by Joanne Pence
He hadn’t yet figured out how to help her, but somehow, he had to.
o0o
“Was that Shay?” Rebecca asked as she got into Richie’s car.
“He was updating me. Nothing new yet.”
“Well, I may have a breakthrough. Let’s go to Pinocchio’s on Union. I want to talk to the bartender and cocktail waitress there again.” Rebecca took off her wig and did her best to remove the dark eyebrow pencil as Richie drove.
Once at Pinocchio’s, Rebecca showed the bartender the building inspector’s business card. He said the man looked familiar, but he couldn’t be sure why. The cocktail waitress’s shift would start in a half-hour, so she was on her way to work.
Rebecca and Richie decided to wait for her. Richie ordered a bourbon and water for himself, a Mai Tai for Rebecca, and he carried them to the table where she sat.
They talked about Kiki’s condition, the number of customers at Big Caesar’s, and even Benedetta Rossi’s house problems while they waited—anything but the subject that was on both their minds: their relationship.
Finally, mercifully to Rebecca’s point of view, the cocktail waitress, Lisa Hayes, arrived. Rebecca handed her the building inspector’s business card.
The waitress only needed a moment to study Darryl Kreshmer’s photo. “That’s him,” she stated flatly. “Now that I see him, I remember him. I remember thinking, ‘Surely, she can do better than that.’”
“So something made you think they were a couple,” Rebecca said.
“Umm, I wouldn’t go that far. I’m saying like, with you two, it’s obvious—just the way you look at each other.”
“But not with them?” Rebecca asked, trying not to think about how “obvious” a couple she and Richie were … to an absolute stranger no less.
“With them, there was a weird undercurrent going on. Something about the way he looked at her made me think about it. I don’t know. Maybe he was as confused about her being willing to meet him and buy him drinks as I was. I mean, the guy just didn’t seem her type.”
“But this is the man she was with?” Rebecca pointed at the building inspector’s photo again.
“Unless he has an identical twin running around.”
After the waitress left, Rebecca faced Richie. “It’s time for me to talk to the building inspector.”
Something about the way he looked at her, she was sure he was going to make some sort of a crack about them looking like a couple. She scowled at him, hard.
“Okay, okay,” he said with a grin. “About the building inspector, I always said Kreshmer was working with Audrey to find properties for her to sell. Remember how I found out that shortly after his visit to Benedetta Rossi, Audrey talked to her.”
“God! Of course! It was staring right at me,” Rebecca said. “Kiki told me Kreshmer showed up at the spa to check on a remodel. I suspect it wasn’t long after that the owner decided to sell. Kreshmer was the stalking horse. The one that found properties Audrey might have been interested in. But that means he probably didn’t kill her,” Rebecca said. “After all, she was his source of income.”
Richie nodded. “That would leave Sean Hinkle,” Richie said. “He’s the only one with the contacts and know-how to go after you for getting too close to figuring out what was going on.”
“Great—a former date is now perfectly willing to have me killed. That doesn’t do good things for a gal’s ego, you know.”
“It must have been a hell of a break-up.”
“Funny.” Rebecca grimaced. “But even though he might have the knowledge to send me to a fake crime scene, he would have no reason for killing Audrey. Just like Kreshmer, he would lose more than he’d gain by killing her, and there’s no evidence he knew the other two women at all.”
They both sipped their drinks.
“If everyone stood to gain from working with Audrey,” Richie said, “and no one stood to lose, why are Audrey and Inga dead, and Kiki could have been as well?”
“We’ve got to be missing someone, or overlooking something,” Rebecca said.
“Can your FBI friend help?” Richie asked.
Rebecca shook her head. “He would need something more than theories about a federal connection.”
“I know you think he’s not worthless,” Richie sneered, “but I’d do whatever it took to help you if I had the power of the entire FBI at my fingertips. For cryin’ out loud!”
“I don’t want to ask him,” she said firmly.
His jaw clenched a moment. “Okay, I’ve got some friends who might help. Let me talk to them.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Is it legal?”
“You don’t want to know. I’ll drop you off at the Jade Dragon, and then I have to keep going. I’ve got to meet someone.”
“That’s fine, although I can’t stay hidden there forever. One more night, and then tomorrow, I’m going back home and back to work.”
He nodded. “Then we’ll have to make sure we get the proof you need to put the killer away before that happens.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
After Richie dropped Rebecca off at the Jade Dragon, he went to see Milton Jang of the Five Families Association to explain the crooked dealings going on. He had a plan that he hoped Jang would assist him with.
Richie wrote two identical notes, and then had Jang’s secretary type them up. She was asked to wear gloves as she placed them into envelopes. Jang would then have one of his runners, also wearing gloves, to deliver the notes directly to Darryl Kreshmer and Sean Hinkle.
The note read:
I have evidence that you killed Audrey Poole. Come to the alley behind the Jade Dragon with $50,000 in cash tomorrow at midnight, and I’ll give you the evidence. If not, I’ll turn the evidence over to the police.
Richie had no idea if either man would acknowledge such a note, but it wouldn’t be the first time that greed and nervousness combined to make a killer do something foolish. He planned to wait there with some of Jang’s bodyguards.
