“Medium height. Brown hair parted on the side. Bit of a beard. White.”
“Do you know where he went?”
“Took off up Geary toward the ocean. Don’t know where he went after that.”
“Did he say anything to you?”
“Nope. Just asked me to give it to the cops when they showed up.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
Marco nodded at the door. “Let’s see if we can catch him.”
Peyton stepped back, carrying the tablet with her. “Thank you,” she said.
The waitress shrugged.
Peyton followed Marco from the diner and waited while he opened the car, then she slipped into the passenger seat. Marco dropped into the driver’s seat and started the car, then wheeled out into traffic again, headed west on Geary. He didn’t turn on the lights or his siren. He obviously didn’t want to alert Jake if he was still around.
On impulse, Peyton slid her fingers across the tablet’s dark surface. It sprang to life with a chime of bells. A note appeared on the screen and she read it. Check Zoë’s birth certificate. It wasn’t signed, but she knew who wrote it.
Looking up, she glanced at the people wandering up and down Geary. “Go back to the precinct,” she said. “I’m sure he’s gone.”
Marco shot a glance at her. “You don’t think we should look?”
She held up the tablet for him to see.
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Don’t know, but let’s go look up her birth certificate.”
“Whatever you say,” he answered, moving into the left turn lane to make another U-turn. “What do you suppose we’re gonna find there?”
“With this case, who the hell knows? It’ll probably say she’s an alien.”
“Oh, like the gardener’s kid or something?”
“No, not like the gardener’s kid or something. Like a space alien.”
“Yeah, that makes a lot of sense,” sneered Marco.
“It was a joke, D’Angelo. Jeez, you work with a guy as long as I have and you’d think a sense of humor would rub off on him.”
“Seems to me you’ve got to have something first before it becomes contagious.”
“Just drive,” she snarled and began thumbing through the files Jake had on the tablet.
“Better not let your boyfriend see your lovely morning personality, Brooks,” he muttered.
Peyton glared at him. “He’s not my boyfriend,” she said.
* * *
Jake sank into the last seat at the back of the bus and slid over to make room for the skinny kid with the long hair and sandals. It alarmed him to think how adept he was at riding the bus for free. No one had even once tried to stop him.
He placed the backpack on his lap and unzipped it, pulling out Zoë’s journal. He wanted to flip through it again and make sure she hadn’t written anything else after the entry about the birth certificate. He leaned back in the seat and started at the first page. He turned each one, rubbing them between his thumb and first two fingers to make sure none of them stuck together.
He came to the last entry and did the same thing for the blank pages. When he got to the end, he hesitated. Taped to the back cover was a scrap of paper. It wasn’t just stuck there with a few strips. Zoë had meticulously taped its entire surface.
Jake lowered the backpack between his feet and braced the journal on his lap, then he carefully began peeling off the tape. The young man next to him looked down and watched him, but Jake only half noticed he was there.
Once he had gotten a few strips undone, he could wedge his thumb beneath the note and pry it up. Closing the journal, he dumped it in the backpack, then gently pulled apart the edges of the note until he had a full piece of paper. Laying it across his thighs, he smoothed it out, staring at Zoë’s handwriting without reading it. The letter was addressed to him.
He became aware that the young man was watching him. Angling his body toward the window, he hunched over the note, so that no one else could see it.
Jake,
Oh, God, I don’t know how to write this or if I’ll ever be able to give it to you. Before I begin, you must know I love you. I know I haven’t been the best wife, but you have always been there for me, patient and loving, even when I pushed you away.
And I know I’ve been pushing you away a lot more lately. I’m so ashamed, I can’t even look you in the eye. I never expected this to happen and I would give anything if it hadn’t. I didn’t mean it, but I’m sure that won’t be any comfort at all.
I betrayed our marriage and I betrayed your trust. Oh, God, how can I ever say this to you in person? You have the right to know the truth, but I can’t bear the pain I know I’ll see, the shock and disappointment. I don’t think I can bear having you look at me like I’m tainted in some way.
How do you explain what I don’t even understand? I received some shocking news, so I went home to find out the truth. Dad was apparently filing for divorce before his stroke and if that wasn’t enough, I found out something even more devastating. Something I can’t even write here.
Mom wasn’t at the house, but Brandon was. I was pretty hysterical, crying and everything, so he offered me a drink.
I swear I only had the one drink, but the next thing I knew it was many hours later and I woke up in bed with Brandon. Oh, God, Jake, I’m so sorry. I would give anything to take it back. I don’t even remember what happened. I must have passed out or blacked out or something.
Please, please believe that I would never have consciously betrayed our marital vows. I would never have cheated on you, not for anything in the world. I pray that you will be able to forgive me. I pray that you won’t give up on us, but I know that this will be such a shock, such a horrible, nightmare of a shock. I am filled with such guilt and shame. Every time you touch me, I feel as if I’m betraying you all over again.
And because of this, I know I will never be able to give you this letter. I just can’t destroy what we have. I know that is horribly selfish of me, but I can’t. May God have mercy on me.
