He kissed her, tasting the bitter hops on her tongue. She leaned into him, and he into her, until they ended up against the refrigerator. He knew the moment she was his, the moment she seemed to melt in his arms as though her knees had suddenly grown weak. Their breathing turned ragged, even more so when Casey slipped his hand beneath her sweater, running his fingertips across her smooth skin, upward until he reached the lace of her bra. She tilted her head back, closing her eyes.
Her breath caught as he ran his thumb up and over her breast. “Are you sure it’s been a while?” she asked and might have laughed. He couldn’t tell. But then she pushed him back, and he wondered what he’d done wrong.
“Bedroom,” she said.
That he understood, and she grasped him by the hand, leading the way from the kitchen down the hall, stopping suddenly, drawing him back to the kitchen. She grabbed a white paper bag on the counter then led him down the hall to her bedroom. She pushed him back on the bed, tossed the bag next to his head. “Condoms…”
The realization that she’d planned everything down to the last detail intoxicated him. And then she pulled off her sweater, climbed on top of him, her control absolute as she straddled him wearing only her black lace bra and blue jeans. He couldn’t have moved if he’d wanted to. Her kiss resonated through him, every nerve in his body taut. She loosened his tie, worked at his shirt buttons, and finally unbuckled his belt.
And the moment she slipped her hand into the open zipper, the moment he felt the heat of her fingers on him, his cell phone buzzed. He ignored it.
She raised up on one elbow beside him. “You’re not getting that?”
“If…it’s important…they’ll—”
She moved her hand lower then smiled. “They’ll what?”
It was a moment before he could even breathe. “…Call…back.”
And then, as though fate had been hovering over them, just waiting for the right moment, the phone buzzed again.
He dug the phone from his pocket, hoping like hell it was his mother reminding him that he promised to come to dinner that weekend. Something inane that he could blow off.
Al’s number showed up on the screen.
Casey closed his eyes. “Sorry.”
She smiled as he answered the phone.
“Sorry, kid,” Al said. “Dinner break’s over.”
“For what?”
“What’d ya think? They found the stolen truck at the Presidio. Pick me up at the office. They’re standing by until we get there.”
Casey dropped the phone to the bed. He didn’t say anything at first, then, “I knew I shouldn’t have answered it.”
Becca zipped up his pants, then nuzzled at his neck. “Anticipation. Think how much better it’ll be.”
“I’d rather find out now.”
She smiled then reached over him, grabbing her sweater.
He watched as she slid it on over her head, her breasts just visible over the top of her black lace bra, then hidden from view as she pulled the sweater down.
“What?” she asked, apparently noticing his stare.
“You might be wearing a uniform to work, but all I’ll be able to think about is that black lace bra.”
Her smile was decidedly wicked. “Finish dressing. I’m making you my famous gourmet microwave pizza before you go.”
“Guess I was here for the food after all.”
The one advantage of working at night was that the city was actually fairly easy to get around without the added commuters. He picked up Al at the Hall, then drove to the Presidio, where access to the bridge vista was still closed off. Casey pulled up, showed his star to the uniformed officer manning the barrier erected across the street. The officer moved it far enough for Casey to drive through then replaced it when they drove past.
“Where to?” Casey asked Al.
“Other side of the freeway.”
Casey drove through the deserted main parking lot, then under the freeway to the west side. “Just up a ways,” Al said. “It’s the parking lot on Cranston Road.”
“No wonder we didn’t see it. Never made it this far.”
“Wouldn’t have mattered. They ran every vehicle over here, too. It was cold-plated. Just a lot easier to find considering it was the only vehicle left in the lot. After I called in the BOLO tonight, a smart patrolman did an area check and ran the VIN.”
Casey pulled into the lot and parked near the black-and-white, where a patrolman sat writing reports. Al went over to talk to the officer, and Casey popped the trunk to retrieve a flashlight from his gear box.
He turned it on, walked up to the truck, aimed the beam into the passenger side window, then tried to open the passenger door. It was locked. He focused on the center console, saw some papers, coins, and an open soda can in the cup holder. Other than that, nothing to be seen, and he walked around to the driver’s side, locked as well. “Nothing.”
Al joined him a moment later. “The officer called for a flatbed tow. Said it should be here anytime.”
It arrived about twenty minutes later, and the driver popped the locks with his slim-jim. Although the vehicle would be processed by CSIs at the impound lot for evidence in the case, Casey and Al donned latex gloves and did a quick preliminary search. Al was checking the contents of the glove box while Casey was fishing around beneath the driver’s seat. He felt something toward the back, reached in, and pulled out the original license plates.
He placed them on the driver’s seat, then reached beneath it again, this time finding a cell phone. He held it up. “The delivered phone his mom mentioned?”
“Let’s hope. Bag it up for forensics. If we’re lucky, we’ll find something good on there.”
EIGHT
Did you hear something?”
Marcie’s limbs felt heavy. It took a moment before her husband’s words registered in her brain. She opened her eyes, realized Devin was sitting up in bed beside her, his hand on her shoulder.
