10th Anniversary (Women's Murder Club 10)

I cooked dinner for Joe and had a jumbo glass of merlot with my pasta. We went for a long walk with Martha and I told my husband the latest episode in the Avis Richardson story.

Joe said, “I have a hunch QT is going to find something for you, Linds.”

Joe has first-class, FBI-trained hunches.

I had a great night’s sleep wedged between Joe and Martha, and when I got to the Hall at 8:30 a.m., I discovered that QT had called.

I called him back, and while I waited for him to get my message and return my call, Brady asked me to come to his office and update him on Richardson. I gave him a detailed but concise report, and he asked good questions. I only wished I had something worthwhile to tell him.

“Get traction on this thing, or we’ll send it down the line to Crimes Against Persons and move on,” he said.

My phone was ringing when I got back to my desk. I was hoping it was QT, but I saw from my caller ID that it was Dean Hanover of the Brighton Academy.

“Boxer,” I said, picturing the man with the polka-dot bow tie in his buttoned-up office.

“Sergeant, I’m glad I reached you.”

“Is something wrong?”

“Avis Richardson is missing,” the dean told me. “She came back to school yesterday, but she wasn’t in her dorm room this morning. Now I just found out that one of our teachers is missing, too. Jordan Ritter didn’t show up to class this morning. That’s very unusual for him. Both of them are gone. No note, no nothing. They’re just gone.”

Chapter 63

LESS THAN TWENTY-FOUR hours earlier, Phil Hoffman had been in his office, rehearsing his defense strategy, when a phone call from the SFPD radically upped his client’s chances for acquittal. It had sure felt to him like an act of God.

Now he stood behind the defense table in Judge LaVan’s courtroom and said, “The defense calls Bernard St. John.”

Bernard St. John entered the courtroom. He was wearing an expensive chalk-striped suit and a blue silk shirt. Not a spiked hair was out of place. After he had been sworn in and was seated, Hoffman approached the witness stand.

As expected, Yuki shot to her feet. “Your Honor,” she said, “we only learned about this witness last night and haven’t had a chance to do any investigation.”

Hoffman said to the judge, “I only became aware of this witness myself yesterday evening, and we sent an e-mail to Ms. Castellano immediately.”

LaVan peered through his glasses, looking down from the bench, and said, “Ms. Castellano, you’ll have your chance to question the witness. Mr. Hoffman, you may proceed.”

“Thank you, Your Honor. Mr. St. John, what kind of work do you do?”

“I play the piano for events, and I am also a piano teacher.”

“Are you currently employed as the Martin children’s piano teacher?”

“No. I was let go four months ago. The children were busy with a number of activities, and piano lessons were apparently not a priority.”

“What was your job with the Martins before you were let go?”

“I mostly taught Caitlin,” St. John said. “But Duncan was learning his scales and some beginners’ songs.”

“When did you first start working for the Martin family?”

“Two years ago last month.”

“And do you have a friendship with other people who worked for the Martins?” Hoffman asked.

“Yes, I do,” said St. John.

“Were you friends with Ellen Lafferty, the children’s nanny?”

“Yes, sir.”