“We got sandwiches and cookies. Also coffee,” said Yuki.
Cindy said, “Linds, just so you know. Anything anyone says here is off the record. Even if you know who really shot Kennedy. Even if you know the location of the Holy Grail.”
Lindsay laughed and Yuki got the baby out of her crib and handed her to her mom.
“Lindsay, sit your ass down,” said Claire. “Let the feast begin.”
When the four best friends had gathered around the finger food on the coffee table, Claire announced, “Now that we’re all settled in, Lindsay, let’s have it. When was the last time you saw Joe?”
CHAPTER 38
IF CLAIRE HAD called first, I would have said, “Thanks, but no way. I’m going to sleep in, all day long.”
But she didn’t ask, and without warning or my permission, my well-earned deep funk was shattered by Yuki’s infectious laughter, Claire’s bossy mothering, and Cindy’s genuine joie de vivre.
Plus food.
Julie loved a crowd and was super-glad of the company. I put her in her bouncy chair about five feet from the action and Martha curled up at my feet, so it was all girls and all good. Correction, it was great.
Claire said, “Time to work, Linds. When did you last see Joe? When did you last hear from him?”
“And what do you think is going on?” Cindy added. “No matter how bad this is, you know we’re not going to judge.”
“We just want to clear up the mystery,” said Yuki. “We need to know what we’re dealing with, am I right?”
Yuki, her legal mind at work, asked for a calendar of events. So I started from the beginning and proceeded in chronological order.
I started with the remarkable fact that Joe hadn’t come home Monday night but had been snoring beside me on Tuesday morning. I told them he’d been perfectly fine—in fact, romantic. He’d made breakfast for me and Julie Anne, and I’d left him home with her as I ran out to work.
I said, “Monday was the day of the shootings at the Four Seasons. Rich and I were consumed with it. We got an ID on Michael Chan the next day and went out to see his widow.”
My friends were nodding, saying “Uh-huh, uh-huh” and encouraging me to keep talking.
I said, “I spoke to Joe on Tuesday while Rich and I were driving Shirley Chan back to the Hall. Late that night, I reviewed the surveillance video from our van we had sitting on the Chan house from across the street. He was on that tape.
“Wait, I’ll show you.”
I woke up my laptop, and as the girls stood around me, I showed them the clip of Joe stopping his car on Waverley and staring directly into the SFPD’s dedicated spy cam. And I told them about Richie picking out a guy in the hotel’s lobby footage who looked like Joe.
“Joe’s face on that tape—that’s the last I’ve seen of him.”
A lot of questions came at me from my clever, mystery-solving friends, but they were questions I couldn’t answer.
“Here’s what I think,” said Cindy. “He’s involved in this, Lindsay. I don’t mean in a bad way, but his drive-by in Palo Alto can’t be a coincidence.”
“I don’t know, Cindy,” I said. “I agree it means something, but we may not know all the angles.”
“Meaning?”
“He’s a consultant. He knows everything about port security. He could be working some kind of hush-hush job. He might be prohibited from contacting me. Maybe phones are being hacked.”
“Did you call the people he works for?”
“I would if I knew who they were.”
Cindy was undeterred.
“So keep going with your ticktock,” she said.
“OK, OK.”
I told the girls about the mysterious blond woman who’d been seen entering Chan’s room at the Four Seasons. Cindy jumped in, saying, “I posted her picture on our site and got a tip.”
“The next day,” I said, throwing my hands into the air, “before we could follow up—”
Claire finished my sentence: “The crash of WW 888.”
I said, “That night when I got home, Mrs. Rose said I had just missed Joe. He’d been home to change his clothes. He left me a message saying he’d been pulled into the plane crash nightmare, and, like, don’t wait up.”
“So he’s definitely alive,” said Yuki. “He’s not hurt. He’s working.”
“That’s what he said.”
I believed what I was saying, but damn it, it was weird that Joe couldn’t get in touch at all. Actually, it was inexplicable. When our lunch was over and the last of my friends were gone, I bathed Julie, gave her some applesauce, and called Joe.
“I’m sorry,” said the mechanical voice, “but the subscriber’s mailbox is full. Good-bye.”
Honestly? This was killing me.
CHAPTER 39
I SPENT THE rest of the day doing laundry, and by dinnertime I was hungry and bored. I took Julie across the hall to Mrs. Rose, saying, “I’ll be right back,” and headed out to our local Asian grocery store.