by Penny Warner
I’ve been to the San Francisco Hall of Justice—referred to as 850 Bryant—more times than would look good on a résumé. Mostly to retrieve my mother, who’s been held briefly for various 5150 (official police code for “crazy person”) infractions, such as freeing kennel “detainees” at the animal shelter and picketing to “save the pigeons” in Union Square. A couple of the watch commanders know me by sight.
Located in the Tenderloin, across the street from a number of bail bonds shops and a place called the Stud Bar, the block-long building reminds me of the cellblock on Alcatraz, only with fresher paint. The jail portion is curved with lots of smoky windows, but the rest of the building is typical for city structures—pink beige walls, screened windows, and a couple of armed security checkpoints, a result of September 11th. I scanned the sign—WARNING. SUBJECT TO SEARCH. NO SCISSORS, KEYS, WATCHES—to see if I’d forgotten anything and pulled a pair of scissors out of my purse. Dropping them into the contraband container, I placed my purse on the belt and walked through the metal detector. The WC checked my photo ID, issued me a temporary sticker-badge, and directed me to the fifth floor where homicide officers hung out.
I thought about one of my mom’s party rules as I entered the elevator car and practiced a few opening lines to help break the ice with Detective Melvin. Naturally I chose quotes from an appropriate film—and my favorite—The Maltese Falcon.
“I haven’t lived a good life. I’ve been bad, worse than you could know. . . .”
Nah. I was no Brigid O’Shaughnessy.
“I have a terrible confession to make. That story I told you yesterday was just a story. . . .”
Trouble was, I didn’t have anything to confess. At least, not that I knew of.
“Haven’t you got anything better to do than to keep asking a lot of fool questions—”
My lip was still curled, Bogey style, when the doors opened on the fourth floor. Two officers read my IBS T-shirt and took a step back, allowing me a wide berth as I left the elevator. I wanted to tell them that not only do I not have irritable bowel syndrome, but that it’s not contagious, but I bit my tongue and just smiled.
After we exchanged places in the elevator, I turned and asked, “Detective Luke Melvin’s office?”
The cop with his hands clasped over his crotch said, “Five oh two.” The other one stifled a laugh.
Spinning around with all the dignity I could muster, I moved down the hall, found the office marked 502 HOMICIDE, and knocked. No answer. I let myself in. A kid who looked right out of police academy greeted me, asked my business in cop-speak, then had me sit down in an indestructible orange chair against a far wall of the small waiting room. Moments later Detective Melvin appeared from behind a closed door. I stood up.
At five ten, I’m tall, but he was taller—at least six four. Imposing, to say the least, even without the classic uniform. He gestured for me to follow him. In an effort to be his equal, at least in stature, I stretched my neck, straightened my shoulders, and stood up straight before heading into his inner sanctum.
Passing several offices, he led me to one at the back. He closed the door behind me and moved around his desk to take a seat. I took a moment to scan the office. The metal desk held a storm of crisscrossed papers, files, and reports. While his in-box overflowed, his out-box held nothing but an M&M’S candy wrapper. The pink beige walls were covered with indecipherable charts, infamous “Wanted” posters, a whiteboard with what looked like football plays, and some bizarre artwork that may have been painted by the criminally insane.
But what surprised me most was the movie poster hanging on the back of his office door. It looked like an original copy of The Maltese Falcon, signed by director John Huston. Humphrey Bogart’s Sam Spade gazed out at the city holding a smoking gun, while Mary Astor’s Brigid O’Shaughnessy leaned on him sorrowfully. The Fat Man and Cairo peered out from small cameos at the bottom corners. The Black Bird—“the stuff that dreams are made of”—guarded the scene from his perch at the top of the poster.
Shoot. Don’t tell me I had something in common with this cop.
Shutting my open mouth, I sat down in a wooden chair and tried to look as innocent as Brigid O’Shaughnessy—because I was. But somehow, sitting in a homicide detective’s office, I didn’t feel that way. Then I remembered Brigid’s harmless demeanor hadn’t helped her with Spade—and he’d been in love with her.
