by Joanne Pence
He walked along the side of Richie’s house, the side next to the garage, and then disappeared. A fence and gate were there, leading to Richie’s back yard. She got out of her car and followed, gun in hand.
The gate was still shut, but she didn’t see the man anywhere. She phoned Richie.
“What?”
Wow, but he sounds angry … or hurt. “Someone is lurking around your house. He may have snuck into your yard.”
“You’re just full of good news.”
“Shut the lights and let me in.”
He hung up.
The door was slightly ajar when she reached it. She entered the darkened house.
“You sure someone is out there?” He sounded dubious as he quietly shut and locked the door.
She stepped close enough to make out his features in the moonlight shining through the window. “All I can tell you,” she whispered, “is that I saw a man approach your side gate and then disappear. He may have climbed over it. I didn’t want to take any chances.”
“Chance of what?”
“That you might be hurt!” With that admission, she saw a relaxing of the hard line of his mouth, a softening around his eyes.
She walked into the kitchen and stopped. The back door was mostly glass with eight window panes, and on both sides of it were large windows. It gave the kitchen a lot of sunlight during the day making it a warm, inviting spot to cook and eat. Now, it offered a good view of the deck, and the moonlit yard.
Richie stepped up behind her, his hand on her shoulder. As they waited with nothing happening, he leaned close. “How long do we wait?”
“We need to be sure,” she whispered.
“Yes, we do,” he said. She wondered for a moment if he was referring to more than the prowler, but then he added, “What do we do if he’s out there?”
“I have a gun, remember,” she whispered.
His hand tightened slightly on her shoulder. “You aren’t the only one.”
She was pondering the various ways she could take that statement when she heard a sound outside. She froze. “Did you hear that?”
He let her go and took a few steps closer to the window for a better view of what was happening in the garden. He moved one hand to the back of his waist—a common place for a holster for a small handgun. Of course, she realized, he would have a gun in the house, and probably more than one, even if he couldn’t get a concealed carry license in this city.
Suddenly, a face shadowed within a hoodie appeared outside the kitchen window. She jumped, startled, and it seemed Richie did the same.
The figure stared inside the house no more than a split second, and then turned and ran.
Rebecca pushed past Richie, flung the kitchen door open and stuck her head out, ready to hurl herself back indoors if she saw a gun pointed at her. Instead, she saw the hooded man running down the steps to the yard. “Stop, police!”
“Rebecca, no!” Richie reached for her, but she was already running down the stairs from the deck to his lawn and garden.
The intruder ran across the yard to the high fence.
“Stop or I’ll shoot!” Rebecca shouted.
He boosted himself over the fence as Rebecca hit the bottom step. Richie was right behind her. She reached the fence and was about to scramble up and over it when Richie grabbed her.
“What are you doing?” she yelled. “Let go of me!”
“No. It’s too dangerous.”
“I know what I’m doing.” She was furious.
“I don’t give a damn.” He pulled her away from the fence, gripping her wrists.
“It’s my job. I could have caught him.”
“You have no back-up.” They were nose to nose. “So no, you don’t go running after a killer alone. For all you know, this could be a contract job. Which would make him a pro, which would mean he’d as soon put a bullet in you as not.”
She would have continued to fight him except that she became too aware of his nearness, of how tightly he was holding her. Ironically, she had once thought that getting closer to him, even having sex with him, would make it easier to forget about him—that the mystery and excitement would be gone. Instead, she found it more difficult than ever. His touch, now, reminded her of all she was missing. And the change in his expression, in his eyes, told her he had the same awareness.
Her breathing quickened as she fought against her instincts. “Let go.”
He did, and stepped back, running a hand over the back of his head as if needing to do something, anything, rather than let himself reach for her again.
They went back into the kitchen, and Richie handed her a beer as he called Shay, telling him to get over there to help him figure out what was going on.
When he hung up, he got a beer for himself. Rebecca could still feel the adrenaline pumping through her. “I might have ended this, right here and now,” she said.
“You don’t know that.”
“Could you recognize him at all?” she asked. “Height? Stance? Anything?”
“You saw him, too. I couldn’t make out anything, except that he’s tall and athletic enough to get over a six-foot high wooden fence.”
“He was wearing gloves.” She rubbed her forehead, trying to think of something helpful. “Even if I called someone at work, there’s probably no way they could figure out who he was. And with that hoodie pulled low, I suspect your security cameras couldn’t pick up his face, anyway.”
He circled her, pacing and nervous. “Yeah, well, all that’s well and good because one cop trudging through my house is bad enough.”
“Real nice, Richie.” Her temper, her frustration at him, at the whole situation, flared. “What if I hadn’t seen him? If I hadn’t called you? He might have snuck in here, or shot you through a window. I mean, anything could have happened!”
He faced her, standing close. “Why did you? I would have thought you’d be long gone.”
She didn’t answer.
He continued to wait.
She changed the subject. “You can’t stay here. It’s not safe.”
“Yeah, I can. It’s my house.”
“It’s too dangerous and you can afford to go elsewhere.”
“You’ll come with me?”
She was stunned by his question. “Of course not!”
