MD03 - Criminal Intent Read online

  “You’re the most conscientious man I’ve ever met, Michael Daley. You aren’t helping me fall in love with you.”

  “I’m trying, Leslie.”

  “I don’t know if this is going to work.”

  “Why not?”

  “A lot of reasons.”

  “The federal bench?”

  “That’s an issue,” she acknowledges. “But not the real one.”

  “What isthe real issue?”

  “I’ve been single for a long time. I’ve never mentioned it, but I was married once.”

  This is news. “When?”

  “I was in college. It lasted less than a year.”

  “It was a long time ago.”

  “I know. And the one bad experience shouldn’t color my judgment—but it has. I like my independence. I’m used to having things my way. I promised myself I wouldn’t get seriously involved with another man unless he was almost perfect.”

  That’s a pretty tall order. “How do I stack up?”

  “You’re pretty damn close—maybe as close as I’m going to find.”

  Not bad. “What’s the problem?”

  “I need your attention.”

  “I’m all yours.”

  Her eyes flash. “No, you’re not. You have other responsibilities—big ones. You have your practice, which seems to involve a lot of late-night phone calls.”

  Fair enough. “The last couple of days have been unusual.”

  The hint of a grin. “I understand. But you also have Grace and Rosie to worry about.”

  “I can’t change it. They’re part of the package.”

  “I know. This may sound selfish, but I don’t want to share you—especially with your ex-wife.”

  This is a new angle. I tread cautiously. “You seem to get along okay.”

  “On a professional level, yes. I’m not so sure we’ll do so well on a personal level.”

  “Why?”

  “You still have feelings for her.”

  There’s no point denying it. “I always will.”

  “I don’t want to be looking over my shoulder.”

  “You won’t have to.”

  She shows a hint of irritation. “Come on, Mike. It’s clear to everybody who sees you together. You have stronger feelings for each other than most of my married friends have for their spouses. You have a daughter. You work together. And you can’t seem to untie the knot. How do you think I feel when I see the two of you together?”

  “You shouldn’t be jealous of Rosie.” I realize I sound defensive as I say it.

  “I am.”

  “It isn’t that sort of a relationship anymore.”

  “Before I can make any real commitment to you, I need to know you won’t be leaping back into each other’s arms.”

  “We won’t.”

  “I’m not so sure.” For the first time since we’ve been seeing each other, I think I see tears welling up in her eyes. This is unusual. She once told me judges aren’t allowed to cry.

  “I want this to work out,” I tell her. “I want usto work out.”

  She regains her judicial composure. She kisses me and says, “We’ll talk about it later. Your brother is waiting for you at Fort Point.”

  # # #

  “You don’t sound good,” Rosie tells me.

  “I’m tired,” I say. I’m talking on my cell as I’m driving to her house.

  “Is something wrong?” she asks.

  “They found Martin Kent.”

  “I know. My mom heard it on the radio.”

  It shouldn’t surprise me. Sylvia wakes up at four-thirty. “Can you find somebody to stay with Grace?”

  “I’ve already talked to Melanie and Jack.” Her neighbors have a son who is Grace’s age. We impose upon them more frequently than we should.

  “I’ll be there in five minutes,” I tell her.

  “Are you okay, Mike?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Something in your voice.” She hesitates and says, “Something with Leslie?”

  She knows me better than anybody. “I’m fine.”

  # # #

  Fort Point is a masonry building located twenty-five stories directly below the deck of the Golden Gate Bridge. It was called the Pride of the Pacific when construction was completed during the Gold Rush. At the time, its four tiers of cannon were considered a state-of-the-art deterrence to a naval attack on California. It turns out they were never tested in battle.

  Rosie, Pete and I are standing in the fog next to a cyclone fence between the outside wall of the fort and the bay. The spot is a popular turnaround for runners and cyclists who come here from the Marina district. The park service put up a sign with a picture of two hands. It’s customary for the runners to touch the hands before they turn back. A more imposing warning next to it says, “No Admittance—This Area Subject to Falling Objects During Bridge Repairs.” Although traffic is light at seven-fifteen on Sunday morning, we can hear the cars and trucks barreling across the deck.

  The police have cordoned off an area about the length of the football field on the narrow access road that hugs the bay. Officers are huddling around the body of Martin Kent, which is covered with a black tarp. The papers will note that he washed up at almost the exact spot where Jimmy Stewart plucked Kim Novak out of the water in Vertigo. Inspector Jack O’Brien is supervising another crime scene. The coroner’s van, a paramedic unit and four police cars are parked just outside the yellow police tape.

  I gesture toward O’Brien, who looks visibly troubled. “We seem to have found another body,” he says. “Do you think you can persuade your client to talk to us about it?”