I straightened up, leaned forward, and met his blue eyes. “ ‘I haven’t got the bird, Detective.’ ”
Detective Melvin blinked. “Pardon me?”
I sat back and waved my hand. “Nothing . . . I was just . . .” I pointed a thumb at the poster. “I’m a big fan of The Maltese Falcon. . . . I saw your poster. . . . Never mind. Why am I here, Detective Melvin?”
The detective glanced at the poster behind me, nodded slightly, then shuffled through the pile on his desk and read over what looked like my statement. After a few dramatic moments, he retrieved a file marked “Sax, Andrea.” He opened it, pulled out a photograph, and held it up for me to see. The popular party planner was standing between the governor of California and the mayor of San Francisco, grinning as if she’d just won a jackpot at the local Indian casino.
I nodded, making an effort to meet his intense stare. I felt beads of sweat break out under my bangs. I knew he was watching my body language, something I do when hosting a party to see who’s bored, who’s having fun, and who’s having too much fun. I hoped my body was saying, I’m innocent!
His, on the other hand, was formal, confident, and seemed to be saying, “You’re going over for this, schweetheart.”
“Ms. Parker, when’s the last time you saw Ms. Sax?”
I shook my head. “Like I said before, I never saw her. I didn’t even know her—although I knew of her, of course. I heard she was planning the mayor’s wedding and then . . . I guess there was an argument or something . . . and he fired her and hired me. That’s all I know.” I clutched my purse, ready to bolt at his dismissal.
Detective Melvin frowned as he replaced the photo in the file folder. From a locked drawer he withdrew a plastic bag. Inside was a BlackBerry that looked small in his large hands. He set the bagged object on the desk in front of me. I relaxed the grip on my purse.
“Ever seen this before?”
I shook my head. “I mean . . . I’ve seen a BlackBerry before—I have an iPhone—not the new one—but it has all the apps—” I was rambling, a sure sign of guilt. “Is that Andi’s?”
Apparently the answer was obvious, because instead of answering, he said, “Your business address on Treasure Island is in her contacts list. If you say you don’t know her, any idea why she might have that information?”
“You’re kidding.” I frowned. I had no clue why she would have the address of my office barracks in her BlackBerry.
His look told me he was no kidder.
“No, I don’t know why, Detective. Maybe she was planning to stop by for some reason.”
“It’s the last entry in her calendar on the day she died.”
My heart started to beat double-time. “I . . . uh . . . you said she died how?”
He nodded. “In a car wreck. She was found at the bottom of the hill, off Macalla, on her way to the island.”
A chill ran up my spine. “Macalla? I . . . I don’t understand.”
“That’s the exit you take off the Bay Bridge to Treasure Island.”
“I know that,” I snapped. I tried to shake my head at his sarcasm, but my neck seemed to have locked up. What was Andi Sax doing on Macalla Road? Had she really been on her way to my office? Why?
Detective Melvin interrupted my silent self-interrogation with a question of his own. “You not only work on Treasure Island, you live there too, don’t you?”
“Yes, I have a condo—the old military housing—but—”
He folded his hands on the desk, his eyes steely blue. “I think it’s obvious that Ms. Sax was on her way to meet you.”
&nbs
p; “I . . . suppose it may look that way, but—”
“But she had an accident and never made it.”
I didn’t like his tone. “Apparently not, but—”
He leaned in. “So why was she coming to see you, Ms. Parker?”
“I. Don’t. Know,” I said, enunciating each word. “I’m telling you the truth—I had no idea she was coming to see me—if she was. And you said it was an accident.”
He shrugged.
What did that mean?
“Well, if it was an accident, I’d like to know why I’m here. Even if I was supposed to meet her—which I wasn’t—her car went off the road—which I had nothing to do with. We’ll never really know whether she was coming to see me, right?” I felt as if I were trying to convince myself as much as the detective. From the look on his face, I think he sensed it too. It seemed to say, Let her hang herself.
