The 9th Judgment

She drained half her glass before answering. "My victim isn't just scum, he's dead scum, and Jo-Jo is cute and stupid. The women jurists looked at him, Linds, like they wanted to breast-feed him."

I'd stopped by the courtroom to watch Yuki's closing argument, and I had to agree. Dr. Lincoln Harris was dead slime, and while Jo-Jo Johnson was hardly better-he was alive. And he looked like a man without a clue.

"Asher could actually win," Yuki wailed. "I quit private practice for this? Help me, Linds. Should I find a good-paying job in a corporate law firm?"

My phone vibrated on my hip again. I looked down at the caller ID. Jacobi. My ex-partner and current boss, whose gut reaction to everything is to call me. Old habits die hard. I keyed the button and said, "Boxer," into the mouthpiece.

"There's been a double homicide, Lindsay. It's got 'psycho' written all over it."

"Did you call Paul Chi? He's back from vacation. I'll bet he's home right now."

"I want you on this," Jacobi growled.

After more than ten years of working together, we were almost able to read each other's mind. Jacobi sounded freaked out, like someone had walked over his grave.

"What's this about, Warren?" I asked him, already knowing my best-laid plans for the evening were shot.

"One of the vics is a young kid," Jacobi said.

He gave me the address-the parking garage near the galleria. "Conklin just left. He'll be there in a couple of minutes."

"I'm on my way," I told him.

Chapter 8

I CLOSED MY phone and promised Yuki a longer, better talk about her career after the jury came back. I said, "Your closing was outstanding, girlfriend. Don't quit." I kissed her cheek and fled the bar.

I drove my Explorer toward Market and got gridlocked. I put the Kojak light on my roof and hit the siren. Vehicles parted reluctantly, and I finally reached the entrance to the garage near the Stonestown Galleria.

The mouth of the garage was cordoned off and blocked by a grumbling crowd of car owners. I held up my shield, ducked under the tape, and signed the log. Officer Joe Sorbero looked gray, as if he'd never seen death before.

"You're the first officer on the scene?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"You okay, Joe?"

"I've been better, Sergeant," he said, smiling weakly. "I've got kids, you know." He pointed out a blue RAV4 parked toward the far end of the row. "Your next nightmare is right over there."

I followed Sorbero's finger and saw Inspector Rich Conklin standing between a couple of vehicles at the end of the aisle, peering into the driver's-side window of the RAV4.

When Jacobi moved up to lieutenant, Conklin became my partner. He's smart and disturbingly handsome, and he's got the makings of a first-class detective. It wouldn't shock anyone if he made captain one day, but right now he reports to me.

He came toward me before I could reach the scene.

"Brace yourself, Linds."

"Fill me in."

"White female, about thirty, name of Barbara Ann Benton. The other victim is an infant. Might be a year old. Both were shot point-blank. The ME and CSU are on the way."

"Who called it in?"

"A lady who was parked in the spot next to the RAV4. I interviewed her and sent her home. She didn't see anything. So far, no one did. Unis are going through the trash cans, and we've collected the surveillance tape."

"Are you thinking the baby was collateral damage?"

"No way," Conklin said. "He was capped on purpose."

I approached the SUV and sucked in my breath as I looked inside. Barbara Ann Benton was slumped awkwardly in the front seat, half facing the rear as if she'd tried to climb over the divide.

I saw two obvious gunshot wounds: one to the neck and another to the side of her chest. Then I forced myself to look past the mom to the child in his car seat.

The baby boy had a glaze of pink candy on his lips and on the fingers of his right hand. The rear window was spattered with blood. The child had been shot through the temple at close range.

Conklin was right.

The baby's death was no accident. In fact, the shot was so precise, the kid could have been the prime target.

I hoped that the little boy hadn't realized what was happening.

I hoped he hadn't had time to be afraid.

Chapter 9

"WHAT DO YOU make of this, Linds?"

Conklin called to my attention the vivid red letters printed on the windshield. I stared, riveted by the sight. This is what Jacobi had been talking about when he'd said that the crime scene had "'psycho' written all over it."

He hadn't said it was written in lipstick.

The letters "WCF" meant nothing to me, except the fact that only wacko killers deliberately leave a signature. It reminded me of cases I'd caught where the killer had signed his crimes. And it brought back the bad old days when the Backstreet Killer had terrified San Francisco in the '90s, a murderer who took eight innocent lives, left signatures and notes for the police, and was never caught. A chill went down the back of my neck.

"Those shopping bags in the rear," I said to Conklin. "Were they looted?" I was hoping.