Murder on Potrero Hill (Peyton Brooks' Series Book 1)

by Hamilton, M. L.

  The guard knocked him off balance, dragging him closer to the doors. His briefcase with Zoë’s journal was still in the credenza. They couldn’t make him leave before he got that.

  “Mr. Andrews? Please, Mr. Andrews, let me get my things.”

  Andrews placed the phone in his pocket. “The police are on the way, Jake. I think you better get out of here before they arrive.”

  Jake felt the fight go out of him.

  “Get him out of here,” said Andrews, walking beyond Jake and pulling open the door.

  The guard led him to the opening and across the foyer. Using his free hand, he shoved open the glass doors and then threw him out onto the sidewalk. Jake stumbled, but caught himself and whipped around. Andrews and the guard blocked the entrance. Behind them, Jake could see Sam watching him with a tortured expression on his face.

  “I’m sorry, Jake, I really am.”

  Jake looked around the street. Some of the customers were staring at him. When he looked back up, Andrews was gone, leaving the guard standing at the door, watching him.

  Jake’s gaze shifted to the plate-glass windows. Sam and a few other colleagues were looking out at him. He couldn’t read their expressions from where he stood, but he sensed their confusion. A moment later, Andrews appeared behind them, scattering them like gazelle.

  * * *

  Peyton’s cell phone vibrated on the desk and she automatically reached for it. “Brooks.”

  “Officer Smith here.”

  Peyton didn’t recognize the voice, but she remembered the name of the patrol officer sent to follow Ryder during the day. “Hey, Smith, what ya got for me?”

  “He just got thrown out of the bank.”

  “Hm, he went to work, huh?”

  “Yeah. The manager placed a call to dispatch, but we intercepted it. You want us to pick him up?”

  “No, tail him. Don’t haul him in yet. D’Angelo and I are trying to get more evidence before we bring him in. Don’t want him lawyering up on us.”

  “You got it.”

  “Hey, how’d he get to work? He doesn’t have a car registered in his name.”

  “Bus.”

  Peyton reached for a pen and jotted a note on her pad. Need to revoke bus pass. “Where’s he headed now?”

  “He’s just standing around in front of the bank, looking lost.”

  “When you say they threw him out, do you mean literally?”

  “Yep, the security guard dumped his ass on the street.”

  Peyton’s brows lifted. She hadn’t expected that when she talked with the bank manager. Nothing like innocent until proven guilty. Well, she was responsible. She hadn’t left much wiggle room when she talked to Andrews. She made it clear the first suspect was always the husband. Ninety percent of the time that proved to be the assailant as well.

  “He’s on the move,” came Smith’s voice over the phone

  “Where’s he headed?”

  “South, toward Mission.”

  “Don’t lose him.”

  “We’re on him.”

  “Where do you think he’s headed?”

  “Bus stop.”

  “Okay. I’ll get his pass revoked. Make sure he doesn’t see you.”

  “Got it.”

  Marco dropped something on her desk, then circled around to his seat and slumped into it.

  “Keep me posted,” she told Smith.

  “Done.”

  Peyton lifted the paper and glanced at it. “What’s this?”

  “Motive.”

  Peyton read more carefully. “Life insurance?”

  “Quarter of a million. Look at the beneficiary.”

  Peyton nodded. “I see. Did he have one as well?”

  “Yeah. Same amount.”

  Peyton tapped the paper with her pen. “They got these when they married.”

  “I know.”

  Peyton sank back in her chair. “A lot of couples get life insurance when they get married. I don’t know. It doesn’t feel solid to me.”

  “We’re pretty slim on everything. Your daddy’s stool is a bit wobbly on this one.”

  “So there’s got to be something we’re missing. Did you check his prescription records?”

  “Yep, no warfarin.”

  “What about hers?”

  “Nope.”

  “Where the hell did he get the stuff?”

  Marco opened the file again and riffled through a few pages. “Her father had a stroke five months ago. He’s in a convalescent home on California Avenue. I called the home and asked if Ryder had ever visited. They looked back over the records and found multiple times when he was there.”

  “Are you saying he got it from the home?”

  “It could be a source.”

  Peyton tapped the pen again. “We need something else, a real solid motive. I wish we could find out if she was messing around on him.”

  “Do we know any of her friends? She might have told one of them.”

  “I haven’t found anything yet. I was thinking of putting in a call to her mother. See if she knew who Zoë’s friends were.”

  “Yeah, you handle that one,” he said with a dramatic shudder.

  “Okay. If I’m gonna call the Socialite Queen Bee, you head over to the coffee house and find out who Zoë hung out with at work.”

  “On it,” said Marco, rising to his feet.

  “I’ll bet they’re gonna love you,” laughed Peyton, reaching for the phone.

  Marco gave her a wicked smile as he headed for the door.

  * * *

  Jake exited the bus at Powell and walked toward the branch on Kearny. He couldn’t believe how angry he was. He needed to get his card fixed and he sure as hell couldn’t go back into his branch to have it done.

  Andrews had thrown him out without allowing him to get his things. He needed to call Sam and ask him to collect them, but he was so humiliated he couldn’t face that call just yet. He needed to walk off some of this frustration and anger.

