Blessed are the Meek (4 page)

 

Chapter 6

“H
ELLO,
S
EAN,”
A
NNALISA PURRS.

He doesn't say a word as we stare at one another.

“Oh, pardon me, Gabriella,” Annalisa says. “Let me introduce you to Detective Sean Donovan.”

Silence.

Annalisa must sense the tension because she adds, “Don't worry. He's not here to question me. He's here to help. He's my ex-­boyfriend.”

Ex-­boyfriend? It takes me a second to process this information. When I do, I don't like the conclusion I come to.

“Gabriella, I saw your car out front. What are you doing here?” Donovan finally says. We lock eyes, ignoring Annalisa.

“Doing my job,” I say, biting the words out. “I didn't know Rosarito police were involved in this case.”

Annalisa is looking back and forth at us with one arched black eyebrow.

Donovan looks down for a second at his shoes, then rakes a hand through his perpetually messy hair. “I'm not on duty.” He looks past me, over my shoulder.

“I'll let you explain to Annalisa how we know each other.”

Donovan starts to reach for me but drops his arm to his side as I rush past.

I gun my motor as I leave the neighborhood, not even glancing back at the house. I'm gripping the steering wheel so hard, my knuckles are white. Donovan didn't have a single thing to say about Annalisa Cruz the other night when I told him about Sebastian Laurent's death. Not one damn word. He sat there shoving mashed potatoes in his mouth, saying nothing.

 

Chapter 7

D
URING THE REST
of my day at the newspaper, I know in my heart that Annalisa Cruz is the girl who seduced Donovan away from a life of celibacy. He doesn't have many ex-­girlfriends. She has to be the one.

When we began dating, Donovan told me that after his father died—­in an effort to please his grieving mother—­he'd considered life as a monk. Before he took his final vows, he met a Mexican-­American girl who had come to visit her brother, a fellow monk, at the Berkeley monastery. He had consulted with a priest and, within twenty-­four hours, packed his meager belongings and moved in with the girl. I had never known her name. And I was okay with that. I buy into the whole don't talk about your exes thing. But now I don't have a choice. Now I know. Her name is Annalisa Cruz.

When he told me this story last year, I couldn't wrap my mind around the fact that my sexy, tough, cop boyfriend had ever even considered life as a monk. The only part that made sense was when he explained that a girl had lured him away from that path.

The story has always disturbed me, making me jealous of a girl with such allure that she was able to change Donovan's mind—­and the course of his life—­within hours of meeting him.

Driving across the Bay Bridge toward home after work, I steel myself to talk to Donovan about it. He had today off work, and we had made plans to have dinner together at my place. Now that I know he spent part of his day off with an ex-­girlfriend, I'm not really much in the mood to see him. But it will be worse if I show up at my place, and he's not there.

My apartment is in the heart of North Beach, the Italian part of town. My grandparents settled here when they came over from Italy. The landlady gives me a great deal on my tiny studio because she went to Catholic school with my grandfather. I am usually filled with excitement when I hit the streets of North Beach, with all the cafe tables overflowing onto the sidewalks and all the good smells and music, but today my heart is heavy.

Does Donovan's odd behavior and nightmares lately have to do with this woman?

Our bed is a battle zone because my sleep isn't that peaceful, either. I still have nightmares about the day I killed a man—­waking up crying and frantically scrubbing at my face and hair until I realize in relief that it was all a dream and that Jack Dean Johnson's guts aren't coating my hands. I don't know if I'll ever get over killing a man. Even one as awful as Johnson.

At the time, I'd thought Johnson was the one who kidnapped and killed my sister, but it turns out Caterina wasn't one of his twenty-­four child victims. Until I hunt down the monster who snatched my sister, I know my nightmares will loop on replay.

I pound up the stairs of my apartment building, trying to prepare what I'm going to say. I slam open the door of my apartment. Donovan is sitting on my beat-­up red velvet couch, holding a tumbler of bourbon.

“It's her, isn't it?” I cringe at my own words. It's exactly the opposite of how I had intended to broach the subject. I had coached myself driving home to be calm and rational—­not a jealous girlfriend. So much for that.

