Page 11

11

“ Y ou first,” Monk said once they were back in the atrium, each with a plate of food. Juliana eyed the biggest sandwich she’d ever seen that Simon had made for her, but her attention drifted to the chocolate cake. The scent of dark sweetness called to her. As cliché as it was, she was a woman with a thing for chocolate. Growing up, sweets hadn’t been allowed, so her wild rebellions took the form of using what little money she had to buy contraband chocolate bars. Yes, she adored the distinct flavor, but it also tasted like freedom and dissent and a little bit of sin.

Simon reached out and slid her sandwich out of the way, replacing it with the chocolate cake. She glanced over. He winked. “You only live once.”

Bubbles of joy burst through her. Once again, he wanted her to just enjoy something she enjoyed. It might be a small thing to everyone else, but not to her.

His gaze held hers until Monk drummed his fingers on the table. Simon cleared his throat and looked away. She dragged her attention to the man sitting across from them, his sandwich in hand and an expectant look on his face. Philly was blissfully filling his mouth with a handful of potato chips.

“Why don’t you go first,” Monk repeated.

“Right,” she said, picking up a fork in one hand and bringing up her notes with the other. “Aaron Lowery was born in the Bay Area, Richmond to be specific, to a lower-income family. His mother was a grocery store checker, his father a laborer for a yard maintenance company. No apparent issues in Lowery’s childhood other than living barely above poverty.

“College wasn’t an option for him, so he enlisted in the army, joining right after high school graduation. He served eight years, a part of that during Operation Desert Storm, then chose not to reenlist. He returned to California where he obtained his bachelor’s degree from San Francisco State, then his law degree from what was then UC Hastings School of Law and is now UC San Francisco Law.”

“Funded by the GI bill?” Philly asked before taking a ginormous bite of his sandwich. She gaped. He continued chewing as if he hadn’t just impersonated a reticulated python. With a shake of her head, Juliana paused and took a bite of her new favorite cake—it had the perfect balance of bitter and sweet and the ideal ratio of cake to frosting.

“Just curious,” Philly added when he was able to talk again. “He didn’t have money for school before enlisting, and eight years in wouldn’t have earned him enough either.”

Simon shrugged. “He might have taken loans. I think we can all agree that being deployed can change your perspective on life. After being in Desert Storm, maybe he decided loans were worth taking on to have a different kind of life.”

“How’d he become a supervisor?” Monk asked, bringing her back to her readout.

“He worked through college and law school. Although, to Philly’s point, not enough to pay for tuition and room and board. He started in the planning commission as an admin?—”

“In San Francisco?” Monk asked.

She nodded. “Made his way up the chain, so to speak. By the time he graduated from law school, he had enough contacts to get hired into the city attorney’s office. Not as a city lawyer at first, but after a few years, they promoted him. And kept promoting him until he decided to run for office at the age of forty-two. He’s been in office ever since, and he’s sixty-one this year.”

“What’s his record?” Philly asked. “Did he piss anyone off?”

“Nothing obvious we could find,” Simon answered, taking over and giving her a chance to eat her sandwich now that she’d finished her cake.

“He’s a bland guy,” he continued. “The type of politician who gets enough of the right things done to keep getting reelected but doesn’t ever do anything groundbreaking or controversial. His district doesn’t include the more challenging parts of the city, so he can evade direct responsibility for tackling those issues. He does like to be out and about, though.”

“Meaning?” Monk asked.

“He’s very public. We found a lot of pictures of him at city events, fundraisers for popular charities, opening night at the opera, those sorts of things. More so than other supervisors,” Simon answered.

“Where does he live?” Philly asked.

“A modest but nice house in the Sunset District,” she answered before taking another bite of her sandwich. She’d never been a big fan of chicken salad, but Dottie added something to hers—sage or possibly thyme—in just the right amount to give it a depth and richness she’d never tasted before. Juliana wouldn’t do it justice—she was a baker at heart—but maybe she’d ask Dottie for her recipe.

“He represents District Seven, which includes that neighborhood,” Simon added.

With nothing else to report, she and Simon fell silent. They knew more about Lowery now than they had, but not why he was being blackmailed or who he so casually talked about killing. Glancing at Philly and Monk, she hoped they’d found something more substantial, more incriminating , than she and Simon.

“Philly, please tell me you have something big to share,” she said. He waggled his eyebrows and flashed her a smile.

“On Polinsky,” Simon clarified, eliciting a grin from Philly. Monk chuckled, and Juliana rolled her eyes.

“Interestingly—or perhaps not,” Philly started. “Polinsky enlisted after high school and served in the army as well. Also deploying during Desert Storm. I emailed a contact to see if I can track his unit information. I’ll send a follow-up and include Lowery’s name. Would be interesting to know if they served together.”

