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DETECTIVE SOKOLOV APPEARED in the window of Damien’s office door, blocking Brent and Kat’s exit. They backed up into the room, both wearing hangdog expressions.
When Cesar’s colleague from another precinct entered, he stepped forward and greeted her with a handshake.
I was standing close enough to hear her mutter. “Should have called me first thing.”
“Sorry. I promised Alma I wouldn’t.”
He’d done no such thing, but if it helped him save face with her, I wouldn’t argue. Instead, I exposed both my palms. “It was the family’s wishes.”
She gave me a terse nod, letting me know the conversation wasn’t finished. “Mr. Gough, Kat, can I speak to you alone?”
When they both nodded, she glanced at Damien as if she expected him to leave his own office again.
“Oh, by all means, it’s not as if I have any work to do around here.”
Cesar and I followed him out.
“Well, back to the Mission Street Station for me,” said my excellent ex. He bent and kissed my cheek. “That was amazing sleuthing, Alls. Checking the apps was brilliant. I hadn’t thought of that.”
Smiling up at him, I soaked in the praise even as I missed the adversarial banter we’d rocked when I was in his hair on the Carlos Club case. I poked him in the ribs. “Stop being so nice to me. It won’t get you laid.” I said it for both our benefits, not entirely sure if it was true. If we were getting back together, it couldn’t be out my desperation for kindness.
Cesar cleared his throat and smoothed his shirt, then shook hands with Damien in farewell. “Nice to meet you.”
When the elevator closed me and Damien inside, he gasped, his palm to his heart. “Oh my God, where did you find him?”
“We grew up together. On again, off again for more than a decade.”
“There’s only one right answer where he's concerned, and it’s on.”
“Yeah. It’s a good answer, but there’s a teeny problem.”
“What’s his name?”
“Her name is Naomi.”
“Pity,” he sighed. “Don’t suppose you can convince them to try a threesome.”
I giggled, but it turned into a sigh. “Sadly, no.” Cesar didn’t want to share me, and Naomi didn’t even know about my past with him. She didn’t go for men at all.
Sokolov opened the door to Damien’s office and ejected Kat. She loped over to us, and Damien ruffled her hair.
“You idiot,” he said fondly.
Her eyes filled with tears.
“You should have told me about school.” He gave her jaw a light punch. “I could have scraped up the cash.” The Gough family fortune was on the list of things I’d held against Damien back in seminary, and apparently unlike his brother’s, his share was intact.
“Dad told me not to. He said he had to solve his problems on his own.”
He pulled a tight smile and looked at me. “I guess no one likes to be bailed out by their baby brother.”
The silence stretched out as we contemplated that pronouncement.
For the sake of all teenagers’ extreme intolerance of the awkward, I spoke. “I went to Mission High. It was awesome. If you want to work hard, you’ll find teachers to support you in public school. And Dara was right that you’ll meet different kids than you do at Prescott.”
“Prescott is diverse.”
“Prescott has the select diversity of a carefully arranged bouquet. Public schools in the city are like an empty lot full of wild flowers. Personally, I prefer the wild kind of beauty.”
Kat’s lower jaw jutted. “Aren’t empty lots also full of abandoned refrigerators and used tires?”
“Sure. But the flowers grow up around them. And the wild fennel smells so good when the sun hits it.”
“Until you step on some junkie’s needle.” Kat crossed her arms.
God, what a city kid. She wasn’t as naïve as I thought, and I had to love her. “That sounds like Dara talking. Have you ever met a junkie? I know some very nice ones.” Rico with his stuffed poodle, Bambi, had helped me exonerate David Cohen.
Brent shuffled out of Damien’s office, zombie-like. Oh, hell. What had Sokolov said to him? Kat whimpered in the back of her throat, probably wondering the same thing. Her father held out his arms, and she ran into them. My stomach churned like the cage of bingo balls at St. Giles’ senior night. Did Sokolov suspect Kat was more than just teenager-unstable and involved in the murder? I wanted to judge her for even thinking it of the girl, but how could I, when I was thinking it, too?
Damien stayed at my side, jaw rippling with tension. “Lookie there. An empty office. Maybe I’ll actually get work done today.” His flippant tone didn’t fool me. Was he afraid for Brent, or Kat?
Accomplishing work was more than I could hope for myself. But Kayla wasn’t at St. Giles’ to nag me, and the bishop had given me this very important task. Although, according to Coach Taylor’s organizational plan, I should at least look at Sunday’s lessons today so I could start meditating on them. And I should check in with Al.
