Book Preview - Credo's Honor

Chapter One

Grumpy because my sergeant, Kate Brannigan, had dragged me out of bed at an ungodly hour for someone else’s case, I peered over the lip of the dumpster, “Yup.”

“Yup?” Tucson Police Homicide Sergeant Jon Logan pulled the zipper on his quilted coat a little higher, then stepped up next to me and leaned towards the green metal container, carefully keeping his hands behind his back to forestall accidentally touching the several years accumulation of putrid grease, old burger meat and dried milkshakes lining the edge of the rim. Little white puffs streamed from his mouth with each breath.

The two of us stood in a dead-end alley to the side of a neighborhood greasy spoon. He was a handsome man, blonde even into his forties, with a quick wit and a sharp, questioning mind.

Midnight had come and gone, and other than our flashlights, the only illumination was from the red and yellow neon sign of the Sling ‘Em burger joint blinking above the opening to the alley.

Sling ‘Em’s claim to fame was their “world famous” Beefcake Sliders—a two-ounce beef patty slathered in an oily pink secret sauce and tucked into an unwholesome white bread bun.

Kate had come to the call-out as well, and when she walked up, I turned to her and shrugged. “He’s dead.”

Logan moved to stand next to her and it occurred to me they could have been the models for Mattel’s Ken and Barbie dolls. Kate’s ponytail perfectly matched the coloring of his hair, but now that I thought about it, she didn’t have Barbie’s buxom body. She was well built though and not someone you wanted to take on in a fight.

It was obvious Logan wasn’t happy about being called out for the third time in three consecutive nights, and the sarcasm of his next words was in direct proportion to his accumulated sleep deprivation. “He’s dead? What was your first clue, Alex? Of course, he’s dead, you m—.” He stopped himself in the middle of the word and raised his hands in surrender before rubbing his tired eyes.

I shrugged. “I wasn’t sure you’d seen the hole in his face big enough to drive a locomotive through. Why does the homicide unit need me to come to one of their scenes, anyway? The guy’s dead, Sarge. It’s your case, right?”

His homicide detectives had finished setting up the portable lights, and the dumpster was suddenly bathed in so much light that even the rats paused to squint in blind stupefaction before scurrying out of sight.

Sgt. Logan shielded his eyes with an upraised hand. “The killing has all the earmarks of an execution. Since you’ve become the de facto expert on the local mafia, we thought you might know who it is.”

A second set of lights switched on, illuminating the parking lot in front of the restaurant. I blinked at Kate, who looked as awake and well-groomed as she usually does when she first walks into the office at nine in the morning. Confused about why they’d dragged me out of bed for a run-of-the-mill homicide, I ran a hand through my sleep-induced mohawk, trying to get it to lay down. “Doesn’t he have I.D?”

The muscles of Logan’s jaws twitched, his growing irritation showing in the ever-tightening muscles along his shoulders and neck. “If he had I.D, Alex, do you think I would have called you out here?”

I didn’t like his snarky tone, but when Kate crossed her arms and began tapping her pen on her forearm, I turned back to the bin and mumbled, “No, Sir. I guess not.” Logan was one of the few really good sergeants on the department and I didn’t want to irritate him anymore than I already had.

Truth be told, I hate dead bodies. I can compartmentalize just about everything about my job, but I have a difficult time shutting out certain images and odors whenever I sit in front of a plate of food that resembles some aspect of a mutilated corpse.

When I’d worked patrol, I’d had a call where an old man had died alone while sitting in his Barcalounger eating refried beans. The beans had nothing to do with his death, but the sight of them flowing out of his mouth had soured me on anything remotely resembling smashed Pinto beans.

Realizing I wasn’t going to be able to get away with a cursory look, I, Alexandra Wolfe, a one hundred twenty-five-pound, five foot six, brown-haired, brown-eyed detective in the Tucson Police Department Special Crimes unit, steeled myself and once more peered over the green dumpster’s rim.

Gunshot wounds to the head tend to follow standard patterns, one of which is unless the entire face is blown off from a shotgun blast or a large caliber weapon, the entry hole will be small and the exit large, but the end result is usually at least part of the face is left intact to make an identification.

Unfortunately, this victim, lying on his side on a bed of discarded buns and old lettuce, had been shot point blank in the back of his head, thus blowing out most of his face and rendering him unrecognizable.

Except… I moved to the side of the dumpster to get a better view of what was left of the lower part of his face. I glanced up at Logan, “Can I move the head to get a better look?”

Logan shouted to Detective Andy Montagne, who’d been working homicides for as long as I’ve been in special investigations, “You finished taking pics yet, Montagne?”

The too‑handsome‑for‑his‑own‑good Montagne straightened after photographing something on the sidewalk leading into the restaurant. He pushed a shock of his thick black hair out of his eyes and gave Logan the thumbs up. “All good, Boss.”