“Add Brian Gregor’s name to the request,” Monk interjected.

“Who’s that?” Simon asked.

“The developer of the Bayview project who I think is the third man. The bio on his company site says he served, but not which branch or when,” he answered.

“Do you think that’s the connection between them all?” Juliana mused. “If so, is it possible that the blackmail has been going on for that long? Desert Storm was over thirty years ago.”

Simon inclined his head. “Maybe, but it took over a decade for Lowery and Polinsky to be in a position where blackmailing them would amount to anything. That’s not to say corrupt admins, clerks, or beat cops can’t do damage, but supervisors and police lieutenants have far more power to wield.”

“Fair,” she said with a nod. “What else, Philly?”

“When Polinsky discharged, he returned home to South Boston,” he said, dutifully returning to his readout. “A few months later, he enrolled in the police academy. He started his career in Boston but moved to San Francisco two years later.”

“An odd move for a cop,” Simon said. “Leaving your hometown—and a good force—to move somewhere new. And more expensive.”

“There was a woman involved,” Philly replied. “His wife. Or I should say former wife. They divorced four years ago. No kids.”

“Is Lowery married?” Monk asked.

Juliana nodded. “Only recently, though. Three years ago. She was a wealthy widow when they met. She runs an art gallery in the city.”

“No kids?” Philly asked.

Juliana shook her head. “Not between the two of them, but she has a daughter from her first marriage. She’s a doctor in New York City.”

“Anything unusual in Polinsky’s climb from a beat cop to a lieutenant?” Simon asked.

Philly tapped his pen on the table as he stared into the middle distance. After a beat, he brought his attention back to her and Simon. “Not really. There aren’t that many of them in the SFPD, so the fact he is one is remarkable enough. But he wasn’t cited as being the lead on any big cases or anything. He also hasn’t been named in any lawsuits against him or the department, so he has that going for him.”

“Oh what standards we have for public servants,” she mumbled.

“Any connection to Lowery?” Simon asked.

Philly shook his head and shrugged. “Possibly the military, but we’ll have to wait to hear about that. As you can imagine, as law enforcement, it’s not easy to find a lot of public information on his private life. I only found out about his wife from an interview she gave after she joined the board of the city ballet company. I discovered the divorce by trolling through court files. I was looking for something more salacious, but that’s the only thing that cropped up.”

Juliana picked up her drink and looked to Simon, silently asking if he had more questions. After shaking his head, he turned to Monk. “And Gregor? That’s the developer’s name, right?”

Monk nodded, his beard brushing his chest as he did. She was in no way attracted to the man—although he was adorable in a big teddy bear sort of way—but she wondered what it felt like to kiss someone with so much facial hair. It was the trend these days, although she doubted Monk had considered that. Even so, she much preferred Simon’s clean-shaven look. Well, almost clean-shaven. He did have a bit of a sexy scruff today.

Monk drummed his fingers on the table again, and she pulled her gaze from Simon. Amusement danced in his eyes, but his expression didn’t otherwise change. “You ready to hear about Gregor?”

She grimaced, then cast an apologetic look at Simon, who didn’t look at all displeased to be the object of her distraction. Forcing herself to focus on the task at hand, she turned to Monk and nodded.

“He caught my eye because he’s the only local developer identified as being involved in the Bayview development project. He lives in San Francisco and has a lot of projects in the area. The two other developers that came up are both located outside the state.”

“If he’s relying on a corrupt city supervisor, then it makes sense that his projects are local,” she murmured. The three men nodded in agreement.

“He was born and raised in Oklahoma,” Monk continued. “A formerly thriving farm town that, by the time Gregor came along, was little more than a truck stop about sixty miles from Oklahoma City. Like Lowery and Polinsky, he joined the military after high school. We’ll find out which branch,” he said, with a pointed look at Philly, who responded with a sharp nod.

“After fulfilling his commitment, he moved to New Orleans, but there isn’t much about him after that. Not until he shows up in California shortly before Lowery’s first election.”

“Any work history in New Orleans?” Philly asked.

Monk shook his head. “None I could find. When he arrived in California, though, he had enough money to buy a six-unit apartment building in one of the gentrifying neighborhoods. It was a fixer, and he lived there during the renovations, but he dropped three million on it.”

“And that’s how his development career started?” she said more than asked.

Monk tipped his head. “In California. What he was doing in New Orleans is still a mystery. I’m curious what would keep him off the radar but leave him with enough money to buy that kind of property in San Francisco.”

“Yes, I’m curious, too,” she said. Philly and Simon nodded.

