by Wiehl, Lis
Mia nodded, and Charlie stuck out his hand. “I’m Charlie Carlson, Seattle Homicide.”
Her face stilled. “Homicide? You mean like murder?”
“I’m afraid so. A body washed up on the shore of Puget Sound. We’re wondering if it’s the same guy you talked to.”
Laura’s mouth twisted and her eyes narrowed until her expression became a combination of fascination and fear. “So do you want me to go down to the morgue?”
“That won’t be necessary. I’ve got a photo on my phone of his face.” Charlie scrolled back, then handed it over. “Tell me if it’s the same guy.”
“Okay.” Cradling Charlie’s phone in her palms, she sucked in a breath. “Oh no!” She shook her head.
Mia’s heart sank. “Is it him?”
“It’s hard to say for sure because his face isn’t in the best shape, but I think it is.” Laura pressed her fingers to her lips for a moment.
Why had Kenny—who had known Lihong well—not been able to identify him? Had he been hedging his bets, hoping the body would stay unidentified? Hoping that no one would show up asking awkward questions about Lihong’s papers, his provenance?
Or was it that they had primed Laura so well that she was already well on her way to “identifying” Lihong before Charlie even handed over his phone?
“Got any surveillance cameras in this place?” Charlie asked, scanning the walls.
Laura shook her head.
“I know you already told the story to Mia, but could you tell me everything you remember, starting from when you first noticed him?”
“He came in before we get really busy. It was still full dark outside.” Laura looked up, remembering. “He was walking toward me, but he kept turning and looking behind him. I thought maybe he was meeting a friend here. Then, when he focused on my face, his face lit up, and he started rattling off a bunch of stuff in Mandarin. Even if I knew how to speak it, I think he would have been hard to understand, he was talking so fast. I told him the only phrase I really know, other than food words, which is ‘I don’t speak Mandarin.’ ” She bit her lip. “Then he said something like, ‘You know Mrs. Scott?’ and I said I had no idea who he was talking about. I said that in English. That’s not that complicated of a sentence, but he didn’t even understand that. So I simplified it and just said no. He took out your business card”—she pointed at Mia with her chin—“put it down on the counter, and started trying to ask me about you. I think he wanted directions to your office. I don’t think he understood that you wouldn’t even be there at that time of day.”
“And his friends came in while you were talking?” Charlie asked.
“Yeah. One white and one Chinese.”
Mia saw this story in a new light. Where had Lihong made these so-called friends? According to Kenny and Chun, he didn’t have friends. “Why did you think they were his friends?” she asked.
“The Chinese one was talking to him in Mandarin. The white guy slung his arm around his shoulders. I thought they were buddies, like maybe they had been out all night drinking.” She rolled her eyes. “You see that a lot when you work the opening shift. Sometimes it’s people who didn’t even know each other but just spent six hours together at a strip club or something. Then the Chinese guy said something to me in Chinese, but I told him I only spoke English. Then all three of them walked out the door. And after that the morning rush started and I stopped thinking about them.”
“There wasn’t one word of Chinese they said that you understood?” Mia asked.
“The second Chinese guy did say one thing to the guy who was looking for you that I understood, because my mom used to say it to me when she was really mad. It was ‘Don’t be so troublesome!’ Lo sow—that’s troublesome. And the guy who’s dead now, he did say this other word I knew. A couple of times. It was bù. Basically, it means no.”
Charlie and Mia exchanged a look.
“What was his expression like?” Mia asked. “Did he look happy to see them?”
“He was kind of, I don’t know, grinning. But looking back, it was a weird grin.” She stretched her mouth wide, baring her teeth. More rictus than smile.
Any hope Mia had had died. “What did these men look like?” she asked.
“Like I said, one was white, one Chinese. The white guy, he had a shaved head, and I’d say he was in his thirties. He was built like a square. About my height, but really muscular. The Chinese guy was skinny and younger.” She looked from Mia to Charlie. “I guess they really weren’t his friends, were they?”
