Women's Murder Club [10] 10th Anniversary

by James Patterson

  “Baby? I don’t know anything about a baby.”

  “Avis was nine months pregnant,” I said. “You saw her every day. Unless you’re blind, you must have known she was pregnant.”

  “Well, I didn’t,” the girl said. “She was a pretty good eater and she didn’t work out.”

  Turning to Conklin, I said, “You know, Inspector, I’m getting sick of these kids lying their faces off.”

  “I don’t think they understand that we are homicide cops,” he said. “Maybe they think that because they go to a rich kids’ school, they’re outside of the law.”

  The girl was staring at us now, eyes going back and forth between us and darting to a spot on the floor. I followed her eyes to a pile of laundry and saw the corner of a plastic bag under a sock.

  I said to Conklin, “You’re right. They’re spoiled. They’re living in a separate universe. A universe where this,” I said, toeing the sock aside, “a few ounces of marijuana, isn’t illegal. But, of course it’s possession of an illegal substance, and in this case, given how much you have here, Kristin, I’m thinking it could even be possession with intent to sell.”

  “That’s not mine. I never saw it before.”

  I had to laugh. Two feet from her bed and she’d never seen it before.

  “I say it’s your grass and that your urine is going to show that you’ve been smoking it.”

  I reached under my coat for my cuffs, and the girl backed up.

  “Kristin Beale, you’re under arrest for possession of narcotics.”

  “No… what, are you—kidding? I’ll get kicked out of here. Okay, okay, okay. Like, what do you want to know?”

  “Where is the baby?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Who is the father of Avis’s baby?” I said.

  “She never told me. I am telling you the truth.”

  “Someone got her pregnant,” said Conklin.

  “She’s gone out with boys, but no one regularly.”

  “More lies,” I said. “I think you’ll tell us the truth at the station. Of course, we’ll have to call your parents.”

  “I think she was going out with a married man,” the kid yelled at me. “Look. She didn’t tell me. One time, I asked her if she was pregnant. She said, ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ I asked if her secret boyfriend was married, and she gave me a look. Like this. And she told me to never tell anyone. And that is everything I know. Everything. She never talked about the baby again. Maybe she told Larry Foster. Those guys are tight.”

  Chapter 32

  I PUT MY CARD on Kristin’s desk and told her to call me if she had any thoughts she’d like to share that might save a baby’s life. I flushed the weed down the toilet in the bathroom down the hall, and then, muttering under my breath about teenagers, my partner and I left the dorm.

  During the six hours we had spent interviewing Avis’s friends at Brighton, her parents had called me a dozen times. I had nothing for them, so I’d let the calls go through to voice mail. But as we were driving away from the campus empty-handed, Brady called.

  I picked up the call on the third ring.

  The lieutenant sounded agitated.

  “The press has the story,” he said. “It’s going to hit the fan on the networks in a couple of hours, but it’s already broken on cable news and the Web.”

  Cindy was my next caller.

  “Lindsay. How could you not call me? You promised the story to me. You swore.”

  “I’ve got nothing, Cindy. Nothing at all. Zero. Zip. Legwork with no payoff.”

  Conklin’s phone rang, too. It was Paul Richardson saying that the media were gathering outside their hotel, clamoring for a statement.

  “Don’t tell them anything,” Conklin told Avis’s father. “Stay in your room and get the hotel to block your incoming calls. Use only your cell phone.”

  “The press is going to do cartwheels with this story,” I said to Conklin as we got back into the car.

  “Maybe a lead will come out of it,” he said.

  “I like your optimism.”

  I’d seen similar stories spin out of control and confuse evidence, spawn hoaxters, and contaminate jury pools. “Baby missing” could become kidnapping, child trafficking, even witchcraft or alien abduction. And that would be before the supermarket tabloids got hold of the story.

  “We need to catch a break,” Conklin said as we got back on the road.

  I sighed loudly.

  I wished I felt upbeat about this one. But I was feeling that it was too late to strap in. We’d already hit the wall.

