21st Birthday

by Patterson, James

  “Later, past dark on that same day, the camera will record Lucas coming home around eight thirty and leaving again the next morning at seven. Tara’s car is not in the driveway. On Tuesday, he is questioned by SFPD in his office and cooperates fully. The next morning, he gets the horrifying news that his baby daughter is lying dead in the surf of Baker Beach.

  “A police sergeant drives him to this very building, where he is questioned and held as a material witness, released the next day. He goes home, and several hours later police cars pull up, several inspectors come to the front door and hand Lucas a search warrant. He is asked to stay outside while they search his premises and Lucas, nearly deranged with grief, gets into his car and drives clear to Sacramento.

  “After the police and CSI enter Dublin Street, there is no more video from the Burke house surveillance camera. CSI disconnects the receiver and takes it back to the lab.

  “But the most important piece of information in this case is on the video. We see Tara Burke leaving the house and she does not lock the door. My client has told me that his wife never locked the doors, front, back, or side. And so if you were planning to kill her, you would be aware of this, and you would have had access to the Burke house from the rear, where there was no camera.

  “This fact will come up again. Tara never locked the doors.

  “The prosecution will show you video of Ms. Melissa Fogarty, known as Misty, Lucas Burke’s girlfriend. The video was taken on Friday, two days after Lorrie Burke’s body was found at Baker Beach. This video was taken at 8 p.m. in the parking lot of the school where Luke taught English, and Misty was in the senior class. These two often met at this time in the empty parking lot, but on this night, Lucas Burke was not coming to meet Misty. He had left town, driven from his house to Sacramento, where Alexandra Conroy, his ex-wife, suggested they both travel to Carmel-by-the-Sea for his health.

  “The two of them drive to Carmel the next morning. Only a day later, on Saturday, while Lucas and ex-wife are having breakfast in the hotel, Lucas sees a newspaper with a headline he cannot believe.”

  Gardner said, “This is the paper.”

  He held up the Chronicle Yuki had seen enough times to memorize the headline. “Slash-and-Gash Killer Takes Second Victim.” Misty’s sweet face filled the rest of the front page.

  Gardner went on.

  “Ms. Conroy will testify that she and Lucas were together from the time he arrived in Sacramento until a day and a half later, when they returned to San Francisco. So how can the prosecution have a video of my client killing Melissa Fogarty, flinging the murder weapon into the weeds, and — voilà — it has Melissa’s blood on the blade and Lucas Burke’s fingerprints on the handle?

  “I call bull on the prosecution’s theory. It is a theory full of holes because Lucas wasn’t there. They have a possible murder weapon, and it may have belonged to Lucas. But they don’t have proof it was in his hand when Melissa Fogarty was killed.

  “I will prove to you that someone else committed these unspeakable murders. He had access to my client’s house. He had access to his razor blade.

  “As for Tara’s body. By the time that poor woman’s car floated up near China Beach she had been in the ocean for nearly a week. She was bloated, and ocean animals — fish, crabs, seals, whatever — had been rough on her. But it was still clear that she had been killed with a straight-edge razor sliced across her throat from left to right. When she was dead or dying, her killer weighed down the accelerator and sent her car into the ocean, with mother and baby daughter inside.

  “My client, Lucas Burke didn’t do this. And the prosecution can say what they want, but they have no witness, no trace evidence, no clear video of the person who killed Tara Burke.

  “My client didn’t do it.

  “Lucas killed none of these people.

  “He’s never killed anyone in his life. But as his attorney, I don’t have to prove his innocence.

  “The prosecution has to prove his guilt beyond reasonable doubt.”

  Yuki watched Gardner thank the jury and return to his seat. He put his arm around Burke’s shoulders, and his client put his head down on the table and sobbed loudly and authentically.

  The judge called Yuki and Gardner to the bench and said, “I feel strongly we should recess now and pick up again after lunch.”

  Gardner said, “Yes, yes, for the love of God, yes.”

  Yuki said, “I agree, Your Honor.”

  Court was adjourned until one o’clock.

