by Joanne Pence
As Hanemoto spoke, Rebecca thought about the San Francisco Beat article. Just as with Richie and Bosque, the implication had been made that Tanaka hadn’t come by the money to start and expand his restaurants through legal means. “I would imagine it’s rather expensive to start a restaurant,” she said. “Did Mr. Tanaka’s family have money to help him out?”
“Not at all. His parents are somewhat elderly, and they still live in Kyoto. They tried to help, but they don’t have much. He needed to take out loans. That was where my expertise came in,” Hanemoto said. “I made sure the terms were reasonable. But everyone who knew him was willing to help. We knew he would be successful.”
“I’m sorry to ask, but are you aware of a not-so-flattering story about Mr. Tanaka in San Francisco Beat? The article made it sound as if some of the money he used was from questionable sources, and that he’s a bit of a womanizer.”
Hanemoto chuckled. “Of course, all of us at the restaurant know about the article. It’s pure rubbish. Everyone knows it’s all lies, but Tanaka told us not to worry about it, that in San Francisco, that kind of story will make the restaurant more popular, not less so. I assure you, his loans were quite legitimate. Also, Tanaka-san does have a fiancée in Kyoto. He’s very much in love with her, and they plan to marry soon. But, as he is often invited to events in this city and others, he needs a companion. The women who accompany him are friends. Nothing more. All of them know he’s engaged.”
Rebecca remembered how the tabloid had interviewed three women he’d dated in this country. The writer caught their reactions as he told each one that Shig had a fiancée back in Japan and showed them a photo of a delicate woman wearing a traditional kimono. Some of the things the jilted women said about Tanaka after learning he was engaged had made Rebecca’s skin crawl.
But was it a reason for decapitation? She didn’t think so. “Do you have the names of his closest female friends?”
He frowned at the request. “I shall ask my secretary to provide you with that information.”
The phone sounded shrill in the quiet office. Hanemoto visibly jumped. His secretary answered and gave Rebecca the phone. It was the building manager. He said Tanaka’s apartment was empty, and Tanaka’s car wasn’t in its space. The car was a brand new Mercedes S 550, with GPS.
Rebecca thanked the man and hung up.
Hanemoto stared at her. “I don’t know what to say.”
She had reached the point in interviews that she most hated, but it had to be done. “Mr. Hanemoto, there’s something I need you to look at. Hopefully, it has nothing to do with your missing friend. But we must rule out that possibility before I go any further.”
Hanemoto’s shoulders sagged, and his gaze told her he had been expecting something like this. “I see,” he whispered. “I’ll do what I can to help.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Richie sat in his favorite booth at the very back of the Columbus Cafe in the city’s North Beach district. It was an old place with dim lighting and high walls around each booth. Richie liked it and had gone there for years, from the time he lived nearby. North Beach had once been the Italian quarter of the city, and then became the home of the “beatniks” of the fifties and early sixties, and now survived mainly from tourists who enjoyed going to picturesque shops and restaurants that harkened back to both eras.
After the waitress took his order of a beer and a pastrami sandwich, Richie opened his phone to see what Logan Travis’ new ‘liar’ application told him about Tommy Ginnetti. They worked together most of the day. The app had flashing red lights and yellow warnings marked throughout. But Richie trusted Tommy. Or, at least, he thought he should trust him. What was going on here?
He looked up as the waitress brought his food, and as he did, he saw his friend, Shay, enter the restaurant. Shay rarely ate out, so Richie had ordered without him. Now, he hit a couple of items on the phone, and said “Shay,” and then put it in his pocket.
Shay, whose actual name was Henry Ian Tate III, was the person Richie worked with the most often outside of Big Caesar’s, and he was also the most reliable. Although the two were close, there was a lot Shay kept hidden from everyone, including Richie. He was around Richie’s age and few inches taller, but where Richie had dark hair and eyes, Shay’s hair was pale blond and silky, and his eyes sky blue. He was also a skilled marksman and a computer whiz. His appearance, his style of dress, his mannerisms all made him seem like someone who’d just stepped from the pages of Gentleman’s Quarterly. But when a person got to know him, he was pure Soldier of Fortune.