He didn’t tell Rebecca about his plan. He wasn’t that crazy.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Rebecca went back to Homicide the next morning. She would have to get her SUV back from Vito sometime soon. That morning, she took a taxi to work.
She knew she wasn’t going to catch anybody by hiding in what was no more than an over-sized closet in Chinatown. She asked Sutter to join her as she went into Lt. Eastwood’s office. There, she told both men about the phony call that led her to Baker’s Beach two nights earlier.
“Once I got there, the man who called himself Officer Garcia was so strange, I knew it wasn’t a legitimate crime scene, and I left.” She didn’t want to tell them about the shoot-out with the stranger or how she got away from him. Such a tale would lead to more questions than she wanted to answer.
“I think the person who sent me on the wild goose chase has something to do with city government,” she said. “The only person involved in either murder with that background is Sean Hinkle.”
“I was afraid you’d say that,” Eastwood muttered.
“I’d like a search warrant for his home, phone, and computer,” she said.
“You aren’t going to get one,” Eastwood replied. “He’s too big, too important, and so far you have no evidence against him except a hunch.”
“He called Poole the night she died, and his finances seem to be connected to hers. Plus, they were dating.”
“Still not enough. I need hard evidence. He is, after all, on the mayor’s staff.”
“But that doesn’t mean,” Sutter said, catching Rebecca’s eye, “that we can’t lean on him.”
o0o
Rebecca had an idea. She knew it was a long-shot, but sometimes they paid off. She phoned Sierra and asked Kiki’s daughter to look up Sean Hinkle to see if he had ever been a customer at Kiki’s spa. She knew Kiki didn’t know him, but Kiki didn’t personally know everyone who ever went there.
“He’s here,” Sierra said after a short while. “
Let’s see. He went twice for a massage. The last time was three months ago.”
“Was Inga his masseuse?” Rebecca asked.
“Yes. Both times.”
She thank Sierra. She told Eastwood what she’d learned. “Enough evidence against Hinkle yet?”
“A lot of men get massages, Rebecca.”
That evening, about an hour after most of the City Hall offices closed, Rebecca and Sutter went to Hinkle’s apartment. It was time to “lean” as Sutter had said. Also, the last time Rebecca met with Hinkle, she had set up a meeting with him the next morning. She didn’t make it because of the Baker’s Beach incident, but apparently, he didn’t show up for it either—almost as if he knew she wouldn’t be there.
Almost as if he had arranged it so that he wouldn’t have to answer difficult questions.
Hinkle lived in a condo high on Telegraph Hill, overlooking the piers of the Embarcadero, and the Bay beyond. He wasn’t home when they arrived, so they sat in Sutter’s car and waited for his return.
o0o
Earlier that day, Richie went to the Jade Dragon. Benny Wong told him Rebecca had left that morning for work. Richie guessed he shouldn’t have been surprised. She’d been itching to return.
He called to make sure she was all right. She was. She told him she working with Sutter, and would try to catch up with him later.
He went in to Big Caesars for a while to take care of paperwork. As evening approached and he still hadn’t heard from Rebecca, he sent her a text asking her to meet him for dinner at the Jade Dragon at seven o’clock that evening.
He hoped that would keep her from going back to her apartment alone.
o0o
Rebecca saw Sean Hinkle’s car turn onto the driveway for his condo’s underground parking garage. As he waited for the gate to open, she and Sutter walked up to him. Sutter knocked on the window and showed his badge. “We need to talk.”
Hinkle started, his eyes wide, as he looked from one to the other. He rolled down the window.
“We’ll meet you inside,” Sutter said.
Hinkle wet his lips, slowly regaining his composure. “Okay. My parking space is just past the entrance.”
They followed while the gate was open. A few feet into the garage, Hinkle parked and got out of his Prius. “What’s this about?” he asked.
“Why don’t we talk in your apartment?” Sutter suggested.
They rode the elevator in silence.
On the fourteenth floor, Hinkle led them to a small and sparsely furnished apartment. A balcony ran parallel to the living and dining areas, and the view from it made up for the apartment’s lack of size and style.
Rebecca couldn’t help but remember Hinkle’s very old place on Valencia Street when she dated him. It had heating along the walls near the floor, and he had to kick the heater in the living room to get it to turn on. He’d come a long way in just a few years.
Hinkle didn’t invite them to sit. Instead, hands on hips, he faced her and Sutter. “Now can you tell me why you’ve followed me up here? I’m guessing it’s more than because I didn’t bother to show up for the third-degree you wanted to give me, Rebecca. You knew I’d already told you everything I could.”
“It’s more than that,” Rebecca said. “I want to know why Audrey Poole was afraid of you.”
“Afraid of me? You’re joking.” Hinkle looked astonished. “You can’t possibly think I had something to do with Audrey’s death. Isn’t it bad enough I get blackmail threats?”
“What blackmail threats?” Rebecca asked.
“Look.” He handed her the hand-delivered note demanding he turn over money that night in Chinatown. Rebecca could scarcely believe what she was reading—especially the location “behind the alley at the Jade Dragon.” Her mouth went dry and she didn’t want to consider who might have written such a thing.