I throw my bag down and slam the front door behind me. I gave him a key to my place about a month ago. Right now, I'm wondering if that was a mistake. “Annalisa Cruz is that girl—­the one that you left the monastery for, isn't she?”

Donovan rakes his fingers through his hair before he lifts his head again. His look says it all. It's her.

“Are you still in love with her?” I'm not breathing, waiting for his reply. I turn away and lean over my chessboard on a side table, pretending to analyze my next move to send to my long-­distance opponent, Tomas, in Ukraine. I'm pretending that my whole life doesn't depend on the answer Donovan is going to give me. The board blurs below me as I swallow and blink.
Die before cry.
It's my mantra.

I can't decipher the look on his face as he stands and heads my way. I brace myself. He's going to tell me he is leaving me for her. I know this is absurd. I know because of therapy that this fear stems from my father's dying when I was six and the irrational belief that every man I love will eventually leave me. But I'm frozen, waiting for his answer. Does he still love her?

“I still care about her,” he says, “but I'm not in love with her.”

Relief floods through me.

He paces my small studio apartment. “But I am going to help her. They want to pin the murder on her. The underwear they found in Sebastian Laurent's car were hers, she admitted it. They think she was”—­he looks up at me—­“pleasuring him in the car and that's why his clothes were off. They think she shot him and put the car in gear, sending it over the embankment.”

“Sounds pretty plausible to me, especially now that I've met her and seen how warm and loving she is.”

He ignores my snarky comment.

“It sounds like the evidence against her is pretty strong, even without their finding a gun, but I don't think she killed Sebastian Laurent. I can't let her take a murder rap.”

I brush past him into the kitchen and slam cupboards around, hunting until I find my favorite rocks glass—­an old vintage one with tiny gold stars. He says he doesn't love her, yet he feels compelled to be her knight in shining armor. I yank the vodka bottle out of the freezer, upsetting some frozen-­chicken-­noodle-­soup containers. My studio apartment is tiny, stuffed with bookshelves and big plants, and that usually doesn't bother me, but right now, I'm not interested in being in the same room as Donovan.

“Maybe your feelings for her are clouding your judgment.” I pour myself three fingers of vodka and take a large gulp that makes my lips tingle and sends a fiery trail of heat trickling down into my core. “She seems perfectly capable of killing someone to me.”

“You don't know her.” Wrong. Thing. To. Say. I storm into the bathroom and slam the door. It's childish, but it's the only place I can go to get away from him without leaving the apartment. Donovan knocks. I'm slumped on the floor near the door, staring at the chipped black, blue, and yellow mosaic floor. The 1940s tile is missing many pieces, but I refuse to replace it. I ignore Donovan's knocks a few inches away on the other side of the door, draining the vodka in my glass.

“Okay, that came out wrong,” he says through the door. “I know Annalisa seems cold at times, but I don't really think she's capable of putting a bullet through someone's head. Don't get me wrong. She's no angel, but she'd rather manipulate the guy into doing it to himself. I just can't see her pulling the trigger.”

“That doesn't mean she isn't guilty,” I say to the door. “She could've paid someone. Did you know she stands to keep the multimillion-­dollar home, a Ferrari, and God knows how much of a life-­insurance policy?”

“That's why I think she might take the fall for it,” Donovan says. I can hear that he is sitting on the floor on the other side of the door. “No alibi. Claims she was home alone asleep. Nobody can verify that.”

I don't say a word.

Donovan clears his throat. “Ella, you have nothing to worry about.” He slides something under the large gap under my bathroom door. I stare at it. But don't pick it up. It's a picture of us that my favorite photographer at the paper, Chris Lopez, took. Donovan and I are standing by some crime-­scene tape talking. It's shortly after we got together, and it's obvious in the way we're looking at each other that we're already in love. I made Lopez print out two wallet-­size copies. I kept one and gave the other to Donovan. I stare at the photo, my ear pressed against the door. Donovan stands, and I can hear his footsteps as he walks away.

I pick the picture off the tile and stare at it. He had me from day one. From the first second I saw him, I knew. I do some deep-­breathing exercises my therapist taught me. Thinking of my therapy sessions makes me realize I'm overreacting.

