Mr. Monk Goes to the Firehouse (11 page)

Everyone except us seemed to be wearing either a pair of white iPod earphones or one of those Bluetooth cell phone units that looked like the radio Q-tip that stuck out of Lieutenant Uhura’s ear on the original
Star Trek
.

It was after twelve by the time we finished shopping for dishes, silverware, and glasses at Pottery Barn.

I’ll never admit this to Monk, but once I got past my initial anger, I was glad he threw my stuff out. I’d been ashamed to have people over to eat because we had chipped dishes and silverware that had been mangled in the disposal. But I couldn’t afford to replace any of it. Now Monk was buying me new kitchenware, and I was thrilled. (It wasn’t until he suggested we browse the cookware that I discovered he’d thrown out my pots and pans, too.) Here’s how awful I am: I actually began to toy with the idea of “accidentally” letting him see the mess in my closet so he’d buy me a new wardrobe, too.

To make shopping as painless as possible for both of us, I picked solid colors for the dishes and let him open all the boxes in the store to inspect each piece for imperfections. Every so often while this was going on, I’d feel a pang of guilt, like I was taking advantage of him or something. But then I’d remind myself that
he
was the one who went into
my
kitchen and threw out all of
my
dishes. And then my anger would come back and beat the crap out of my guilt and I was fine with myself all over again.

We’d just finished loading up the back of my Cherokee with all my goodies when Stottlemeyer called. The captain was on his way to interview Lucas Breen, the developer who planned to demolish Esther Stoval’s block, and asked if we wanted to join him. We did.

Breen Development Corporation was in a thirty-five-story Rubik’s Cube that had shouldered its way between two other buildings in the Financial District for a view of the bay. The lobby was a glass atrium that had its own florist, chocolatier, and a small outpost of the Boudin Bakery, which makes the best sourdough bread in the city, maybe even the world.

Stottlemeyer, sipping a cup of coffee from Boudin, was waiting for us in front of Flo’s Floral Designs. The smell of fresh sourdough was making me swoon.

“Morning, Natalie. Monk. I heard you talked to everybody in Esther’s neighborhood. You come up with any clues we missed?”

“No,” Monk said.

“That’s depressing,” Stottlemeyer said. “What about your other case, the one with the dog; how’s that going?”

“I think I’m on to something,” Monk asked.

That was news to me. But Monk doesn’t always share with me what’s going on in his mind, and, I have to say, most of time I’m deeply thankful for that.

“Want to trade cases?” Stottlemeyer said.

“I don’t think so,” Monk said. “Though you could do me a favor. Could you ask Lieutenant Disher to find out everything he can about a notorious robber named Roderick Turlock?”

“It’s the least I can do. What’s Turlock notorious for?”

“Robbing trains,” I said.

“Do people still do that?”

I didn’t think it would help our cause to mention that Turlock was captured in 1906. Apparently Monk agreed with me, since we both treated Stottlemeyer’s question as a rhetorical one. We must have been right, because Stottlemeyer didn’t wait for an answer.

“So, Monk, you ready for this?” Stottlemeyer tipped his head up.

Monk looked up, searching for whatever it was the captain was talking about. “For what?”

“To see Breen,” Stottlemeyer said. “He’s a rich, powerful man. He’s not going to appreciate either one of us suggesting he might have been involved in Esther Stoval’s murder.”

“He’s up there?”

“Thirtieth floor,” he said. “Rich guys love to look down on everybody.”

Stottlemeyer approached the security guard, a beefy guy with a boxer’s nose who manned a marble-topped counter in front of the elevators. Stottlemeyer flashed his badge, introduced us, and said we were there to see Lucas Breen. The guard called up to Breen’s office, then nodded to the captain.

“Mr. Breen will see you now,” the guard said.

“Great,” Monk said. “When’s he coming down?”

“He’s not,” Stottlemeyer said. “We’re going up.”

“It would be better if he came down.”

Stottlemeyer groaned and turned to the guard. “Could you ask Mr. Breen if he’d mind meeting us for a cup of coffee in the lobby? My treat.”

The guard made the call, spoke for a moment, then hung up. “Mr. Breen is very busy and can’t leave the office at this time. If you want to see him, you need to go to his office.”