When Logan lifted his chin in my direction indicating I could do whatever I needed to do, I pulled a pair of latex gloves from my pocket, wrestled them on and stepped onto a wooden box someone had set next to the dumpster. Leaning in, but still careful not to touch the rim with any part of my body, I gingerly put my fingers on the man’s jaw and turned the head so it faced me straight on.

Kate and Logan moved closer and craned their necks to get a closer look at the pulpy mess that remained attached to the neck by a few strands of skin and sinew.

Most everything above the mouth had been blown apart, but a quick look at the lips confirmed what I already suspected. I’d caught a glimpse of it during my first cursory peek over the rim but turning the mouth away from a ketchup covered fry confirmed my suspicions. A v-shaped scar bisected the man’s lower lip, exposing a couple of fake teeth that had been jolted loose by the blast.

Kate motioned with a gloved hand. “Pito?”

“That’d be my guess.”

Logan’s brows came down low. “Pito?”

Nodding, I used my thumb and forefinger to move a piece of limp lettuce off the sleeve of the man’s right arm. I pushed up the overcoat, undid the button on the shirt cuff and pulled it back, exposing a line of six small, gray, amateurishly inked tattoos that vaguely resembled human skulls stair stepping the inside of the arm. “Agapito Mancini, a bodyguard for the Angelino family.”

Sergeant Logan indicated the skulls, “More like a hitman than a bodyguard. Each of those skulls represent a body he’s put in the ground.”

Since Gianina Angelino, the head of the Angelino crime family, is a friend of mine, I bristled at his implications, regardless of the fact that he was absolutely correct. “He was a bodyguard,” I emphasized the word, “who came to Tucson to protect Ms. Angelino after the Andrulis family killed her father.”

He shrugged. “Whatever. Looks like this is your case if you want it, Kate. We’re swamped right now and could use the help. Some lowlife gangster gets blown away, it’s not like it’s going to make the front-page news.”

I started shaking my head. “No, no, Kate. That’s not a good idea.” I really didn’t want to be the one investigating Gia or anyone else among her circle of friends…or…enemies—I never could be sure on a day-to-day basis which was which.

Pito, an obnoxious, loathsome, nasty little toad was universally disliked among the various mafia syndicates, and I wouldn’t be surprised if someone in the Angelino family had decided to give the guy a final facial.

“You have something against doing your job, Detective Wolfe?” Kate’s tone was one that brooked no dissent.

“No, but­­­—”

“No? Glad to hear it.” She turned back to Logan. “Can your people leave the lights in place? I’ll have my guys return them when we’re through.” She pulled her cellphone off her belt and began composing a group callout text to the other members of our unit.

Logan nodded once. “No problem, and thanks. I owe you one.” He walked out to the middle of the parking lot and motioned his people over. I heard him tell them to go home and one by one they ducked beneath the yellow crime scene tape and drove away in their sedans.

I glared down at Pito, thinking he’d been a thorn in my side ever since the day I’d met him and I cursed the guy for getting his head blown off, in the middle of the night no less, just to aggravate and inconvenience me one last time.

“Start searching around the dumpster and in the parking lot while we’re waiting for the others to arrive.” Kate’s gaze roamed over the garbage surrounding the body, expertly taking in every little detail. “You and Casey will have to dump this trash out onto tarps and go through it after the body is removed.”

I held my hands out to the sides. “Kate, this is Pito. Agapito piece of shit Mancini. Do we really care who did us the favor of blowing his little pea brain all over creation?”

Kate stepped so close I could see the gold flecks in her otherwise dark brown eyes. “Sometimes I wonder whether you’d rather go back to patrol instead of being part of my investigative unit.”

Sighing, I held my hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay. You’re right.” I buttoned the topmost buttons on my quilted winter coat and silently thanked the gods Pito hadn’t carked it in the middle of summer. At least he’d saved me from the stench of rotting flesh and the irritating buzz of hungry flies.

I returned to my car, popped open the trunk and searched around for my dwindling supply of evidence bags. This was my third callout this week, and I hadn’t had time to restock. I found some and while I was stuffing them into my pocket, an emaciated teenager sidled over and leaned her hip against my car.

I’d seen her a couple of times walking Miracle Mile, the local boulevard frequented by hookers and their johns, and I motioned to her skinny legs barely covered by an extremely short miniskirt and her light blue sweater, the ends of which she held pulled in close around her chest. “You should be inside the Sling ‘Em. Where’re the rest of your clothes? You’ll freeze to death dressed like that.”

When her lips pulled back in a fake semblance of a smile, a smile that probably hadn’t reached her eyes in a very long time, the gaping holes and rotted black teeth told me everything I needed to know. She lifted one shoulder and spoke with a timid, childlike voice. “Don’t let folks in if ya got no scratch. If ya can’t buy no burger, they kick ya out.” She pulled the sweater tighter and lifted her chin toward the dumpster. “I’m th’ one foun’ him. I was lookin’ fer slops they throwed in th’ trash.”

