The 9th Judgment (Women's Murder Club 9)

Recently Cindy had been writing about a cat burglar who’d been doing second-story jobs, always breaking in when the homeowners were having dinner on the first floor and the alarm system was turned off. This burglar made off with only jewelry—which had not turned up. Cindy had dubbed the cat burglar “Hello Kitty,” and it stuck.

Here’s what was known about Hello Kitty: he was fit, deft, and fast, and had a huge pair of stones.

“Think about it,” Conklin said. “Hello Kitty seems to know when these wealthy people are having dinner parties. What if he’s part of the same social circle? If Casey Dowling recognized him, maybe shooting her was his only way out.”

“Not a bad theory,” I said to Conklin as we took the walk up to the front steps of the manse next door. “But wait a sec. What did you make of Dowling’s wet hair?”

“He washed off his wife’s blood.”

“So he leaped into the shower after Casey was murdered,” I said. “It seems weird to me.”

“So what’s your theory? Homicide One Oh One?”

“Why not? Because Dowling’s a movie star? Something about him isn’t right. He told Clapper he heard two gunshots. He told us he heard a noise, and then sometime after that, he heard a second sound, and that time he was sure it was a shot.”

My partner said, “Could be he was just summing up, telling the story in shorthand.”

“Could be shorthand,” I said. “Or could be he’s making up the story as he goes along and can’t keep it straight.”

Chapter 14

THE HOME NEXT to the Dowlings’ was set back from the street and had a groundskeeper’s house in the side yard and two deluxe cars in the driveway.

I pressed the bell, and chimes rang. The front door opened, and a brown-haired boy of about ten, wearing a rugby shirt over pajama bottoms, gazed up at us and asked who we were.

“I’m Sergeant Boxer. This is Inspector Conklin. Are your parents at home?”

“Kellll-yyyy!”

The boy turned out to be Evan Richards, and Kelly was his babysitter, a woman in her midtwenties who had been watching Project Runway in the media room when she heard the sirens screaming up the street.

“Casey Dowling was killed?” she asked. “That’s crazy. That burglar could have come here! Evan, can you grab the phone? I have to call your parents.”

“I think I saw something,” the boy said. “I was staring out my bedroom window, and someone ran past the house. Like, in the shadows under the trees.”

“Could you describe him?” Conklin asked the boy.

Evan shook his head. “Just someone running. Wearing black. I heard him huffing as he ran.”

I asked if this person was big or small, if there was anything special about the way he ran.

“I thought he was just a jogger, you know? He was wearing a cap, I think. I was looking down at the top of his head.”

Conklin left his card with the boy’s babysitter and asked Evan to please call if he remembered anything else. Then we headed down the block toward the next house.

I said to Conklin, “So maybe we have a live witness to Kitty making a run for it.” And then my cell phone rang.

Yuki, sending a text message: Call me.

I hit the recall button, and Yuki picked up.

“God! I know her!” Yuki said.

“Know who?”

“Casey Dowling.”

Frickin’ grapevine. How could she have heard already?