Page 71 of Dead Man's List

Kit turned from the whiteboard at the sheepish voice, smiling when she saw Sam standing in the doorway to the SDPD conference room. “Hey, yourself. Did you get some sleep?”

“I did. Then I got fed. You have a visitor. Is it okay to let her in?”

A familiar voice came from behind him. “It means put all the gory photos away,” Akiko said. “I’ve got your dinner.”

Kit gathered the autopsy photos and any crime scene detailsthat her sister shouldn’t see. “All the gory photos are put away. Please, let her in. I’m starving.”

Akiko ducked under Sam’s arm, a covered glass baking dish in her hand. “I got a great haul today. White sea bass and lingcod. Mom and I cooked them up and we had a feast at the house.” She arched a brow. “I texted.”

Kit sighed. “I’m sorry. I got distracted and forgot to reply. But it smells really good.”

Akiko had come to McKittrick House shortly after Wren’s murder. She and Kit had become friends first, then sisters. Out of all the kids fostered by Harlan and Betsy, Kit was closest to Akiko, who operated a fishing charter. The family benefited when she had a good day on the water.

“How did you and Sam come up together?” Kit asked, digging into the meal.

Sam sat at the conference table, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly. “Your folks invited Georgia and Eloise for fish and I was with them.”

“He was still tipsy,” Akiko stage-whispered, then laughed when Sam shot her a dirty look. “Well, you were. I picked them up on my way from the harbor. Stopped by to get your mail too, since you haven’t slept on the boat in a while.”

Kit stopped chewing to consider that. It had been days since she’d slept in her own bed. Going home to McKittrick House was so much nicer.

“So I had dinner with them and Betsy made me drink a gallon of coffee,” Sam said. “But the dinner was amazing, so it was worth it in the end. Akiko brought me back here because I left my car in the lot this morning. Where’s Connor?”

“He took a break to have dinner with CeCe and her parents. He’ll be back soon, and he’ll definitely want some of this fish.They’re vegetarians. He doesn’t want to be rude, so he eats a meal there, then goes somewhere for meat.”

While Kit explained, she was watching her sister. There was something wrong. Kit was almost certain of it. Akiko had yet to meet her eyes. But she’d ask later. Kit trusted Sam, but Akiko might want to keep whatever was wrong private.

“Vegetarian is an extremely healthy lifestyle,” Akiko said. “But I get his point.” She stood up and headed for the door. “Enjoy the food. Mom says to bring the dish the next time you come home. She says that will probably be tonight.”

Kit’s mother was not wrong. But Kit did have to go back to her boat soon. It technically wasn’t her boat. She rented it from one of her older foster brothers who was in the navy, stationed too far away to use it.

She really didn’t spend much time on the boat anymore, now that she thought about it. “I’ll walk you out. Sam, can you stay? I need to bring you up to speed.”

“Of course,” he said in a way that made Kit wonder if he’d seen Akiko’s preoccupation, too.

Kit waited until she and Akiko were at the double doors leading out of the homicide division. “What’s wrong?”

Akiko shook her head. “It’s tough having you for a sister. I can’t hide anything.”

“Akiko…”

Her sister sighed. “I got a call a few days ago from someone I didn’t know. She wants to meet me. She claims to have known my mother.”

Kit blinked, too stunned for a moment to speak. “Your mother?”

Akiko had no memory of her mother. She’d been left outside a firehouse as an infant and had been immediately sucked into the foster care system.

Akiko nodded. “I don’t know what to tell her.”

“How did she know your mother?”

“I don’t know. She said she’d tell me when we met. I told her I’d think about it and call her back. I don’t know what to do.”

Alarm bells were clanging in Kit’s head. “Give me the number the woman called from. I’ll check it out. And if you decide to go, I’ll go with you.”

Akiko closed her eyes in relief. “I hoped you’d say that.”

“Like there was any doubt.” She could see that her sister needed a hug. She opened her arms. “Come on.”