by JoAnn Chaney
They were a progressive family, Denver was a progressive city, but the long shadows of the past were still around, hiding, waiting to trip you up if you didn’t keep an eye out. Tony’s mother liked to make sly comments during her weekly phone call with her son, sighing and asking when he was planning on finding a job, that real men worked while the wife stayed at home, as if they were all starving. And then there was the struggle Spengler had at work, trying to find her place in a field where men dominated. Yes, they were progressive, exhaustingly so. Neat-o.
The second door had been pulled halfway shut to block out the light from the hallway and she slipped inside, moving sideways to get by without disturbing anything. Elliott was on his back, his long eyelashes fluttering against his cheeks as he dreamt, his dark hair curling and damp with sweat. He’d turned two the week before, and they’d celebrated by moving him out of his crib and into a big-kid bed. She leaned over and kissed him on the forehead. She sometimes wondered if she was missing the best part of her son’s life by working, but then felt guilty because she so rarely thought about either Elliott or Tony when she was on the clock.
“He still sawing twigs in there?” Tony asked when she came out again.
“Yeah.”
“You want to get changed and I’ll meet you downstairs?”
“Okay.”
She hadn’t yet kicked off the flip-flops when her cell phone rang. She dug it out of her purse. It was Jackson.
“Did you find her?” she asked, perching on the edge of the bed and looking at her feet. There was a flap of skin hanging off her ankle, and she gave it a delicate tug to see if it would peel away. It didn’t, but only made her hiss in pain.
“Nope. But a group came by right after you left. They’d been out farther for the last few nights, camping.”
“I thought camping was prohibited out there.”
Jackson snorted.
“Some of these people think the rules don’t apply to them. Anyway, they came by and asked what we were doing, and said they’d heard a woman screaming that night. They’d thought it was a joke. Someone fooling around.”
“Okay. Marie Evans screamed when she fell, her husband said that.”
“Yeah, but these guys said this woman didn’t just scream. She said, Please, stop. Don’t. Shouted it, and then screamed.”
“‘Please, stop, don’t’?”
“Yeah.”
“If you accidentally fell off a cliff is that what you would scream?”
Jackson laughed half-heartedly. He sounded tired.
“I guess it may’ve been right to send you out here to poke around. Looks like this Evans guy might’ve killed his wife, after all.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
August 31, 2018
Oh, he’s fucked, now. Hard. No lube, either. Ralphie Loren, this is your lucky day. Bend over and grab your ankles, take a deep breath. This one’s gonna hurt.
“It never occurred to you this might be something you’d want to share?” Chief Black demanded. “I sure as hell could’ve used a warning before getting a visit from that detective.”
“I didn’t think it would get this far.”
“It wouldn’t have gotten this far at all if you’d clued me in.”
“I’m sorry. You’re right, I should’ve told you about this.”
Black paused. In surprise, maybe, but Loren wasn’t sure. The chief had been working on his poker face for years and the damn thing was nearly perfect. It was most likely surprise, though, because when had anyone ever heard Ralph Loren apologize for anything? And admitting he was wrong was even more of a shock. You could say the sky was blue and Loren would harass and threaten and tease and bully until you admitted it was green—and not because he actually thought the sky was green, but because he liked to know he could force you to agree with him.
Loren was spooked, Black thought. He’d worked with Loren for years and he’d never seen him like this. It was as if the man had seen a ghost. And that’s exactly what it was. The ghosts of the past had been chasing Loren for a long time, and they’d finally found his home address and come calling.
“Okay, then why don’t you tell me now?” Black said, sitting back and folding his hands on top of his considerable gut.
Loren hesitated.
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because it would open all sorts of other questions I can’t answer.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Both, I guess.”
“I wish I knew what you’re talking about.”
“I wish I could explain better.”
“Then goddammit, Loren, try!” Black shouted. He slammed a fist on the desk. The cup of pencils wobbled and then stilled without tipping. Barely. “I get an unannounced visit from a detective based in your hometown, claiming you murdered your partner thirty years ago and they just found his body in an unmarked grave, and that’s not something you can explain?”
