better call it in" he sighed, blowing his nose as his seasonal allergies continued to clog his sinuses. "Never know what you'll find in these things." He shuffled off, his nose so stopped up he didn't smell the sweet, cloying smell of decomposition emanating from the dusty vehicle.
Back at the precinct.
Chloe and Lucifer returned to precinct and noticed that both Dan and Ella were huddled around Dan's computer. "Wonder what they found?" Chloe whispered, headed in her ex's direction.
Lucifer shrugged. "Not sure I want to know."
Dan looked up and waved them over. "Hey – Amenadiel and I talked to Annalise's father. Scary guy who hires even scarier ex-cons to work at his diner. But he seemed genuinely concerned about his kid's disappearance so while I'm not crossing him off the list I'm inclined to drop him down a few levels."
"How terribly boring for you, Daniel" Lucifer drawled. "Having to spend all that time with my brother only to come up with nothing useful."
Dan made a face and continued. "Also Annalise's faculty advisor came by looking for you. She had copies of the podcast her student and our murder victim were working on right before she disappeared."
Chloe blinked then smiled. "Oh yes – she did mention Annalise was working on a YouTube series about famous haunted houses. So I guess her project morphed into a set of podcasts?"
"Yeah, with a very familiar co-host – our murder victim John McIntyre." Dan waved a hand at his computer. "Her first podcast introduces them to their audience then goes on from there."
Chloe moved a chair and sat down in anticipation. "So that's why they were at that diner together. Does she say how or where they met?"
Ella nodded enthusiastically. "McIntyre had escorted his wife to an alumni event sponsored by her old sorority. He recognized Annalise's voice from some production he had heard that had been created by a web group discussing famous hauntings. He and Annalise got talking and found out they had a lot of interests in common, including famous haunted sites around the country."
"Well that explains how their connection started – but why did she have him as a co-host on her podcasts?" Lucifer stared at the computer with a frown. "Surely she could have found someone in her school to assist her?"
"Maybe the guy they were quarreling with in the diner was originally supposed to be her co-host and she dumped him for McIntyre" Dan mused. "Did Bradley give you anything on Gabe?"
Chloe shook her head. "Claimed his nephew was supposed to be staying with them for a while but never showed up."
"They lied, of course. We saw a curtain move on the home's second floor which I'm lay odds was Gabriel watching us leave." Lucifer pulled up a chair for himself beside Chloe. "Pity. I would have LOVED to have a little talk with him about what he most desired."
Ella rolled her eyes. "He might not have been impressed with that shtick of yours."
"Oh I think he would have been" Lucifer purred. "All that lovely rhetoric he was taught at the seminary – I'm sure he would have been perfectly primed to respond to me."
Chloe sighed. "We're not sure that there was anyone behind that curtain, Lucifer. It could have been moved by a puff of air from an A/C unit or someone cleaning upstairs." She looked thoughtfully at the computer again. "Let's hear what her Cecil hotel podcast has to say. Maybe it will point us in the direction of a suspect with a motive."
Dan started the podcast up, leaning back in his chair as the bright voice of the missing girl started off the show.
Podcast
Young female voice - "Hello again – this is Annalise Gibson and my partner John McIntyre coming to you with another in our series of podcasts about haunted homes and why they have the reputations that they have now. Today's episode is on the Cecil Hotel right here in L.A."
Male voice - "John McIntyre here – the Cecil has a long and blood reputation. It was founded in 1924 as a destination for business travelers and tourists but began to decline after the Great Depression, attracting a seamier clientele."
Female voice - "John, when was the first death recorded at the Cecil?"
Male voice - "1927 – Percy Cook shot himself in the head while inside his hotel room after failing to reunite with his wife and child. He was the first death and the first suicide reported for the establishment. But there would be others. The hotel seemed to attract people looking to end their lives."
Female voice - "Is it true that several serial killers had stayed at the Cecil?
Male voice – "At least two that were know - Richard Ramirez and Jack Unterweger – stayed at the hotel during their hunt for victims."
Female voice – "So let's talk about the issue of the Cecil being haunted. Or at least the place somehow attracting death."
Male voice – "Like our other famous venues this hotel has a bad reputation not only for where it's located but for the amount of death it appears to attract. It was even used as an inspiration for a season of that American Horror story series. But was the hotel a gateway to an antechamber of hell or, because of its location just a convenient place for people already determined to end their own lives or someone else's? That's really what the discussion should center on.
End of Podcast
Chloe looked at the computer for a moment. "Well – he was right about what the conversation should be about. Did it seem to anyone that our victim was the one doing all the talking?"
"It's pretty evenly divided between Annalise and McIntyre in the other podcasts" Elle replied. "This one just feels… unfinished. They didn't even get into details about the Cecil's reputation or how they found their information. Or about their theory about why the Cecil was or wasn't touched with evil."
"Maybe they were afraid to get sued? Dr. Harris said when she went to the Cecil looking for Annalise Ms. Simonton, the manager, pretty much told her that the new owners would sue if anything that Annalise found while she was snooping through the hotel come to light." Chloe tapped one finger on the desk. "And we still haven't heard from cybercrimes on that guy you found Ella – what was his handle?"
"DeathStalker24" Elle responded. "I'll ping my buddy and see what he found out." She skittered out of the office, running for her own phone.
"Question?" Lucifer asked, eyes on the computer. "How long was this woman gone before anyone – specifically your dead man – really started looking for her?"
"Her father was on her trail almost immediately" Dan responded. "Tried to file a missing person's report on her the morning after she disappeared." He reached over and pulled out one of the flyers they had found on McIntyre's desk. "I'm thinking these copies were from the one he originally posted when Gibson was told he had to wait 24 hours before filing on her. Though how our vic got a copy of it…"
"Maybe our missing Gabe made sure he had one" Lucifer mused. "Or perhaps his brother-in-law Mr. Milton. There's a guilty conscious in that man – I can smell it. He knows more than he's willing to tell."
"About the disappearance, the murder or his boss's relationships with younger women?" Chloe replied. "We still need to talk to both him and his sister. Funny how neither of them have shown up to demand answers about their loved one's death."
"You're assuming either of them gave a rat's ass about McIntyre" Dan pointed out. "A Middle-aged man spending time with a teenage girl doing podcasts doesn't sound like someone getting a lot of attention at home."
"Sadly, I must agree with Daniel" Lucifer said. "Perhaps we should go out and speak with Mr. McIntyre's "family" such as it is and see if they know anything worth knowing."
"Yeah – like where Annalise Gibson is and why someone would want to shut both her and McIntyre up about a beat-up old hotel on the edge of Skid Row."
Parking area at LAX
The uniformed offer frowned, his stomach churning at the smell coming from the vehicle. "The plate's show it belongs to a man found dead just a few days ago. We'll need to have it towed to the LAPD impound yard and have forensics take a look at it."
His older partner shook his head. "Not until we find out where that smell is coming from." He dialed a number and stepped back from the smell. "Put me through to Det. Chloe Decker. This is Officer Murchison. I think we've found her murder victim's car – and something in it smells."
