of note, and she was wearing her on-the-job hound dog clothes.
She blew me a couple of kisses, and Yuki stood up to give me her seat and a jasmine-scented smack on the cheek. She had clearly come from court, where she worked as a pro bono defense attorney for the poor and hopeless. Still, she was dressed impeccably, in pinstripes and pearls.
I took the chair across from Claire. She sat between Cindy and Yuki with her back to the room, and we all scooched up to the smallish glass-and-chrome table.
If it hasn’t been said, we four are a mutual heart, soul, and work society in which we share our cases and views of the legal system, as well as our personal lives. Right now the girls were worried about me.
Three of us were married: me, Claire, and Yuki; and Cindy had a standing offer of a ring and vows to be exchanged in Grace Cathedral. Until very recently you couldn’t have found four more happily hooked-up women. Then the bottom fell out of my marriage to Joe Molinari, the father of my child and a man I shared everything with, including my secrets.
We had had it so good, we kissed and made up before our fights were over. It was the typical: “You are right.” “No, you are!”
Then Joe went missing during possibly the worst weeks of my life.
I’m a homicide cop, and I know when someone is telling me the truth and when things do not add up.
Joe missing in action had not added up. Because of that I had worried almost to panic. Where was he? Why hadn’t he checked in? Why were my calls bouncing off his full mailbox? Was he still alive?
As the crisscrossed threads of espionage, destruction, and mass murder were untangled, Joe finally made his curtain call with stories of his past and present lives that I’d never heard before. I found plenty of reason not to trust him anymore.
Even he would agree. I think anyone would.
It’s not news that once trust is broken, it’s damned hard to superglue it back together. And for me it might take more time and belief in Joe’s confession than I actually had.
I still loved him. We’d shared a meal when he came to see our baby, Julie. We didn’t make any moves toward getting divorced that night, but we didn’t make love, either. Our relationship was now like the Cold War in the eighties between Russia and the USA, a strained but practical peace called détente.
Now, as I sat with my friends, I tried to put Joe out of my mind, safe in the knowledge that my nanny was looking after Julie and that the home front was safe. I ordered a favorite holiday drink, a hot buttered rum, and a rare steak sandwich with Uncle Maxie’s hot chili sauce.
My girlfriends were deep in criminal cross talk about Claire’s holiday overload of corpses, Cindy’s new cold case she’d exhumed from the San Francisco Chronicle ’s dead letter files, and Yuki’s hoped-for favorable verdict for her client, an underage drug dealer. I was almost caught up when Yuki said, “Linds, I gotta ask. Any Christmas plans with Joe?”
And that’s when I was saved by the bell. My phone rang.
My friends said in unison, “NO PHONES.”
It was the rule, but I’d forgotten—again.
I reached into my bag for my phone, saying, “Look, I’m turning it off.”
But I saw that the call was from Rich Conklin, my partner and Cindy’s fiancé. She recognized his ringtone on my phone.
“There goes our party,” she said, tossing her napkin into the air.
“Linds?” said Conklin.
“Rich, can this wait? I’m in the middle—”
“It’s Kingfisher. He’s in a shoot-out with cops at the Vault. There’ve been casualties.”
“But—Kingfisher is dead. ”
“Apparently, he’s been resurrected.”
My partner was double-parked and waiting for me outside Uncle Maxie’s, with the engine running and the flashers on. I got into the passenger seat of the unmarked car, and Richie handed me my vest. He’s that way, like a younger version of a big brother. He thinks of me, watches out for me, and I try to
She blew me a couple of kisses, and Yuki stood up to give me her seat and a jasmine-scented smack on the cheek. She had clearly come from court, where she worked as a pro bono defense attorney for the poor and hopeless. Still, she was dressed impeccably, in pinstripes and pearls.
I took the chair across from Claire. She sat between Cindy and Yuki with her back to the room, and we all scooched up to the smallish glass-and-chrome table.
If it hasn’t been said, we four are a mutual heart, soul, and work society in which we share our cases and views of the legal system, as well as our personal lives. Right now the girls were worried about me.
Three of us were married: me, Claire, and Yuki; and Cindy had a standing offer of a ring and vows to be exchanged in Grace Cathedral. Until very recently you couldn’t have found four more happily hooked-up women. Then the bottom fell out of my marriage to Joe Molinari, the father of my child and a man I shared everything with, including my secrets.
We had had it so good, we kissed and made up before our fights were over. It was the typical: “You are right.” “No, you are!”
Then Joe went missing during possibly the worst weeks of my life.
I’m a homicide cop, and I know when someone is telling me the truth and when things do not add up.
Joe missing in action had not added up. Because of that I had worried almost to panic. Where was he? Why hadn’t he checked in? Why were my calls bouncing off his full mailbox? Was he still alive?
As the crisscrossed threads of espionage, destruction, and mass murder were untangled, Joe finally made his curtain call with stories of his past and present lives that I’d never heard before. I found plenty of reason not to trust him anymore.
Even he would agree. I think anyone would.
It’s not news that once trust is broken, it’s damned hard to superglue it back together. And for me it might take more time and belief in Joe’s confession than I actually had.
I still loved him. We’d shared a meal when he came to see our baby, Julie. We didn’t make any moves toward getting divorced that night, but we didn’t make love, either. Our relationship was now like the Cold War in the eighties between Russia and the USA, a strained but practical peace called détente.
Now, as I sat with my friends, I tried to put Joe out of my mind, safe in the knowledge that my nanny was looking after Julie and that the home front was safe. I ordered a favorite holiday drink, a hot buttered rum, and a rare steak sandwich with Uncle Maxie’s hot chili sauce.
My girlfriends were deep in criminal cross talk about Claire’s holiday overload of corpses, Cindy’s new cold case she’d exhumed from the San Francisco Chronicle ’s dead letter files, and Yuki’s hoped-for favorable verdict for her client, an underage drug dealer. I was almost caught up when Yuki said, “Linds, I gotta ask. Any Christmas plans with Joe?”
And that’s when I was saved by the bell. My phone rang.
My friends said in unison, “NO PHONES.”
It was the rule, but I’d forgotten—again.
I reached into my bag for my phone, saying, “Look, I’m turning it off.”
But I saw that the call was from Rich Conklin, my partner and Cindy’s fiancé. She recognized his ringtone on my phone.
“There goes our party,” she said, tossing her napkin into the air.
“Linds?” said Conklin.
“Rich, can this wait? I’m in the middle—”
“It’s Kingfisher. He’s in a shoot-out with cops at the Vault. There’ve been casualties.”
“But—Kingfisher is dead. ”
“Apparently, he’s been resurrected.”
My partner was double-parked and waiting for me outside Uncle Maxie’s, with the engine running and the flashers on. I got into the passenger seat of the unmarked car, and Richie handed me my vest. He’s that way, like a younger version of a big brother. He thinks of me, watches out for me, and I try to
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