THE BRIDGE (17 page)

“What about John?”

“He’s off duty. I tried him at home, but he’s not there or he’s not picking up.”

“Hurry, Sean. It’s not that far. Maybe she’s still with a client. I told her to stay in her office and lock the door.”

Sean’s tires squealed as he shot into the street, horns honking in his wake.

“Elise, did Courtney ever tell you anything about this new client of hers, the one who was so demanding?”

She clamped down on her bouncing knees. “No. Why are you asking me that?”

But she knew why. The same thought had been niggling at her brain since Sean started putting together the puzzle of the note.

“She started seeing that guy right after you were attacked, right after you moved in with her.”

Elise doubled over, sinking her face in her hands. “He found her because of me.”

“Maybe. This is all just supposition right now.”

She shot up, pain pounding behind her eyes. “Courtney did mention something about him today.”

“Description, name?”

“She wouldn’t break that confidentiality.” She stared unseeing out the car window. “She told me how he picked her out.”

“How?”

“Her name.” She dug her fingernails into Sean’s thigh. “He chose her because he liked her name, Sean. Courtney Chu. Two Cs. He’s still on the Cs.”

With this last bit of news, Sean whipped around the next corner and tossed his phone at her. “Try calling Curtis again. Leave him a message. Tell him we’re on our way to Courtney’s and give him the address again.”

Elise followed his instructions and by the time she ended the call, Sean had pulled up in front of Courtney’s office building.

Elise scrambled out of the car before it came to a complete stop. She grabbed on to the two long silver handles of the glass doors and yanked. They didn’t budge. She pressed her face against the glass, her eyes searching the lobby.

Sean joined her and picked up the phone to the right of the doors. “This is SFPD Homicide Detective Sean Brody. We’re trying to get into the building to see Courtney Chu on the eighth floor.”

He listened for a minute and then replaced the receiver. “That was security. They’re sending someone down.”

Elise kept hold of the door handles as if that could make them arrive sooner. “It’s dark, it’s locked up. Maybe Courtney left already. Maybe she’s out with Derrick. It’s so late.”

“Here’s the security guard.” Sean opened his ID and pressed his badge against the glass.

The doors clicked, and the security guard swung one open. “Is there a problem?”

“We’re here to check on Courtney Chu, eighth floor. Have you seen her? Has she left for the night?”

“I know Ms. Chu. She had some food delivered a while back, but I haven’t seen her since.”

“Did anyone come to the office to see her? Anyone you had to let in?”

“No, sir. We lock the doors at ten o’clock. If she had a client before then, I wouldn’t have opened the door for him or her.”

“Okay, thanks. We still want to check on her.”

“Sure thing.” He swung the door open wide and they stepped into the building. “From this point, you can go on up to the eighth floor.”

“Can you come with us in case we need to get into Ms. Chu’s office?”

“I have my rounds, but—” he pulled a key from his keychain “—this is the master and it’ll get you in.”

“Thanks.” Sean took the key and pounded the button for the elevator. “One more thing.”

The security guard stopped at the door to the right of the elevators with his hand on the doorknob. “Yes?”

“Has anything unusual happened tonight? Anything out of the ordinary?”

The guard cocked his head. “As a matter of fact, yes. An emergency buzzer sounded for one of the side doors about an hour ago.”

Elise swallowed and curled her hand around Sean’s arm. “What does that mean?”

“Means someone left the building by way of an emergency exit. Who knows? Maybe it was Ms. Chu.”

“H-has she ever done that before?”

The security guard shook his finger. “That Ms. Chu likes to break the rules.”

As they rode up to the eighth floor, Elise said, “Maybe that’s it. Maybe Courtney’s not even here.”

“Maybe.”

The doors opened, and Elise tugged on Sean’s sleeve to steer him to the right. The silence enveloped them, and Elise held her breath. When they got to the door of Courtney’s office, Elise let out a breath on a whispered prayer. “Please, God, let her be safe.”

Sean tried the door handle first. Then he pulled out the key the security guard had given him and shoved it into the lock. He turned the lock and pushed the door at the same time, staggering into the small waiting room.

Elise had been in here once before and it looked the same—undisturbed. Courtney had fanned out the latest magazines on one low table and had stacked others in a holder on the wall. Two fake plants bobbed in the corners, and someone had left an indentation in one of the leather love seats.

The needy client who liked Courtney’s name?

Elise marched toward the door to Courtney’s inner sanctum, but Sean put out a steadying hand.

“Wait.”

