No one had any.
“Then get your asses moving, people. We have a dead body that’s getting colder by the minute.” His team members disbursed and he turned to Parks. “You have any questions? No? Good. Not like you’re going to ever touch this case anyways. I don’t care what she says. We both know I’m getting fucked here. Thanks.”
9
“Son of a bitch.” Parks threw the binder across the table, and it flew up and slammed against the wall before hitting the ground, most of the papers inside coming free from the three rings that held everything together.
“Sorry,” he mumbled to no one in particular as he picked up his cup of coffee, only to find it empty. He crushed the cup and went to throw it but resisted the urge and dropped it into a trash can instead. He could feel the stress building inside, and the endless supply of caffeine wasn’t helping.
The rest of his team was in the conference room going over various aspects of the Tisdale crime scene from five days earlier. So far they had found nothing of any significance and weren’t any closer to identifying who had murdered Allison Tisdale. There had been no further poisonings or messages delivered to the police or anything of the sort. Parks felt the case coming to a halt. Five days after the fact with nothing to show for it wasn’t a promising start. Apparently he had been wrong about the possibility of a serial poisoner.
Jackie Isley had to go back to the coroner’s office to continue with her day-to-day activities considering the lack of forward motion on the case. She had informed them that if they needed any further assistance from her, she was only a phone call away and happy to oblige.
They had brought Mr. Tisdale in for further questioning, all of which he passed without signaling any red flags other than the fact that he had no solid alibi. He hadn’t proven himself enough to be wiped completely off their suspect list, but at the same time, Parks knew it was pointless to continue pursuing him when they had other avenues to follow up on. Either way, Doug Tisdale’s photo stayed up on the murder board under their list of suspects. If the department could afford to spare a few lower-level officers, maybe he’d have some men keep an eye on the man just to be sure.
Not to mention the threat of Peter Kozlov’s possible release weighing heavily on Parks’s mind, making his focus and concentration difficult to keep under control. A child killer could be back out on the streets within a week.
“Sorry,” Parks repeated with a little more force this time.
“It’s okay,” Moore reassured him as she helped pick up the binder. “We understand.”
“It’s just . . . this guy is good. He’s thought of everything. Paper trails. Fingerprints. Evidence. He’s left nothing out of place. It’s like he’s a phantom. A ghost. And there’s been no other murders. It’s almost like Allison Tisdale was an isolated event. If we don’t discover something soon, I’m not sure what’s going to happen to this case. It’s turning cold and fast.”
“You need some coffee?” Moore asked softly, her mothering instincts kicking in. She did that effortlessly, a trait Parks found interesting considering the woman had never actually had any children of her own. At least as far as he knew. “Go on. Take a break.”
“Hardwick’s putting us back into rotation today. Let everyone know.”
“We know. It’s not like it wasn’t expected. We were lucky to have as much free time on this case as we did. But the truth is there are homicides every day, and this case can’t take up all our time anymore. It’s okay. We’re ready to work. This case isn’t finished; it’s just on hold pending new information. What’s going on with Kozlov?”
“No idea,” Parks said. “That’s what I really hate. The waiting. I’ve got parents of the children calling here day and night. Hell, they’re even showing up in the parking lot. Accosting me. Asking me how I can let that man who attacked their children go free?”
“They see you as the knight who vanquished the dragon,” Moore said.
“Yeah, well now that dragon might go free and it’s this knight’s fault,” Parks said, shaking his head. “My, how they turn on us so quickly.”
“They don’t blame you. But you stopped the monster once. They just want you to do it again.”
“Yeah, well it’s looking like I’d have to kill the monster in order to achieve that.”
Moore stared at Parks, knowing he wouldn’t ever do such a thing. That by simply saying the words, putting them out in the universe, was dangerous enough. Parks turned from Moore, not able to handle her glare, glancing over at Fairmont and Tippin. Fairmont was digging through several binders of charts, forms and other various papers that Tippin had printed off for him, while Tippin himself typed away at his laptop.
“You two got anything new?” Parks asked.
“Nothing so far,” Fairmont said, leaning back, stretching in his chair, raising his hands high above his head before bringing them down and covering his face. “Nothing in their financials to make anyone suspect.”
“And the affair?”
“What affair?” Fairmont shot back, talking through his hands. “Sure she had one? There’s no evidence she ever did anything outside her marriage. No receipts. No secret getaways. No hidden love notes. Text messages. Whisperings behind her back. Nothing.”
“What about coworkers?”
“None of them are suspect,” Fairmont answered.
“Really?” Parks asked, looking to Tippin.
“Of the five men she worked with, two are gay, one is over sixty, and the other two have been there less than a year. Which doesn’t exactly feel like enough time to have had an affair, have the husband find out about it, and all be worked out and forgiven by now . . .” Tippin trailed off. “They’re all in the clear.”
Parks stayed quiet, thinking, staring off into space.
“Parks?” Moore asked a minute later. “You on to something?”
“It’s just while we were searching through the Tisdales’ financial records, I realized something. They loved each other. I believe that. But Mr. Tisdale wasn’t exactly spending the big bucks on his wife. Other than holidays, birthdays, and anniversaries he rarely ever spent anything on her.”