  The damn police. Where did they get off contacting his employer? They had nothing on him. They hadn’t even hauled him into the precinct yet. Why the hell were they messing in his life?

  His thoughts turned as always to Zoë. They said this drug was in her system, a drug he’d never heard of before. How did he even know that part of it was true? He believed them without any evidence to prove it. Zoë would never have taken anything knowing she was pregnant. He was sure of that.

  So how the hell did she get it? It had to be a lie. Dr. Singh said she died of an aneurysm. Why would he lie? Why would he tell the police something different than he told her husband? Maybe he made a mistake and gave her the wrong medication. Maybe the whole thing was Dr. Singh’s fault.

  He paused outside the bank and stared at the doors. For a moment, he couldn’t remember why he’d come here. Then he blinked and rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. He needed some real sleep. He was getting punchy and this whole situation was beginning to spook him.

  He climbed the stairs and pushed open the doors. Only two other people waited in line for a teller, so he moved up behind them.

  If Dr. Singh was lying about the warfarin stuff and he was the one who gave it to her, what made her sick in the first place? What made her blood pressure drop so low? Maybe she’d had a ruptured aneurysm and they gave her the warfarin stuff to stop it. He had to look up warfarin and see what it did, but his tablet was in the briefcase with Zoë’s journal.

  Two windows opened up and the people in line moved to them. Jake pushed thoughts of Zoë into the background and reached for his wallet, pulling his card out. Another window opened and the smiling young woman behind the counter beckoned him forward.

  “Good morning,” she said.

  Jake forced himself to smile in return. “Good morning.” What an ironic statement! It had been anything but good. “My card seems to have become demagnetized.” He held it out to her.

  “No problem. Let me just take a look at that.” She took
the card and swiped it on the keyboard of her computer, then began clicking on things with her mouse. “How has your day been so far?”

  Jake leaned on the counter. He couldn’t believe how tired he felt and it was only just past 11:00. “Fine,” he lied.

  She smiled at him again, then looked at the screen. Her brows drew down into a frown. “Do you have some ID on you, Mr. Ryder?” she said.

  He opened his wallet and showed her his driver’s license. She tilted it toward her, then made a few more clicks on the screen.

  “Let me just get my manager, all right?”

  Jake straightened. “What? Why? Is something wrong?”

  She gave him a tight smile and backed away from the counter. “I’ll be right back.”

  Jake watched her hurry over to a desk in the back, picking up a phone. She said something into it, covering the receiver with her hand. Jake glanced over his shoulder at the rest of the bank. No one else seemed to be on alert. A security guard wandered toward the front doors, but he didn’t even look Jake’s way.

  A middle aged Asian woman emerged from a hallway in the back and walked toward the teller. They exchanged a few words and the teller handed her Jake’s card. Together they approached the window again.

  “I’m sorry to make you wait, Mr. Ryder.”

  “Is something wrong?” Jake realized his voice came out sharp when the teller flinched.

  “Your accounts have been frozen and…”

  “What?”

  “Your accounts have been frozen as of this morning.”

  “I’m an employee of this bank.”

  “We can see that.”

  “Why the hell are my accounts frozen?” He suspected he knew, but he just couldn’t get his mind around the fact the police had so much power. “I want my money. There must be at least a thousand dollars in my checking account. I want to withdraw it now.”

  The manager’s eyes went beyond him to the security guard. “I promise you I’ll look into this matter myself and see what can be done, but for now there’s nothing more I can do.”

  Jake moved up to the counter and the two women fell back a few steps. “Don’t tell me you can’t do anything. I want my money. You have no right to hold it.”

  “Calm down, sir,” came a voice behind him and Jake knew it belonged to the security guard.

  The manager edged to the counter and laid a card on it. “Here’s my card. Call me tomorrow and I’ll see what I can find out. I should have some information for you by then.”

  “Who put the hold on my account?”

  “It was placed by the branch on Market.”

  “Why?”

  “It doesn’t say, but I promise I’ll look into that for you.”

  Jake realized he was breathing hard. “I need that money. I have bills to pay. You have no right to put a hold on it.”

  “I’m sorry, sir. I wish I could do something for you.”

  “You can give me my damn money!” he shouted.

  A hand clamped down on his shoulder. “I said calm down, mister.”

  Jake shrugged the hand off and backed away from the counter. “I don’t understand this. What the hell is going on?”

  The manager and the teller gave him pitying looks. The security guard rounded on him, stepping between him and the counter. “She said she’d look into it.”

  Jake took another step back. He didn’t want to be thrown out of another bank today. “I didn’t do anything. I didn’t do anything to anybody.”

  The security guard took a step forward and Jake took one back. “Just leave now, okay? Just leave.”

  Jake looked at the manager once more, then turned on his heel and hurried from the bank. He stumbled down the stairs and stopped on the street, bracing his hands on his thighs. He felt light headed, the blood pounded so fiercely in his temples.

  What was he going to do now? He couldn’t get money to buy food or pay rent. He’d lost his job. And why? He didn’t even understand what was happening to him. He needed to sit down and think his next move. He wondered if he should contact a lawyer, but how the hell would he pay a retainer?