He drew his gun from his holster and crept toward the same door. Shoving Elise behind him, he eased open the door.

More silence.

Elise’s nostrils flared and the blood thrummed in her eardrums.

Sean aimed his gun at the three closed doors off the hallway and whispered, “Which one is her office?”

The whisper sent a chill up her spine, but she shook off her fear and pointed to the first door on the left.

“Stay back.”

Sean twisted the handle of the door and inched it open. He’d stepped into the office, but Elise was no longer watching him.

A slight movement on the floor to her right caught her eye. Her gaze darted to the tile in front of what she knew was the bathroom floor.

A trickle of dark liquid meandered from the crack beneath the door. As if in a trance, Elise stepped over it to push open the bathroom door. The door swung freely and then stopped.

She heard Sean’s voice coming from the office, words she couldn’t comprehend, words coming at her in a fog.

She opened her mouth and managed a small sigh. She ran her tongue along her teeth and tried again.

This time she managed a scream, a scream so loud it echoed and bounced off the walls of the small bathroom where Courtney’s lifeless form couldn’t hear her at all.

Chapter Sixteen

Sean shot a worried glance at Elise, slumped in the leather love seat in the waiting room, her eyes glassy, a grayish pallor to her cheeks.

Curtis was yammering at him. “You figured out the next victim was Courtney Chu from that cryptic note?”

Jacoby slapped Curtis on the back. “Brody’s the best. Get used to it, Curtis.”

“So you got some prints this time?”

Jacoby smiled and patted his bag. “If he was posing as a client and he’d been here before, maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Sean swung around on Melvin, the security guard. “Did you get the video from the cameras?”

“We’re collecting that for you now, Detective Brody.”

“But you didn’t notice the guy coming in tonight?”

“Nope. The only one I saw was the delivery boy from the restaurant.” He pointed at Curtis. “And I gave Detective Curtis the name of the restaurant.”

Curtis held up his hand. “I’m on it. We’re going to bring the kid in for questioning.”

“The killer has to be on camera. I’m hoping we can get a good look at him on those videos.”

Curtis lowered his voice and moved closer to Sean. “Sorry I wasn’t available when you called, and there’s going to be hell to pay for Healy for refusing backup.”

“I don’t know if it would’ve helped. Judging by the—” he slid a glance at Elise, who was sipping some water “—condition of the body, I think we were too late anyway.”

The coroner had arrived and Sean slipped away from the crush of people and crouched in front of Elise, taking her hands.

“How are you doing?”

She raised her blue eyes, flooded with tears. “It’s my fault. I brought him into her life.”

He squeezed her hands. “It’s his fault, Elise. His and no one else’s.”

“She was so full of life. I can’t even imagine her silent forever.” She pressed a hand to her forehead. “Has anyone notified her brother? Has anyone told Oscar yet?”

“They’re working on that.”

A tear crested on her lower lid and rolled down her cheek. “He screwed up, didn’t he? Dan Jacoby told me he got a lot of prints. There has to be video of him coming in and out of the building as a client of Courtney’s. He can’t have come and gone through the emergency door every time he saw her.”

“We’ll get him. I promise you that. There will be justice for Courtney and the other three victims, too. Justice for you.”

She dashed the tear from her cheek with the back of her hand. “How am I going to make it to the last day of school tomorrow? It’s already past one-thirty.”

“Take the day off. Everyone will understand.”

“But the kids.”

“You can see them next year when they’re first-graders. I know you’re a wonderful teacher, but they’ll be so excited for the last day of school they won’t be sad for long that you’re not there.”

“Maybe. I feel so awful. I don’t even know if I can get up from this love seat.”

“Sean!”

He twisted his head around and answered Curtis. “What is it?”

“Lieutenant Healy wants you down at the station—now.”

“Are you kidding me? Don’t tell me he’s mad because I found the Alphabet Killer’s victim.”

“He’s mad about a lot of things. I suggest you head down there.”

Sean rose to his feet and brought Elise with him, tucked against his side. “Technically, I was on a date.”

Curtis cleared his throat. “Technically, you were on a date with a witness, which is another one of his points of contention.”

“I’m not leaving Elise stranded, and I don’t want her going back to my place alone.”

“Your place?” Curtis rolled his eyes. “Yeah, the LT doesn’t even know about that, but he could add it to his list when he chews you out.”

Elise pressed her shoulder against Sean’s. “It’s okay. There are a million cops here, and my guess is they’ll be here for a few more hours. I can just stay here and wait for you.”

