James Patterson: WMC - First to Die

I STARED AT CLAIRE as the information settled in my mind. All along, Nicholas Jenks had been telling the truth. He hadn't been in the room when David and Melanie Brandt were killed that night. Nor in Napa. Probably not even near the Hall of Fame in Cleveland. I had hated Jenks so much I couldn't see past it. None of us had been able to get past the fact that we wanted him to be guilty. All the evidence- the hair, the jacket, the champagne -had been an incredible deception. Jenks was a master of the surprise ending, but someone had set the master up. I put my arms around Claire and hugged her. "You're the best." "You're damn right I am. I don't know what it proves," she answered, patting my back, "but the person standing over that poor boy at the murder scene was a woman. And I'm just as sure that she stabbed David Brandt to death with her right hand." My mind was spinning. Jenks was loose, hundreds of cops on the chase- and he was innocent. "So?" Claire looked at me and smiled. "It's the second-best news I've heard lately," I said. "Second best?" I took her hand. I told Claire what Medved had shared with me. We hugged again. We even did a little victory dance. Then both of us got back to work.

UPSTAIRS AT MY DESK, I radioed Jacobi. Poor guy, he was still sitting outside Joanna Wade's home at the corner of Filbert and Hyde. "You all right, Warren?" "Nothing that a shower and a couple of hours of sleep wouldn't improve." "Tell me what's going on." "What's going on?" Jacobi recited, as if he were resentfully going over his log. "Four-fifteen yesterday afternoon, target comes out, struts down the block to Gold's Gym. Six-ten, target reemerges, proceeds down block to Pasqua Coffee, comes out with plastic bag. I suspect it's Almond Roast. Goes into the Contempo Casuals boutique, comes out empty. I gotta figure the new fall stuff hasn't arrived yet, Boxer. She makes her way home. Lights go on on the third floor. Is it chicken I smell? I don't know- I'm so fucking hungry I might be dreaming. Lights go out about ten-twenty-five. Since then, she's been doing what I'd like to be doing. Why you got me out here like a rookie, Lindsay?" "Because Nicholas Jenks is going to try to find his ex-wife. He believes she's setting him up. I think he knows that Joanna is the murderer." "You trying to cheer me up, Boxer? Bring meaning into my life?" "Maybe. And how's this… I think she is, too. I want to know immediately if you spot Jenks." Chris Raleigh came in about eight, tossing a surprised look at my bleary eyes and disheveled appearance. "You should try a brush in the morning." "Claire called me at five-ten. I was in the morgue at five thirty." He looked at me funny. "What the hell for?" "It's a little hard to explain. I want you to meet some friends of mine." "Friends? At eight in the morning?" "Uh-huh. My girlfriends." He looked completely confused. "What am I not following here?" "Chris." I seized his arm. "I think we broke the case."

AN HOUR LATER, I got everyone together on the Jenks case, hopefully for the last time. There had been a few alleged sightings of Nicholas Jenks -in Tiburon down by the marina, and south of Market, huddled around a gathering of homeless men. Both of them proved false. He had eluded us, and the longer he remained free, the greater the speculation. We got together in a vacant interrogation room that Sex Crimes sometimes used. Claire smuggled Cindy up from the lobby, then we rang down Jill. "I see we've loosened the requirements," Jill commented, when she came in and saw Chris. Raleigh looked surprised, too. "Don't mind meI'm just the token male." "You remember Claire, and Jill Bernhardt from the district attorney's office," I said. "Cindy you may recall from Napa. The team." Slowly, Chris looked from one face to another until he settled on me. "You've been working on this independently of the task force?" "Don't ask," said Jill, plunking herself down in a wooden chair. "Just listen." In the cramped, narrow room, all eyes turned to me. I looked at Claire. "You want to begin?" She nodded, scanned the group as if she were presenting at a medical conference. "On Lindsay's urging, I spent all last night going through the three case files; I was looking for anything that would implicate Joanna. At first, nothing. Other than coming to the same conclusion I had before- that from the angle of the first victims' wounds, the killer was right-handed. Jenks is left-handed. But it was clear that it wouldn't stick. "Then something struck me that I had never noticed before. At both the first and third crime scenes there were traces of urine. Individually, I guess neither the medical examiner in Cleveland nor I ever thought much of it. But as I thought through the crimes scenes in my head, the locations of these deposits didn't make any sense. Early this morning, very early, I rushed down here and performed some tests." There was barely a breath in the room. "The urine we found at the Grand Hyatt demonstrated large deposits of yeast, as well as atypically large counts of red blood cells. Red blood cells in that amount appear in the urine during menstruation. Coupled with the yeast, there's no doubt in my mind that the urine was a woman's. A woman killed David Brandt, and I have no doubt we'll find a woman was in the stall in Cleveland, too." Jill blinked, dumbfounded. Cindy's bright red lips parted in an incredulous half smile. Raleigh just shook his head. "Jenks didn't do it," I said. "Joanna must have. He abused her, then he dumped her for his new wife, Chessy, just as he was about to strike it rich. Joanna tried to sue him twice, unsuccessfully. Ended up with a settlement many times smaller than she would have gotten a year later. She watched him gain celebrity and wealth, and a new, seemingly happy, life." Chris, looked amazed. "You really believe a woman could physically put this off? The first victims were stabbed, the second were dragged twenty, thirty yards to where they were dumped;" i "You haven't seen hern I believe "She knew how to set Jenks up. She knew his tastes, investments, and had access to his possessions. She even worked at Saks." Cwuiy chipped in, "She was one of the few people who would've been aware of Afwtx5oBrid mait" I nodded toward Jill.*Steha the motive, and I'm damaed sure she had tbedestire.?" A really heavy silence filled the room:, t "So Now do you want to play this?" Chris finally said. "Half the force is lookij for Jenks." I'll want to inform Mercer, try to get Jenks brought in without sjwraeone killing him. Then I want to go ahead and pierce Joannas cover. Phone calls, owfat cards. If she was in Cleveknd, something will tie he? tbete. I think you'd agree now," I said to Jill, "we have enough to authorize a search." Jill nodded at first hesitantly, thea with more resolve. "It's just impossible to believe that after all this, we now have to defend that bastard." Suddenly, there was a loud rap on the glass window of the door. John Keresty, an inspector on the task force, broke in onus. "It's Jenks… He's just been sighted. He's up in Pacific Heights."

RALEIGH AND I LEAPED UP, almost as one, racing back to the command center. It appeared Jenks had been seen in the lobby of a small hotel called the El Drisco. A bellboy spotted him. Free of his cuffs. Now he was on the streets, somewhere up in Pacific Heights. Why there? My mind ratcheted through the possibilities. Then it became clear. Greg Marks lived up there. I radioed Paul Chin, who was still sitting surveillance on the agent's brownstone. "Paul, be on the alert," I told him. "Jenks may be headed your way. He was seen in Pacific Heights." There was a beep on my cell phone. It was Jacobi. Everything was happening at once. "Boxer, there's an All Available Units on Jenks up in the Heights about a mile from here. I'm headed up there."