Civil Twilight (11 page)

He nodded again, but I had the sense he’d swallowed a comment, probably about the police lab figuring that out without my guidance.

“You haven’t done an autopsy. There’s no incision.”

“Not yet. The M.E.’s backed up.”

“Did they do toxicology? Drugs’d explain a lot.”

He nodded. He was humoring me, answering questions he’d normally remind me were police business, not mine.

I looked back at her face—half almost normal, half destroyed—and tried to find an answer to this. Common sense said there must have been a desperation in her that I missed. But, even now, even staring at her corpse, I couldn’t reconstruct that. Excitement, yes. Recklessness, even. She had been about to step off the hundred-foot pole and was ready to go, not preparing to be herded into a fall.

But none of that was reflected in her body. Right now, I wasn’t going to find anything of any use to Karen Johnson or Korematsu. What I needed to do here was for myself. I reached down to touch her hand.

“Omigod! Her hands! They’re shredded!”

“That kind of accident . . . hard on appendages.”

“You don’t mean she tried to break her fall?”

He eyed me questioningly.

“That’d mean,” I said, choosing my words with care, “she had some awareness of what was happening. A fall from that height takes less than two seconds—add another second for the horizontal momentum. There wouldn’t have been time to assess the situation mid-flight.”

His lips pursed.

“You’re thinking no one who’s gone off a building and about to hit the freeway is going to
assess,
” I explained. “What I mean is take in the situation enough to react. Putting out a hand to break your fall is the natural reaction. Stunt doubles have to train ourselves
not
to do that. You coach
yourself, you practice, you do a run-through of the fall in your mind, you know the safest landing is on your back, arms and legs out. And still you can barely keep yourself from trying to land face down with your hands and knees breaking the fall.

“But if you were drugged, or if a car you didn’t see hit you from behind, you wouldn’t have time to even take in what was happening or where you were. You wouldn’t be aware enough of the situation to have a reaction.”

Korematsu was staring at the floor.

“But that’s not how her hands got so mangled, is it?”

“That may have been part of it.” He hesitated, as if asking again if I really wanted to know the next thing. “When the body lands, the force flings the arms and legs out. Drivers see the body, swerve, and if they miss the body, likely they run over the hands or feet. Probably that’s what happened with the drivers in the first vehicles. In the ones after that, people are essentially driving blind. They know there’s a problem, but they can’t see what. Maybe they saw the body fall, but they haven’t had mental time to process that it’s a
body
in front of them. Bad enough it’s any object falling out of the sky. It’s dark; ahead of them taillights are suddenly glowing. Brakes are squealing, metal crashing all around them. They can’t see anything. They’re just standing on the brakes and hoping. So whether they run over her—it’s a crap shoot. Chances of them braking and being rear-ended into her—” He shrugged. “We’re lucky to have fingers. That’s the truth. If we get prints, we’ll be real lucky. It’s not like we’re going to be able to send them through the system in the condition they’ll be. We’re going to need leads to match them.” He took a step toward the door.

“Give me a moment.” I turned back to Karen, this woman I may not have known at all. I touched a square of flesh on her mangled hand.

I lifted my hand, but the chill of her skin stayed on my fingers as I walked out of the room and started down the hall. Korematsu must have signaled a lab assistant to wheel her body back to the freezer. He was only a minute in catching up with me, as if he wanted to warn me one last time.

Before he could speak, I said, “The killer had to be in the car with her, right? You’re not assuming she met him up there on the parking slab . . .”

“Another conclusion we would have reached. I’d be happy to question him if we knew who he was—if we knew who she was. So if you have other information—”

“Look, I’ve been with her less time than I’ve been with you today. I couldn’t know any more.”

“But your brother can.”

“Fine. Go get him!” I snapped. This was like dealing with Dr. Korematsu and Mr. Hyde.

“Where is he?”

“I have no idea.”

“I think you do.”

“You think in error. If I knew where he was, I wouldn’t be here; I’d be there.” I pushed open the outside door and was relieved to feel the fresh air.