“A word with you, Reverend Lee?” Sokolov asked.
“Sure.”
“I can offer you a ride back to your church, if that would help.”
Now that I’d thought about work, I felt itchy all over, like tiny sharp deadlines were poking my exposed skin. Thanks a lot, Coach Taylor, for teaching me to sweat the small stuff. Plus, I needed space from Goughmania to think straight.
“A ride would be great.” I held up my thumb to my ear, my pinky to my lips, and mouthed Call me to Damien.
Sokolov wore a pedometer device on her wrist that looked like it might measure her heartbeat, IQ, and the atmospheric pressure. People with those things always take the stairs, and so I followed her down two flights to the courtyard. Not that I minded. The bigger my quads, the harder I could kick ass in Krav Maga.
She’d parked Cesar-style, halfway on the sidewalk over a red curb. I didn’t blame her. Parking in the cathedral’s underground garage cost an hourly rate on par with the price of a healthy young human ovum, even if you wore a clerical collar and had a special license to meddle. I really had to get on Photoshop, design one, and have it laminated. Apparently, even a police badge didn’t get you free parking.
When she pulled out into traffic, the detective said, “You wowed Garza, the way you put those clues together about Kat—with the app, and the photo. The word intuition was used more than I’m comfortable with.”
I shrugged beneath my seatbelt.
“Still, you should have called me first thing.”
“If I’d called you, and actual police resources went into finding Kat, her misery and embarrassment would have been exponentially greater. I was skeptical as soon as I saw the ransom amount and looking out for her.”
Sokolov scraped her thumbnail on the steering wheel of the black, police-issue Ford Explorer. The vehicle appeared newish, but the synthetic material covering the wheel looked frayed from thousands of hours of cops taking out their anxieties and frustrations on it.
“Dara Chey-Walker was pregnant,” she announced.
I swung my head to look at her profile—its hawkish nose and full lips. Dara couldn’t have been very far along, but the news added another layer of loss to her death. “That’s sad, but it’s not a huge shock. She was living with Brent.”
“Brent Gough just informed me he had a vasectomy ten years ago.”
Interesting. And messy. I sat up straighter. Ten years was after his wife had died from complications related to pregnancy, a fact I’d learned from reading her obituary. He must have felt responsible for her death, to get snipped. And who was the father of Dara’s embryo? “Sperm donor?”
Sokolov shook her head. “Only in the old-fashioned sense. Gough reported that he and Dara had no plans to have a baby, and as far as he knew, she was not undergoing fertility treatment.”
Whoa. Poor Brent. And a potential motive for murder. “Any clue who the father was?”
“No. The lab is collecting DNA from the embryo, but the chances of matching it are a needle in a haystack unless the father is in the sex offender database.”
“Right.”
“Have you heard anything that might suggest a baby-daddy?”
“No. Only Kat’s revelation that Dara thought Brent was rich, and he thought the same about her, but they were both broke. Also, she recently argued with her ex-husband, Sir Peter Shortwall, the philanthropist.”
“Interesting. That’s good info, Lee.” Sokolov flashed her blinker, then changed lanes. “I’m not bringing Gough in yet, but if he knew she was pregnant and marrying him for his non-existent money, he has a motive. Keep your eyes and ears open. One piece of material evidence, and we’ll have our man.”
Tension took hold of me by the shoulders and squeezed. I hoped Brent was innocent, for Kat and Damien’s sake as much as his own. At least she didn’t have Kat in her sights. And she wasn’t arresting Brent—we might still find someone else had killed her. Shortwall, maybe, or the father of her baby.
I blew out a long, steadying breath. Sokolov no longer seemed to mind my meddling so much. Which meant I had leeway to find any suspects who could prove a desperate teenage girl had not murdered her stepmother. And this unknown baby-daddy was the best lead I had.
“How far along was the pregnancy?”
“Just six weeks. We’re pulling up medical records to confirm she knew.”
Oh, she knew all right. It explained why she wanted to push the wedding up fast, a small private Friday ceremony instead of a grand Saturday afternoon affair. The question was, did Brent know, or the father? And who the hell was he? The ex-husband, a gangster friend of Alice? Someone not even on our radar?
The city whizzed by as the detective drove east in the SOMA district, where new cafes and restaurants popped up then fizzled out faster than I could keep track.
