Slice of Greed: A Kevin Rhinehardt Mystery (BOL Mysteries Book 1)

by K. C. Reinstadler

  Louie then explained to me why I couldn’t understand almost all the Spanish Jose was speaking. Camacho was from the Guerrero region of mainland Mexico. They spoke an Aztec dialect there, something called Nahuatl. Luis had studied it, along with about a dozen other indigenous dialects. I went back in with Louie to speak to Jose, and my assurances and promise did the trick. The man visibly sighed with relief.

  After my huddle with Louie outside, I hustled back into the cramped video room. Was it just me, or was Will sitting closer to Rachael, looking at her with his puppy-dog eyes? And the weird part was that Storm was looking back at him, all doe-eyed. Holy shit, that was a shocker. I sat down, squeezing in between them. It just seemed the right thing to do. I prayed Will’s sphincter would stay in check. God, we could die in that tiny room of asphyxiation if it didn’t!

  After nearly an hour, my Mexican protégé came out of the interview room with a big grin on his face.

  “Kev, you got a Snickers on ya?”

  “Ocampo, don’t fuck with me here. If you got something good, I got a case of that cavity-causin’ crap for you.”

  Louie just kept smiling. “I think this little fellow saw your killer casing the doctor’s place right before the murders.”

  Luis explained that about a week before he heard about the killings, Jose Camacho was raking the back pathways at the Commons when he noticed a tall figure walking slowly back and forth behind the complex connected to Marvin Redbone’s town house. Jose thought this person might be a thief because of the way he was acting and because of how he was dressed. The figure was wearing blue jeans and a baggy, gray, hooded sweatshirt with the hood up at 3:00 p.m. in the afternoon. He said the person wore a ball cap underneath the hood and big, dark sunglasses. Camacho told Luis that he saw this person three times in a matter of two days, and each day the person dressed and acted the same. After walking back and forth behind the complex a few times, the individual would go to the back door of bungalow number six and try the doorknob. It looked like he had something in his hands, maybe a rag. Jose wasn’t close enough on the first occasion to see what had happened when the knob was turned, but the second time he saw the door open a few inches. This person then shut the door and quickly walked away. The last time he saw this guy, he was walking away from the place, and Jose figured he had just come from inside the bungalow.

  Jose said (through Louie’s translation), “If it’s a ladrón [thief], why didn’t I see him holding something? Maybe he’s a friend of the person living there. If I call, they will send me back to Mexico.” So, Camacho never told a soul.

  Louie continued to explain that when Jose saw the person walk away, he decided to follow him as he left the bungalows. He told Luis that the tall figure walked about two hundred yards down the pathway and around the north corner of the buildings. As Camacho watched from behind a tree, he saw the person part some tree limbs and bushes next to the path and then walk up a narrow dirt trail toward the chain-link fence line bordering the top end of the Village Commons. The fellow then slid through an opening there. Although it was hard to see through the bushes, Camacho thought he saw the guy walk up to the Dumpster near there, lift the lid, and look inside.

  Louie, Will, and Rachael were all high-fiving in the hallway when I burst their bubble. “You call this a damn epiphany, guys? We know the Phantom is tall, and we know he wears hoodies. We saw all that shit on the grainy video taken from TriCorp, for Christ’s sake.” It looked to me like Jose Camacho had done nothing more than tell us what we already knew. The killer was tall, wore a hoodie, and later put evidence in that Dumpster. Thank you very much for absolutely fucking nothing.

  “Louie, get back in there, and this time, I’m going with you.”

  We went back in, and I started to center the questioning, through Louie, on getting a better physical description of the Phantom. I asked Jose, “Señor, did you notice anything else unusual about this person? How tall was he? How much did he weigh? Was there anything else you noticed about him? We need a better physical description, por favor.”

  Luis fired off the translation. The gardener said he really couldn’t tell a weight, but that he figured the person was slender and around six feet tall. He figured he was thin because the jeans and hoodie looked a little baggy on him. Camacho then paused for several moments, and he said something quickly in Nahuatl.

  Louie seemed taken aback, and turning to me, he said, “Camacho thinks the killer could be a woman.” I asked why on earth he would say that, and Jose explained through Luis that it was because the person had a feminine walk.