I felt my face flush with anger and tried to take a calming breath, something I’d been taught by one of my many special ed teachers as a way of controlling my hyperactivity. I had no reason to be on the defensive, but somehow this Bogart wannabe made me react that way. I sat back, gripping the arms of the chair, and crossed my legs, trying to look relaxed, even if I didn’t feel it.
“Is that all, Detective? Because I have a business to run—that is, if I still have a business. . . .” I trailed off as Detective Melvin pulled out another folder that was hidden underneath Andi’s. He flipped the cover over and scanned the report. All I could read upside down was the heading in bold black letters: “SF Medical Examiner.”
My heart began pumping wildly. There was something more to Andi’s death.
The detective took a moment to look over the report—as if he didn’t already know what it said. Finally he lifted his eyes and summarized it for me. “According to the autopsy report, Ms. Sax had three broken ribs, a punctured lung, and a contusion to her forehead.”
“No seat belt?”
“Yes, but the air bag in her SUV didn’t deploy.”
I thought for a moment. “Did she die of the head wound, then?” I asked, puzzled. The injuries didn’t seem bad enough to cause her death. But then, I’m not a doctor.
He glanced again at the paper. “She died from a myocardial infarction, just before the crash.” He looked up with those steely eyes to gauge my reaction.
It felt like the air had been sucked out of my lungs. “A heart attack?” I wheezed. “But she was only in her early thirties, wasn’t she?”
“According to the tox scan, there was a high level of KCN in her bloodstream.”
“KCN?”
“Potassium cyanide.”
“I thought you just said she had a heart attack—”
“With five milligrams of KCN in her bloodstream, she probably lost consciousness. Her stomach was nearly empty, which no doubt hurried things along. The ME found traces of”—he paused to read from his notes, carefully pronouncing the multisyllabic words—“theobromine, endogenous cannabinoid anandamide, N-oleoylethanolamine, soy lecithin, cacao, and cocoa butter.”
Cocoa butter? “So . . . what does all that mean?”
“It looks like Andrea Sax was given a toxic substance, had a myocardial infarction, lost consciousness, and her vehicle subsequently collided with a cement beam.”
Cop-speak for: She was poisoned, had a heart attack, passed out, and crashed the car.
“How did she get all those chemicals in her?”
“Chocolate.”
Chapter 8
PARTY PLANNING TIP #8:
In the competitive world of event planning, do your best to kill the competition by thinking outside the balloon. Caveat: Not literally.
I felt the hairs at the back of my neck stand up like tiny needles. Somebody had actually murdered my competitor, Andi Sax.
And it was painfully obvious that Detective Melvin considered me a suspect.
I shook my head, trying to gather my thoughts in one place, not unlike gathering a bouquet of helium balloons in a windstorm. No matter how hard I rattled my brains, the important information eluded me, and I was left with a head full of hot air.
“Chocolate? How did they get poison into the chocolate?” I said finally.
He studied me like a wolf would a rabbit. “You tell me.”
“How should I know? Are you actually accusing me of something?”
Detective Melvin raised a hand and patted the air. “Simmer down, Ms. Parker. I’m just trying to get some questions answered. Like I said, you were her last scheduled appointment. And her body was found on TI, most likely on her way to see you.”
“Well . . .” I started to object again, realized it was a waste of energy, and just shook my head.
“You and Ms. Sax were competitors, weren’t you?”
“No! I mean . . . I guess you could say that we had similar businesses, but I was no threat to her. She’s been the party queen in this city for years. I’m just starting out, hoping to raise money for some important causes. . . .”
Detective Melvin looked down at my irritable bowel syndrome shirt. I felt my face flush. He lifted another sheet of paper, buried under the files. I recognized the name at the top left-hand side of the page: “Presley Parker.”
“What’s that—my rap sheet?” I said, half kidding.
He didn’t even give a half smile. “So you raise money for good causes? Says here that after you were fired—”
“Downsized.”
“Let go . . . from San Francisco State University, where you were teaching”—he glanced at the paper—“abnormal psychology. . . .” He looked at me pointedly, as if checking to see whether I might be abnormal myself, then continued. “You abruptly moved from your flat in the Marina to the former navy housing on Treasure Island, and out of the blue, with little experience, decided to go into the party planning business—”
“Event planning,” I said, maybe a little shrilly.
