by Mike Markel
“Can you tell me if she was here alone?”
She shrugged. “No idea.”
“Can you tell me if this ER doc, David Tristan, is on duty now?”
She hits a few keys. “Not yet. He does ten am to midnight today.”
“Thanks.” I turned to Ryan. “Wanna wait till ten or go to his house?”
“I’d go to his house, so he can talk to us,” Ryan said. “We wait till he gets here, he might have a case right away.”
“Okay, but he might be cranky if we wake him up before a shift.”
“Don’t you hate having to deal with cranky people on the job?”
I looked at him. “Screw cranky people, I say.”
“Exactly,” he said.
“Go back and get his address from the woman, would you?”
I stood there, bleary-eyed, waiting for my caffeine to kick in as Ryan walked back over to the desk and returned in thirty seconds, waving a slip of paper.
“One other thing,” I said, “before we go. Wanna see if there’s CCTV of the ER entrance? To see if Amber came in alone or with Jared?”
“Good idea.”
He turned and went back to the woman in Medical Records, then spun on his heels and came back over to me.
“Facilities, room 2300.” He pointed down the hall to the staircase.
We walked down the long hall, past docs and nurses and assorted clerical people. I pulled myself up the flight of stairs. Room 2300 was on the right.
“Ma’am,” I said, pointing to my shield. “Detective Karen Seagate, Rawlings Police Department. Can we talk to the senior person on duty now?”
She picked up the phone. “Arnie, can you talk to two detectives?” She hung up. “Arnie Hastings, first door on the right.”
He rose to meet us.
I introduced us, and we shook hands. “Mr. Hastings, do you have CCTV of the entrance to the ER?”
“Yeah, we added that two, maybe three years ago. After a baby was left at the ER.”
“Oh, yeah, I remember reading about that. Can you call up a particular date and time?”
“Absolutely. It’s digital. What do you need?”
Ryan said, “Early Wednesday morning, starting at 2:10 am, until about 2:20.”
He hit some keys on his computer, which also lit up a large flatscreen on the wall to his left. “Okay, what are we looking for?”
“A twenty-year old girl, dark hair, maybe holding her face.”
Arnie hit fast forward, bumping it to 2X and then 8X. A couple of trees rimming the circular drive in front of the Emergency Room entrance started shaking back and forth real fast.
“Okay, slow it down a little,” Ryan said. Arnie slowed it down to 2X. “That’s her,” Ryan said to me. She was wearing gray sweatpants and a plaid wool coat. Her left hand was up to her eye. “Okay, put it on normal speed, please.” She was walking up to the entrance.
I leaned in to see her face. “Can you freeze it right there?” The picture stopped. “Looks like she’s holding a tissue or something to her face.”
“Yeah,” Ryan said, “it’s been bleeding. Okay, start it up again, normal speed.” He pointed to the screen. “There’s our boy.”
Jared was walking behind her, looking sheepish. We saw her turn back to him, say something sharp, pointing her finger at him. “Looks like she’s giving him hell, doesn’t it?”
“That’s what I see,” Ryan said. “Can you freeze it right there?”
“What are you looking for?”
“Just checking on his earrings.” He walked over to study the screen on the wall. “They’re both in.”
“You want to see anything else?” I said to Ryan.
“No, that’s all we need.”
“Okay, thanks, Mr. Hastings.”
“Sure thing,” he said, as the big screen went black.
Back in the cruiser, Ryan looked up the address of David Tristan, the ER doc. It was inside Ravensmere, a gated community in the east end of town. It took us ten minutes to get to the million-dollar house neighborhood. I punched in the number, and the gunmetal gray gate swung open.
“You know the password on this thing?” Ryan said.
“It’s the year, then star.”
“Heck of a password,” he said.
“It’s the same for all the gated communities,” I said. “So we can get in, and the ambulances and firemen.”
“And the FedEx guys, I bet.”
“Yeah, mostly the FedEx guys.” I parked at the curb at 4211 Blue Stem. We walked up the brick path. I rang the bell.
A carefully packaged forty-year-old woman, cashmere sweater, wool slacks, answered the door. She was normal size but seemed small standing on the marble entryway, beneath a huge cut-glass chandelier hanging from the double-height ceiling.
I introduced me and Ryan and asked if Dr. Tristan was in.
“He’s got a long shift coming up,” she said, looking at her watch, “and he’s got one more hour of sleep. Can you possibly come back in an hour?”
“Ordinarily, ma’am, we’d be happy to do that,” I said, shaking my head. “But we’re working on a murder investigation, and this is time-sensitive.”
“All right,” she said, sighing. “Come in.” She turned and headed up the large, curved oak staircase with its wrought-iron balusters.
We took in the foyer of the home, which was bigger than any room in my sorry house. A minute later, Dr. Tristan came down the stairs, wearing a silk bathrobe and pajamas, leather slippers. He was rubbing his eyes. I introduced me and Ryan.