  What a shocker. “Shit, Louie, it’s just another queer! O’Hara was right all along—this was a gay-on-gay murder.”

  It was like Jose Camacho knew I was disappointed, because he suddenly began waving his hand to get our attention. He told Ocampo that he was sorry. “¡Lo siento!” He had forgotten to tell us the most important thing he had remembered about the suspect that day. The person had taken off the hood up by the trash can while walking off, and Jose got a quick glimpse of the person’s hair color under the baseball cap. “Rojo.” Not just any old red, though. Jose exclaimed, “¡Muy rojo!” Our Phantom had bright-red hair.

  Once I left the interview room, Rachael Storm seemed even more excited than I was. She was lightly holding on to Will’s arm when she exclaimed, “This new information is fabulous. It will let people know you guys are on the right track. My God, it’s maybe another red-haired homosexual or maybe even a woman. My editor will get an erection over this stuff!”

  I turned to her quickly. “Whoa, girl! You just learned a piece of information that cannot be released to the public at this point. ¿Comprende, amiga? Rachael, don’t forget what the chief said. You might need to keep some information confidential until the end of the case.”

  “But, Rhino, my editor wants something yesterday on this story. I need to satisfy him, or he will just keep bugging me. It could cost me if I don’t give him something real soon. You don’t understand how he is.”

  “Sorry, Rachael. This may be the crucial piece of evidence we need to keep close to the vest for when we need it. Do you understand? I need your promise.” Turning to Phillips, I also admonished him, “You, too, Will.” She quickly let go of his arm at this point. “Not a word about this to the other patrol guys, OK? No coffee-room confidentials either, my friend. Got it?”

  Phillips ran his fingers across his tight lips, like a zipper, but you could see it on Storm’s face: she was pissed. In a very unladylike tone she barked back, “OK, Kevin, fuck me once, fuck me twice. Please don’t slip it to me again! I haven’t written anything in a couple of weeks now, and I am way past deadline. Please make my next article a fabulous piece. You owe me one, amigo.”

  I called up the sarge and Ted and gave them this new info. I tried to get Jose to recollect a hair length, but he said that on account of the way the person was turned and his being behind the bushes, he couldn’t see how long the killer’s hair was, or which way he went after leaving the trash bin up in the parking lot. Camacho was just positive the hair was a bright-red color: “pelirrojo.” It could have been long or short; Jose just couldn’t tell. I kept wondering was it a feminine man with red hair, or a psychopathic wonder woman? At the very least, this would narrow our field of potential suspects. Finally, something we could sink our teeth into.

  Chapter Twelve

  Quid Pro Quo

  Rachael Storm got home late from her sojourn with the sheriff’s detectives. She had spent too many hours of late worrying about her future in the television news business. Her mind raced. What will I tell Earl Waxford? What will that snake say when I don’t come into the newsroom full of juicy stories about what the “stupid cops” are doing about this case? He hates law enforcement after all.

  Just last week the middle-aged editor called her at the sheriff’s office and demanded she come see him at the television station. She winced at what she knew was coming.

  Most of the other reporters were giving her
the fish eye as she walked into the news deck. Channel 3 News was located in a converted warehouse outside of Santa Barbara, and it smelled like an old men’s club—stuffy and cold. Rachael walked slowly but confidently down the rows of desks occupied by the other reporters and copyeditors. One of the female copy assistants sheepishly whispered to her as she walked by, “Mr. Waxford told me to tell you he wants you in his office the second you come in.”

  Earl Waxford, standing in his office at the end of the hall, spotted her and motioned for her to come toward him. When she got to his door, he barked loud enough for all the staffers to hear, “Close the door behind you!” As soon as it snapped closed, he started in on her. “Rachael, babe, you’re killing me here.”

  “Look, Mr. Waxford, what can I say? The investigators are tight-lipped about their case. Can’t say I blame them.”

  Waxford cocked his head her way and said, “What are you saying? Fuck those guys. They’re supposed to give us all they dig up. You’re supposed to be embedded with them, right? So start getting in bed with them. You got it?”

  “Exactly what are you telling me, Earl?”

  “I mean, you’re a chick. You’re a looker. Use those tits and ass, and get them to loosen up. Do what you have to do to get this story fast. I mean it. Or else!”