“No, boss.”
“It’s a simple question, Loren. Did you murder this guy? Lucas Gallo, that was his name, right?”
Loren started to say something, then thought better of it and sat back silently.
“You’re not even going to defend yourself? This detective seems pretty certain you’re the one behind this. Your partner went missing, and you transferred out six weeks later. Sounds like he’s got one helluva good case against you.”
“I don’t have anything to say.”
Black wearily rubbed his hand down his face. Every conversation with Loren tended to be frustrating, but this was worse than usual. He’d never seen Loren clam up, and he wasn’t sure how to handle it.
“This detective—” Black glanced down at a paper on his desk. “—Pete Ortiz, you know him?”
“Yeah.”
“He said when your partner went missing, his wife and kid vanished, too. They’re thinking they’ll find them next, buried a little farther on. Is that what’s going to happen, Loren?”
Again, silence.
“You know what this Ortiz asked me to do? He wants me to put you on an unpaid suspension while he’s investigating.”
“Is that what you’re gonna do?”
“Hell, no. I asked if you were officially a suspect in the case, and he said no. He doesn’t have anything on you except some gossip from thirty years ago. So I let him know I don’t have the backup manpower available to just cut one of my guys loose. He wasn’t too pleased with my response, but it isn’t his decision. So I need to know, Loren. Are they going to be able to connect you to this body?”
Loren let out a deep breath, setting his lips flapping.
“I don’t think so, boss.”
“You sure you don’t want to tell me what happened?”
“Trust me, you don’t want to know.”
“I do want to know, but it sounds like I’m not gonna get the story out of you.”
Loren shrugged. Black seemed ready to blow up again, then thought better of it and sat back with a disgusted sigh.
“All right. You need to keep yourself busy, then. What’s going on with the Simmons case?”
Dana Simmons and her three kids had been reported missing by her husband two weeks before. Two days later her car was found on the top level of a parking garage downtown, and she was dead behind the wheel. Her kids were in the back, also deceased.
“Coroner’s report came through yesterday. Murder-suicide,” Loren said. “She overdosed the kids on sleeping pills and then put a gun in her mouth.”
“What else you working?”
“I’m waiting on ballistics for the shooting out in Curtis Park, and the DNA results for the Adoba case.” Loren shrugged. “Treading water at this point, can’t do anything else until the other departments get off their asses and actually do their jobs.”
“Go back through the files, then. Talk to some witnesses. Tag along as help on another case,” Black said impatiently. “I don’t give a flying fuck what you do as long as Ortiz doesn’t s
how up here again and find you asleep behind your desk. Try to look like a man doing his job. Act normal for once in your goddamn life. Keep yourself occupied until all this blows over.”
Black’s eyes narrowed as he watched Loren stand up. If Loren left without a smart-ass remark, it would be a first. The door began to snick shut, but then opened again. Loren poked his head around.
“Forgot to tell you what a nice shirt that is, boss,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“The way it clings to those man titties of yours is sure to get some of the boys to at least half mast, if you know what I mean. You might not want to sashay around the bullpen looking like that.”
It was a typical Loren remark, but without the usual zest in the delivery. Even when he was sick as a dog Loren enjoyed giving everyone shit, but this was a pale imitation.
Spooked, Black thought as he watched Loren walk away through his wall of windows. And for the first time in Loren’s twenty years with the DPD, he had the slow walk and shoulder slump of an old man.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
“Where you heading, Spengler?” Loren asked. She was the first detective he saw, so she’d won without even knowing she was playing. That was the bitch of things in Homicide—it was either feast or famine. There were times when it seemed like the entire city was busy killing each other, usually around the holidays or during high summer, but then there were times when everything was quiet. Those between-times felt like waiting. Waiting for the other shoe to drop, or maybe it was the ax, and this was just another one of those times.
