Beth judged Van Ness to be the quickest route to Jordan’s house in Noe Valley, but by the time she reached the O’Farrell Street intersection, traffic was hopelessly entangled, and a uniformed police officer was waving traffic east to avoid an accident ahead.
The convoy of vehicles crawled along O’Farrell, giving Beth the opportunity to read a painted mural outside one of the city’s porn palaces. Admission is limited to adults who will not be offended should they observe any type of sexual activity.
Reflexively, Beth pushed the button for her automatic door locks. As she did so, she noticed movement in the doorway under the theatre’s marquee. A man emerged from the shadows. He wore a pale green checked leisure suit, beige straw fedora. Though the hat was angled oddly over the man’s face, Beth had no difficulty recognizing Rex McKenna.
Her first impulse was to hunch behind the wheel so Rex wouldn’t see her. Their next meeting would be uncomfortable enough, with only one item on the agenda: the NSF cheque. But Rex’s gaze remained fixed on the sidewalk.
What Rex McKenna did in his spare time was none of her business. Still, if he poured his cash into establishments like the one she’d just driven by, and if he wasn’t attracting new clients or doing anything to keep the old ones, she just might have her sample room sooner than she thought.
15
Manuel Fuentes propped his feet on Jim Kearns’s desk. His Senior Inspector status allowed him that privilege. Too, he and Kearns had once been partners, in the early days, before Kearns had cut the determined swath through to lieutenant. “Still can’t smell him, can you, Jimmy?” Fuentes’s black eyes were dull, all the usual spark gone.
“Not a whiff. You?”
Fuentes shook his head.
Kearns was doodling on a pad of yellow paper. He had been in his thinking posture for close to an hour, fingers laced behind his neck, gaze focused on the ceiling. When his neck began to stiffen, he switched to doodling. Now, he took a good hard look at Fuentes who was rolling a wad of gum between his index finger and thumb. “That bitch Devereaux is right, Manny. This guy scares me.”
“Why should you be immune? We’re all scared. Don’t let Devereaux get to you.” He shot the gum into the garbage can.
“You mean she’s still alive? Damn.”
Though it had been two days since Kearns had watched Devereaux’s video, he was still plagued by strobe-like images of the woman, shrieking her opinions at the masses. It hadn’t taken long for other members of the media to follow Devereaux’s lead and jump on the barbecue-the-cops bandwagon. This afternoon’s Examiner had published “Dispirited Police Seek Public Understanding” on its front page. Kearns had been quoted: “The police always make the news when the public perceives us to be unresponsive, and when the public’s afraid. Now, more than ever, we require the support of our citizens. The force is working round the clock, pursuing every lead, following up dozens of phone calls, to catch this criminal.”
In the article, the reporter cited several recent instances where police were being held accountable for their vices. One inspector was currently doing community service and spending several weekends in jail after hitting her live-in lover over the head with a full jug of Almaden. Another, who worked in the Juvenile Bureau educating kids about alcohol and drugs, had been arrested for drunk driving.
“There have been mistakes made,” Kearns acknowledged to the press. “The police force is constantly held up to scrutiny. The best of us can fall from the pedestal. I assure the public that corrective measures as well as preventive ones are being taken to provide the best law enforcement possible.”
Kearns had assumed the article would generate empathy and support from the public. Instead, it merely served to make the police look inept and weak. Now, with frustrations at epidemic high and morale at rock bottom, that traditional back-patting, shoulder-punching camaraderie among fellow cops, though superficial, was nearly non-existent. If the public’s desire for a macho, fearless police force was strong, the determination to maintain this image was trebled within the task force itself. Kearns’s team would compensate for this latest attack on their infallibility and puff their chests with adolescent bravado.
Everything Kearns had worked so hard to change had come undone with the press’s coverage of the murders. At all costs, Kearns had to continue to conceal his depression, his use of Paxil, and his visits to a therapist.
Fuentes shook his head. “I don’t know how much more of this cop-slamming any of us can take.”