“Says here you’ve only done a couple of kids’ birthday parties and a murder mystery for IBS. . . .” He emphasized the word “murder.” “And then—in a stroke of amazing luck—you were hired to replace Ms. Sax as host of Mayor Green’s ‘surprise wedding.’ ” He crooked his fingers mockingly around the last two words.
I shrugged. “I guess they were desperate, since Andi had . . . quit.”
“Quit? Or been fired?”
“I have no idea.”
“According to the mayor’s admin—Chloe Webster—you were highly recommended to them by former socialite-slash- party hostess Veronica Parker—”
Oh no. Mother. “Shit,” I hissed under my breath.
“Beg your pardon?”
“Veronica Parker is my mother—although I’m sure you know that already. I should have known why the mayor’s wedding fell so easily into my lap. Although how she pulled it off, I’ll never know. She’s been out of the business for years.”
Detective Melvin pulled yet another sheet out of his ass and held it up. This one featured a front and side photograph of a smiling woman wearing too much makeup in her effort to look younger, with wild red-blond-brown hair and a flirtatious gaze inappropriate for her age and the circumstances.
A mug shot.
Underneath, a list of personal statistics and misdemeanors filled the page. I skimmed it, already aware of most of the contents.
CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF LAW ENFORCEMENT CRIMINAL JUSTICE INFORMATION SYSTEMS AUTOMATED CRIMINAL RECORD CHECK SYSTEM * CUSTOMER SUMMARY REPORT *
PARKER, VERONICA
ADDR1: 5224 PACIFIC HEIGHTS AVE, SF
ADDR2: 1710 VAN NESS AVENUE, #222
OCCUPATION:
PEACE ADVOCATE/ARTIST/REVOLUTIONARY/
PARTY PLANNER/ANIMAL ACTIVIST/CITIZEN/
MODEL/TELEVISION PERSONALITY/HOSTESS
AKA:
VERONICA VALDEZ
VERONICA UAWITHYA
VERONICA JEFFERSON
VERONICA HELLER
ARREST- 1
AGENCY CASE-412084
&nb
sp; CHARGE 001-BATTERY-
STATUTE/ORDINANCE CA784—03
LEVEL—MISDEMEANOR
ARREST- 2
I couldn’t read any more and let my mother’s list of arrests and misdemeanors float back onto Detective Melvin’s desk.
Oh, Mom.
“She’s got quite a rap sheet.”
I rolled my eyes. “She’s got Alzheimer’s. She doesn’t always know what she’s doing. But whatever it is, it’s for a good cause—at least in her mind.”
“Like mother, like daughter, huh?”
I bristled. “Look, Detective, if she really did help me get the job—which I doubt—hosting the mayor’s wedding isn’t a crime. Having a mother with a debilitating disease isn’t a crime. And knowing a dead person isn’t a crime.”
Melvin the Magician opened his drawer of tricks and conjured up another plastic bag. With a twist of the wrist, he dumped the contents onto his desk.
It was a miniature replica of a black bird.
Made of chocolate.
I looked up at him, puzzled. “Where did you get that?”
“In Ms. Sax’s car. Four others, including one half eaten, are at the ME’s lab.” He raised his eyebrows, apparently waiting for my confession.
“But why . . . how?”
“That’s what I want to know, Ms. Parker.” He rolled the bird over with a flick of his pencil nib.
Flabbergasted, I couldn’t speak for several seconds. Then I said, “Look, Detective. I. Don’t. Know. Rocco, my caterer for the event, made a bunch of chocolate Maltese Falcons and chocolate handcuffs for the mayor’s wedding. He thought they’d be appropriate for the ball-and-chain theme—falcons for the crime solvers and handcuffs for the criminals. But you’re not implying . . .”
Detective Melvin stuck his hand inside the empty plastic bag, grasped the dark chocolate bird and, turning the bag inside out, pulled the bird back in. He placed it in a concealed desk drawer and locked the drawer securely.