Seeing Gia and feeling all the feels for her had done it.
It hadn’t helped that Nicoletta had kept refilling his glass.
Come to think of it, that was pretty strange. She usually encouraged him to stop at two drinks, but last night, she just kept refilling his glass. He wondered if it was because she sensed how he was feeling about Gia.
He wondered if it was some sort of revenge. But that didn’t make sense. How could her revenge be getting him drunk? Unless she was secretly angry at him and wanted him to pass out so she could leave without making love to him or staying the night.
Nah. She didn’t have a conniving bone in her body. He was imagining things. She was just being her usual nurturing self. She probably saw he was hurting and confused and was giving him what he actually really wanted—more booze.
He shook out two more aspirin and downed them without water before he turned back to the stack of reports on his desk. He sighed.
Moving up in the cop world meant more paperwork and less time on the street. If he’d only known.
His phone rang, and he scooped it up.
“Lieutenant?”
“Speaking.”
“This is Sergeant Ernst. You told me to call you if there were any crimes I thought you might be interested in?”
He closed his eyes thinking Spit it out, son.
“Yes?”
“In particular, anything that might be related to the protests at the opera house…?”
“Go on,” he said impatiently. Did someone else throw something on one of the actors? He would have heard about it from Nicoletta.
“We just found a DOA, and it looks like it might be Carl Rosenbloom.”
“Jesus,” James said. “What time was the call?”
“O five hundred.”
He glanced at his watch. Less than twenty minutes ago. Good.
“Text me the location I’m on my way.”
In his unmarked sedan, James raced through the streets of San Francisco. This was bad.
This marked the second murder of someone on the gala fundraising board in two days. It was not a coincidence. He would need to warn the board members. He would also need to warn Gia.
Just thinking her name made him feel on edge.
Why did she have such a powerful effect on him? They were terrible for one another.
They’d tried and tried again.
It would never work.
And yet, she was suddenly all he could think about.
God damn it.
Why did she have to come back into town? Why couldn’t she leave him alone and stay far away in a distant country where he didn’t have to see her and smell her and feel her cheek brush against his?
The address took him to a residential neighborhood.
A two-block area was marked off with yellow crime scene tape. Neighbors lined the tape, curious.
As he pulled up to the scene, the rookie cop recognized him and lifted the tape allowing his vehicle to glide underneath. A few squads were parked in a semi-circle to hide the body from onlookers.
He parked and was greeted by his homicide lieutenant.
“Identification confirms its Carl Rosenbloom.”
James nodded. He bit his tongue but inside he was thinking, Motherfucker.
He called the chief.
“Commander?”
“We’re dealing with a serial killer, sir,” he said. “This is the second member of the opera fundraising board to be found dead in as many days.”
“Jesus. Are you at the scene?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Call me when you’re done. We’ll meet this afternoon and form a task force. We need to get ahead of this before the media gets wind.”
James glanced at the people behind the crime scene tape. No TV crews, but he recognized a young man, slouched to one side, wearing expensive sneakers, a hoodie, and Elvis Costello glasses. It was that scrappy, new newspaper reporter for the Daily. The kid had recently graduated from Berkeley and was working the crime beat. One of the first things he did was stalk James with calls and emails until James had let him come into the precincts and introduce himself. Daniel Quan. James admired the kid’s ambition, but that didn’t mean the little punk wasn’t going to be a royal pain in the ass. Especially on a case like this.
“That might be a problem,” James said into his phone, keeping an eye on Quan who had begun talking to a woman with red-rimmed eyes. “I’m off to do damage control right now.”
But by the time James sent an officer over to the woman, Quan closed his notebook with a smug thump. Fuck. He’d gotten her.
The woman was Rosenbloom’s daughter. Soon they had her in the back of a squad, away from prying eyes and pesky reporters, but James saw by the way Quan took off on his little scooter, that the kid had figured out who the victim was and the significance.
Damn it to hell.
By the time James made it back to the station, news had spread: Someone was killing members of the opera fundraising gala board.
When James rolled into his office, his secretary, Josh, rolled his eyes.
“Did you see the news crews out front?”
“I’m sure the orbiting satellites saw them too.”
“You’ve got exactly three billion messages from reporters, including the New York Times reporters and Associated Press.
James shook his head. It was already a national story. This was going to be a major problem.
But then the day got even worse.
When he rolled into the conference room, the chief was sitting there with the district attorney, Mark Nolan.
“A witness just came forward. We have a suspect.”
“Fantastic,” he said and pulled up a chair. “Who’s our guy?”
“It’s not a guy. It’s a woman,” the DA said. “Her name is Gia Santella.”
Fifteen
There was something about Gia Santella that was irresistible, Charles thought.
And he was disturbed by it.
Sitting in his favorite armchair smoking a cigar while a silky-wigged head bobbed between his legs, he tried to analyze what it was. The fading sunset over the bay lit up the room in a reddish-gold color.
Thinking of her had