“Hear what?”
“I don’t know…” He threw off the covers, then walked over to the balcony door, pulling the curtains to look out.
“The cat…” Marcie glanced at the clock, saw it was after midnight, then rolled over, barely able to keep her eyes open.
“I’m going to check.”
She heard him padding down the stairs, too tired to care; then she was vaguely aware that he’d returned to bed a minute or two later.
“Everything’s locked,” he said.
She reached up, tucked the pillow beneath her head, and closed her eyes, recalling nothing more until morning.
Light seeped in through the sheer curtains at the balcony door, and she glanced over at the windows, the eucalyptus bathed in the early sun.
Devin was still asleep next to her, and she quietly rose from bed, grabbed her robe, used the bathroom, then went downstairs to start coffee. The moment she walked into the kitchen, she noticed the back door slightly ajar. Devin had gone to bed before her, and she was certain she’d checked all the doors before heading upstairs.
What was it that had woken her?
Devin had heard something last night. He’d gone down to check…
She walked over, the tile cold beneath her feet, wondering if perhaps he hadn’t closed it tightly. Maybe the wind sweeping in from the bay blew it open.
But when she examined the door, it wasn’t locked at all. She stepped outside to the back porch. At first everything seemed fine, but then she noticed a bit of dirt on the bricks next to one of the many flowerpots lined up by the door. The spare key…She eyed the pot where it should be, lifted it, saw the key, picked it up, then shoved it in her pocket.
Had someone known it was there, entered, then replaced it on leaving? To what end? Nothing else seemed disturbed in the backyard, and she returned inside, locked the door, then started taking inventory of everything downstairs.
/>
Nothing obvious appeared to be missing. Her purse was hanging from the back of a chair at the dining-room table. All her money and credit cards seemed to be there.
What then?
“Marce?”
Marcie spun around at Devin’s voice.
He continued down the stairs, his face etched with worry. “What’s wrong?”
“The back door was open.”
“Impossible. I checked everything after I heard that noise. It was locked. Maybe I didn’t shut it tight and the wind blew it open.”
“It wasn’t even locked when I checked.”
His gaze narrowed slightly as he passed her, making a beeline to the back door. He opened it, looked around. “This is weird. The key—?”
“I have it.”
“We’re not keeping it outside anymore. Is anything missing?”
“I don’t think so.” She walked into the living room and turned on the television, more out of habit than anything else, because the last thing she wanted to hear about was a rehash of Trudy’s murder. And yet there it was, the camera panning over the running trail where Trudy was killed.
She stood, transfixed, somewhat aware that Devin had come up beside her, also watching as the perfectly coifed newswoman reported.
“…police have not released any further information concerning Darrell Fife, the man killed yesterday in the parking lot of the Golden Gate Bridge after being chased by homicide detectives into the path of an oncoming car. Fife is suspected in the murder of Trudy Salvatori, a campaign worker for the reelection of Congressman Parnell,” she said as a photo of Trudy flashed on the screen. “Standing by at Congressman Parnell’s campaign headquarters is Channel Two reporter Lacy Hudson. Lacy, any word from the Parnell team about the investigation?”
The picture shifted to the street outside the headquarters, its windows plastered with Reelect Parnell signs visible behind the perky brunette reporter. “Hi, Sarah. Yes. Congressman Parnell issued a public statement in a press release yesterday afternoon, stating that Trudy Salvatori, the woman killed near the Presidio, was a valued member of his campaign team and a true supporter of the causes Representative Parnell believed in, one of which was working to increase funding to police for the reduction of crime—”
Devin walked over, shut off the television. “I don’t like this, Marcie,” he said, facing her.
She turned and walked into the kitchen, thinking how surreal it all felt.
He followed her. “The police are looking at Trudy’s murder as part of that serial killer case. That Strangler. And then this,” he said, pointing to the now-closed kitchen door.
She glanced that direction, then back at him. Devin, who had always been so self-assured, smugly so at times, now seemed worried. “What does that have to do with us?”
“You were out there when Trudy was killed. What if you saw something? Someone? They could come after you.”
“That’s insane. They caught the guy who did it. He’s dead.”
“Is he? The police don’t even know if the man they chased is the one who killed her. What if whoever that was thinks you can identify him? How do you know he doesn’t already know who you are?”
She stared in disbelief. “Why would you even say that to me?”
“I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on.”
She took the pot from the coffee maker to the kitchen sink to rinse it, looking out the window as she had every morning, seeing Tony and Trudy’s kitchen through her blinds. Tony was sitting at his table. Alone. “What if Tony found out?” she asked.
“Found out what?”
“That Trudy was coming over here. What if he thought the same thing I did? That you were having an affair? They were getting divorced, after all.”
Devin joined her at the window, peering through the blinds. “I don’t think he knew Trudy was coming here.”
She filled the pot with water. “But what if he did? He and Trudy both knew where that key was.”
