“You’ve got a pretty good memory, have you?”
Williams touched his temple with the tip of his left index finger. “All cylinders still functioning.”
“I need to check something out in Mendoza’s loft. Then I’d like to ask you a few questions about the night Mendoza went off the balcony?”
“Be my guest,” he said, giving Santana a key.
Santana took the elevator up to the eighth floor. He wanted to verify that there was no incense in Mendoza’s loft. He did a thorough search and came up empty. This reinforced his belief that Scanlon had been in the loft the night Mendoza was killed.
Santana went back to the lobby to return the key. Williams had pulled up a second director’s chair opposite where he was seated. He gestured for Santana to sit down.
“Have you been working here long, Mr. Williams?”
“Call me Reggie. And yes. Been here since it opened two years ago. Before that, I worked security for the North Star bank. And before that, I spent twenty-five years with SPPD. Mostly worked out of the southwest station around Highland Park. Retired in 2002.”
“I don’t remember seeing you around.”
“I never was able to get in plainclothes. More opportunities for minorities now.” He tilted his head and looked at Santana. “You got a little accent. Where you from, anyway?”
“Colombia.”
“No shit.”
Santana often got that response, yet never quite knew how to respond.
“Well, it’s good the department’s recruiting more minorities. Even if they have to go all the way to Colombia to get ‘em.” Williams smiled, hoping Santana got the joke. “I liked working the street. Spent a lot of years ridin’ shotgun. Didn’t agree with the decision to go with single officers in squads. Don’t like that they’re closing the old station downtown either. But, what the hell,” he said with a shrug. “Don’t matter much to me anymore.”
Williams smelled of talcum powder and Old Spice. His nails were clean, and his neatly pressed uniform was stretched tight over his substantial middle. It was obvious that he took his current job seriously.
Santana said, “Tell me what you remember about that night, Reggie.”
“I remember it was colder than a well-digger’s ass,” he said with a deep chuckle. “Seems the older you get, the colder you get. Winter gets inside your bones like a disease.” He shook his head as if his analogy was as confusing as rocket science. “The missus and me are moving down to Arizona next fall. No more winters for me.” He let out a sigh and folded his thick hands over his stomach.
“About that night, Reggie.”
“Oh, yeah. Well, I get off at eleven. Security company has a college kid come in for the eleven to seven shift. I try and keep busy in the evening. I tend to fall asleep if I watch too much TV, so I move around. Know what I mean?”
Santana let him talk.
“Didn’t notice anything unusual that night. People pretty much kept to their regular schedule.”
“You know most of the tenants?”
“Most of ‘em, sure. Building this size, you can’t know everyone real well.”
“But the building is pretty secure.”
“Absolutely.”
“What about the emergency exit at the bottom of the stairs on the main level?”
“The door automatically locks when it closes. No one gets upstairs without a key or without being checked in.”
“Unless they come in through the underground garage,” Santana said.
“Well, they have to have an ID card to open the garage door.”
“What about visitors coming up here from the main lobby?”
“Anyone who comes to see someone in the building has to sign in and out.”
“Does that include the time they arrive and leave?”
“Damn right. Residents have to be safe.”
Santana opened his briefcase and removed the photo of Rubén Córdova standing in front of the Church of Guardian Angels and showed it to Williams.
“Recognize him?” he asked, pointing to Córdova.
Williams reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a case with his reading glasses and opened the snap. He took the photo from Santana and held it gently between his thick fingers. Put his glasses on the end of his nose and stared at it for a time.
“He looks familiar.”
“That’s the guy who was killed in the atrium. Rubén Córdova.”
He nodded uncertainly. “Oh, yeah.”
“So how did Córdova get up to Mendoza’s that night, Reggie?”
William’s eyes danced back and forth and his cheek twitched. “He signed in.”
“Did you make the call to Mendoza telling him he had a guest or did Córdova make the call?”
“I always make the call.”
“You sure it was Mendoza who answered the phone?”