“Did you tell that to the other detectives who were here first?”

“Nope.” She shook her head back and forth. “Dempsey….” She raised her chin off her chest and squinted at me. “You know Dempsey?”

I nodded and tried to keep the derision I felt for the man off my face.

“So, Dempsey spit on my shoes when I walked up t’ tell him. He used t’ wanna give me a bam in th’ ham when he wore th’ blues, but now he won’t even look at me.” We both looked down at her tattered secondhand Nikes. I could see the wet spot on the toe where the spit had landed and she moved that foot behind the other to hide it.

“What’s your name?”

“Cherry.”

“No, I mean your real name.”

She blinked a few times and slowly shook her head. “I been Cherry so long, before don’t mean nothin’. I’m just Cherry, now.”

I studied her a minute and had to change my first impression of her age. She had the rail thin look of an anorexic teen, but when I took the time to really look at her, the signs of age became apparent. Small wrinkles fanned out from the edges of her eyes and her cheeks hung looser than they would on a teenager. Despite the fact that a heavy meth addiction had robbed her of several teeth, a young woman’s skin should have been a bit tighter and have a lot less stretch. I’d say mid to late twenties, maybe? Thirty? It was hard to know.

“Let’s go inside, Cherry. I’ll buy you a burger and you can warm up and tell me about finding the body.”

Cherry looked behind her and then over at Kate, suspicious of any kindness coming her way.

I grabbed my recorder out of the car and walked toward the restaurant, hoping she’d follow.

Kate called over to me, “Alex?”

“I need to do a quick interview, Boss.”

Kate sized up Cherry and must have realized if I didn’t get the woman’s story now we’d likely never get it. She nodded and waved her notepad at me before stepping off some measurement or another. We’d get precise measurements when the rest of the unit arrived, but I’d been with her long enough to know she was working out a possible scenario and would enlighten us when she thought the time was right.

I held the door open for Cherry, who looked like a dog about to get a beating as she lightly stepped over the threshold.

The night manager, a clean-shaven man in his forties, started our way, ready to cut Cherry off at the pass.

I wrestled my badge out from under my heavy jacket and held it up. “She’s with me.” To make sure he understood we were paying customers, I turned to Cherry and asked, “What would you like? You can have anything on the menu.”

She studied the menu board high on the wall behind an elderly woman manning the cash register.

The plumpish, gray-haired woman had a kind smile and gave Cherry an encouraging nod. “Can you read okay, Sweetie Pie? I’m happy to help if…” She spoke with a slight southern drawl as her deep green eyes took in Cherry’s thin sweater and bare legs. Her gaze flicked to me and pity poured off her in waves.

Closing her lips and lifting her hand to her mouth to hide her ruined teeth, Cherry gave the woman a small nod. “Yes, Ma’am, I kin read.”

There were no other customers in the place at this time of night and the woman, whose name tag read, Annalee, nodded her approval. “Take your time, then. There’s a lot to choose from.”

Cherry glanced at me. “I don’t eat much. I get full real easy.”

I pulled my wallet out of my coat pocket. “That’s okay. Order what you want and you can take what you don’t eat with you. Save it for later, if you like.”

That decided her and she moved closer to the counter. “Could I please have a cup of hot coffee, a batter fried fish sandwich, some French fries…”

Her cheeks flushed a faint shade of pink when she turned to me. “Do you mind if I get an apple fritter? My momma used to buy me fritters whenever she had a few extra dollars. They always remind me of her.”

“Sure. Get whatever you want.”

“And one of them apple fritters, please.”

The woman looked at me and I held up two fingers. She nodded and added an extra fritter to the order. “And for you?”

“Just a hot chocolate, please.”

“Oh…they have hot chocolate?”

“Make that two hot chocolates and another coffee for my sergeant outside.”

The woman smiled. “That’ll be on the house since you’re law enforcement.”

I quickly shook my head. “No Ma’am, I always pay for what I get, but I appreciate the offer.” Annalee quickly filled the order and after I’d paid and had Cherry safely ensconced in a corner booth where I could watch her through the huge plate glass window, I grabbed the extra coffee and took it out to Kate. “Here you go, Boss. This should help warm you up.”

Pulling off her glove, she gingerly took the hot cup and nodded her thanks. “Who’s the girl?”

I glanced back to make sure Cherry was still inside. “She says she’s the one who found the body.”

“Didn’t she give a statement to the homicide dicks?”

I thought about how to answer that. Even though Dempsey is a waste of a good badge, it went against my grain to rat on the guy.

Kate must have seen my hesitation because after she took a sip, she said, “Never mind. I get it. Go get her statement and then come back out and search around that dumpster.”

“Yes, Ma’am.” I returned to the lovely warmth of the seating area and sat facing the front door instead of the one that read “Employees only.” That one opened onto the crime scene, and since Kate was in the alley and would cover my back if need be, I chose to watch the front.