After meeting with Logan Travis the day before, Richie had contacted Shay to investigate Travis’s former partners, Mitch Voltz and Jason Singh. Shay would understand what they were all about. When it came to technology, Richie didn’t care how things worked; he only cared that they did.
Shay sat in the booth across from Richie and ordered tea. He waited until the waitress brought him a cup of Earl Grey and left again before he asked, “What’s the story on the fire at Big Caesar’s?”
“Not good,” Richie said. He had fallen into ownership of Big Caesar’s, taking it over when an investment didn’t turn out the way he’d expected. To his surprise, he actually enjoyed owning it. Because of the nightclub, he even thought about giving up his other line of work—a business that relied on his know-how alone, with no building to manage, no full-time employees, and no need to hire performers. It was basically a safe and legal operation, although he had to admit that at times things went very wrong and could become more than a little dicey. And as a result, some people, such as Rebecca, didn’t understand the business and told him he was crazy to keep doing it, legit or not. There were some things a fixer can’t fix, like Rebecca’s unfavorable opinion of him being a fixer.
But last night, looking at the charred ruins of just one room of his nightclub, and realizing the entire building could have looked that ugly were it not for a fluke of good timing, he knew he would always keep all his options open. He’d been poor, dirt poor, and he now had money. He preferred life this way.
“It was definitely arson,” he said in answer to Shay’s question. “Yesterday, Diego Bosque’s clothes shop was fire-bombed too. Not much physical damage, but some poor homeless guy sleeping inside was killed. Fortunately, no one died at Big Caesar’s. But—here’s what’s worrying me—Rebecca said the accelerant that started the fire at Bosque’s place was the same as used at Big Caesar’s.”
Shay’s notoriously unexpressive face did show a slight narrowing of his eyes. “Diego Bosque. Isn’t he another of the—”
“Yeah, he is.” Richie took a long swallow of his beer. “I’m sure that has nothing to do with it. I mean, it’s stupid. Silly. Whatever. Nobody the hell cares!”
“Okay,” Shay said calmly. “I’m only trying to see what connection there might be between the two of you.”
“None. I’ve only talked with him a couple times.”
“What are you going to do about Big Caesar’s?”
“Right now, the water from the fire trucks did more damage than the fire. I’m cleaning it up, and found a couple guys to keep an eye on it round the clock until we can stop whatever’s going on. I don’t want whoever did this to come back for a second try.”
“Can I help?”
“There’s not enough info yet. I’ll let you know. In the meantime, tell me about Logan Travis’s fearsome duo.”
“Wait a minute,” Shay said, his eyes fierce. “Logan Travis is also—”
“I already told you, get off that shtick. It means nothing.”
Richie could see from Shay’s expression that he wasn’t convinced, but Shay answered his question. “I talked to them both.”
“Talked to them?” Richie asked. “I thought you’d just check on what they’re up to.”
“I did, and that’s why I decided to see what they’re like in person. They’re working on a project I’m actually interested in. It’s an app to compare train versus air travel. Nobody think
s about trains in this country, but some day, because of the way TSA causes delays and because of the goofy ways airlines come up with rates, trains are often faster and cheaper for short trips.”
Richie was literally at a loss for words. Mr. High Tech was interested in trains? Richie shuddered at the thought of them. He even found the bullet train that California planned to run from “almost Sacramento” to “almost Los Angeles” incomprehensible. Who’d want to use it?
“Weird,” Richie muttered, and watched Shay’s lips slightly spread into what was, for Shay, a display of raucous amusement. “Okay, whatever, what did you find out about the two?”