“Probably not.” Mia felt queasy. She wished she hadn’t ordered coffee.
“I should have noticed that.” Laura bit her lip. “I should have done something. Asked him if he was okay.”
“It sounds like you were all alone here when it happened,” Charlie said. “If you had said anything, it could have been both of you dead. They would have opened your till, made it look like a robbery gone bad.”
“What about my business card?” Mia asked suddenly. “You said it was lying on the counter. Did either of the men notice that?”
“I sure hope not.” Laura put her hand to her mouth. “Only the thing is, I don’t remember what happened to it afterward. I could have put it in the recycling, but I don’t remember picking it up. It’s possible—it’s possible that one of them took it.”
CHAPTER 30
Charlie pulled up at Mia’s house, put his foot on the brake, and waited for her to get out.
Only she didn’t.
“Do you want to come in?” she said, surprising him. “Maybe we can keep brainstorming.”
Was there a hidden message in what she was saying? Mia played her cards close to her vest, and Charlie never knew quite what she was thinking.
He liked that.
“Sure.” He threw the car into park and told himself not to get his hopes up. They were working on a case together, that was all.
When they came in, Kali and Brooke were in the living room, around which were scattered dozens of pink toys, from a doll’s convertible to a shopping cart that was the right size for Brooke. Kali was sitting on the couch, but she was fast asleep. In her lap was a plate and in her loose hand was a bagel with a bite gone. Sitting inches from the TV and wearing a pink tutu, Brooke was engrossed in some kind of cartoon about superheroes.
Mia turned off the TV, then swung Brooke up on her hip. “Hey, baby girl, where’re your brother and Eldon?”
“Gabe took the bus to the mall … but he wouldn’t take me with him. Eldon”—she screwed up her face, remembering—“Eldon is at Danny’s house.”
With a snort, Kali woke up. When she saw Charlie her expression changed to one of embarrassment. “Oh, uh, hello.”
“Hey.” Charlie nodded, suddenly wondering what he was doing here in a room filled with females and pink plastic toys.
“I guess I’d better go officially lie down.” Kali levered herself off the couch. She was still a big woman, but she had lost a lot of weight. She gave them a nod and left the room.
Brooke pushed Mia’s nose and made a beeping sound, then laughed, delighted with herself.
Mia set her down. “Brooke, honey, could you go upstairs to your room for a little while so I can talk to Mr. Carlson?”
She tilted her head. “Can’t I stay down here with you?”
“It’s grown-up talk.”
Charlie braced himself for an argument, but instead Brooke just said, “Okay.”
He sat on the couch and something jabbed his thigh. A naked Barbie was stuck between the cushions. A shoestring was tied around her middle. Maybe he had been in his line of work too long, because looking at the doll made him think of a crime scene.
“I think Brooke’s been twirling her Barbie around, pretending she can fly,” Mia said by way of explanation.
“Naked?”
“Maybe it’s more aerodynamic.” Mia shrugged, then went to a desk in the corner and started digging through it. “I know you don’t need to make notes, but
I do.” She took out a pen and then kept digging. Every piece of paper she pulled out had already been enthusiastically scribbled on with crayon. “We’ve got to have some paper in this house,” she said in an exasperated tone, straightening up and scanning the room. She walked over to a backpack that had been shrugged off next to the TV.
She opened it up. “Why does Gabe have a Dopp kit?” she said to herself. She took out the small brown leather bag and pulled the zipper. And then went so silent, so still, that Charlie knew she had found something terrible.
He got up and looked over her shoulder. Inside the bag were a bottle of pills and three small glass vials. And two needles.
“It’s heroin, isn’t it?” She grabbed Charlie’s arm so tightly that her fingernails were poking holes in his skin.
Charlie picked it up. The label read Decagen. “It’s not heroin, Mia. It’s steroids.”
He watched as the emotions washed across her face. First she went pale with relief. Then red with anger.
A voice from behind them made them both jump. “What are you doing in my stuff?”