Cherry had bypassed the fish sandwich and had gone directly to the fritters. She nibbled on the last bite of the second one as I took the cap off my hot chocolate to let it cool.

I’d had Sling ‘Em’s hot drinks before and knew they’d scald the hair off a gorilla’s knuckles if you didn’t let them cool before taking a sip. “Do you mind if I ask you questions while you eat? My sergeant’s anxious for me to get back out to help.” It didn’t matter if she minded or not, but I figured it didn’t hurt to be courteous to someone to whom the idea of getting respect from another person was a foreign concept.

“No, I don’t mind.” She unwrapped the fish sandwich and took a tiny bite, setting the remainder neatly on the wax paper she’d laid out in front of her.

While she moved the food around in her mouth, probably trying to find a tooth that actually worked, I brought out my notepad and the recorder and set it on the table in front of us. “This is Detective Alexandra Wolfe…” I went on to give the date and time before introducing Cherry. “You told me your name is Cherry. Can you give me your last name?”

She glanced down at the recorder. “Don’t remember it.”

“People usually remember their name.”

She lifted her shoulder. “I don’t.”

“Can you tell me why you don’t?”

She chuckled half-heartedly, “Too many drugs, I s’pose.”

“Do you remember your birthdate?”

“January fourth.”

“What year?”

She lifted a shoulder. “Nineteen‑ninety probably. That’s what my Momma thought, but she wasn’t too good on rememberin’ neither.”

I wrote down 1/4/90, added a question mark and tapped the pen on the pad. I doubted we’d ever be able to find her again, let alone use her as a witness, but I decided she might accidentally give me something I could follow up on. I reluctantly continued with my questions. “Where do you live?”

“In the tunnels under Fourth Avenue.”

“Cherry, you told me you were the one to find the man in the dumpster. Can you tell me some more about what you saw?”

“Well, around eleven-thirty, I know it was around then ‘cuz they usually dump whatever burgers ‘n such they don’t sell out there in the dumpster. When I got here I—”

“How did you get here?”

“I walked. I don’t own no car. Anyways…” She took another small bite of her battered fish and carefully set it down again. “I went to see what they’d left and when I looked in, I saw that man.”

“How did you know it was a man?”

“Jus’ the way he was dressed. Couldn’t tell by his face or nothin’.”

“Did you see anyone else around?”

“Not really. Jus’ Tom Handy.”

Tom is a seventy-something Vietnam vet who panhandles more money in a month than I earn from the department. He lives in an RV parked out in the desert with his dog, a lurcher named Max. “Where did you see Tom?”

“He was leanin’ over the edge of the dumpster when I walked up. I thought he was gettin’ all the burgers so I yelled out, ‘Leave some fer me, Tom!’”

I nodded, waiting for her to continue.

“So, Tom jumps back real quick like, an’ it looks like he’s got somethin’ in his hand.”

“Food?”

“Don’t know. Don’t think so. He had a small knife in one hand an’ he jammed somethin’ inta his pocket with th’ other.”

“What did he jam into his pocket? Which pocket?”

“Don’t know what he stuffed in there, but it was his coat pocket.”

“That old green World War II field jacket he wears?”

“Nuh uh. He got a warmer one for when it gets cold like this. It’s…” Her brow crinkled while she tried to figure out a way to describe it. “Well, ya ever seen the book called Moby Dick?”

“Yes.” I smiled, curious as to where her meth addled brain might be taking me.

“It reminds me of Captain Ahab’s coat. Kinda black or maybe dark blue.” She shrugged. “I dunno, somthin’ like that.”

I tilted my head trying to picture Ahab on the cover of the book. “You mean like a peacoat?”

“Dunno what it’s called, but my momma read me that book over an’ over an’ over again. I used t’ love the pictures an’ such.”

“Where’s your momma now?”

“Dead. Long time ago.”

“Where did you live with your Momma when she was still alive?”

“A little town called Artesia Wells.”

“Where’s that?”

“Texas.”

“And your Dad?”

“Went to prison for killin’ Momma.”

I felt like I was in the middle of a bad western. Papa kills Momma and ends up in the hoosegow. Children left to fend for themselves, oldest daughter turns to prostitution and gets hooked on meth. Only I knew there wouldn’t be any happy ending to this one. My guess was Cherry would last another month at best and we’d probably find her frozen in a fetal position down in the tunnels. “Can you give me any idea what Tom had in his hand?”

“Nuh uh.”

“Paper? Hamburger, money?”

“Well, it kinda looked like part of a chain hangin’ down before he stuffed it in his pocket, but I can’t say fer sure.” The fritters and the few bites she’d taken of the fish had apparently filled her up because she wrapped the rest in the red and yellow checked wrapper and put it back into the bag with the fries.

Headlights lit up the interior of the restaurant before suddenly winking out. I twisted around and saw my partner, Casey Bowman, getting out of her sedan. She walked over to talk to Kate and I turned back to Cherry. “What kind of chain? A bike chain? A dog chain?”