“Okay . . . ?”
“So remember how you said the flowers that we found Allison holding were the same ones she received a few years back for a few months from her husband. What if they weren’t from her husband? What if they were from whoever she was having an affair with?”
The group remained silent for a moment and processed what they had been told.
“Can you guys trace the flower orders?”
“It was two years ago,” Fairmont replied, unenthusiastically.
“Yes. But I figure a bouquet of flowers every week for three months in a row . . . chances are that was done automatically.”
“Like on a credit card,” Tippin added. “Not sure what company delivered them, but I can do some digging around. Hit up all the usual online retailers and then check with any shops around Allison’s office.”
“Looks like you boys know what you’re doing next.” A smile came to Parks’s face as his cell phone in his pocket began to play the chorus to Poison’s Unskinny Bop. “What the hell is that?”
Fairmont and Tippin both held back laughter as they turned back to the folders and papers spread out in front of them.
“What the flip did you two do to my phone?” Parks barked sharply, though not totally serious, as he retrieved his phone. “One of you, I don’t care who, but one of you better fix this shit,” Parks ordered as he waived his phone in their direction before looking at the screen to see the number was blocked. He answered it anyway. “Hello?”
There was only silence from the other end of the line. Parks sighed. He didn’t know who had been calling him but this was the third time this week. Someone called. Never spoke. Sounding like no one was there until suddenly a child’s laughter could be heard from the other end. Parks never heard more than that, never got an answer when he asked who was calling or what they wanted
. He wanted to tell whoever was calling to piss off but he had a feeling that it would be the one time he would be recorded and then there’d be hell to pay. Though he wasn’t sure why? He was the one being pranked. He wasn’t in the mood and was about to say something when he simply hung up. He was more likely to change his number if this continued. He had done it before.
Moore eyed him with a questioning look.
“Wrong number,” Parks said by way of an explanation.
“You getting a lot of those lately?”
“There’s worse things going on around us than me getting prank calls.”
“Still, you might want to have IT put a trace on your calls. Or at the very least tell Tippin. I’m sure he knows of some way to find out who’s calling you. We’ve got too much going on around us right now for you to start losing your cool over prank calls. As it is, it doesn’t look like you’ve been sleeping enough. And I don’t care what you’ve told Hardwick, or what she’s willing to believe for the good of the department, I know better.”
Moore finished and stared at him, her eyes grilling into him.
“Fine,” Parks said, giving in. “I’ll have Tippin look at my phone.” Moore raised her eyebrows in doubt. “I promise. Now can we please get back to the case in hand?”
“You’re the boss.”
10
“Parks? Parks?”
Parks continued fiddling with the crossword puzzle as he sat at his desk, feet up on the corner, while he tried to clear his mind of anything case-related. That apparently included hearing his name as Wilkes stood in his doorway and called out to him. He’d finished a Sudoku and several brain teasers on his phone earlier that morning as he waited for the rest of his team to show up. After staring at the files for three hours his brain needed a break. He figured the crossword was as good a way to give his brain a break as anything else.
“Parks?”
Parks looked up from the puzzle on his desk, confusion on his face. “What?”
“Tanaka needs us over at the morgue.”
“Us? Together? What for?”
“The Harris case.”
“Why both of us? You sure?”
“That’s what she said. You want to question her?”
“When?”
Wilkes held out his arms and made a face as if to say, what do you think I’m standing here for? Parks noticed Moore bury her face deeper into the binder in her hands as she held back a smile that was fighting to turn into laughter.
“All right. Let’s do it.”
The two detectives drove in silence to the LA County Medical Examiner’s Office, which was less than ten minutes from the LAPD’s downtown station, though to Parks it felt like an eternity. He had tried several times to start a conversation before giving up and embracing the silence. Wilkes parked illegally in a handicap space near the front entrance, and Parks let it go. If they got a ticket it would be on Wilkes anyway. They made it to the front desk when Tanaka walked out through a side door before they could even address the receptionist.
“Men,” Tanaka said, smiling. “Follow me.”
“This better be important,” Wilkes snapped. “I don’t know why he needs to be here. This is still my case.”
Parks remained quiet, hoping not to start anything with the other detective. Wilkes was shorter than Parks by a good six inches but was just as fit and had a decidedly shorter temper. And if there was a tumble to be had and Wilkes couldn’t defend himself, it was known he had no problem getting on the phone and calling the proper people who could.
Tanaka led the investigators to the morgue, where she had Ian Harris’s body out on a table, still opened up from the autopsy that was only halfway completed.
“I just started less than an hour ago, but I sent a vial of his blood in to be examined Monday night. Figured that might be helpful on how and why he bled like he did. So I put a rush on it. Just for you, Wilkes.”
“And? What did you find?” Wilkes spat out, proving once again that no matter the situation he was never one to be pleased.
“Methanol,” Tanaka answered, putting on two blue latex gloves. “As well as a high level of neurotoxin which I was able to determine came from an acanthophis.”
