The Suspect

by John Lescroart

  “No. I just got it this afternoon after I’d spent half the day with him. And oh, did I mention my charming half hour with Clarence this morning too?”

  Thinking it might be better news, Hardy took the bait. “How’d that go?”

  “I can’t decide which part was worse, my ethical failings or my incompetence.” She gathered the folder of pictures back to her, then sighed deeply. “He was as mad at me as I’ve ever seen him, Diz. It was bad, maybe irreparable.”

  “I doubt that,” Hardy said. “He’s eaten me for breakfast a few times and we’re still pals. He’ll get over it if you will.”

  Gina nodded, the picture of glumness. “Let me ask you something, Diz. You’re up on this case, right?”

  A shrug. “Just what’s in the news.”

  “What’s it look like to you? Honestly.”

  Hardy killed a second or two admiring the ferns, then came back to Gina with a somber look. “I might be wrong,” he said, “but since your Px”—a preliminary hearing—“has a probable-cause standard of proof, which is a long long way from a reasonable-doubt standard, bottom line, the judge holds him to answer.” This was legalese, telling Gina that she was going to lose tomorrow and her client was going to have to go to a full trial. “Of course, that’s assuming I’m a reasonable mind, which is not a slam-dunk assumption. But if you’ll grant me that, then you’ve got a reasonable mind with a strong suspicion that a crime has been committed and that your client committed it. And that’s what the statute mandates.”

  “Even without any physical evidence?”

  Hardy’s brow went dark. “What are you talking about? They got physical evidence up the wazoo. An autopsy. Probably a murder weapon. Pictures of a torn-up cabin, plus a strong motive, an eyewitness, prior domestic violence, a bunch of lies your client told, and—oh wait, before I forget—he grabbed a gun and took off before the police could get him in jail. Did I leave out anything? Of course he did send his daughter to threaten a witness too, but maybe that was her idea. Your client’s going to trial, Gina. You better get used to it.” Hardy gave her a shrug. “You asked me.” On a less confrontational note, he added, “You got anybody else to point at?”

  Gina shook her head no. “Wyatt’s talked to Caryn’s business partner, whose life got way better when Caryn died. Plus, he had an affair with her a while ago. His alibi is weak too. But we can’t put him at the scene. He even provided fingerprints to Wyatt—voluntarily—and no match. Beyond that, there’s nobody else close except maybe this guy who sent Stuart a couple of threatening e-mails. His car is what’s killing us; the neighbor girl seeing it.”

  Hardy reflexively corrected her. “You mean saying she saw it.”

  “I didn’t say that? I thought I did.”

  “No, what you said was, ‘The neighbor girl seeing it.’ And not to beat on you when you’re down, that’s the kind of slip that’ll kill you.”

  “You’re right. You are so right.” Gina’s face went blank, her voice hollow. “You know,” she began, “Stuart wanted to fire me this morning. I talked him out of it. I’m thinking now that maybe that was a mistake, that I’m not ready for this.”

  “Everybody feels that way, Gina. It’s performance time. You’ll rise to it like you have before a hundred times.”

  “But never in a murder case.”

  Hardy embodied nonchalance. “Same rules, same procedures, same people in the courtroom. You’ll get your sea legs and be fine. But let me ask you one.”

  Sighing again, she nodded. “All right. Shoot.”

  “You believe your man didn’t do it, right? He’s factually innocent. And forget about Wes. You don’t have to explain why to me, if it’s good enough for you.”

  “Okay. Yes. He’s innocent.”

  “So use that. If he’s innocent, what really happened? What’s your theory on the case?”

  Gina pursed her lips, looked into the middle distance. “She was expecting somebody. He came and they had a disagreement about something important. No, more than important—life-altering. Somehow she was going to ruin this guy’s life. So he had to kill her.”

  Hardy contemplated that for a moment. “So she was having an affair?”

  “Yes.”

  “Definitely?”

  A beat, then, “Yes.”

  “Okay, then, there’s your case. So here’s ten cents of free advice: Prove it.”