Something in his gaze shifted and she felt the tension in the room go up several notches as, without losing her gaze, he put down the beer and walked towards her. She could feel her pulse quicken and she knew, despite what she had said, she just might go anywhere with him.
Before he reached her, however, his phone buzzed. It was Shay, calling to say he’d be there in ten to fifteen minutes, and that he’d called a bodyguard friend of his who would arrive about the same time.
Richie ended the call and faced her. “For now, Rebecca Rulebook, we’ll do things your way. Fill Shay in on all the details. The analysts at the SFPD are okay, but none have an MBA from Wharton School of Business the way he does, or are such whizzes at figuring out financial schemes. And the more I think about what’s going on here, the more I think the businesses are the key.”
Rebecca agreed.
“And then you can go about your routine of searching for clues and following the evidence.” His eyes turned serious. “But one of these days, you’re going to have to make up your mind, once and for all.”
She understood that he wasn’t only talking about her murder investigations.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
On her desk the next morning, Rebecca found footage from the one business with a camera in the alley behind Kyoto Dreams.
She immediately began to go through it, even though that meant holding off going through Diego Bosque’s records. She couldn’t remember ever having a case with so much data, but none of it pointing towards anything useful.
She was shocked to see the footage showed the same man with a San Francisco Giants baseball cap who had been at the two arson fires. He was skulking about on the corner, clearly
watching what was happening at Kyoto Dreams. If he was there, did he kill Tanaka? Was he a murderer as well as an arsonist?
Once again, his baseball cap was worn so low, only his nose, mouth and chin were visible.
All this time, she’d had a niggling feeling as to who the arsonist might be. Now, an idea struck as to how she might prove it one way or the other: Facebook.
Anyone who worked as a writer probably had a Facebook page to promote his or her work. She typed in Connor Gray. Several men with that name came up. As she went through them, she found a match. Several links and comments about the SF Beat article were posted, as well as news stories on the arsons and murders.
But more interesting than any of that was Connor Gray’s photos. She realized that chasing the man she saw at Big Caesar’s had given her a better view of his face than any of the security cameras. The mysterious man hanging around the arson fires, and the alley behind Kyoto Dreams, was the writer of the tabloid article.
Now, the question was why.
She was pondering that when her once-upon-a-time-heartthrob, Inspector Paavo Smith, walked into Homicide. She was glad that she and Paavo were now friends with none of the uneasiness between them that her former crush had caused.
Instead of going straight to his desk, he stopped at Rebecca’s and sat. “I haven’t had a chance to talk to you alone since that tabloid article came out,” he said. “Don’t think too harshly of him.”
He didn’t have to mention Richie’s name for her to know who he was talking about. She put down her pen. “I know the article was exaggerated. It’s no big deal.”
“Isn’t it?” Paavo asked. “Angie told me what you said to her and Serefina. But I didn’t believe it. And if the article is what is causing you to doubt him, you’re making a mistake.”
She was puzzled. “You were one of the many people warning me against Richie.”
“I know, and I still want to make sure your eyes are open about him. That’s one thing, but for you two to break up because of a lie is wrong.”
She leaned back in her chair, arms folded and studied him. “And here I thought I was confused.”
He smiled balefully. “I know, but all I can tell you, hearing everything third hand from his mother to Serefina to Angie to me, is that the guy is pretty darn serious about you. Also, Angie thinks he hangs the sun and the moon in the sky, which tells me a lot of good things about him. I just wanted you to know that.”
Rebecca couldn’t help but smile. Richie always called that kind of gossip “the Italian hotline,” and he swore it could move faster than the speed of light. “Thank you for telling me, but I’m sure you’ve heard how badly stories get twisted when they go from one person to the next to the next.” Rebecca turned more serious. “Who knows what Carmela really said? Besides, she hates me, and constantly worries that Richie will get serious about a cop who once ‘got him shot’ as she puts it. The way she blames me for a minor wound he got on his arm, you’d think he faced mortar fire and IAD rockets.”
Paavo smiled and nodded. He, too, had gone through grief with the Amalfi’s over falling in love with Angie. In his case, it was her father who would have loved to exile him to an island in the middle of nowhere. “No matter what Carmela says, Angie thinks the two of you are good for each other, and if nothing else, she’s a good judge of such things.”
“Angie scarcely knows me.”
“But she knows Richie quite well, and she’s always looking out for what’s best for him.”
Rebecca looked down at her desk, not able to meet Paavo’s pale blue eyes as he spoke. She had seen how close everyone in Richie’s family was. Since Richie had no siblings, and Angie and her four sisters had no brother, when they were little kids, Richie was like a big brother to Angie. As they got older, they all drifted apart, but for some reason, lately, they seemed to find each other again. She was glad—Richie needed stability in his life, and she even envied him the love the family surrounded him with, although she knew at times they could drive him half crazy. “I’m afraid, Paavo, as to what’s best for him … tell Angie, it isn’t me.”
“What’s not you?”
Rebecca recognized that voice. She looked up to see Richie walking towards them and couldn’t help but smile. She glanced back at Paavo who was now standing, and then she faced Richie again. How much had he heard? She wracked her brain, then answered, “I’m not one to bake cookies for a sale at Angie’s church.”
