Джеймс Паттерсон: 14th Deadly Sin:

One of the cops said, “Right this way, Sergeant. Mind the blood.”

“Got it,” I said.

I gloved up, then moved closer so that I could get a good look at the victim.

CHAPTER 8

IT WAS A terrible sight.

The dead woman was lying on her side. She was white, had shoulder-length brown hair, and looked to be in her late forties or early fifties.

She had cared about her appearance, and wore expensive clothing: an unbuttoned tan raincoat over blood-soaked beige knit separates. The source of the blood looked to be a long slice through her clothes from her lower abdomen up to her rib cage that had likely required strength, determination, and a long, sharp blade.

The victim had bled out fast. She might never have known what had happened to her.

I trained my camera on the conspicuous wound. Then I shot close-ups of the victim’s hands—no wedding band—and of her face, and of her stockinged feet, which lay like beached fish where she’d fallen out of her shoes.

An authentic and pricey large Louis Vuitton handbag lay beside her. I opened the bag and photographed the contents: a pair of good running shoes, a makeup kit, a Jimmy Choo sunglass case, a paperback novel, and a brown leather wallet, new and of good quality.

When I opened her wallet, I learned that the victim’s name was Tina Strichler. Her driver’s license listed her age as fifty-two, and her home address was about six blocks from the scene of her death. Strichler had a full deck of credit cards, and business cards identifying her as a psychiatrist. She also had receipts for recent purchases and two hundred twenty-two dollars in cash.

I typed Strichler’s name into my phone, using an app that linked up to SFPD databases—and got nothing back. Which didn’t surprise me. So far, I had nothing to explain why this woman of means had not been robbed. She’d been gutted in broad daylight on a busy street where cell phone cameras were pointing in every direction.

I circled the body and took photos of the crowd on the sidewalks on the chance that whoever had killed this woman was watching the activity at the crime scene.

Conklin came toward me and summarized the witness statements, using his hands to point out the direction the victim had been coming from.

“The Gosselins were crossing Balmy Alley toward the victim,” he said. “Mrs. Gosselin didn’t notice the killer until he struck or punched out at the victim’s midsection. All she saw was a medium-size white guy in a black jacket or coat or shirt with the tails out. She thinks he had brown hair.”

Conklin looked exasperated, and I felt the same way. So many pairs of eyes, and one of the only two witnesses had seen practically nothing.

My partner went on.

“After the attack, the doer kept going and disappeared into the crowd. Mr. Gosselin saw none of this. He went to his wife when she started screaming. The rest was chaos. A stampede.”

An unmarked car pulled up and two guys from our squad got out: Fred Michaels and Alex Wang, both new hires by Brady.

Conklin and I greeted them and brought them up to date on the details of the crime as we knew it. I told them I’d send them a typed version of my notes and the photos as soon as I got back to the Hall. And then, as sorry as I was to do it, I turned the case over to the new guys.

Conklin and I had our own horrible murder waiting for us at our desks. We got back into our separate cars and were headed back to the Hall when, as I turned onto Bryant Street, something came to me. It was a realization that just about reached out and hit me like a slap across the face.

Claire had been right.

There had been murders on each of her birthdays for the previous two years. And I was almost positive that those cases hadn’t been solved.

CHAPTER 9

WHEN THE WRETCHED day finally ended and I came through the front door of our apartment, Martha wiggled her butt, barked, and sang me an excited welcome-home song. I hugged her, held her front paws, and danced a few steps with her. Then I called out to Joe.

He called back.

“I’m giving Julie a bath.”

OK, then.

I hung up my jacket, kicked off my shoes, and put my gun in the cabinet, locking it up. I walked with Martha to the open kitchen of our airy apartment on Lake Street, where I’d come to live with Joe as his bride. A year later, this was where I gave birth to Julie during a blacked-out and very stormy night while Joe was out of town.

That was at the top of the list of the most memorable nights of my life.

I topped up Martha’s dinner bowl and poured two chilled glasses of Chardonnay. With Martha trailing behind me, I went to the master bathroom.

I knocked, opened the door, and saw the two people I love the most. My smile stretched out to my ears.

“Awwww,” I cooed. “Look how cute and clean she is.”

I leaned down and kissed Joe, who was kneeling beside the tub. Julie grinned her adorable face half off, lifted her arms, and squealed. I put the wineglasses on the vanity. Then I kissed Julie’s hand, making funny noises in her palm. I handed Joe the pink towel that was appliquéd with OUR BABY GIRL.

I understand that first-time parents are a little goofy, but this towel had been a gift .

“I need a bath myself,” I said as Joe lifted the damp baby into his arms.

“You go ahead,” said my handsome and most wonderful husband. “You OK with Pizza Pronto? I’ll call in an order.”

“Brilliant,” I said. “Sausage, mushrooms, onions, OK?”

“You forgot the jalapeños.”

“Those, too.”

The pizza arrived, pronto.

Over our down-and-dirty dinner, I told Joe about the Windbreaker cops. When the pizza box was in the trash, the baby was asleep, and Joe was working in his home office, a.k.a. the spare bedroom, I brought my laptop to the living room and took over the big leather sofa.

I’d worked the Windbreaker cops case at both ends of my day, but I found I couldn’t stop thinking about Tina Strichler, the shrink who’d been gutted in the street.

Now that I had a full belly and some free time, I felt compelled to check out the homicides that had happened on Claire’s birthday the two previous years.

I was almost positive that these cases had somehow slipped through the cracks.

CHAPTER 10

MY HUSBAND STOOD behind me, his hands working on the clenched muscles in my neck.

“Oooh, I think I like working at home,” I said.

“Yes, well, I’m the legendary man with the slow hands.”

I laughed. “Yes, you are.”

“More wine?”

“No, thanks. I’m good.”

“OK, then,” he said, giving my shoulders a squeeze. “Martha and I are going for a run.”

“I’ll wait up.”

As soon as Joe and Martha had left the apartment, I checked on our sleeping little one, and then I went back to work.

I typed in my password and opened the SFPD case log to kick off my search. The index to the files was little more than a list of the victims; each case was dated and marked either active, closed, or pending. The name of the lead inspector on each case was listed under the victim’s name.

Since I was searching for murders on specific dates, it didn’t take long to find the two women who’d been killed on Claire’s birthday. I stared at the names, and I remembered the occasions.

Just the way it had happened today, I’d been called from the table to go to the crime scene because I was a ranking officer, on duty, and near the location when the body had been discovered.

I clicked open the older of the two unsolved cases.

Two years ago a woman named Catherine Hayes had been killed outside her father’s coffee shop on Nob Hill. Hayes, who worked for her father during the day, went to night school for accounting and finance. On that twelfth day of May, she’d been having a smoke outside while talking to a friend on the phone when she’d been stabbed in the back. Then her throat had been slit.