Who Killed Jenny Schecter? Ch. 15

"You're doing okay," Lauren said quietly. "No one says it isn't complicated."

"I hesitate to ask ... do either of you know about this stuff? The tranny thing? Transgender, transman, whatever you call it?"

"We know some," Carmen said. "We know a few people who are transgender." Still, she didn't want to tell Collins that she actually knew Max, and didn't like him, and hadn't, from Day One. It might have seemed like validating an anti-trans prejudice. How to explain coming home and finding the kitchen messed up and not cleaned up after dinner? How to explain Max's small-town insecurities and boorish behavior the night they took Jenny out to dinner? How to explain her anger at finding Max's hypodermic needle on the bathroom sink, and thinking it was heroin instead of testosterone, and then not really caring which one it was, considering that either one would have fucked up Max and made her/him treat Jenny like shit? It was a lot of work for Carmen to be able to say it's okay to not like a transgender person. To not like Max. It wasn't because the person was transgender. It was because the person was an asshole who happened to be transgender. It was because she agreed with Shane that night at the fundraiser when Shane had told Max, "If you hurt Jenny I'll cut your tits off myself."

"What you're saying is, when you were told Max was transgendered, you didn't know exactly how to proceed."

"Yes," Collins said. "I mean, we categorize people all the time. Dead prostitute, you know what to do, who to look for -- the pimp. Dead housewife? Piece of cake, sweat the hubby. Dead husband? Same thing, sweat the wife. Dead girlfriend? Dead boss? Dead gangbanger, dead liquor store owner, dead gambler, dead rich guy? Even a dead cop. Maybe especially a dead cop. But those categories, those homicides, you get the call-out and pretty much you know what to do almost from the moment you get to the crime scene. But a dead tranny lying by the side of the road at 3 a.m., full of drugs and booze? Yeah, we fucked up. I tell myself, it wasn't because he was trans whatever. I tell myself it was because I just didn't know what to do next. Who to talk to, who to look at, beyond the obvious landlord and job supervisor. And the forensics dribbles in over two weeks and then I go on vacation, and my partner and his temp partner take over, and I admit, I said to myself, thank god, because I don't want this case and I don't know what I'm doing, and the next three weeks it's all their problem and not mine. And no, I don't feel good about that, but there it is. I was happy to get the case off my hands."

"So what happened next?"

"The coroner releases the body finally, and there's a funeral. The sister comes in from someplace in Illinois and the ex-boyfriend who knocked her up, he comes in from LA, and when they hold some sort of service at the funeral home I am literally at home packing my bags for Hawaii and I am on leave and couldn't care less, Baxter and Gomez have the case. I get back three weeks later, the case is colder than a frosty Coors light. They interview the ex-boyfriend, he says he knows nothing, gives them an alibi where he was the night Sweeney got run down, and guess what, home alone in bed asleep, went to work the next morning. The sister from Illinois hasn't spoken to Sweeney in years, they don't get along, the sister isn't crazy about gay people in general but tolerated Sweeney being a lesbian, but the tranny thing, well, that was some kind of deal-breaker for her. Bitches about the cost of flying out to Bakersfield. Tells the boyfriend you pay for the fucking funeral, the boyfriend says no fucking way, the funeral home throws them both out on the street, cops come, break up the catfight but nobody wants to press charges, especially the funeral home, because the last thing they want is a newspaper story about a riot at a tranny funeral. Jesus Christ. Three, four days later I'm on a tour of Pearl Harbor, we go out to the Arizona, sunk in the harbor, you know? I get a text from Baxter, guess what, we just found out the tranny had a baby that died from SIDS in a foster home. I text him back, go fucking check it out and don't text me anything until I get back, with one of those smiley emo-whatchamacallit things. There's one with the middle finger raised. So, short story long, that's what happened. We didn't know in a timely fashion what we had, we didn't really know what to do, and like people say, it fell through the cracks because we let it do exactly that. We never learned anything about the Schecter thing, and we never contacted anybody in LA because we didn't know anything about LA or Sweeney's life there. We had an LA ex-boyfriend and some weird stuff about a baby. Baxter and Gomez looked at it, but there was nothing. My mistake was I let it ride, I accepted their work, because that was the easiest thing to do. And then, you know, another case comes along, and another, and another, and the file goes into a filing cabinet, and its sits there untouched for who-fucking-knows forever. Then you called."

