“You learn that from Gavin? The signature thing?” asked Rall.
“It’s an FBI term,” said Jarsdel.
“Ah. An FBI term.” Rall rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Well, you and the FBI aren’t lookin’ too good right now. Creeper’s print’s on the master bedroom door. So I think he decided to change things up.”
“Bullshit. Not possible,” said Jarsdel. He couldn’t stop the words from tumbling out, but he discovered he wasn’t interested in amending them. There was no way this could be the same man.
“I’m just tellin’ you the same person who did the Rustads and Lauterbachs and all the rest, along with Amy Sponholz, put his print on that door.”
“All that proves is that he was here, not that he killed anybody.”
“On the pillow. Bread knife, too. And we found a tension rod near the front door. From a lockpick set. Which answers our question as to how he got into the LT’s house.”
“Maybe—”
“Whoa, wait.” Rall held up a hand. “You sayin’ the Creeper was here, but he didn’t hurt nobody. That it was someone else did the actual killing. Am I understanding you correctly?”
Put that way, it sounded ridiculous. But the scene was so different. And as much as it sickened Jarsdel to think about it Ipgreve’s way, the ME was right about the child’s murder; compared to the rest, it was a mercy. It felt pro forma, something done out of necessity rather than to gratify an impulse. The Creeper wouldn’t have been so gentle. Hadn’t been so gentle. His youngest victim before tonight was ten-year-old Wally Verheugen, and after seeing the crime-scene photos, Jarsdel had gotten blackout drunk, hoping to scrub the images from his memory. It hadn’t worked.
“I just…” Jarsdel looked around, hoping for something to jump out at him, to give him an answer.
“Hey.” Rall’s tone was sympathetic. “Guy’s crazy as they come. Not gonna fit into those neat little categories.”
“The kid, though. Right? You saw the Verheugen pictures.”
Rall shrugged. “Maybe this girl reminded him of his long-lost sister or something. So he decided not to rip her apart like the others. I don’t fuckin’ know, and I ain’t interested in getting inside his brain to figure it out.”
Jarsdel shook his head. “I still don’t think it’s the whole story.” An idea occurred to him then, one so fantastical that he immediately decided he shouldn’t mention it until he’d thought it through some more. But something on his face must have telegraphed his revelation to Rall, because the detective raised his eyebrows.
“You havin’ a Sherlock Holmes moment?”
“No.”
“Now I’m curious. What is it?”
“It’s probably crazy.”
“Probably. Let’s do it anyway.”
Jarsdel tried to come up with a way of phrasing it that wouldn’t sound quite so outlandish, then gave up. “What if someone’s using his prints?”
“Come again?”
“I’m not saying the prints aren’t his, but what if they’ve been duplicated? Faked?”
Rall looked mystified. Jarsdel went on.
“I don’t know exactly how it would work, but let’s say you scanned the exemplars we have on file and fed them into a 3-D printer. Couldn’t you make a few rubber fingers with the Creeper’s prints? I mean, who better to be a fall guy, right?”
Rall turned his own hand over and examined the lines swirling and looping at the tips of his fingers. He turned what was left of the apple he’d been eating and found a patch of unbroken skin. He pressed his right thumb against the green flesh, then angled the fruit until the light caught it the right way. He looked at the print, then looked at his thumb.
“Nope,” he concluded. “Wouldn’t work.”
“Why not?”
“It’d be backwards.” He pointed at the place he’d touched. Jarsdel could only make out a faint smudge, but knew if a crime-scene tech dusted the apple, there’d be a perfect latent of Rall’s print.
“Think about it,” Rall went on. “You scan that and put it on some dummy hand, you’re gonna get the mirror image of your actual thumbprint.” He bit off that chunk of apple, cutting through the crisp meat with the sound of a beer can opening.
“Couldn’t you just flip the image?” asked Jarsdel. “I don’t know much about computers, but I’d think that’d be as easy as clicking on an editing feature.”
