The trip from the Nine Dragons office in Shinagawa to the second crime scene didn’t take long. Sakaguchi sent Osaki and Sugamo ahead in their own car while Hiroshi informed the early-arriving employees that their workplace would remain a crime scene for as long as it took.
Sakaguchi talked on the phone almost the entire way, telling Hiroshi only that there was another murder scene and that yes, it involved English, since one of the persons of interest was American. And yes it involved money, since it was in Azabu, a well-off neighborhood in central Tokyo.
A new young detective, whose name Hiroshi had forgotten, drove them. Hiroshi noticed her in the meetings, but he didn’t know anything about her, not even her name. She let Hiroshi and Sakaguchi out in front of the apartment building.
Inside the spacious lobby, a nervous-looking local cop checked their badges and a thin-faced apartment manager escorted them across the marble floor peppering them with questions. They ignored him and got on the elevator with a terse bow.
On the eighth floor, the door to the apartment was open. The genkan was crowded with detectives’ shoes, so Hiroshi left his outside in the hallway and followed Sakaguchi into the large LDK, living-dining-kitchen, area. The crime scene crew finally had enough space to work without bumping into each other. Ayana’s entire apartment would have fit in the living room.
Ueno had been the first detective at the scene after the local police. He had already finished the preliminaries of contacting the airports and train stations and was instructing the younger detectives from where he sat on the multisectional sofa. Ueno’s leg was still healing from a gunshot wound, the repeated infections confining him to headquarters or easy-to-work scenes like this. Hiroshi wondered if he could ever return to the field full-time again.
Sakaguchi’s knee wasn’t any better. Multiple knee surgeries and a brace kept him away from arrests, chases, or the rare shooting. Sakaguchi plopped down next to Ueno on the sofa, a piece of furniture that fit his size. Everyone told Sakaguchi to stay off his knee, but he came from a working-class area of Osaka where people took national holidays as the only rest. For Sakaguchi, hard work was basic, but working his way up from beat cop also meant being easy to get along with while almost no one else was.
Ueno pointed Hiroshi toward the tatami mat room. Double the standard six-mat size, the room was lined by sliding doors that granted privacy when shut and enlarged the living room when open. At one end, a head-sized bloodstain blotted the tatami. Even the tatami was high quality, golden, and smoothly woven. A floor chair and zabuton pillows were tossed around. A small panel TV rested off-center on an antique tansu chest. Hiroshi said a prayer of thanks the bodies had been taken away.
Sugamo and Osaki were supervising the detectives in the bedrooms from the back hallway. The two of them, despite Sugamo doing sumo and Osaki playing rugby in the police league, didn’t appear quite as massive in the spaciousness of this apartment.
The open kitchen held a recessed refrigerator, a freezer, and a glass-fronted wine cellar with a stack of wine crates. The kitchen island was too wide to reach across, with a built-in flat grill, double sink, and plenty of space to eat. Tall stools held two schoolgirls’ backpacks.
Sakaguchi was reading something on a clipboard from one of the medical staff. When he finished, he waved Hiroshi over. “Can you go talk to the mother? I can’t speak English.”
“Isn’t she…?”
“She’s Japanese, but she married a foreigner, so there’s a batch of stuff in English.” Sakaguchi handed a printout from the portable printer Ueno had in front of him. “The daughters are gone. Her mother is dead. The babysitter is in a coma. Husband left a year ago. Apparently she filed for divorce.”
“How old are the daughters?”
Ueno read from the printout. “Nine and five.”
Sakaguchi stretched his leg, the knee brace visible under the billow of his pants. “And see if she knows anything about the babysitter’s cellphone. We couldn’t find it.”
Hiroshi turned to go.
“And get a description of the cats.”
“Cats?”
“Their cats are gone. She’s concerned.”
“Now it’s cat abduction,” Hiroshi mumbled as he walked past the kitchen to the bedrooms.
Like the living room and kitchen, the bedroom was larger than any Hiroshi had seen. An attractive woman with thick hair bunched in barrettes sat on the end of the bed, folding clothes. The room was decorated in pink and white with a vanity mirror, a study desk, bookshelves with books in English and Japanese, and stuffed animals on every surface.
Hiroshi held out his meishi. “Are you Miyuki Nakano Walsh?”
Miyuki took his name card and nodded absently, maybe still in shock.
“I’m Detective Hiroshi Shimizu. I’m sure you’ve been barraged with questions, but could I ask you just a couple more? We want to find your girls as soon as possible.”
Miyuki kept folding the clothes, taking them from one side, shaking them straight, rolling them up, and nestling them against her thigh. She was dressed in loose-fitting workout clothes, some designer brand.
Hiroshi pulled the pink chair from the desk and sat down in front of her. “So, Walsh-san…”
“Miyuki is fine. I’m used to the foreign first name custom.”
“Miyuki-san, then.”
