A Killing in China Basin (10 page)

La Rosa shot him a look of disbelief, but Raveneau was determined to try this.

‘You were there when two people went through the gate.’

‘They were already through.’

‘When you drove up?’

‘No, I was already parked down the street when they got there and I didn’t want to follow them in. One of them was hurt, probably her. She was walking funny and he was helping her.’

‘It was a man helping her?’

‘Yes.’

‘Could you tell anything about him?’

‘He was too far away. They were around the corner by the time I got up to the gate.’ He turned toward la Rosa and made eye contact as he added, ‘They moved into the darkness before I reached the gate.’

‘What about a car?’ Raveneau asked.

‘I saw a white Camry or maybe it was a Ford pickup truck with a crushed right front fender.’

Raveneau knew the type of truck that struck Jacie Bates was public knowledge. Heilbron no doubt got it from the TV. He didn’t react, didn’t show Heilbron anything, and neither did la Rosa.

‘You saw a Camry?’

‘Might have been a Honda Civic.’

‘Did you see the man leave the building?’

‘I left after twenty minutes.’

‘Do you feel pretty sure it was around twenty minutes?’

‘Might have been twenty-one and a half or twenty-two minutes. Let me think about it and get back to you.’

Raveneau nodded and said, ‘So twenty-two minutes and you don’t know what kind of car. But here’s the part I don’t understand, you say they were going around the corner when you got up to the gate. Is that right?’

‘Did I say that?’

He smiled at them and Raveneau said, ‘Yes, that’s what you said but your film shows them right at the corner and you’re not in the film, so I guess like the car you’ve got it a little screwed up.’

‘They were already around the corner.’

‘There’s a way that could work and you tell me if I’m wrong. You were in the van when they went around the corner. You didn’t get out like you said. You filmed from the van.’

‘Now you’re getting it.’

‘And there were no lights on the building so you didn’t have much of a view.’

Heilbron smiled. ‘You’ll never catch him. He’ll do another one and another and another and another and you’ll never catch him.’

‘We might with your help. Can you describe the man at all?’

‘Did I say I saw a man?’

‘You did earlier.’

‘Do you really think I would help you?’

He laughed. He turned and looked at la Rosa.

‘Elizabeth, I don’t know how you got stuck with Inspector Clouseau, but I would still like to go out with you. I know we could have a lot of fun. Why don’t you ditch him and stay here tonight?’

La Rosa got to her feet. She spoke only to Raveneau, ‘See you outside.’

TWENTY-ONE

L
a Rosa was quiet as they drove away. Her fingers drummed on the seat and she squinted as they passed through some of the last of the day’s sunlight. She stared at a couple holding hands standing talking on a corner as they waited for the light to change.

‘There are a lot of things one can do with one’s life,’ she said. ‘There are people like Heilbron in the world, but the world isn’t about them. They’re the abnormals. Don’t you ever get sick of just being in the same room as someone like him? Do you ever wonder at your decision to spend your best years chasing the worst of humanity?’

‘It’s about justice and protecting people. It’s about speaking for the dead.’

‘Yeah, sure, all that, but we just came from Heilbron’s house. Do you know what it smelled like to me in there? It smelled like someone took a quart of vomit and heated it slowly on a stove for an hour in a tight space. I can barely stand to be around him, let alone sit in his living room. You wanted to go there and he took you up on your challenge. He pushed the taunting up a notch because we showed weakness by asking for his help. Or ostensibly asking for it, and that makes him feel stronger and it may make him more dangerous.’

‘He witnessed something.’

‘And he’s going to hold it over us forever. He’ll never tell us. He was there in his Stalker-mobile and saw them go in, and later put two and two together. Now he’s got information and he’s in control.’

‘He wants the dialogue. He wants to tell us.’

‘I don’t think so. I think he lives to fuck with us. I think I could waste my life talking to people like him, but I have another idea also, which is he did kill her and you’re right, he’s feeding us information gradually. He knew a search of his house and van would turn up nothing except for the video and the video would bring us back. But what’s your real feeling? What’s your gut? Are you after what he videotaped or after him?’

