by Janet Dawson
I frowned. “How did you know it was me?”
“That’s the interesting part,” Sid said, one corner of his mouth twitching under his mustache. “Whoever called nine- one-one to report this little incident mentioned you by name. Have you got a guardian angel, Jeri?”
No, I thought, a watcher. I looked up at the windows around me and saw eyes. Eyes on my back, eyes that didn’t want me out of commission. Which meant that whoever was watching wanted something from me.
“Your mouth’s bleeding.” Sid pulled out a handkerchief. I took it from him and touched it to the corner of my mouth. “What happened?”
“A couple of would-be muggers. I gave the officers a statement.” I nodded in Conwell’s direction. He and Sid traded looks, then he and the other officer moved off to take a statement from the café owner who had come to my aid.
Sid narrowed his eyes and stared hard at me. “Don’t bullshit me, Jeri. Those goons weren’t after your purse. They were after you.”
“Maybe.”
“There’s no maybe about it,” he said. “This has something to do with Foster’s missing wife, doesn’t it? I looked up the Willis murder case after you called me the other day. The oldest girl — Elizabeth — she’d be the same age as Foster’s wife. Is Mrs. Foster Elizabeth Willis?”
I looked down at the spot of blood on the white handkerchief. “I don’t have to tell you anything. Client confidentiality, remember?”
“You and your damned cases. I’m sorry I ever gave Foster your number.”
“Why did you, Sid?” I crossed my arms over my aching stomach.
“I told you before. It was spur-of-the-moment. I was in the office when Missing Persons called Homicide to see if we had any Jane Does matching Mrs. Foster’s description. Foster said something about hiring a private investigator. I gave him your name.”
“And you had a good laugh about it later,” I said, “because you don’t think I can find Renee Foster.”
“Is that the only reason you’re doing this? To show me?” His mouth quirked. “I didn’t know my opinion mattered anymore.”
“Oh, come on, Sid. You threw down the gauntlet. You issued a challenge. I merely accepted your invitation to play the game.”
“Getting worked over by a couple of assholes isn’t a game. You got off easy. Last time they put you in the hospital.”
“I can take care of myself,” I said grimly. It was the second time in a week someone had reminded me of what happened in the parking lot on San Pablo Avenue. First my father, now Sid.
“It’s different now than when you were working for Errol. You were part of a team. You had someone to call on for backup. Now you’re a woman working alone.”
“And being a detective is a man’s job, right?”
“A few years ago it was.” Sid punctuated his words with a gesture. “I know you’re an experienced investigator. I’m just telling you there’s a reason cops work in pairs. It’s so we can cover each other’s butts. You’re working alone. Your butt isn’t covered.”
“I take it this means you’re concerned about me.”
He moved toward me. His hand reached out and touched my hair. “Did it ever occur to you I might care what happens to you?”
He looked at me the way he used to, his eyes searing my skin in the cold night air. At one time I would have felt a responding heat, but I didn’t anymore. At least I told myself I didn’t. There was too much water under that particular bridge. That tingle was just my body playing tricks. And the look in Sid’s eyes was that of a cat mesmerizing a bird. He inclined his face toward mine. I looked away before I could get caught.
“That doesn’t work anymore, Sid.” I walked away from him, toward the officers and the café owner.
“The hell it doesn’t.” The sly cat smile played over his face, then went away again. He sighed. “I do care about you. In spite of everything.”
“‘Care’ covers a lot of territory. I care about you, Sid, but not the way I did.”
“My loss.” He looked at me for a long moment. “Let’s get back to the original subject.”
“There’s nothing to discuss.”
“Yes, there is. Who sent the goons?”
“I have theories, Sid, but no facts. It could be one of my current cases, or something I worked on during the past year. I haven’t lacked for business.”
“I know. I salute your success.” The light tone of his voice didn’t match the look in his eyes. “You’ve proved that you can get along very well without me.”
“That isn’t the point, Sid. Our marriage didn’t work out. I can admit it even if you can’t. Are we finished here?”