“A chain, you know.” She put her fingers around her neck.

“A necklace?”

Nodding, she let her hand drop back into the bag and pulled out a French fry. “Maybe.” Nibbling the fry, she nodded slightly. “Maybe.”

“Cherry. This is important. Can you describe what little of the chain you saw? Anything.”

Her forehead wrinkled again while she tried to concentrate on what she’d seen. “Kinda black.”

I blinked and sat back. “Black? The chain was black?”

She shook her head. “Not really the chain. I mean, it dangled like a chain, but it weren’t no chain.”

Okay, the lack of synapses in her meth damaged brain was beginning to give me a headache.

“I mean…” She paused to allow the tiny protein dude in her brain to jump the chasm between synapse and receptor. “Maybe there were baubles or somethin’ on a chain. Black baubles.”

Sighing, I dutifully wrote down ‘black baubles.’

“It was dark. I just seen it for a second.”

I didn’t want to discourage her cooperation, so I said, “That’s okay. Which hand was the knife in?”

She blinked in confusion and then turned around in the booth so her back was to me. Presumably she now faced the same way Tom had faced when he looked at her. “This one.” She held up her right hand and wiggled her fingers and then turned back around.

“What did Tom do when you called out to him?”

“He took off, kinda runnin’, you know, th’ way he kinda hops and then runs and then hops again?”

The bell above the door sounded and I looked back to find Casey striding toward us. “Kate wants to know how much longer you’re gonna be.” She lifted her chin in Cherry’s direction. “Hey, Cherry. How ya doin’?” Apparently she and Cherry were acquainted, which didn’t surprise me because she had a soft spot for the down and out.

I held up a finger asking Casey to wait a second.

She dipped her chin once before moving to the register and ordering something from Annabel.

“Anything else you think I should know about?”

“You mean besides the man’s face bein’ blowed off?”

“Yeah, besides that.”

“No, Ma’am.”

I suddenly remembered one last question. “Oh, did you take anything out of the dumpster?”

She shook her head. “No, Ma’am. Them burgers didn’t look so good no more.”

Stomach a little queasy at that last tidbit, I turned off the recorder and stood. “Wait here a minute.” I went out to my car and pulled my workout bag from the trunk. I took my sweatshirt and sweatpants out and rezipped the bag before returning to where Cherry waited obediently in the corner booth. “Here. Put these on. They’re clean.” Right after I added that last part, I realized how stupid I sounded. Clean to her meant they’d been washed in the last two months.

She stared at my offering before lowering her head. “No, thank you. You done fed me an’ all and I can’t take your clothes, too.”

I set them on the table. “Yes, you can.” I knelt beside her. “Listen, Cherry. You know we can get you into a program, right? You don’t have to live like this.”

She stood and carefully folded over the top of the bag a couple of times.

Knowing she’d never go into a program where she couldn’t get her fix, I straightened and picked up the sweatshirt. “Look, these are workout clothes. I’m allergic to gyms, so you’d actually be doing me a favor by taking them.” I held open the bottom of the sweatshirt until she relented and set the bag back on the table. She pushed her stick arms into the sleeves and pulled it over her head. The sweatshirt hung off her like a father’s t-shirt engulfs his six-year-old son. The bottom almost dropped to below her miniskirt and I knew there was no way the sweatpants would stay around her emaciated waist.

Annabel must have realized the same thing because she pulled her belt out of the loops of her pants, making a zipping sound in the process, and came over to us. “You go on and pull on those pants, Child. We’ll tie ‘em on with this.”

Cherry did as she was told and after she’d doubled over the waistband, Annabel slipped the belt around her waist and cinched it tight. I must have had a surprised look on my face because Annabel smiled and recited from memory, “‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ I try to live by those words, Detective, and I can see you do as well.”

I glanced over her head at Casey, who raised her fist to her mouth and was doing her best not to scoff out loud.

I grinned at her and then motioned to the bag Cherry had reclaimed. “Enjoy the rest of your meal, and if I need to find you for some reason, I’ll check the tunnels.”

Annabel tut-tutted. “You live in the tunnels? You poor…”

Her voice trailed off as Casey, who had just accepted a burger and coffee from the manager and paid her bill, and I made our way outside to join the rest of the detectives in our unit.

They were all huddled in a circle around Kate who was briefing them on what we knew so far, which wasn’t much. I stepped between Nate Drewery, a handsome twenty-seven-year-old who stood six foot two with wide, muscular shoulders and handsome, Scots-Irish features and Allen Brodie, a forty-something sugar addict whose belly bulged over his waistband. Tony Rico stood to Allen’s right with his hands tucked beneath his underarms and his chin hiding beneath his fully buttoned up coat.

Kate finished her briefing and then asked, “Did you find out anything new, Alex?”

