4th of July

by James Patterson

  I felt eyes tracking me as I walked the narrow aisles lined with videos. I was the only female wandering loose in the place, and I guess I stood out more in my slacks and blazer than if I’d been stark naked.

  I was about to approach the clerk in front when I felt a dark presence at my elbow.

  “Lindsay?”

  I started—but Dennis Agnew looked thrilled to see me.

  “To what do I owe the honor, Lieutenant?”

  I was caught in a maze of stacks and racks of chicks-and-dicks, but like a steer in the chute of a slaughterhouse, I could see that the only way out was straight ahead.

  Agnew’s office was a brightly lit, windowless cubicle. He took the chair behind a wood-grain Formica desk and indicated where I should sit—a black leather sofa that had seen better days.

  “I’ll stand. This isn’t going to take long,” I said, but as I stood there in the doorway, I had to look around the room.

  Every wall was hung with framed photos signed to “Randy Long” from G-stringed lovelies, porn film publicity stills of overheated couplings featuring Randy Long and his partners. I also saw a few flashbulb snapshots of Agnew posing with grinning guys in suits.

  Bells started clanging as I matched the mugs of young up-and-coming wiseguys to the mobsters they’d later become. At least two of the suits were now dead.

  It took me another couple of seconds to realize that Dennis Agnew and the younger, long-haired Randy Long in the photos were one and the same. Agnew had been a freaking porn star.

  Chapter 67

  “SO, LIEUTENANT, WHAT CAN I do you for?” Dennis Agnew said, smiling, making neat stacks of his papers, corraling a loose pile of cock rings, pouring them like coins from one hand to another, then onto the desktop.

  “I don’t know what you’re trying to pull,” I said, “but where I come from, running a car off the road is a crime.”

  “Seriously, Lindsay. You don’t mind if I call you Lindsay?” Agnew folded his hands and gave me one of his bleached-beyond-white smiles. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “That’s crap. Twenty minutes ago you ran me off the road. People could’ve been killed. I could’ve been killed.”

  “Oh. No. Couldn’t have been me,” Agnew said, furrowing his brow and shaking his head. “I think I would’ve noticed that. No, I think you’ve come here because you want to see me.”

  It was infuriating. Not just that Agnew was a creep with a fast car who didn’t give a shit, but his mocking attitude really fried me.

  “See these girls?” he said, hooking a thumb toward his “wall of fame.” “You know why they do these flicks? Their self-esteem is so low they think by debasing themselves with men, they’ll actually feel more powerful. Isn’t that ridiculous? And look at you. Debasing yourself by coming here. Does it make you feel powerful?”

  I was choking on this load of crap, sputtering, “You arrogant horse’s ass,” when I heard a voice saying, “Whoa. Please tell me you’re applying for a job here.”

  A small man with a cheap green jacket buttoned over his beer belly appeared in the office doorway. He leaned against the doorjamb, an arm’s length from where I stood, running his eyes over me. It was a look that just about skeeved me out of my skin.

  “Rick Monte, this is Lieutenant Lindsay Boxer. She’s a homicide cop from San Francisco,” Agnew said. “She’s on vacation—or so she says.”

  “Enjoying your time off, Lieutenant?” Rick asked my bustline.

  “I’m loving it, but I could make this an official visit at any time.”

  As soon as I said those words, I felt a jolt straight to the heart.

  What was I doing?

  I was on restricted duty and out of my jurisdiction. I’d chased a citizen in my own car. I had no backup, and if either of these jerk-offs phoned in a complaint, I’d be up on disciplinary action.

  It was the last thing I needed before my trial.

  “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were upset,” Dennis said in his oily voice. “I haven’t done anything to harm you, you know.”

  “Next time you see me,” I said through clenched teeth, “turn and walk the other way.”

  “Oh. Pardon me. I must have it wrong. I thought it was you who followed me.”

  I was hot to fire off a comeback, but this time I stifled it. He was right. He hadn’t actually done anything to me. He hadn’t even called me a name.

  I left Agnew’s office, kicking myself for showing up on this lowlife’s turf.