Sean glanced at the coroner’s stretcher in the hallway. “I don’t want you hanging out here, Elise. You’re exhausted.”

“I’ll tell you what.” Curtis smiled at Elise. “You go have your confab with the lieutenant, and I’ll take Elise out for coffee to wait for you or back to my place, or we can even go back to your place.”

“Hot chocolate.”

“Huh?”

“Elise likes hot chocolate with whipped cream.” He hugged her close. “Is that okay with you?”

“Yes, of course. I don’t want you to get into any more trouble because of me.” She sniffled. “I don’t want to be the cause of any more trouble for anyone.”

Sean gave her a quick kiss and didn’t care who saw. “Hang in there, kid. I’ll be with you as soon as I can.”

She bobbed her head once and sank back down to the love seat.

“Take care of her, Curtis.” Sean glanced over his shoulder at Elise one more time before leaving the crime scene.

When he got to the station, it looked like one o’clock in the afternoon instead of one o’clock in the morning. And Lieutenant Healy was presiding over all the controlled chaos with a tight rein.

When he saw Sean, he barked, “Brody. In here now.”

Sean sat tight-lipped as the lieutenant dressed him down for consorting with a witness, for conducting an investigation on his own and even for continuing to thrust himself into this case when he’d been removed from it.

At the end of the tirade, he praised Sean for his good detective work and was personally inviting him back on the case.

“I’ll deal with the captain tomorrow. He can’t really believe you don’t have something important to contribute, but—” he held up one crooked finger “—Curtis will still be lead. And if you have a problem...”

“No problem with that, sir.”

“Good. Now let’s head over to the situation room. The security office at the victim’s building turned over the tapes. We have the victim’s phone and appointment book, so we’re going to try to match up some appointment times with the videos.”

“I’m in.”

He and the lieutenant and one of the junior detectives hunched over the laptop and fast-forwarded through people walking in and out of Courtney’s building.

Sean tossed down his pencil in frustration. “There are a lot of offices in that building and a lot of foot traffic. Elise Duran told me there were a few nights this week where the victim saw this new client later in the day. Let’s concentrate on the video for those times when there aren’t so many people.”

When the videos were loaded, Sean peered at the grainy images on the laptop monitor. They stopped the video and captured and printed pictures of every man who came through the door.

When he had a stack, he said, “I’m going to run these by Elise so she can see if any of these guys look familiar.”

He studied in particular a stocky man with a cap pulled low over his face, which he kept turned away from the camera. He could even be wearing a gray jacket, like the man who attacked Elise.

Rubbing his eyes, Sean checked his watch. He’d been here for almost two hours. He wanted, no, he needed to see Elise.

He grabbed the printouts and cruised down the hallway to the lab. Lieutenant Healy had the techs hopping in here, too.

Sean waved the papers in his hand. “I need a few of these blown up. Do we have anything on the fingerprints from the office yet?”

Kwan looked up from his computer. “Fingerprints? We don’t have no stinkin’ fingerprints yet.”

“Jacoby hasn’t been back here with his treasures yet? I thought he’d be gleefully running prints about now.”

“Jacoby does love him some fingerprints, but he hasn’t come back from the crime scene.”

“Are they still out there?”

“Oh, yeah.”

Sean furrowed his brow and smacked the printouts down on the counter. “Okay, can someone work on these? I’m going to check in with the LT, and then I’m outta here. Call me if something comes up.”

Sean returned to his desk to file some notes and then started for the lieutenant’s office. His heart stuttered when he saw Curtis through the glass talking to Healy.

Had he brought Elise here?

He stalked to the office and pushed open the door. “Where’s Elise? Did you bring her down here?”

Curtis turned and leaned against the lieutenant’s desk. “No, I had more work to do at the crime scene and then the lieutenant called me back here.”

“Where is she? You didn’t leave her alone, did you?”

“Relax, loverboy.” Curtis shifted a quick glance at Healy and grimaced. “I left her with Jacoby. He said he’d take her back to your place and stick around until you got there.”

Jacoby.
The adrenaline continued to course through Sean’s body and he charged out of the lieutenant’s office and back to the lab.

“Have you singled out those stills from the video yet?” Sean had punched in Elise’s cell phone number, but it had tripped over to voice mail.

Kwan’s mouth dropped open. “Dude, you just dropped off the printouts. We haven’t had time to match them on the video yet.”

Sean pulled out a chair at one of the computers and opened the portions of the video they’d marked. He scanned through and stopped at the image of the man in the baseball cap. “Kwan, come here.”

Kwan hovered over his shoulder. “What?”

