Five O'Clock Twist

by Joanne Pence

  “I knew it was too easy,” Richie said. “Whoever broke in here knows a lot about how this spa operates. Almost like an inside job, or something.”

  “True,” Rebecca said. She couldn’t help but wonder if the robbery investigator who thought Kiki knew someone, or something, and wasn’t saying, might be on the right track.

  Just then, there was some noise at the front door. The crime scene investigators had arrived.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Several months back, when Richie was working with Steve Burlington on a messy ‘situation’ involving his wife and his mistress, he had learned that everyday around noon, Burlington could be found sitting at the bar of the Comstock Saloon on Columbus near Pacific Avenue. Now, Richie entered the bar and, right on schedule, there sat Burlington.

  Richie liked the Comstock. With its massive hundred-year old bar and antique furnishings, it looked like something out of the Barbary Coast days when San Francisco was a rough-and-tumble Western town, not the chichi place it was today.

  He hadn’t really wanted to go to a bar in the afternoon, but he needed something to help him put Rebecca out of his mind for a while—and the bar’s “White Lily,” an old-time Comstock drink made of gin, rum, orange-flavored curacao, and absinthe, just might do it. Looking for Burlington gave him an excuse to get one.

  Richie took a seat next to Burlington. They greeted each other with jokes and jabs in the way of a couple of old friends in a bar. Only after catching up was over, and Richie took a sip of his “White Lily” did he bring up the reason for his visit.

  “I heard that you’re selling your Third Street office building to some foreign investors,” Richie said. “I’ve come across a couple other situations, too, with foreign investors. What the hell’s going on?”

  “Why? You interested?” Burlington asked. He was a beefy fellow with a blond pompadour-shaped toupee, expensive clothes, and wearing a pinky ring with an ice-cube size diamond. A real one. He made sure the ring caught the light as he reached for his drink.

  “Maybe,” Richie said, shifting his arm so that his Piaget watch could be seen. “Sounds like a lot of money is coming into the city.”

  “You got that right. I tell you, Russian and Middle Eastern money, including Iranian, were big, but now Chinese money is absolutely flooding this area. You got any junk you want to unload, this is the time to do it. I thought the goddamned Commies weren’t supposed to be rich, but these guys are Saudi-prince kind of wealthy. I don’t know what’s going on, but if they want my for-shit white elephant out on Third, I’m more than happy to unload it. And I’m getting a good price.”

  “So I’ve been hearing,” Richie said, growing increasingly interested. “How do you find the buyers?”

  “The crazy part is they goddamn found me,” Burlington said with a laugh. “I mean, holy shit, was that luck, or what? Apparently, they need to go through a broker of some kind. In my case, I use a realtor who works out everything. I mean everything. You should give her a call. Her name is Audrey Poole.”

  Richie drew in his breath. He could scarcely believe it. She always said she wanted to corner the market. It seemed she had—the very lucrative foreign investment market. “As a matter of fact, I’ve tried to reach her a couple times today. But her phone goes to voice mail. I tried her office, but same thing is happening. Do you know if she still lives in a condo up on Pacific Heights?”

  “You know about that place, huh?” Burlington gave him a broad, knowing smile. “Very few do, from what I understand.”

  “We used to be pretty good friends,” Richie admitted.

  “I’ll bet you were. I’ve heard she still lives out that way. I never had the pleasure of seeing it first hand, myself.”

  “Good,” Richie muttered, remembering the troubles this guy had when his mistress threatened to tell his wife about their $800,000 love nest unless he signed it over to her.

  Burlington laughed and slapped Richie on the back, apparently having similar flashbacks. “Anyway, I know that she often flies to China. She likes to convince buyers in person to use her offshore holding company as their investment vehicle. Maybe she’s not answering because that’s where she is.”

  Now, Richie was impressed. “Offshore holding company? You’re shitting me.”