  “No,” Rosie answers.

  I ask him if he knows what happened.

  “Too soon to tell. The watchman found him at five-thirty. He called us.”

  “Did he jump?” Pete asks.

  He shrugs. “I don’t know. He was pretty banged up.”

  “What about gunshots or stab wounds?” I ask.

  “None.”

  I ask him about other evidence of foul play.

  “I’m not the medical examiner.”

  “Do you have any idea how he got to the bridge?”

  “No. You shouldn’t assume he went off the bridge.”

  I won’t. “Any telltale signs on his clothing?”

  “He’s been in the water for awhile. We’ll have to wait for the coroner’s report.”

  I survey the scene and ask, “Have you been able to connect Kent to MacArthur’s death?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Is it safe to assume they’re related?”

  “We aren’t assuming anything.”

  Pete looks toward the body and points to a distraught middle-aged man who is talking to the police. “Is that Kent’s son?” he asks.

  “Yes. He identified the body.”

  “Mind if we ask him a few questions?”

  O’Brien starts walking away. “This might not be an ideal time.”

  He’s right. “We’ll talk to him later,” I say. “He needs a little time to himself.”

  # # #

  “That’s where they found Angel,” Pete tells me. We’ve driven up to the area known as the east view lot at the south end of the bridge. He’s gesturing toward a parking space about fifty feet from the concession stand. The yellow police tape has been removed. A cool breeze is gusting as we’re standing among the tourists next to the statue of Joseph Baermann Strauss. Every San Francisco school kid learns he was the chief engineer for the bridge. Construction of his masterpiece began in 1933 and was completed four years and twenty-three million dollars later. Next to Strauss is a display of the cross-section of the main cable, which is more than three feet in diameter.

  “Did anybody see her park the car?” I ask. I glance at the tacky snack bar emblazoned with the words, “Bridge Café.” Just past the Strauss statue is the Roundhouse gift shop, a circular building that used to be a restaurant. It’s been a souvenir shop since the lat
e eighties. Like most natives, I haven’t stopped in this touristy area since I was a kid.

  “The security guard didn’t see her drive in,” Pete says. “They haven’t found any other witnesses so far. The snack bar and the gift shop were closed.”

  We walk past the gift shop and through a garden area. The fog is starting to lift and I can see patches of blue sky above the towers. The cool air smells of salt water. We pause at the open cyclone fence gate at the entrance to the walkway on the east side of the bridge deck. A sign says pedestrians may walk across the bridge from five a.m. until nine p.m. The gate is topped with barbed wire.

  “He couldn’t have gotten out on the deck if he was here before five,” I observe.

  Pete studies the gate and says, “He could have climbed over it.”

  I look at the barbed wire at the top and say, “That would have hurt.”

  “He probably wasn’t worried about cuts if he was planning to jump. If there wasn’t any traffic, he could have hopped over the barrier onto the roadway and walked around the gate.”

  “He might have been hit by a car.”

  “There isn’t much traffic at four in the morning.”

  I look at the tollbooths adjacent to the snack bar. You have to pay only when you’re heading southbound. “Somebody at the toll booth might have seen him,” I say.

  “Maybe not. Only four lanes were open at three-thirty yesterday morning.”

  I ask him about patrols.

  “The bridge has its own security force. A couple of officers watch for potential suicides. We should talk to the guys who were on duty last night.”

  We walk onto the deck and head north. I stop for a moment and look over the side. Fort Point is directly below us. I can see the yellow police tape forming a semicircle arc around Kent’s body. “He couldn’t have jumped from here,” I say. “He would have landed in the middle of the parade ground.”

  Pete nods. We continue walking for another hundred yards or so. A tall chain-link fence was added above the original iron guardrail several years ago to deter suicides. It extends only part way to the south tower. If Marty Kent didn’t want to climb the higher fence, he needed to walk only a few hundred feet north.

  When we reach the south tower, the skies are starting to turn dark blue and we can see Alcatraz to the east. I glance over the side and look down over the murky waters of the bay. “I wonder what Marty Kent was thinking.” I say to Rosie.

  “This may have been the last thing he saw,” she says.

  I can feel the blood rushing to my feet, and I take a step back from the rail. He may have flown over two hundred feet straight down into dark, ice-cold water at full speed in the middle of the night. Rosie and I look at each other for a moment without speaking.

  Pete glances out at Alcatraz and says, “Just because his body washed up at Fort Point doesn’t necessarily mean he jumped. It may be a coincidence that Angel and Kent were both at the bridge. Maybe they came in the same car. Maybe they were in on something. Maybe they were mad at each other. Somebody could have driven both of them.” He turns back to me and says, “The one thing I do know is that we shouldn’t jump to any hasty conclusions.”

