1st to Die (Women's Murder Club 1)

How could it be that I was going to die?

Tonight, my eyes were different, though. Scared. Everything seemed different. Surf the waves, I heard a voice inside me say. Stand tall. You always stand tall.

As much as I tried to press it back, the question formed: Why me?

I threw on a pair of sweats, tied up my hair in a short ponytail, and went into the kitchen to boil water for pasta and heat up a sauce I had put in the fridge a couple of nights before.

While it simmered, I put on a CD, Sarah McLachlan, and sat at the kitchen counter with a glass of dayold Bianco red. I petted Sweet Martha as the music played.

Ever since my divorce had become final two years ago, I had lived alone. I hate living alone. I love people, friends. I used to love my husband, Tom, more than life itself — until he left me, saying, “Lindsay, I can’t explain it. I love you, but I have to leave. I need to find somebody else. There’s nothing else to say.”

I guess he was being truthful, but it was the dumbest, saddest thing I’d ever heard. Broke my heart into a million pieces. It’s still broken. So even though I hate living alone — except for Sweet Martha, of course — I’m afraid to be with somebody again. What if he suddenly stopped loving me? I couldn’t take it. So I turn down, or shoot down, just about every man who comes anywhere near me.

But God, I hate being alone.

Especially this night.

My mother had died from breast cancer when I was just out of college. I had transferred to the city school from Berkeley to assist her and help take care of my younger sister, Cat. Like most things in her life, even Dad’s walking out, Mom dealt with her illness only when it was too late to do anything about it.

I had seen my father only twice since I was thirteen. He wore a uniform for twenty years in Central. Was known as a pretty good cop. He used to go down to this bar, the Alibi, and stay for the Giants game after his shift. Sometimes he took me, “his little mascot,” for the boys to admire.

When the sauce was ready I poured it over fusilli and dragged the plate and a salad out to my terrace. Martha tagged along. She’d been my shadow since I adopted her from the Border Collie Rescue Society. I lived on Potrero Hill, in a renovated blue Michaelian town house with a view of the bay. Not the fancy view like the one from the Mandarin Suite.

I sat down, propped my feet up on a neighboring chair, and balanced the plate on my lap. Across the bay, the lights of Oakland glimmered like a thousand unsympathetic eyes.

I looked out at the galaxy of flashing lights, felt my eyes well up, and for the second time that day I realized that I was crying. Martha nuzzled me gently, then she finished the fusilli for me.

Chapter 12

QUARTER TO NINE the next morning, I was rapping at the fogged window of Lieutenant Roth’s office at the Hall. Roth likes me — like another daughter, he says. He has no idea how condescending he can be. I’m tempted to tell Roth that I like him — like a grandfather.

I was expecting a crowd — at least a couple of suits from Internal Affairs, or maybe Captain Welting, who oversaw the Bureau of Inspectors — but, as he motioned me in, I saw that there was only one other person in the room.

A nice-looking type dressed in a chambray shirt and striped tie, with short, dark hair and strong shoulders. He had a handsome, intelligent face that seemed to come to life as I walked in, but it only meant one thing to me:

Polished brass. Someone from the department’s press corps, or City Hall.

I had the blunt, uneasy feeling they’d been talking about me.

On the way over, I had rehearsed a convincing rebuttal about the breach in press security — how I’d arrived late on the scene myself, and the real issue was the crime. But Roth surprised me. “‘Wedding Bell Blues,’ they’re calling it,” he said tossing the morning’s Chronicle in my face.

“I saw it,” I replied, relieved to focus back on the case.

He looked at Mr. City Hall. “We’ll be reading about this one every step of the way. Both kids were rich, Ivy League, popular. Sort of like young Kennedy and that blond wife of his — their tragedy.”

“Who they were doesn’t matter to me,” I answered. “Listen, Sam, about yesterday…”

He stopped me with his hand. “Forget about yesterday. Chief Mercer’s already been on the line with me. This case has his full attention.”

He glanced at the smartly dressed political type in the corner. “Anyway, he wants there to be close reins on this case. What happened on other high-profile investigations can’t happen here.” Then he said to me, “We’re changing the rules on this one.”

Suddenly, the air in the room got thick with the uneasy feel of a setup.

Then Mr. City Hall stepped forward. I noticed his eyes bore the experienced lines of someone who had put in his time. “The mayor and Chief Mercer thought we might handle this investigation as an interdepartmental alliance. That is, if you were up for working with someone new,” he said.

“New?” My eyes bounced back and forth between the two, ultimately settling on Roth.

“Meet your new partner,” Roth announced.