‘I think he’s still riding a thrill but with some regrets. If he had it to do over again, he probably wouldn’t come in and confess. He got all lit up the night of the murder and chatted up the responding officers, but it’s probably vicarious. He wishes it were him and has fantasized about killing a woman in that way, and when this live action came along he couldn’t resist claiming it.’

‘That’s what you said before, but now you’re working him for what he saw. Are you hoping he’ll make a mistake? And what about the fact his key worked in the padlock?’

‘Looks like a lot of people can get into the building.’

La Rosa didn’t believe that. Her fingers returned to drumming on the seat.

Early the next morning Raveneau fielded a call from a woman who said she was calling because she’d just seen the sketch of their China Basin victim and recognized her as someone she used to work with at a pottery wholesaler in Hollister. She gave a name, Alex Jurika. Raveneau got the caller’s name, phone number, and place of work. He thanked her and said he’d try to come see her today.

Then he ran Alex Jurika’s name through the Department of Motor Vehicles database. He learned there were twelve Alex Jurika’s with driver’s licenses in the state. Three were local, one was in San Francisco. The SF Jurika had an address in the Hayes Valley.

When the DMV faxed a photo Raveneau caught it as it fed into the tray. He knew the second he saw the photo and walked it over, laid it in front of la Rosa alongside the sketch of their victim. ‘Here she is. DMV shows a Hayes Street address. Want to take a ride?’

The apartment manager’s annoyed look vanished when they told him they were homicide inspectors. Raveneau showed him the DMV photo.

‘Do you know her?’

He did. He went to get a key for her apartment and then explained that he didn’t know anything about her whereabouts. She often went on short business trips. He knew Phoenix was one place she traveled to regularly.

‘What about a boyfriend or relatives?’

‘She had friends but I don’t know any of them. I asked her out once and she turned me down, but I never saw a boyfriend.’

He gave them a look as if to say she was a little odd for not going out with him.

‘What about friends within the apartment complex?’

He shrugged, didn’t know.

‘Let’s go have a look at her apartment,’ Raveneau said.

TWENTY-TWO

A
s soon as the front door unlocked, Raveneau turned to the apartment manager and said, ‘We’ll take it from here. We’ll bring the key back to you.’

Inside it smelled heavily of used cat litter and a small red cat appeared and meowed as it rubbed against Raveneau’s leg. He leaned over and picked it up. Raveneau found some dry food in a kitchen cabinet and fed the cat, and then got on the phone to CSI as la Rosa went back to the car for latex gloves. Raveneau looked around as he waited. One bedroom, one bath, and a lot nicer interior than the dirty exterior of the building.

On a shelf they found several photo albums. She had a Facebook page and a Twitter account. They’d get on to the Facebook page when they got back to the office and made the call. They read through her Twitter feeds, her emails, and la Rosa called AT&T for phone records. She banked online. Either he or la Rosa would call the bank when they got back to the office.

He walked into the bathroom, looking but touching little as la Rosa was on the phone with AT&T getting Jurika’s voice mail password. He went through her photos on the computer and emailed several of those and her email address book to both his address and la Rosa’s. Then he printed off the emails she’d sent and those received in the last month. As the printer clacked along CSI arrived, and he walked out to lead them in. La Rosa was on the computer when he came back.

‘Did you read these?’ she asked. ‘This must be a friend of hers.’

Raveneau read, ‘u going?’

‘yes. u?’

‘We need all of her friends.’

In an hour they had gone from knowing nothing about Alex Jurika to sorting through information. Raveneau watched la Rosa’s hands move over the keyboard. She was three or four times faster than him. She clicked through emails, pausing on one reading, ‘You’re going to love this.’

CSI pulled prints and latents off counters, the table and door knobs. They had prints from two different people. One was likely Jurika; the other they guessed was also a woman. Nothing Raveneau found suggested Jurika intended to travel; no packed bags, passport, itinerary, plane tickets, or email records of flight confirmations. From the cat pictures and the rest, Raveneau couldn’t see her abandoning her pet, leaving it here to starve. So good chance she was abducted.