Zoë
Jake curled the letter into his fist and closed his eyes, hunching his shoulders. He didn’t think he was capable of feeling any more pain, any more anguish, but he was. The guilt she carried with her up until the moment she died. The pain she must have been hiding. And he’d never done anything to help her, to find out why.
“Dude,” came a voice beside him and a hand closed on his shoulder. “You okay?”
Jake realized his face was wet and he rubbed the tears away with the back of his fist. “Yeah,” he said, but his voice was strained. “Yeah, I’m okay. Where are we?”
“Divisadero and Pacific Avenue.”
“Thanks.” He forced himself to take a few deep breaths, then he smoothed her letter out on his thighs again. He reached for her journal, folded it in half, and placed it inside, then he returned them both to the backpack.
If he ever saw Brandon Dixon again, that son-of-a-bitch was dead.
* * *
Peyton set the tablet on the desk and sank into her desk chair, pressing the button on her desktop to boot it up. Marco took a seat across from her, swiveling to study the white board.
Maria wandered over to them and leaned a hip on Marco’s desk. “Hey, Marco baby,” she said, “Captain wants an update on the case as soon as you get a moment.”
Peyton frowned at her as she typed her password into the keyboard.
“We’re working on something right now, Maria,” said Marco, “but as soon as we find out, we’ll check in with her.”
“Hey, Maria,” Peyton said. “I could use a cup of coffee. No cream, but at least a tablespoon of sugar.”
Maria sneered at Peyton. “Captain was pissed this morning,” she said. “Talking about taking your badge.”
Peyton smiled. “I’d also like a donut, chocolate if we got it.”
“Kiss my ass,” hissed Maria, walking away.
Peyton
caught the shaking of Marco’s head before she focused on the screen. She typed in the California Department of Public Health website address. “Hey, look through the file and see if we have Zoë’s social.”
Marco swiveled around and reached for the file. He thumbed a few pages, then called out the numbers for her. Peyton typed them into the birth certificate form. She reached for a pencil as she waited for the website to think, drumming the eraser on her desk blotter.
“You see Devan last night after we went for drinks?” asked Marco, leaning back in his chair and hooking his hands behind his head.
“Nope. I went home and took Pickles for a walk. Devan offered to come over, but I needed a night alone. What’d you do after we left the bar?”
“I had a pizza and a couple of beers with my brother, Vinnie, then went home.”
Peyton gave him a smile. She’d rarely seen a family as close as the D’Angelos were. They all lived within blocks of each other and regularly went to Mom and Dad’s for Sunday dinner. She envied it.
Peyton wished things were different with her mom, but what could she do? She didn’t like her mom’s new boyfriend and she wasn’t going to quit her job. She called her at least once a week, but the conversations were stilted. Still she called. She needed to check in at least that often and make sure everything was all right.
Zoë’s name came up on the screen and Peyton scrolled the mouse over to it. She clicked on the link and a birth certificate unfolded before her. She scanned it quickly, reading Zoë’s given name, date of birth, hospital name, delivery doctor, then her parents.
Peyton’s eyes widened and she leaned closer to the screen. “Come here,” she said to Marco.
He swiveled around the desk and looked over her shoulder. “What am I looking for?”
Peyton pointed. “Check out her parents.”
Marco squinted, then leaned back and let out a low whistle. “What the hell?”
Peyton scrolled through the form, then came back to Zoë’s parents. “Who the hell is Annabelle Harper?”
“Obviously, Zoë Harper’s birth mother.”
Peyton minimized the screen and pulled up a new one. She typed Annabelle Harper into the search engine, but nothing came up. She clicked back into the Department of Public Health and punched Marriage Certificates. She typed in Blake Harper’s name because she didn’t know what Annabelle Harper’s maiden name might have been. Two entries came up for Blake Harper. Peyton clicked the first and studied the form that appeared on the screen.
“Give me Zoë’s date of birth.”
Marco snagged the folder off his desk and read off Zoë’s birthdate.
“They were married two years before Zoë was born,” said Peyton.
“What about a divorce settlement?”
Peyton pulled up the Department of Public Heath again and clicked Divorce Records. She typed in Blake’s name.
The computer thought.
Peyton chewed on her lower lip, then turned to Marco. “I wasn’t kidding about the coffee. Do you want some?”
“Sure.”
She pushed away from the desk and walked into the break room. Grabbing two mugs, she set them on the counter and reached for the coffee pot, filling them. Marco liked his black, but she grabbed the sugar and spooned a heaping tablespoon into her mug. Glancing over her shoulder to make sure Marco didn’t see, she dumped in a second spoonful and stirred it.
Stopping with the spoon still in the mug, she studied the swirling coffee. She could see her dad in her memory – barrel-chested with short cropped black hair. He wore a mustache and a soul patch just beneath his lower lip.
Always look at the obvious, Sweetness. He would touch her on the nose with the tip of his index finger.
Sweetness, his homage to his favorite running-back, Walter Payton. He’d tricked Alice into naming his daughter after the legend by changing the a to an e. No matter how old she’d been, Peyton always melted when he called her Sweetness.
Always look at the obvious, then when you’ve done that, look at the unexpected.