“I tried, Monk,” Stottlemeyer said. “So let’s go.”

We headed for the elevators, but Monk dragged behind. “I have an idea. Let’s take the stairs.”

“Thirty floors?” I said.

“It’ll be fun.”

“It’ll be fatal,” Stottlemeyer said. “I can talk to Breen without you. You really don’t need to be there.”

“I want to be there,” Monk said.

“I’m taking the elevator,” Stottlemeyer said. “Are you coming or not?”

I looked at Monk. He looked at the elevator, took a deep breath, and nodded.

“Okay,” he said.

The three of us got into the elevator. Stottlemeyer hit the button for the thirtieth floor. The doors closed. Monk covered his finger with his sleeve and hit the button for the second floor. And then the fourth. And then the sixth. He hit the button for every other floor all the way up to the thirtieth.

Stottlemeyer rolled his eyes and sighed.

The instant the doors opened on the second floor, Monk stepped out, took several deep breaths, then came back in.

“I think this is going very well,” he said.

On the fourth floor he burst out with a cry, startling the people in the waiting room at the Crocker Advertising Agency.

“It’s a living hell,” he told them.

Monk took several hungry breaths of air and then leaped back into the elevator as if he were plunging into deep water.

The instant the elevator reached the sixth floor, he threw himself out into the lobby of Ernst, Throck, and Fillburton, Attorneys at Law, and screamed something about the “injustice and inhumanity” of it all.

By the eighth, Stottlemeyer and I were resigned to our fate, leaning against the handrails and doing our best to relax. We played Tetris on Stottlemeyer’s cell phone screen while Monk paced, and groaned, and cried, and pulled at the imaginary leeches in his hair.

Stopping at every other floor, it took us forty minutes to reach Breen’s office on the thirtieth. I won six games and Stottlemeyer won eight, but he’s had a lot more practice, working on his technique during stakeouts. When the elevator doors opened, Monk staggered out, gasping for air, his face drenched with sweat, and collapsed onto the black leather couch in the waiting room.

“Sweet Mother of God,” he whined. “It’s finally over.”

I gave him a bottle of Sierra Springs water from my purse—which, by the way, is about the size of the baby bag I lugged around when Julie was an infant. It’s full of water, Wet Ones, Baggies, even some Wheat Thins in case he gets hungry. The only thing I’m not carrying with me that I carried then are diapers.

Stottlemeyer went up to the receptionist, a disarmingly attractive Asian woman who sat behind a sweeping desk that made her look like the anchorwoman on the eleven-o’clock news. Except that the breathtaking view of the city behind her wasn’t a backdrop; it was the real thing.

“Captain Stottlemeyer, Adrian Monk, and Natalie Teeger to see Mr. Breen,” he said.

“We were expecting you to be here almost an hour ago,” she said.

“So were we,” he said.

Monk guzzled the water and tossed the empty bottle over his shoulder. The color was beginning to return to his cheeks. He mopped his forehead with his handkerchief and then tossed that, too.

“Going down will be much easier,” I said reassuringly.

“Yeah, because I’ll be taking the stairs.”

The receptionist spoke up. “Mr. Breen will see you now.”

She gestured toward a massive set of double doors that reminded me of the gates to the Emerald City of Oz, only without the munchkin guard. Breen had an Asian supermodel instead, which I’m pretty sure the wizard also would have preferred.

The doors slid open on their own as we approached, which was intimidating. Sure, the doors at Wal-Mart do the same thing, but somehow it’s different when you aren’t pushing a shopping cart.

And there, in a cavernous office of glass and mahogany and stainless steel, stood real-estate developer Lucas Breen, his arms outstretched, a welcoming smile on his face, his capped teeth gleaming like polished ivory.

 

 

 

 

Everything about Lucas Breen’s office screamed money and power. His floor-to-ceiling windows offered a commanding view of the city and the bay. The intricately detailed models of his most architecturally daring office towers were dramatically lit and displayed on marble stands. The designer furniture was arranged like sculptures. There were pictures on the wall of him and his gorgeous, bejeweled wife shaking hands with presidents, kings, movie stars, and local politicians.