Korematsu caught my arm. “I’ll say this to you again,” he said louder. “We are on the same side. John ought to be on that side. It’s not doing him any good to think he can deal with this off the books. Sure, he’s pissed about his car and the brass being furious and the rest of the guys laughing their heads off. I can understand why he doesn’t want to run the gauntlet here, why he’s set on figuring out what’s behind it—beyond his own stupidity. Why he wants to come back dragging a perp or waving a psychiatric
record or digging up something more than just her name. But he’s only making things worse—a
lot
worse—not showing up here, not calling in, being the kind of irresponsible he’d ride a rookie out of the department for. What I’m saying is if he knows something about this case that he’s not reporting, he’ll get himself suspended and it’ll be what he deserves.”

I stopped, turned, was inches from his face. “You’ve already convicted him, haven’t you? He’s hiding out. He’s doing secret sleuthing. He’s too cowardly to come to work. Has it even occurred to you that something might have happened to him? Thought never crossed your mind, has it? I have no idea where he is. And I’m worried. It’s not like John, not at all.” My voice was quivering, dammit. Now this train of thought seriously frightened me. I pulled my arm free, turned, and nearly smacked into Chief of Detectives Broder.

I looked back at Korematsu, trying to deduce what was show for Broder and what was real.

He eased back a bit. His breathing was shallower, as if to allow more internal room for weighing options. But when he spoke his voice was unwavering and his eyes hard. “I’m going to give you time to get this message to him: if he gets himself in here by the end of the day, I’ll cover for him. I’ll work with him on this case. Do what you have to. No one’s going to be following you. He’s made enemies in the department, and a lot of guys will be happy to see him gone. No one’s got his back. I’m sticking my neck out, but I’m going to trust you.”

“Thank you,” I said so docilely a lesser man might have laughed. “I have no idea where to find him but I’ll do everything I can. He’s being an ass. He’ll be here by sundown.”

I walked to the street. If I could trust Korematsu then he was on very thin ice here. As for John, there was no way I could find him, even if I had intended to.

I wanted to get back to the zendo. But city running has its drawbacks and there was no good route, with some much worse than others. Hoping to clear my sinuses and my head, I opted for flat and headed back along Howard, on once seedy blocks now in the process of spiffification. I cut left onto the Embarcadero. There was one lead Korematsu might not think of.

I intended a quick stop at the zendo, but when I got there a note was on the door:

“You read my mind, huh?” I said as I walked into his little café on the corner. Just one of the three tiny tables was empty. The bracing aroma of strong coffee and sweet pastry filled the space. I pulled out a chair, ready to wrap my finger around the handle of the little white cup.

Renzo caught my arm. “Outside.”

“Without coffee? What’s going on?”

He motioned me to the door. With his greyhound face and gray ponytail, he looked like he’d walked out of City Lights Books after hearing a young Ferlinghetti in 1960. His jacket—cleaned, pressed—was probably circa 1960. He held the door for me and I walked out and followed him down Pacific till we were clear of the café windows.

“That Korematsu,” he said, “he may be okay, but I don’t really know him. He comes in here getting coffee for you and it makes me uneasy. He looks like he’s on business.”

“He was.”

“Like I say, I don’t know him. I’ve been running this place for forty years. I know the city. I know the police. Korematsu may be okay but his boss—”

“Broder.”

“Yeah, Broder. He’s shifty.”

“He dislikes John.”

Renzo shrugged as if to say my point meant little in the greater scheme of things. “Broder’s father was a cop and his father before him. They were on the force back in the days when joining was a business investment. Grandpa made his money in protection. Dad was a favorite of drug consortiums.”

“Are you telling me—”

“Broder was
going
to be different. He was a stand-up guy. Could have been a twin to your John. Figured he’d wind up chief. But he didn’t have the pull. Chief’s a political appointment in this town and Broder didn’t have the savvy to spot the right connections. Took him a while, but he realized he’s dead-ended.”