  I had pointed my nose toward the front of the shop, intent on putting this horrid little scene behind me, when my way was blocked by a brawny young guy with blond streaks in his mullet and tattooed flames shooting out of his T-shirt collar.

  “Out of my way, hot stuff,” I said, trying to squeeze past him.

  The guy held out his arms while standing like a boulder in the middle of the store. He smiled, daring me.

  “Come on, mama. Come to Rocco,” he said.

  “It’s all right, Rocco,” Agnew said. “This lady is my guest. I’ll walk you out, Lindsay.”

  I reached for the door, but Agnew leaned against it, boxing me in. He was so close all I could see was his face: every pore, every capillary in his bloodshot eyes. He pressed a videocassette into my hands.

  The cover advertised Randy Long’s epic performance in A Long Hard Night.

  “Take a look when you have a chance. I put my phone number on the back.”

  I pushed away from Agnew and the video clattered to the floor.

  “Move it,” I said.

  He stepped back, just clearing the door enough so that I could open it. Agnew had a grin on his face and his hand on his crotch as I left.

  Chapter 68

  I WOKE UP THE next morning thinking about Dennis Agnew, that slime. I took my coffee out to the porch and before it had cooled enough to drink, I was taking my agitation out on a rattle in the Bonneville’s engine.

  I had a feeler gauge in hand and was fiddling with the valves when a car rolled up and parked in the driveway.

  Doors slammed.

  “Lindsay? Helllooo.”

  “I think she’s been swallowed by that big gold boat.”

  I ducked out from under the hood, wiped my greasy hands on a chamois, and reached out my arms to Cindy and Claire, grabbing them both in one giant hug. We squealed and jumped around, and Martha, who’d been sleeping on the porch, joined in.

  “We were in the neighborhood,” said Claire when we broke from our clinch. “Thought we’d stop by and see how much trouble you’ve gotten into. So what’s this, Lindsay? I thought all these gas gluttons had been crushed and outlawed.”

  “Don’t be talking bad about my baby,” I said with a laugh.

  “It runs?”

  “No, sirree, Butterfly. She flies.”

  The girls handed me a beribboned spa basket from Nordstrom’s full of great mood-altering bath and body stuff, and after a unanimous show of hands, we piled into the Bonneville for a ride.

  I buzzed down the electric windows, and as the car’s big whitewalls softened the road, the zephyr coming off the bay mussed and tousled our hair. We rounded the loops of Cat’s neighborhood and were headed up the mountain when Claire showed me an envelope.

  “Almost forgot. Jacobi sent this.”

  I glanced at the eight-by-eleven-inch manila envelope in her hand. The night before, I’d called Jacobi and asked him to get me anything he could find on Dennis Agnew, aka Randy Long.

  I filled Cindy and Claire in on my first accidental meeting with Agnew at the Cormorant bar, the set-to at Keith’s garage, and the near-rear-ender. Then I described my skeevy tour of the Playmate Pen in minute detail.

  “He said that to you?” Cindy exclaimed after I quoted Agnew on “women debase themselves with men so they can feel powerful.” Her cheeks pinked; she was pissed off right up to her eyelashes. “Now, there’s someone who should be crushed and outlawed.”

  I laughed and told her, “Ag
new had this wall of fame, like something you’d see in Tony’s office in the Bada Bing. All these signed photos from porn queens and wiseguys. Unreal. Claire, will you open that, please?”

  Claire took three pages from the envelope. They were stapled together and annotated with a Post-it note from Jacobi.

  “Read it out loud, if you don’t mind,” Cindy said, leaning over the back of the front seat.

  “There’s some minor league stuff: DWI, assault, domestic violence, a drug bust and some time at Folsom. But here ya go, Linds. Says he was charged with first-degree murder five years ago. Case dismissed.”

  I reached over and peeled off Jacobi’s handwritten note: “The vic was Agnew’s girlfriend. His lawyer was Ralph Brancusi.”

  I didn’t have to say more. We all knew Brancusi was a high-profile defense attorney. Only the wealthy could afford him.

