First to Die

Chapter 76

and stared at it. "It is me," he declared. "But the lady, though quite beautiful, I don't recognize. If I can ask, where's this picture from?" "The San Francisco opening of Crossed Wire." "Ah," he sighed, as if that classified something for him. I watched the gears in his brain start to shift for the right response. He was definitely smart, and a pretty good actor. "I meet a lot of people at these events. It's why I try to avoid them. You say this was that girl who was killed in Cleveland?" "We were hoping this was someone you might've remembered," I replied. Jenks shook his head. "Too many fans, not much appetite to meet them, even the really pretty ones, Inspector." "The price of fame, I imagine…" I took the photo back, thumbed it for a moment, then slid it back in front of him. "Nevertheless, I have to come back to this particular fan. I'm curious why she doesn't stick out for you. From all those other fans." I withdrew a copy of a Northwest Bell phone bill from my folder and handed it to him. On it were several highlighted calls. "This is your private number?" Jenks held the copy of the bill. His eyes dimmed. "It is." "She called you, Mr. Jenks. Three times in just the past few weeks. Once… here, I circled it for you, for twelve minutes only last week. Three days before she was married, then killed." Jenks blinked. Then he picked up the photo again. This time he was different: somber, apologetic. "Truth is, Inspector," he took a breath and said, "I was so, so sorry to hear what had taken place. She seemed, in the last month, so full of anticipation, hope. I was wrong to mislead you. It was foolish. I did know Kathy. I met her the night of the photo there. Sometimes, my fans are rather impressionable. And attractive. At times I, to my detriment, can be an impressionable man." I wanted to lunge across the table and rip Nicholas Jenks's impressionable face off. I was certain he was responsible for six vicious murders. Now he was mocking us, and the victims. Goddamn him. "So you're admitting," Raleigh interjected, "that you did have a relationship with this woman." "Not in the way you're insinuating," Jenks replied. "Kathy was a woman who hoped to satisfy her own vague artistic aspirations through an association with someone engaged in the act of creating. She wanted to write herself. It's not exactly brain surgery, but I guess if it was so damn easy we'd all have a book on the bestseller list, right?" Neither of us responded. "We spoke, maybe met, a few times over a few years. It never went beyond that. That's the truth." "Sort of mentoring?" Raleigh suggested. "Yes, that's right. Good choice of words." "By any chance" -- I leaned forward, no longer able to control my tone" were you mentoring Kathy in Cleveland last Saturday, the night she was killed?" Jenks's face turned granite like "That's ridiculous. What an inappropriate thing to say." I reached into the folder one more time, this time taking out a copy of the security photo of the killer arriving at the Hall of Fame. "This is a security photo from the night she was killed. Is that you, Mr. Jenks?" Jenks didn't even blink. "It might be, Inspector, if I had been there. Which I categorically was not." "Where were you last Saturday night?" "Just so I understand," he said, stonily, "are you suggesting I'm a suspect in these crimes?" "Kathy Kogut talked, Mr. Jenks." I glared at him. "To her sister. To her friends. We know how you treated her. We know she left the Bay Area to try to get away from your domination. We know things were going on between you right up to the wedding night." I wouldn't take my eyes off Jenks. There was nothing in the room but him and me. "I wasn't in Cleveland," he said. "I was right here that night." I ran the whole body of evidence by him. From the bottle of Clos du Mesnil left behind at the Hyatt, to his involvement in the real-estate trust that owned Sparrow Ridge Vineyards, to the fact that two of the murders had been committed with nine-millimeter guns and according to the state, he owned one. He laughed at me. "This is not what you're basing your assumptions on, I hope. "I got that champagne ages ago." He shrugged. "I don't even recall where it is." "You can locate it, I assume?" Raleigh asked, then explained that it was a sign of respect that we were asking him to turn it over voluntarily. "Would you mind supplying us with a hair sample from your beard?" I asked. "What!" His eyes met mine with a churlish defiance. I imagined the look Melanie Brandt might have seen as he attacked her. What Kathy Kogut saw as he raised his gun to her head. "I think," Nicholas Jenks finally answered, "that this fascinating interview has come to an end." He held out his wrists. "Unless you're intent on taking me away, my lunch is waiting." I nodded. "We'll need to follow up. On your whereabouts. And on the gun." "Of course," Jenks said, standing up. "And should you need any further cooperation- feel free to request it through my attorney." I assembled the photographs and put them back into the folder. Raleigh and I got up. At that moment, the attractive strawberry blonde from the photographs walked into the room. She was undeniably pretty, with gentle, aquamarine eyes, a pale complexion, long, free-flowing hair. She had a tall dancer's body, and was dressed in thigh-length leggings and a Nike T-shirt. "Chessy!" Jenks exclaimed. "These are officers from the San Francisco Police Department. My wife, inspectors." "Sorry, Nicky," Chessy Jenks apologized. "Susan's coming over. I didn't know you had guests." "They were just leaving." We nodded stiffly, moved toward the door. "If you could locate what we talked about," I said to him, "we'll send someone by to pick it up." He gazed right through me. I hated to leave without taking him in, and to have treated him with kid gloves. But we were still a few steps away from an arrest. "So," Chessy Jenks smiled and said, "has my husband finally gone homicidal?" She went up to Jenks, clasped his arm in a teasing way. "I always told him, with those creepy crawler characters he writes about, it was inevitable." Could she know? I wondered. She lived with him, slept with him. How could she not be aware of what was going on inside his head? "I truly hope not, Ms. Jenks," was all I said.