He doesn't deserve my jealousy. That's one thing I've been working on in therapy—­my flying off the handle. It's a constant theme. Okay, screw it. I'll try to handle this the “mature” way. I make the sign of the cross, crack open the door, take a deep breath, and try to sound as calm and rational as I can.

“What else they got on her?”

I don't meet his eyes but head to the kitchen to start making
pasta carbonara.
I fill my big pot with water, dump a small palmful of salt in, and set it on a burner. The bacon-­and-­egg pasta is Donovan's favorite. This morning before I left, I had promised to make it for dinner. He gets out the butcher-­cut bacon, eggs, and cheese, acknowledging my peace offering.

“There's a string of domestic-­violence calls to her address,” Donovan says, beginning to grate the big hunk of
Parmigiano Reggiano.
“The most recent one was last weekend, neighbors called 911. They said they heard a woman screaming, ‘Please don't kill me.' Annalisa told police Sebastian Laurent held a knife to her throat. He said she tried to push him off the balcony. He hung by his fingers but was able to haul himself back up while she hit his fingers with a fireplace poker. Annalisa's got a bit of a temper.”

I remember Sebastian's Laurent's bruised and scabbed-­over fingernails and knuckles.

“You think?” I add some red-­pepper flakes to the bacon chunks sizzling in my skillet.

Donovan continues. “Sebastian Laurent apparently has—­or
had
I should say—­some type of pull with the SFPD because neither one was arrested in the incident.”

Domestic-­violence calls are a mandatory arrest in California with probable cause, and it sounds like cops had plenty of probable cause.

I fish a spaghetti strand out of the pot with a fork and test it with my teeth. It's almost
al dente,
so I nod at Donovan, and he starts beating the eggs with a whisk, adding in a ladleful of the hot pasta water.

L
ATER, WE'RE ALMOS
T
finished eating when I remember something.

“Maybe it's not Laurent. Maybe it's her. Maybe the cops didn't arrest them because Annalisa has the pull.” Twirling my last bite of pasta and taking a sip of my cabernet, I tell him what the news research department dug up this afternoon—­a gossip-­column photo showing San Francisco Mayor Adam Grant and Annalisa Cruz having dinner together a few months ago at a fancy Union Street restaurant.

Grant is a hotshot thirty-­five-­year-­old lawyer who is being groomed for the White House.

“Cheating on her dot.com-­millionaire boyfriend doesn't help her case, either,” I say, hiding my smirk with my wineglass. “Or maybe it does. Let the mayor help her.”

He ignores my comment.

“Doesn't look good,” Donovan says. “Lot of circumstantial evidence, but there is definitely motive.” He clears our plates. I head to the living room with the last of my wine. “She's going to need more than his help,” he says. “I'm sorry if you don't like it, but she needs my help, too. It's something I have to do.”

He means it.

Heat rushes into my face. He's drawn the line. Two can play that game.

Perched on the edge of my couch, I rummage in my bag and retrieve a crumpled pack of old cigarettes.

“I thought you quit,” Donovan says, his eyes narrowing.

I pull Annalisa's naked-­woman red ashtray out of my bag and plop it on the coffee table. That shuts him up. I put a match to my bent cigarette, shaking it out with a flick of my wrist and tossing it across the coffee table, where it lands smack in the ashtray.

Donovan starts to say something. He stops when I lean back, put my feet on the coffee table, raise an eyebrow, and let out a long stream of smoke.

 

Chapter 8

T
HE NEWSROOM IS
humming like a beehive this morning.

A new report from Cal Trans came out reminding everyone that until construction on the eastern span is complete, the Bay Bridge could collapse in the next earthquake that registers more than 6.0.

“Just great,” says Rich Olsen, who is hovering by my desk. “I already do a Hail Mary every time I go across that bad boy. That's it. I'm moving to the East Bay. I'm not going to take my life into my hands getting to work every day.”

He's from Minnesota.

I laugh. “I've been in about ten earthquakes, and I'm still breathing. You've got to play the odds, my friend.”

“Screw that.”

The replacement, which has been planned for decades, just started this year. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of commuters are driving across the span each day—­some as nervous as Rich. The mayors of both Oakland and San Francisco are still taking cheap shots against one other about who was to blame for the delay, mainly caused by arguments over design and whether the bridge should have a bike path. Finally, the governor stepped in, and said, “Bay Area, get on with it already!”