And even if Breen’s office didn’t scream money and power, his handmade jacket, monogrammed shirt, elegant watch, and expensive shoes certainly did. I’d wow you with the brand names, but my fashion and jewelry expertise doesn’t extend beyond what you can find at Mervyn’s, JCPenney, and Target.

Breen was in his forties, remarkably fit, and naturally tanned—the kind of body and rich tan that comes from playing tennis on your Marin County estate, lazing around on yachts in the Caribbean, and having tantric sex.

Okay, I don’t know about the tantric sex part, but he looked like the type who would brag that he was having it even if he weren’t.

“Thank you for making the time to see us, Mr. Breen,” Stottlemeyer said, shaking the developer’s hand.

“My pleasure, Captain. I’m pleased to do anything I can to assist the San Francisco Police Department,” Breen said. “That’s why I’m so honored to be a member of the Police Commission.”

You’ve got to admire how Breen got that in there so quickly, as if Stottlemeyer didn’t already know that the chief of police and the department answer to Breen’s oversight committee.

“You must be Adrian Monk. I’ve been an admirer of yours for some time.” Breen offered his hand to Monk, who shook it, then immediately turned to me for a wipe. “Please, Mr. Monk, allow me.”

Breen took a disinfectant wipe from his pocket and gave it to Monk, who scrutinized the package. It was a Magic Fresh.

“No, thank you,” Monk said.

“It’s a moist towelette,” Breen said.

“It’s a Magic Fresh.”

“They’re all the same.”

“That’s like saying all corn flakes are the same,” Monk said.

“They are.”

“I prefer Wet Ones,” Monk said, and held his hand out to me. I gave him a package. “I don’t trust anything with magic in it.”

Breen forced a smile and tossed the package on his desk. Somebody was going to be fired for not providing Breen with the correct wipe for Monk.

“We’re investigating the murder of Esther Stoval,” Stottlemeyer said. “And, for obvious reasons, your name came up.”

“You realize, of course, that I never actually met Esther Stoval or set foot in her home. Other members of my company interacted with her and tried to address her concerns,” Breen said. “But from what I heard, she was a very difficult individual.”

“Is this the project?” Stottlemeyer asked, tipping his head toward a model.

“Yes, that’s it,” Breen said, leading us over to a scale model of Esther’s block.

The three-story building was a clever amalgamation of styles—Victorian, Spanish Renaissance, French chateau, and a dozen others—that made it seem at once both vintage and new. But there was something calculated, commercial, and Disneyesque about the building’s charm. I knew I was being manipulated with subliminal design cues meant to evoke cable cars and foggy streets, Fisherman’s Wharf, and the Golden Gate, and I hated that it was working. Maybe Esther Stoval hated it, too.

While Stottlemeyer and I admired the model, Monk looked at all the pictures on the wall of Breen and his wife with celebrities and politicians.

“What’s the selling price of the condos?” I asked, not that I was in the market or anything like that.

“Six hundred thousand and up, which, without getting into specific numbers, is what we paid the homeowners for their properties. But they weren’t the only ones who benefited. Once you revitalize one corner of a neighborhood, it creates a domino effect of beautification that enhances the whole community. Everyone wins. Unfortunately, there’s an Esther Stoval in every neighborhood.”

“Do they all end up dead?” Monk asked.

Stottlemeyer shot him a look. “What Mr. Monk means to say is that—”

Breen interrupted him. “I know what he means. No matter how beneficial my projects are to a community, Mr. Monk, there is
always
opposition. Environmental groups, historical societies, homeowners associations, and an occasional recalcitrant individual. Most of my day is spent working on compromises that unify people and invigorate neighborhoods.”

“You didn’t reach one with Esther,” Monk said.

“We offered her a premium for her property, as well as a lifetime lease on the condominium of her choice in the project,” Breen said. “You can’t get more amenable than that. She refused to even negotiate. But in the end, her opposition became irrelevant.”

“Because she’s dead,” Monk said.

“Because we were planning to move ahead without her.”

“How could you?” I asked. “Her house was right in the middle of the block.”

“I didn’t get this far in the real-estate business, Ms. Teeger, without being creative.” Breen went to his desk and unfurled an architect’s rendering of a building that was very similar to the model. “We were going to build around her.”