“So other than possibly the military, there’s no obvious link between the three men,” she said, her mind spinning with options and ideas.

“I’ll confirm that—or not—by tomorrow morning,” Philly said.

“What I don’t understand is that the board of supervisors doesn’t approve development projects,” she said. “Not in San Francisco, anyway. There’s a planning commission that does that.”

“The board isn’t involved at all?” Simon asked.

Mentally, she sorted through her memories. She’d gone to dinner once with someone from the commission. His insight into the inner workings of the historic preservation aspects of the commission had been far more interesting than the man himself, and she’d peppered him with questions about his work. At the end of the night, though, he’d mistaken her interest in what he did as an interest in him, and it hadn’t ended well. She’d walked away with unique insights and facts, though, so she’d chosen to chalk it up as a win.

“The board of supervisors selects several of the members of the commission,” she said, the long-ago conversation coming back to her. “The mayor picks the majority, but the board picks the rest. I think there are seven total,” she answered.

“There are,” Monk confirmed, his attention focused on his computer, no doubt looking it up.

“So if the board doesn’t decide, it’s not likely he’s being blackmailed to pass development projects,” she said.

“Not unless he has commissioners in his pocket,” Simon replied.

“The supervisors are the legislative branch of the local government,” Monk said, reading from his computer. “They don’t approve projects, but they approve zoning laws.”

“Land use ordinances,” she said. He nodded. She wagged her head. “That’s an interesting angle.”

“Arguably, influencing land use ordinances is more valuable than the ability to approve a specific project,” Simon said. “If he can influence how neighborhoods grow or what businesses are allowed in certain areas, I imagine a developer would find that useful.”

“I agree,” she said. “So what’s the controversy around the Bayview project?”

“A lot of people wanted low-income housing built there,” Monk said. “But the board designated it as a historically important site. One faction thinks it’s good because it supposedly protects the current inhabitants. But a lot of folks see it as a way to keep low-income development out of the area.”

“Why?” Philly asked.

Simon’s eyes narrowed. “Because if they can’t build to scale?—”

“Or they have to build around existing businesses and residences,” she interjected.

“Then they can’t afford to build at all. Not the kind of homes that would be accessible to low-income individuals or families,” Simon said.

“Leaving the only option being custom builders or higher-end developers,” Philly finished, his voice heavily laced with disgust.

“We’re getting ahead of ourselves, though,” she said. “We don’t know if that’s what’s going on—although it sounds like an option. We need to do more research.”

Monk’s and Philly’s gaze darted to Simon. Her heart sank. An afternoon on the computer wouldn’t be good for him. He hadn’t shared the extent of his injury, but headaches could be a bitch. Especially big ones. And it wasn’t as though Simon would ever say anything, not even if his head felt as if it were splitting in two.

“Do we have any potential ideas as to Polinsky’s involvement?” she asked Philly.

He shook his head. “Based on what you overheard, it sounds like there are drug deals his officers are turning a blind eye to, but I didn’t find anything to substantiate that.”

She frowned, her mind scrambling to figure out a way forward that didn’t involve Simon staring at a computer for any length of time. As ideas tumbled through her mind, her gaze landed on a map of the Bayview neighborhood, the new development area outlined in red.

“If we think Lowery had something to do with the decision to designate that area”—she nodded to the image—“as historically important, I wonder what other decisions he’s influenced over time and if Gregor benefited from them.”

“That would be interesting to know,” Monk agreed, eyeing her as if waiting to see what she’d say next.

“Why don’t you look up all of Gregor’s projects since coming to San Francisco, and I’ll cross-reference that with ordinance decisions,” she suggested.

“What am I supposed to do?” Philly whined, only half joking.

“You will cross-reference the time frames of the developments against the crime stats in those areas,” she said, the idea gelling in her head as she spoke.

“And me?”

“We have three sources of information,” she said, pointing to herself, Monk, and Philly. “We need to collate it. Can you start a spreadsheet for us to track the developments, any ordinances that might have impacted them, and crime statistics?”

Both Monk’s and Philly’s eyes flashed with approval. Her plan limited the amount of time he’d be on the computer, but it was still valuable work. Collating the data was their best chance at seeing any patterns.

Simon eyed her, then flickered his gaze to Philly and Monk, both of whom had already started working—or were pretending to.

He sighed and returned his gaze to her. The look he flashed her told her he knew exactly what she was up to. She should feel guilty but didn’t. If he wasn’t going to take care of himself, she would. Besides, it wasn’t as if she’d told him to go make coffee or anything. If he didn’t organize the data, someone else would have to.

“Great, that’s settled then,” she said, forging on. “Let’s hop to.”