  “Hell, no! That’s how foreign investors from ‘not-so-friendly’ countries get their money out of their country and then become property owners here without having to deal with our laws. When you get how it all works as a money machine, you’ll be amazed. Like I said, it might even be something you want to get into. On the side, if you know what I mean.”

  Richie was taken aback by the legal outlandishness of such a scheme. He didn’t know Audrey had it in her. “I’ll look into it,” he said. “That’s for sure.”

  o0o

  Rebecca stood in Dr. Evelyn Ramirez’s laboratory waiting for the autopsy to begin. Both Homicide and the ME’s space were in the Hall of Justice building. Rebecca spent more time than she would have liked down in the basement laboratory since Bill Sutter claimed he had a weak stomach, which made it difficult for him to watch bodies being cut up. She was, therefore, the team’s “designated observer.” This autopsy was even more crucial than most because it should allow her to identify the victim.

  Last night at Kiki’s spa, as soon as possible, she had the CSI team process Richie’s fingerprints and then sent him out of there. She didn’t want him and Bill Sutter to face each other. The blood between them wasn’t simply bad, it was curdled.

  After filling in the crime scene unit’s Inspector Pacheco, Rebecca returned to Kiki’s office where Esteban waited.

  There, she tried to reach Kiki’s assistant, Inga Westergaard, but her phone went to messaging. Rebecca asked her to call as soon as possible.

  She then turned to Esteban. “Let’s go back to the cleaning service,” she said. “I don’t understand how they could have missed the body.” He found the company in the computer system.

  Rebecca phoned Evergreen Business Cleaning, and spoke to the owner. Jerome Gleason was filled with curiosity about what had happened at Kiki’s place, and asked Rebecca nearly as many questions as she did him. He also wondered when the spa would again open up.

  Rebecca told him what little she could, and then asked what conditions were like at the spa Saturday evening.

  “I don’t know. We weren’t there.”

  “I thought you went every night it was open.”

  “Usually, we do, but I got a call not to show up at the usual time.”

  “Who called you?” Rebecca asked.

  “The assistant, Inga.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Oh, yes,” Gleason said with a bit of a sigh in his voice. An amorous sigh, truth be told. He then added, “I’d know that accent anywhere. She said she had a late customer and she’d call when the spa was free so I could fit it into my schedule. But she never called back. Then yesterday, Mrs. Nuñez’s daughter called and told me the place would be closed until further notice.”

  Rebecca thanked him for his help.

  “Does that make sense to you?” she asked Esteban after relaying all she was told.

  “Not at all.”

  “Show me the appointment screen,” Rebecca said. “Let’s see who that late night customer was, if anyone.”

  Esteban opened the appointment software. At the end of the day, only one appointment was shown.

  It belonged to a person Rebecca had heard glowing words about from Richie: Audrey Poole.

  Shortly after that, Bill Sutter had shown up, immediately followed by the medical examiner’s team. Rebecca quickly filled both in on what she’d discovered.

  Dr. Evelyn Ramirez and Rebecca had worked so many cases together, they were becoming friends. They had gone out a few times for coffee or, after a particularly sad or ugly case, something stronger. Ramirez was an attractive woman, in her fifties, and divorced. It gave Rebecca pause when she looked around at the people she worked with and found that
nearly all had either never married or were divorced. It didn’t say good things about the compatibility of her chosen field and married life.

  Dr. Ramirez left the detectives to check on the body, but seconds later she called them back to her. “I need to speak to you both right now,” she said, standing beside the corpse. “This body is completely covered with dried mud. It’s hard as concrete.”

  “Yes, we know that,” Rebecca said, wishing Ramirez didn’t have the ability to make her feel like a misbehaving child.

  “I’m not taking the mud off here,” the ME announced.

  “But we need it off to find out who the victim is.”

  “I have no idea what the mud might be covering that’s loose or potentially volatile, or what evidence it might contain that could be lost or contaminated in this environment. I won’t do anything until I have the body and the mud surrounding it lifted out of the tub and delivered, intact, to my laboratory.”