  CHAPTER 81

  I WAS IN BRADY’S OFFICE when he got the call.

  After a moment, he said, “Hold on, hon. I need you to tell Lindsay, too.”

  Brady stabbed a button on his console and I went out to my desk and said, “Yuki? What’s wrong?”

  Her voice was strained.

  “Linds, I asked Brady if you can you take another stab at finding Evan Burke. I want to talk to him.”

  “We’ve kept a camera on his house on Mount Tam. He hasn’t been back. His cabin cruiser is still in its slip at Richardson Bay Marina.”

  “So, you’re saying this is a dead end?”

  It was ten thirty Monday morning.

  Yuki asking us to take another run at Evan Burke meant she was having doubts about her case, and if she was feeling that way, jurors would surely feel the same.

  I asked, “What happened this morning?”

  “I was on fire, but Gardner brought a bomb to the firefight.”

  “Say a few more words, please.”

  She sighed, “Okay. Gardner made a strong case that Evan did it, killed them all. Lucas broke down. Judge called the game on account of crying. Reconvening after a long lunch break.”

  “I’ll call you later,” I said. “Buy you a drink.”

  “Or two,” she said.

  “Chin up, girlfriend,” I said.

  I hung up, left my desk, tapped Cappy and Chi, Alvarez and Conklin, and we went down the hall to our task force office in the corner. We’d gone on to other homicides once the Lucas Burke trial had been scheduled.

  As the five of us dragged chairs up to the table, I told the team we had to go over everything again with fresh eyes.

  “Look for one unturned stone. Don’t worry if it’s not the holy grail. We need a lead.”

  Evan Burke’s ID photo from his military days was centered on the whiteboard. He’d been a kid when the photo was taken, and while Lucas resembled him, Evan was better looking. If he was the killer, I could see how he could put a spell on young females and kill them before they had a hint of the danger.

  We had piles of data in both hard copies and digits, and since Paul Chi was super organized, he knew all of it.

  He took charge now, calling up files, slapping maps on the whiteboard. There were now cold cases across the West Coast that had fallen into geographical patterns of five to seven victims centering on but not exclusive to California. Oregon, Nevada had a few clusters as well.

  The victimology was vague and at the same time told a lot about the killer. Bodies had turned up both fresh killed and long buried. They were all women under thirty, and they’d all been killed by a sharp blade across the throat.

  Chi said, “He sticks to the coastline and interior waterways when he can. If you draw lines from the victim locations, you can see that the nexus is San Francisco.”

  We looked at the compiled data on the possible victims and found only one case of a woman who had stab marks on her chest like those we’d found on Misty and Wendy Franks. Possibly the killer was only now trying on a style.

  Alvarez had told us her theory that Luke had been attached to his father when he was young, but that his father was never there, which caused him to have a longing for his father and to hate him at the same time.

  Where was Daddy? On a killing spree out of town before he brought it back home to murder his own wife and daughter.

  Alvarez said, “I did some research on this sick on-and-off parental disconnect,” she said. “In
France and Switzerland in particular, they refer to hardly home dads as ‘eclipse fathers.’

  If that was true of Evan, then Lucas longed for his attention. And then his mother and sister disappeared. Their bodies were never found. Maybe Luke knew. Maybe he had a bad feeling he didn’t bring out into the sunshine. Or. Maybe he did the killings to get his father’s love.”

  I asked if anyone else had a theory. No one did. If dozens of Homicide divisions hadn’t landed him, how could we do it in this dreary room with the clock ticking toward the afternoon court session?

  I went outside to the noise of Bryant Street and called Joe.

  “Can you reach out to Berney? Please. Couldn’t be a more important time than now.”

  CHAPTER 82

  JOE PHONED ME BACK before I reached the squad room.

  “I reached Berney,” he said. “He’s tracking Evan Burke toward Nevada. Burke’s haunted Vegas in the past.”

  And then Joe said, “Berney added the kicker: Tell Lindsay to meet me at the Bellagio Hotel this evening.”

  “That’s all he said?”

  “He’s a man of few words. Sometimes no words. Linds, I suggest you bring backup.”

