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22

If Mickey had turned left, which was south, on Potrero, he would have gotten to Cesar Chavez Boulevard after only a couple of blocks, then immediately taken the on-ramp to 101 North and made it back to the Stockton garage at just about the time he figured Wyatt would be returning from the memorial service. They would have grabbed a bite somewhere, compared notes on their respective morning’s adventures, and developed a plan for the rest of the day, or even week.

But as it happened he turned right, got up to Eighteenth Street, which reminded him of the tasty and tender goat he’d bought the day before at Bi-Rite Market, which happened to find itself on Eighteenth as well. So he turned left on Eighteenth, intending to get provisions for the homestead-whatever looked good, and something would-for the next couple of days. His plan was to keep cooking at home for as long as Tamara kept showing her renewed appetite.

The light was solid green for him to go when he got to Mission and so there wasn’t any reason to slow down. He was thinking about special cuts of pork they might have at Bi-Rite and then after that maybe he’d go to his favorite burrito place only a few blocks over to his right on Mission.

He never even began to see the 2009 Volvo going, according to the accident records that were later filed in the incident, approximately thirty miles per hour. The car ran the red light and broadsided him on his passenger-side door.

The initial impact pushed his car sideways for exactly thirty-six feet until its momentum was stopped by a ten-year-old Chevy Suburban that was parked at a meter on the west-side curb of Mission. This second collision, on Mickey’s side of his car just behind his seat, T- boned his Camaro, smashed his head against the side window, concussed him, broke his left arm and three of his ribs, and rendered him unconscious. His cell phone, which he’d thrown onto the passenger seat a few minutes earlier, and which held all of his contact information, got bounced around like a pinball inside the car and hit something hard enough to smash its screen and break it, making it useless.

The parked Suburban, jumping the curb, killed a homeless John Doe everybody called Frankie who’d been a fixture begging at that intersection for the past seventeen months. The driver of the Volvo, who was wearing her seat belt and whose airbag deployed perfectly according to factory specifications, was a bit banged up but basically uninjured.

Hunt came out of his own office in the back and hooked a hip over Tamara’s desk. She was working on a scheduling spreadsheet on her computer and kept tapping the keyboard for a second before, still typing, she turned to face him. “Yes?”

“I’ve been wrestling with it for half an hour driving back here and I’ve got to ask you a question.”

She didn’t miss a beat. “Almost thirty,” she said, “but most people guess closer to twenty-five.”

In mock chagrin, Hunt hung his head. “When am I going to learn?”

Tamara put on an empathetic face. “One day it’ll just happen. You wait.” She broke a smile. “Okay, what’s the real question?”

“The real question is Mick. How serious is he with this Thorpe woman?”

Tamara sat back. “Alicia, Wyatt. Her name’s Alicia.”

“I know what her name is, Tam. I’m a little worried about both of you using it, being on a first- name basis with her. I don’t want you two getting too close to her.”

“You said that this morning.”

“I meant it then too. And I noticed it kind of pissed off both of you, Mickey maybe a little more. And that was before I talked to Al Carter and heard the latest from Devin. That’s what I’ve been wrestling with. Whether I should even tell you what they said, either of them, either of you.”

“Of course you should tell us. We’ve got to know what we’re dealing with.”

“That’s true, but I don’t want either of you shutting me out because I’m keeping an open mind on all the possible suspects.”

“Are you?”

“As far as I can tell, Tam. You tell me where I’m not.”

She touched his hand. “You don’t have to get mad.”

“You know, I’m afraid I can’t help that. Six months ago, you’ll remember, we had a little problem with-”

“This isn’t like that.”

“It isn’t? Employee of the Hunt Club gets involved with murder suspect who turns out-”

“Craig was never a suspect.”

“No. That’s true. We both know what Craig was, though, don’t we? An actual murderer, too smart to get himself suspected. And he had everybody fooled. Even me.”

Tamara flared. “Even you? I like to think that if there’s an even there in that equation, it’s even me.”

“All right. I’ll give you that. But that’s not the point either. The point is Mickey and whether he’s being blinded to the truth about somebody he obviously cares about. And if he is, what I’m going to do about it.”

“And are you sure you know that truth?”

“No. Not ultimately. But I do know some truths, or probable truths, and I just learned what might be another couple of ’em. You want to hear them?”

Still pushed back away from her desk, Tamara, her mouth a grim line, folded her arms. “Go ahead.”

“All right. Let’s start with her relationship with Como. She admits they were close. In fact, real close. Mrs. Como says it was more than that-Dominic was in love with her. He admitted it. And even if he didn’t, they got themselves caught doing it in the office.”

“No, they didn’t.”

“Mrs. Como says they did. Lorraine Hess says they did. We call this corroboration. Besides which, I don’t think a guy like Dominic Como gets in love with somebody if something physical isn’t going on. You buy that?”

“I’m listening.”

“All right. We know we’ve got a tire iron, probably from the limo, as the murder weapon. We know Alicia could have gotten to that anytime she wanted. Next, we find out from your witness just today-Hang-up Lady-that two people, a man and a woman, are having a violent fight at about the same time and in the same place where Dominic got hit. Good? Good. So then this morning an hour ago I’m talking to Al Carter and I’m not even asking him any questions about Ms. Thorpe and he volunteers information that exactly corroborates Mrs. Como’s story that Dominic fired her on that Tuesday, the day he got killed. We didn’t know that this morning when we all were talking. We just had Ellen’s word for it. But now with Carter’s-”

“What did she say? Alicia. When Juhle talked to her.”

“What do you think? She denied it.”

“And you think that was a lie?”

“I think that Al Carter and Ellen Como both didn’t independently make up the same story, let’s put it that way. They’re not exactly bosom pals, you know? There’s no indication that they’ve ever even talked to each other.”

Tamara merely shrugged. “What else?”

“Well, since you ask, Devin’s latest, from underneath the limo’s backseat, there’s the whole semen-on-her-scarf thing. And it is her scarf.” Hunt straightened his back, eased himself off the desk and over to the window, letting the gravity of this last revelation work its way into Tamara’s worldview. At the window, he turned around. “I’m not making that last part up, Tam. It’s her scarf. She admitted it. It was stuffed into the limo’s backseat.”

Tamara uncrossed her arms. Her hands went to her belly, which she squeezed a couple of times.

“I don’t mean for this to give you a stomachache, Tam. But I don’t want you and Mick thinking you’ve got to stick up for her because you’ve all become friendly since this investigation started. And also, let’s remember last Monday night. She’s sleeping in her car a quarter mile from Nancy Neshek’s.” He came back over to the desk. “I’m not saying she did it. Not yet. Although Dev and Sarah are getting pretty close to thinking so. But I am saying we’d be foolish-any of us-to just ignore these facts.”