“A what?” Wilkes asked.
“It’s a highly venomous snake,” Tanaka explained, holding up Harris’s hand and showing the two men the snakebite. “More commonly known as a death adder.”
“That’s it?” Wilkes laughed. “So we’re looking for a snake? Shit. I thought we had a killer on the loose. So the man stuck his hand where it didn’t belong and got bit. People and their dogs get bit up on Runyon all the time.”
Tanaka looked like she was ready to jump up and murder Wilkes herself.
“What is it, Amy?” Parks asked.
“There aren’t any death adders up around Runyon Canon. Rattlesnakes? Yes. Death adders? No. And I don’t think this was an accident.”
“What do you mean?”
“I think that the vic here was poisoned.” Tanaka turned from Wilkes and focused on Parks. “On purpose.”
Parks took in what she was saying. She thought this case was related to his.
“Wai—what? How do you know that?” Wilkes asked. “It’s a snake for crying out loud. You can’t order a snake to go and sic someone down and kill them. And you got the bite marks right there. Stupid son of a bitch reached for or grabbed a snake and got bit. It happens.”
“No, you can’t order a snake after someone,” Tanaka agreed. “But that’s not what got me thinking it was intentional.”
“What did?”
“The methanol.”
“How so?” Parks asked.
“Methanol comes in several different forms. It’s a sort of distilled alcohol. Like moonshine. It’s also in perfumes, antifreeze, shellac, varnish, windshield wiper fluid. But at room temperature it’s a liquid that can be swallowed. Tastes a lot like alcohol. Strong alcohol.”
“Aren’t there housewives who’ve killed their spouses with that stuff?” Wilkes asked, looking from Tanaka to Parks, who nodded in agreement.
Tanaka turned to Wilkes. “You said you found a half-empty bottle of vodka next to the body?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I hope you’re testing the bottle for what was in it. I have a feeling that it was mixed in with that. But this was a strong dosage. It didn’t come that way. Someone had to have fixed the bottle. As little as ten milliliters can cause permanent blindness. But generally around a hundred milliliters is a fatal dose.”
“That sounds like a lot,” Wilkes said. “No way he drank that much.”
“That’s about four fluid ounces,” Tanaka corrected. “The average water bottle holds approximately sixteen fluid ounces. If the vodka bottle next to him was mixed fifty-fifty and he drank half of that . . . you get where I’m going with this?”
“Asshole drank a lot,” Wilkes muttered.
“And that’s what killed him?” Parks asked, skeptically.
“No. Although it is toxic, it can be treated if discovered in time. Plus the symptoms usually show up between eight and thirty hours after consumption. Though at the rate and amount that our vic here consumed, I have a feeling the reaction time was bumped up.”
“And what are the reactions?”
“It creates an imbalance of acid in the stomach. Like acidosis. The victim will feel inebriated. There will be haziness in the eyes. Possible blindness. And if it goes on long enough, seizures, possibly coma, and eventually death.”
“So someone started poisoning the vic, and when it took too long they sent a snake in to finish the job?” Wilkes didn’t believe what he was hearing.
“I don’t think so,” Tanaka said. “I think the snake was the original, intended poison for our victim. But while a bite from an adder is deadly, it’s also treatable. If gotten to in time. And that’s if you didn’t run away from the snake in the first place.”
“So the methanol . . . was a sort of precursor to the snake. To slow him do
wn. Distort his senses.” Parks thought aloud. “But why? Why did our victim need to die by snakebite? What’s so special about the adder bite? Symptoms-wise?”
Tanaka shook her head. “Chills. Fever. Swelling. Skin discoloration. Heavy perspiration. Vomiting of blood. Bleeding from nose and eyes. Loss of vision. Loss of consciousness. The body was covered in sweat when I examined him. And while there was blood in the mouth area, he didn’t appear to vomit any. Most of the blood just came from the eyes.”
“That seems like a lot of blood to come from the eyes,” Parks said, focusing on the crime scene photos Wilkes had passed to him. “That usually how much they bleed?”
“Not sure. Haven’t seen this before. I’d have to check, but I’d say off the top of my head, no. Also, methanol affects the eyes, so maybe the two poisons together worked in overdrive to attack the area.”
“He wanted to blind our victim? But why?”
“Something he saw?”
“Or something he was going to see? Or had been watching?” Wilkes added.
“Yes,” Parks agreed. “Says in your report that he was found next to a window, correct?”
“That’s right.”
“Along with a pair of binoculars and an empty camera?”
“Yep.”
“He saw something he shouldn’t have. And possibly even took pictures of it. We need the film from that camera.”
“The cameras were all empty. No film. No memory cards. No nothing. I can send my men back and have them check every angle of viewable space from his seat by that window. Check out what he could have possibly been watching. But that’s our only option at this point.”
“Is that all?” Parks asked, turning back to Tanaka.
“Nope,” she said. “There’s one more thing. Come look. Up at the screen. I have it hooked up to my microscope. I never would have seen this had I not already been looking at the eyes due to the blood. But this . . .”
The Poisonous Ten Page 9