“What are you going to do?” she asked, putting the note on the coffee table.
“Nothing. I’m ignoring it. I didn’t do anything to Audrey! Why doesn’t anyone believe me?”
“I’ve got an answer to that,” Sutter said smugly.
Rebecca tried to put the note out of her mind. “Audrey went into hiding right before she died. She stayed in a hotel instead of her apartment, and she only had to finish a couple of deals before leaving the country. But something, or someone, convinced her to leave the hotel and return home.”
“I know nothing about that.”
“Except,” Sutter said, “that you were one of the people who owed her money, a lot of money. Did you promise to pay her back? And then, after she met you, you killed her?”
“No!” Hinkle shook his head. “I owed her, but she wasn’t afraid of me. I can’t imagine Audrey hiding from anybody.”
Rebecca took over. “But she claimed she was. If not you, who was she afraid of?”
“She once said she had some kind of crazy stalker after her.”
“A stalker? You’re saying a stalker killed her?”
“How should I know? All I know is it wasn’t me.”
“What did you talk about the night she died?”
“A meeting—”
“No. She had no charity meeting scheduled,” Rebecca insisted. “She was trying to leave the country!”
Hinkle’s shoulders sagged. “She was demanding I pay her what I owed.” He shrugged. “I’d have loved to, except this city is so damned expensive, no matter how much I made, it was never enough. Besides, she hardly needed my pittance. She had plenty.”
“We also connected you to Inga Westergaard,” Sutter stated.
Hinkle stared at him a long moment. “Who?”
“The masseuse at Kiki’s House of Beauty. You’ve gone to her; Audrey went to her, and now both women you know are dead.”
Sean lifted his hands to his forehead. “You’re joking, right? Why in God’s name should I kill a masseuse?”
“You tell us,” Sutter said.
“Look,” Hinkle sat down on the sofa. “I don’t know why you two think I’m involved in any of this, but I’m not.”
“Not even involved in setting up a fake call from Dispatch that sent me out to Baker’s Beach, alone, two nights ago?” Rebecca asked.
He opened his mouth as if to speak, then shut it tight.
She pressed. “I know you have connections with a lot of police in town. They could have easily filled you in on what’s said, and paying some young techie would have resulted in a clone of the dispatch phone number showing up on my phone.”
Hinkle’s hands curled into fists and pressed them to his knees. “It wasn’t me, Rebecca.”
“Who was it then?”
He shut his eyes and took a few deep breaths, then stood and walked over to the windows. There, he stared out at the lights of the city.
o0o
Richie finished his dinner, and Rebecca still hadn’t shown up. He could see customers waiting for a table, so he told Benny to let his staff know that when Rebecca appeared, he would be waiting down in the room she was using.
He headed down there. He feared he would have a long wait. He couldn’t help but remember the strange night they’d shared in that little room. He wished, more than anything, she were with him now, so he’d know she was safe.
He stepped into the room and from the corner of his eye noticed some movement.
And then he saw nothing at all.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Sean Hinkle stood before the picture windows of his apartment, staring at San Francisco Bay. Rebecca and Sutter were sitting on the sofa waiting for him to talk to them. As he turned and faced them, his eyes were troubled, even sad.
He crossed the room and poured himself some straight bourbon, asking if either detective wanted to join him. Both refused. After downing the glass, he faced Rebecca. “I’ve heard rumblings about you rocking the boat with some big investors, okay? I mean foreign types—not just Chinese, either. But especially some Saudis and Iranians. They’ve moved their money to Europe but are starting t
o get nervous over there. It’s important for the city to be welcoming to them. To make it easy for them to buy good property here. Audrey was a key participant in all that. The last thing anybody wanted was for her to get killed. We were trying to present ourselves as a safe, diverse city. Then, our real estate agent got knifed to death on the street. How was that supposed to help anything?”
“Are you talking about politics?” Rebecca could scarcely follow what he was babbling about.
“No. Money. Big money. And things no one wants looked at.”
It was beginning to make sense. As Richie kept telling her, it wasn’t what she was specifically investigating, but where that investigation might lead, and who might be mentioned in the course of it, that was making “someone big” nervous.
“The mayor has his eye on the governorship,” she said. “Maybe you’re hoping he’ll take you with him there. More money; more influence to peddle.”
“Yes, I’m hoping the mayor will move up in the world. He deserves to, and I want to be there with him. But that’s all the more reason for me not to go around killing anybody.”
Sutter jumped in. “There’s so much evidence—”
“No, there isn’t,” Hinkle interrupted. “If there were, we’d be having this conversation in your office, not my home. Rebecca’s right, that I do have a lot of SFPD friends, and I know how these things work. I suggest you both leave now.”
“We will be watching you, Hinkle,” Sutter said, as the two detectives walked towards the door.
“I’m sorry it’s come to this, Sean,” Rebecca added.
“I didn’t do anything to Audrey,” he insisted.
“I know. It was her stalker.” As she said it, she remembered Richie also mentioning that word. Could it be?
Sutter reached for the door to open it.