“You searched her hotel room?” I asked.
“Turned up nothing. Dirty glasses from drinks with Alice Ma. An empty garment bag...”
“Where are the clothes she was wearing when she drowned?”
“Don’t know.”
“And Gough’s house?”
“Again, nothing out of the ordinary. And before you ask, there’s no giant incinerator in the basement with smoldering, chlorinated clothes in it.”
I laughed. She’d practically described the exact image in my mind. “Glad you checked for that.” I took no offence that she thought my sleuthing skills were amateur. I’d learned them from TV, along with a little guidance from the Spirit, which she called “more intuition than she was comfortable with.”
“Any info about why she’s broke? Shady business deals? Bad investments?”
“Looks like good old-fashioned over-spending, according to our digging. We’ve found no organized crime connections despite her friendship with Alice, and we have a lead on the designer’s murder. She filed a restraining order against a jealous ex.”
“So, a coincidence, just as you thought?”
“Like I said, they happen. And intuition, unless it’s informed by facts, is bullshit.” She pulled up right in front of St. Giles. “Listen, Lee. You keep the communication flowing in my direction, I’ll tolerate your continued involvement in this. It keeps the Goughs calm. They haven’t called in the expensive lawyers to impede my every move. But you hold anything back from me, and I’ll put a patrol officer on you to make sure you are never within shouting distance of a Gough or any shred of evidence in this murder.”
Tingles of excitement sparked in my belly. Hello, bad cop. I hopped out of the car and saluted. “I’d expect nothing less, detective.”
I entered the church office without flipping on the lights. In the dark, behind my desk, I called the bishop and left him a long voicemail update, then texted Al. Thanks for covering morning prayer. How’s Diana? He didn’t reply instantly, which wasn’t like him. Was he at an appointment for Diana? Could she already be declining while I was gallivanting around with my license to meddle? Poor Al. I wrote another message. LMK if you need anything. Sending love.
––––––––
WORRY for the couple wriggled into my gut. I breathed deeply, refusing to leap to assuming the worst-case scenario. Best to get some work done while I waited for his reply. I read the lessons assigned for Sunday, closed my eyes, and inhaled again, inviting inspiration from the Holy Spirit.
My office had its own unique odor: the subtle smell of sage from the occasional smudging after someone confided a particularly awful story to me, mildew from the carpet that needed replacing, and the old book mustiness from pre-feminist Biblical commentaries abandoned by a previous rector which I kept to remind me how far we’d come. The scents didn’t improve with their mingling and contributed to my preference to do my sermon planning outside, on long walks through my neighborhood.
But Coach Taylor insisted I set a goal of at least fifteen to twenty hours at my desk to balance my pastoral visiting and community engagement. “Strong leaders are also accessible administrators. People know when and where to find them.” Personally, I believed the mission of the church was outside, on the streets, at the hospital, in the homes of our neighbors. I trusted my parishioners felt content to find me at the other end of a phone call or text, knowing I’d be at their side in a flash if need be, but I could try her suggestions for a while if it made my bishop’s committee happy.
In the meantime, I’d tried to train my mind to think the way it did when I walked—flashing with images and ideas, leaping to make connections I never would have seen if I hadn’t been at a particular intersection or standing in that exact sunbeam.
Generally, the indoor sermon brainstorming was working okay. But today, I could only think about Dara and Alice, Brent and Kat. Who had Dara been sleeping with? Brent was purportedly shocked by the news of her pregnancy, but what if she told him the night before their wedding and he went nuts on her? Or—and this is what I feared the most—Kat dreaded Dara as her stepmother so much she stopped the wedding the only way she knew how. What if she’d come to my place on Sunday with a guilty conscience, then lost her nerve to confess? After that kidnapping stunt, it no longer seemed impossible that she’d want her dead.
Sokolov had searched the Gough house and Dara’s hotel room, but found nothing.
I called her, and as soon as she picked up, I asked, “What about the pools?”
“We’re working through a list from the city.” She didn’t hesitate, nor sound particularly surprised by the question or my lack of pleasantries. “So far, nobody saw her or caught her on security footage.”
“Can I see the list?”
“You can see it, as long as you don’t start investigating.”
“Promise.”
“God, you’re a pain in the ass.” She delivered the complaint surprisingly warmly. “I’ll send it now.”
The attachment came by text moments later, with another admonition. Look, don’t snoop.
