Treasure Hunt

“So what happened?” Hunt asked.

“So the zoning got changed and everybody won. Except, of course, the city as soon as a buyer appeared and got about two months into the cleanup and discovered that the land essentially could never be used.”

“Didn’t they sue?”

“Sure. And they even won, in the sense that the sale got rescinded. But, and this is the truly great part, Turner and his clients then turned around and sued the city for approving the zoning change in the first place. They hadn’t done their due diligence, et cetera. And finally, the city settled with these cretins to the tune of like ten million dollars.”

“Can this guy Turner be my lawyer?” Hunt asked.

Gina gave him a sweet smile. “No, because I’m your lawyer. But you see what I mean? And the story isn’t over yet.”

“I’m listening.”

“Okay, before the settlement, while all the stink is going on over this deal and the lawsuit, needless to say all the supervisors who voted for the zoning change are taking a lot of heat. At about this time, Como enters the picture. Or this particular picture.”

Hunt cocked his head. “How do you know all this?”

Roake hit him with a level gaze. “Mostly David.” This was her former fiancé, David Freeman, who for forty or more years before he died had been one of the city’s legal titans. “He was counsel for the Conservancy Club.”

“Aha. Okay, back to Como.”

“Como sees an opportunity here, and starts pumping money that certain development interests had been donating to the Sunset Youth Project into the campaigns of the supervisors who are ru

“That’s got to be illegal.”

“Oh, it’s illegal, all right. But illegal only matters if someone is going to pursue it criminally. And back then in the DA’s office, perhaps because the DA had a son who was having rehab issues himself, there didn’t seem to be the will.”

“This is getting good,” Hunt said.

“I thought you’d enjoy it. And so, to continue, guess what? A majority of new supervisors got elected. And those are the folks who, to avoid the cost and hassle of litigation, for the good of the city and to put this ugliness behind them, approved the settlement. In other words, it all just went away. Oh, and one other thing.”

“Hit me.”

“This was also when the city signed over the decrepit and abandoned former Ocean Park Elementary School to the Sunset Youth Project to use as their headquarters.”

“Wow,” Hunt said. “Nice ending.”

“You see why I think it might be smart of you to watch out and pay attention around this thing? It might have been Como’s wife, or something else personal, all right. But it might also have been something altogether different. In which case, there are interests you don’t want to get in the way of.”

“Well”-Hunt went back to his meal-“you made your point. But I still think there’s a big difference between these financial shenanigans and people actually killing other people over them.”

“You do, huh?”

“I do.”

“Well, then, I better not tell you about Addario and Ayers-the supervisor and the Conservancy Club president.”

“I bet you’re going to, though.”

She nodded. “Before the settlement got a

“I notice you said apparently twice in there.”

“Right.” Solemn, Gina nodded again. “Good word, isn’t it? Apparently is the new allegedly.”

13

Tamara opened her eyes before the alarm went off, while it was still dark out, and for a moment could not exactly place herself, although she had slept in the same Murphy bed that she’d been using for the past six months. She turned to look at the digital clock on the windowsill and saw that it was 4:42.

At 5:01, and wide awake, she tossed the blankets off and sat up. She’d been sleeping in plaid fla

After a quick trip to the bathroom, she looked in at where Mickey slept and felt a surge of relief and love when she saw his gangly form splayed out on top of his bed. Closing the door softly, she went into the kitchen, turned on the one light, and set up the Mr. Coffee for eight cups. While the coffee gurgled and dripped, she rummaged in the refrigerator, pulling out a plate covered with strips of leftover lamb, then some polenta, butter, a carton of eggs.

Five minutes later, she poured her first cup of coffee, added heavy cream and-what the hell-three sugars, then scooped her three-egg concoction onto her plate, smothering it with ketchup.

The first bite was so delicious that it brought tears to her eyes.

The Hunt Club’s office was over a Chinese gift shop on Grant Avenue. The door was around the corner on Sacramento and at 8:10, twenty minutes early because they were excited about the possibility of more leads coming in by phone, Mickey and Tamara were just getting to that door when, coming from the other direction, they almost literally ran into the two women who were about to turn into the same doorway. And upon recognition-it was Gina Roake and another, younger attorney from her office, Amy Wu-the exclamations and hugging commenced.

“We heard from Wyatt you were back!”

“We’re so glad it’s true!”

“We’ve missed you so much.”

“I missed both of you too.”

Mickey, standing to one side, said, “Me too,” ambiguously, and Wu came over and gave him a conciliatory buss on the cheek and about half a hug. “We would have missed you, too, Mickey,” she said, “except you just wouldn’t go away.”

Hunt showed up early, too, but it was still after everyone had gone upstairs and gotten the office opened up, the coffeemaker going, the shutters open. The three employees were acutely aware of the number “ 7” blinking at Tamara’s phone, but waited until Roake and Wu left to go back to their own offices before they encircled the desk while Tamara pressed the playback button.

“Hi, the Hunt Club. This is Cecil Rand, three eight one, two two eight four. I believe I’ve seen something that might have to do with the Dominic Como murder. I’m not sure if it’s anything and I don’t want to have the police think I’m just trying to waste their time, so maybe you could call me back. Thanks.” He repeated his number, and hung up.

“Hello.” A tentative woman’s voice. “Is anybody…? Hello? My name is… well, never mind. I guess I’ll just call back when you’re there.”

“Oh, super,” Mick said. “Unless you die in the meantime.”

Next was another woman, no greeting. “This is Nancy Neshek. I’m the executive director of the Sanctuary House. My name may be familiar because my organization has also put up twenty- five thousand dollars for the reward, so I won’t be calling to claim any part of that, but I did have a question if one of you could please call me back, either at home or my office, sometime tomorrow. It’s somewhat important.” She then left both of her numbers, said thank you and good-bye, and rang off.

“Hey. I’m Damien Jones, over here at the Mission Street Coalition, and uh… well, there’s just some stuff goin’ on here that ain’t right. I mean, they say we getting all this foundation money s’posed to pay for room and board and food and stuff and then they take it out our pay. I don’t know how Como did it over there at his place, you know, Sunset, but if I can get moved over there, I’m applying.”

Next: “My name is Eric Canard with the San Francisco Palace Duck Coalition and I just wanted to inform you that I’ll be going to the media myself in the next day or two to expose this obviously fraudulent murder you’ve got everybody talking about, and the even more blatant attempt to deflect attention from the situation with the displaced ducks from the Palace Lagoon, which is now, as I’m sure you know, just about completely empty. I don’t know who’s putting up all this supposed reward money, but I think I can prove that there is both no dead man and no money that will actually be paid for any reward. If the Hunt Club is even in fact your real name.”