Women's Murder Club [07] 7th Heaven

by James Patterson

  “So, just as he finds the fire investigations manual to lend me, Jacobi calls and tells me your apartment went up. I told Hanni, and he said, ‘I’ll drive,’ and I was still holding that book when we entered your place.”

  “You put it down on the telephone table.”

  “Didn’t think about it again until Jacobi called me,” Rich said miserably.

  “Has Jacobi already spoken to Hanni?”

  “No. He wanted to talk to me first. Hanni knows nothing about this.”

  It took long seconds for me to sort it all out, put Chuck Hanni back into his role as friend, and realize that the essential truth hadn’t changed. I was shivering, and I wasn’t cold.

  “Linds?” I heard Rich say.

  “We still don’t know who set fire to my place or to any of the others,” I said. “We still don’t know anything.”

  Chapter 72

  THERE HAD BEEN a whole blessed week’s break while Judge Bendinger returned to physical rehab for his replaced knee. But the break was over. Bendinger was back. And Yuki now felt the tsunami effect of the whole freakin’ Junie Moon circus starting all over again, the out-of-control press, the pressure to win.

  At nine o’clock sharp, court was called into session.

  And the defense began to put on its case.

  L. Diana Davis didn’t look up as her first witness came through the gate, passing so close she must have felt a breeze as his herringbone jacket nearly grazed her arm. Yuki saw Davis lean in and speak behind her hand to her client, all the while panning the gallery with her eyes. The TV cameras were running, and the reporters were packed in the rows at the back of the room.

  Davis smiled.

  Yuki whispered to Len Parisi, “There’s no place Davis would rather be. Nobody she’d rather defend.”

  Red Dog smiled. “That beast is inside you, too, Yuki. Learn to love it.”

  Yuki watched Davis pat her client’s hand as Lieutenant Charles Clapper, head of CSU, was sworn in. Then Davis stood and greeted her witness.

  “Lieutenant Clapper, how long have you been head of the San Francisco Crime Scene Unit?”

  “Fifteen years.”

  “And what did you do before that?”

  “I started with the San Diego PD right outta school, worked vice for five years, homicide for five. Then I joined the Las Vegas CSU before moving to San Francisco and joining the CSU here.”

  “In fact, you’ve written books on trace evidence, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, I’ve done a couple of books.”

  “You appear on TV a few times a week, don’t you? Sometimes even more times than me,” Davis said, smiling widely, getting the laugh she wanted from the gallery.

  “I don’t know about that,” Clapper said, smiling too.

  “Very good. And how many homicides have you investigated in the last twenty-five years, Lieutenant?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Take a wild guess.”

  “A wild guess? Maybe a couple of hundred a year.”

  “So it’s reasonable to say you may have investigated as many as five thousand homicides, is that right?”

  “Roughly.”

  “I think we can accept ‘roughly,’ ” Davis said, good-naturedly. “And as well as investigating fresh crime scenes, you investigate crimes that happened months or even years ago, is that correct?”

  “I’ve investigated cold cases, yes.”

  “Now, in April of this year, were you called to the home of the defendant?”

  “I was.”

  “And did it have the appearance of a crime scene?”

  “No. The rooms were orderly. There was no evident disturbance, no blood or shell casings, et cetera.”

  Davis said, “Now, were you told that a man may have been dismembered in the bathtub of the defendant’s house?”

  “I was.”

  “And you did all the normal tests for trace evidence, did you not?”

  “Yes, we did.”

  “Come up with anything evidentiary?”

  “No.”

  “Find any evidence that showed that the blood had been cleaned up?”

  “Nope.”

  “No bleach or anything like that?”

  “No.”

  “Lieutenant Clapper, let me just give you the whole laundry list at once and save a little time here. The walls hadn’t been repainted, the rugs hadn’t been cleaned? You didn’t find an implement that could have been used to dismember a body?”

  “No.”

  “So it’s fair to say that you and your team did everything you could do to ascertain the manner in which a crime was committed — or even if a crime was committed?”

  “We did.”