For a long beat, Mia was quiet. “I don’t think that’s the real question, Gabe.” She turned around. In one hand was the Dopp kit and in the other, one of the needles.
The last time Charlie had seen Gabe, a month or two earlier, he’d still looked like a kid. Scrawny, gangly. Now his shirt strained across his thick arms and wide chest. Football season was over, but if Gabe was going to suit up today for a game, he would probably need a new, bigger uniform.
“It’s like a supplement—” he started, but Mia cut him off.
“It’s not a supplement, Gabe. It’s steroids. That’s an illegal drug.”
“But it’s not like cocaine or anything like that. It’s not like heroin.” Gabe glared at them. “I’m not an idiot. I researched it pretty good before I started.” He looked from Mia’s face to Charlie’s. “Two months ago, I could still wear T-shirts I’ve had since sixth grade. I was doing everything they say to do. I lifted weights all the time. I tried all those stupid shakes, the protein shakes, the weight-gainer shakes. I ate eggs and peanut butter. I tried. You saw how I tried. But I still didn’t have any more muscles than Brooke. I still looked like a little kid, not a man. There’s something biologically wrong with me.” He nodded at the vials. “And that fixes it.”
Kids these days were expected to look like models and play like all-stars. There were certain areas in Seattle, awash in Boeing and Microsoft and Amazon money, that were hypercompetitive. Snobbish. Charlie was pretty certain this was one of them. Areas where both parents and kids tried to one-up each other with their expensive houses, cars, and clothes. And now, he guessed, their chiseled physiques.
Charlie had always been only an observer of that world. On a homicide detective’s pay, there was no way he could compete. So he drove a car with stains on the seats and his shoes were down at the heels and he needed a haircut—and he didn’t care.
And maybe Gabe’s family had once been part of that world, but then Scott had died and the house of cards, or rather credit cards, had tumbled down. The expensive Suburban had turned out to be leased. And from what Mia had told him, she was just barely hanging on to the house.
So if Gabe couldn’t compete by boasting about going helicopter skiing in Canada or snorkeling off Kauii’s North Coast, then he had to have something. And Charlie guessed that something was his body.
“What about Eldon?” Mia asked. “Does he use steroids too?”
“No, he’s big because he’s Samoan.” Gabe’s voice was bitter. “You guys really don’t understand. It’s not like bad kids take this stuff. It’s for kids who want to do better. Kids who want to improve themselves. It’s for the good kids. And older guys on the team told me I needed to get bigger, faster, stronger.”
Mia shook her head. “You are way more than what you look like on the outside.”
The kid rolled his eyes. Charlie tried to repress his irritation at his insolence.
“People can’t see my insides,” Gabe said. “They can only see what’s outside.” He flicked a hand from his biceps to his flat belly. “And judge me on that.”
“If that’s all people judge on,” Charlie said, “then you don’t need them as friends. You think just because you work out with weights and now thanks to steroids you’ve got big muscles, that makes you a man? That you’re an adult now? You know what makes you a man?” He tapped his thick index finger right between his own eyebrows. “It’s what’s up here. It’s how you think. How you act. What you decide is important.”
“You’re not my dad!” Gabe shouted. He turned to Mia. “He’s not my dad! Why is he even here?”
“Can I talk to Gabe alone for a minute, Mia?” Charlie asked in a reasonable tone of voice.
“Why?” mother and son asked at the same time.
“Because part of what I want to say to him is a conversation that should really be between guys.”
She looked from Gabe to Charlie. “Okay.”
“But, Mom—” Gabe started.
She leaned forward until she was only an inch or two from his face. “Don’t start with me, young man. You are on thin ice right now.” Her face was a mask of anger, but Charlie guessed that inside she was close to crumbling.
“So you decided to take a shortcut,” Charlie said mildly after Mia had left the room.
The kid puffed out his chest. “It’s not a shortcut. I was doing everything right but I wasn’t getting any bigger.”
“That’s because you’re only fifteen. It takes awhile for guys to reach their full height and weight. And you don’t want to mess around with Mother Nature.”