  Rebecca and Sutter glanced at each other, then Rebecca said, “But once there you’ll take the mud off tonight, right?”

  “No. It’s far too late. I want to think about the best way to approach this.” Ramirez lifted her chin. “I’ve never had a situation like this before, and I want to make sure I don’t do anything that will cause problems later. Removing it should be like removing the caste for a mask.”

  Rebecca hated the death-mask image the words conveyed.

  As the ME’s group carried off the body, and CSI did what they could to collect evidence—and there was an amazing amount of DNA-containing substances throughout the spa, including hair and nails and dried skin flakes—Rebecca phoned Sierra to tell her what was happening.

  The two of them felt it would be best not to tell Kiki about the body at that time. The doctors wanted her to remain as calm and possible, and a death at the spa, particularly not knowing who had been killed, would be upsetting, to say the least.

  Now, some sixteen hours after the body had been found, the ME finally began to remove the dried mud. Ramirez decided to begin with the head, and to cut along the edge of where the face should be, and then to lift off the mud pack. That should have resulted in a neat, clean removal. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out the way she’d hoped, and she ended up having to pick crumbling pieces of gunk off the woman’s eyes, and to all but dig it out of her mouth, nose, and ears.

  The process, Rebecca had to admit, was stomach-turning. She found it more unnerving than a typical autopsy, which she had learned to watch with a studied, professional eye.

  But even before the face was completely revealed, Rebecca recognized the woman.

  She now understood why Kiki’s assistant, Inga Westergaard, had not returned her calls. She had met Inga the two times she’d gone to the spa for a massage and mud bath. The memory of it, given Inga’s death, gave her a cold chill.

  From the autopsy, Rebecca learned that Inga had died by being smothered to death by the facial mud having been stuffed into her nose and mouth. Someone must have really hated her. She had struggled, but bruising on the head, chest, and arms showed she had been overpowered. Rebecca couldn’t help but connect the blows to the head Inga that received with those of Kiki. Same modus operandi, same perp, was a common finding.

  The body was fully clothed under all that mud, and there was no sign of sexual assault.

  Dr. Ramirez would perform blood work and other analyses, and if anything of note turned up she would contact Rebecca.

  Ramirez believed Westergaard had been dead nearly thirty-six hours. That meant, Rebecca realized, her death took place around the same time as Kiki’s attack.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  After hearing about Audrey Poole’s offshore holding company, Richie was more eager than ever to talk to her. He called several more times with no luck and she hadn’t returned his messages. He didn’t like being ignored, stiffed by an old “associate.”

  He also called Bay-to-Breakers Realty numerous times. Once, a receptionist actually answered. She said she didn’t know when “Ms. Poole” would be back in the office, and took a message.

  He went to Audrey’s condo. No answer. Her neighbor said she hadn’t been there for a couple of days. That gave him an idea of where he might find her, but first he had to take care of another pressing problem.

  The day before, after visiting his mother, he had driven Benedetta Rossi home. She was a bit too looped from Carmela’s wine to drive herself or even to take the cable car. He was afraid she’d topple off, and then he’d have to listen to Carmela lamenting her friend’s accident every time she’d think about the word “cable” let alone “cable car.” It would be more than he could handle.

  But one look at Benedetta’s beautiful home from the outside made him want to see the inside and its remodel for himself. The house had been built in the 1920’s, and retained most of the original, ornate woodwork. The kitchen and bathrooms were dated, but the house had been decently maintained over the years. It didn’t even show very many earthquake cracks, and they were visible in just about every older San Francisco home.

  He couldn’t see anything seriously wrong with the house, not even in the basement or the garage. Benedetta showed him the building inspector’s report, and sure enough, it claimed her foundation was cracked and rotting. But how could the inspector have known that? He looked at the man’s name, hoping he was someone Richie knew from the past. Darryl Kreshmer. Never heard of him.