Look at the unexpected. She tossed the spoon into the sink and carried the mugs to their desks. Marco accepted his and shook his head. “I tried Annabelle’s name too, but I can’t find any record of a divorce.”
“That’s because there wasn’t one.” She took a sip of coffee as she sank into her seat. She clicked on the home page and hovered over the last choice on the left side. Death Certificates. She had to search by Annabelle’s name, since she knew they wouldn’t have her social security number in their file.
The cursor turned from an arrow into a wheel, spinning around, then the screen shifted and a list of Annabelles appeared. Marco sucked in a breath, but she ignored him, clicking on Annabelle Harper. Peyton realized her heart was pounding as she waited for the death certificate file to load.
As it spread across the screen, Marco set his coffee down hard on the desk.
There before them was the death record of a woman they didn’t know existed ten minutes before.
“What’s the date?” asked Marco.
Peyton searched for it, then she snagged their file on Zoë and scanned the first page with her index finger. “Two days after Zoë was born.”
“You’re sure?”
Peyton nodded, chewing on her lower lip.
“Cause of death?”
Peyton searched for that, then swiveled her chair to face Marco. “Complications from child birth.”
“What does that mean?”
Peyton shook her head. “We need a warrant for her medical records.”
“I’ll get on it.” He swiveled his chair back to his side and reached for his phone.
“I’ll call Abe and let him know he should expect it.”
Marco keyed in the number and put the phone to his ear. “You know, Brooks…” He gave her a narrow-eyed look. “We should probably get Blake Harper’s medical records while we’re at it.”
Peyton hesitated. Do you know what a shunt is, Officer? I think I do. It’s too remove excess fluid, right? Blake Harper has a shunt because his brain is bleeding into his cranial cavity.
“On it,” she said, grabbing her phone out of her pocket. She felt a surge of adrenaline. This was the part of an investigation that she loved – when it all started to coalesce.
CHAPTER 12
Jake got off the bus at the juncture of Divisadero and Green. He wanted to be far enough away from the lawyer’s office before he made the call. He watched the bus pull away, then reached for his cell phone. He hadn’t turned it on since he slipped the police in the Italian restaurant. He didn’t know how long he could talk before they found his location through GPS, but he was afraid it might be instantaneous.
He closed his eyes and tried to decide if this was the best option. Then he thought of the letter from Zoë and knew there wasn’t a decision to make. She deserved better than she’d gotten from him. He couldn’t make it up to her now, but he could try to settle a score.
He dug in the bottom of the backpack and found Peyton’s card. With a deep breath, he turned on the phone, then quickly dialed her number. It rang at least five times. Jake almost hung up. His stomach hurt and he felt like he might be sick.
Then he heard her voice. “Brooks?”
“Hey, Mighty Mouse.” He tried to sound confident, but he felt a flush of anxiety race through him.
“Jake? Where the hell are you? We need you to come in. A lot of cops are looking for you. You’ve got our asses in a sling and the captain is chewing us out at regular intervals. Claire Harper has been screaming to every available ear. They’re going to turn up the heat on you now. It was right stupid to go to her house and ask her for money.”
“Listen. I need you to know something…”
“Where are you? Tell me that first and we can talk.”
“I’m not going to tell you where I am.”
“We can protect you, Jake. I’m not kidding you. Claire is demanding we bring you in. You really scared her the othe
r day and someone might get hurt if you don’t turn yourself in.”
“Please just listen to me for a moment…”
“We checked out the birth certificate like you asked. I’d like to share that information with you. We found out something more than you did.”
“Wait. What?”
“Come in and I’ll tell you everything. Just tell me where you are and I’ll send a squad car over. You must be tired and hungry. I can get you something to eat, a shower maybe…”
Jake lowered the phone. He wanted to know what information they’d found, but it could be a trick. She always sounded genuine and kind, but he’d seen her turn in an instant. Then he realized what she was doing. She was stalling so that a squad car could get to his location.
He lifted the phone to his ear again. “Just shut up for a minute, all right?”
She went quiet.
“Zoë had a journal and at the back of it was a letter for me. If you do a blood test on Brandon Dixon, I’ll bet you find out his blood is B. Sometime in late January, Zoë went to see her mother, but she wasn’t home. That bastard Brandon was. He offered her a drink and she didn’t remember anything else after that until she woke up in bed with him.”
Peyton didn’t respond for a few moments, then he heard her exhale. “Zoë had a journal? I need to see that journal, Jake.”
“No, the journal is mine. It’s all I have left of Zoë, but you’ve got to test Brandon’s blood. I’m sure he’s the father. He forced her, Peyton, he must have drugged her and forced her to sleep with him.”
“Okay, Jake, I’ll look into it, but I still need you to come in. Please, Jake, I don’t want you to get hurt. You need to turn yourself in now and let me handle this.”
“You won’t handle anything once you have me. I know that. Claire is putting pressure on you to finish this case and it’ll be too tempting just to pin it on me, but if you can’t find me, you might keep looking. That’s all I’ve got, Peyton. That’s all I can do to force your hands.”
Murder on Potrero Hill (Peyton Brooks' Series Book 1) Page 19
