The Dirty Secrets Club (15 page)

Tang looked aghast. "It's on the eleventh floor. I don't care if it's good for my heart, I'm not climbing a skyscraper."

Jo's own heart pumped harder, and she glanced at the elevator. "You trust that box after a tremor?"

"An elevator has never plunged to the ground after an earthquake in San Francisco. You're paranoid."

There'd never been a bridge collapse in San Francisco, either, until there had been. There'd never been a freeway collapse because of an earthquake, until it happened.

The doors
pinged
open. Tang walked in and held the door. "Fon-secca has to be in court in half an hour. The timer's running. Come on."

Jo swallowed and stepped inside. Tang pushed the button and the doors began to close. Jo leaned against the back wall; watched the doors slide shut. They reminded her of two blades closing on each other. With her back pressed against the wall, she felt, ludicrously, that if the elevator began to shrink like a trash compacter, she could brace herself and shove her feet against the doors to stop it from crushing her.

Tang looked indifferent. "Tell me how you got your expertise with sexual fantasy."

The car rose. Jo heard a buzz in her ears. "You mean my experience analyzing equivocal deaths that involve sexual games gone fatally wrong."

"Same diff. That was ..."

"Jeffrey Nagel, found hanged in his bedroom, partially nude."

"Accident?"

The elevator bounced to a stop on the fifth floor. She gritted her teeth.

Tang regarded her analytically. "You really hate this."

"I'd rather stab myself in the eye with a fork." She forced a smile. "Luckily, all I have in my purse is a spork."

With a smooth burst of energy, the elevator rose again. Her jaw was clenched and she couldn't get it to relax.

Tang smiled. "A claustrophobic shrink? That seems—"

"Ironic. I know." She watched the numbers. "Bad quake experience."

Tang turned thoughtful. "Loma Prieta?"

She nodded. Her palms were sweaty. She was going to need to shake hands with people in a minute. She wiped them on her slacks.

"No fun," Tang said.

Jo shook her head.

The air, as ever when she was in a tight space, felt electrically charged. Her skin tingled. She wanted to gulp air. She fought the temptation. Rush her breathing, try to bring in all the air she needed
right now,
to breathe while she still had the chance, before the walls and concrete and roadway collapsed, the metal creaked and pressed against her face and chest—

She exhaled. Grab for air and she'd hyperventilate. She watched the numbers. Come on, come
on.
Her face felt red-hot. She knew how she must look to Tang: stupid. A mental health expert, reduced to dread, unable to handle a simple elevator ride because of an irrational fear.

She knew the terms. Anxiety disorder. Panic trigger. She didn't care. Hurry up, stupid box. Tang was watching her.

The numbers went up. Nine. Ten. "How much have the police told the U.S. Attorney's Office about Harding's death and the scene last night?"

"They know what's been on the news. Nothing else—not about
dirty
and certainly not this
pray
stuff. Let's keep it that way."

"I want to ask him if he's heard of a Dirty Secrets Club."

"That's fine."

The elevator stopped, the doors opened, and Jo strode out into a bright hallway. Thank you, God. She resisted the urge to drop to her knees and kiss the floor.

Tang caught up. "How old were you when the quake hit?"

"A kid. More or less."

"You were in the city?"

She shook her head. Most of the people who died in the Loma Prieta quake had been killed in San Francisco's Marina District. But that's not where she had been.

"You weren't on the Bay Bridge, were you?"

"East Bay."

Tang glanced at her sharply. They walked up to the desk and showed their IDs to the receptionist. The heavy seal of the Department of Justice was on the wall behind her. She picked up the phone.

Jo reached into her satchel for her notebook and pen. She couldn't find them.

Ugh. She had left them on the table at the taqueria after the earthquake.

The Loma Prieta quake, centered under Santa Cruz eighty miles to the southwest, had played a dirty trick on the Bay Area. When the fault cracked, incredible seismic energy had bounded down through the ground and hit a lower stratum of rock. Santa Cruz shook, but most of the energy rebounded, like a basketball, and surfaced in San Francisco. It happened on a beautiful October evening, at the end of rush hour, when Candlestick Park was packed with people attending the World Series. It was her aunt's birthday. She was with her dad; Tina; and her brother, Rafe, on the way to the party in Oakland.

Tang said, "Don't tell me you were on the Cypress Viaduct."

Briefly she smelled gasoline and burning tires. She offered a bitter smile. "I seem to be a cat with eighteen lives."

Tang arched an eyebrow. "Who'd you take the extra nine from?"

Leo Fonsecca walked into the lobby, shaking his head. "I hope you're here to tell me who killed my prosecutor. Because if you can't, both of you deserve to be out of a job."

Fonsecca's office had a cramped view of the office buildings surrounding City Hall and the Federal Courthouse. He stood in front of his desk, hands clasped like a funeral director. His thinning gray hair topped a face that was sad and flushed.

On the sofa Jo and Tang sat like schoolkids called to the principal's office.

"Callie wasn't suicidal," Fonsecca said.

"What was her mood in the past few weeks?" Jo said.

"Working hard, as usual." He looked soft, but his movements seemed quick and exaggerated. His rimless glasses shone under the lights.

Fonsecca was the chief federal prosecutor for the Northern District of California, a jurisdiction that comprises eight million people. Jo knew that he was a career prosecutor, a courtroom battler rather than a political appointee. Though he looked like a mournful hamster, he was a powerful figure, respected and intense.