Gabe shrugged, still glowering.
How could Charlie get through to this kid? It might be twenty-five years ago, but he still remembered what had worried him as a teen. He had wanted to be accepted. He had wanted to look his best. Had wanted to get the girls. He had wanted the other guys to admire him.
“Gabe,” he started, but then stopped, uncertain of what direction to go. Kids’ desires hadn’t changed since Charlie was fifteen. Only everyone wanted things right now. Charlie was no better than anyone else, impatiently waiting for the microwave to bing because three minutes was too long to wait.
The difference was that in today’s instant gratification world, kids had access to drugs that could make things happen now. Steroids could build your self-esteem at the same time as they built your muscles. The problem was, all that growth came at a price.
After a long silence, Gabe said, “What.” Not making it a question. Still, Charlie chalked it up as progress.
“Steroids aren’t like taking baby aspirin. These are freakin’ hormones. And at some point your body will start thinking it has plenty of testosterone and it doesn’t need to bother making it anymore. So that makes your”—Charlie had to pause for a minute before he came up with the polite word—“your testicles shrink. Maybe makes them decide to stop working all together. It does other stuff too. Do you really not want to be any taller than you are now? Do you really want to end up with breasts? To go bald? You could be damaging your liver. Screwing up your blood pressure.”
Gabe didn’t answer. His expression was blank.
Charlie could imagine what was going through the kid’s mind. In his eyes, any problems were a long way away. When you were fifteen, all that mattered was now. And right now, Gabe had the muscles he had always dreamed of.
“Look, man, I understand. Who doesn’t want to be big? But these drugs can affect your mind, not just your muscles. They can make you depressed. There’re guys your age who have killed themselves after they started taking steroids. Sometimes they hurt other people. Just snap for no real reason.” He thought of what Mia had told him in the car last night about how Gabe had been acting lately. “It’s call ’roid rage. I’ll bet there’ve been times lately when you’ve gotten really angry at something and then later you couldn’t even think of why.”
“I can control my temper.”
“You don’t even know how pure this stuff is. It could be cut with just about anything. This kind of thing gets made in someone’s bathtub or in a Chinese factory someplace, and they don’t care what they put in it. All they care about is making money. It could not even have any anabolic steroid in it. It could have poison. Your dealer doesn’t care if you get muscles. They don’t even care if you die. Not when there are other customers lining up right behind you.”
“I don’t have a dealer!” Gabe spit out the word like he was swearing. “It’s just some guy. When I first called him, he was in an SAT prep class. We meet at a restaurant.”
“Well, you’re not going to be meeting anymore. Because as of right now, you’re done. Your mom’s going to be watching you like a hawk and so am I.”
Gabe kicked the coffee table so hard it skidded forward two feet. “Great. Everything sucks. I’m going to shrink down to nothing again. My dad’s dead, and now you seem to think you get to take his place. I don’t even have my own room anymore.”
Everything the kid said was true. So what was Charlie supposed to say?
In the end, he just said nothing.
CHAPTER 31
As he stood half dressed in front of the bathroom mirror, Warren generously sprayed Axe cologne over his chest. But what if he put his arm around Song tonight? She was so petite that her nose would be right next to his armpit. Just to be safe, he sprayed his pits as well. Then fanned his hands in front of his chest to make sure it was completely dry before he put on his shirt. He had last worn it to a wedding, and for the past six months it had hung in his closet, white and pristine and shrouded in plastic.
Now maybe he would have the kind of life where he wore dry-cleaned cotton shirts every day. Instead of a polyester blue shirt with his name embroidered over the breast pocket.
Thinking about the money made him a little anxious. He had been warned not to put it in a bank, that the IRS kept track of deposits over ten thousand dollars. He had split it up and hidden it in various places in his apartment: inside a DVD case, in a plastic bag in the freezer, in a water bottle in the toilet tank, in an envelope taped to the bottom of a drawer, and inside an old sock in his sock drawer. Now he was afraid he would forget where it all was.