  I was pretty sure the bosses were going to spike this request, but hell. I had to try. Clapper was making a rare visit to the squad room and was meeting with Brady. I rapped on the glass and barged in. Both men looked up at me, said nothing until I finished my short, sharp presentation.

  “Yuki needs to depose Evan Burke. A confidential contact of Joe’s is tailing Burke and has advised me to go to Vegas ASAP. If you agree, I want to bring Alvarez. She knows Vegas, knows cops and security at the casinos. I’m going to need clearance from LVPD.”

  Brady said, “Fine with me. Chief?”

  Clapper said, “Good choice of Alvarez.”

  He snatched up Brady’s phone and called LVPD’s Chief Alexander Belinky, saying that Alvarez and I were “dogging a witness” and that we had a subpoena.

  “We do?” I said, after he hung up.

  “You will.”

  An hour and a half later, Alvarez and I were at SFO in Terminal 3.

  Our flight was scheduled to depart in forty-five minutes. Alvarez brought Cinnabons and coffee to our seating area, where I was FaceTiming with Joe and Julie.

  I showed Julie the herd of metallic sculptures hanging from the ceiling above our seats. They were shiny bronze lights reflecting our surroundings from twenty feet up, showing curvy views of the concourse, the moving crowds of people, and storefronts. Mood music was playing and the temperature was optimal.

  I tried to sound like I was having fun, but of course I was faking it. I said good-bye to my family and said I’d call from Vegas.

  Then I called Richie.

  “You okay?” Rich asked.

  “I’m having flashbacks.”

  The last time we’d been inside Terminal 3, there’d been a ticking time bomb somewhere inside the airport. Shots were fired by cop impersonators and a foot chase took us up through the airport layer cake to the Loop trains. There’d been a shoot-out with fatalities. And we could have easily joined the departed. I could still see it as clearly as if I were wearing a virtual reality headset.

  I wasn’t ready to share my posttraumatic flashbacks with Alvarez, so I sipped coffee and watched the escalators and the airport shops. Even with one leg in the past, I was anxious about the immediate future. We were going after Evan Burke and our spirit guide was the mysterious spook called Berney.

  Joe admitted that Berney had been vague.

  “It’s how he is,” Joe had said. “I trust him.”

  I had no basis to trust or mistrust the man. I had no doubt that Joe had great experience with Berney, but to me he was a question mark, and Evan Burke was in my own experience armed and very dangerous.

  Alvarez brought me into the present.

  “Boxer,” she said.

  “Hmm?”

  “Our flight’s been called.”

  We headed to the gate, with no information about our mission beyond “Tell Lindsay to meet me at the Bellagio.”

  CHAPTER 83

  THE FLIGHT TO VEGAS was short and smooth and our Uber was waiting outside McCarran’s main terminal when we exited the airport at two o’clock.

  We quickly reached the Bellagio; we passed the design wonder of the Bellagio’s fountain, which was synced to over thirty different songs. Alvarez and I checked into the hotel, and the desk clerk handed me two envelopes; one was white, marked “Business Center.” My name had been typed on a label. The other was a Bellagio hotel envelope, my name printed in blue ballpoint ink.

  I waited until Alvarez and I were ensconced in our two-bedroom suite — thanks to Clapper’s decision to put us up at the same location as Joe’s CI. We had a dazzling panoramic view of the neon city. But this was a business trip. I tore open the end of the larger envelope and slid out the contents. There were two stiff papers, each folded in thirds.

  Document one was a faxed subpoena for Evan Burke’s appearance signed by the trial judge and DA Leonard Parisi. Document two was an extradition order to be forwarded to the Nevada supreme court if needed.

  Alvarez said, “Clapper is tremendous, isn’t he?”

  I agreed and peeled open the flap of the smaller envelope. Inside was a page torn from a notepad. It said, “Meet me at Lago at eight. B.”

  I showed it to my roommate.

  “Lago is here in the hotel.”

  I said, “Sonia, can I go to dinner like this?”

