Tender Is The Night(21)

     



 

"I'm sorry," she whispered, seeing the guilty agony in every tight line  of his face. "That's why you blame yourself. It wasn't just the case; it  was the personal stuff, too."

"I let Sam down. I didn't have her back. I was distracted. It was the  first time I ever let my personal life get in the way of a case. And I  wasn't the one who paid the price; that was Sam. She was probably my  closest friend." He cleared his throat. "Are you satisfied?"

She didn't like the question, because it made her feel like she'd pushed too hard, but maybe she'd needed to do that.

Devin could have lied. He could have avoided her questions, but he  hadn't. Was there a chance he'd needed to make the admission to someone  else besides himself?

"I'm glad you told me," she said. "It helps me to understand."

"I don't need your understanding; I need you to help me find a killer.  And whether I was involved with Sam's sister has nothing to do with  that."

"You're right. Your relationship with Val has nothing to do with the  case now. But I also wonder if it has as much to do with what happened  to Sam as you think it did. Were you on the verge of some groundbreaking  moment when you went to meet Val?"

He frowned. "No."

"So you didn't leave Sam in the lurch. You didn't know something big was coming?"

"Don't try to make me feel better."

"I'm just getting to the truth. What were you doing that day besides meeting Val?"

He drew in a breath as if he wasn't sure he wanted to keep talking, but  in the end he said, "I went to meet with the fire investigator. We were  going over the evidence again-or lack of evidence. Sam was focusing on  the persons of interest. We were supposed to meet up that night to  compare notes."

"So you were working independently that day."

He shrugged. "I guess. It doesn't matter."

She thought it mattered a lot more than he was saying but decided she'd  pushed enough on that part of the conversation. "Tell me more about Sam.  Not who she was as an agent, but as a person."

"Why? Who Sam was is not important to what we're doing now. We should be focusing on potential fire targets."

"We'll get there. But you're eating, and so am I." She grabbed the salad  and a plastic fork to make her statement true. "Tell me about Sam's  family if talking about her is too difficult."

He sighed. "Fine. Sam was the center of her family. She was very smart,  excelled at everything. Her mother adored her. Her father respected her.  Val was always in her shadow. Sam didn't put her there, but Val  couldn't escape it. Val was always rebelling. Whatever Sam did, Val  would do the opposite. That's why she often found herself in trouble."

"What did Sam's parents do?"

"Her mother was a stay-at-home mom. She volunteered at school and city  fundraisers. Now she doesn't do much of anything. Her dad is a salesman  for a software company. He's gregarious and bigger than life. Sam was a  mix of her quiet mom and her outgoing dad. She was friendly but  introverted. She liked analysis more than she liked people. She  preferred to profile than to interview or take action. That's why we  were a good team."

"Did Sam enjoy being near her family for this assignment?"

"She did. We had several dinners over there in the weeks before she  died." He paused. "When I had to call her mom and tell her what had  happened." He shook his head. "Worst call of my life."

She couldn't even imagine. She impulsively reached across the table and  put her hand over his. "You went through hell. I'm so sorry, Devin."

He squeezed her fingers. "Thanks." He drew in a breath and let it out.  "The hell got worse when the Bureau closed the case, and I was  reassigned. I spent three days on that new assignment and then said to  hell with it. I quit that day, and I've been here ever since-working and  waiting. Now, the wait is almost over."

She nodded. "We're going to find the bastard who killed Sam. I believe that."

"I believe it, too," he said, surprising her with the admission.

"So you can be optimistic," she said, trying for a lighter tone.

The tension eased from his face. "On that one point, I've never lost the  faith. It's been shaken badly at times, but it's never disappeared." He  let go of her hand. "After you finish eating, we'll take a look at  targets."

"And suspects. We need to review the list again. Knowing now that Rick  went to St. Bernadette's and had at least a few acquaintances there,  maybe we can connect some new dots. But before we do all that, Devin … "

"What?" he asked warily.

"We should go see Sam's mom."         

     



 

"We?" he asked with an arch of his eyebrow. "I don't think that's a we job."

"Do you really want to go alone? Sit with Val and her depressed mom all by yourself?"

"Okay, you have a point. But let's push that back awhile and do some work first."



* * *



After lunch, Devin opened his computer and pulled up the file on people he had listed as persons of interest.

"Do you want me to go down the list?" he asked.

Kate nodded, her computer open in front of her. "I'll follow along."

"Let's start with Ron Dillingsworth. Thirty-four years old, thinning  brown hair and brown eyes. He has authored a series of books about  firefighters. He was photographed at three of the fire scenes, but he  claims that he goes to the scenes for research for his books."

"He published the first book five years ago, two months after the first  school fire in your pattern of fires," Kate finished. She looked up at  him. "You sat in on his interview after the fire. What was your personal  take on him?"

"I couldn't catch him in a lie, but he didn't seem to be telling the  entire truth. He had alibis for several of the fires, although no real  alibi for the fire that killed Sam. He alleged that he was at home  alone. A neighbor verified that she'd seen him enter his apartment that  evening, but whether or not he left after that sighting was unknown."

"Sometimes when people are lying, they're not lying about the actual case," she said. "Maybe he had other secrets."

"Like what?"

"Perhaps he doesn't write the books himself? He could have a ghostwriter  and not want anyone to know. Or maybe he was cheating on his  girlfriend, and one of his alibis had to do with that. It says he was  dating a model at the time of the fire but they've since broken up."

"It's possible."

"We could talk to him again. It's been a year and a half. Maybe I could get a different read on him."

"After his interview, his lawyer started intercepting all of his calls.  Dillingsworth has also gotten to be very popular in the last year. His  most recent book hit high on the New York Times Bestseller List. He has  become an author celebrity."

"He has to have a life. There must be some way we can catch him off  guard. Let's think about that. Go on to the next one," she said.

"Bennett Rogers. He's a forty-six-year-old real-estate developer. He  owned two of the historic properties that were torched and both had  insurance policies that paid off. He's since built new homes on those  sites." He paused. "He doesn't work for the rest of the fires, though."

"And he's a lot older than Baines, so he wouldn't have been connected to  him through high school. I'm going to pull up the background on each of  these people while we're talking. It goes into more detail than your  general notes." She paused for a moment. "Okay, Dillingsworth grew up in  San Francisco, and he attended Catholic school through the sixth grade.  He went to St. Mary's." She looked at Devin. "There weren't any fires  at St. Mary's, were there?"

"The second one," Devin said. "But he had an airtight alibi for that  fire. He's at the bottom of my list." He moved on to the next name.  "Eileen Raffin is an interior designer and a member of the San Francisco  Historic Preservation Commission. She approved the certification for  three of the structures that burned down. She works at the architectural  firm of Connors and Holt."

"Mrs. Raffin seemed forthcoming in her interview. She's a  fifty-seven-year-old woman with a good job and long ties to the  community. What bothered you about her?" Kate asked.

"It wasn't Eileen that bothered me as much as her friend and the owner of the firm she works for-Gerilyn Connors."

Kate glanced back at her computer. "Gerilyn is a forty-two-year-old  architect. She drew up the plans for the remodel additions on two of the  houses that were targeted."

"And one of those houses was the one that Sam was killed in," he said.

Kate met his gaze. "Four of the five historic structure fires are  connected to Gerilyn and Eileen in some way. That's a lot. But your real  interest isn't even Gerilyn; it's Gerilyn's ex-husband."