"Callie could not have killed herself. Period. I've known her for ten years. She didn't let courtroom losses get to her. She hated to lose, but knew we can't get every bad guy who's out there. She was not obsessed."

"Can you tell me what she was working on?" Jo said.

His head popped around. He stared at her. "No."

"In general terms?"

"Absolutely not. I will not reveal details of her active cases. And I don't want you worming information out of anybody in this office."

"I'm not your adversary, Mr. Fonsecca," she said.

His shoulders slumped. He took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I'm sorry. She was aces. I consider it a privilege to have called her my friend."

"I'm sorry."

He put his glasses back on and attempted a weary smile. She gave him a few seconds to regain his composure.

"Have you heard of something called the Dirty Secrets Club?" she said.

He looked puzzled. "What's that?"

"I'm trying to find out."

He shook his head. "How does it connect to Callie?"

"I was hoping you could tell me."

"No. It sounds very odd. Where have you come up with this idea?"

Tang said, "The phrase has come up in the course of our investigation."

"It sounds like ... a nightclub. Not Callie's type of thing at all." Fonsecca shrugged. His face was bemused and slightly red.

"Was she investigating the deaths of Maki Prichingo and David Yoshida?" Jo said.

"No."

He fired the answer at her like a bullet. She didn't exactly disbelieve him, but it was a shot across her bow, and she decided not to ask again.

"Can you tell us what Callie might have been doing with Angelika Meyer last night?" she said.

"Angelika was working with Callie on a couple of matters. Doing basic research, that sort of thing. She's a bright young woman. We've been happy to have her here this semester."

"Had she and Callie become friends?"

"I couldn't say." Wearily he ran a hand over his lank hair.

"Would you consider Callie a mentor to her?" Jo said.

"Yes. Angelika has a keen interest in criminal justice. Wants to become a prosecutor when she graduates from law school." He thought for a moment. "What else can I tell you? She did an undergraduate criminology internship at San Quentin—so she's not a wilting flower. She'd make a good street fighter."

Jo nodded, but knew from her own forensic psychiatry rotation that working in the California prison system didn't prove your toughness. What the work did was remove scales from your eyes, and test your nerve.

Fonsecca's face looked drawn. "Do you have the latest on her condition?"

Tang said, "No change."

He pressed his lips tight. "She's tough. She'll pull through."

Jo and Tang didn't respond.

After a moment, Tang said, "Do you know of any threats against Callie? Maybe from somebody she put away?"

"We're investigating that. But so far, no."

Jo waited a moment. "Do you know why Geli was in Callie's car last night?"

"Maybe she was getting a ride home."

"Did they have a personal relationship?"

His gaze was wandering, but now zeroed on her. "Are you implying that they had a lesbian attraction to each other?"

"Asking."

In San Francisco, the question could hardly be considered controversial or insulting. Nonetheless, Fonsecca's face was red again.

"Absolutely not." He adjusted his glasses. "Callie was divorced, and had dated since then. Dated
men.
Angelika—I ..." He waved his hands vaguely. He didn't know. "This is groundless speculation."

With a knock, a secretary opened the door. "Time to head to court."

"I'll be right out."

Concern tightened her face. "Sir, are you all right?"

"Fine, yes."

She opened her mouth to say something else, but he raised a hand to forestall it. Reluctantly she departed.

"Mother hen," he said. "Fusses over me. Thinks I need to watch my blood pressure."

Judging from the flush that came over Fonsecca whenever he faced a stressful question, Jo thought his secretary might be right.

She said, "One last question. Why would Callie run from the police?"

This time his face didn't redden. He looked calm.

"There can only be one reason. She couldn't stop. Because if she stopped, something catastrophic would happen."

His gaze panned from Jo to Tang and back. "She was trying to keep something terrible from happening. Find out what that is, and you'll find out why she died."

Perry waited until he was alone. People passed by in the hallway. He gave them a smile. They didn't return it. Fuck you, too.

He knew how to present a charming facade to the world. That's what the shrinks had said. He'd read his medical chart, stolen it one day from the desk, back when they were badgering him to
cope
and
adapt
and be happy speaking like a robot with the electro-larynx, the freak machine.

He turned on the cell phone, set to Silent. No calls. Goddammit. He hated to wait. He wanted an update from Skunk. He had been waiting too damn long, and Callie was already getting cold. He needed to finish this.

He longed to do it himself. He bit the inside of his cheek. His desires, he was learning, didn't get met instantaneously these days. And that made him feel like strangling the next person who told him
no.

He wanted the names. He wanted to see them crossed off in dark black ink, one after another. Finally the phone lit up.
1 new message.

The surgeons and occupational therapists and psychobabble Nazis had tried to twist him into accepting his new status as a circus freak. He had smiled and got them to believe he understood.
Shallow affect,
that's another term his medical chart had used to describe him. It meant he only pretended to feel friendly, that he faked emotion. No kidding. What was the point of feeling friendly?
Seeming
friendly, now that got you something. What else mattered?

On the other hand,
perceptual and emotional recognition deficits,
that was a helpful comment. It explained things to him. He apparently didn't recognize emotions on people's faces. Love,'disgust, shame, they went right past him. That explained why he was such a lousy poker player. He couldn't read people's faces and tell what they were hiding.

The rage was spinning up again, a black mouth with sharp teeth, screaming in front of him.

He couldn't read people sometimes. That's why he hadn't seen it coming.