“It sounded like him.” Williams bit his lower lip. He looked down at Córdova’s picture in his hands and then at Santana again. “I wish I would’ve known what he was planning to do that night.”
“Why don’t you show me the guest book,” Santana said. “Specifically the time Córdova signed in.”
Williams got up and went behind the counter where he picked up the guest sign-in book, brought it back and sat down. He opened the book and flipped the pages until he came to January fourteenth. “Córdova signed in at seven twenty-eight p.m.”
“Is that accurate?”
He gestured at the clock on the wall behind the counter. “Accurate as that clock there.”
Santana looked at his watch and then the clock on the wall. “So Córdova signs in at seven twenty-eight p.m. and takes the elevator up to the eighth floor?”
“That’s what I told the detective.”
“What detective? Do you remember the name?’
“Can’t say as I do. But you must’ve read my statement.”
Santana had not read it because Kehoe had taken charge of the murder book before all the witness statements were included and after Santana had made copies. But he could guess who had taken William’s statement.
“Was the name Kehoe?”
“Sounds familiar.”
“Muscular. Electric tan.”
“That’s him.”
“You say Córdova signed in at seven twenty-eight and took the elevator upstairs.”
Williams pointed to the guest book in his lap. “Says that right here.”
“I’ve got a little problem with the timing, Reggie. My watch has the same time as that clock on the wall. Detective Anderson and I got to the lobby that night at seven thirty just as Mendoza was going off his balcony. So how could Córdova sign in, get into the elevator and up to the eighth floor in time to push Mendoza off his balcony?”
Williams took off his glasses and looked at Santana. “I had a problem with the timing, too. But I didn’t say anything to the detective that night.”
“Detective Kehoe.”
“Yeah. I mean, I’m just a security guard, you know, though I was a police officer. But he’s the detective.” Williams rubbed his palms on his pant’s legs and cleared his throat. “I don’t know. It’s like I told you. I called up to Mendoza’s loft and … well, I figured Mendoza was home. I mean I wouldn’t know for sure ‘cause he usually uses the garage and takes the elevator up to eight.” Tiny beads of sweat had formed on his brow, and he rubbed them away with a shirtsleeve. “But I keep thinkin’ that maybe the papers are wrong. Maybe Mendoza wasn’t murdered. Maybe he did commit suicide. I’d hate to see an innocent man get the blame.” He handed Córdova’s picture back to Santana, as if it contained the answers to all his questions.
Santana put it back in his briefcase.
“I suppose it’s possible somebody else could’ve come in through the garage,” Williams said, thinking out loud. “We always warn tenants to make sure two cars don’t enter at the same time, but you know how that goes. Some don’t pay any attention to the rules.” He paused for a moment an
d blew out a breath for emphasis. “But you already got the tape from the garage for that night. You should know if there was anything suspicious on it.”
“There’s a tape from the garage?”
“Course there is. I gave it to the detective that night.”
“Detective Kehoe.”
“That’s right.”
Santana began to put it all together now. How it had gone down the night Rafael Mendoza was murdered.
He said, “You tell anyone else there was a security tape for the garage?”
“No one asked except for Detective Kehoe.”
That’s because everyone else figured Córdova was good for Mendoza’s murder, Santana thought. Only Kehoe knew for certain that Córdova was innocent. That whoever killed Mendoza came in through the garage and not the main lobby door.
Williams licked his lips, let out another sigh. “Look, Detective Santana. I don’t want any trouble. Six months and I’m out of here. I got a good pension. You understand.”
“I do.”
“But I think I could get you a copy if it’d help. You see we’re using two systems now. Just got the new digital one up and running a couple of days before Mendoza was killed. The video is recorded directly on a computer hard-drive. Detective Kehoe just took the VCR tape. Don’t think he knew we had a new digital system.”
“Could I get a CD copy off the computer hard-drive?”
“I believe you can. You’d have to talk to the security company about that. But it’s kinda curious you haven’t seen that tape, Detective Santana. Maybe a little department politics going on,” Williams said with a smile. “It wouldn’t be the first time. You know how it is. Can’t help but feel sorry for Mendoza’s family though.”