  “Based on your experience and your examination of the so-called crime scene, please tell the jury — did you find any evidence, direct or indirect, that links Junie Moon to the alleged murder of Michael Campion?”

  “No.”

  “Thank you. That’s all I have for this witness, Your Honor.”

  Chapter 73

  YUKI WAS STILL STEAMING from Red Dog’s rebuke. Or maybe she was hot under the collar because he’d been right.

  Learn to love the beast.

  Yuki slapped her pen down on her notepad, straightened her jacket as she stood, and approached Charlie Clapper at the stand.

  “Lieutenant, I won’t keep you long.”

  “No problem, Ms. Castellano.”

  “You’re a member of law enforcement, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And in the course of your twenty-five-year-long career in vice, homicide, and crime scene investigation, have you been involved in matters concerning prostitutes?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Are you familiar, generally speaking, with the lives of prostitutes and their customs?”

  “I’d say so.”

  “Would you agree that in exchange for a fee, a prostitute engages in sexual relations with any number of men?”

  “I’d say that’s the job description.”

  “Now, there are many subsets of that job description, wouldn’t you say? From streetwalker to call girl?”

  “Sure.”

  “And some prostitutes work mostly out of their homes?”

  “Some do.”

  “And is it your understanding that Ms. Moon falls into that last category?”

  “That’s what I was told.”

  “Okay. And would you also agree that as a matter of hygiene and practicality, a prostitute working at home would do her best to shower after her sexual encounters?”

  “I would say that would be a common and hygienic practice.”

  “Do you happen to know how much water is typically used by a person taking a shower?”

  “Twenty gallons, depending.”

  Yuki nodded, said to Charlie, “Now, based on your general knowledge of prostitutes, and given that Ms. Moon worked at home, would you agree that she probably showered after having sex with each of her tricks, maybe six to ten times a day, seven days a week —”

  “Objection,” Davis called out. “Calls for speculation on the part of the witness, and furthermore, I strongly object to the way counsel is characterizing my client.”

  “Your Honor,” Yuki protested. “We all know that Ms. Moon is a prostitute. I’m only asserting that she’s probably a clean one.”

  “Go ahead, Ms. Castellano,” Judge Bendinger said, snapping the rubber band on his wrist. “But get to the point today, will you?”

  “Thanks, Your Honor,” Yuki said, sweetly. “Lieutenant Clapper, could you tell us this?” Yuki drew a breath and launched into what was becoming her trademark — an uninterruptible run-on question.

  “If a man was dismembered in a bathtub, and in the three months between the day the crime was committed and the time you examined the bathtub a large amount of soap and shampoo and water passed through that two-inch drain — by my calculations, 100 gallons of soapy water daily — and now let’s double that for
the johns who took a shower before going back to their dorm or office or home to their wives — so even if Ms. Moon practices ‘Never on Sunday,’ that would still be about 130,000 gallons by the time CSU examined the drains — could that activity have completely cleansed that bathtub of residual trace evidence?”

  “Well, yes, that’s very possible.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant. Thank you very much.”

  Yuki smiled at Charlie Clapper as the judge told him that he could step down.

  Chapter 74

  YUKI SAT BESIDE the immense form of Len Parisi as Junie Moon’s sleazebag pimp-boyfriend, Ricardo “Ricky” Malcolm, was sworn in.

  Yuki was fully aware that Davis had hired a bounty hunter to drag Ricky Malcolm over the Mexican border for his court appearance, and as Malcolm swore to tell the whole truth, she wondered if Davis really thought this punked-out, tattooed, and homely creep could persuade the jury of anything. Davis’s voice was confident as she asked Malcolm her preliminary questions, getting out ahead of the prosecution by getting Malcolm to say he’d served time for drug possession.

  Then Davis started her direct examination in earnest.

  “What’s your relationship to Ms. Moon?”

  “I was her boyfriend.”

  “No longer?”

  “We’re separated,” Malcolm said drily. “I’m in Tijuana and she’s in jail.”

  Titters arose in little pockets around the gallery.

  “How long have you known Ms. Moon?” Davis asked.