Jabbing his finger at the screen, Sean asked, “Doesn’t this look like Jacoby to you?”

Adjusting his glasses, Kwan leaned in. “Could be, same shape, but Jacoby’s built rock solid. This guy looks a little heavyset to me.”

“That could be the jacket, right? A guy with big muscles might look heavy in a puffy jacket.”

“Sure, but what are you saying? Jacoby was in that building? I mean, he could’ve been—dentists, lawyers, hell, even steroid docs. So what?”

“Fingers. Fingerprints.”

“What the hell, Brody?”

“How come there hasn’t been one set of prints to come out of any of these murders? Not even a partial.”

“The Alphabet Killer wears gloves. He’s careful.”

“He knows police procedures.”

“Jacoby’s weird, but he ain’t that weird.”

Sean’s head jerked to the side. “What do you mean by
weird?
”

“I don’t know.” Kwan wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “With the ladies. He trolls those online dating forums but can never get up the guts to make a move.”

The blood was roaring in Sean’s ears now. He stormed out of the lab and interrupted Curtis and Healy. “Where’s Jacoby?”

Curtis smirked. “Why? Do you think he’s moving in on your woman?”

Sean smacked his hand against the doorjamb. “This isn’t a joke, John. I think Jacoby might be our killer.”

Both men stared at him, but they weren’t laughing.

“That’s crazy, Sean.”

“Brody, unless you have some hard evidence, you’d better put a cork in it.”

“Here.” Sean drilled his fist into his gut. “I feel it here.”

“You’re a good enough detective to know that’s not good enough.” Healy had sat back down in dismissal.

“Fingers, the guy loves his fingerprints.” Curtis scratched the stubble on his chin. “What do you need, Sean?”

Healy glared at them from beneath his eyebrows. “You two can take this outside my office.”

When the door shut behind them, Curtis turned to Sean. “What do you need me to do?”

“Look at his schedule, John. See where he’s been at the time of the murders. Review that video for me. One of the guys walking in that building looks like Jacoby.” He grabbed his shoulders. “Did he ask to watch over Elise?”

Curtis squeezed his eyes closed. “Sort of. Let’s just say he was eager to take over the job when I got called away.”

“Damn. Where’d they go? What kind of car does he have?”

“We can look up his car here. He told me he was taking her to that twenty-four-hour coffee shop near the park.”

“Thanks for your help, John. I know you can get in trouble for this if it’s all in my head.”

“I’ll bet on you every time, Brody.”

Sean yelled over his shoulder as he took off toward the elevators, “Keep me posted.”

When he got to his car, he punched in Elise’s phone number again. This time when he got her voice mail, he left her a message. “Elise, where are you? Call me as soon as you get this message and don’t trust Jacoby. If you’re with him, make some excuse to get away and then—get away. Run away from him as fast as you can.”

He cranked on his engine and swung out of the parking garage. His phone buzzed in the cup holder, where he’d tossed it, signaling a message, and he grabbed it. He blew out a breath when he saw Elise’s name on the display.

He balanced the phone on the steering wheel to click on the message. Then he slammed on his brakes, sending his car into a fishtail as he read the message:
Elise is busy. Thirty-seven plus forty-nine plus 122 plus twenty-eight equal 187.

The coordinates for the Golden Gate Bridge.

* * *

E
LISE
COUGHED
AND
gagged as Jacoby dragged her from the trunk of his car—a different car than the one he’d had at their first meeting.

He shoved her in front of him, prodding her back with the barrel of his .45. “No running away this time, Elise. Guns are not my weapon of choice—too much evidence in the form of ballistics and blood spatter. You see, I’m just as good a detective as Brody.”

She licked her dry lips. “Where’s your phony English accent?”

“The same place as my phony cast, beat-up car and fake beard.” He nestled close to her side and she gagged on his cologne. “You have to admit that was a pretty good disguise. Nothing even registered for you when I came to your house not twelve hours later. Of course, I didn’t think it would since you wouldn’t expect a homicide field tech to be a killer, would you?”

“Something about you rubbed me the wrong way from the beginning.”

“Yeah, yeah. That’s what they all say. Keep walking.”

“Where are we going?” But she didn’t have to ask. Even though he’d parked his car in the gravel parking lot on the other side of the tourist center, the Golden Gate Bridge soared above them, just peeking from the early morning fog that swirled around it.

He clicked his tongue. “Just trying to make small talk, Elise? You know where we’re going.”

“W-we can’t go onto the bridge. It’s closed to pedestrians at this time of night.”