“I don’t believe he had one.”
“Oh, that’s too bad. Man all alone like that. Everyone should have family.”
Santana didn’t reply.
“Seems like nowadays there’s more bad than good in the world. Man my age, well, I’m not gonna be around much longer, so I guess it don’t really matter a whole lot. But for you, workin’ Homicide, it must be kinda depressing. I mean, you put ‘em away one day, and there’s two more the next takin’ their place.”
“We have a saying in Colombia, Reggie. Mala yerba no muere. Bad weeds never die.”
“Man, ain’t that the truth.”
Santana sat behind the steering wheel of the Crown Vic and stared out the driver’s side window at the cold, dark face of night. He was thinking that there was one remaining piece to the puzzle of this case, and it might be found in the Ranch style house where James Kehoe lived.
The house was dark behind the windows and sat on a corner lot near Lake Phalen on St. Paul’s East Side. Santana was counting on the fact that Kehoe would be attending the five hundred dollar a plate dinner tonight at the University Club where the mayor was scheduled to announce his bid for a second term. Still, he had parked a half block down from the house where he waited and watched the neighborhood for twenty minutes before deciding it was safe.
He took a miniature flashlight from the glove box of the car, stepped out and closed the car door quietly behind him. The night air was sharp with the scent of wet pine and spruce. Ice smothered the bare branches of the oaks, glistened like a steel blade under the harsh glare of the streetlights.
He moved quickly down the driveway to the garage where he cleared the moisture from a side window with a sleeve. Turned on the flashlight and aimed the beam through the glass.
Kehoe’s car was gone.
Santana clicked off the light. Staying in the shadows, he jumped over the three-foot high chain-link fence that enclosed the yard and crept along the back of the house until he came to a door. He paused a moment and shined the light over the back windows, searching for any evidence of a security alarm. Then he pointed the beam toward the backyard, looking for dog droppings or a doghouse.
When he was satisfied Kehoe had not installed a security system and that there was no dog to contend with, he retrieved a pair of latex gloves from one coat pocket and slipped them on. In another pocket he found the leather pouch containing his picks. He turned on the flashlight again and held it in his mouth as he worked the picks in the lock. In less than a minute he was able to push the pins and open the back door.
He stepped into a small kitchen that smelled like something had recently been burned on the stove. He closed the door and locked it behind him. Paused a moment until his eyes adjusted to the darkness.
He had little time. The mayor’s dinner was over at 9:00 p.m. and, according to the clock on the microwave, it was 8:50 now.
Following the narrow beam of light, he went through the house quickly until he located a bedroom at the end of a hallway. It appeared that a wall had been removed between two smaller bedrooms, creating one expansive master suit. A king-size, four-poster bed sat in the center of the room. A wrinkled white shirt and black trousers were tossed on the unmade bed. Leather straps were tied around each of the posts. A 35 mm Nikon camera and tripod were set up about five feet from the foot of the bed.
Santana probed the darkness once more with the flashlight beam, watching as it flared off the mirror behind the dresser near the bed where there were three framed pictures of Kehoe dressed in hunting gear standing proudly over dead deer.
Santana walked to the nightstand and sat on the edge of the bed. On top of it was an A.G. Russell catalogue on knives. The headline across the front cover read: KNIVES SUPPORT U.S. TROOPS IN WAR ON TERROR. Underneath the catalogue was a newsletter on photo developing entitled Formulating.
Inside the nightstand drawer Santana found a box of Trojan condoms, a prescription vial of Viagra, an address book, and a 5 x 7 colored photo. The woman was younger and her hair darker, but there was no mistaking Janet Mitchell. Apparently, the divorce decree had not severed the matrimonial bonds that still held Kehoe to his ex-wife.