AT&T called back and promised to fax a record of her incoming and outgoing phone numbers for the cell and landline. After the CSI pair left and Raveneau couldn’t think of anything more to do here, they locked the door and Raveneau told the manager, ‘We’ll be back later today. We’d like to keep the key, if that’s OK.’ Then he asked, ‘Do you have a way to take care of the cat?’

The manager wrinkled his nose. ‘They’re not even allowed here.’

Now they crossed the Bay Bridge on their way to a print shop in Emeryville, where the woman who had recognized Jurika and called in this morning worked. Her name was Sally Cheung and she turned out to be seasoned, tough, and no nonsense. She nodded as Raveneau showed her a photo.

‘That’s her, and she wasn’t the most honest employee, but she was always fun.’ After a pause she added, ‘She got fired for stealing.’

Fired for stealing credit card numbers, but never arrested and prosecuted according to the former boss they talked to that afternoon. ‘Hiring her was like catching a bad cold on a plane. In the end it didn’t hurt us much, but it was shitty while it lasted.’

They read about her all afternoon and finally got on her Facebook page, then started contacting her Facebook friends, none of whom had contacted the police on their own. Late in the afternoon they went back to the apartment building and made another search for the green Toyota Camry registered to her. At seven that night Raveneau said, ‘Why don’t you come over? I’ll cook dinner and we’ll keep working.’

When la Rosa arrived she spotted the cat exploring the roof.

‘Isn’t that Jurika’s cat?’

‘Yeah, I couldn’t leave it there.’ When the cat ran back over he picked it up and showed her the name tag, Visa. La Rosa smiled, shook her head.

He fired up the barbecue as la Rosa checked out how he lived. At 10:30, just as they called it a night, Raveneau’s landline rang. He saw Celeste’s name on the screen and remembered they were going to try to see each other tonight if it all worked out. With everything happening today he forgot to call her late this afternoon.

‘Celeste, I’m sorry, I saw the message light blinking when I got home, but we caught a break in a case today and I’ve been caught up in that.’

‘Are you still working on it?’

‘Just finishing.’

In the background la Rosa laughed at something the cat did.

‘Who’s that?’

‘My partner. She came over for dinner so we could keep working. We got an ID on that woman in China Basin I told you about. We know who she is now.’

‘I didn’t know you had a woman as a partner.’

La Rosa laughed again and when he looked over the cat was jumping up two to three feet straight up off the deck.

‘She sounds young.’

‘You’ve got a good ear if you can tell that, but you’re right.’

‘What’s her name?’

‘Elizabeth.’

‘Pretty name.’

He looked at la Rosa as he answered, knew she was tracking the conversation and said, ‘Yes, it is a pretty name. Too bad her personality doesn’t match it.’

La Rosa smiled and Celeste said, ‘Have fun, I’ll talk to you later.’

A moment later she hung up.

TWENTY-THREE

T
he first words of the older sister of the victim, Gloria Jurika, were, ‘I’m not surprised.’

But she was surprised and shocked and had trouble talking. She declined Raveneau’s offer to pick her up at the airport and didn’t call his cell until she reached the Hall of Justice. He found her downstairs standing alone twenty feet from the elevators, the black hair, wide forehead and thin nose unmistakably similar to her sister’s. People walked past her and around her; she seemed in a space all her own until he touched her shoulder.

‘Gloria, I’m Inspector Raveneau.’

‘Will you take me to see her?’

‘Let’s go upstairs first.’

In the office Gloria Jurika said the last communication from her sister was an email asking to borrow fifty thousand dollars. A moment later she added, ‘Fifty thousand is all of my savings. The last time I loaned her money she didn’t pay it back. Do you think she was killed over money?’

‘We don’t have any idea yet. We’re hoping you can help us.’

‘She also tried to borrow from mom. She flew down, went to the nursing home, and got mom to sign a check. One of the employees at the nursing home called me and I put a stop on it. That was about a week and a half ago. Before that, Alex hadn’t visited mom in two and a half years.’