Collins signaled to the waiter for more coffee.

"Let me ask you," Collins finally said. "Sweeney was a guy, sort of, but had a baby. How does that work? In my whole life, I never heard of such a thing."

"Well, it sort of works like this," Carmen said. "One reason you never heard of it is because it's pretty rare, but it has happened, and usually on purpose. Usually when a woman is transitioning she starts taking testosterone, and Max was, starting in January or February 2006. Apparently it was black market hormones. Because she couldn't afford to go to a legitimate doctor—"

"Who's your source on this?" Collins asked.

"Shane and Alice."

"Who?"

"Shane McCutcheon and Alice Pieszecki. They're in your paperwork we gave you. Alice is the one in jail on what we believe is the false confession. McCutcheon was Schecter's girlfriend at the time of her murder. They both had known Max from the time Max came out to LA in 2005."

Lauren said nothing, least of all that Carmen knew this information firsthand.

"Okay," Collins said. "Go on."

"The testosterone treatments really screwed up Max's emotions. He would go into rages and was often out-of-control. He wanted to get what's called top surgery, that's basically when a surgeon removes the breasts. It's a mastectomy without the cancer. Max wanted it but couldn't afford it, any more than he could afford proper testosterone therapy. He and Schecter were in a relationship but it broke up, in part because he was treating her badly, she was treating him badly, and she cheated on him with a woman she met in Canada. He kind of cheated on her, too, with a gay guy they met briefly where they hung out. Jenny walked in on him giving the guy a BJ, but Jenny said go ahead, she didn't give a damn. A year or two later Max had a relationship with a woman who didn't know Max was a woman, too; he had a mustache and was pretty masculine, but he still had a vagina and uterus. That relationship went badly, too, when she finally found out. So a year or two later, Max met this guy Tom, and apparently got pregnant by him unintentionally, somewhere around September or October 2008. They fought a lot, in part about Max deciding to keep the baby and it may have been too late to have an abortion anyway. They actually had a baby shower for him, which I'm told didn't go well. They finally split in February 2009, and Schecter had a lot to do with it. Apparently the boyfriend hated Schecter and vice versa. In her interview after the murder Max said Jenny might have been responsible for the break-up. Anyway, about a month later was the going-away party where Schecter was murdered. Max was there, and was maybe five to six months pregnant at the time. It seems that Schecter was the only one keeping Max tied to the group, and after Schecter's funeral Max pulled up stakes and disappeared, so far as any of the group knew. It tells you something that none of them appears to have kept in touch, or asked about the birth of the baby. They were all pretty shook up by Jenny's murder and dispersed somewhat anyway. Two of them moved to New York, Pieszecki confessed, falsely, we believe, and went to jail. McCutcheon went off the deep end into booze and drugs for a couple months, that's how she mourns, before she got her shit back together and managed to get back on track. Helena Peabody was filthy rich and had two kids in Europe she went off to visit. That left just Kit Porter, who was the owner of the place they all hung out, and she's still there."

"So what happened to Sweeney before she moved to Bakersfield, do you know?"

"We've learned she went to a woman's shelter in San Francisco, and they helped get her through the pregnancy and delivery. The baby had health issues right from the start, and the suspicion is being on testosterone may have been the cause. There's not much in the medical literature on it, but what little there is says testosterone treatment in transgenders might cause birth defects. Medically, the cause doesn't matter, but psychologically it might have had an effect on Max, we don't know. What the record shows is he turned the baby over to the city which put it in foster care, and four months later it died of SIDS, that sudden infant death syndrome when it just stops breathing. The record is sketchy for a while, but it appears Max was living in a shelter, and had a couple of arrests for drunk and disorderly, getting into fights in bars, and they finally kicked her out of the shelter. The next two months go dark, and then she turns up relatively clean and sober in Bakersfield and gets the job at the computer repair shop. Somewhere along the line she finally got the top surgery, but we don't know where or when, or how she paid for it."