  TWENTY-FIVE

  IT WAS STILL DARK OUT WHEN Gina heard her morning Chronicle hit her front door and, since she wasn’t sleeping anyway, reached out in her pajamas and brought it in. The end of the balmy spell, prefigured for the past several days by increasing winds and scudding cloud cover, was now reality enough that the paper was wrapped in plastic to keep it dry, and although the actual rain hadn’t begun to fall, clearly it was going to be wet and cold.

  Gina had stayed at the office with her discovery folders until nearly nine o’clock, then packed them up in her lawyer’s briefcase. Thinking it might bring her luck and wondering all the while at the same time if it was a good idea, she had taken a taxi to the Rue Charmaine, the restaurant directly under David Freeman’s old apartment on Mason, one block straight downhill from the Mark Hopkins Hotel that had been their favorite. Rick came out of the kitchen and showered her with attention. Then, in a custom long-established by David, Rick first determined what wine she’d be drinking—in this case, a half bottle of Gevrey-Chambertin—and then brought her several small private special dishes that did not appear on the menu, to match the wine.

  Home by eleven, wrestling with all that surrounded her case—Stuart, David, Juhle, Clarence, Caryn’s phantom lover (and killer?)—she finally fell asleep sometime after 12:30, the last time she remembered glancing at her clock.

  Until she was looking at it again at 4:15, wide awake.

  When the paper hit the front door, it was the excuse she needed to throw off her covers. She knew she wasn’t going back to sleep today. Might as well not fight it.

  In her single-mindedness since Stuart had been arrested, Gina had neglected to do any grocery shopping, and now the pickings in her home were slim. She told herself that this wasn’t smart if she was to have the energy she was going to need in court, but that wasn’t going to help her this morning. Nothing remotely resembling a meal spoke to her from the pantry shelves. But she had one frozen teriyaki rice bowl left in her freezer, and not really in the mood for it, she nevertheless put it in the microwave and started the coffee going, six cups’ worth.

  Returning to the kitchen table, sitting down, opening the paper, she felt some undefined sense of relief that, at least for today, Stuart was off the front page. Although ironically enough, she thought, here was a picture of Jedd Conley and his wife on page three, at some fundraising event, with an accompanying article about his anticipated run for the U.S. Senate. He was still being coy and hadn’t definitely committed, but obviously someone—one of Horace Tremont’s political allies, no doubt—had floated the rumor to see how it played on the street. Judging from the article, it was going to play pretty well.

  Thinking back to the night he’d put the make on her ten days before, Gina shook her head in a kind of disgusted wonder. She didn’t hate or even dislike Jedd. In fact, to the contrary. But why, she wondered, was it always these guys with a kind of slippery personal morality who got drawn to high-level politics? And, all too often, elected? It drove her nuts, which is why she rarely allowed herself to think about it. But seeing the story now in the paper, she resolved that if Jedd did decide to run, she wouldn’t vote for him. Even if he was charming, sexy, discreet. It wasn’t going to happen.

  The timer on the microwave sounded as Gina finished the first section of the paper. She turned it over as she was getting up. Stirring the rice absentmindedly, she brought it over by the coffee machine, put it down and poured herself a cup with a spoonful of sugar. On automatic, coffee in one hand, rice bowl in the other, she returned to her seat at the table, noticing that outside, it was still dark.
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br />   The cup stopped halfway to her mouth and she put it back down softly, staring at the familiar name under the headline in the regional news that had caught her eye:

  APPARENT SUICIDE IN FOSTER CITY

  Police in Foster City are treating as a probable suicide the death, apparently by sleeping pills, of a woman found yesterday in her bed in the Harbor Creek Condominium complex. Kelley Gray Rusnak, 34 years old, and unmarried, had been a laboratory specialist for the San Bruno medical technology company, Polymed Innovations, Inc., for the past 11 years. When she failed to appear or call in her absence at work last Friday, and then this Monday, her employers became concerned and notified the police. William C. Blair, PII’s president, said, “Kelley was one of our most reliable employees and when she didn’t call in sick, we were very concerned that something bad must have happened.”

  Fully clothed when found, Ms. Rusnak, police say, appeared not to be the victim of foul play. Blair acknowledged that he had heard reports from the victim’s colleagues that she had been depressed in recent weeks, and had recommended that she seek counseling. An autopsy is pending.

