by Brian Thiem
Braddock leaned over his shoulder. “It’s looking more and more like she’s a bookkeeper. Did you have this number and e-mail for her?”
“I had nothing.” Sinclair pulled out his phone, hit speaker, and called the number.
It went immediately to voicemail: “You’ve reached the number for Dawn Gustafson. Please leave your name and number and I’ll return your call.”
“No landline here,” Sinclair said.
Braddock removed an iPad from her handbag, powered it up, and entered the phone number into the Safari search engine. “It’s a Verizon cell phone. Nothing else comes up, so she probably doesn’t list it on a website or anywhere else on the web.”
“We should eventually do a warrant on it,” Sinclair said. “I’d like to see all of her call and text records and any locator data the account shows.”
“Verizon will take at least a week to return info unless we can justify exigent circumstances.”
“Yeah, and another half a day wasted typing when we should be investigating. I’ll put it on my to-do list along with writing a warrant on Google to get her e-mail info.” Sinclair slid a few of her business cards into his pocket and opened the other box. Sadly, he wasn’t surprised at what he saw. A photo of Dawn wearing a lace negligee and a provocative come-hither smile took up the left half of the card. On the right, it read, Blondie, Special Ladies Escorts, San Francisco & Bay Area, www.specialladies.com, followed by a 415 area code phone number.
“She was such a pretty girl.” Braddock sighed. “It’s so sad she allowed herself to be exploited like this.”
Sinclair put a few of the cards into his pocket. “It’s not like someone shanghaied her, dragged her to California, and forced her into a life of prostitution.”
“The coercion and influence that lead girls into this life is more subtle than that—abuse in their childhood, lack of opportunities,” Braddock said.
Sinclair didn’t buy the bad-childhood and no-job excuses for crime. He and Braddock had had this discussion before. Her stepfather was an ultraliberal professor at UC Berkeley whose worldview was the polar opposite of Sinclair’s. Sinclair had quipped with Braddock many times, only half-joking, that after four years at UC Berkeley, the Peace Corps, and social work jobs, her leftist brainwashing was nearly complete, and even with the harsh realities of the real world she saw as a cop, she had a tendency to slip toward the dark side when he wasn’t watching.
“Even if some of those factors got her into the life, she had plenty of opportunities to get out,” Sinclair said. “Don’t forget, when I busted her the first time, she was sent home. But she came back. On her own. She got out of the business a few years after that, but here she was again.”
“She got off the streets a second time?” Braddock asked. “When did that happen?”
Sinclair hesitated for a moment and then said, “I’m just assuming that, based on what Jimmy said and the rough timeline I have in my head about her life.”
Braddock studied him. He wondered if she was trying to read his mind or trying to get him to say more. “Okay then,” she said, obviously willing to let it drop. “Maybe that’s why she was studying to be an accountant—to change her life. And it looks like she was paying her bills—at least some of them—with her bookkeeping business.”
“So she might’ve been in the process of changing,” Sinclair said. “All I’m saying is most people don’t commit crimes because they have no alternative. They make a choice to sling dope or sell their bodies on the corner because it’s easier than getting up every morning, working at an entry-level job, and busting your ass to move up to something better.”
“I still feel sorry for Dawn.”
“So do I,” he said. “She didn’t deserve this, and the only person I blame for her death is the one who killed her.”
Braddock returned to her iPad while Sinclair went through the bookshelf, fanning each book and hoping a piece of paper with something relevant would drop out. Nothing did. When he was finished, he looked over Braddock’s shoulder as she swiped through the pages of the Special Ladies Escorts website. Dawn was one of about fifty women advertised. Each had a short bio designed to play into men’s fantasies.
The techs returned from the bedroom. The female tech said, “We’re done in here, if you want to have a look. We went through all the clothes and checked them with the ultraviolet light. We didn’t find any blood, semen, or other secretions, so they were probably washed before being put away. We went through all the boxes in the closet, photographed the contents, and put them back for you. When you’re done, we’ll collect them as evidence in case you want to have the lab examine them for DNA later.”