"Think that's important or relevant?"

Carmen shrugged. "We have no idea. What I really want to know is how she paid for it."

"Why?"

Carmen shrugged. "Just a feeling. Max never had any money, other than his salary, and my guess is working in a mom-and-op computer repair place isn't the same as some high-tech Silicon Valley job. I think what I'm most worried about is this: Did Max sell the baby? I guess he could sell a kidney or something, but let's look at what we know. Max was pregnant, wanted or needed money, didn't want the baby, the father really, really didn't want the baby. We know in hindsight he wanted the top surgery, because he went and had it done. Here's what I wonder: What would you do if you bought a black market baby and then you discovered it had birth defects and after a few months it dies of SIDS? Notwithstanding the grieving, do you want to get your money back? Are you really pissed, or just grieving? Do you feel cheated, or lied to? Suppose during the adoption process you discover the birth mother never mentioned testosterone treatments or anything else? The adopting parents may never have met Max, they may have had no truthful information beforehand. Maybe they were told the mother was in great health and blah blah, and so was the baby. Then after the baby dies they somehow find out the truth. Maybe from the baby's autopsy."

"You're saying these are motives for murder," Collins said.

"I'm just thinking out loud," Carmen said.

"Yeah, but you're really good at it," Lauren said. "Unfortunately."

"Why unfortunately?"

"Because now we have more suspects we have to track down. One is Tom, the pissed-off ex. And then, as you said, there's the whole baby thing. And in a way, it only helps us for fifty percent of the two murders. This line of questioning may advance solving Max's murder, but it does nothing for Schecter, and it means we have two different killers, not the same killer for both."

Carmen couldn't help it; she broke into a giant yawn that she covered with both hands. "Sorry, but I am physically, mentally and gastronomically exhausted. Can we pick up tomorrow? Lauren, where are we bunking down for the night?"

"You can probably get rooms here at the Padre," Collins said, "but if you're on the city dime we've got all the usual chains, Days Inn, Motel 6, Red Roof, and some decent mom-and-pops I can recommend."

Lauren looked at Carmen.

"It's up to you, boss lady," Carmen said, "but as far as I'm concerned the shortest distance between two points is from here to the front desk to upstairs. With any luck, I can be in bed and sound asleep in ten minutes."

"Sounds like a plan," Lauren said.

They settled up the bill with the waiter and Collins came with them to the front desk to make sure there were two vacancies that included the Kern County Sheriff's Department courtesy discounts. While they waited they agreed they had covered everything they needed to, and Lauren thanked Collins for his time and the copies. They agreed to keep in touch. Then he said goodnight and walked the few blocks to his car. Carmen and Lauren got their overnight bags from Lauren's car and went back to the hotel lobby and went up to their rooms.

Neither one said anything, but they both knew they were thinking the same thoughts. Instead of two rooms we could use just one. Instead of single beds, one nice, big comfortable double bed might be nice ... except we need the proper paperwork for the expense forms and reporting. So two rooms, no matter who sleeps where. I wish I weren't so fucking tired, Carmen thought. I wish I weren't so fucking tired, Lauren thought.

Should I make a move? How would she react? Is this even a good idea? There's no question I'm attracted. She's been giving me the right signals. I wonder if ... you know ... if she's good in bed. If we did ... I need a shower first. I'm just so fucking tired, and the wine didn't help. I bet Shane thinks I'm going to fuck Lauren. I bet McCutcheon thinks I'm going to fuck Carmen. I wonder if Collins has enough gaydar to know we're lesbians? Probably not. This is a terrible idea, us sleeping together, right in the middle of an investigation of two murders. If anybody found out we'd be in deep shit. This investigation, it's serious business. Let's not fuck it up with sex. I bet she's a good kisser. I wonder if she gives good head. I could really use a couple of good orgasms. It's been a while.

They got off the elevator. "Seven o'clock tomorrow morning?" Lauren asked.

"Ohhhhh," Carmen moaned.

"Okay, eight o'clock," Lauren laughed. They opened the doors to their rooms.

"Good night," Lauren said.

"Good night," Carmen said.

Twenty minutes later there was a quiet knock on the door.