Spengler’s desk was out in the center of the bullpen, where it was the loudest. That’s where the newbies started, and after a while you got to move farther out, maybe even end up in a private office. She looked up in surprise at his question. She’d just slipped her purse over her shoulder and had her car keys jingling in her hand.
She was the new kid on the block, the latest addition to Denver’s Homicide department. Loren had heard some of the guys moaning over the way her ass looked in the pantsuits she wore, clutching their chests and rolling their eyes into the back of their heads when they thought she wasn’t looking, although Loren had an idea she knew exactly what was going on. She wasn’t an idiot, like so many others who’d ended up promoted to detective. She’d been in charge of a major sex trafficking case that stretched across several states but was based in Denver, had spent months undercover until it culminated in a bust at the Western Stock Show. She was a big deal, and when Chief Black had offered her a choice of assignments she’d asked for Homicide. She’d been with the department a few weeks now but still hadn’t managed to make any friends. There was something standoffish about her that put people off.
“I’m driving out to Estes Park again.”
“For what?”
“To get statements from some campers.”
“Why wouldn’t you have them come down here?”
“I’m going up there anyway to watch the search, I figured this would be easier for everyone. They’re waiting for me at the Estes police station.”
“I’ve never seen you dressed like that before.”
She was wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt with a flannel layered over the top. On her feet were hiking boots, brown with red laces. They looked brand-new.
“I would’ve dressed like this yesterday if I’d known what I was in for.” She smiled at him. Her lips were stretched as thin and sharp as a razor.
His cell phone buzzed inside in his pocket.
“I’m gonna tag along with you today.”
Spengler frowned.
“Why? You’ve got cases of your own.”
“Yeah, I do,” Loren said. “But if I had a choice between waiting on these dipshits to deliver lab results or chew off my own fingers, I’d be nothing but palms. And then how would I wipe my ass?”
Spengler blinked.
“What’re you talking about?”
Loren sighed.
“I’m tagging along,” he said. “You’ve got a partner. Congrats, Spengler. It’s a boy!”
Spengler gave him a strange look.
“Okay,” she said. “Let’s go. I’m already running late as it is.”
His phone buzzed again.
“I’ve gotta take this call. Give me five minutes and I’ll meet you out in the parking lot.”
“All right,” Spengler said. She didn’t look thrilled to have him coming, and that made him smile for the first time that morning. And it wasn’t one of those smarmy, polite smiles most people wear all the time, their lips pursed so tight they look like puckered little buttholes, but a real big grin.
“Preach, you there?” Loren said, pressing the phone against his ear and watching Spengler march down the hall toward the elevator. She pushed the button and then disappeared down the stairwell, too impatient to wait. But she didn’t walk—no, Spengler slammed the door open hard enough that the wall shook and several heads turned curiously, and he could hear the angry stamp of her feet as she went down. Loren’s grin widened.
“It’s Captain Preach to you now, dipshit.”
“Captain? Big mistake, putting you in charge of anything.”
Captain Robert Preach had been Detective Robbie Preach thirty years before, when Loren had first been hired on with the Springfield Police Department. Back then Loren had thought he’d live the rest of his life in Ohio—there were plenty who did, lived and died within the city limits—but now he thought of Springfield not as the armpit of America, but the perineum, the tender spot between the balls and asshole where the dingleberries grow thickest. He’d been lucky to escape—not that he’d gloat about it to guys like Preach, who were still there.
“You still pissing on electric fences?” Loren asked. Back in the day they’d called Preach Cocksmoke, after the night he’d drunkenly urinated on a fence surrounding a cattle ranch, and the current had zapped him and thrown him back ten feet. Loren swore he’d seen tendrils of smoke curling up from Preach’s balls and disappearing into the night sky, and while the nickname didn’t stick, the story had become legend.
“Fuck off,” Preach said loftily. “You know I’d love to listen to your dumb ass chatter on like a schoolgirl, but I’ve got a meeting with the city commissioner in a few so I’ve gotta be quick. And you’re the one who called me, I’m just getting back to you. What’s up?”