  “Gotta be three years.”

  “And did there come a time last January twenty-first when Ms. Moon called you at around eleven thirty at night and asked you to come to her house because one of her clients was having a heart attack?”

  “No.”

  “Let me get this straight. You’re saying Junie didn’t call to tell you she needed help with Michael Campion?”

  “No, ma’am. No, she did not.”

  “Did the police question you about the dismemberment and disposal of Michael Campion’s body?”

  “Yep. I told them I didn’t do it.”

  “Were you telling the truth?”

  Malcolm started to laugh. “Yeah, yeah, I told them the truth. I never dismembered anybody. I can’t stand the sight of blood. I eat steak well-done. It was one of the wackiest things I ever heard.”

  “I agree,” Davis said. “Pretty wacky.”

  Yuki jumped to her feet. “Objection, Your Honor. Ms. Davis’s opinions are totally irrelevant here.”

  “Sustained.”

  Davis spun on her heels, took a few paces toward the jury, then turned back again. “And yet,” Davis said, her voice ringing out across the oak-paneled courtroom, “according to police testimony, Ms. Moon said that she called you because Mr. Campion was having a heart attack, and that when you arrived at her place, Mr. Campion was dead.”

  “It’s totally bogus. Never happened,” Malcolm said, clearly enjoying himself.

  “The police further testified that Ms. Moon told them that you dismembered Mr. Campion with a knife and that you and Ms. Moon then transported Mr. Campion’s remains and disposed of them in a Dumpster.

  “Did that happen?”

  “No way. Crock a’ shit. Plus, I’ve got no skill with anything but power tools.”

  “Okay, Mr. Malcolm. So, in your opinion, why would Ms. Moon say such a thing if it isn’t true?”

  “Because,” Malcolm said, looking at Junie with his spacey green eyes, “she’s simple, you know, like a special ed kid. She sucks up romance novels, daytime soaps —”

  “Move to strike, Your Honor,” Yuki said. “This whole line of questioning calls for speculation.”

  “Your Honor, Mr. Malcolm’s testimony goes to the credibility of the defendant.”

  “I’ll allow it. Go on, Mr. Malcolm.”

  Yuki sighed loudly, took her seat again between Gaines and Red Dog as Malcolm continued.

  “Like I was saying, in my opinion, right? When the cops asked her if she’d done the deed with the famous Michael Campion, that was like lighting up a wide-screen, three-D fantasy starring Junie Moon, stupid little whore —”

  “Thanks, Mr. Malcolm. Were you charged as an accessory in this crime?”

  “The cops tried, but the DA knew they couldn’t indict me on Junie’s flaky confession, especially since she, whatcha-callit, recanted.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Malcolm. Your witness,” Davis said with a smirk to Yuki.

  Chapter 75

  YUKI READ LEN’S NOTES to her, his suggested line of questioning exactly what she planned to ask, but what was underscored in her mind was how important Malcolm was to the defense. And how important it was that she nullify his testimony.

  Yuki stood, walked toward the witness stand, saying, “Mr. Malcolm, are you here today of your own volition?”

  “Not exactly. The long arm of the law reached out and grabbed me out of a nice little titty bar in Tijuana.”

  “You have friends in Mexico, Mr. Malcolm?” Yuki asked over the laughter in the gallery. “Or was this a case of ‘you can run but you can’t hide’?”

  “A little of both.” Malcolm shrugged, giving the jury a glimpse of his terrible, gappy smile.

  “A few minutes ago you swore to tell the truth, isn’t that right?”

  “I got nothing against the truth,” Malcolm said.

  Yuki put her hands on the railing in front of the witness, asked, “How do you feel about the defendant? Ms. Moon.”

  “Junie’s a sweet girl.”

  “Let’s see if we can refine that answer, okay?”

  Malcolm shrugged, said, “Refine away.”

  Yuki allowed a smile to show the jury she was a good sport, then said, “If you and Junie Moon were both free to walk out of here, Mr. Malcolm, would you spend the night with her?”

  “Yeah. Sure.”

  “And if she needed a kidney, would you give her one of yours?”