  Funeral arrangements have not been announced but the family asks that in lieu of flowers, contributions be made to…

  Gina knew that rain or shine or fog, Wyatt Hunt usually started his day early with a jog from the warehouse in which he lived near the Hall of Justice, out to the Embarcadero, then north to Maritime Park, and back. He didn’t answer his phone at home when she called him, so she left a message and, her breakfast and coffee forgotten, ran to her room and got changed into her well-worn jogging outfit and tennis shoes. She would run across town, down California and Market, and cut him off. If she missed him, she’d go by his place.

  She didn’t miss him. At 6:15, Gina ran at his side, slowly enough through the light drizzle that they both could talk. “She was going to be one of my witnesses, Wyatt. She was one of the two people Stuart saw down the Peninsula. He wasn’t fleeing from the arrest, but going down to talk to these people and find out what they knew about Caryn’s business. I tried to subpoena her, but couldn’t get the damn thing served.”

  “Well, now you know why.”

  “This has to be related to Stuart, and to the Dryden Socket somehow,” she said. “She told Stuart something was seriously wrong with the product.”

  “So she killed herself over it? Why would she do that?”

  “I’d be surprised if she did.”

  “But you just said…”

  “I said the cops in the paper were calling it a probable suicide. I’m calling that pretty unlikely. I mean, two deaths in two weeks, and the women were partners in the same project? This doesn’t raise a flag for you?”

  They jogged on together. “It’s a definite question,” Wyatt said.

  After a few more steps, he added, “I could look into it, but it would be an expensive fishing trip. And how’s that helping Stuart in the here and now?”

  “Yeah, I know. It’s not.”

  They’d gotten pretty much to the end of the line, where the asphalt of their running path ran into the breakwater a few hundred yards beyond the Maritime Museum at the corner of Ghirardelli Square. Out on the open water, the bay was a churning mass of gray-green, studded with whitecaps. The cloud cover was dark, thick, unbroken and low over the Golden Gate Bridge, the wind gusty and fitful. Without discussion, they turned and put the wind at their backs, now allowing it to push them along, making it easier to talk too.

  “Okay,” Gina said, “let’s leave Kelley and go back to Caryn. Do you think she was sleeping with somebody?”

  Wyatt huffed. “Probably.”

  “Diz says that’s our killer.”

  “He’s probably right.”

  “So who do we got?”

  “Actual names? McAfee. Maybe Pinkert. The guy down in Palo Alto—Furth. Conley…”

  Gina came to an abrupt stop. “Conley? You mean Jedd Conley?”

  Hunt, keeping up his pace, jogging in place, shrugged. “Sure, why not? They talked on Friday. Maybe they made a date for Sunday night.” Seeing Gina’s reaction, Wyatt said, “I’m just throwing out possibilities, Gina, everybody we know she talked to. I don’t know if anybody’s even asked Conley if he’s got an alibi. I could find out quick enough.”

  “You ought to do that.” Gina went back into her jog, Wyatt falling in beside her. “Eliminate him, if nothing else. But whoever she was seeing, they had to meet up somewhere. They had to plan it. Somebody might have seen them or heard something.”

  “Maybe not,” Wyatt said. “Not if it was Doctor Bob.”

  “McAfee?”

  Wyatt bobbed his head. “Lots of places to hide out in their new clinic space. It would have been a piece of cake, Gina, as long as they mostly didn’t want to do it laying down. The same would hold true of Pinkert, too. Even if she didn’t like fat guys.”

  “Who said that?”

  “McAfee.”

  “Well, she liked Pinkert enough to ask him to be her partner. What’s his alibi?”

  “I don’t have one for him, either. McAfee basically just said it was no chance.”

  “Okay, we should get that too.” They ran in silence for about half a block, then Gina went on. “I’d like you to put in all the time you can on this, Wyatt. Go back to the hospital and start with the assumption that Caryn was having an affair. See what you can find.”

  “Do you have her phone records?”

  “They were with the discovery docs. I haven’t done much with them.”

  “I’ll want them.”

  “Done. What else? But think fast.” They’d gotten to the Ferry Building, the foot of Market Street. “This is my turnoff.” Both of them came to a halt, neither breathing hard.

  “I’ve probably got most of the rest. I’ll call your office if I need anything else.”

  “You won’t forget the alibis. For everybody.”