“Yeah, Cherry says when she was walking to the dumpster to look for food, Tom Handy, a local transient, was already rooting around in there. When she yelled at him, he jumped back with a knife in one hand and he stuffed some kind of chain or necklace into his coat pocket with the other. She said she thought it was black, but she didn’t get a very good look at it. Tom ran off and that’s all she knows.”

At the beginning of an investigation, any tiny little bit of information can either prove to be crucial or absolutely worthless. Because of this, everyone listened quietly while I told them what I’d found out. Well, that and because Kate ran a tight ship and she would have bitten anyone’s head off for interrupting.

Kate glanced around the circle. “Casey, you and Alex have the body and the dumpster.”

Nate snorted at our misfortune until Kate gave him the stink eye. He shut up after that.

“You’ll have to use blue evidence tarps and after the M.E. comes to get the body I want you to dump everything out onto the tarps and go through it.” This elicited chuckles around the group and Kate allowed a slight smile to tug at her lips. “Okay, okay. They get the dirty job today, tomorrow it’ll be one of you jokers.”

Brodie stage whispered behind his hand loud enough for everyone to hear, “Unless Alex pisses her off for some reason, then we’re in the clear.”

There was a general nodding of heads around the group, which in all fairness I had to join because pissing Kate off was my secondary job description. “Glad I could be of assistance to you guys.” When I glanced from Brodie to Kate, her smile had been replaced with a warning glare in my direction.

After I shrugged and mumbled, “Sorry Boss,” she turned her attention to Nate. “Nate, you have the parking lot and surrounding area, let’s say a good twenty‑five‑yard radius around the whole restaurant, and include the entire alley back here. Go over it with a fine-tooth comb. Tony, I want you doing interviews. Restaurant employees, any witnesses if you can find them. Knock on doors and wake people up if you have to.”

Tony Rico, whose black hair clumsily hung across his forehead and ended abruptly just above his ears, nodded. He’d done a stint in the navy and his hair was a combination messy chic and military regulation cut. He walked around in a perpetual good mood and was always quick with a smile or joke.

“Brodie see if you can find this Tom Handy. Bring him in if you have to, but I want to know what he took away from my crime scene.”

“You got it, Boss.”

I didn’t know if he knew where to find him, so I added my two cents. “Cherry says he’s wearing something resembling a peacoat now instead of his usual military fatigues, black or maybe dark blue. And the last time I saw him, he was living in his RV in that desert lot near 22^nd and the freeway.”

He’d pulled out his notebook and was taking everything down. “What kinda RV?”

“It’s one of those that have the front that looks like a truck. You know, like the RV is sitting on the truck chassis.” I didn’t know much about motorhomes and I could tell by the slight tilt of his head he didn’t either. I added helpfully, “They have the bed part sticking out over the cab.”

Casey stepped next to him and showed him a picture on her phone. “They’re called Class C’s. His is pretty small and looks like this.”

Everyone gathered around and Casey held up the phone so they could get a better look.

Pointing at the picture, Brodie asked, “What d’ya mean he’s livin’ in one of those? I thought you said he was a bum?”

Kate, always ready to give vets the benefit of the doubt, corrected him. “Homeless. Not necessarily a bum.”

Brodie shrugged, “Yeah, sorry Boss.” He looked back at me. “So, he’s homeless but he lives in an RV?”

“Well, yeah. People pour money into his hands because his limp suddenly gets worse when he works a corner. He has the pitiful look down pat. He made enough last year to buy an old RV.” I shrugged, “More power to him I say if he can get in out of this cold….” I pulled my coat tighter around my chest.

There were shrugs all around as everyone shuffled their feet back and forth in the freezing night air trying to get warm.

“Got it. Anything else I should know?” When I shook my head, he said, “Thanks. That’ll at least give me a starting point.”

At Kate’s, “Let’s get busy then,” we all scattered like football players leaving a huddle.

Casey and I retreated to the dumpster. When I squatted to get a better look beneath it, the smell of putrefied oil hit me. There was a drain in the back left of the enclosure and I assumed that was where the restaurant dumped their used frying oil.

The employees apparently weren’t particular when it came time to dump, and a line of white grease ran from the drain to the left rear wheel of the dumpster where it parted and flowed to either side and then congealed in a dip directly beneath the center of the waste bin.

The portable lights illuminated the inside of the enclosure, but I had to pull out my mini Maglite to get a clear picture underneath. I wondered if the Health Department ever came back here to check because the rotten food, discarded wrappers and the skeleton of a dead rat all combined to be the perfect breeding ground for the plague.

I glanced up at Casey, relieved she hadn’t brought her burger to munch on before we got started. I assumed she’d dumped it in her car before joining the group. “Uh, Case. You might want to rethink the burger you bought in there.”

She squatted, took one look at the rat and turned her head to the side. “That’s disgusting.”

“Yup. My guess is the poor little bugger ate a slider and that was all she wrote.”

