Be Mine (16 page)

Ray Beamon’s socket wrench
clicked as he
tightened his Barracuda’s spark plugs.

“Excuse me, Inspector?”

The clicking stopped.

Beamon adjusted his head around the car’s raised hood. Tom Reed
stood at the entrance of his garage. Beamon eyed him. He didn’t like this.

“Sorry for showing up unannounced, but you’ve been hard to reach
lately. You didn’t return my calls.”

“I really don’t have anything to tell you.” Beamon went back to
working under the hood. The clicking resumed.

“Just a few minutes for a short interview, Inspector, please?”

The chinking of metal against metal underscored Beamon’s silence.

“You must have some theories. A story might yield a critical tip.”

Beamon weighed everything. Tom could’ve been sent by Molly. Even
Sydowski. He didn’t know what Tom knew. Beamon thought maybe he could turn
things around. Use an interview to put a few small things right, maybe make a
slight alignment. It might be okay, if he kept his guard up, kept things
natural. He tapped his wrench in his palm.

“I don’t know much,” he said, “and what I might know, I might have
to hold back for the case, understand?”

“I understand.”

“Okay, a few questions.”

Tom pulled out his mini-cassette recorder. After testing it, the two
men leaned against Beamon’s Barracuda.

“Tell me about that last day. Walk me through it.”

Beamon’s summary of the day got him talking, but when he indicated
he wanted to wrap things up, Tom brought out his most important questions.

“So who do you think wanted your partner dead?”

Beamon’s head snapped up.

“I sure as hell wish I knew, because if I ever caught the guy who
did it, I’d put one in his head. I’d kill him. No question.”

Beamon read the surprise on Tom’s face.

“Those are pretty strong words. Do you stand by them?”

Beamon let a long moment pass, then looked at the cassette, seeing
the tiny reels on the recorder rotating, knowing that he couldn’t take back
what he’d said.

“I do,” Beamon said. “I want to know who did this. I’ve thought
about it over and over. Who would want to kill Cliff? Why? It makes no sense.”

“What do you make of the fact OCC and Management Control showed up
in the detail shortly after Hooper’s homicide? Isn’t that odd?”

“Yes.” Beamon was careful. “It puts a cloud over things.”

“There’s the impression, or suspicion, that Hooper was involved in
something corrupt and that his murder arose from that.”

Beamon shook his head.

“No way. Cliff was a decorated, decent, honest police officer.”

“What about a vendetta from an old case?”

Beamon doubted it. Tom pressed him to reflect on some of their worst
cases, including ones he and Beamon had worked on while in other details like
Robbery and Narcotics.

“There’ve been threats but those who make a lot of noise never come
after you. If someone’s serious, you’ll never hear them coming.”

Beamon said he knew of no one specifically who’d try anything. Then
after letting several moments pass, Tom changed the subject.

“And what about the relationship with Molly Wilson?”

Beamon didn’t move. He looked at Tom as if he’d cocked a gun.

“What about her? What did she tell you?”

“How did you get along with her, her being Cliff’s girlfriend and a
reporter?”

“Fine. We all got along fine. Like I said, I know her, like I know a
lot of the other reporters who are on the police beat. I also know her because
of Hooper. We sometimes went to parties together.”

“Like friends?”

“Yes, like friends,” he said, ending the interview.

Long after Tom drove off and long after the sun had set, Beamon felt
as empty as he did when they lowered Hooper’s coffin into the ground. He sat
alone on his balcony contemplating his life and the city lights.

Things were closing in on him.

He drank some beer, then went back to looking at the pictures
Hooper’s sister, Andrea, had sent him. Beamon stared at one of Molly, tracing
her smiling face, recalling their time together, never dreaming where that
moment would lead him.

Again he thought of Hoop, out in Lodi by the cherry orchard, then he
thought of Molly. His hand shook slightly as he raised his bottle to his mouth.

God, help me.

Sydowski opened the small fridge
in the
far end of the homicide detail, selected a bottled water for Molly, then led
her to an interview room and opened the door.

“We’ll talk in here. It’s private. Make yourself comfortable, I’ll
get Linda. She’s finishing up in the lieutenant’s office.”

Molly sat down, twisted off the cap. She knew all about this small,
barren room made of white cinder block. It had hard-back chairs on either side
of a table with a wood veneer finish. The room was wired to record
conversations. Taking deep breaths, she glanced around. She’d felt empty since
Hooper’s murder. Now that she feared Beamon was responsible, she was afraid.

Could she do this?

These bare white walls. This was where detectives questioned murder
suspects and witnesses. Where the truth was pursued with righteous fervor. Not
much larger than a prison cell, designed so you could feel the walls closing in
on you.

Molly rolled the water bottle in her hands.

Sydowski had called her a short time ago requesting she come in. “A
few follow-up questions,” he’d said. “Routine stuff.” It had to have arisen
from her accosting Beamon at court in full view of the others, she thought, as
Sydowski and Turgeon entered. They were carrying ceramic mugs.