Rall’s paused in his chewing, but only for a moment. He was about to take another bite, then noticed there was little left of the apple but its core and stem. He ripped a paper towel from the roll by the sink, wrapped up the remains of his apple, and slipped it in his coat pocket.
“But you said a lot of the same ’bout the last scene,” said the detective. “LT’s wife. How it didn’t match and all that. But we got his DNA right outta her mouth. You can’t 3-D print someone’s DNA, so what’s your answer for that one?”
Jarsdel didn’t have an answer. “I concede I may have been wrong about that. I can buy that he broke from his pattern to get to the lieutenant.”
“Oh, you concede, huh?” Rall shook his head. “You know, I ain’t impressed. You spend a lot of time just battin’ shit around and tryin’ to force it to agree with you. It’s like you think you could just come into the police and do it better than everybody else because you’re smart at other things. But you got no street degree. You like to think and you like to talk, but when’s the last time you tried real police work? The unsexy shit. The shit that actually works. Talk my goddamn ear off with all your pontificatin’, but it ain’t worth nothin’.”
Rall pushed past him and moved back down the short hallway toward the bedrooms. Jarsdel didn’t follow. He hadn’t been prepared for Rall’s fusillade of criticism, perhaps had even—naively—supposed they shared a burgeoning friendship.
Part of him wanted to go back to Hollywood Station and work something else. Then again, Hollywood Station wouldn’t solve his problems, either. That was Gavin’s domain, and now Haarmann’s.
Haarmann, a homicide detective. The inmates were truly running the asylum.
“Hey.”
Jarsdel started. It was Mailander. She’d come up beside him during his reverie, and he hadn’t noticed. “Oh, hey.”
“Didn’t mean to scare you.”
“No, I’m…I was only woolgathering. What’s going on?”
“He’s picking up his timeline. Amy Sponholz was less than two weeks ago. And it looks like he’s definitely abandoned his routine. No more hiding out. Another blitz attack.”
“Yeah.” Jarsdel didn’t want to talk about it and was hoping she’d go away, but she just stood there. Finally, if only to fill the awkward silence, he said, “Went back to biting, though.”
Mailander thought about that a while. “Except for the girl.”
Jarsdel grunted. “Ipgreve says it was merciful, the way he killed her.”
“Compared to the others, I guess it was.”
“He meant for the Creeper. Merciful for himself, so he wouldn’t have to see what he was doing.”
“Never bothered him before, killing kids.”
“No. I don’t know. Need some fresh air.” He edged past her and found his way outside. Near a dying stand of bougainvillea, he bent over and put his hands on his knees. One deep breath, then another. Could hear his pulse slamming in his ears. Could feel his heart kicking away, like an animal caught in a thorn bush.
Lauterbach, Rustad, Santiago, Verheugen, Galka. Then Amy Sponholz. And now Minchew.
“We’re losing,” he said into the night.
21
Jarsdel had resolved to at least make an attempt to cull his books. They filled his shelves so tightly that a playing card wouldn’t fit between them, and the overflow had spilled onto his bedside tables and dining room chairs.
He’d begun his project an hour earli
er and immediately hit a snag in the shape of Walter J. Ong’s Orality and Literacy. It had been required reading for a sophomore humanities class, and Jarsdel selected it as surely the easiest target for disposal. But in flipping through it to make sure he didn’t want it anymore, he’d become ensnared.
His phone rattled on the kitchen countertop. Jarsdel dropped the book to his left, making it the first of his “to keep” pile, and went over to check the display. Morales. Jarsdel hesitated, but curiosity got the better of him. What could his former partner possibly want? Was it something to do with Haarmann?
“Hello?”
“Hey, man, you got a minute?”
“What d’you want?”
“C’mon, Tully. We gotta talk.” Morales’s use of Jarsdel’s actual name—instead of Dad or Prof—was surely calculated. But if nothing else, it signified the importance of the call.
“Okay, what do we need to talk about?”