We both stood and Casey stepped onto the wooden box. After quickly checking in the bin, she retrieved a shovel from her trunk and began systematically shifting trash around to get a better idea about what was inside.

Kate came over with a pair of rubber wellingtons and a packet containing a paper Tyvek suit and handed them to me.

Tyveks are disposable bodysuits made from a fairly dense polyethylene and I had no idea why she thought I needed one. “What am I supposed to do with these?”

“Pull ‘em on before you climb in there.”

“I’m not…” At the tilt of her head I knew it was useless to argue, so I pointed at the bin and then at a stack of tarps she’d dropped near the dumpster. “I thought you wanted us to dump it out onto the blue tarps.”

“Dump it out? You mean tilt it over onto its side?” She smiled at my naivete and with a gloved hand pulled on the dumpster’s lip. “Do you know how much these weigh?”

Casey piped up. “About eight‑hundred‑pounds empty.” She poked around a little more with her shovel. “I think it’s safe for you to get in over here, Alex.”

I gave her my best stink eye before donning the body suit and rubber boots and gingerly climbing into the bin with Pito. Kate handed me two paper bags to place over his hands, which I did before taking the proffered zip ties and zipping them in place.

She held out a third bag and used it to motion toward his head. “Bag his head, too.”

My lip curled in disgust and I was grateful when she pulled on some gloves and pulled over an old wooden pallet, which she stepped on in order to lean in to hold up what was left of the head so I could slide the bag over and secure it. Not many sergeants actually get their hands dirty, but Kate had always been the exception to the rule—one of the reasons there was always a long waiting list to get in whatever unit she was in charge of.

That accomplished, I finished rolling Pito to the side so we could see beneath his shoulders and butt. The movement released the odor of crap that had been hiding in his pants. He must have eliminated when they shot him and that combined with the grease and rotting food nearly did me in. I tried my best not to gag and mentally reminded myself exactly why I would never, ever transfer to the homicide unit.

Kate stepped back, blinking her eyes rapidly and obviously trying not to show her disgust. “Looks like he was killed somewhere else. There’s hardly any blood beneath him, or anywhere around for that matter.”

I knew Gia paid her people well, but the overcoat seemed much too nice for a goon like him. When I opened his camel brown coat and slipped my fingers into his inside pocket, I felt a small, rectangular piece of cardboard. I pulled it out and realized I’d found the price tag for the coat. Bruno Cuccinelli was embossed in raised gold lettering and the price, $7,200, had been done in shiny silver numbers. I whistled and then handed the tag to Kate.

When she read it, she kept her head down but raised her gaze to meet mine. I knew what she was thinking and I didn’t like it. If Pito was on the take behind Gia’s back and Gia found out…I pursed my lips and felt in the pocket on the other side.

Kate said, “You need to stay impartial, Alex. It’s part of the job.”

I angrily threw the lapel back down on his chest. “This is why I didn’t want you to take the case, Kate. I knew, and you knew, we might end up investigating Gia and her people for offing the douche bag and…”

She stepped close and lowered her voice, “And which would you prefer, Alex? To have me in charge of the case with you involved in the investigation or Jon Logan and Dempsey investigating? Logan would be fine, but do you honestly think Dempsey would give the Angelinos a fair shake when all he ever talks about is how the department should take Gia down?”

That cooled my temper. I honestly hadn’t thought of it that way and although I knew Kate didn’t like my friendship with Gia, she’d always do right by an investigation.

She glanced around to make sure we were alone and then continued in an even quieter tone, “Why do you think Jon called me? Because his guys are too busy? They are, but they’ve worked multiple cases before with no problems. Or did you buy that B.S. about you being the…” She held two fingers up on each hand like quotation marks,” “resident expert on the local mafia?”

That hurt my ego a bit, but she was right. The homicide detail wouldn’t give up a case simply because the mafia was involved. On the contrary, normally they’d love a case like this. And my friend Chuck had forgotten more about the mafia and local gangs than I’d ever know.

She continued, “Remember, Sgt. Logan inherited Dempsey from the previous sergeant and he’s well aware what kind of investigation would happen if Dempsey knew Pito was one of the Angelino family. I need you to keep an open mind and investigate this to the best of your ability and I’ll do the same.”

Realizing Kate had actually done me a favor, I nodded my thanks, and then grimaced as I felt in his back pocket for a wallet. Logan had already said there was no identification on the body, but I always double-checked details like that. It felt squishy beneath the pants material and I could only imagine what lay beneath. The rest of his pockets were empty.

The back-up beeper on the M.E. van filled the air and I looked up to see them backing it close to our scene. Jayne, with her big-toothed smile and Kendra, the younger one who always wore her dark brown hair pulled into a bun, got out and began pulling out their equipment. Jayne stepped over to Kate. “What you got, Sarge? Dispatch didn’t give us much.”

