get tarnished.”
“There’s also what she was.”
“In this city, just about everyone we come across is involved in some kind of crime. As long as you’re not banging her and then looking the other way when she robs banks or something, what’s the big deal?”
“Just the same, I’d prefer you keep what I told you between us.”
“Mum’s the word. Not that you don’t take every case personal, but I’ve had the feeling this one was more personal than most.”
Sinclair nodded in agreement.
“What do you say we call it a night?” Braddock said. “We’re still on standby, and the city’s overdue for another killing.”
Chapter 12
The mansion was quiet as Sinclair wrote a note and left it with his dirty suit and raincoat in the butler’s pantry. When he had first moved into the guesthouse, it felt strange having Walt and his wife handling everything from grocery shopping to housekeeping, but Walt insisted it was part of their responsibilities as the caretakers of Frederick Towers’s estate.
Walt had first met Fred Towers six years ago when Walt was working a second job as a limo driver and was assigned to pick up Fred at his Oakland office, where he was the CEO of one of the largest corporations in the city, and drive him home every day because he had lost his license after a DUI arrest. Over several weeks, Walt shared with Fred how booze had destroyed his own life fifteen years earlier, and eventually drove him to his first AA meeting and became his sponsor. When Fred’s wife and daughter died in a drunk-driving accident a year later, he asked Walt to move into his house to manage the estate and his personal affairs. Walt and Sinclair’s friendship had started in a similar way—at Sinclair’s first AA meeting.
Sinclair hadn’t been too happy about having to attend AA meetings when he got out of rehab nearly two years ago, and seeing people such as Walt, who talked at every meeting about serenity and gratitude, drove him crazy. But when he almost picked up a drink while investigating the Bus Bench murders,Walt was there with support and needed words of wisdom. Fred and Walt invited Sinclair to stay in their guesthouse after his apartment was firebombed, and what was intended to be a month or so stay turned into more than a yearlong residency. Whenever he looked at the cost of rent for a decent apartment in a halfway decent area, he realized how good he had it here. Still, he dreamed of buying a house again someday, and hoped the escalating home prices in the East Bay didn’t outpace what he was able to save while living rent-free.
Sinclair walked through the commercial-grade kitchen and breakfast room onto a rear stone patio. The rain had stopped, but heavy clouds shadowed the light from the full moon above. He made his way down a flagstone path through the lush yard, around the pool, and into the guesthouse through the French doors. Originally a pool house with changing rooms and a large open space filled with pool tables and ping-pong tables, Fred had it converted to a one-bedroom apartment for his daughter when she turned twenty. By default, it became a guesthouse after she died.
Sinclair took a cigar from a drawer in the rolltop desk that sat in one corner of his living room. He grabbed a towel from the linen closet and a down jacket from the closet and returned to the pool area. After wiping down a chair, he sparked his lighter and puffed on the A. Flores Habano until it was evenly lit.
When he’d first recognized Dawn in the park yesterday morning, the first thought that jumped into his mind was that he had failed her—that if he had somehow said the right thing to her when she came to him several years earlier, she would have walked away from her life of prostitution. Maybe if he hadn’t been so focused on his own needs and problems. Although he hadn’t mentioned it to Dr. Elliott that morning, Dawn’s face was one of those that flashed through his mind as he was reliving the
“There’s also what she was.”
“In this city, just about everyone we come across is involved in some kind of crime. As long as you’re not banging her and then looking the other way when she robs banks or something, what’s the big deal?”
“Just the same, I’d prefer you keep what I told you between us.”
“Mum’s the word. Not that you don’t take every case personal, but I’ve had the feeling this one was more personal than most.”
Sinclair nodded in agreement.
“What do you say we call it a night?” Braddock said. “We’re still on standby, and the city’s overdue for another killing.”
Chapter 12
The mansion was quiet as Sinclair wrote a note and left it with his dirty suit and raincoat in the butler’s pantry. When he had first moved into the guesthouse, it felt strange having Walt and his wife handling everything from grocery shopping to housekeeping, but Walt insisted it was part of their responsibilities as the caretakers of Frederick Towers’s estate.
Walt had first met Fred Towers six years ago when Walt was working a second job as a limo driver and was assigned to pick up Fred at his Oakland office, where he was the CEO of one of the largest corporations in the city, and drive him home every day because he had lost his license after a DUI arrest. Over several weeks, Walt shared with Fred how booze had destroyed his own life fifteen years earlier, and eventually drove him to his first AA meeting and became his sponsor. When Fred’s wife and daughter died in a drunk-driving accident a year later, he asked Walt to move into his house to manage the estate and his personal affairs. Walt and Sinclair’s friendship had started in a similar way—at Sinclair’s first AA meeting.
Sinclair hadn’t been too happy about having to attend AA meetings when he got out of rehab nearly two years ago, and seeing people such as Walt, who talked at every meeting about serenity and gratitude, drove him crazy. But when he almost picked up a drink while investigating the Bus Bench murders,Walt was there with support and needed words of wisdom. Fred and Walt invited Sinclair to stay in their guesthouse after his apartment was firebombed, and what was intended to be a month or so stay turned into more than a yearlong residency. Whenever he looked at the cost of rent for a decent apartment in a halfway decent area, he realized how good he had it here. Still, he dreamed of buying a house again someday, and hoped the escalating home prices in the East Bay didn’t outpace what he was able to save while living rent-free.
Sinclair walked through the commercial-grade kitchen and breakfast room onto a rear stone patio. The rain had stopped, but heavy clouds shadowed the light from the full moon above. He made his way down a flagstone path through the lush yard, around the pool, and into the guesthouse through the French doors. Originally a pool house with changing rooms and a large open space filled with pool tables and ping-pong tables, Fred had it converted to a one-bedroom apartment for his daughter when she turned twenty. By default, it became a guesthouse after she died.
Sinclair took a cigar from a drawer in the rolltop desk that sat in one corner of his living room. He grabbed a towel from the linen closet and a down jacket from the closet and returned to the pool area. After wiping down a chair, he sparked his lighter and puffed on the A. Flores Habano until it was evenly lit.
When he’d first recognized Dawn in the park yesterday morning, the first thought that jumped into his mind was that he had failed her—that if he had somehow said the right thing to her when she came to him several years earlier, she would have walked away from her life of prostitution. Maybe if he hadn’t been so focused on his own needs and problems. Although he hadn’t mentioned it to Dr. Elliott that morning, Dawn’s face was one of those that flashed through his mind as he was reliving the
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