“What’s in the boxes?” Sinclair asked.
The female tech grinned. “You’ll see.”
The bedroom furniture was made of honey-colored oak, heavy and sturdy. The top of the dresser was clear. The top drawer contained some bras and panties, sexy, but the kind of underwear any twenty-something woman would wear. Two conservative sweaters and two sweat suits were in the next drawer—clothes someone would wear lounging around their home. The other drawers were empty, as were the drawers in both nightstands.
He pulled two boxes off the closet shelf and opened the first. Inside were an assortment of leather restraints and plastic handcuffs. The second box held a dozen satin blindfolds and a vast array of vibrators and dildos.
Sinclair looked at Braddock. “How many boxes of this stuff do you have in your bedroom?”
“My only sex toy is my husband,” she said. “What about you, Sinclair?”
“I’m saving myself for marriage, remember?” Sinclair replied with a wry smile.
Sinclair went into the bathroom and slid back the shower door. Not even a bar of soap or shampoo. The drawers below the sink were equally sparse, containing a toothbrush and toothpaste, a few brushes and combs, and some dental floss.
“She didn’t live here,” Braddock observed.
“And I doubt she entertained any clients here either,” said Sinclair. “Wouldn’t a call girl need to shower and clean up between clients?”
“I’d think so, and a woman would have all kind of toiletries if she even stayed here overnight.”
In the main room, the techs were on their hands and knees, crawling along the carpet and stopping occasionally to examine different locations. “We saw some spots,” said the male evidence tech, “but it wasn’t blood.”
Sinclair went through the kitchen cupboards and drawers. A basic set of glasses, dishes, eating utensils, and cookware. A Mr. Coffee coffeemaker, a can of coffee, and a bunch of bananas beginning to turn black were on the counter. In the refrigerator were four containers of yogurt, a carton of cream, a package of deli turkey, and a bottle of salad dressing.
Sinclair stripped off his gloves. “What do you think?”
“She’s not living here,” said Braddock. “She uses it as an office for her bookkeeping, but that’s it. She probably eats lunch snacks here, but the kitchen doesn’t look like anyone’s cooked in it.”
“Stealing her computer and files could mean the motive relates to her bookkeeping stuff rather than her prostitution.”
“Unless she’s an accountant for the mob, bookkeepers aren’t killed for what they do,” Braddock replied. “Maybe the killer thought she had trick information on her computer and in the file cabinets and grabbed everything.”
“Then we’re back to assuming she was killed over her prostitution activity.” Sinclair scratched his head. “But we’ve decided she’s no longer using this apartment as a hooker pad.”
“Maybe she never was,” said Braddock.
“You think?”
“She moved from the Hayward apartment a year ago. What if she just moved her bedroom stuff and living-room stuff here because she had to do something with it? If she had been using the sex toys, wouldn’t she unpack the boxes and put the stuff in drawers where she could get at it easier? Wouldn’t some of her lingerie be dirty and in a laundry basket
?”
“Most escorts only do outcalls,” said Sinclair. “When I worked vice, we hardly ever ran across girls who took customers to their own place, and let’s not rule out something to do with the streets. She never fully broke away according to Jimmy and Tanya. What are the rest of the tenants like in this building?”
“Quite a few middle-aged and elderly Asians, the rest a mix of young professionals of every race, but mostly single women.”
“Not the kind of place you’d bring tricks, especially when you’ve already been kicked out of one apartment complex for it.”
“No,” Braddock said. “So she set the place up to look like she’s living here, with a bedroom and all, but she’s only using it as an office.”
“She wants to give the outside appearance that she works out of her home, but she’s living somewhere else and either hooking there or just doing outcalls.”
“Or maybe she’s gotten out of the business.”
