A Novel Crime: The Prequel for the St. Marin’s Cozy Mystery Series

by ACF Bookens

  A Novel Crime

  The Prequel for the St. Marin’s Cozy Mystery Series

  ACF Bookens

  Copyright © 2019 by ACF Bookens

  All rights reserved.

  * * *

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  * * *

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

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  A preview of Publishable by Death

  Also by ACF Bookens

  About the Author

  1

  It was a normal Thursday evening. I had taken the 1 bus across California Street from SOMA to the Outer Richmond like I did after work as a fundraiser every weekday of every week. I picked up my usual pound of dark roast coffee from Cleon at the coffee roaster and headed home up 25th Avenue.

  The evening seemed pretty normal. Fog was low above the buildings, but it wasn’t misty, drizzly, like it could be some days in August. And tomorrow the weather predicted we might have some of that famous San Francisco summer. I was ready for sun.

  As I walked past the gray house a few doors up from the corner, I glanced into the open garage door to be sure no one was backing out and stopped cold, dropping the bag of coffee beans to the sidewalk. There, right in the middle of the parking space, was the body of a young man surrounded by a pool of blood.

  Something about the decorum of not entering a person’s private space kept me from walking in, but I got out my phone and called 911. Then I waited, as the dispatcher said to do, for the police to arrive.

  Meanwhile, I called Trevor, my husband, who was over in the Castro teaching a painting class. “Trevor, I just found a body. It was awful. I need you to come . . . please.” Even as I left the message, I knew he wouldn’t get it for at least another hour when the class finished, and I couldn’t help but wonder if he would respond at all. We had agreed early on in our three-year marriage that we’d only leave messages if it was urgent, since we were both busy with meetings on and off all day. But sometimes, Trevor didn’t even bother to check his messages if he was prioritizing his four hours of studio time, and he was always prioritizing his studio time.

  Once, I had been stranded in the Tenderloin neighborhood after a concert when the bus to take me home hadn’t shown up and, because it was so late, the next one wasn’t due until three hours later. I’d left Trevor at least a dozen messages as I sat in the wan light of the bus stop and talked with a very nice woman named Bonita who had offered to sit with me until her bus came. Bonita was homeless and clearly had an addiction problem, but she cared more about my safety than my own husband did.

  When I had finally caved, flagged a taxi with a $45 fare that we couldn’t afford, and got to out apartment at 2:30 a.m., Trevor still wasn’t home and didn’t call. When he crawled into bed at 4 a.m., I pretended to be asleep. I was so angry, and I had to be up at 6:30 for work. I couldn’t stomach his excuse, and I knew there’d be an excuse. The next morning, he didn’t even mention my messages.

  So, when I found the body and Trevor actually called me back forty-five minutes later and said, “What are you talking about? You found a body? Where?” I actually felt relief. At least he had called.

  When he pulled up in our shared Honda Accord twenty minutes later and dropped an arm around my shoulder, I looked up into his face with expectation. “So where is it?”

  I walked out from under his weight and pointed to the garage. Then I told the officer waiting nearby that I was ready to answer questions and walked up the block with her. We sat on the stairs to someone’s house, and the female officer said, “I’m Officer Jensen. You okay doing this alone? I mean, we can do this with your husband if you’d like someone with you?”

  “No, it’s fine.” I glanced over to where Trevor was lingering to try and get a look at the body. “Let’s just get it over with.”

  A flash of sympathy passed over the Officer Jensen’s face before she hardened it again and said, “Okay, now tell me just what you saw.”

  I told her about glancing into the garage and seeing the body just like it was. “At first I thought someone had just fallen, but then I saw the blood.” There really wasn’t much else to tell.

  “You don’t know who owns this house?”

  “I don’t. I couldn’t even tell you what kind of car they drive actually, even though I walk up and down this street every day. Too many houses that look alike.”

  The officer glanced up the street at all the mauve, peach, and light green homes and nodded. San Francisco homes styles were pretty uniform by neighborhood, and the Outer Richmond was a little more affluent and, thus, a little more understated than, say, the more vibrant Mission.

  “You didn’t know him?”

  I was trying hard not to picture his face, but there it was–all gray and lifeless, eyes open and staring out at the street. “Nope.” I didn’t know him at all, but something about him felt just a little familiar.

  “Well, I think that’s it,” Officer Jensen said. “I have your number. I expect you’ll be around, right? I mean if we need to talk to you again.”

  I knew the question was more of a command than a question, but nodded anyway. I had no plans to go anywhere soon. “Is it okay if I go on home then?”

  The officer handed me a business card. “I’m Officer—Stephanie. I’m Stephanie. Call me anytime if you need anything.”

  With a weak smile, I took the card, shouldered my messenger bag, and headed the two blocks to home. I glanced back once to see Trevor lingering as they loaded the young man’s body into the coroner’s van.