Too often, Kearns was overhearing complaints from his team. The vicap forms were too long, took forever to fill out. No one wanted to be bothered, and what was the use anyway? Kearns praised his task force when he could, and gave them shit when he had to, though recently, the latter was more the norm. If he had to offer them chocolate cake, then stab them with the fork, well, that was an inconsistency they would have to live with. Kearns was determined there would be no repeat of the Green River Killer fiasco, the Seattle madman who eluded capture because of monstrous egos and law enforcement’s refusal to share information between jurisdictions. All the cracks would be sealed, and if it took a rainforest of paperwork and thousands of telephone calls, that was a price worth paying.
Kearns stared at the sheet of yellow paper he’d been doodling on. The page was covered with drawings of spiders.
“Your artwork’s improving, Jimmy, but it’s getting us nowhere,” Fuentes said.
Fuentes, along with everyone else, was fed up with the investigation’s inertia. Kearns saw the stress building daily, and now Fuentes was in it up to his eyeballs, with much of his frustration directed at Kearns. “Let’s go over what we’ve got and see if anything fresh surfaces,” he said, the futility of the suggestion clear in his voice.
Kearns resisted a groan, yawned instead, then forced himself to sit up straight. Time for the Kearns-Fuentes tango, where each would take turns reciting what they knew, hoping that, hearing a phrase reworded, a fact presented from a different voice, something important might be triggered. Kearns hoped that with a positive attitude, the exercise in tedium might yield more than a yawn and the desire for a Johnny Walker’s. He stifled a second yawn.
“Five victims,” Fuentes began. “All with WASP names. Two blondes, two brunettes, one redhead.”
“Esthetician, flight attendant, model, salesgirl, dancer,” Kearns chanted, trying to muster enthusiasm. Fuentes had chosen the victimology route, hoping that the women’s profiles would somehow create a link to the killer’s psyche.
“Occupations requiring some level of physical attractiveness—”
“They were lookers, all right. But they didn’t know any of the same people, none had steady boyfriends — God, it feels so good every time I bang my head against a wall.”
“They were more than just pretty, Jimmy. They worked hard to enhance their femaleness.”
“What?”
“Each of them presented her best face and body to the public. They were all in excellent physical shape, they had great skin —”
“Where’s this going, Manny?”
“Remember Lydia Price? Salesgirl’s wages. Not big bucks. What did her older brother tell us she liked to spend money on?”
Kearns scratched his head and tried to conjure an image of Price’s brother, sort his face out from among the hundreds of friends and relatives he had interviewed. “Got it,” he said. “Clothes. Simple, classic jewellery — bought a Stairmaster the week before she died.”
“See? Not just attractive. Worked at it.”
“So we’re after a killer who hates women because they treat themselves to a few niceties? Come on.” As soon as he’d uttered the statement, Kearns realized where Fuentes was going.
“Maybe the killer sees these women as selfish.”
Kearns let the idea settle, then nodded. “Could be something there.”
“Abducted on different days of the week,” Fuentes continued, “on average once a month since April. It’s like some bizarre menstrual
cycle. ’Cept he missed his period in May.”
Kearns nodded. It was thought that some serial killers operated on a kind of hormonal timetable. “Kept the women alive for three to eight days. And no one anywhere reported hearing any screams.”
“Not yet, anyway. The women bled to death either in silence or in isolation. Where’s he getting the anticoagulants?”
“We’ve been through that,” Kearns said, frustrated. “No report of theft from any of the hospitals or pharmacies.”
“He could have access — he could be a doc. Or work in a drugstore.”
“Or, like you and me, visits his local hardware store for a supply of water-soluble rat poison.” Kearns changed tack. “Why were victims’ bodies dropped or made to roll downhill?” This was a new twist, something neither had thought of. “Natalie Gorman was displayed in a fountain. Ironic, considering her profession. The only body not toppled from some height. But what if the killer hadn’t intended to leave her there? Maybe he planned to drop her down the Filbert Street steps.”