  “I’ve got two, right?”

  “Yes. Odds are you have two.”

  “Sure. I’d give her a kidney.” Ricky Malcolm grinned expansively, conveying what a generous guy he was.

  “During your three-year-long relationship with the defendant, did you share things with her? Enjoy doing things with her?”

  “Yeah. Sure.”

  “And how do you feel about her now?”

  “That’s a little personal, isn’t it?”

  Davis called out, “Your Honor, is this the Dr. Phil show? There’s no relevance —”

  “If the court would give me a moment to show relevance,” Yuki interrupted.

  “Overruled, Ms. Davis. Proceed, Ms. Castellano.”

  “Thanks, Your Honor,” Yuki said. “Mr. Malcolm, your feelings aren’t a secret, are they? Would you please roll up your right sleeve and show your arm to the jury.”

  Malcolm hesitated until the judge asked him to do it. Then he exposed his arm to the jury.

  Called a “full sleeve” by tat aficionados, a dense collection of tattoos ran up Ricky Malcolm’s pale skin from his wrist to his shoulder. Among the snakes and skulls was a red heart branded with the initials R.M. hanging from the hook of a feminized crescent moon.

  “Mr. Malcolm, could you tell us what the letters underneath that heart tattoo mean?”

  “You mean T-M-T-Y-L-M-J-M?”

  “That’s right, Mr. Malcolm.”

  Malcolm sighed. “It stands for ‘Tell me that you love me, Junie Moon.’ ”

  “So, Mr. Malcolm, is it fair to say that you love the defendant?”

  Malcolm was looking at Junie now, his face heavy, having lost its wiseass expression, Junie looking back at him with her huge slate-gray eyes.

  “Yes. I love her.”

  “Do you love her enough to lie for her?”

  “Sure, I’d lie for her, what the hell?”

  “Thanks, Mr. Malcolm. I’m done with this witness, Judge,” said Yuki, turning her back on Ricky Malcolm.

  Chapter 76

>   JACOBI CALLED THE MEETING to order at the crack of eight a.m. He asked me to come to the front of the room to brief the troops on our arson-homicide case and where we were with it — that is to say, nowhere. I was wearing jeans and a beaded tank top, a pair of moccasins, and a faded denim jacket that I’d left at Joe’s place before the fire.

  It was all that I had.

  I got whistles, of course, one beefy old-timer shouting out, “Nice rack, Sarge.”

  “Shut up, McCracken,” Rich shouted back, making me blush, extending the moment as my fellow cops laughed and made raunchy comments to each other. After Jacobi kicked a desk so that a hollow boom silenced the room, I filled everyone in on the Meacham and Malone homicides.

  Assignments were divvied up, I got into the car with Conklin, and we drove to one of the dark and grubby alleys in the Mission. We were doing it again, more down-and-dirty detective work, hoping for clues in the absence of a single hard lead.

  Our first stop was a pawnshop on Polk called Gold ’n’ Things, a shop piled high with outdated electronics and musical instruments, and a half-dozen glass cases filled with tacky bling. The proprietor was Rudy Vitale, an obese man with thick glasses and thin hair, a marginal fence who used the pawnshop as his office while making his real deals in cars and bars, anywhere but here.

  I let Conklin take the lead because my insides were still reeling from the sharp turn my life had taken only twelve hours before.

  My mind was stuck in a groove of what the fire had cost me in emotional touchstones to my past: my Willie Mays jacket, my Indian pottery, and everything that had belonged to my mother, especially her letters telling me how much she loved me, a sentiment she’d only been able to write when she was dying but was never able to actually say.

  As Conklin showed insurance photos to Vitale, I glanced at the display cases, still in a daze, not expecting anything, when suddenly, as if someone yelled Hey in my ear, I saw Patty Malone’s sapphire necklace on a velveteen tray, right there.

  “Rich,” I said sharply. “Take a look at this.”

  Conklin looked, then told Vitale to open the case. Baubles clanked as Vitale pawed through them, handed the necklace up to Conklin with his catcher’s mitt of a hand.