Files were tucked under their arms. Chairs scraped as they seated
themselves.

“Thanks for coming by.” Sydowski leaned forward to study her for a
moment. “Anything we can do?”

Half smiling, Molly shook her head. He slipped on his bifocals and
opened his manila file folder, then wet his forefinger and took his time going
through pages. Molly forced herself to focus on mundane things: the bottle cap,
Sydowski’s watch, his bifocals, the flash of his gold crowns when he spoke.

“It’s been a while since we took your statement of what happened
that night. We’d just like to go over a few areas. Make sure we have a clear
picture of everything.”

She nodded.

“You’ve said the last you heard from Cliff was when he called you
near the end of his shift that night.”

She nodded.

“How did that conversation go?”

“Brief, something like, we’re still on for tonight, right? I’ll see
you later at Jake’s. Like that.”

“How was his tone, his demeanor? Anything unusual?”

“No. He was upbeat. Nothing unusual.”

“I want to go over something again. It’s very important.”

“Okay.”

“When we talked right after you’d found Hooper, I asked you about
your ex-boyfriends and the chances any of them would have been jealous enough
to go after him. You gave us some names. We checked them out. Then there is
this.” He lifted a page in the file, stared at it for a long time. “You said a
lot of jerks contact you because they see you on Vince Vincent’s show, Crime
Scene.”

“That’s true. They write or call.”

“But nothing stands out?”

“No.”

“Let’s go back to ex-boyfriends. Of all the guys you’ve known, not
one would’ve had any reason to have a run-in with Cliff?”

Molly said nothing.

Without taking his eyes from his file, Sydowski said: “And what
about Ray Beamon?” Then he peered over his glasses. “Ever go out with him?”

Her breathing quickened. Tell him. Now is the time. Tell him
everything. She began but the words died on her tongue and Sydowski leaned
forward.

“Don’t hold back on me, Molly.” She blinked.

“This is the time to get it off your shoulders.”

She felt something deep inside weaken and fracture.

“Is there anything you want to tell us?”

Molly could no longer look into Sydowski’s eyes. Tears fell as she
nodded her head slowly, feeling the hard white walls closing in on her.

“Yes, I dated Ray. Recently.” Molly cleared her throat. “Cliff found
out the day he was murdered. I think Ray told him and something happened.
Something went wrong.”

The creamy morning fog
smothering the
coastline haunted Sydowski as he drove the unmarked Impala south of San Francisco on Highway 1.

The Chevy had been tuned up recently and was running quiet. He had
opened the windows a quarter of the way, picking up the occasional crash of
waves, the screams of gulls, the sounds of things unseen out there in the thick
clouds, wrapped in mystery.

Like the truth about Hooper’s murder.

He rolled up the windows and finished the last of his coffee as they
drew closer to Half Moon Bay. It was cradled between the breathtaking coastline
and rolling green hills. It offered everything you’d expect of a small seaside
town: art galleries, restaurants, crafts, quaint bed-and-breakfasts, golf
courses, motels, hotels, spas, and new resorts, like the Moonlight Vista Hotel.

Molly Wilson had told them they’d find evidence there.

The Moonlight Vista was a new two-story Mediterranean-style complex,
with two hundred rooms on a cliffside overlooking the ocean. Tall palms bowed
over the entrance canopy, their fronds hissing in the breeze as Sydowski and
Turgeon entered the darkened lobby. Within minutes a man wearing a blue suit
appeared.

“Eduard Sanchez,” he said after Sydowski and Turgeon showed him
their identification. “We spoke. This way, please.”

Sanchez’s office was dark. There was a state-of-the-art flat-screen
computer on one side of his large mahogany desk.

“You have the warrant?”

Turgeon opened her valise, unfolded the papers, and passed them to
Sanchez. He read carefully, thoughtfully. He turned in his chair to his
computer keyboard and began typing, stopping from time to time to consult the
information on the warrant.

Sanchez studied the screen as his printer kicked to life. He
retrieved the printed documents, handed them to Sydowski.

“These are all the charges to Beamon’s room for this date. Room
service charges indicate a meal for two people. Breakfasts,” Sydowski said.

“Yes. Two guests. As you are aware, most hotels don’t require
identification of additional guests. Please follow me for the other matter.”

Sanchez led them to a room behind the main desk that was jammed with
monitors, computers, and control panels. Nick Miller, the man in the swivel
chair, shook hands with Sydowski and Turgeon. “I’ve got what you want here.
Watch number 12.” Tape was rolling at high speed.

“We watch the lots for car thefts, accidents, you name it. The pool.
All entrances, exits, lobbies, common areas. Elevators and hallways. We archive
the footage for one year. We get all kinds of claims, ‘I slipped in the hall,
I’m suing,’ or, ‘Our kids never destroyed the paintings in your hotel hallway,
prove it.’ It’s in the fine print that we monitor all public common areas for
security. Most places do.”