“Retribution?” Kelly asked.
“Who knows? I mean, do we know anything about the family of this man that was killing people in San Francisco? Sure we heard about how many he’d murdered, the gruesome nature of the murders and the link to the Zodiac case but what about his kin? Maybe one of them wanted retribution for his death?”
Kelly leaned back and turned her cup ever so slowly in her hand.
“Look, we’re probably only going to be here until tomorrow and we’ll be heading back to the city. If I leave my card with you and anything comes up will you keep me informed? You can email or phone.”
“Sure,” he said.
She unzipped her purse and fished around before handing him one. Adam got up and before he left he turned back. “Word of advice, Ms. Armstrong. I’m not sure how long you’ve been a reporter or what you plan to do with this story but something I learned very early in my career was not to get too attached to the story. Write it as you see it and move on. It’s not worth heading down a rabbit hole in pursuit of the unknown. It only leads to complications. I’ve seen good friends of mine get obsessed and take their work home and the next thing you know they are booking themselves into an A.A. meeting.”
“I don’t drink much.”
“Neither did they.”
“Well, I’ll take that into consideration,” she said. “Thank you.”
He smiled and headed out but not before thanking the staff and stopping at a table close to the door to speak with a girl. They laughed and he waved to her before heading out into the busy day.
Kelly remained there chewing over what he’d said. All the while she noticed the woman behind the counter was staring. The same one Adam had pointed to — Cathy. Kelly got up and went to the far end of the counter and waited until she wasn’t serving anyone before she asked for a moment of her time.
“Sorry to interrupt your day. My name’s Kelly Armstrong. Adam said you knew Dana Grant. Is that right?”
Cathy looked out the window and then back at her again. She nodded.
“Look,” she fished into her bag for another card so she could show her the emblem for the San Francisco Chronicle and her title there. “We used to work together. Do you mind if I ask you some questions?”
Cathy grimaced. “I’m short on staff today.”
“It won’t take a minute. We’re trying to find her.”
She nodded and let the other girl know before she came over to Kelly’s table.
“How well did you know her?”
“We talked on a daily basis. She used to come in and sit over there and work.”
“Work? On what?”
“She never really divulged. She said it was something to do with travel. She’d go off for several days at time but she’d always come back here and be hammering away. I assumed she was writing articles about different cities or restaurants. I even thought she was a critic at first. That’s actually how we struck up a conversation. I thought she was scoping out my café.” Cathy smiled.
Kelly nodded. “Did she say what company she worked for?”
“She was a freelance writer. I gathered it was for a blog or a magazine, or she was writing a book.”
“And did she ever mention Jack?”
“All the time. He’s a good man, Ms. Armstrong. He’s helped a lot of folks around this town.”
“Yeah, I heard. A real philanthropist.”
“I wouldn’t call him that. He didn’t give away money.”
“But he had money,” she shot back.
“A lot of people in this town have money, Ms. Armstrong. Where people choose to live, what kind of houses they buy, what type of cars they drive is their business. As long as they are kind and well mannered that’s all that matters to me. And I can tell you from experience that both of them were good people.”
“Were?”
“Are… good people,” Cathy corrected herself.
Kelly nodded and looked across the room.
“So on the day of the fire did she say anything to you?”
“I didn’t see her that day or the days after. The last time we spoke she was working on a project, and she told me that Jack was away. That’s it.”
Kelly nodded. “So he must have swung by and spoke to you when he returned?”
She shook her head.
“Really? Strange, if my partner went missing, I would approach those who were closest to him. I’d want to know when he was last seen, what he had to say, and so on. Now I know he visited the police department but you’re saying he didn’t drop by and speak to you?”
“Nope.”
Kelly didn’t have a gift for telling if someone was lying but she was convinced Cathy wasn’t telling her the whole truth. She was quick to change the topic.
“So do you have any leads so far?” Cathy asked.
“Unfortunately no. We’re as much in the dark as you are. Did Dana ever talk to you about Jack? You know, where she met him, how long she knew him, that kind of stuff?”
“I did ask but all she said was that she met him a long while ago back when she was living in Maine. That was all.”
“Maine?”
“Rockland Cove, Maine. She used to run a motel there.”
“You wouldn’t have the name of it?”
Cathy frowned. “Unfortunately, no.”
Kelly had her phone recording the conversation and she made a mental note to look into that. “Is there anything you can remember that might be useful?”
Cathy shook