  * * *

  Once I was home and had fed the cat, I sat on our bed and looked out the window at the Marin Headlands. I took a deep breath and then screamed until I was sobbing into my pillow. Trevor came in a few minutes later and plopped onto the bed beside me. I look a mess when I cry–all red and blotchy–and it takes forever for my face to go back to normal. Still, all Trevor said was, “That was crazy, huh? A dead body, and you found it.”

  I turned toward him and stared at his handsome face–the chiseled jawline, the scar on his left eyebrow. I loved that face.

  Then I said, quietly but clearly, “I want a divorce, and you’re moving out. Tomorrow.”

  His face was completely blank–not shocked, not angry, and especially not sad. Just blank. “What are you talking about?”

  “Tomorrow, Trevor. I suggest you start packing.”

  It could have gone worse. I guess he could have yelled or refused. Instead, he simply loaded a duffle with his clothes, grabbed his easel and paints, and headed toward the door. No goodbye to the cat. No goodbye to me. No awkward last night in the same bed.

  I thought I maybe should be a little grateful, but mostly I was just very, very sad.

  2

  Still, the next morning I felt lighter. All my expectations were gone. For too long, I’d wanted Trevor to care for me, to put me first. But he wasn’t able to do that. . . and now I didn’t have to try to make him.

  Instead, I could spend my energy t
rying to find out what I could about that young man’s murder. It felt like a harmless and engrossing way to spend my time instead of scrolling Instagram or pondering what it would be like to go home to an empty house.

  Work was light at this time of year– people don’t give much during the summer; too many vacations to fund– and a distraction was just what I needed. I felt a little guilty using someone’s death as a coping mechanism, but I hadn’t killed him after all . . . and maybe I could even do a little bit of good.

  * * *

  As soon as I got to my cubicle, I logged into my computer and searched for news reports. In a city as big as San Francisco, murders rarely made the front page unless someone high-profile had been killed. Still, I expected I could find something. And I did, there on the bottom of page seven of The Chronicle:

  Man found dead in the Outer Richmond.. The San Francisco Police Department is investigating the death of a young man from an apparent knife wound on Thursday, August 8.

  The victim has been identified as Juan Ortega Montague, 25, of Lake Street.

  According to a news release from SFPD, authorities received a call shortly after 5pm reporting a body in a 25th Avenue home garage. When deputies arrived, they found Montague dead from a knife wound to his lower chest.

  The investigation is ongoing, and no further information will be released at this time.

  I let out a long sigh of relief. I hadn’t realized I was worried, but when I saw they didn’t name me, I was glad. Too many TV shows made me afraid I might be a target if someone thought I knew something I shouldn’t. I didn’t know anything about the murder of course. I had only come upon it after the fact. The murderer didn’t necessarily know that, though.

  But something was niggling at the edge of my mind, something familiar that I couldn’t quite place. Montague was my neighbor on Lake Street, but that wasn’t it. He wasn’t someone I knew from the neighborhood. I didn’t even know most of the people in our—my—building, much less the people on the streets around my apartment.

  I stared out the sliver of window I could see from my desk and watched the barges move in and out of the Bay, hoping I’d figure out what was bugging me. But when nothing became clearer, I gave up and opened my email.

  After a few hours of being lost in work–mostly sending emails trying to get companies to let me come in and ask their employees for money to support the work of the almost one hundred nonprofits our organization supported–-I turned back to the murder, satisfied I’d done enough for a Friday. I googled “Juan Ortega Montague” and immediately got a long string of hits, and the first one–a link to the SF Gate Social Scene page–had an image of Montague in a very nice suit at the gala for the SF MOMA just the week before. He had a sparkling smile, and his hair was cut tight to his head with just a little flare in a series of thin lines shaved diagonally to match his jawline. He was handsome, no doubt, and from the number of photos I saw of him online, he was pretty famous.

  I leaned back in my chair and wondered if maybe I had seen him before, if this is what was still noodling around in the back of my mind waiting to be hooked. But I still didn’t think so. Except for the occasional black-tie event for work, which I avoided if at all possible and left as soon as professional decorum allowed, I didn’t hobnob with San Francisco’s elite very much. I was more of a books and TV kind of person, although I did love a walk through SeaCliff, San Francisco’s wealthiest neighborhood, in the very early morning. Even there, though, I was mostly enjoying the view of the Pacific and stealing sprigs of rosemary from the giant bushes outside the mansions. At home in Maryland, that much rosemary would cost a fortunate.

  Maybe, though, Montague lived in Seacliff? Could that be it?