  Chapter 33

  THE PRESS-MOBILES were already parked in front of the Hall, satellite trucks and setups with talking heads using the gray, granite edifice as a backdrop.

  Conklin pulled into the lot off Harriet Street and I got a buzz in my hip pocket. Yuki was texting me to say she wanted to see me, tell me about her date last night. She’d put a picket fence of exclamation marks at the end of her message.

  I fired back a message in return, saying that I had to see her, too. Important!!!!!

  At just after six, I edged into the standing-room-only crowd at MacBain’s Beers o’ the World Saloon, a cop-lawyer-bail-bondsman hangout two blocks from the Hall. There were peanut shells on the floor, exotic beer on tap, and a pool table in back. Yuki was at the bar.

  I opened my jacket and, revealing my badge hooked to my belt, flashed it at the guy sitting to Yuki’s right.

  “I didn’t do it, Sergeant,” he said, holding up his hands. We both laughed. “Congratulations on, you know, getting married,” he said.

  “Thanks for the seat, Reynolds.”

  I said, “Hey, girlfriend,” to Yuki, kissed her cheek, planted myself on the bar stool. Then I ordered a Corona and plunged ahead. “I met with Candace Martin last night.”

  “You did what? I don’t think I heard you right.”

  Yuki was only sitting a foot away from me, but she jacked up the volume to a yell. She’d never been angry with me before, and frankly I felt ashamed.

  I flashed back to that trial of mine a couple of years ago, when I’d been accused of wrongful death in the shooting of a teenage girl who had fired on me and Jacobi without provocation.

  It was absolutely self-defense, but I was put on trial anyway. The city of San Francisco couldn’t help me. I could have lost my job, my life savings, my reputation, but that didn’t happen.

  Yuki Castellano had been on my defense team. She had fought for me and we had won. I owed her a lot.

  I said to Yuki now, “Phil Hoffman asked me to see her. He said we’ve got the wrong person for Dennis Martin’s killing.”

  “Are you ka-razy?” Yuki said.

  And then she let loose with her trademark breathless verbal fusillade. “You listened to a defense lawyer? You went behind my back and interviewed the defendant in my case? How could you do that, Lindsay? What made you even think you had the right?”

  “Chi and McNeill report to me,” I said, feeling my cheeks flaming. “If they made a bad arrest, I had to know.”

  I could have called Yuki. I should have called Yuki. But she would have been aboard the same train as Brady, Chi, and McNeill. She would have said, “Don’t do it.”

  “I just talked to her, dammit,” I said. “All I did was talk to her.”

  Yuki signaled the bartender, a wiry young woman with big breasts named Nicole.

  “Hit me again,” Yuki said, pushing her beer mug forward, dumping a bowl of peanuts over the bartender’s side of the bar.

  “That’s three,” Nikki said.

  “Yeah?” Yuki shot back. “So what?”

  “Just sayin’.”

  “Well, don’t.”

  Yuki swung around to face me. “So, while you were just talking to Candace Martin, what did she say?”

  “She said that Ellen Lafferty was likely having an affair with her husband and she has a theory. Candace thinks either Ellen got dumped or she knew she was being played by
a player. Candace thinks Ellen shot Dennis.”

  “Wow,” said Yuki. “Candace is saying, ‘The other dude did it.’ What a shock.”

  Christ, Yuki was mad.

  I said, “It answers the big unanswered question, Yuki. Who was the unknown intruder? If Ellen Lafferty didn’t leave the house for her evening off, she was already on the scene.”

  “Lindsay, this whole setup is a Phil Hoffman distraction. Maybe Santa came down the chimney and did it. Maybe Dennis Martin pressed the gun into his wife’s hand and pulled the trigger on himself. You should have kept your nose out of this. You’ve made me look bad and for what?”

  “Paul Chi. It was his case.”

  “Good point. Why didn’t Hoffman go to Chi? He went to you because we’re friends and he’s trying to undermine my case,” Yuki said, slamming her beer mug down on the bar.