“You’ll have to check with Officer Conwell. Look, Jeri, I can tell you’re hurting,” he said. “Will you at least go to the hospital?”
“I’ll be okay.” I folded the soiled handkerchief into a square. “I’ll wash this and get it back to you.”
The officers had finished taking notes. I thanked the café owner for his help. He bowed slightly and went back across the street, where his wife waited in the door of the restaurant.
Sid followed me as I walked slowly to my car. I unlocked the door and slid carefully into the driver’s seat. When I reached for the shoulder harness, I couldn’t quite make the stretch. Sid shook his head but he didn’t say anything. Instead he pulled the belt down, leaned over, and fastened it for me.
I started the car and drove out of the parking lot, using a circuitous route that took me all over downtown and North Oakland. When I was certain I wasn’t being followed, I drove home.
Abigail, wanting to be fed, meowed at me as I came in the door, but I headed for the bathroom first. I leaned over the sink and washed the cut at the corner of my mouth, then dabbed it with some iodine from the medicine cabinet. Then I swallowed some Tylenol.
In the bedroom I shed my clothes, looking at my body in the mirror above my dresser. My wrists looked chafed where the big man had held me. My stomach and abdomen glowed red, no bruises showing yet. I’d look worse in the morning.
I pulled on a robe and went to the kitchen, Abigail at my heels. I fed her, then I filled a plastic bag with ice, wrapped the bag in a dish towel, and carried it into the living room. I lay down on the sofa and pressed the ice to my stomach, feeling the chill numb the ache.
It hurt, but it wasn’t as bad as the beating I’d taken two years ago. I stared at the ceiling and saw that parking lot behind a bar on San Pablo Avenue and the two men who methodically worked me over.
I moved the ice pack and took a deep breath, probing my abdomen with my fingers. The time before, that deep breath brought a sharp stabbing pain from two broken ribs. I remembered how it felt to lie on a gurney with paramedics asking for my name and address while they poked and probed and took my vital signs. And the hospital emergency room where strange hands removed my clothing and held out a clipboard and pen so I could sign myself in as a patient.
I sighed and hugged the ice pack to me. It could have been a lot worse, but it was meant as a warning. Drop the case, Little had said.
The Foster case. In addition to pissing off Admiral Franklin last week, and Karen Willis and her boyfriend this afternoon, I had also managed to antagonize everyone in the Foster family except the baby. I sorted through the possibilities. Philip could barely function. Although his mother had looked as though she wanted to bounce me like a tennis ball, I doubted she’d send a couple of apes to do it for her.
That left Edward. After looking into Edward’s hard brown eyes I figured he was capable of anything. Even so, he must know that I’d consider him the likeliest author of tonight’s revels.
I went back over the past few days and recalled the sensation I’d felt that night on the steps outside Lawrence Kinney’s office, the feeling that I was being watched. An hour later someone had tried to break into my office. That first time I went to Karen’s apartment I’d experienced the same feeling. And there was the blue car that seemed to follow me as I drove through Berkeley. Ha
d Edward been trying to scare me off?
I lay on the sofa and thought about various ways to get even with Edward Foster, until the ice in the bag melted and I felt cold water seep through the towel and my robe, chilling my flesh. I got up, moving carefully, and dumped the remains of the ice pack in the kitchen sink. Then I went to bed, where I dreamed I was being chased through an endless dark parking lot, pursued by black and white snowmen.
Nineteen
WHEN I WOKE UP THE NEXT MORNING, I FELT LIKE a herd of elephants had been tap dancing on my entire body. I groped my way to the bathroom, swallowed a couple of Tylenol, and went back to bed. The phone on the nightstand rang and rang, but I burrowed my head under the pillow and went back to sleep.
When I woke up a second time Abigail had curled up on the pillow, between my ear and my shoulder, so close that every time I turned my head I came up against a wall of cat. I looked at the clock and saw that it was midmorning. Finally I threw back the covers and stood, my body screeching in protest as I pulled my nightshirt over my head.