“Or the Greenwich Street steps.” Fuentes’s eyes lit up. Both sets of stairs led from the Coit Tower parking lot. The Spiderman had been successful in dumping Lydia Price on the opposite side.
“But something went wrong.”
“The Filbert steps are narrow,” offered Fuentes. “Body wouldn’t roll far without getting stuck. Not the effect he’d be going for.”
“Too many houses near the Greenwich stairs. Lots of picture windows,” Kearns recalled, having scouted the area after Price’s death. “He’d be seen. So he drives around to the bottom of the hill and leaves her in Levi Plaza.”
Fuentes’s index fingers tapped rhythmically at his temples. “What would that do to you, Jimmy,” he said, clearly agitated, “if you were a killer, a stylist with a plan, a vision, and you had to settle for something less than your best …”
“I’d be pissed off,” Kearns said simply. “I’d plan the next one better, cruise around for a perfect spot, make sure the act, from beginning to end, fulfilled my fantasy.”
“Right. And if this guy’s sticking to schedule, we better get our shit together. It’s already October. Can’t afford to let his homicidal PMS kick in again.”
“Time to get back to the phones and follow up on our countless leads, you know, the ones we keep telling everyone we have.” He heard the bitterness in his own voice. Kearns didn’t relish another chunk of time spent calling crackpots, but he was fresh out of creative alternatives. He felt the energy drain from him, fatigue settling on him like a wet shroud. “Like we’re not busy enough,” he added, “now I find out there’s another nut on the loose.”
“Yeah? Where?”
“Someone’s writing nasty letters to Beth Wells. Signs ’em ‘the Spiderman.’”
“And?”
“So I had to check it out.”
“Personally? Why not send one of the plebes?”
“She’s a nice lady, Manny. A … friend. And she was freaked out.”
Fuentes removed his feet from Kearns’s desk, his expression full of concern.
“What’s that look?” Kearns asked.
“Listen,” Fuentes began, “don’t take my head off. One, the Spiderman’s huge news. Two, you’re the big cheese at the centre of the investigation, a local celebrity. Three, Beth Wells wouldn’t be the first woman to fall for a big, strong heroic type like you.”
“What’s your point, Manny?”
“My point is, maybe the lovely Beth Wells is writing the letters to herself.”
16
Once Beth extricated herself from the snarl of downtown traffic, she put the sleazy vision of Rex McKenna behind her and thought about Jordan Bailey.
It amazed her how vividly his image came to her, even in the middle of a working day with customers all around. Jordan was tall, with brown hair cropped short, which only made his eyes all the more noticeable, eyes that drew her in, mesmerized her past the point of caring. They’d had only two dates, once for lunch, the next for dinner, both to discuss decorating Jordan’s house. They’d talked about everything but. Finally, it was agreed Beth should come and see his place, and now she hoped they could get the business part over with quickly.
Ginny was right. Beth usually resisted beginning relationships, often refusing second dates from perfectly decent men because they failed to captivate her instantly. “Can’t you date a few Mr. In-Betweens while you wait for Mr. Right?” Ginny would wail.
No, it seemed, she couldn’t. But when Jordan walked into Personal Touch Interiors, after Beth had spotted him pacing the sidewalk outside on three separate occasions, she was ready to strap him into a chair so he wouldn’t leave. He had been getting up the nerve to come inside, he’d said.
Now, two weeks later, she was paying a house call, and she was nervous, too. As she steered the Audi through the steep streets of Upper Noe, she wondered about the home that Jordan had described as a fixer-upper. She was not ready for what she found.
The house, painted Wedgwood blue, was a classic example of San Francisco Stick architecture. Tones of plum, greyish-turquoise, and cream accented the ornate trim. A milk glass lantern hung from a brass chain, illuminating the front porch, its delicate archway resembling a crown of pearls. No detail had been overlooked; even the discs that flanked a bay window had been painted in gold leaf, like a collection of coins.