 As Kate motioned for me to get out so they could retrieve the body, she escorted Jayne to the lip of the dumpster. “GSW to the back of the head. We bagged the hands and head but go easy on the head as there’s not much left and I don’t want you accidentally decapitating him from the jaw up.”

At Jayne’s, “Got it,” I put one boot on the dumpster’s rim, swung my leg over and hopped down onto the box. As I stepped off, my foot slipped in a coagulated puddle of grease.

Jayne grabbed my arm before I fell into the muck, a small favor for which I will be eternally in her debt. She and Kendra made quick work of getting Pito zipped into the body bag and off to the morgue. One body was the same as the next as far as they were concerned.

That is, they headed off once they’d gotten their stubborn engine to turn over. It had taken three tries, and I’d begun to wonder whether they’d have to bring a second M.E. van to the scene. In the meantime, I helped Casey cover the ground in front of the crime scene with the blue tarps. That accomplished, I watched as she, too, donned the protective overclothing and boots.

We both climbed into the bin and began tossing old buns, meat patties, and discarded paper plates over the side. A lot of the trash was already tied up in thick black garbage bags, so it was fairly easy to toss them onto the furthest the tarp to search once we were back on solid ground.

Anything we found that looked like it didn’t belong we set onto a small portion of the tarp we’d designated for that purpose. Even little things, like a small ballpoint pen, a single cowboy boot and the broken bottom of a blue and white flowered lamp went into that area. We tried to keep all the food items on a single space so it would be a simple task to pick up all four corners of the tarp and toss them back in with one fell swoop.

Both of us heaved a sigh of relief when we finally began seeing the bottom of the container. A half of something round and black poking out from under a dill pickle caught my eye. On top of the pickle, a shiny white maggot had apparently ingested too much brine because he lay in an immovable stupor.

Kate had been splitting her time between running the crime scene and acting as our photographer since we couldn’t exactly handle the camera with the same slimy gloves we were using to sort through the trash. “Hey, Kate. Can you come take a picture of this?”

Casey leaned over my shoulder. “Whaddya got?”

“Maybe nothing, except Cherry said the chain Tom Handy tried to hide from her was black. But then she said the chain wasn’t black. What if she was trying to describe a chain with a bunch of beads on it?” I pointed to my find. “Well, here’s a black bead…”

A camera flashed off to my side and Kate said, “Good find. Now let’s hope Allen finds the necklace to go with it.”

I gingerly moved aside the pickle, maggot and all, to expose a small black bead.

The camera flashed again and then Kate pulled out a small evidence envelope and a pair of tweezers from her pocket, saw my greasy gloves and pulled out two clean ones. “Here.”

I dropped my used gloves over the side onto the tarp and pulled on the fresh ones. Only then did Kate hand me the tweezers, which I used to carefully pick up the bead and drop it into the proffered bag.

Kate closed the bag and then motioned to Casey. “From here on out, you toss and let Alex collect anymore beads with the tweezers and clean gloves.”

Usually an amiable teammate, Casey’s lips were clenched tightly shut. Even she was feeling queasy about rooting through all this greasy trash. Her jaw set with determination, she nodded slowly, “Yes, Ma’am.”

Kate chuckled, “Maybe this will convince you to take that sergeant’s test that’s coming up.”

My head shot up and I stared at Casey. The little green gremlin of envy reared his ugly head because Kate hadn’t ever suggested to me that I should take the sergeant’s test.

Casey chuckled and shook her head. “No, I’m right where I want to be, Sarge. I have no intention of ever taking anymore promotional tests. Getting to detective was hard enough.”

My head swiveled between Casey and Kate, who raised her eyebrows at Casey’s refusal and shrugged. When she glanced at me, I quickly stood and began moving trash around with the toe of my boot. I’d be damned if I’d let her see I was even a tiny bit affected by her words. Truth be told, I’d be thrilled for Casey to become a sergeant and I’d even be happy to work for her. It just stung that Kate thought she was ready for it and I wasn’t.

Actually, I knew I wasn’t, but that didn’t make it any easier. I glanced over my shoulder and saw that Kate had gone to see whatever had caught Nate’s attention as he was kneeling down poking an object on the ground with his pen.

Casey reached out to companionably punch me in the arm but remembered her dirty gloves at the last minute. “We’re partners, Alex. Maybe someday, when you become sergeant, I’ll come work for you, but right now, you’re stuck with me.”

I sighed dramatically, “Well, if I’m stuck with you, I’m stuck with you. Somebody has to keep an eye on your work or God only knows what you’d get up to.”

Smiling her assent, Casey went back to chucking the last few buns and bags while I carefully looked around for any more baubles. I picked up a silver-colored back that slips onto the post of a pierced earring, dropped it into a bag, and set it on the top of the lip of the bin. “Keep your eyes out for a pierced earring.”

Casey grunted her assent. Our search was nearly done, and I couldn’t wait to climb out, find a shower, and put on a fresh set of clean clothes.