  “Or else what? Look, Earl, Mr. Waxford, I don’t need to use my looks to get what I want. I’m a legitimate reporter. I write good stories. Sometimes, you just have to wait to get the prize. That’s what’s happening here.”

  Earl Waxford then got up and sauntered toward Rachael Storm as she sat in front of his cluttered mess of a desk. He slid slowly in behind her chair and began massaging her shoulders, making the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. Her shoulders instinctively shrunk from his clammy grasp.

  Waxford made his position very clear. “Wait for the prize, huh? I remember when you first came here to KCMP. You were just a wide-eyed kid who didn’t know shit. I went out on a limb and gave you a shot. Do ya remember that?”

  “That was a couple of years ago, Mr. Waxford, and I do appreciate the chance to prove myself. But—”

  “But nothing, sweetie. I’m the one who took a chance on you. Me, nobody else, and now you need to pay your dues. These cops are just marking time till they retire. They don’t give a shit about you or about solving this case. Screw ’em.”

  “Earl, they do have some leads, but they think that if I reveal that information now, it could hurt their case. It might interfere with their investigation, and they have specifically asked me not to write a story about it until it’s time.”

  “So, what is it they got?”

  “Don’t do this to me, Earl. You know how critical it is to maintain a source—not to burn a bridge. If I tell you, you’ll broadcast it live at five, as soon as you can type the copy. You’ll change the facts around, too, and I’ll pay for it, just like you did last time, to make the cops look bad. I’m paying for that with them now.”

  In a voice loud enough for the outside staff to hear, Waxford blasted back, “Those fuckers deserve to look bad! They never gave my kid a break, and I intend to return the favor!”

  “So that’s what this is all about, Mr. Waxford. I know all about your son’s problems; everyone does. How many trips to rehab and jail has he made? Two, or is it three?”

  “Fuck you, Storm. The cops kept busting him for no reason, trumping up charges, plantin’ dope on him. I think they did it to get back at me for running bad press on them. The boy just couldn’t get a break. They drove him back to rehab and trumped up those charges. I hate those assholes!”

  Rachael had enough. “You really believe that crap, don’t you, Earl? You can’t face the truth. Your son is nothing but a drugged-out thief, and you can’t save him. You’re blaming the cops for the mess he got himself into, aren’t you? They threw him in prison for no good reason, right? Everyone’s to blame but poor Robbie.”

  “Enough of this bullshit. Listen, bitch, you owe me here.”

  He slid his sweaty palms over her shoulders, moving toward her breasts. Rachael stood up defiantly, pushing the chair hard back into Earl Waxford’s chest. His lips curled in anger as he threw it hard against his office wall. Everyone outside within earshot winced as he was heard yelling, “You will live to regret this, you little cunt! You get me something to broadcast by next week, or your career is over. Take that to the bank, lady! Bill Baxter is drooling to take over this case, so you better put up or get out.”

  Rachael beat feet out of the station that day, gathering all the notes and materials off her desk as she left. She headed for the door. She figured it might be the last time. This wasn’t the first time Earl Waxford had tried to pull this crap on her, and she knew it wouldn’t be his last try at the slap and tickle either. He was a philandering pig with a druggie son. His hatred of the police had shaped his journalistic bias; she was sick of it and didn’t want any more part of it.

  Back at her apartment that night after the Camacho interview, she uncorked a bottle of cheap cabernet and pondered her future in broadcast news. KCMP was her first real break, and it was shaping up to be her last. Rachael loved being a television journalist. She felt that breaking a good story was her only passion at the moment. She had given up more than one emotional relationship for the opportunity to make it in broadcast journalism. Now she had hit a wall.

  Deputy Will Phillips had been showing a keen interest in her lately, too. The youthful deputy had taken his shot tonight and asked the attractive reporter if she was currently in a relationship. She told him no, but that she had a policy not to date anyone involved in a story she was writing. He was polite about it and immediately backed off. As she sat there in her small apartment, she wondered if he would ever ask her out again. Maybe once she finally finished this story. Will was single and cute after all, despite the occasional flatulence. Hell, her shot at finishing the Phantom story might be finished now anyway, especially after today’s showdown with Waxford.

