Private (Private 1)

Justine’s mind skidded and spun out of control. She knocked over her wineglass and didn’t move to stop the flow. Her glow was gone, her thoughts shooting back to very bad days in the recent past.

Morgue shots flooded her mind: teenage girls who’d been murdered over the past two years. The poor girls had all been in high scho

ol, lived throughout Los Angeles, but most had been from the neighborhoods of East LA. The last girl had been found dead just a month ago.

There had been so much police and media attention on that girl’s death, Justine had almost come to believe that the killer had retreated or even quit. Maybe he was in jail. Or maybe he had died. Wouldn’t that be nice?

But now Bobby had shattered that fantasy, and at least one other she had had about tonight and the possibilities it held for the two of them.

Chapter 5

“I HAVE TO call Jack right now,” Justine said to Bobby. “I have to. Damn it. Damn it!”

He reached over and squeezed her hand. “I already called him. Your ride will be here in twenty minutes. You’re going to be up most of the night, Justine. Have some pasta. Please, honey? You’re going to thank me for making you eat.”

A waiter put a clean cloth on the table and refilled Justine’s wineglass, but she was no longer aware of her surroundings. She picked up her fork and stabbed a tortellini to satisfy Bobby and so she wouldn’t have to speak while she mentally reviewed the case.

All eleven of the girls had been killed by different methods. That was highly unusual. The murder weapons had been removed from the crime scenes as had the victims’ handbags and backpacks. The killer had always taken trophies: a hank of hair, a contact lens, a pair of panties, a class ring. What law enforcement people called “murderabilia.”

Then, in a bizarre and audacious twist, the killer had claimed credit for one of the murders in an untraceable e-mail to the mayor.

He wrote that he had buried his trophies from the most recent murder in a planter outside an office building on the corner of Sunset and Doheny. He signed the note “Steemcleena,” a name that revealed nothing, then or now.

It took time for the e-mail to work its way through the system, and more time before it was taken seriously.

But three days after that encrypted e-mail was sent, the planter was dug up. A plastic bag was recovered. Inside were items taken from the latest victim. There was no DNA on the objects, no prints, no trace; the police were left with nothing but the humiliation of the killer’s last laugh.

Justine had volunteered to consult with the LAPD, and they invited her in. She remembered now how seeing the girl’s personal effects made her physically ill. The killer had handled them, buffed them up, and sent them back to the police with a meaningless signature and a dare.

Then Justine had come up with a plan. To make it work, she got Jack Morgan and Bobby Petino together.

And in a controversial arrangement that had outraged the homicide division of the LAPD, the district attorney’s office approved Private Investigations to work the case as a public service—pro bono.

And now another girl was dead.

Bobby was answering his cell phone, trying to get her attention. “Justine. Justine. Your ride is here.”

Chapter 6

DAMN IT! JUSTINE gripped the armrest of the sleek black, ridiculously fast Mercedes S65 as Emilio Cruz, her “ride” and fellow investigator at Private, took a hard right turn onto Hyperion Avenue in the Silver Lake area of East LA.

The four-lane road was lined with strip malls and fast-food restaurants of every kind, all within easy walking distance of the John Marshall High School, which two of the murdered girls had attended.

“What do you know about the victim?” Justine finally asked Emilio, glancing his way.

Emilio Cruz didn’t even have to try to look good. He bunched his black hair back with a rubber band, put his ancient leather jacket over anything, and generally looked like a movie star just waiting to break out.

Cruz’s voice was as soft as butter. “Her name is Connie Yu. She was a bright light. In the eleventh grade, only sixteen years old.”

“She’s so smart,” said Justine, “why was she walking on this street alone?”

“These girls, Justine, are being killed in my neighborhood. They’re too tough to act scared.”

“Sorry, Emilio. That’s my frustration talking. I feel desperate and even guilty. Why can’t I get a decent handle on this fucker?”

“Tell me about it. I’m here with you, right? Pro bono. I hate pro bono.”

Cruz hated to lose too, really hated it. Maybe even more than Jack did. He had once been a ranked prizefighter, then a cop, then a special investigator for the DA’s office under Bobby Petino. Three years later, Bobby Petino introduced him to Jack, who hired him as a Private investigator. Justine was in awe of Cruz’s bulldog-like tenacity when it came to getting to the truth. This and his natural charm made Cruz a gifted investigator. Only the gifted made it at Private.