her? I felt the urge to appall Nola now and then myself. Not that I had to try. My existence was enough to keep my mother-in-law in a constant state of pall.
Which meant what?
That the real target was me? The assumption being that I would pay up to keep Jinx’s past from embarrassing her? From embarrassing me? No. From embarrassing John.
Of course.
Because John was the vulnerable one. As Police Commissioner, San Francisco’s first gay police commissioner at that, John was the one with something to lose. The news that the police commissioner’s younger sister was a devil worshipper (oh, I could already hear all the idiotic and ignorant things people would say) would certainly bother the hell out of John—and might even impact his political future. John was an ambitious man. A man with a plan.
So why not send this packet to John?
Oh, right. Because John was as honorable as he was ambitious. He would not be blackmailed. He would see Jinx burned alive—in the court of public opinion, that is—before he paid one cent of blackmail money.
The blackmailer was relying on me to pay up to protect John from himself.
Mistake.
If I had learned anything in the four months I’d been married to John, it was that honesty was the best policy. At least with John.
When I stepped out of the office, I found Blanche, my assistant, struggling valiantly to load a seventeenth century Nuremberg wrought-iron pirate chest onto a hand truck.
Blanche is a curvaceous fifty-something. She’s an expert on eighteenth century jewelry, makes the best vegan cheesecake this side of Sacramento, and favors Elvira Mistress of the Dark eye makeup. She is also Wicca, a loyal friend, and a great employee. What she is not, is a deckhand or a longshoreman. I rushed to her aid.
“What the—? Blanche, you’re going to throw your back out.”
She gasped out, “No worries,” but hastily moved out of my way.
I managed to redirect the chest’s landing so it did not topple over the tall and very narrow Italian Regency apothecary chest. Blanche leapt to save the gilt and violet SF & Co. water basin and pitcher rocking precariously on the nearby dining table.
“No worries? This thing’s nearly two hundred pounds.” I managed to shimmy the loading platform beneath the bottom of the trunk and leveraged it a few inches off the floor. Awkwardly, I maneuvered my unwieldly cargo through the obstacle course posed by plush carpet and fragile furniture to its new home by the large bay windows at the front of Blue Moon Antiques’ showroom. I lowered it to the floor with a little oof of relief.
“It is heavier than it looks,” Blanche admitted.
I glanced around the long, furniture-crowded space. Sunlight gilded old wood and fragile porcelain, glittered off a decorative string of benignly smiling jack-o’-lantern faces.
“Where’s Ambrose? I asked him to move this thing.”
Blanche murmured something vague, and I glanced at her. Behind heart-shaped rhinestone spectacles, her blue-green gaze was evasive.
“What?”
“Oh. Well… He had to leave.”
I frowned. “Had to leave why?”
“I’m not exactly sure. Something to do with his grandmother.”
“Not again!”
She raised her hands in a now-don’t-get-excited gesture. “I think it really was an emergency.”
“It’s always an emergency.”
Blanche didn’t bother to argue because it was true.
“This can’t go on. The whole point in hiring him was because we need someone here.”
“I know.” Blanche sounded sympathetic. As though Ambrose’s irresponsible behavior didn’t affect her too.
“I mean, I like him. I think he’s a good kid. He’s a big help when he’s here. But he’s never here.”
“Yes. True.” Her expression was regretful.
I brooded for a moment or two. “Okay. Don’t worry. I’ll deal with it.”
Behind the sparkling red glasses, Blanche’s eyes went wide with alarm. “Cos, you’re not— Are you going to fire him?”
I hesitated. “I’m not sure. Probably not? Not today. Not without talking to him. But this can’t go on.”
“I know. I know.” Her tone was soothing.
“I know you know.”
“It’s just he’s in such a difficult situation.”
I nodded. This was so. Ambrose was sole caretaker of his elderly grandmother.
She added persuasively, “And he is trained now.”
“Whatever that means.”
Blanche said coaxingly, “He’s used to us? We’re used to him?”
I opened my mouth. Closed it. Shook my head.
* * * * *
I arrived at City Hall one minute after noon. Pat Anderson, John’s charming and ruthlessly efficient executive assistant, apologetically informed me that John’s meeting with “The Brass” had gone into overtime.
In this case “The Brass” meant Mayor Stevens, Police Chief Morrisey, Deputy Chief Danville, the Board of Supervisors, various elected officers, and