Santana took the address book out of the drawer. Alphabetical tabs divided the book into sections by last names. On a hunch, Santana flipped open the “S” tab. Halfway down the page, he found the name he was looking for. Richard Scanlon. Feeling lucky, he flipped open the “M” tab and quickly found Mendoza’s name. When he tried “P” for Pérez, however, his luck ran out. He put the address book back and closed the drawer and went to the closet. Behind the louvered doors were Kehoe’s dress and casual clothes and shoes along with a one-piece King of the Mountain wool suit and a two-piece Bug Tamer suit, both in 3D camo, a fluorescent orange cap and vest, a Springfield 30.06 rifle with a telescopic sight, and a box of 150-grain cartridges.
He went to the dresser and opened drawers. The top two drawers contained underwear, socks and T-shirts. The bottom drawer held a rectangular cardboard box. Santana removed the cover. The beam of light revealed a stack of magazines. Santana pulled out two of them. The magazines were titled UNZIPPED and FRESHMAN and featured muscular, naked men in various sexual poses.
Underneath the magazines Santana found a videocassette with a label on which was written in large block letters: RIVERVIEW LOFTS. Adrenaline shot through his veins as he held it in his hand. He was certain that this was the tape Reggie Williams had given Kehoe the night Rafael Mendoza was murdered. It was evidence that could possibly link Kehoe and Scanlon to Mendoza’s murder. Still, he had no search warrant and no excuse for being in Kehoe’s house. If he took the tape with him, he couldn’t prove that it came from Kehoe’s house.Worse yet, if Kehoe caught him here, he could claim Santana was attempting to plant the tape in order to frame him for Mendoza’s murder.
Santana checked his watch. It was 9:12. He was pushing his luck. He set the magazines and videocassette back in the box and left the bedroom.
Halfway down the hallway he found a door that led to a basement. He went down the creaking wooden stairs slowly, the narrow stream of light from his flashlight cutting through the darkness like a laser.
He stopped on the bottom step and scanned the skeleton of two-by-fours and conduit with the flashli
ght. At one end of the basement were two barbells of free weights and a bench for presses. At the other end nearest the stairs was an unfinished room with plasterboard walls.
He walked across the concrete floor into the unfinished room and pulled the cord on the overhead light, which revealed a counter with a sink and trays for developing photos, a photo enlarger, timer and safe light. Shelves full of chemical containers of amidol, glycin, silver nitrate and ferric oxalate lined the wall behind the counter. Behind him was an 11 x 14 print easel. There were four color prints on the easel. The prints were taken in sequence and showed a bare-chested man wearing a dark head mask and holding a whip. The masked man stood near the head of a four-poster bed Santana recognized as the one upstairs in Kehoe’s bedroom. In the first print, he was bending over a second man who was naked and lying spread-eagled on the bed. Leather straps attached to the posts bound the second man’s wrists and ankles. In each of the next three prints the masked man was bending farther over until in the final print he was clearly kissing the man tied to the bed. Santana could not see the face of the second man because his head was tilted back on the pillow, away from the camera, but based on his muscular physique; he guessed that it was Kehoe.The first man was easier to identify. The mask concealed his face, but not the appendectomy scar on Scanlon’s abdomen. It appeared that Kehoe, like Julio Pérez and Rafael Mendoza, was another one of Richard Scanlon’s victims.
Inside a counter drawer, Santana found strips of negatives. He wondered if one of the strips contained the negative of Scanlon and Hidalgo taken at the archbishop’s cabin near Two Harbors. It was difficult to decipher the black and white images even as he held a strip up to the light bulb hanging from the ceiling. He would need to enlarge the images, but time was his enemy now. He glanced at his watch. It was 9:23. He had to go.
He turned off the light and went up the stairs. As he reached the top step and opened the door, headlights swept across the living room indicating a car had pulled into the driveway.
Santana stepped into the hallway and then into the darkened living room, moving carefully around the shadowed furniture, keeping the narrow beam of light low to the ground so that it could not be seen through the slits between the drapes and blind. He moved quickly to a window to his left that faced the driveway. Peered between the blinds. The garage door was open and the light on. If he went out the back door he would run straight into Kehoe.
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