Free Sudden Exposure by Susan Dunlap

for work, knowing Howard would be gone when I got home.
    The first thing waiting for me at the station was a message from Herman Ott, Telegraph Avenue detective. A message from Ott is never a plus. I tossed it. The second was a note from Brucker: “Need to go over your cases. I’ll be here until noon.” There were no open homicides and I had left him notes on all the felony assaults that required explanation. Still, his wasn’t an unreasonable request. I would answer his questions, after we were eye to eye about sticking my belongings on the squad room table. And after I’d dealt with Bryn Wiley.
    I didn’t know how serious Bryn Wiley had been about her threat to force Johnson’s hand at her press conference Saturday. She’d expect me to be on Johnson’s tail, not “wasting time” reminding her how unpredictable the man was and objecting to her plans. She wasn’t going to be pleased to see me at her own door.
    Which is why, when I got there, I was surprised to be greeted with a look of panic followed by a smile. And more surprised that the woman at Bryn Wiley’s door was not Bryn Wiley but Ellen Waller. “Come on in,” she said. In the daylight she looked less like Bryn’s deflated ghost. I could see now that the resemblance was more general than it had seemed last Saturday—two thin, tallish women with short, full, chestnut brown hair. But Ellen Waller’s face was softer than Bryn’s. Her eyes were brown, not blue. And she was older than Bryn. Forty-five or so to Bryn’s thirty-three.
    “Can I get you some coffee? It’s decaf,” she said, in that wary tone we police officers hear so often we begin to think of it as normal.
    I pulled out a line that always puts female witnesses at ease. “I wish I could take you up on that coffee. But not in the middle of a ten-hour shift driving around.”
    She smiled. “The dangers of police work they don’t tell you about, huh? Well, sit then. Oh, I guess that’s not really possible with all that stuff hanging off your belt? How about a stool? I’ll get the one from the kitchen. It’s not real comfortable, but—”
    “Thanks.” I was impressed at how quickly she’d sized up the situation. Bryn hadn’t noticed it at all. Still I followed Ellen to the kitchen door and held it open as she carried the stool in. I didn’t think she’d make a break for it, but I wasn’t about to take the chance.
    She put the stool in the middle of the living room, moved toward one of the sofas, and then, reconsidering, she moved the lusting Shiva to an end table and sat in its place on the end of the confessional bench. She curled her feet under her and rested her right arm familiarly on the penitent’s shelf, next to the priest’s seat. It was a remarkably uncomfortable-looking pose; one, I thought, that merited whatever forgiveness she might request. A clever hostess puts her guest in her debt by offering her the best of the food, the most comfortable chair. It’s not easy with a police officer, but Ellen Waller was managing better than average.
    “Where is Bryn?”
    “At a planning meeting. She should be back anytime.”
    “Planning for the press conference?”
    “No. For the fall’s lecture schedule at The Team.”
    I nodded. I considered asking Ellen about her sudden departure last week, but the level of potential cooperation was four hundred times what I had expected and I wasn’t about to undermine it—yet. “What can you tell me about the attacks?”
    She was wearing a gray sweatshirt and those loose sweat shorts. Now she rearranged her bare legs on the bench, using the time to prepare her answer. I wondered if Bryn had cautioned her about me, or if Ellen herself knew something she hadn’t decided whether to say. Or if she just had more sense than her cousin about pushing Sam Johnson too far. “First off,” she said slowly, “Bryn’s really undone by them. She’s unnerved, but more than that she’s shaken to find out that she is unnerved. She thinks