14th Deadly Sin (Women's Murder Club 14)

“I think so,” he said. “The start of something, anyway.”

I liked what I was hearing, but at the same time, I felt a little bad. Here was this big-time law enforcement guy on the bench, now doing unpaid busy work—for me. But he wasn’t complaining.

“Tell me about it,” I said.

“I’m gonna do that. Eat your dinner before it gets cold.”

I tucked in. Joe leaned closer and said, “I went back five years and found every crime that happened on the twelfth of May in San Francisco. A lot of shit happened, Linds.”

“I’m guessing fifty-sixty murders a year,” I said.

“Sixty-eight last year,” he said.

We grinned at each other. I loved working with Joe. I was even a little envious that my husband had the time to focus on this case and work it from home.

“Although there was no shortage of violent crime, very little of it resembled the murder of your victim on Balmy Alley. Along with the three fatal stabbings from this year and the previous two, I found a stabbing fatality in each of the two previous years that met my narrowly defined parameters. And I didn’t find any stabbing fatalities just like it on any other days or in the years preceding the one that happened five years back.”

“Tell me about the stabbings in years one and two.”

Joe grinned. “You don’t have to beg.”

He took our empty plates to the sink and brought two slices of pie to the island. It was apple pie, and he’d stopped to put ice cream on top. I looked up at him like, Is this for real?

“Nope. I didn’t make the pie. But then, I was busy on a very twisted and highly interesting case.”

I laughed at him, grabbed a plate, and stuck in a fork.

“Run it for me, will you?”

“Yes, I will, Sergeant,” said Joe.

CHAPTER 29

“SO I DID a little time-traveling,” Joe said. “The victim in y

ear one of the five was an uptown lady, Ms. Alicia Thompson. She had been to Neiman’s and she was on her way to her car.”

“We know this how?” I asked.

“Shopping bags and keys in her hand. And she was killed a half block from Union Square Garage, where her car was parked.”

“Did anyone see anything?”

“Nope, and Ms. Thompson got the full five-star investigation. Chi was the lead investigator.”

“And how did the case play out?”

“Not only were there no witnesses, there were also no forensics, no footage, no nothing. Not even the knife. Make a note, Sergeant Blondie. Taking the knife is a common thread.”

“Duly noted,” I said.

“OK, next victim was very different than Ms. Thompson.”

“Do tell,” I said.

I took the empty dessert plates away and put them in the dishwasher while Martha and Joe headed to the living room. We all settled into the oversize leather sofa. Martha put her head on my lap, letting out a contented sigh.

“Victim number two, Krista Toomey, was homeless,” Joe said. “Twenty-five years old, in bad shape even for a meth addict. She was sleeping in an alley in the Tenderloin. Olive Street. No witnesses, but plenty of people knew her.”