Here’s what we learned.
Michael Jansing had vision and high standards. His people liked and trusted him. He paid fairly. The product was good. Employees took pride in their jobs.
No one reported hate mail or knew of current or former employees who exhibited erratic behavior, insanity, or aggression.
Net/net: we did not have one stinking lead on who might have spiked a hamburger with military-grade explosives. And that meant we had no idea how to head off future belly bombs.
I handed the car keys to Conklin, who said, “Well, there went two days of my life that I can’t get back.”
“I’m never eating hamburger again,” I said. “I mean it. I’m off ground beef forever.”
I strapped into the passenger seat, and as Conklin drove us back to the Hall, I took out my phone and opened some mail. I got caught up in one e-mail in particular. I started laughing to myself.
“Okay. What’s so funny?” Conklin asked me.
“I want what Yuki’s having.”
“Hot sex with Brady? Really?”
“No. Shut up. Listen to this.
“‘Dear Girlfriends.
“‘I don’t even know where to start talking about the awesomeness of Alaska. But let me try.
“‘Crack a dawn this morning, we went out on a tender with an onboard naturalist, and OMG, we saw a pod of Orca whales. Yes! A family pod of them, breaching or “spy-hopping,” where they point their heads straight out of the water as if they’re standing on their toes. Guys, this was amazing.
“‘Then a bald eagle swooped down right in front of us and grabbed a salmon with his talons. It was a big fish, almost the size of the eagle and it was no sure thing he was going to be able to carry it off—but he kept holding that fish and beating his wings and he achieved lift-off!
“‘We climbed a glacier. Me! I did it! This is a stunning experience, my buds. Walking on a world of ice the color of Brady’s eyes. In between the jagged blue and white boulders as far as I could see, a river of ice ran through it.
“‘I knelt down and drank from a glassy well of blue water that had just melted for the first time in millions of years.
“‘It was dazzling. Just incredible.
“‘And get this.
“‘I was climbing down off the glacier and had just about reached the boat. Brady reached out to me and I slipped, guys. My feet went outward and I skidded asswise and dropped my booty right into the water.
“‘Brady saved me, pulled me out of the drink, gave me a hard time, and promised he had a nude cure for hypothermia. Geez, I almost laughed my chilly butt off.☺
“‘I’m writing to you from our outstanding cabin on the FinStar and now Brady is calling me to go to the spa. Think of me having the best time of my entire life.
“‘What Claire said; best friends, best times, best sex—or something like that!
“‘Sending you all my love.
“‘Yuki C. BRADY’”
I finished reading and turned to Conklin. “Isn’t she hilarious?”
He shouted at a car in front of us that was switching lanes without signaling. “Hey, buddy, make up your mind, will you?”
Then, to me: “So, what now, Sherlock?”
“Really. I wouldn’t mind taking a slow boat to Alaska.”
“Who wouldn’t? So we should talk to that Timko woman. The boss of the product-development office?”
“Tomorrow. First thing. Just drop in on her. You know, Richie, I never got to have a honeymoon,” I said as the sun slipped down behind the city of San Francisco.
Richie was back to verbally negotiating rush-hour traffic.
I thought about my friend and realized that I’d never said these two words before. But, I said them now.
“Lucky Yuki.”
Chapter 27
We were this close to Conklin’s apartment when a radio call came in that had our name on it. There had been a shooting that had likely stemmed from a domestic dispute. A crying child had called 911. The address was about four miles away.
I grabbed the mic and said that we were on our way, then asked Richie to stop the car.
He pulled into a handy driveway, and we got out, took our vests from the trunk, and put them on. We headed out and I snapped on every flasher we had, the grille lights, the visor lights, and the one on the roof of the car.
Richie stepped on the gas and eight short minutes later, we braked in front of a tan wood-frame semi-detached condo, one of dozens just like it on Jerrold Avenue.
The front door was open. We entered with our guns drawn, Richie calling out, “This is the SFPD.”
We came to a full stop in the living room, where a woman sitting in a crouch position with her back to a wall was holding a shotgun pointed at us. Blood and tissue fragments were sprayed on the wall, and there was a body—it looked like a man’s—ten feet to the north of the woman.
His heart was pumping blood onto the wooden floor.
Conklin said, “Ma’am, we need you to lower your weapon.”
The woman was white, about thirty, and wearing a torn T-shirt and jeans. There was blood spatter on her face, telling me that she had been very close to the victim when the gun fired. It looked to me like half his face had been shot away, but I thought he was still breathing.
I heard children crying somewhere down the hall.
This was a volatile situation, and I flashed on what could happen if we didn’t shut it down fast. I imagined the woman unloading that shotgun on us. Reloading. Taking out the kids. Reloading. Turning the gun on herself.
She wasn’t responding to Conklin, so I shouted, “Lady. Drop the damned gun.”
“I can’t,” she said in a small, almost little-girl voice. She looked at us with crazy eyes, shaking her head and trembling at the same time. “He’ll kill me.”
“We’re here now,” Conklin said, coming forward. “He’s not going to hurt you. We’re here now, ma’am. We’re here for you. So put the gun down, okay? You have to do it so we can go to your children, make sure they’re okay.”
“My kids? You know my kids?”
Her eyes flashed back and forth between me and Conklin and skipped right over the downed man on the floor.
Conklin holstered his gun. I covered him as he walked slowly toward the woman, showing her his empty hands.
“I’m just coming to help you. What’s your name?”
“Holly.”
“Okay, Holly. I’m Richie.”
One of Conklin’s many strengths is that he has a terrific way with women. It’s a real gift, that’s for sure.
I said, “I’m just going to walk behind you, Holly.”
She looked at me as I edged around her, and Conklin saw his chance. He stepped forward and, grabbing the gun, cracked it open and knocked out the remaining shell and threw the gun onto the couch.
“There we go,” he said. “Now we can talk. Holly, tell me what happened here.”
Chapter 28
Once Holly was disarmed, my breathing and my heartbeat returned to something like normal. I was not just relieved that no guns had gone off. I also wanted Holly to be all right.
I already had a pretty good idea what had happened in this house. Holly’s husband had been abusing her and had introduced a loaded shotgun into the fight. He’d been pointing that gun at her when she surprised him, grabbed the weapon, and got off a shot.
Very likely Holly had saved her own life.
But that didn’t mean that she wouldn’t have to prove self-defense in court. Her crappy life wouldn’t get better for some time, if ever.
I retraced my steps and bent to the man bleeding out on the floor. He was stocky, maybe in his thirties, and had tattoos on his arms and neck. A mixture of blood and air bubbled through what remained of his nose and lower jaw. He was alive. But he might not want to survive what he was facing—surgery, pain, food through a straw—while in jail.
I called dispatch and was told the ambulance was only three minutes out. I said that the situation was under control, that the EMTs could come directly into the house, and I asked for Child Protective Services.