And still – she felt afraid.

Chapter 125

A MONTH LATER, Conklin and I were back in Alta Plaza Park, where it all began.

This time, we watched Henry Tyler come down the path toward us, his coat whipping around him in the wind. He reached out a hand to Conklin, gripping it hard, and then stretched his hand out to me.

"You've given us back our lives. I can't find words to thank you enough."

Tyler called out to his wife and to the little girl playing on a hexagonal construction, some new kind of jungle gym. Face brightening in surprise, Madison dropped down from the bars and ran toward us.

Henry Tyler swung his daughter up into his arms. Madison leaned over her father's shoulder and put an arm around my neck and Rich's, gathering us into a three-way hug.

"You're my favorite people," she said.

I was still smiling when Henry Tyler put Madison down and said to us, his face radiant, "We're all so grateful. Me, Liz, Maddy – we're your friends for life."

My eyes watered up a bit.

It was an excellent day to be a cop.

As Richie and I took the path back toward the car, we talked about the hell we have to go through to solve a case – the drudgery, the up close contact with killers and druggies, the false leads.

"And then," I said, "a case turns out like this and it's such a high."

Rich stopped walking, put his hand on my arm. "Let's stop here for a minute," he said.

I sat on one of the broad steps that had been warmed by the sun, and Rich got down beside me. I could see that there was something on his mind.

"Lindsay, I know you think I have a crush on you," he said, "but it's more than that. Believe me."

For the first time it hurt to look into Rich Conklin's handsome face. Thoughts of our grappling in a hotel in LA still made me squirm with embarrassment.

"Will you give us a chance?" he said. "Let me take you out to dinner. I'm not going to put any moves on you, Lindsay. I just want us to… ah…"

Rich read the feelings on my face and stopped talking. He shook his head, finally saying, "I'm going to shut up now."

I reached out and covered his hand with mine.

"I'm sorry," I said.

"Don't be… Forget it, Lindsay. Forget I said anything, okay?" He tried to smile, almost pulled it off. "I'll deal with this in therapy for a few years."

"You're in therapy?"

"Would that help? No." He laughed. "I'm just, look, you know how I feel about you. That's almost enough."

It was a tough ride back to the Hall. Conversation was strained until we got a call to respond to a report of a dead body in the Tenderloin. We worked the case together past quitting time and into the next shift. And it was good, as if we'd been partners for years.

At just after nine p.m., I told Rich I'd see him in the morning. I'd just unlocked my car door when my cell phone rang.

"What now?" I muttered.

There was a crackle of static, then a deep, resonant voice came out of that phone, turning night back into day.

"I know not to surprise an armed police officer on her doorstep, Blondie. So… fair warning. I'm going to be in town this weekend. I have news. And I really want to see you."

Chapter 126

MY DOORBELL RANG AT HOME.

I stabbed the intercom button, said, "I'm coming," and jogged down my stairs. Martha's dog sitter, Karen Triebel, was outside the front door. I gave her a hug and bent to enfold Sweet Martha in my arms.

"She really missed you, Lindsay," Karen said.

"Ya think?" I said, laughing as Martha whimpered and barked and knocked me completely off my feet. I just sat there on the threshold as Martha pinned down my shoulders and soaked my face with kisses.

"I'll be going now. I see that you two need to be alone," Karen called out, walking down the steps toward her old Volvo.

"Wait, Karen, come upstairs. I have a check for you."

"It's okay! I'll catch you next time," she said, disappearing into her car, tying the door closed with a piece of clothesline, cranking up the engine.

"Thank you!" I called out as she drove past me and waved. I returned my attention to my best girl.

"Do you know how much I love you?" I said into one of Martha's silky ears.

Apparently, she did.

I ran upstairs with her, put on my hat and coat, and changed into running shoes. We took to the streets we love so much, running down Nineteenth toward the Rec Center Park, where I flopped onto a bench and watched Martha doing her border-collie thing. She ran great joyous circles, herding other dogs and having a heck of a good time.

After a while, she came back to the bench and sat beside me, rested her head on my thigh, and looked up at me with her big brown eyes.

"Glad to be home, Boo? All vacationed out?"

We jogged at a slower pace back to my apartment, climbed the stairs. I fed Martha a big bowl of chow with gravy and got into the shower. By the time I'd toweled off and dried my hair, Martha was asleep on my bed.

She was completely out – eyelids flickering, jowls fluttering, paws moving in some great doggy dream.

She didn't even cock an eyelid open as I got all dressed up for my date with Joe.

Chapter 127

THE BIG 4 RESTAURANT is at the top of Nob Hill, across from Grace Cathedral. It was named for the four Central Pacific Railroad barons, is elegantly paneled in dark wood, staged with sumptuous lighting and flowers. And according to a dozen of the glossiest upmarket magazines, the Big 4 has one of the best chefs in town.

Our starters had been served – Joe was having apple-glazed foie gras, and I'd been seduced by the French butter pears with prosciutto. But I wasn't so taken with the setting and the view that I didn't see the shyness in Joe's eyes and also that he couldn't stop looking at me.

"I had a bunch of corny ideas," he said. "And don't ask me what they were, okay, Linds?"

"No, of course not." I grinned. "Not me." I pushed a morsel of hazelnut-encrusted goat cheese onto a forkful of pear, let it melt in my mouth.

"And after a lot of deep thought – no, really, Blondie, really deep thought – I figured something out, and I'm going to tell you about it."

I put my fork down and let the waiter take my plate away. "I want to hear."

"Okay," said Joe. "You know about my six sibs and all of us growing up in a row house in Queens. And how my dad was always away."

"Traveling salesman."

"Right. Fabrics and notions. He traveled up and down the East Coast and was away six days out of seven. Sometimes more. We all missed him a lot. But my mother missed him the most.

"He was her real happiness, and then one time he went missing," Joe told me. "He always called at night before we went to bed, but this time he didn't. So my mother called the state troopers, who located him the next day sleeping in his car up on a rack in an auto-repair shop outside of some small town in Tennessee."

"His car had broken down?"

"Yeah, and they didn't have cell phones back then, of course, and Christ, until we heard from him, you can't imagine what we went through. Thinking that his car was in a ditch underwater. Thinking he'd been shot in a gas-station holdup. Thinking that maybe he had another life."

I nodded. "Ah, Joe. I understand."

Joe paused, fiddled with his silverware, then started again. "My dad saw how much my mom was suffering, all of us, and he said he was going to quit his job. But he couldn't do that and still provide for us the way he wanted to. And then one day, when I was a sophomore in high school, he did quit. He was home for good."

Joe refilled our wineglasses, and we each took a sip while the waiter placed our entrées in front of us, but from the catch in Joe's throat and a feeling that was growing in me, I'd lost all desire to eat.