Richie’s eyebrows rose, astonished. “Angie wanted you to bake cookies?” He pulled his ever-present wad of bills out of his pocket, took out two twenties and gave them to Paavo. “Tell Angie it’s for the church. Better than cookies, I’m sure.”
Paavo gaped at them both as he stood there with money suddenly in hand. “Uh, yeah. Thanks. Excuse me. I think I should go over to the jail.” He hurried out of the bureau.
Richie frowned, then sat by Rebecca. “What was that all about?”
Rebecca shrugged. “You know Angie. So, what are you doing here?”
“Have you looked at the news this morning?”
“The news? Not yet. Why?”
“Moss Brannigan is the lead story. Word somehow got out that he’s now a target of the ‘serial killer’ who’s going after San Francisco’s enticing bachelors.”
She was shocked. “Serial killer? What serial killer?”
“Take a look.” He pointed at her computer.
She went to some local news websites, and sure enough, there was Brannigan, surrounded by reporters, telling a tale of how someone tried to sabotage his cruiser.
“Brannigan claims his cruiser was tampered with,” Richie said. “But it doesn’t quite fit the murders, does it? Or the arsons.”
His words puzzled her. “Are you thinking he might be lying?”
“I’m saying I’d like to take a look at his boat. I know something about them. I used to own a sailboat.”
That was news. “You owned a sailboat? A little one, or was it large enough to go out on the Pacific?”
He smiled at her interest. “It was good size. A thirty foot Cross trimaran. A real beauty. I hired a guy to sail it who knew what he was doing, of course. I never did get good enough to trust myself out on the Pacific without an expert with me. But I learned a lot about yacht-size boats before I finally bought one. I wanted one that could go a good distance. We went down the coast to Cabo San Lucas three times in it.”
“That would be so much fun. Days and nights out on the ocean. I’ve only dreamed of doing such a thing.”
He nodded and seemed to study her a moment. “She was a good ship. Once in a blue moon, I even miss her.”
“I love how boats are female, and have names. Moss Brannigan said he calls his the Celine. I think it’s kind of creepy to name a boat after the woman who sang the theme song for the movie Titanic.”
He shrugged. “It’s also a pretty name.”
“Maybe. So, why did you sell your boat?”
“The upkeep on those things is ridiculous. They always need something done, whether you use them or not. There’s a saying among boaters, that your happiest day is when you buy a boat, and your next happiest is the day you sell it. I guess that sums it up pretty well.”
She stood and put on her jacket. “Obviously Moss Brannigan hasn’t had such a happy day as yet. We’ll go see him, but keep in mind, a killer might be watching both of you, and seeing you together—”
“You worry too much, Mayfield.” They went to the elevator and he put his hands in his pockets as they waited. “It’s too beautiful a day for anyone dying. And being stuck in an office is too close to it.”
He had parked, as had become his habit, in the employee parking area. She didn’t know how he managed to get an employee parking pass, and frankly, she didn’t want to know. He followed her to her apartment, where she left her SUV and got into his Porsche 911 Turbo for the drive to the St. Francis Yacht Club. She figured her Ford Explorer would never get past the gate.
From the Club
’s parking lot, they walked along the marina to the piers. He stopped at one and stared at a boat there, The Magic Flute.
“That’s where we used to dock the Isabella,” he said. “That boat is nice, but nothing like mine was.”
Her smile faded. Isabella was his deceased fiancée’s name. “Have you been down here since you sold it, or I guess I should say, her?” she asked.
“I’ve been to the area, but not out here on the piers.” She watched the wind blow his hair as he looked out on the water. She let him gather his thoughts in silence. Finally he turned to her. “Let’s see what the Celine is all about.”
She took his arm, not sure why, but it felt right. They continued along the marina. “For all we know,” she said, “Brannigan might have left already.”
“And miss out on all this publicity?”
He was right. Up ahead they reached a small crowd of cameramen and reporters. In the center of them stood Moss Brannigan. Docked just a bit farther down the pier was his large, beautiful cruiser. “It’s a plenty nice boat,” Richie said. “A Marlow Mainship. I knew a guy who had one. I checked it out before deciding a sailboat was more my style. But I do remember something about the way it’s designed makes it easy to work on, particularly to reach the engine and fuel and so on.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m not sure.” He thought a moment. “Those babies hold a lot of fuel—probably well over a hundred gallons. If he thought it was full, and it was nearly empty, where did the fuel go?”
“He said he noticed the fuel was missing after he was out on the Pacific a few hours. If a hole in the fuel line caused a slow leak, he wouldn’t have seen the gas leakage.”
Richie nodded, but didn’t look convinced.
Rebecca dropped his arm as they neared Brannigan. “Mr. Brannigan,” she called. “May we talk?”
He looked over at her and Richie.
“Hello, Moss,” Richie called.
“Well, well. Inspector, Richie. What a surprise.” He gave a smile to the reporters as he said, “I think we’re finished here.” He strolled over to Rebecca and Richie. “Maybe you’d like to come on board.”