12th of Never (Women's Murder Club 12)

“Are you okay?”

Yuki took the seat across from Brady and said, “You’ve got to hear this.”

Brady punched all his phone lines so that no calls could come through.

“You’ve got my full attention,” he said.

“Lynnette Lagrande just told me who was

keeping Lily Herman for the last year, and I’ve got their full names. Marcia Kohl, née Kransky, and Alan Kohl.”

Brady typed the names into a known-criminals law enforcement database.

“They’re low-level jerkoffs. Insurance fraud. Petty theft. Last known address was Bolinas,” he said.

“Right. Well, according to Lynnette, they did some insurance schemes with Keith Herman. They slipped in restaurants. Fell down in front of expensive cars that were slowing for traffic lights. Herman went after the insurance companies, split the take with the Kohls.”

“Okay, here we go,” said Brady. “Alan Kohl, insurance fraud, charges dismissed August 2007. Attorney, Keith Herman.”

“That was Keith Herman working his way up to full-blown dirtbag criminal defense attorney,” Yuki said.

“So how does Lily Herman fit into this?”

“Lynnette says she overheard Keith talking to the Kohls about babysitting Lily. She presumes he wanted to get the child out of the house and away from Jennifer. Then Jennifer turned up in garbage bags and Keith was arrested. Lynnette thinks the Kohls continued to babysit and charge Keith for their services.”

Brady printed out the Kohls’ address, then said to Yuki, “We’ve got probable cause.”

“Yes, we do.”

“Want to ask Arthur Nussbaum for a search warrant?”

Chapter 85

YUKI SAT IN the passenger seat beside Brady, who was driving the squad car, responding to radio calls, and taking quick glances in the rearview mirror at the cop cars behind him, bumping up the narrow dirt road that ran out from the town toward the far-flung farmlands beyond it.

They were just outside Bolinas, a town of 1,600 people about thirty miles north on the coast, known for its remote location and reclusive townspeople, who habitually removed highway signs to keep strangers out.

Thickets of trees lined the road, and behind the trees were private properties, separated from each other by fences and high hedges. Brady nodded his head toward a driveway coming up on the left, marked by a couple of garbage cans and a dinged-up mailbox.

He said to Yuki, “That’s it.” Then he took the mike and told the cars behind him to slow and prepare to turn.

Yuki leaned forward and gripped the armrest. She had never been as humiliated as when her case against Keith Herman had blown up in her face. Far worse, the charges against him had been dropped, and now Keith Herman, presumed innocent, was as free as thought.

Yuki didn’t know what Keith Herman had to do with hiding his daughter, but she had an idea. Maybe Lily had witnessed or heard something that would prove her father had killed his wife. With luck, the Kohls would fill in the blanks.

Brady turned up the overgrown driveway and drove uphill to a clearing, where an old wood-shingled house clung to the side of the hill.

He said to Yuki, “Stay here.”

She said, “Oh, yeah, right.”

“I mean it, Yuki. I don’t know what we’re going to find.”

She got out of the car.

“Watch me. Stay with me,” Brady said.

Yuki said, “Okay,” and trudged behind Brady and four cops up the weedy lawn and broken walkway to the front door.