  He’d probably have to go to Claire and ask for help, but he didn’t know how he was going to explain that the police were suspicious about Zoë’s death and thought he’d had something to do with it. Would Claire believe him capable of something so horrible? How could he know? Zoë was her daughter.

  He forced himself to slow his breathing. He needed to go home. He needed to get some real sleep and then think through his next move. They hadn’t brought him into the precinct, which must mean they didn’t have a very solid case. They were speculating right now. He just needed time to figure this out. There had to be a way he could prove he’d done nothing and get them off his back. There had to be something he could do.

  He walked to the bus stop on the corner of Powell and sank into the seat. Leaning forward, he braced his head in his hands. He felt like he was in a nightmare and couldn’t wake up. How had this happened to him? Just a week ago, he’d been happy. His life might not have been overly exciting, but he was satisfied with it. He had no problem with routine. He didn’t long for anything more. How could things have changed so quickly?

  “Got any spare change?” A filthy hand shot into his line of sight and Jake looked up. A homeless man with a wreath of wild grey hair stood in front of him in tattered clothes. “Got spare change?”

  Jake reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a few coins, extending them to the man. As he did so, his eyes landed on a white Crown Victoria parked across the street from the bus stop. Two men sat in the front seats, looking back at him.

  The homeless man hit his hand with his open palm. Jake dropped the coins onto it, but his attention was fixed on the car. It had no markings, but a large antenna sat on the roof. The two men were nondescript, both white, one middle aged, the other younger. Jake didn’t recognize them, but he was certain they watched him.

  He rose to his feet, but as he did so, the bus pulled up to the curb, blocking his sight. The doors hissed open.

  Who the hell was watching him?

  “You riding?” said the bus driver.

  Jake tried to look around the bus without being suspicious, but he couldn’t see the car.

  “Hey, you riding?” said the bus driver again.

  Jake looked down, trying to corral his thoughts. None of this seemed real. He felt like he was completely off kilter.

  “Mister?”

  Jake lifted his eyes to the bus driver, then stepped around the homeless man and reached for the handrail, pulling himself up the stairs.

  He automatically reached into his pocket for his keys and thumbed the bus pass forward. Pressing it to the reader, he started toward the seats.

  The reader made a strange sound.

  “Hold up, mister,” said the driver. “Do that again.”

  Jake backed up and pressed the pass to the reader another time.

  The reader made the same strange sound.

  The bus driver leaned back and looked up at Jake from beneath the brim of his hat. “Dude, it says declined.”

  CHAPTER 6

  Marco entered the coffee house. It was crowded as these places always were. He took in the overstuffed arm chairs, the small, round tables, the people of every race, every age, lounging around the room, reading from tablets or typing on laptops. He even saw a woman with a paperback. Funny how you didn’t see many of those anymore.

  He pushed past the line of patrons waiting to order drinks and walked up to the counter. He felt the eyes of the customers on him, but he ignored them. Behind the counter, the employees scurried around, making drinks or grabbing pastries out of the glass cases. A lower counter to the left allowed patrons to pick up their drinks once they were made. He reached into the inner pocket of his jacket and pulled out his badge, flipping it open.

  He set it on the counter and pushed it forward, so the young woman making coffee could see it. She paused as she set a cup on the counter and
looked up at him.

  “A caramel latte with nonfat milk,” she called. A man reached around Marco and grabbed the cup.

  “I’m Inspector D’Angelo,” he said, picking up his badge.

  She studied him, nodding slowly. She was in her early twenties, Hispanic. A thick, brown braid ran down her back and she had at least six earrings in each ear. “What can I do for you?”

  “Did you know Zoë Ryder?”

  She sighed and looked down. “Yes. She and I worked together a lot.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Teresa. Teresa Gomez.” She glanced at the other baristas, who were watching them. “Is something wrong?”

  Marco looked at them as well. “Can you take a break, Teresa? I have a few questions I’d like to ask you.”

  “About Zoë?” She narrowed her eyes at him.

  He nodded.

  “Hold on.” She moved toward the other workers and whispered something to them. Marco stepped back, feeling the eyes of everyone in the room following him.

  Untying her apron, Teresa shoved it beneath the counter, then eased past her coworkers and met him in the middle of the store. She motioned to the doors. “Let’s talk outside.”

  He followed her to the patio and took a seat opposite her in one of the metal chairs. The sun was breaking through the cloud cover and the temperature was pleasant. A few more people entered the coffee shop from the street. When Marco glanced over his shoulder, he could see a number of the patrons looking out at them.

  “Curious bunch,” he said, offering the girl a smile.

  She studied him with a worried expression.

  Reaching into his inner pocket again, he pulled out his business card and passed it across the table to her. He noted that her eyes were locked on his jacket where it gaped open. The butt of his gun must be visible. He straightened and covered the gun.

  “Tell me about Zoë.”

  “What’s to tell?”

  “Were you close with her?”

  “I guess. We went out for drinks and a movie or two. I’ve even been to her flat.”

  “Did you know she had a college degree?”

  “Yeah, biology, but she didn’t want to be a doctor. That’s what her dad wanted for her.”