Devin reached up and closed the blinds. “We’re getting an alarm. Today. The kind with cameras. If you’re going to be here alone, I want to know you’re okay.” He glanced at the clock, then started from the room, saying, “I need to get ready for work. But I’ll call someone out this morning.”
Marcie took the decanter to the coffee maker, poured the cold water into it, then leaned against the counter, staring at the machine as it sputtered to life. When she heard Devin moving around upstairs, she returned to the window, cracking the blinds just enough to see through.
Tony was still there at his kitchen table. Alone. Not doing anything at all.
She reached into her pocket and felt for the key she’d removed from the back porch, if nothing else, to reassure herself that she hadn’t lost it.
And almost as if he knew she was watching him, he suddenly turned, glanced her direction.
She stepped back, out of view, surprised by how fast her heart was beating.
NINE
San Francisco Union-Examiner
Office of the Editor
Jenn Barstow stood in front of her editor’s desk, waiting for him to look up from his computer screen. He didn’t. Just grabbed his coffee, took a sip, then said, “You wanted something?”
Sometimes she felt invisible. Or close to it. “I was wondering if you’d mind if I attended the press conference this afternoon.”
He looked up. “Is this about the dead hookers?”
“Yes.”
“The answer is no. Dead hookers don’t sell papers. Murdered white women do. Besides, your job is local politics.”
“Yesterday’s victim worked for a politician.”
“I have a crime reporter. Translation? The only way you’re getting a byline on a homicide is if that politician did it. Until then, I’d suggest getting back to what you’re supposed to be writing about.”
She backed from the room—not that he was paying her any further attention—then returned to her cubicle.
Taryn, in the cubicle directly behind hers, swiveled her chair around. “Success?”
Jenn gave her a thumb’s down as she dropped into her seat.
“So the alien life-form gets to go?” Taryn said, referring to Marty, their coworker who worked at the crime desk.
Both women glanced down the row of cubicles in that direction to see him eyeing them, the corners of his mouth turning up slightly as though he knew he was the topic of discussion. “Who else?”
“The crime desk should have been yours.”
“Lot of good that does me now.” Jenn tapped the space bar on her keyboard to wake up her computer. Even though their editor admitted that she was the better writer, in his opinion the male-dominated police world was more suited to a man, and so the newly vacated position was given to Martin.
Jenn didn’t necessarily want it permanently. Only long enough to bring some attention to some older cases—one being a murdered prostitute. For her it wasn’t the fact the woman was a prostitute, it was the story behind the woman, the choices she made and the choices refused to her.
It was going to be her Pulitzer.
But as Jenn’s editor had just pointed out, dead hookers did not make for sensationalistic journalism. Kill a white housewife on the streets of San Francisco? Golden. Make one of the recent victims a tourist by twisting the facts as Marty did in his last article? Suddenly the Strangler was the national topic du jour. The third victim, a former New Yorker, had recently relocated to the Bay Area and had been living in the area for at least six months. That small detail about her residence was left out of his article, and his unfortunate and incorrect statement about her being a tourist at a landmark was picked up by a nightly news show in Los Angeles, then the Today show the following morning. Suddenly no one was safe in the city.
And that was exactly how her editor wanted it. The jump in sa
les anytime the Strangler was mentioned in a headline was enough to convince him that serial murders of white women were good for business. And when this fourth murder at the Presidio came to light yesterday, he didn’t care that the case had not yet been determined to be a Strangler victim. He was, however, smart enough to make sure he wasn’t accused of printing unverified facts, and so he had changed his first choice of headline from Strangler Strikes Again to Strangler Strikes Again?
What Jenn couldn’t figure out was why no one else seemed to notice or care that the current victims were killed in a manner that closely resembled that of the prostitute she had hoped to write about. So her victim wasn’t sitting under a specific landmark. But then, really, were any of these victims?
Or was she being too hopeful? Reading too much into something that wasn’t there, because she desperately wanted there to be a connection? Maybe then they’d solve it and absolve her of some of her guilt. Or was it more that she wanted them to solve it and allow her to write the article she’d hoped to write?
“Alien alert,” Taryn said, pretending to shuffle papers as Marty approached.
Jenn closed out the windows before he could see what she was looking at. She needn’t have bothered, because he made a beeline for the TV, then stood there watching the news coverage of the Presidio murder, the screen filled with yesterday’s film bites of the police detectives standing in the midst of an accident scene in the parking lot below the Golden Gate Bridge gift shop. It was the younger detective Jenn focused on.
Apparently Taryn noticed him as well. “There he is, the key to your Pulitzer.”
“Shut up, Taryn.” She glanced around, hoping no one heard.
“You’re going to waste your career and talent if you let this opportunity slip by. You have the connection. Use it.”
“No. I already feel guilty enough just cultivating it.”
“That doesn’t make you evil, just smart.”
Then why did it feel so underhanded?
“Just go,” Taryn said. “You probably won’t even be missed. You sort of blend into the background anyway.”
The Last Good Place Page 6