“It was my husband. I can’t imagine anyone else.” Miyuki nodded as she rolled up another shirt.
“When did you see him last?”
“He hasn’t been here for nine months. I filed for divorce while he was gone.”
“Gone where?”
“Wyoming. For work. At least at first, for work.”
“Do you have any sense he was somewhere else?”
“The girls are gone.” She acted like that would be evidence enough.
Hiroshi wasn’t sure she understood the question. Shock did odd things to people.
Miyuki looked up at Hiroshi. “Other than that, no, I don’t, no. I just hope it was him who took them. I can’t think of what it might be otherwise.”
“Could you tell me why you were divorcing? Did you fight or…?”
“No more than most couples.”
“Most couples don’t get divorced.”
“Most do, I’m told by my lawyer. I suspected Patrick was having an affair. Or multiple affairs.”
“Did you have any evidence of that?”
Miyuki refolded the small T-shirt in her hand. “He said Wyoming was for a short time. He wanted us to go, but I couldn’t leave my job. And the girls like their school. His work there kept getting extended.”
“He extended it or his company did?”
Miyuki shook her head. “I was so busy with work and taking care of the girls.”
“Why would he take them?”
“To punish me for the divorce, I guess.” Miyuki crumpled a baby blue pajama top in her hands, then flapped it out straight and folded it.
“Where was he working?”
“Nine Dragons Wealth Management.”
“Where?” Hiroshi turned over the sheet Sakaguchi handed him, but there was nothing about Nine Dragons.
“Nine Dragons? In Shinagawa?” Hiroshi took a minute. Sakaguchi must have known this, but he didn’t say anything. Or maybe he didn’t know, but that was unlike him. The distance between the two crime scenes would be easy to figure out.
“And where do you work?”
“At MizuTNG Bank, accounts manager. Toranomon office.”
“It must be difficult working full-time and taking care of two daughters.”
Miyuki started folding bright-colored tights. “People always say that, but we manage. I manage.”
“This is your oldest daughter’s room? Your younger daughter sleeps where?”
“They sometimes sleep together. Her bedroom’s over there, and our bedroom, I mean, my husband’s and mine, or what used to be ours, is at the end of the hall.”
Add on the tatami room where the grandmother died and that made a 4LDK, in real estate parlance, four bedrooms, and a living-dining-kitchen. The mortgage probably ran one to two million yen a month, maybe more.
“Did they take a lot of clothes?”
“Yes. And toothbrushes, hairbrushes. And the cats, it seems.”
“Maybe the cats escaped? Did you leave the door open?”
“They’re supposed to have an ‘enjoy nature’ outing tomorrow.” She stared at the clothes beside her as if noticing them for the first time. “What am I supposed to tell the school?”
“When did you get the last message from your husband?”
She shook her head and shrugged. “Last week. I didn’t write back.”
“Why not? Were you…?”
“My lawyer said I should wait until we got the divorce settled. It didn’t seem like he was coming back to sort it out.”
“He received the paperwork?”
She nodded. “I’d hired a detective—”
“To find proof of infidelity?”
Miyuki unrolled and rerolled another shirt without answering.
“Can you give me the name of the detective?”
“I have it somewhere.” Miyuki pulled out her phone, and, after scrolling for a long time, held out the information to Hiroshi.
He took a quick photo of the info.
“And can you tell me about the babysitter?”
“The girls love him.”
“Could you start with his name?”
“Taiga Smith Sato. Is he OK?” Miyuki looked up, her face tight.
“Head wounds always look worse than they are. Three names?”
“He’s half. Like my daughters.”
“Did you see Taiga’s cellphone? It’s important.”
Miyuki shook her head.
Hiroshi nodded. “When did you hire him?”
“At the start of the semester. Taiga’s great with the girls. He really connected with them. Takes them from school to soccer to cram school. Out to dinner if I’m late. My mother—” Miyuki choked up. She took a breath, glanced at Hiroshi, and then stared at the mirror.
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
Miyuki recomposed herself. “Is that all you need from me?”
“Is there anyone else other than your husband you can think of who might be involved? From your work, or his work, or…?”
Miyuki shook her head more slowly. “I’ve been over every possibility in my head since I found my mother and Taiga.” She looked up. “If you have more questions, could we talk at my lawyer’s office tomorrow? I mean, this afternoon.”
“Yes, of course. You need some sleep. We’ll leave detectives in the living room and monitor your calls.” Hiroshi wished Takamatsu were there to ask more questions in his inimitable, irritating way. But instead of asking a Takamatsu-type question, Hiroshi let it go. “As for your cats, do you have a photo or—?”
“Fuck the cats!” Miyuki shouted in English, rising up red-faced, her eyes full of tears. “I don’t care about the goddamn cats.” She let out a scream as tears poured from her eyes. She snatched a handful of the just-folded clothes and buried her face in them.