  The more Richie looked over the house, the more interested he became in the property and in questioning why this woman was being leaned on to sell it as “distressed” to foreign investors.

  That morning, Carmela had called to ask about his progress on Benedetta’s permit problem. He promised to report back soon. He knew she would keep bugging him until he took care of it, so he contacted the Department of Building Inspections on Mission Street and asked to speak to Darryl Kreshmer. He set up a meeting that very afternoon.

  Now, he drove to the building inspection office. Soon, a mountain of a man came out to meet him. A massive hand reached for his. “Mr. Amalfi,” Kreshmer said. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m representing a woman whose home you recently looked at. Benedetta Rossi. Francisco Street.”

  “Yes. I remember. An old house, beautiful neighborhood,” Kreshmer said. As he nodded, his double chin flapped against his chest.

  “It’s also a very nice house,” Richie said. “I understand you went there to inspect the installation of a new furnace, and ended up telling her that a remodel done years ago was no good.”

  Kreshmer folded stubby fingers over his bulging stomach. “That’s right. She had no permits. It was done by an unlicensed relative, from what I understand. When I look at it, I can’t tell if it was done right or not. It’s got to come down.”

  “It’s lasted eighteen years.”

  “Dumb luck, Mr. Amalfi. I’ve been doing this a lot of years. I know these houses like the back of my hand. I also know the neighborhoods. We haven’t had a large earthquake since ‘eighty-nine. One big shake and who knows what will happen to that house. Nothing has been secured as it should be. The pipes could break, the electricity could short out, and the water heater is attached to an illegally installed gas pipe. You know what that could do in an earthquake? It could destroy the entire block. It’s very, very serious. I suspect there are other problems as well. It’s always the case when we start to open the walls and foundations of these old houses. Considering the owner’s age, I also doubt the place has been kept up as it should be.”

  Richie had wanted to play nice, but something about the bureaucrat’s smugness made him want to pop him in the mouth. “All that is pure speculation. It’s lasted through several quakes with no problem at all.”

  “The remodel has to go, Mr. Amalfi. I cannot allow an unsuspecting person to buy that house and then have it come down around their ears. Mrs. Rossi wants to ignore these problems, but she can’t. She threw me out of there! Who does she think she is? If she wants to play har
dball with me, I’ll play right back.”

  “I’m sure she didn’t mean anything.”

  “Like hell she didn’t.” Kreshmer’s face turned red and glistened with sweat. “She all but said she could ignore me. Well, not on my watch. In some localities, if the buyer doesn’t care and wants to fix problems himself, the town or city looks the other way. But that’s not how I operate. This one, I just might take to the compliance inspectors.”

  “I see.” Richie was taken aback at the man’s vehemence. “I’ll have to talk to her.”

  “Look, she’s sitting on a place worth well over a million in today’s crazy market.” He slid his hands in the front pockets of his baggy slacks. “I’m sure she can find a way to fix it, or find someone who will tear it down and put up something more fitting for that neighborhood. I get it that my report isn’t the sort of thing you want people to know about in a neighborhood like that one.”

  “She told me you suggested a realtor, Audrey Poole.”

  “I suggested she call ‘a’ realtor. I don’t remember naming any one in particular.”

  “She said you did. How else did she get the name?”

  “How should I know? Realtors are always giving me business cards because of my job. I probably handed her a stack of them. I would never recommend any one in particular.”

  “You didn’t recommend Audrey Poole?”

  “Of course not. Why do you keep asking about her?”

  Richie didn’t answer; he’d have to ask Benedetta more specifically how she got Audrey’s name.

  “One other thing,” Richie said. “Did you happen to inspect some property for sale on Union near Fillmore Street? It’s a two-story place with a spa on the ground floor.”

  “Hmm. A spa out in that neighborhood sounds familiar. Yes, I remember. Some work was done to the spa and I needed to make sure it met the permit requirements. That was all.”