  “Right,” Wyatt said. “Everybody in the whole world.”

  The whole Kelley Rusnak situation refused to go away, but before Gina had even gotten home from the run—walking up the steep grade of California Street on the way back—she got to thinking about something that struck her as anomalous in the news story, and that led her to what she thought was a pretty good idea. By the time she was in her kitchen, she was sold on it.

  It was still early, just after seven o’clock, but she had no compunction about making the phone call to another longtime acquaintance who was also a member of Jackman’s kitchen cabinet. Jeff Elliott was the columnist who wrote “CityTalk” every day for the Chronicle, and Gina had what she believed was a legitimate scoop.

  Jeff had been conspicuously silent to date on the Gorman case, probably because he didn’t deal so much in innuendo as in hard news, he wasn’t starstruck and he had friends—Jackman and Gina—on both sides of the matter. He was also generally regarded as a class act who didn’t feel the need to spin the truth for a headline. Wheelchair-bound now with slowly advancing multiple sclerosis, he already had his column and his byline; he had nothing to prove, and he usually avoided trolling in the turbid waters of slander and leakage favored by so many of his Fourth Estate colleagues.

  He picked up on the second ring, apparently awake for hours. “This is Jeff Elliott?”

  “Jeff, good morning. It’s Gina Roake.”

  “Back in the fray too,” he said. “I must say I appreciate the personal invite, but I was already planning to attend.”

  “Attend what?”

  “Your hearing today. That’s what you’re calling about, isn’t it?”

  “As a matter of fact, no. Not really. Although I’ve got a story that might be related.”

  “Might be?”

  “Probably is. I just don’t know how.”

  “Which is where the ace investigative reporter comes in.”

  Gina thought, no wonder Jeff was so universally well-liked. “Exactly,” she said. “I’m guessing you’ve seen the paper today. I’m further guessing you’ve still go
t it within arm’s length. Would I be correct?”

  “It’s almost scary,” he said. “Okay, I’ve got it. What?”

  “Second section, page six, under Digest.”

  She heard him turning the pages over the phone. “So we’re not in the City?”

  There was no mistaking his disappointment. Jeff drew his columns almost exclusively from within the boundaries of the City and County of San Francisco. Interesting news might happen elsewhere, but if it wasn’t on his turf, he usually passed it along to someone else.

  So Gina spoke up quickly. “I’m predicting we’re going to get here pretty fast. You see the suicide in Foster City?”

  “Got it. Kelley Rusnak?”

  “That’s her. Lab assistant at PII. Guess who she was the assistant to?”

  “Don’t say Marie Curie. She’s not old enough.”

  “Caryn Dryden.”

  “Stuart Gorman’s wife.” Although Jeff had not yet written a column about the case, he knew that the hearing was scheduled for this morning, and he knew the principals by heart.

  “Correct. Although you notice the article doesn’t mention that. It also doesn’t mention, perhaps because the reporter had no way of knowing, that I’d tried to subpoena Ms. Rusnak for Stuart in the preliminary hearing.” Gina paused for a second, letting Jeff absorb the fact. “You also might notice that the spokesman for the company isn’t some personnel person, somebody with HR, it’s the CEO himself. William Blair. Talking about being worried about a lab assistant because she missed two days of work? This in a company with over a hundred and fifteen employees on site.”

  “Okay.” Jeff was following her.

  She went on. “The reason I know all this, and the reason I wanted her to be my witness, is because on the day that Stuart Gorman was arrested last week, he got a call at home from Kelley Rusnak, and then met her in some parking lot down the Peninsula.”

  “What did she have to do with him?”

  “Nothing, directly. She’d only met him a few times. But she gives him a reason to be down the Peninsula other than running from an arrest warrant. She also thought something about the work they were both doing at PII might have had something to do with Caryn’s death.” A long silence ensued, during which Gina read Jeff’s mind. “I don’t blame you for considering that this is me trying to get another version of events out in front of the public, Jeff. But two things. First, I just wouldn’t do that. You’ve known me a long time. That’s not my game. Second, all this is easily and independently verifiable. You call Bill Blair, ask a few questions, you like his answers, you leave it alone. But I don’t think you will like his answers. I think there’s an enormous story here.”