I was downright colorful, with an ugly purple patch below my breasts. I ran a finger along the scratch at my mouth, then twisted my torso from one side to the other, feeling like a rusty hinge. Pulling on a robe, I went to the kitchen to feed Abigail, who had been more than patient under the circumstances. I showered, standing under the stream of hot water, letting it loosen my aching muscles. The phone rang several times again while I dressed. I ignored it, lingering at the table as I read the morning newspaper, drank coffee, and ate a bowl of Cheerios.
It was past noon when I left for the office. Outside the sky was gray, matching my mood. The weather guesser on my car radio said a front was moving in from the Pacific, due to hit us this afternoon or evening. The red light on my office answering machine blinked furiously. I made a pot of coffee before sitting down to play back the tape.
Sid had called four times. With each call his voice sounded progressively more irate because I hadn’t returned his previous calls or answered the phone at home. Interspersed with Sid’s calls were two calls from Cassie, three from other clients, and seven hang-ups. And there was one abrupt message from Karen Willis.
“I’m sorry about yesterday,” she said after identifying herself. “I have to talk to you. I’ll call back.”
I rewound the tape and listened to it again. There was some background noise that sounded like the diesel roar of a bus. Had Karen made the call from a phone booth, or while standing near an open window? There was no way to tell. She could have been anywhere.
I called Cassie to let her know I was in, then I got up to pour myself a cup of coffee. When I settled back into my chair the door opened and Sandra Baines walked into my office, an unbuttoned gray raincoat over tweed slacks and a white sweater. She tossed a small manila envelope onto my desk.
I picked it up and opened the flap. The envelope contained photographs, half-a-dozen Polaroid shots, all of them showing the same tow-headed little boy I’d seen yesterday at the home of Edward and Helen Foster. He was wearing blue shorts decorated with yellow ducks. The maid held him up to the camera, her dark skin contrasting with his soft white baby flesh. He had a bruise on his back, a dirty yellow blotch the size of a fist.
I spread the photographs out on the surface of my desk, side by side. Then I leaned back in my chair and looked at Sandra Baines.
“That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?” She sat down and crossed one leg over the other. “Proof.”
“Is it? Proof?”
“Call Helen’s doctor in Los Gatos. His name’s Graffinger.”
“All this proves is that he had a bruise, an old one at that. There’s nothing in these pictures to indicate when they were taken. Or what really happened. Maybe he fell, or ran into some furniture. If somebody hit him, it could just as easily have been Helen. Or Philip.”
She laughed and pulled her cigarettes and lighter from her purse. She lit a filter tip and looked around for an ashtray. I took one from my desk drawer and passed it across the desk.
“Helen adores that little boy,” she said. “So does Edward, in his way. Philip certainly wouldn’t do anything like that.”
“That’s what Elizabeth’s aunt says about her. Besides, the nicest people abuse their kids. Which brings me back to the question I asked yesterday. If someone’s been hitting this kid, why didn’t anybody notice it until now?”
“I don’t know. Does it really matter?”
“Yes, particularly if all of you are lying about Elizabeth. Why are you doing this, Sandra?”
She took a few puffs of her cigarette. “I told you. I want Philip. I’ll get him, too.”
“Just one little problem. He already has a wife.”
“Had. She left him. She’s a child beater. A few weeks in Reno will wipe the slate clean.”
“There may be a little chalk dust left on the board. What happens if she shows up again?”
“She won’t. I told you. She ran off with her lover.”
“I checked him out. He doesn’t know where she is.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Sandra said, supremely confident. “It’s too late for Renee. She dug her own grave. I’m merely taking advantage of the situation.”
She took a final puff on her cigarette and ground it out in my ashtray. Then she stood up to leave.
“Philip still loves her,” I said.
“Maybe he does now. But I can take care of that.”
I was sure she could. Philip was used to being manipulated. One more person pulling the strings wasn’t likely to bother the puppet.
After Sandra left, I stacked the photographs into a pile and looked at them again. I didn’t like what I saw. The pictures were disturbing, particularly when I considered that Elizabeth may have been abused herself. I put the photographs into the envelope and stashed it in my desk drawer. The phone rang and I picked it up.