“In person.”
“I’m busy.”
“You at home?”
“Yes.”
“I’m at the gate. Let me in.”
Morales had never been to Jarsdel’s apartment before. Now he was showing up just to talk? “What’s going on, Oscar?”
“Will you just come out here? There’s a guy sleeping under the tree, and he stinks like piss.”
Jarsdel hung up and stepped outside the apartment. The fires in Malibu had given a sickly orange glow to the midafternoon light. Millions of years of evolution balked at that light—it was wrong, Jarsdel knew and felt it deeply. It was the light of uncertainty, of an eclipse, as unsettling as a comet smeared across the night sky.
He approached the pedestrian gate at the end of his street, where Morales waited, gripping the bars to take some of the weight off his bad knees.
“Standing behind there, you look like you got locked up,” said Jarsdel. “When good detectives go bad, tonight at 11.”
Morales didn’t answer. He waited for Jarsdel to open the gate, then shuffled in.
“I’m just over here,” said Jarsdel. “Not far.”
“I’m not an invalid,” Morales grumbled.
Once they were inside the apartment, Morales collapsed into Jarsdel’s wingback chair. He made a face. “This is uncomfortable as shit. What is this?”
“Danish modern. Worth about seven grand, incidentally.”
“What kind of person was this built for? Armrests are digging in. They’re like half an inch wide.”
“Glad you like it.”
Morales shook his head. “White-people furniture. Your people got a guilty conscience, so you find ways of punishing yourselves. Explains opera, tuxedoes, all kinds of stuff.” He looked at Jarsdel. “You gonna sit down, too?”
“Should I?”
“It’s your house, do what you want.”
“If it’ll make you more comfortable, I’m happy to.” Jarsdel pulled over one of the barstools near his kitchen counter and sat facing Morales. “Okay. I’m here. What’s going on?”
Morales seemed unsure how to begin. “You know me and Haarmann are working the Varma thing, right? And, uh, I know you were kinda close to her, so I wanted you to hear this first from me instead of on the news.”
Jarsdel leaned forward. “You got the guy.”
“Now hang on. Everything we talk about here is between us. Hasn’t been released yet.”
“Yes, yes, of course, but you got him. That’s what you came to tell me?”
From the inside pocket of his sport coat, Morales brought out a thick packet of paper that had been folded into thirds. “Gavin finds out I gave you this, I’m gonna get Bruce-alized, so I need it back before I go.”
Jarsdel took the offered pages and unfolded them. He’d been expecting to see a printout of a mug shot, followed by pages of arrest records. Instead, he found a certified copy of Dr. Ipgreve’s autopsy report on Alisha Varma.
The heading read, “County of Los Angeles, Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner.” Below that were listed Varma’s age, sex, race, address, occupation, and a series of boxes to be checked. These included whether the body was clothed, partially clothed, or unclothed, whether the death was the result of a motor vehicle accident, and whether rigor had been present when the body was found. There was another set of boxes dealing specifically with the manner of death, including violent, suddenly when in apparent health, casualty, and suspicious or unusual. None of these boxes had been marked.
Instead, Ipgreve had put a slash in the box next to accident.
Jarsdel looked up. “What’s this?”
“Yeah, I know.”
“What do you mean, ‘Yeah, I know’? What’s he mean it was an accident? Manslaughter?”
“Read the notes.”
Jarsdel stared at Morales. “What am I gonna see?”
Morales jutted his chin in the direction of the report.
Jarsdel didn’t want to read it, but he forced his gaze downward.
The right side of the form was occupied with the template of a hairless, sexless line drawing of a human body, first front, then back. Upon it, Ipgreve had marked four X’s of varying size. One was on the forehead, right between the eyebrows. The next two were located below the left shoulder, one being slightly bigger than the other. The largest X was lower on the same side, between the heart and the sternum.
The notes were handwritten in Ipgreve’s crude but dependably legible script.
