the van and operated with switches mounted at the dash. Heilbron got in his van and, with Raveneau and la Rosa tailing him, drove straight to China Basin.
SEVENTEEN
Heilbron slowed as he reached China Basin then continued south to his former employer, Boyle’s Auto Body. He pulled into an open bay, probably to pick up his last check or ask for his job back. Up the street, Raveneau eased the car over to the curb.
‘Who is this guy?’ la Rosa asked, and he understood what she meant. The San Jose detectives brought their file this morning. La Rosa read through it. So had he.
‘Here’s what I think,’ Raveneau answered. ‘When Heilbron walked into the homicide office and tossed out the San Jose rape after confessing to this killing, he was building his credibility. He knew the DNA was missing, probably wouldn’t magically show up, and if it does Heilbron’s probably been advised by a defense attorney that the amount of time it was lost will get it discredited as evidence. The district attorney won’t go anywhere near a chain-of-custody problem.’
‘OK, but he knew the San Jose detectives would come interview him again.’
Raveneau paused. He looked over at her.
‘He wanted that. It was another chance to taunt them and that’s probably what he’s trying to do with us. I’m not seeing the evidence yet that he’s our guy and I doubt we will. He was standing outside talking to the responding officers when we were upstairs. He got what he knows about the inside of the building from them.’
Taylor, the younger officer, had looked at a photo of Heilbron and IDed him.
‘Then why are we following him?’ she asked.
‘Because the rape was probably him, and we aren’t one hundred percent certain yet on China Basin.’
Heilbron’s van backed out suddenly on to Third Street forcing a bus to veer around it. He accelerated away from the auto shop and Raveneau had to jump on the gas just to stay within two stoplights of him. Heilbron drove to the house he leased in South San Francisco and backed into the one-car garage. Inside, he pulled the shades in the bay window that faced the street.
‘Let’s go back to Boyle’s,’ Raveneau said. ‘Let’s find out what happened.’
In Boyle’s Custom Auto Body an employee restoring a yellow Camaro pointed them toward a rear office with this warning: ‘Boyle isn’t here today, but the office manager Katrina is, but she’s worse than the hurricane was so watch out.’
Katrina had a pinched nose, hair dyed a light red, and earrings that looked like car keys hanging from her ears. She took Raveneau’s card and studied it as if she was with Homeland Security. Raveneau watched and then pulled his homicide star.
‘Carl Heilbron just got fired,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t work here any more. Why is he walking around anyway? Why isn’t he in jail? Seems like every time the police talk about a person of interest they’re back on the street the next day. If he said he killed her, does he have to prove it to you before you keep him in jail?’
‘He recanted his confession and we don’t have anything to hold him on.’
‘So hold him anyway. He’s a creep. He delivered a car to the home of one of our customers last summer and the next night was caught looking in the windows of her house. He didn’t get arrested and now she gets free engine care.’
Katrina stared at them as though he and la Rosa had let that happen.
‘Boyle talked the customer out of calling the police.’
‘That’s your boss?’ Raveneau asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Is he around?’
She rolled her eyes and said, ‘Only if it rains.’
‘Why is that?’
‘Simple. When it rains he can’t play golf, and since he doesn’t like to be around his wife he comes to work. Boyle thinks Heilbron is the best auto body man here, so Boyle and the rest of the misogynist pricks look the other way when Heilbron goes into the bathroom for an hour with one of his magazines. He’s disgusting.’
They listened but didn’t learn much and drove back to the homicide office. Raveneau saw the TV vans from three blocks out. He counted five as they picked up coffees at Café Roma, and then watched a reporter warming up, practicing, pulling her voice down lower, getting more baritone into it as she asked, ‘Is a killer targeting San Francisco’s homicide detail?’
‘Shit,’ he said, ‘here we go.’
Upstairs Becker told them to stay completely away from all media. The brass would handle