This was also the Preach Loren remembered. He was a guy who’d fall asleep at his desk and fart so loud it’d wake him up and he’d tip right out of his chair, but he wasn’t full of shit like so many other cops were. Straight down to business when he had to be.
“Ortiz showed up out here, paid my boss-man a visit about Gallo.”
There was a pause so long, Loren thought they might’ve been disconnected until Preach finally sighed.
“Oh, shit, Loren. I had no idea. That cocksucker said he was going on vacation, out to California. I told him to leave you outta this whole thing, but he couldn’t let it go. I’m gonna rip that idiot’s asshole a mile wide when he gets back here.”
Loren closed his eyes and listened to the sound of Preach’s fury. It was almost soothing. Took him back to his roots. He’d come onto the Springfield PD and cut his teeth on guys who all talked the same way, and he was a perfect product of his environment—he was loud and full of curses and threats and anger. They’d all been that way. Raucous, that was the word for them. And they had plenty of good times. They’d spend their entire lives together—at work, then later at each other’s homes, drinking and playing poker and telling dirty jokes and watching the Bengals get destroyed on the field yet again, and they fought like they were brothers. Their lives were hard, crusty outsides disguising the soft parts beneath. People around here thought Loren was a head case, always screaming and throwing around insults, but if they could only see the Springfield station when all the boys were there, present and accounted for. No one knew how easy they had it with only Loren to deal with.
“Did they really find Gallo?” Loren a
sked when Preach’s fury had burned out some.
“Yeah. A developer was out by the Mad River, doing some digging to pour foundations, and they found the remains.”
“Shit. And it’s definitely Gallo?”
“Yeah. Coroner said he was nothing but bones wrapped in one of those tracksuits he always wore. You remember how loud he’d be walking around in those with his thighs rubbing together?”
“He was so pissed when I said he sounded like a giant zipper being pulled up and down.”
“And then you turned on that Madonna CD he kept in his desk.”
“Gallo in a tracksuit dancing to Like a Virgin. That’s my entire recollection of the eighties.”
There was a pause, and Loren again thought the connection had been dropped or that Preach had simply hung up, but then he heard a wheeze and realized Preach was laughing. He’d forgotten how he always did it silently, his belly and shoulders shaking, the tears running freely down his pock-scarred face.
“Same, Ralphie. Same. Man, fuck the eighties. It was bad.”
Ralphie, another blast from the past. They all had nicknames, called each other Shitbrick and Jack-Off and Cocksmoke, the usual boys’ club idiocy, but the only thing anyone had ever called Loren was Ralphie. Gallo had been a part of the good times, too, although there’d always been something a little off about him. Skewed, that was the best word for it. Like a figure in a picture that’s just barely out of focus, and if you squint hard enough, tilt your head to one side, you just might be able to make out their face. But no one had ever complained about Gallo. Because they hadn’t all just worked together, they were brothers, they were family, and you don’t snitch on family.
“Should I be worried about Ortiz?”
“I—I don’t know, man. He’s still nursing old grudges, and he wants to make you pay.”
“Yeah.”
“He’s been waiting for something like this to happen for a long time. If he gets the chance he’ll try to stomp you out like a bug.”
Thirty years ago Pete Ortiz had been a skinny piece of shit with a zitty face and big, pouty lips that were like two pieces of raw tuna sliding against each other. He’d been promoted to detective before he was ready, but Ortiz had known important people—or he’d known information about important people and had gotten exactly what he wanted. He’d been made a detective, and the other guys would’ve accepted him except he was a know-it-all shit for brains. He’d walk around the station with his fingers hooked into the belt loops of the Wranglers he wore so tight you could see the outline of his cock under the denim and tell men who’d been on the force longer than he’d been alive how to do their jobs. And if anyone told him to go screw himself, he’d pout and whine and moan and probably add their name to a secret list of people who deserved payback, kept safe in his own head. Ortiz was the worst weasel Loren had ever met, but he was mostly beneath Loren’s notice until two things happened.