“They aren’t a problem. They have no interest in Logan Travis or his app. They say it’s a crock. It won’t work, won’t ever work, and they call Travis a whack job. All that Travis will do with his app, if it were ever to go live, will be to ruin friendships and romances by having people put their faith in something that’s erratic at best. Anything a person does outside their routine way of speaking or acting, it records as a potential lie. Someone once sneezed and the app said he was lying.”
Richie tried to remember if Tommy Ginnetti had sneezed or coughed as they talked to him.
“And another time, a guy told a joke, and the app said it was a lie. No, it was a joke.”
“So the app has no sense of humor,” Richie said sardonically.
“Even worse,” Shay said. “Mitch told a story about an employee, a guy, who had a secret crush on Logan Travis. Around Travis, he was always a bit flustered, a little tense, and he liked to touch Travis’s arm or his hand to emphasize whatever he was saying. The stupid app thought he was lying, and Travis fired him. It’s crazy. People’s emotions are too complicated for an app to handle.”
Good God! Could Tommy have a crush…? Richie shook his head; he really had to stop thinking about that dumb liar app. “So if someone is bothering Travis, it’s not his ex-partners. You’re sure of that?”
“Do you want to put Travis’s app on your phone and see if I’m lying?” Shay asked, without a hint of a grin.
Richie blanched. “I don’t think so.”
“They also said Travis is a bit psycho. He’s paranoid and because he spends so much time alone, he weaves little things into big ones. There were times, they both agreed, they were actually afraid of him. Maybe you shouldn’t go back to see him. Just phone in your info.”
“He’s not scary,” Richie said. “But he is nuts. I’ll talk to him, and try to convince him those guys are okay.”
“The thing is,” Shay continued, “if someone is lurking around Logan Travis’s house, the question is who? And why? There’s Diego Bosque’s clothing store, your place, Travis’s house—”
“I told you to get off that. It means nothing.”
Shay took a sip of his tea. “By the way, SF Beat is already out.”
Richie turned pale. “Already? I was told it’s next week’s issue.”
“They always release them before the date that’s printed. It helps them look more current.”
Richie thought about the strange way Rebecca had been acting. Nah, she didn’t read that junk. Impossible.
o0o
Rebecca was a hardened homicide detective, but even so, she found it difficult to watch Shig Tanaka’s longtime friend and business partner, Kazue Hanemoto, doing his best to contain his emotions as he looked with sickened, unmasked horror at the head of his boss. The medical examiner, Dr. Evelyn Ramirez, and her staff had done all they could with the judicious use of sheets and other coverings, to make the head look not as gory as it might have. But still, it was clear that the body wasn’t attached to it.
After Hanemoto left, Rebecca opened up the SF Beat article as she attempted to reach the other three bachelors. Although she had no definite proof the write-up was connected to the attacks, there was enough circumstantial evidence to warrant a call.
The first one she reached out to was Pierre Fontaine, owner of a boutique hotel near the top of Nob Hill, where wealthy customers had easy access to downtown shops and businesses, the Financial District, as well as the tourist attractions of Chinatown and Fisherman’s Wharf. According to the tabloid, it wasn’t unusual to find certain wealthy female customers, especially married ones, checking into the hotel for some very personal service from management. Sometimes, when she found herself shocked while reading something like that, Rebecca realized a part of her was still a country girl, despite the years she’d worked in the notoriously avant-garde city.
Fontaine was in Los Angeles at the moment. His secretary took a message.
She then tried to reach Logan Travis, a software engineer who designed one lucrative application after the other, mainly for smart phones. He would sell the app to the highest bidder, which was often Apple, and then develop an equally lucrative new app. His problem, according to the article, was that he was always working. Even when not physically at his office or even his desk, his mind was always on the job. He’d make a date and then forget to show up for it; sometimes, he’d even forget while with his date and walk out of a restaurant or theater without him (the article made it clear he only dated men) and without paying. And then he wouldn’t apologize or even offer to pay back the money spent. His dates were left not knowing if they had done something wrong, or were simply so boring he ditched them. Whichever it was, the tabloid was able to find plenty of men who still held a grudge because of the way they’d been treated. They swore they would never forgive him.