  “You’re being jerked around, so enjoy that. I’m going to get that woman convicted. Because it wasn’t the other dude, Lindsay. Candace Martin did it.”

  Chapter 34

  ENTERING THE COURTROOM the next morning, Nick Gaines said to Yuki, “What’s this? Some adorable little kids are missing from the front row.”

  Yuki put her briefcase on the table and stole a look at the row of seats behind the defense table. She saw strangers there. They looked young and intense. Probably law students. The Martin kids were gone. She guessed they’d served their purpose—before Duncan went off-road and got the judge mad.

  Court was called into session. Judge LaVan called on Yuki, asking her to put on her next witness. She was ready.

  “The People call Felix Ashton.”

  A fortyish man with black hair and mustache, wearing an expensive-looking gray jacket and dark pants, was sworn in.

  Yuki asked him to state his name, then his profession. “Real-estate broker. High-end residential properties,” Ashton said.

  Yuki paced in the well and said, “How well do you know Candace Martin?”

  “We’ve been seeing each other for about a year.”

  “By ‘seeing each other,’ you mean romantically?”

  “Yes.”

  “And how did you meet her?”

  “Dennis Martin asked me to appraise the house that he and Candace owned together. She contacted me after I did the appraisal and asked me to give her the information.”

  “I see,” Yuki said. She glanced at her notes, looked back up at the witness.

  “And what was the value of the house?”

  “In that neighborhood and in that excellent condition, no less than three-point-five million. Some would go as high as five.”

  “Did you have occasion to meet Dennis Martin more than once?”

  “Yes.”

  “Under what circumstances?”

  “Every couple of weeks, he’d show up in the restaurant where Candace and I were having dinner and take a table near us. He sat next to us at the movie theater a couple of times. He followed Candace to antagonize her. He used those occasions to have sarcastic buddy-buddy talks with me.”

  “So he was stalking her. Did that make Candace angry?”

  “Objection,” Hoffman said. “Leading the witness.”

  “I’ll allow it. Answer the question, Mr. Ashton.”

  Ashton said, “Dennis Martin needled Candace all the time. He bragged to her and to me that he was seeing a lot of different women. He told me that he’d divorce Candace in a flash, if she gave him what he wanted—the house and alimony and the kids. He said he wanted it all. And so he was trying to torment her until she gave in.”

  “And did Candace ever tell you that she was going to agree to his terms?”

  “No.”

  “Do you love Dr. Martin?” Yuki asked.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “And has she told you that she loves you?”

  “Yes.”

  “But she wouldn’t give her husband a divorce.”

  “He was a mean guy. If he hadn’t insisted on custody of the kids, she would have cut him loose. But she didn’t want to give him joint custody.”

  “Nice of her.”

  Hoffman got to his feet and objected.

  Yuki said, “I withdraw the comment. I have only one more question, Mr. Ashton. You say the two of you were in love. Yet Dennis Martin was in your way. Did Candace Martin ever tell you that she’d like to kill her husband?”

  “Well… not that she would actually do it.”

  “Yes or no, Mr. Ashton? You’re under oath. And we have your deposition.”

  “Ah. Yes, she said that, but—”

  “The answer is yes. That’s all, Mr. Ashton. Thank you.”

  “Cross, Mr. Hoffman?” LaVan asked.

  Phil Hoffman stood, buttoned his jacket, straightened his Hermès tie, and walked smartly to the witness box.

  “Mr. Ashton, based on your conversations with Candace, did you think she was actually going to kill her husband?”

  “Objection, Your Honor. Calls for speculation,” Yuki said.

  “Overruled,” Judge LaVan said. “The witness may answer.”

  “No. Candace isn’t violent.”

  “Let me ask this,” Hoffman said. “You’ve known the defendant for a year. In that time, did she ever show you a gun or say that she had one?”

  “No, she did not.”

  “Thank you. I have no further questions.”

  “The witness may step down,” said the judge.