Priest’s honor. I sent her a fingers-crossed emoji along with my reply, then wrote, Whoops, meant to send this one. It was a peace sign.
LOL. Here you go. You have any epiphanies, you call me.
The Department of Public Health had a list of all the pools in the city. The ones near Nob Hill were in hotels and apartment building. Sokolov’s list showed those within three blocks of the cathedral had been ticked off. Not promising, but to her credit, she was putting feet on the ground to investigate.
Got it. I replied to her. BTW, you mind if I take a look at the Gough residence?
If BG says yes, I won’t complain.
So I called Damien, who gave me Brent’s number. I called, identified myself, and made my request.
“Yes. Sure. I’m keeping Kat home from school, but I don’t like her brooding alone in her room. I’ll take her out for a hike so you can have the run of the place. Hopefully, you'll find something in Dara’s things to explain what happened. The police didn’t, but maybe...” Brent’s voice sounded hollow, as if he were in a zombie-like state of shock to learn the woman he’d been about to marry was unfaithful as well as dead.
I was hoping to find evidence all right, but I feared it would incriminate him, or worse, his daughter. He was a damn good actor, if he'd already known Dara was pregnant. Had she been planning to terminate the pregnancy? Or to call off the wedding? Maybe the baby-daddy had more money than broke-ass Brent, she found out, and tried to break up with her betrothed.
Or perhaps his shock was over Kat’s little kidnapping stunt—the come-down after so much fear, then the realization his own daughter had put him through it. Holy cow, kids could be cruel. One more reason to steer clear of the maternal path. Naomi and her nice Jewish girlfriend could contribute to overpopulation, while I fought climate change and guarded my heart from the trials and tribulations of parenting.
Brent spoke, yanking me out of thoughts of Naomi. “I’ll text you the address and let our housekeeper Rosario know to let you in.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to be there to point out your underwear drawer?” By which I meant the private stuff we all keep in our bedroom and don’t want anyone—strangers, cops, family or friends—to see.
“I have nothing to hide.” The declaration made the hairs on my neck stand up. Everyone has things to keep private, which isn’t the same as hiding them. I didn’t display my vibrator as a sculpture on the coffee table or hang my bras out to dry outside the cottage where my parishioners could see them from their seats in the pews. Which begged the question, had Brent gotten rid of his private things along with any evidence, knowing the police would poke through his drawers and every other nook and cranny at his house.
“Okay, I’ll head over now.” Although the entire exercise already seemed futile.
“Thank you. Thanks for your diligence. We all really appreciate it, even Kat.”
Oh, Kat... The worry wriggled its way into my stomach again, along with a thick lump in my throat I hadn’t felt since Cindy's murder. I’d said yes to the bishop out of sheer nosiness and ego, and Damien’s gestures of friendship drew me in further. But I liked that rash, vulnerable girl, and I could imagine no worse outcome than discovering she’d killed Dara out of teenage desperation.
“Governor Newton called me today,” Brent said.
I shook my head, trying to follow the change of subject. “Oh?”
“He admired Dara very much. Invited us for a private dinner when he asked her to be the poet laureate. He’d like to do an official state funeral here at Grace Cathedral, and Damien says he can give a short remembrance, but he’s not up for officiating.”
“I understand that. Fortunately, he has a quiver of canons to choose from.” Was there a collective noun for canons? I’d heard several for a group of priests, some humorous (a discretion), some critical (a lechery). I’d bristled at that one, then remembered how many people had been victims of that particular collective and had to resist my inner urge to form a task force for survivors of sexual abuse. Coach Taylor would have approved when I performed a quick Internet search and discovered the good work advocating for victims of sex abuse in the Episcopal Church. Someone else already chaired that committee.
“So Damien and I wondered...” Brent pulled me out of my worldly rabbit hole. “Would you officiate at Dara’s funeral?”
I’d always wanted to officiate a service at the cathedral, but, “Why me?”
“We appreciate you and your sensitivity. Damien says you’re a pastoral care detective.” Brent chuckled hoarsely, like he hadn’t laughed in days.
I swooned in my desk chair. That placed me in the ranks of Father Brown, who always compassionately fretted over the souls of murderers. After a compliment like that, how could I say no? Besides, I didn’t want to. Maybe I’d get to meet the governor who was swoon-worthy himself.
“I’d be honored. And now, I am going to hang up and go snoop around your house.”
He chuckled again. “Good luck, and thanks.”