  Two hours later, with an empty bottle of Two Buck Chuck sitting sideways on the table, Rachael Storm sat cross-legged on her living-room floor sobbing in the dark. This case would not be her Waterloo. She would not let that asshole Waxford, with his wandering fucking hands, beat her. She had to figure out a way to stay true to herself and to get this story out to the public when the guys broke the case. She just knew they would get that break soon. She believed in them. Storm dried her mascara-stained eyes, got up, and started making plans.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Fun with Stanley

  I got home late after the Camacho interview, kissed my crew good night, and hit the sack. In the morning, I woke up fine. But suddenly, I remembered I had dreamed again. Strangely, it wasn’t that same old dream, but it was eerily similar. In this dream, I was underwater, but it was clear water, not murky as usual. I was floating, and I thought I was in the ocean. I felt peaceful. Suddenly, something abruptly ended the dream, and I was left feeling apprehensive about something. What was it about? It bugged me. I had this same dream a couple of times recently, and I figured it was leftover stuff from my PTSD. I was confident these would subside with time. I wasn’t worried about it, and I sure as hell didn’t tell Julie. Heck, I was just happy it wasn’t waking me (or Julie) up. So what she didn’t know wouldn’t hurt me.

  The detective bureau was abuzz shortly after my arrival. All of us were methodically dissecting our witness interviews, each investigator frantically searching for someone, anyone, who was tall and slender with red hair. We had lots of blondes, black-haired folks, and brunettes, but our well of suspects ran dry when it came to redheads. How about feminine-acting men? We had run across several queens, but they didn’t come close to fitting the description. The closest we had come to a womanly male with red hair was one dude who had pink hair with a streak of blue in it. But he was five foot four and weighed about a hundred and eighty pounds. We needed a tall, slender suspect, not a friggin’ gay hobbit.

  Even our pretty reporter voi
ced her concern. Rachael exclaimed, “This sucks. You guys get a great lead, and it fizzles out like a cheap Chinese firecracker. This pisses me off, so I can’t imagine what you’re all going through. What do you guys do when you hit a wall like this?”

  Biff Corbet, in his usual wry style, said, “Well, Rachael, when the going gets tough, our bosses get tougher. An ass-chewin’ is a great motivator.”

  By midday, my good buddies had begun their usual shenanigans. An orange fuzzy clown wig appeared hanging over the coatrack. Then at about 2:00 p.m., a typed warrant for arrest got tacked on my desk’s overhead file bin. The suspect’s first name was listed as Carrot, and the last name was Top. The charge listed was of course 187 PC (murder). The height and weight were about right, and the magistrate’s scribbled signature line simply read: Bozo. Of course it was signed in bright-red ink. Fucking hilarious, I must say. There was even a “suspect photo” attached to it of that comedian who called himself Carrot Top. That dude was scary-looking. Sorry, Mr. Carrot Top. I knew his bag was comedy, but he scared the livin’ crap out of me! We had lots of laughs over all this, but every one of us knew the laughing had to stop, and the hunting had to intensify.

  Shortly after I shredded up Carrot Top’s warrant (if you’re reading this, buddy, no offense), Rachael came up to my desk.

  “You know, Kevin, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that attorney, Richardson. He and his client are nothing but liars.”

  I shot a curious look her way. “Don’t say? Not that I disagree, but how did you come up with that astute evaluation, Miss Storm?”

  She continued, “Well, about three months ago, my shithead of an editor assigned me to cover that trial he was in…Remember when Richardson sued Telford Corporation for eight figures, based on the injuries that guy Blivins had allegedly suffered as a result of the plant’s negligence? I sat through three weeks of listening to that blowhard in court. God, he’s annoying. Anyway, I heard all the testimony about the ton of pain and suffering the plaintiff went through. That guy sat there with a huge cast on his arm and shoulder. He winced from the pain, on cue and only in front of the jury. I heard Dr. Redbone testify, too. He said that the poor man was barely able to function. Redbone said he had limited use of his arm, and the doctor even told the jury that Blivins was also suffering from ED—you know, he couldn’t get it up—as a result of the trauma of it all. It was a bit much for me. I figured the jury probably saw through it, too. Finally, on the day they rested their case, I just happened to be leaving in the back parking area of the court when a big black Lincoln rolled in and drove to the rear corner.”