  Chapter 35

  YUKI SAT ON HER INCREASING RAGE at Hoffman and focused on her witness, Cyndi Parrish, the Martins’ live-in cook.

  Parrish had been a jet-engine mechanic in the Navy and was now in her fifties, a soft and billowy woman with blurry tattoos on her forearms.

  “And how long have you lived in the Martin household?” Yuki asked the cook.

  “It will be eleven years next month. I came to the Martins after Caitlin was born.”

  “And would you say, as a member of the household, that you have an informed opinion about the Martin marriage?”

  “Yes, I would say so.”

  “How did they get along?”

  “They didn’t get along at all.”

  “Ms. Parrish, do you have a close relationship with Dr. Martin?”

  The large woman looked uncomfortable. She glanced down at her hands and muttered, “Yes. She confides in me.”

  Yuki lobbed the next question, a softball, but it was right across the plate.

  “Was Dennis Martin seeing someone? That is, was he in a sexual relationship with someone other than his wife?”

  “I can’t say.”

  “Can’t, Ms. Parrish?”

  “He never talked to me about anything other than food,” said the cook, earning a nice burst of laughter from the gallery.

  Yuki smiled, let the laughter fade away, and then asked, “Did Dr. Martin speak to you about her husband’s affairs?”

  “She did in the early days. Lately, not so much.”

  “Ms. Parrish, let me be more precise. Did Candace Martin tell you how she felt about her husband the week before he was shot to death?”

  “Yes. He tormented her, constantly. Night before the shooting, she said she hated him. She said she’d kill him if she could. I suppose that’s what you want me to say.”

  “Just tell the truth, Ms. Parrish.”

  “It wasn’t a pretty marriage. Neither one of them had any use for the other one.”

  “Did Candace Martin ever say that she’d like to kill her husband?”

  “Yes.”

  “I have no further questions,” said Yuki, heading back to her table.

  “Can I say something else?”

  “That’s all, Ms. Parrish. We’re done.”

  Phil Hoffman stood and approached Yuki’s witness to do his cross-examination.

  He said, “What did you want to say, Ms. Parrish?”

  “I wanted to say that Dr. Martin is a good person. And she loves her kids.”

  “Indeed. Ms. Parrish, did you ever see
a gun in the house?”

  “No, I never did.”

  “Thank you. That’s all I have.”

  Yuki pressed her palms down on the table, stood up, and said, “Redirect, Your Honor.”

  The judge said, “Go ahead, Ms. Castellano.”

  “Ms. Parrish, does Dr. Martin love her kids enough to kill for them?”

  “Objection,” Hoffman said. “Leading the witness. Calling for speculation.”

  “Sustained.”

  “Withdrawn,” said Yuki. “I’m done, Your Honor.”

  “Anyone would,” the cook said.

  “Thank you, Ms. Parrish. You may stand down,” said the judge.

  “Anyone would kill for their kids,” the cook muttered loudly, as she got up from her seat. “It’s a law of nature.”

  Hoffman stood to object, but the judge said, “I’ve got it, Mr. Hoffman. Ms. Parrish, you’ve testified under oath. It’s over. The jury will disregard the witness’s offhand remarks.”

  “I won’t be silenced,” said the cook, as she lumbered across the well. “Anyone would kill for their kids.”

  Chapter 36

  CINDY STARED at her computer monitor, far too aware of the timer in the left-hand corner ticking off the seconds toward her four-o’clock deadline.

  Oh, man, she was so stuck.

  After nailing yesterday’s deadline, she still didn’t know how to write this story. The heartrending and truly terrifying interviews with the rape victims were quite vivid in her mind, but she couldn’t name the witnesses, couldn’t quote the nurses, and there was no “source close to the police,” because the cops weren’t actually working the case.

  Cindy had boiled the facts down to their bare bones.

  The attacks had happened to women who lived and worked in three different places in the city. The women were not of a single type. They were of different ages, occupations, and ethnicities. They looked nothing alike. And the worst fact of all: Cindy could scare women readers half to death with this story, but she had no idea how they could protect themselves from the rapist.