  *****

  Chapter 11

  The Princess of Bryant Street

  “During my tenure as district attorney, we will earn the respect and admiration of law enforcement officials across the country.”

  — San Francisco District Attorney Nicole Ward. San Francisco Chronicle. Sunday, June 6.

  The chief law enforcement officer of the City and County of San Francisco is glaring at me through oval-shaped brown eyes that sit just above her high, sculpted cheekbones. Nicole Ward’s stylish cotton blouse and light slacks suggest she was lifted directly from the pages of a Nordstrom’s ad. Her creamy complexion complements her shoulder-length auburn locks. She wrinkles her prim nose as she says to me, “You don’t seriously think any judge in his right mind will grant bail to your client, do you?”

  Beneath the sleek veneer, she’s a street fighter who plays for keeps and wins more often than she loses. The battle is on.

  “We’re going to ask for bail,” I say.

  “We’ll oppose it.”

  It’s a beautiful Sunday morning. Most San Franciscans are drinking coffee, looking over the Sunday Chronicle and perhaps thinking about a hike on Mount Tam. Rosie and I have an audience with the woman Rosie calls the Princess of Bryant Street. We’re sitting in the overstuffed chairs in the ceremonial DA’s office on the third floor of the Hall. A few years ago, the citizens of our fair city elected an egomaniac named Prentice Marshall Gates III as our DA. His first official act was to have this office remodeled with oak paneling, elegant leather chairs and plush carpeting. He was better at picking furniture than trying cases. Although Gates left the scene two years ago, his furniture is still with us. It would cost at least fifty grand to rip out the paneling and the carpets and replace them with something a bit less ostentatious. Thus, Nicole Ward gets to sit in nice digs. The daughter of the CEO of a biotech firm wears the accouterments of power well. While style will get you a long way in San Francisco, it would be a huge mistake to underestimate her skills as a prosecutor.

  Rosie says, “She isn’t a flight risk. She can’t go anywhere without being recognized.”

  Ward leans across her immaculate desk and says, “You shouldn’t expect special treatment from this office just because your client is a celebrity.”

  Believe me, we don’t.

  Ward glances at the miniature bronze scales of justice sitting on her credenza and adds with melodramatic self-righteousness, “Equal justice under the law. We respect every defendant’s rights. We treat everybody the same.”

  I don’t doubt her.

  She points an index finger at us and says, “She tried to flee. She drove to the bridge. If she hadn’t been intoxicated, she’d be in Oregon by now.”

  Rosie takes in the calculated diatribe with stoic silence. You’re bound to lose if you get into a pissing contest with Ward.

  “The arraignment is tomorrow at two,” Ward says. “We’re before Judge McDaniel.”

  Not a great draw for us. Elizabeth McDaniel is a veteran Superior Court judge who moved down the hall from the DA’s office a few years ago. Although she is thoughtful and exceptionally bright, she’s never met a prosecutor she didn’t like.

  Ward adds, “I presume your client is going to plead not guilty.”

  “That would be correct,” Rosie replies.

  “Then we’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Nicole,” Rosie says, “I was hoping we could take a few minutes to discuss the case.”

  “There’s nothing to discuss.”

  Rosie scowls. “If you didn’t want to talk, why did you agree to see us?”

  Ward doesn’t hesitate. “Professional courtesy. Nothing more.”

  How magnanimous. “What about Martin Kent?” Rosie asks.

  “He’s dead. You know as much as we do. We’re investigating.”

  Thanks. I ask, “Do you know how he died?”

  “We aren’t sure.”

  “Did he jump off the bridge?”

  “We aren’t ruling anything out.”

  Rosie isn’t giving up on a suicide yet. “Why would he have killed himself?”

  “We don’t know.”

  “You mean you won’t tell us.”

  Her eyes narrow. “I mean we don’t know. We just opened an investigation. We talked to his son, who said he saw nothing unusual in his father’s behavior. We’re talking to the toll takers and the bridge security force. We’re trying to find anybody who might have seen him.” She cocks her head and adds, “Who knows? Maybe your client was involved in his death, too.”

  Rosie ignores the cheap shot and observes, “Surely you’ve considered the possibility that Kent might have been involved in MacArthur’s death.”

  “The thought had crossed my mind.”

  “You could even put together a plausible scenario where he
might have killed MacArthur and then jumped off the bridge.”

  Ward gives us a sarcastic grin and says, “You left out the part where he decided to frame your client for murder on the way.”

  Rosie isn’t giving in. “It’s not beyond the realm,” she insists. “His car was still at MacArthur’s house. He could have driven my client to the bridge.”