But the mayors are still bickering. This time over some issues with the integrity of construction materials, whose fault it is, and how that might delay the project. Every television in the newsroom is tuned to the argument. San Francisco Mayor Adam Grant's smile, broadcast on the newsroom's wall-­size big screen, is so large it seems a bit sinister.

Seeing Grant reminds me that I need to find out why he was having dinner with Annalisa. I'll go talk to Lisa Shipley, our longtime political reporter. I'd rather do that than figure out how I'm going to juggle covering two robberies, a four-­car pileup on the 680, and a grass fire before deadline.

I welcome the newsroom chaos today. Today is the twenty-­third anniversary of Caterina's little body's being found. It's horrifying that we don't even know the exact day of her death. Only the day some off-­road bicyclists found her little body under a bush.

I ignore the tears forming at the corners of my eyes. I muted my cell phone when I woke this morning to avoid my mother's calls. As an added bonus, I won't know if Donovan calls, either. Good. I'm still irritated with him.

It's eleven thirty. My mom wanted me to meet her at the cemetery at noon. Well, I'm too busy to go. But I know I'm lying to myself. The truth is, I'm afraid. I pick up Caterina's picture from my desk. For years it was hidden in a desk drawer. Now it reminds me every day why I make those difficult phone calls to make sure every victim I write about is more than just a name in the paper. I kiss my fingers and gently touch the picture. With her dark hair and small pink lips, she looks like an angel.

“
L
ISA, WHAT CAN
you tell me about Mayor Grant?”

She's eating lunch at her desk. My stomach grumbles when a whiff of a half-­eaten cheeseburger and French fries drifts up to me.

She answers in a staccato voice, still typing, without taking her eyes off her computer.

“From big money. Mother's family is East Coast, blue-­blood royalty. Father's family descended from a San Francisco railroad tycoon. Think the Kennedys, but conservatives. Republican Party loves him. On fast track to the White House. Against gay marriage. But appointed several gay staffers. Walks right down the middle, which makes him a very viable presidential candidate for the GOP. Only thing holding him back is being single, but I heard that the plan is before the election, he'll find his dream girl. The spin doctors will use it to conjure a romance and engagement the likes of this country hasn't seen since Grace Kelly married the Prince of Monaco. He'll be like our own royalty—­Princess Di will have nothing on him.” She takes a breath and looks up. “How come?”

“Think he's capable of murder?”

She stops, shoves a fry in her mouth, and gives me a look over her huge round glasses. “He's a politician.”

“I'll take that as a yes.”

“Politicians will do nearly anything to get what they want,” she says. “With that said, Grant is probably too smart to murder someone. You talking about Sebastian Laurent?”

I nod. “Maybe Grant wanted boyfriend out of the way? Maybe Annalisa Cruz is the girl he's going to woo and marry in front of the world. She's got the looks for it.” I hand Lisa the photo of the ­couple having dinner.

Annalisa Cruz's hair is pulled back in a chignon, and she's wearing a slinky red dress—­big diamond earrings dangle from her small earlobes. Grant is in a dark suit. The pair sits at a restaurant table bathed in candlelight.

Lisa gives the photo a fleeting look. “I heard about that, too, but that's par for the course in politics. And, trust me, Grant wouldn't have to resort to murder to steal another guy's girlfriend. You've obviously never met him. Want to?”

Lisa takes another bite of her cheeseburger, dips her frizzy black-­and-­gray hair, and flips through a stack of papers. Unearthing one, she hands me a letter on fine parchment paper with the seal of the mayor's office at the top.

She holds a finger up, asking me to wait as she finishes chewing her bite. Finally, I see her swallow. “I can't make it to the annual press-­club dinner tomorrow night. Kellogg wants someone from the paper there. Call Grant's assistant and confirm. You'll get to see the mayor in action, and, at the very least, you'll get a good meal out of it.”

I thank her and walk away.

“Giovanni,” she calls after me. “Like I said, Grant has no problem with the women. Watch yourself. He's partial to brunettes.”