  Brancusi was also the lawyer of choice for the mob.

  Chapter 69

  WHEN WE GOT BACK to Cat’s house, there was a patrol car in the driveway, and Chief Stark was walking toward us. He looked as grim as ever, brow scrunched up, with a haunted look in his eyes that was actually contagious.

  “What is it, Chief? What’s happened now?”

  “The ME’s starting the posts on the Sarduccis,” he said, squinting into the sun. “This is your formal invitation.”

  I felt a surge of excitement that I masked out of consideration for the chief. I introduced Cindy and Claire.

  “Dr. Washburn is the CME in San Francisco,” I said. “Okay for her to come along?”

  “Sure, why not?” the chief grunted. “Take all the help I can get. I’m learning, right?”

  Cindy looked at the three of us and saw that she wasn’t being included in the invitation. Hell, she was the press.

  “I get it,” she said good-naturedly. “Look, I’ll hang out here, no problem. I’ve got my laptop and a deadline. Plus, I’m a leper.”

  Claire and I got back into the Bonneville and followed the chief’s car out to the highway.

  “This is great,” I said, my enthusiasm brimming over. “He’s letting me into the case.”

  “What am I doing?” Claire said, shaking her head. “Aiding and abetting your completely ill-advised involvement when we both know you should be out on the porch with a gin and tonic, your butt in a chair and your legs over the railing.”

  I laughed. “Admit it,” I said. “You’re hooked, too. You can’t turn away from this thing, either.”

  “You’re nuts,” she grumbled. Then she looked over at me. My grin set hers off.

  “You kill me, Lindsay. You really do. But it’s your ass, baby.”

  Ten minutes later, we followed Stark’s car off the highway into Moss Beach.

  Chapter 70

  THE MORGUE WAS IN the basement of the Seton Medical Center. It was a white-tiled room smelling as pristine and fresh as the frozen-food section in a supermarket. A cooler hummed gently in the background.

  I nodded at two evidence techies who were grousing about some bureaucratic scheduling screwup as they folded the victims’ garments into brown paper bags.

  I was drawn to the autopsy tables in the middle of the room, where the ME’s young assistant was running a sponge and hose over the Sarduccis’ bodies. He turned off the water and stepped aside as I approached.

  Joseph and Annemarie lay naked and exposed under the bright lights. Their glistening bodies were unmarked except for ugly slash wounds across their necks, their faces as unlined in death as those of children.

  Claire called my name, breaking my silent communion with the dead.

  I turned and she introduced me to a man in blue scrubs and a plastic apron, with a net over his gray hair. He had a slight, stooped build and a lopsided smile, as if he had Bell’s palsy or had suffered a stroke.

  “Lindsay, this is Dr. Bill Ramos, forensic pathologist. Bill, this is Lieutenant Lindsay Boxer, Homicide, from SFPD. There may be a link between these murders and a cold case of hers.”

  I was shaking Ramos’s hand when Chief Stark came over.

  “Doc, tell her what you told me on the phone.”

  Ramos said, “Why don’t I show you?”

  He spoke to his assistant: “Hey, Samir, I want to take a look at the female’s back, so give me a half turn. Let’s put her on the side.”

  Samir crossed Annemarie’s ankles left over right, and the doctor reached over and took her left wrist. Then the two of them pulled the corpse so that it rested on one side.

  I peered at seven yellowish marks crossing over one another on the dead woman’s buttocks, each about three-quarters of an inch in width, approximately three inches long.

  “Tremendous force in these blows,” said Ramos. “Still, you can barely make them out. Samir, let’s turn Mr. Sarducci now.”

  The doctor and his assistant pulled the male onto his side, his head lolling back pathetically as they did so.

  “Now, see,” the doctor said, “here it is again. Multiple faint rectangular patterns, pressure-type abrasions. They aren’t the red brown color you’d see if the section had been struck while he was still alive, and they’re not the yellow parchmentlike abrasions you’d get if the blows were administered postmortem.”

  The doctor looked up to make sure I understood.

