“So there's no warrant?”
“Cindy... not just yet.”
“I'm not talking about a story, Lindsay. He went after our friend. Remember? If I can help... ”
“I got a hundred cops working on it, Cindy. Some of us have even handled an investigation or two before. Please, trust me.”
“But if you haven't brought him in, then you haven't found him, right?”
“Or maybe we haven't made the case yet. And Cindy, that's not for print.”
“This is me talking, Linds. Claire, too. And Jill. We're in this case, Lindsay. All of us.”
She was right. Unlike any other homicide case I had worked, this one seemed to be growing more and more personal. why was that? I didn't have Coombs and I could use the help. As long as he stayed free, anything could happen.
"I do need your help. Go through your old files, Cindy.
You just didn't go back far enough.“ She paused, then sucked in a breath. ”You were right, weren't you? The guy's a cop."
“You can't go with that, sweetie. And if you did, you'd be wrong. But it's damned close.”
I felt her analyzing, and also biting her tongue. “We're still going to meet, aren't we?”
I smiled. “Yeah, we're going to meet. We're a team. More than ever.”
I was about to pack it in for the night when a call buzzed through to my line. I was sitting around thinking that Tom Keating had been lying. That he'd spoken to Coombs. But until we put out a warrant, Keating could hold back all he wanted.
To my utter surprise, it was his wife on the line. I almost dropped the phone.
“My husband's a stubborn man, Lieutenant,” she began, clearly nervous. “But he wore the uniform with pride. I've never asked him to account for anything. And I won't start -now. But I can't sit back. Frank Coombs killed that boy And if he's done something else, I refuse to wake up every morning for the rest of my life knowing I abetted a murderer.”
“It would be better for everybody, Mrs. Keating, if your husband told us what he knows.” “I don't know what he knows,” she said, “and I believe him when he says he hasn't spoken to Coombs in some time. But he wasn't telling the whole truth, Lieutenant.”
“Then why don't you start.”
She hesitated. “Coombs did come by here. Once. Maybe two months ago.”
“Do you know where he is?” My blood started to rush.
“No,” she answered. “But I did take a message from him. For Tom. I still have the number.”
I fumbled for a pen.
She read me the number. 434-9117. “I'm pretty sure it was some kind of boarding house or hotel.”
“Thank you, Helen.” I was about to hang up when she said, "There's one more thing... When my husband said he lent Coombs a hand, he wasn't telling the whole story. Tom did give him some money.
He also let him rummage through some old things in our storage locker.“ ”What sort of things?" I asked.
“His old department things. Maybe an old uniform, and a badge.”
That's what Coombs had been looking for in his ex-wife's house. His old police uniforms. My mind clicked. Maybe that's how he got so close to Chipman and Mercer.
“That's all?” I asked.
“No,” Helen Keating said. "Tom kept guns down there.
Coombs took those, too."
Womans Murder Club 2 - Second Chance
Chapter 81
WITHIN MINUTES I traced the number Helen Keating had given me to a boarding house on Larkin and Mcallister.
The Hotel William Simon. My pulse was jumping.
I called Jacobi, catching him as he was about to sit down to dinner. “Meet me at Larkin and Mcallister. The Hotel William Simon.”
“You want me to meet you at a hotel? Cool. I'm on my way.”
“I think we found Coombs.”
We couldn't arrest Frank Coombs. We didn't have a single piece of evidence that could tie him directly to a crime. I might be able to get a search warrant and bust into his room, though. Right now the most important thing was to make certain he was still there.
Twenty minutes later, I had driven down to the seedy area between the Civic Center and Union Square. The William Simon was a shabby one-elevator dive under a large billboard with a slinky model wearing Calvin Klein underwear. As Jill would say, yick.
I didn't want to go up to the desk, flashing my badge and his photo, until we were ready to make a move. Finally, I said what the hell, and placed a call to the number Helen Keating had given me. After three rings, a male voice answered, “William Simon.”
“Frank Coombs...?” I inquired.
“Coombs... ” I listened as the desk clerk leafed through a list of names. “Nope.” Shit. I asked him to double-check. He came back negative.
Just then, the passenger door of my Explorer opened. My nerves were twanging like a bass guitar.
Jacobi climbed in. He was wearing a striped golf shirt and some sort of short, hideous Members Only jacket. His belly bulged. He grinned like a John. “Hey, lady, what does an Andrew Jackson get me?”
“Dinner, maybe, if you're treating.”
“We got an ID?” he asked.
I shook my head. I told him what I had found out.
“Maybe he's moved on,” Jacobi offered. “How ' I go in and flash the badge? With Coombs's photo?”
I shook my head. “How ' we sit here and wait.”
We waited for over two hours. Stakeouts are incredibly dull. They would drive the average person nuts. We kept our eyes peeled on the William Simon, going over everything from Helen Keating, to what Jacobi's wife was serving for dinner, to the 49ers, to who was sleeping with who at the Hall. Jacobi even sprung for a couple of sandwiches from a Subway.
At ten o'clock, Jacobi grumbled, “This could go on forever! Why don't you let me go inside, Lindsay?”
He was probably right. We didn't even know if Helen Keating's number was current. She had taken it weeks ago.
I was about to give in when a man turned the corner on Larkin headed toward the hotel. I gripped Jacobi's arm. “Look over there.”
It was Coombs. I recognized the bastard instantly. He was wearing a camouflage jacket, hands stuffed in his pockets, a floppy hat pulled over his eyes.
“Son of a fucking bitch,” Jacobi muttered.
Watching the bastard slink up to the hotel, it took everything I had not to jump out of the car and slam him up against a wall. I wished I could slap him in cuffs. But we had Chimera now. We knew where he was.
“I want someone stuck to him, twenty-four hours,” I told Jacobi. “If he makes the tail, I want him picked up. We'll figure out the charges later.”
Jacobi nodded.
“I hope you brought a toothbrush.” I winked. “You've got first watch.”
Womans Murder Club 2 - Second Chance
Chapter 82
AS THEY WALKED hand in hand toward her Castro apartment, Cindy admitted to herself that she was scared shitless.
This was the fifth time she and Aaron Winslow had been out together. They had seen Cyrus Chestnut and Freddie Hubbard at the Blue Door; been to Traviata at the opera; taken the ferry across the bay to a tiny Jamaican cafe that Aaron knew. Tonight, they had seen this dreamy film, Chocolat. o matter where this went tonight, she enjoyed being with him. He was deeper than most men she'd dated, and he was definitely more sensitive. Not only did he read unexpected books like Dave Eggers's A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and Amy Tan's The Bonesetter's Daughter, he lived the life that he preached. He worked twelve-to-sixteen-hour days and was loved in his neighborhood, but he still managed to keep his ego in check. She'd heard it over an dover again interviewing people for her story: Aaron Winslow was one of the good guys.
All the while, though, Cindy had felt this moment looming in the distance. Hurtling closer and closer. Ticking. This was the natural step, she told herself. As Lindsay would say, their foxhole was about to explode.