She couldn’t get through to him or to anyone at the number listed for his company. She left voice messages.
Last was Moss Brannigan, owner and operator of the biggest tour boat on San Francisco Bay. He had ginger-colored hair, a bushy beard, sparkling blue eyes, and in every picture he wore a replica of a commander’s navy blue jacket plus a matching cap with a shiny black brim. He was definitely a woman-in-every-port type of guy—several of whom he had married and then either divorced or abandoned. According to the article, he had never legally divorced his first wife. The write-up also implied his business was in a financially precarious state.
She ended up leaving a message with his tour boat operators for him to call her.
Rebecca pushed aside the magazine after making the calls, and she could only shake her head at the litany of sleazy dealings and hurtful relationships the article had exposed. She couldn’t help but wonder how much of all she’d read was actually true, and if true, instead of appalled or disgusted, the write-up only made her feel sad.
Earlier, Rebecca had requested a Japanese interpreter to help her out, asking that he arrive after 5:00 that afternoon, which would be 8:00 the next morning in Japan. When young patrolman from the Taraval station arrived, she briefed him on Shig Tanaka’s murder, and had him call the Kyoto police department. She was put through to a homicide detective named Sugiwara, who fortunately spoke excellent English.
She explained to Detective Sugiwara what had happened. He asked a number of questions, and eventually said that he would have to go to Tanaka’s parents with the news. He said he must tell them face-to-face, especially because of the beheading, which he suspected would be impossible to suppress. Rebecca agreed and understood. The detective also promised to go to Tanaka’s Kyoto restaurant to see if anyone knew anything at all. “But there is one thing you should know,” Sugiwara said.
“Yes?”
“Two years ago, the Kyoto police did an investigation of racketeering by the Yakuza. Do you know that name? I believe you call them ‘Japanese Mafia.’ Tanaka was part of that investigation.”
“You thought he was part of the Yakuza?” Rebecca asked.
“We weren’t sure because there were rumors … but then, there are always such rumors. Tanaka was cleared, however. It was found that Tanaka’s benefactors might have had some small association with the Yakuza, but nothing illegal was shown.”
“I see,” Rebecca said, noticing how nuanced the detectives words were.
“I suspect,” Sugiwara added, �
�whatever had caused Tanaka to be killed has its roots in San Francisco, but if I find anything here that might help, I will contact you immediately.”
Rebecca thanked him for his help. She then decided to go to the apartment of a woman Hanemoto had told her about, Tanaka’s “lady friend” of the longest duration, Michiko Yamata. Michiko was home, but she was too broken up to be of any help. Although she said she knew about Tanaka’s engagement to “a woman in Japan who was a stranger to him,” it was clear to Rebecca that Michiko was in love with the chef and had hopes of a wedding in their future.
Not long after, Rebecca got word that Tanaka’s car had been located. It wasn’t because of his pricey GPS system, but because the car had been towed by the city for having been parked too long on Grant Avenue near Broadway. It was an area of bars and strip joints—an area Tanaka enjoyed going to now and then after his restaurant closed.
She sent the crime scene unit to retrieve the car. So far, their analysis of the dumpster and street where Tanaka’s head had been found gave her no useful information at all. She hoped the car would be different.
She was gathering lots of information about Tanaka, but nothing that gave any clue as to why he would have been killed. Also, he was last seen with Diego Bosque, who was still missing.
She could think of one person who knew both men and just might have some answers for her. This time, she intended to get them.
She phoned Richie.
CHAPTER SIX
Rebecca and Richie agreed to meet at a small steakhouse near Castro—a halfway point between his house and her job. She might be working a murder investigation, plus the death in the arson fire, but she needed to eat dinner, and could justify having company while she did so.
