She came back to her seat and clasped her hands in her lap, then said to my partner, "Casey stifled him. She ground him down with her jealousy and her constant demands. Marc was waiting for the right time, and then he was going to divorce her and I was going to leave Graeme. We were going to get married. That's not bull, that's the truth."

I walked around the living room as Caroline Henley told Conklin "the truth." There were photos everywhere, standing on tables, framed on the walls. Caroline Henley was either at the center of every group shot or alone, wearing something small that showed off her figure and her beautiful face.

I wondered why she was attracted to an aging movie star twenty years' her senior. Maybe her vanity demanded more of a catch than a stockbroker ordinaire.

"So, if I've got this right, you and Marcus Dowling have been lovers for two years," Conklin said.

Caroline Henley looked stunned as she realized why we were there. "Wait a minute. Are you thinking he had something to do with Casey's death? That's crazy. I would have known. Marc's not capable of that. Is he? "

She clapped her hands to her mouth, then dropped them. She almost looked pleased when she asked Conklin, "You think he killed Casey for me? "

Back out in the car, I said to my partner, "So maybe he wanted out of the marriage but didn't have the guts to tell Casey. Then Kitty shows up in his bedroom, for Christ's sake. Dowling couldn't have planned it better."

"Another way to look at it," Conklin said. "Divorce is expensive. But, if you get away with it, murder is dead cheap."

Chapter 79

SARAH WELLS WAS dressed for her night job, black clothes and shoes, car pointed toward Pacific Heights. She hit the turn signal and took Divisadero as the light went red. A cacophony of horns blared, damn it. Brakes screeched, and she narrowly avoided a collision with a station wagon full of kids.

Oh my God. Focus, Sarah!

She should be thinking about the work ahead, but her mind kept drifting back to earlier that night, seeing the perfect blue fingerprints on the soft flesh of Heidi's arms, the still-vivid bite mark on her neck.

Heidi had tried to brush off the evidence of Beastly's attack. "He's out of control," she said. "But it's not his fault."

"Whose fault is it? Yours?"

"It's because of what he went through in Iraq."

"It doesn't make any difference what the reason is," Sarah had snapped. "You don't have to take it."

She hadn't meant to bark at Heidi, but she was angry and scared at what Pete Gordon could do. Heidi had to get away from Beastly for her own sake, and for the good of the children.

"I know, I know," Heidi had cried out, putting her head on Sarah's shoulder. "It can't go on."

No, it couldn't go on, and it wouldn't, Sarah told herself as she cruised along Bush Street. She was meeting with Lynnette Green, Maury's widow, next week. Lynnette had told Sarah that she'd buy the jewels and sell them herself. Sarah couldn't wait to cash out. Could not wait.

She turned on Steiner and again on California, then parked her Saturn at the Whole Foods parking lot, surrounded by other cars. She took a few minutes to make sure she had all her gear, then locked her wallet in the glove box, got out of the car, and locked that, too, now thinking about Diana King, her target tonight.

Mrs. King was a widowed philanthropist, a big wheel on the charity circuit, frequently photographed and written about in the glossies and every month in the Chronicle.

According to the Lifestyle page, Mrs. King was having a small engagement party for her son and future daughter-in-law that night in her home, a superbly restored cream-colored Victorian. And also superbly restored was Mrs. King's classic jewelry: Tiffany, Van Cleef, Harry Winston.

If Sarah could steal it, Lynnette Green would buy it and make it disappear. And then it would be over. Tonight's job would be Sarah's grand finale, her last haul.

A half dozen cars were parked in front of the King house when Sarah approached on her rubber-soled climbing shoes. She crept into the side yard, which was shielded from the neighbors by a tall privet hedge. She peeked through one of Mrs. King's ground-floor windows and saw guests at the dinner table, deeply involved in conversation.

Sarah's pulse sped up as she prepared herself for the climb, and then she caught a lucky break: an air conditioner on the first floor that was diagonally placed under the master bedroom. Sarah told herself she would spend only four minutes inside the house. Whatever she grabbed would be enough.

Using the air conditioner as a foothold, she easily gained purchase, and then she was through the open bedroom window and inside the house.

Getting in had almost been too easy.

Chapter 80

SARAH STOOD JUST inside Diana King's rose-scented bedroom, checking for anything that could impede her speedy exit. She crossed the room and closed the paneled door leading to the hallway. Then she flipped on her light.