“Wigwags,” said Conklin.
“And there was blue and red lights, I don’t know if they came from the grille or the dashboard …”
“That’s very good, Mrs. Watson.”
“Oh Jesus. Do you think that cop set Jace’s car on fire?”
“We’d just be speculating at this point,” Conklin said. “We’re going to have to check out the names you gave us, and we’d like you to come down to the Hall and look at some photographs. Vehicles and people. Is that okay with you?”
Watson said, “What if I had stopped? Maybe those boys would be alive.”
I said, “If you had stopped, you might have been killed, Mrs. Watson. This isn’t your fault. You’re helping us to find who killed those kids.”
And then she started crying. Anna Watson was maybe the only person in the world who felt bad that those gangbangers were dead.
And then she said to Conklin, “I don’t know who’s going to take care of me now.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Jace is gone. How’m I going to get my —”
Conklin held up his hand and said, “Mrs. Watson, I’m sorry you lost your dealer. I can’t help you with that.”
Watson nodded. She said to my partner, “If you drop me off at my house for a minute, after that I can come with you to look at pictures.”
Chapter 37
IT WAS AFTER eleven when I got home. I was hoping for some quiet time with a half-pint of ice cream, just me and Martha and Baby made three.
I put my key in the lock, but the front door was open. I went inside, saw lights on in the living room. The TV was on too. Heyyy. Joe wasn’t supposed to be home for a day or two.
How great was this?
“Joe?” I called out.
Martha galloped into the foyer, and a person in loose clothing came up behind my dog. The figure was backlit, in silhouette, and was definitely not my husband. I started and had my hand on my gun before it clicked.
The woman with the long red hair and cute glasses was Karen Triebel, Martha’s “nanny,” and as far as I knew, she wasn’t even a little bit dangerous. Still, my heart was pounding as if I’d walked in on an armed robbery in progress.
My fear reaction was quickly followed by mortification.
I’d forgotten to call Karen to say I was going to be late. I apologized now, thanked her for hanging in.
“We watched a movie,” Karen said, then added to Martha, “Didn’t we, big girl? And I baked a potato,” she said to me. “And finished off the ice cream. I hope that’s okay.”
“Sure,” I said. “Of course. I’m sorry that I lost track of the time.”
“Martha has a real crush on Tom Cruise,” she said.
I walked Karen out to her car, stood on the sidewalk until I couldn’t see her taillights anymore, then I went back upstairs to my dog.
The phone was ringing when I got inside.
I looked at the caller ID and saw it was my sister, Catherine, who lives a little way down the coast in Half Moon Bay.
I’m four years older than Cat; we’ve both been divorced, and she has two girls. She’s been coaching me on the care of my child onboard, name to be determined, sex unknown to me and Joe.
I grabbed the receiver off the hook, took Joe’s big chair in the living room, and put my hand on my tummy; Martha circled, then collapsed onto my feet.