  “Punch me in the face, then shoot me twice in the chest. There won’t be enough blood pressure for me to get a rip-roaring bruise on my face, but there’ll be something there if my heart pumps for a moment.”

  The doctor took a scalpel to one of the marks on the male’s back, cutting through unmarked tissue and the pale strap mark. “You can see this light brownish color under the abrasions, what’s called a ‘well-circumscribed focal accumulation of blood.’

  “In plain English,” Ramos continued, “and wouldn’t you agree, Dr. Washburn? The deep slash across the carotid artery and the vagus nerves stopped the heart almost instantly, but not instantaneously. This man had one last heartbeat when he was whipped.

  “These blows were administered cum-mortem—just before or at the time of death. In the mind of the killer, the victim could still feel the lash.”

  “Looks like it was personal,” said Stark.

  “Oh, yes. I’d say the killers hated their victims.”

  There was a hush in the room as the doctor’s words sank in.

  “The marks on Joe are narrower than the marks on Annemarie,” Claire noted.

  “Yes,” Ramos agreed again. “Different implements.”

  “Like a belt,” I said. “Could these whippings have been made by two different belts?”

  “I can’t say positively, but it’s certainly consistent,” said Ramos.

  Claire looked not only focused but sad. “What are you thinking?” I asked her.

  “I hate to say it, Lindsay, but this really brings me back. The marks look like what I remember seeing on your John Doe.”

  Chapter 71

  IT WAS AFTER MIDNIGHT when the Watcher headed inland from the beach. He climbed the sandy cliff, then stuck to the quarter mile of path that cut through the thistles and thick dune grasses and ran east from the cliffs. The Watcher could finally make out the serpentine bay-side road.

  He was honing in on one particular house when he stumbled over a log in the path. He reached out to break his fall and went down hard, splaying on his belly, hands scraping packed sand and saw grass.

  The Watcher got quickly to his knees, slapping his breast jacket pocket—his camera had flown.

  “Fuck fuck fuck!” he yelled in frustration.

  He crawled on all fours, patting the sand, feeling the sweat on his upper lip dry in the cool air.

  Desperation clutched at him as the minutes leached away. At last, he found his precious camera, so small—lens-down in the sand.

  He blew on the camera to dislodge the grit, pointed it at the houses, and peered into the viewfinder. He saw through a haze of fine scratches across the plastic lens.

  This was bad.

&nb
sp; Cursing under his breath, the Watcher checked the time—12:14 a.m.—and set out toward the house where Lindsay was staying.

  Now that his zoom lens was useless, he would have to get closer, and on foot.

  The Watcher stepped over the guardrail at the end of the field and stood square on the sidewalk with a streetlight blazing down on his head.

  Two houses in from the end of the road, Cat Boxer’s house glowed with lamplight.

  He ducked into shadows and approached the house obliquely by cutting through side yards, crouching at last in the lee of the privet hedge bordering the Boxer living room.

  With heart pounding, he stood and peered through the picture window.

  The gang was all there: Lindsay in her SFPD T-shirt and tights; Claire, the black ME from the city, in a gold caftan; and Cindy, her blond hair bunched on top of her head, a chenille robe covering all but the legs of her pink pajamas and her feet.

  The women were talking intensely, sometimes laughing loudly, then getting serious again. If only he could make out what the hell they were saying.

  The Watcher ran through the facts, recent events, the circumstances. The chair in the kid’s room. It didn’t connect any of them to anything, but it was a mistake that he’d made.

  Was it safe to go forward?

  There was so much more to do.

  The Watcher felt the accumulating effects of stress on his body. His hands were shaking, and his chest burned with acid. He couldn’t stay here any longer, he just could not.

  He looked around, making sure no one was walking a dog or taking out the garbage, then he stepped from behind the hedge and briefly into the streetlight. He jumped the guardrail and started along the darkened path to the beach.

  A decision had to be made about Lindsay Boxer.

  A tough one.

  The woman was a cop.

  Chapter 72

  I WOKE EARLY IN the morning with a thought that surfaced in my mind like a porpoise breaking from beneath the waves.