  I was wearing my usual: slacks, man-tailored shirt, blue blazer, holstered Glock, flat-soled shoes. She nodded, shrugged, then said, “You’re fine, but I’m going down to the lobby boutiques to get a dress from the sale rack. Otherwise, we’re going to look like a couple of cops. You’re a size ten?”

  “Ten to twelve,” I said.

  “Let me see what I can do. I’m good at costuming.”

  “Maybe I’ll take a quick nap.”

  “Keep your phone on.”

  “Copy that.”

  I put my phone on the nightstand in the closest bedroom and dropped onto the bed. When my head hit the pillow, I was already asleep. I dreamed about Berney. In this fantasy, I was interrogating him in the box.

  What’s your name? Your real name? What’s your interest in Evan Burke? Am I bait? Or free labor so you can nab Burke and take him back to Washington?

  In my dream, the spy who looked like a preacher man just smiled but didn’t answer.

  I was awoken by the sound of crinkling paper. Alvarez was back from her shopping excursion to the lobby, and she had a couple of shiny bags with her.

  “What’d you get?

  Sonia opened one bag and took out something black and slinky with sprays of sequins from shoulder to hip.

  “Try this on,” she said.

  “Me?”

  “I’ve got a backup for you in case …”

  I stripped off my shirt and trousers and stepped into the sparkly black cocktail dress. Alvarez said, “So far, excellent. Shoe size nine?”

  She took a pair of black shoes with a short heel out of a bag and handed them over. I wiggled them on.

  They looked good.

  While I was admiring my legs, Alvarez had put on a cream-colored pantsuit. We were transformed.

  “Cagney and Lacey,” I said.

  “Rizzoli and Isles.”

  I told Alvarez we could always try to expense the undercover outfits. We laughed, then Alvarez said, “We’re not done yet.”

  CHAPTER 84

  NICK GAINES HAD POSITIONED the whiteboard so that the judge, jurors, and witnesses could see the photos of Lorrie and Tara Burke and Melissa Fogarty, along with their names and dates of birth and death.

  Yuki felt good. She was stacking her points brick by brick as she built her case against Lucas Burke.

  She’d put on a series of cops and coast guard officers, all of whom were experienced at testifying in court.

  Patrolman Jay Whitcomb had
been first on the scene when the body of a red-haired female child was found on Baker Beach. Coast guard lieutenant Samuel Waverly directed the recovery of Tara Burke’s vehicle. School security guard Mike Cassidy was the unsuspecting soul who’d found Misty Fogarty sitting in her own blood in her car parked in the Sunset Park Prep student lot. And Misty’s best friend, Johanna Weber, testified that Burke told Melissa that he loved her and wanted to marry her.

  Yuki also had a copy of the note from Lucas to Misty saying so. It was entered into evidence and shown to the jury.

  It was about three thirty when Yuki called Dr. Claire Washburn to the stand.

  Claire was both authoritative and accessible, and her testimony was in spoken English, not medical jargon.

  She explained that the baby had been asphyxiated and, judging from the bruises on her face, most probably smothered by hand.

  And she described to the jury what she could tell from the autopsy of the baby’s mother.

  “Tara Burke’s body was bloated and, no other way to say this, chewed on by sea life. Her eyes, fingers, parts of her cheeks were gone, and the fatal injury was also swollen and disturbed. That said, only a sharp blade across the throat could have made that mortal wound. Force had been used, and Mrs. Burke was nearly decapitated. Both Tara and Lorrie were dead before the car went into the ocean.”

  With Yuki guiding her witness, Claire described Melissa Fogarty’s slashed throat, the seemingly gratuitous stab marks on her chest.

  Yuki walked to the whiteboard and indicated Fogarty’s photo.

  “Is this Melissa Fogarty?” Yuki asked her witness.

  “Yes.”

  The jurors turned to look at the picture of Misty. From her expression, she had good feelings toward the person behind the lens. Her eyes smiled. Her grin was verging on laughter. She had been a beautiful eighteen-year-old.

  At Yuki’s questioning, Claire described the slash across the girl’s throat. detailing the “serial killer gibberish” of the gashes in her upper chest.