Three stab wounds, all ventral. Shallowest located approx. 2 cm left of 2nd rib in pectoralis minor. This was probably first, as didn’t fully penetrate epidermis. Very likely a “testing” stab, common in self-inflicted cases to get an idea of pain to be expected, also to work up courage. Next wound 3.5 cm below, diagonally right. Penetrated dermis and subcutaneous tissue. No major blood vessels involved. Fatal injury occurred with third and final wound. Decedent penetrated the intercostal space 1 cm lateral to sternum and lacerated right internal mammary artery. Despite being a small artery, uncontrolled hemorrhage resulted in right hemopneumothorax complicated by hypovolemic shock within 5 minutes and ultimately complete cardiovascular collapse. This occurred prior to the contact with the back passenger window and explains the minimal blood loss in the setting of a 6cm scalp laceration with evidence of de-gloving.
Jarsdel looked up. “I don’t buy it.”
“Buy what?” said Morales.
“Come on—self-inflicted? This was one of the bravest, most outspoken opponents of street crime in Los Angeles. In that capacity she made quite a few enemies. I have a very, very tough time believing she did this to herself.”
“Thought you liked Ipgreve.”
“He’s a fine ME, but that doesn’t mean he can’t be fooled. I mean, if you think about it, really think about it, what would be a better way to tarnish her reputation than to pass her death off as some sort of attention-seeking stunt?”
Morales looked confused. “So you’re saying you agree, the scene was staged, but just not by her?”
“It’s possible.”
“And her killer was so clever he was able to make it look like she was the one who staged it.”
“I think it would be negligent to dismiss the idea that—”
“It’s weird to see you dodging facts.” Morales now appeared disappointed, even sad. “When they hooked us up as partners, there wasn’t a whole lot I admired or understood about you. But you challenged me every now and then, and as much as that drove me crazy, I saw the value in it.”
“Wait, what facts am I dodging?” said Jarsdel. “What about the broken window?”
“It says right there. She fell. She was bleeding to death and passed out, put her head right through it. I’m sure it wasn’t part of the plan, but it slowed us down.” He considered. “For about two seconds.”
“What about—”
“Tully. No
defensive wounds. Why not? Why not a single cut on her hand or arm as she fought off her attacker? Explain how come in a brightly lit garage she just stood there while this guy stabbed her three times. Guy just came out of nowhere, delicately poked her in the shoulder, not deep enough to bleed but just leave a little bruise, then again, this time breaking the skin, then a third time, straight in the fucking chest without any tearing around the edges of the wound? Come on, man. Didn’t try to get away? Didn’t move? Just stood there?”
“She wasn’t depressed,” said Jarsdel. “She was tough, she was determined. This wasn’t some wilting flower. Her anti-affordances were working, Oscar. They were—”
Morales laughed. “Anti-affordances. All that shit was pure conflict of interest. PuraLux, ReliaBench, that goddamned Sonic Fence that made me want to shoot somebody—those were all her pet projects. She was a silent partner. She wasn’t no employee or consultant with that company. She was an investor. We checked her bank statements. Regular deposits from Halberd Systems, so we called them up and told them we could either get a warrant to find out what she did for them, or they could just tell us. They decided to play nice. She was making money on every unit the city purchased. You know she even had a reality-show deal? Every week she was gonna go to a different city and solve some social problem. Father Duong’s one-man act was gonna cost her the whole thing. Look at it from her point of view. What do you do? You show that crime is everywhere, that no one’s safe. You turn the argument around.”
“That’s all speculation,” said Jarsdel.
“No it ain’t. Smoking gun: she called 911 twice. First time just to log the number in her phone, so she wouldn’t have to type it in while she was bleeding. Save a couple seconds, right? So she dialed 911 and hung up right away before dispatch answered, just to put the number in recent calls. She called again less than two minutes later, this time letting it go through. Obviously she wasn’t counting on dying and having her phone looked at. But we got the phone, and that con artist called the number fucking twice.”
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