Beth lingered in her car, drinking in the façade. It was warm, inviting, and knowing what she did about houses and their owners, Beth assumed this place reflected something about Jordan. From the outside, the fixer-upper was a showpiece. Maybe the inside needed gutting. She shut off the engine and got out of the car.
Jordan, wearing snug faded jeans and a white cotton shirt, greeted her from the doorway with a broad smile. As she passed him, she caught a trace of musky cologne and turned toward him. His feathery kiss brushed her forehead, and she had to remind herself that this was primarily a business meeting.
“Nice to see you again.” Quickly, he closed the door and ushered her inside.
It was the kind of house you could sink into when the fog wrapped itself around the city. Standing in the warmly lit foyer, with a partial view into the front parlour, Beth thought Jordan had gone a long way to creating the sanctuary he claimed to crave.
Each room on the ground floor was as lovely as the next. A gas fireplace burned brightly in the living room. The dining room displayed a magnificent lin-crusta wallcovering at the cornice, producing an elegant frieze effect. The kitchen was a chef’s dream. Even Jordan’s furniture, an eclectic mix of Empire, Eastlake, and Mission oak pieces, suited the house perfectly.
A bottle of white wine stood on the central island in the kitchen, chilling in a ceramic cooler. “Like to see the upstairs?”
She preceded him up the front staircase, his hand holding her elbow as they climbed the narrow steps. The rich wooden banister felt cool and smooth. Jordan’s closeness was overwhelming, and when they reached the top of the stairs, he didn’t move away, but kept a strong hand on the small of her back as he guided her from room to room.
Beth expected to see at least one room torn apart, plaster removed to the bare struts. Two of the bedrooms were small, one converted into a study. Each had been recently redone. She recognized the wall-coverings from a brand-new collection.
The upstairs bath had an authentic clawfoot tub raised on a platform in the centre of the room. Beth’s attempts to remain professionally detached evaporated. She was overpowered by a vision of sharing a soak in the tub with Jordan, candles lit.
“A bit unconventional, I suppose.”
“What?” Beth asked.
“The tub. In the middle of the room like that. But when you’re in it, you feel like you’re on an island. A great stress-buster. Come on, one more room to go.”
Jordan’s master bedroom was spacious. Facing the rear yard was a large bay window; in its recess, a wood and brass telescope was mounted on a tripod.
“Go ahead,” he u
rged. “The view is spectacular.”
Beth went over to the telescope and peered through. Several neighbouring houses came sharply into view. “Ever see anything kinky with this thing?” Instantly, she regretted the question. Ginny was beginning to rub off on her.
Jordan laughed. “Women in hair curlers, mostly.”
“Disappointing.”
“Not to me,” he answered, his voice suddenly close to her ear. “Hair curlers turn me on.”
Beth moved toward the carved cherry posts of Jordan’s antique bed, wondering how she was ever going to get out of this room without flinging herself at him, when the doorbell rang.
“You haven’t eaten, have you?” he asked her.
She shook her head.
“Then dinner is served. This way.”
She followed him back down the stairs, staring a moment longer than was proper at the way his jeans fit, the pale denim clinging to muscular thighs. Very businesslike, she told herself. Who was she kidding?
Minutes later, a bottle of wine was uncorked, and a meal was set out picnic-style on the carpet before the fireplace.
“Salmon teriyaki, nikuyasai, tonkatsu,” Jordan said, pointing at each dish. “Okay?”
“If you say so,” Beth replied, lowering herself onto the carpet and tucking her legs under her. She opened her packet of chopsticks. “As long as you don’t tell me afterward there are snails in here. I won’t eat anything that has to carry its own house.”
“You’d probably want to decorate it,” he teased. He settled in cross-legged, opposite her.
“Speaking of decoration, exactly which room did you want my advice on, the hall closet?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your home is beautiful just the way it is.”
“Maybe I needed a professional to reassure me,” he said, levelling his gaze at her.
Every Wickedness Page 6