“Interesting.”

“I’m not standing on the sidewalk losing business to give you a history lesson.”

“Sorry. I didn’t—”

“I’m telling you, here’s a guy who blew off easy money and lots of it, in order to be chief. All he’d have to’ve done was looked the other way. But he played by the rules and got zip. His father and grandfather’d say he’d been a fool. He’s fifty years old with nothing to show for it. But now . . .
now
he’s going to get his. Now, he’s seriously looking the other way.”

“You mean with the smuggling?”

“I’m not talking any one thing. You poke into any one thing and it’s a gateway to the whole business. Trust me, Darcy, you don’t want to be the one who sticks her head through that gate.”

“OPEN UP!”

No response.

I pounded.

A shade moved next door.

“Gary, get this door open or I’m calling the cops!”

Fog covered the city all the way into North Beach—thick, damp, cottony. “Gary, I’m going to freeze out here and die on this doorstep and you will never, ever hear the end of it!”

He opened the door. “How’d you find me?”

I pushed into the hallway. The place was a typical San Francisco apartment building—three stories, two flats to a floor separated by the staircase. In each one a hall led past the first bedroom in the front, past the second, through a living room with a window on the airshaft and onto the kitchen and another staircase out back. They were often first rentals for wide-eyed newcomers so delighted to be actually living in the shadow of Coit Tower or near the clubs on Union Street that they didn’t care about spending hours each night hunting parking spots.

“Karen Johnson’s,” I said as I followed him down the hallway to the yellow living room.

He nodded. “But how—”

I shrugged, wishing I was here with a less serious need so I could savor this moment. “You said Karen was here for a divorce. You don’t handle divorces. But you’ve been party to three of your own. You had complaints about the first two attorneys but the third, you called the queen of tangled finance, remember? Erica Ukner.”

“Erica wouldn’t discuss a client with you.”

“Not with me, your sister. But with me, your assistant, it’s a different story. I phoned from your office, leaving a message to call back. ‘Law Offices,’” I said mockingly, “‘Mr. Lott asked me to double-check the local address of Karen Johnson.’” He stared at me, not sure how to react.

“Didn’t Karen tell you she was a tourist?”

“Like you told her to? Yeah, Gary. But she has to have a residence in the City and County of San Francisco for three months before a divorce can be filed. Meaning, before you could do whatever you were doing for her. Which was?”

“I can’t say.”

“I didn’t track you down for nothing!”

“Attorney-client confidentiality.”

“Your client’s dead!”

“Confidentiality survives death.”

“Work around it. This is serious. Karen was barely dead when someone was poking around your office.”

His mouth twitched, as if he was about to grin.

“Oh, that was you, huh? What’d you take?”

“Everything I didn’t want the cops to. I know what can happen. Why do you think John’s hiding out. Do yourself a favor, get clear of this whole thing.”

“Too late! Okay, tell me this: Why did Karen Johnson steal John’s car?”

“Dunno. Really. Since, say, two minutes after I called you, I have not learned a thing that was not on the news.”

“Karen didn’t call you?”

“Hey. I’ve told you what I can.”

“Okay,” I said, trying to peer in through the cracks of his fence of confidentiality. “John said you are the one who set things up.”

“Vague.”

“Different question: You’re covered by privilege. The police can’t force you to reveal anything about Karen. So why are you hiding?”

He hesitated.

“Oh, because you know something
not
covered by privilege.”

He didn’t disagree.

I leaned against the counter, aimed my gaze above his head. “Karen’s dead, so it’s not something to protect her. It’s . . . of course! It’s something John told you, something to do with Karen but not your case with her. Now what could that be? The smuggling? She caused a crash in front of Broder’s mistress’s place. Ah . . . you’re not surprised! That wasn’t on the news, or not that specifically. So you’ve been in touch with John. He’s okay?”

He hesitated.

“Dammit, is our brother okay?”

“If I said he was last night, it wouldn’t mean he was today,” he finally brought out.