He saw her coming, just a kid, probably no more than seventeen, grey skin and panda patches around wary eyes. She’d no doubt that his street radar had pegged her immediately as a cop.
‘It’s okay. I’m not here to hassle you. Nothing like that.’
He was still cautious, ready to spring up and grab the handful of belongings that were stuffed into a scruffy backpack, but he didn’t run. She walked with the plastic carrier bag in front of her and he eyed it up, doubtless able to smell the contents.
‘Want this? From the chicken place up the road. Just made and still hot.’
The boy’s brows furrowed. ‘What’s wrong with it?’
‘Well, it’s high in trans fats and saturates, has far too much sugar and salt and it will play havoc with your blood cholesterol. But it will probably taste good.’
He was still confused. ‘Why did you buy it if you don’t want it?’
She smiled. ‘I just lost my appetite.’
CHAPTER 3
The kid was still in the garden of the house on Finley when the cop car rolled in. He stood where he’d called from, pale and scared, a set of headphones around his neck, obeying the emergency operator’s orders not to move.
The uniforms eased their way out of the car like it was a Sunday morning.
‘You Caleb?’
The boy nodded then thought better of it. ‘Yes, sir.’
Kovacic made for the kid while Rojo headed to the window.
‘What were you doing here?’ It sounded like an accusation because it was.
‘Working.’
‘Working for the homeowner?’
‘No.’
Kovacic – broad, bulky and close-cropped – furrowed his brows and stared. ‘Then who you working for?’
‘A company – nViron. They pay me to check folk’s lawns. I look for ones that don’t use too much water and put up a thank-you sign.’ He gestured over the cop’s shoulder to the back of the sign he’d staked earlier.
The cop shook his head, sighed heavily and produced a notebook. ‘Spell it. The company.’
‘Small n, capital v, iron.’
Kovacic looked up from his pad. ‘That’s not a word. You don’t spell like that. I hope you got a number for them so I can check your story.’
Caleb held up one of the signs from his bag: nViron, the company’s number below it. Kovacic scowled and jotted it down. ‘What’s your full name?’
‘Caleb Ashton Washington.’
‘You got a real job?’
‘Just this.’
Kovacic stared hard. ‘Address.’
Caleb gave it and the cop called it in. ‘You don’t go anywhere till that comes back exactly as you say it is. Understand?’
‘I just found the guy,’ Caleb protested. ‘I saw him lying there and called the cops. What else should I have done?’
‘You go around looking in people’s windows?’ Kovacic shouted. ‘Casing the joint or are you some kind of creep? Maybe something worse.’
Scared, Caleb began to stammer out denials, cut off only by the other cop striding over and pushing himself between Caleb and Kovacic. Rojo walked his partner a few yards away.
‘What are you doing, Mario? The kid’s shitting himself.’
Kovacic grinned. ‘Just busting his balls. Because I can. And because I was waiting on you.’
‘Not because he’s black?’
‘Fuck you. What’s going on inside?’
‘One dead guy. No sign of foul play. I’m guessing he’s been deceased a few days. Neighbours say the homeowner is an Ethan Garland. Late fifties, lives alone, keeps himself to himself. They don’t know much about him. Say he’s lived here ten years, works from home, something to do with online magazines.’
‘We going in?’
‘CSI are on their way but they could easy be a couple of hours. No reason to wait. Don’t want to deprive you of the chance to break a door down.’
Kovacic smiled. ‘Let me at it.’
It took just seconds for the burly cop to smash through the lock and the door to fly back on its hinges. They stepped inside, cutting through a haze of dust motes swirling in the sudden burst of sunlight. They smelled death immediately.
‘Man . . .’ Kovacic groaned. ‘The stink. A stiff in near a hundred degrees. We don’t get paid enough for this. Annie’s making black risotto tonight and this is killing my appetite.’
‘Mario, it’s why we get paid,’ Rojo reminded him. ‘Let’s just get on with it.’
They moved from the hallway to the backlit murkiness of the room facing the street. Standing in the doorway, they saw that the curtains screened the strong daylight rather than shut it out. A shard of sunlight cut through the middle of the gloom like a laser, showing dust and flies dancing together. Rojo flicked a light switch to avoid tripping over anything but they could have found their way to the body blindfolded.
The neighbours had described Ethan Garland as being in his late fifties, stocky, broad-shouldered build with receding fair hair and glasses. The bloated corpse on the floor was either Garland or someone impersonating him.
‘Jesus, I hate it when they’ve been unattended,’ Kovacic moaned. ‘We don’t get paid—’
‘You said.’
Rojo couldn’t argue with the sentiment. The stench of the putrefaction was almost overwhelming and the trail where foam-filled blood had leaked from the mouth and nose was enough to turn even a strong stomach, and his partner didn’t have one of those. Kovacic backed off, leaving Rojo to examine the body.
He knelt, a handkerchief covering his mouth, and examined the body without disturbing it. He’d seen enough corpses that he could do his job but not so many that it didn’t still affect him. When that day came, he figured it would be his cue to quit and work mall security.
There was no sign of trauma, no visible injuries or wounds. There had been no indication of a break-in. Nothing suspicious at all. The man was dressed in light brown chinos, now stained darker round the groin, and a white short-sleeved shirt hanging loose at the waist. His spectacles lay halfway off his face.
‘Heart attack,’ Rojo conjectured aloud. ‘Most likely. Maybe a brain haemorrhage or a blood clot. Heart attack most likely though.’
‘Charlie,’ Kovacic called to his partner. ‘Take a look at this.’
Carlos Rojo looked up, irritated at the interruption. ‘What?’ He followed the other cop’s gaze, seeing a number of framed pieces on the wall. ‘Art? Didn’t think that was your thing.’
‘It’s not. But this ain’t art. Like I said, take a look.’
Rojo caught the tone in the other cop’s voice this time and huffed his way to his feet. Kovacic was standing before a thick black frame. Behind the glass, a black Jack Daniel’s T-shirt was pinned to the canvas.
‘Who’d frame that?’
‘Read the plaque,’ Kovacic told him, before taking a couple of paces to his right where the next frame hung.
Rojo read the engraved gold plaque screwed to the wall as if they were in some art gallery.
‘Shirt worn by Richard Ramirez aka the Night Stalker.’
There was a black and white photograph in the bottom right-hand corner of the frame. Ramirez, flinty cheekbones and piercing stare under the tangle of dark hair, being led into court with a detective on each arm. He was wearing a Jack Daniel’s T-shirt. White lettering reading: Old Time. Old No. 7 brand. Tennessee Sour Mash Whiskey.