“Anything’s possible, but I’m not convinced.” Sinclair turned to the techs. “Did you find anything to indicate she was killed here?”
“Nothing,” the man said. “Although someone searched the place, they didn’t really tear it apart. No signs of a struggle, so maybe she wasn’t abducted from this location.”
“We think this was an office for her,” Sinclair said. “And she was already dead when someone came back here to take information that could be incriminating.”
Chapter 8
“What are you thinking?” Sinclair asked Braddock as he started the engine. The rain had stopped and the sun was fighting to break through the clouds.
“The truth?” She laughed. “I’m trying to figure out what to buy Ryan for Christmas.”
“How can your brain jump from figuring out a murder to shopping for your husband?”
“Multitasking. We women have superior brains. Did you want to discuss the murder some more?”
“Hell, we’ve talked it to death.” Sinclair eased the car into the street and drove toward Lake Shore Drive.
“Good. There are only nineteen shopping days left. What would a man want for Christmas?”
“Jeez, Ryan’s married to a homicide cop who leaves him home to take care of two kids while she hangs out with me looking at blood and gore all day and night. With his forty or more hours a week at work, he obviously doesn’t have time to have any fun, so that eliminates all kinds of cool things like a road bike, golf clubs, or a motorcycle.”
“He’s not getting a motorcycle until the kids have graduated high school and their college is fully funded.”
“You both wear OPD badges for a living and you’re worried he’ll hurt himself riding a motorcycle?”
“What about you and Kayla? Are things serious enough to exchange gifts for Christmas?”
“I ended it a few weeks ago.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“There was nothing to tell. We lasted a month, had fun for a while, and then she got clingy and wanted to make plans for the future.”
“And you got scared and ran.”
Sinclair thought about what Braddock said. The longest he had dated anyone since his divorce almost four years ago was the six months he and Liz were together. That ended more than a year ago when she was nearly raped and murdered by the Bus Bench Killer and subsequently took a position as a news anchor in Chicago. He’d lost track of how many women he’d gone out with since then, but knew none lasted longer than a month.
“It wasn’t like that,” he said. “I knew from the onset that she wasn’t the kind of woman I would settle down with. But she knew how to have fun. She was still into the party scene, though, and I’m just not into that anymore.”
“It’s got to be hard when you don’t drink.”
“I don’t mind going out with people who have a drink or two, but when the sole purpose of going out is to drink . . . Being around drunk people when you’re not also drunk isn’t much fun.”
“You’re not alone.” Braddock pulled out her phone and began texting as she talked. “These days, I start getting sleepy halfway through my second glass of wine.”
“It wasn’t just the partying. Kayla just wasn’t right for me.”
“If the right woman appeared, would you be ready for her?”
“If you mean am I ready to buy a house with a white picket fence and have a couple of little rug rats? I think I have a ways to go.” Sinclair glanced at Braddock. When she looked up from her phone, he continued. “But if you mean am I ready to give up the serial dating routine, then yes. I’m getting so tired of that.”
Braddock read something on her phone and put it into her purse. “Can we stop by ACH on the way back to the office? I need to pick up some paperwork on an old case.”
*
A patient yelled for more pain meds from one of the rooms as Sinclair and Braddock walked down the long hallway. Alameda County Hospital—ACH to cops—housed the regional trauma center and one of the busiest ERs in the Bay Area. Every cop wanted to be brought here if they were shot or seriously hurt, but as soon as they were stabilized, they’d want to be moved to a hospital with nicer rooms, a higher class of patients, and nurses less calloused by the workload and the worn-out facility.
A tall, thin white man with a ponytail and a stethoscope around his neck said hi to them as they slipped past the nurse’s station into the break room. A nurse dressed in purple scrubs got up from a seat at a chipped Formica-topped table. She smiled and gave Braddock a quick hug. Alyssa Morelli then stood there for a few seconds staring at Sinclair.
“Matt,” Alyssa said as she finally opened her arms and embraced him.