  * * *

  When lunchtime finally arrived, I grabbed my usual chicken caesar wrap from the market in the first floor of my office building and headed to the Embarcadero for a walk to watch the tourists. This side of the city wasn’t my favorite – too many visitors, too much busyness – but I did appreciate the enthusiasm of the panhandler who hid behind a makeshift shrub and jumped out at unsuspecting out-of-towners. His antics were always good for a smile, as were the ridiculous notions people had about the sea lions on the docks by Pier 39. “Where do you think they sleep at night?” and “Someone needs to be sure these sea lions are taken care of. Who feeds them? Doesn’t PETA have a chapter here?” were two of my favorites. I felt a lot of camaraderie with those not-so-sweet lugs of animals who had displaced the yachts that had once been moored here. They felt like a little bit of resistance against the ridiculous wealth of the “City by the Bay.” Sometimes I thought about squatting on the pier myself. It had to be cheaper than the $3,200 Trevor and I paid for our one-bedroom closet.

  Trevor. There he was again. I knew it was normal to keep thinking about him– he was my husband after all, and I had dedicated most of my time and energy to his passions. His art was the reason we were out here. He liked the “scene”, as he called it, better than the one in Baltimore, where we’d met, and since I could do fundraising almost anywhere, I moved with him, thinking I’d eventually find my own way. But I hadn’t. Instead, I’d let myself get sucked into his world completely. . . going to his shows and his students’ shows almost every week, giving up weekend day trips because he had his four hours of studio time to get in every single day.

  The only thing I’d managed to do for myself in the four years we’d been on the West Coast was to train for a marathon. I was not a runner by any standard of the imagination . . . mostly, I was a walker, a stroller really. Speed was not my forte. But when the San Francisco AIDS Foundation advertised that they were looking for people to train for a marathon as a fundraiser for the foundation, I couldn’t resist. I loved a good cause, and I knew I could raise the money. Plus, the race was in New Orleans, and I’d always wanted to see that city.

  Each Saturday, I had headed to Golden Gate Park in my wildly expensive running shoes and run for two minutes, then walked for three, along with my training group. I’d done really well, making it all the way up to the 17-mile run. But that one proved too much for me, and I really injured my hip–maybe dislocated it a bit, one of the trainers had said—when I stubbornly completed the miles and hobbled back to the snack tables at the start-finish line in the park.

  The trainer had ordered me right to the ocean to cool down and ice my hip, and I had groaned. It was another 500 feet to the water’s edge, but the firm look at the trainer’s face pushed me on. And it felt amazing– shockingly cold, but amazing.

  When Trevor had arrived a few minutes later to pick me up, the trainer had explained what had happened to my hip and said, “Your wife needs pampering for the next two days. She needs be lying down and resting.” I had hoped that the trainer’s firm gaze would get through to my husband, too.

  But that evening, after handing me an ice pack and the remote, he said, “Text me if you need me” and headed out for a show over in the Mission. I had limped to the kitchen for my stash of cheese doodles and drowned my sorrows in powdered cheese, my box set of every season of The Gilmore Girls, and snuggles with my cat, Aslan.

  Now, looking out over the Bay, I felt that tickle of familiarity rise up as I thought about those days of training in the park and, with a jolt, I realized what had been bugging me. Montague had been one of the trainers, not for my group, but for one of the faster ones. I hadn’t seen him often, but I had seen him.

  I hurried back to the office, eager to contact the training team and see if anyone could help my find out more. My hip only hurt a little as I made my way.

  After I shot my former coach, David Sheridan, a quick note to ask if I could stop by training tomorrow, I found myself buried in responses to my earlier queries about fundraising. Something about Friday always made folks feel like they needed to tidy things up. . . and I was no different. By the time I had sent my last reply, it was 4:30 and time to go. One of the perks about the West Coast culture – more casual but also quicker than the East Coast souther
n one I grew up with on the eastern shore of Maryland – was that everyone – even the bosses – left early on Friday afternoon. I didn’t complain. . . or at least not usually. Today, though, that empty apartment was waiting.

  On a whim, I texted my best friend Martha and asked if she wanted to meet at Mel’s Diner over on Gough in an hour for burgers and milkshakes. Mart was never one to turn down a good diner meal and agreed immediately. I hadn’t told Mart about Trevor yet, partially because I knew what my wise, single, attitude-full friend would say: “About time!” I knew she was right, but last night I hadn’t really been ready to hear that. I felt foolish enough all on my own.

  Mart and I been friends since college, and I could still remember the first time we’d gotten ice cream together on one of those get-to-know-you trips the resident assistant had organized. Mart had organized butter pecan ice cream, and I had said, “It’s PE – CAN, not PE – CON.”

  Mart had quipped back, “I do not pee in a can, thank you very much,” and we’d been friends ever since.

  At the diner in the corner booth, I told Mart all about finding Montague’s body and about how I knew Montague from marathon training.

  “Woman, that’s a lot. You okay?” Mart was that friend everyone wanted – the one with the clear focus on what was most important. For Mart, that was always the people she loved.

  I looked at my friend, shoved a fry into my mouth and said, “Well, that’s not all.”

  Mart stuck the straw in her mouth and took a long drag off her root beer while raising one eyebrow.