“Howard, this is Gerrity. How goes the Foster case?”
“It doesn’t. What can I do for you?”
“It’s what I can do for you,” he said. “Helen Foster’s doctor is a guy named Arnold Graffinger, in Los Gatos. He probably won’t talk to you. I took a pass through Philip Foster’s neighborhood this morning. One of Renee’s neighbors told me she saw Renee smack the boy on several occasions.”
“Thanks, Gerrity,” I said, eyeing the photographs Sandra Baines had delivered. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“I like the cut of your jib, as those nautical types say. Besides, I’m between assignments. Things getting complicated?”
“Curiouser and curiouser, as Lewis Carroll would say. A couple of goons paid me a visit last night. They told me in word and deed to drop the case.”
“Edward Foster?”
“He’s at the top of my list.” I told Gerrity what had happened yesterday when I went to see Philip at his office.
“You going to take the hint?”
“I wouldn’t give the son-of-a-bitch the satisfaction. But at the moment I don’t know which way to go.”
“Wait for it,” Gerrity said. Good advice, I admitted to myself after we’d ended our conversation.
It wasn’t until Mark walked into my office that I remembered my dinner date with him. The attack in the parking lot had driven it out of my mind. Now he stood in front of my desk, blue eyes giving off sparks, looking like one of Mr. De Pinna’s firecrackers, ready to explode. Emotions played across his face like water racing down a mountain stream, revealing stone and sand and treacherous rapids.
“You stood me up,” he said.
His mouth twitched at one corner. Looking at him, I saw the same kind of anger he had displayed in his shop in Cibola, the suppressed violence that had erupted when I pressed him for details about the night he killed his parents. Only now it was directed at me, over something as trivial as a missed dinner date.
“I’ve been trying to decide why you stood me up. You think I lied about that car trying to run me down? Just say so. If you didn’t want to go out with me
, all you had to do was say no.”
As he spoke his face changed. The unsettling anger gave way to vulnerability and bruised ego. I felt like a passenger on an emotional roller coaster, riding blindfold, without a seat belt. The Foster case had me scrabbling through a maze, looking for a way out. I was struggling with the attraction I felt for Mark and at the moment I didn’t know whether to deck him or comfort him.
“If you want to know why I didn’t show up last night, all you have to do is give me a chance to explain.” I stood up and winced as my body reminded me of last night’s attack.
“You’re hurt,” he said, surprised.
I sat down again and pulled out the bottom desk drawer where I kept my first-aid supplies. Pulling out a bottle of Tylenol, I negotiated the childproof cap and shook out a couple of tablets. I picked up my coffee, which had by now grown cold.
“Cheers,” I said, washing down the tablets. “Two thugs jumped me in the parking lot last night. Someone called the cops. By the time it was over, I’d forgotten about dinner.”
Mark’s hands balled into fists and he stuck them into the pockets of his jacket as though he didn’t know what else to do with them. “I’m sorry,” he said finally, his voice subdued. “I was out of line. Please forgive me. Have you seen a doctor?”
“Don’t mother-hen me. I don’t like it any better than I like being on the receiving end of your temper. Sit down and let’s start over.”
He did as I told him, sitting uneasily in one of the chairs in front of my desk. I got a fresh cup of coffee for both of us. When I returned to my desk the phone rang. I reached for it, hoping it was Karen.
“Jeri, where the hell have you been?” Sid roared at me through the receiver. “Goddamn it, why haven’t you returned any of my calls?”
Terrific, I thought. This is all I need. “I can’t talk right now, Sid.” I hung up.
“Who’s Sid?” Mark asked.
“My ex-husband. I don’t want to talk about him.” I took a swallow of coffee and burned my tongue. “Yesterday I wasn’t sure I believed your story about the car trying to run you down. Now I’m not sure I don’t. It’s possible. I’m being watched. I’ve felt it for days. Tell me again what happened with the car.”