Sinclair’s chin touched the top of her head as she pressed her body against him. He was certain she could feel his heart pounding in his chest by the time she stepped back and looked up at him. Her hair, pinned up loosely on top of her head, glistened in the sunlight streaming through the window. The sun had finally peeked through the clouds that had blanketed Oakland for the last two days.
“You look good.” Her enormous brown eyes scanned him from head to toe. “I was afraid that you’d turned into some ruddy-faced bozo with a beer belly and blood-vessel-covered nose.”
Sinclair had been a long-haired, unshaven narcotics officer when he last saw Alyssa nine years ago. She was one of the nurses who hung out with a group of patrol officers that Sinclair used to work with. The nurses and cops skied together in the winter, boated and hiked together in the summer, and met at the Warehouse, the local cop bar, most nights after work. After months of being just friends, Sinclair and Alyssa had gone out on a few dates, but their relationship fizzled after that. She didn’t return his calls and stopped associating with the group. Sinclair heard she started dating a doctor. Shortly thereafter, she became engaged and left ACH for a hospital where the patients were cleaner, the workload lighter, and the pay better.
“You look the same,” he said.
“I’m hoping my wrinkles deepen so patients stop thinking I’m one of the student nurses or high school volunteers.” She laughed—a real laugh.
Alyssa’s Mediterranean ancestry showed in her olive complexion, and her hair was such a dark brown it appeared black under certain light. “We should catch up,” Sinclair said.
“I’d like that,” Alyssa replied.
Just then, another nurse poked her head into the break room. “We’ve got a trauma coming in. Car accident with two victims.”
“I have to go.” Alyssa took both of his hands in hers, rose onto her tiptoes, and kissed his cheek.
Sinclair felt his heart racing again.
“We’ll talk,” she whispered into his ear.
She hugged Braddock, and Sinclair noted a conspiratorial smile between them as they left the break room.
Sinclair waited until they were back in their car before he spoke to Braddock. “You set me up.”
Braddock laughed. “She’s wanted to see you ever since she learned we were partners but wanted it to be a surprise.”
“To watch me make a fool of myself?”
Braddock smiled. “It was funny to see you at a loss for words.”
“I had a wicked crush on her back in the day.”
“Duh! I’ve known about you two for years. Alyssa was working pediatrics at John Muir when I took Ethan there for an ear infection five or six years ago. We recognized each other from Oakland and became pals. She’s probably my best nonpolice friend. And she had a crush on you, too.”
“I don’t know what happened. She got scared or something, and the next thing I knew, she married some pretty-boy doctor.”
“You had that bad-boy thing going full speed back then. She saw you on self-destruct mode and couldn’t stand to watch it. She wanted normal. The intern she married was that.”
“What happened? There’s no ring on her finger.”
“Once her husband finished his residency and started making the big bucks, he got into the country club scene and wanted her to quit nursing, have babies, and become a Stepford wife. Last year, she finally decided she couldn’t be that kind of woman and filed for divorce. She got bored with the routine of working a floor at John Muir and came back to ACH last month.”
“How’s she doing? She looks great.”
“She loves being back in the ER and is happier than she’s been in years. She ran the San Francisco marathon last summer and teaches Pilates classes at her health club.”
“You have her number, right?”
Braddock turned in her seat to face Sinclair. “Like the rest of the world, she knows about your divorce, you and Liz, and your pattern of one-night stands. Alyssa is all goodness, and that’s rare in people who deal with the same slime as we do on a daily basis. Don’t disrespect her by using your Sinclair charm on her while you’re still dating other women. She’s not just another girl for you to screw and run from when it gets too real.”
Sinclair pulled out of the hospital parking lot. Braddock’s words stung. She knew his game. He wanted to tell her to mind her own business—that Alyssa was a big girl and could take care of herself. But he knew Braddock was right. Alyssa was smart to distance herself from him back then. He wondered if he had actually changed much since.