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IT WAS EIGHT in the morning when Jacobi dragged his chair into the center of the room and called us together. Yuki sat beside me. Claire stood behind Jacobi, arms crossed over her chest, just as emotionally invested in the young, deceased Darren Benton as Yuki was in Casey Dowling.
I noticed the stranger sitting in a metal chair in the corner: suntanned white male, midthirties, narrow blue eyes, sun-bleached blond hair pulled back and knotted with a rubber band. He was maybe five ten, 160 pounds, and he looked buff from the way his blazer stretched across his biceps.
This guy was a cop. A cop I didn’t know.
Jacobi picked up where we’d left off the day before. Chi reported on the Benton case, saying that there was no match to the slugs found in the Bentons’ bodies. He noted that the stippling pattern was still unidentified but that Dr. Washburn had sent photos out to the FBI.
Chi jiggled the coins in his pocket and looked uncomfortable when he said that the lipstick used to write the letters “WCF” was a common, inexpensive drugstore brand.
Bottom line: they had nothing.
I stood and briefed the squad, saying that we were going over the Dowlings’ phone records and that there were many dozens of numbers that came up repeatedly on both lists. I said that we had found nothing unusual in either of the Dowlings’ bank-account records.
“Casey Dowling owned a very distinctive piece of jewelry,” I continued. “We’re working on that, and we haven’t turned up anything at all on Hello Kitty. All bright ideas are welcome. Anyone wants to work the psycho tip line, raise your hand.”
Of course, no one did.
The meeting was wrapping up when Jacobi said, “Everyone say hello to Sergeant Jackson Brady.”
The cop sitting in the back lifted his hand in a wave and looked around as he was introduced.
“Jack Brady is a new transfer,” Jacobi said. “He’s put in a dozen years with Miami PD, most of those in Homicide. Chief Tracchio has attached him to our unit as a pinch hitter in the short-term, pending his permanent assignment. God knows we need the help. Please make him feel welcome.”
Jacobi dismissed us, and Jackson Brady came over to my desk and put out his hand. I shook it, told him my name, and introduced him to Conklin.
Brady nodded and said he’d heard about the firebugs, a case involving two boys who set fire to houses, killing the residents—a case Conklin and I had closed.
I saw Brady’s sharp blue eyes raking the small squad room as I talked. I turned to see Claire speaking with Jacobi, Cindy huddling with Yuki, the TV in the corner of the room showing Marcus Dowling still chatting up the press.
“The more they talk, the less I believe them,” Brady said, jutting his chin toward the images of Dowling.
“We’ve been working the case for a few days,” I said. “We’re just getting our teeth into it.”
“I heard your report, Sergeant,” Brady said. “You don’t have a clue.”
Chapter 30
ERNIE COOPER’S PAWNSHOP is wedged between a Chinese fast-food restaurant and a smoke shop on Valencia, at the heart of the Mission. Casey Dowling’s high-ticket jewelry was out of Ernie Cooper’s league, but Cooper was retired from the SFPD and had offered help anytime we needed him.
Today, the hulking ex-cop’s frame was filling up a faded art deco fan chair on the sidewalk outside his shop. His gray hair was braided down his back, iPod cords dangled from his ears, an open racing form was on his lap, and there was the bulge of a handgun under his aloha shirt.
Cooper grinned when he saw us and stood up to shake Conklin’s hand and mine.
“We’re working a burglary that turned into a murder,” I told him.
“Movie star’s wife? I read about that,” he said. “Have a seat.”
I pulled up a toy trunk, and Conklin balanced his rump on a bamboo bar stool. Cooper said, “Fill me in.”
I handed him the folder of insurance photos, and he flipped through them, stopping often to take in the sapphires in platinum settings, the chains of diamonds, and then the real showstopper—the yellow diamond ring looking like a pasha’s cushion set in a throne of pavé diamonds.
“Man alive,” Cooper said. He flipped the photo over and read the specs of the piece. “Appraised at a million. And I’m betting it’s worth every penny.”
“It’s one of a kind, right?” Conklin asked him.
“Oh, sure,” Cooper said. “A twenty-karat diamond of any kind is rare. But a canary diamond? The setting alone says it’s an original. I wonder why it’s not signed.”
“So what would you do if you stole this?” I asked.