“Sorry to pull you out of bed, Dr. Tristan. We’re only gonna need two minutes, tops.” The wife was standing nearby to hold me to my word. “Ryan, you got that record?” Ryan handed it to the doctor.
He looked at it a moment, then pulled a pair of half glasses out of his robe pocket and tried again. “Okay,” he said.
“Do you remember this young woman?”
“Not really,” he said. “She had a laceration to her cheek. I applied a topical antibiotic, put a butterfly bandage on it. I can get five of these every shift.”
“So she didn’t need any stitches?”
“No, it wasn’t that bad.”
“And the complaint about blurry vision?”
“That’s typical. When she fell—or whatever it was—she might have popped the eyeball a little.”
“You say ‘whatever it was.’ You didn’t believe her when she said she fell?”
“Falling is the number-one bullshit excuse. Unless it’s a kid or an older person who’s obviously in someone else’s care, we don’t try to figure out what really happened. But her age, the most likely cause is just what she said: she was drunk, fell down, hit something solid.”
“All right, Doctor. Thanks. Sorry to get you up.”
He nodded, turned, and headed up the stairs.
Ryan and I apologized to the wife and walked back to the cruiser.
“Hell, I could’ve done that,” I said.
“Done what?”
“Put a butterfly bandage on her cut and tell her her vision will clear up.”
“Lucky for him all his cases are that easy,” Ryan said.
“Yeah, yeah, I know. But our job’s tougher in one way—”
“Sometimes people shoot at us?”
“Yeah, that, too. But I meant we gotta figure out how they got hurt.”
Chapter 9
“Hector Miguel Cruz,” Ryan said, looking at his screen. “He’s had a Montana driver’s license for six years. Three traffic misdemeanors: one speeding, one failure to yield, one running a red light. Had a drug possession—misdemeanor, marijuana possession, three years ago. That’s it for Montana.”
“Didn’t his boss at the university say he had a battery?”
Ryan looked down at his notebook. “Yeah, he said they do a Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho check, but that Hector volunteered about the battery from California. He was drinking, got in a fight. Eight years ago.”
“How do yo
u read it, him volunteering the battery?”
Ryan shrugged. “Could be that he’s honest? He’s saying, that part of his life is over, and he wants to be upfront with the guy who’s going to hire him?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I got all kinds of stuff in my own life I like to think are over, but I don’t go around telling people about them—especially if they don’t ask.”
Ryan raised an eyebrow. “‘My name is Karen …’?”
He knew I was in AA, just like the chief knew. I didn’t mind that. “Yeah, I say that, but only in front of the other drunks. You don’t hear me saying it here in the department.”
“I understand,” Ryan said. “But it’s really the same thing. You say it not for the other people in AA. You say it for yourself, to remind yourself. That could be what Hector was doing.”
I tapped a pencil against my desk. “Or it could be that Hector’s got some other, bigger shit he doesn’t want anyone to find. So he offers up the California battery so bleeding hearts like you and his boss think he’s being all noble.”
Ryan smiled. “I’m not so sure the head of Buildings and Grounds is a bleeding heart. He gave Hector the key to the computer labs. If he thought Hector was a risk, he would’ve done a more extensive criminal search. Or he wouldn’t have hired him in the first place. Or Hector would have screwed up already and been fired.”
“What about the blue handkerchief in Maricel’s pocket? The one we thought might be the Latin Vice Lords?”
Ryan put up his palms. “Hey, I’m not saying Hector’s clean. I’m not saying he’s dirty—”
“Yeah, I know. You’re just not saying.”
Ryan nodded.
“Okay,” I said, “we definitely need to talk to him.”
“Absolutely. Soon as we can find him.”
“And our girl Amber?”
He looked back at the screen. “She’s had a driver’s license since she was 17. No record of any kind. Not even a parking ticket.”
“And her stupid boyfriend, Jared?”
“Well,” Ryan said, “Jared’s a different story. He’s got a criminal trespassing and vandalism, and a DUI.”
“Tell me more.”
“Let’s see. He’s 24, only had a Montana license three years, so he probably had one in another state, too. When he was a senior in high school, he and two other kids broke into the computer lab at his school, tossed some computers around. Fourteen thousand dollars in damages. He was suspended for a month, and his parents compensated the school district. And last year, a felony DUI, going down I-15 at ninety-five in the wrong direction.”
“Kill anyone?”
“It was three in the morning. Wasn’t anyone to kill. License was suspended for six months, thirty days in County, whole bunch of points, fifteen-hundred dollar fine.”
“Okay, so that’s what we know about him in Montana. He could have some other stuff in other states.”
“That’s right,” Ryan said. “Also, I checked with the university to get his records.”
“Let me guess: shitty student?”
“In a couple of ways. Low grades. He gets put on probation, then the next semester, he raises his grades just enough to get off probation. He’s been on pro three times so far and he’s only earned fifty-seven credits.”
“And the other way he’s a shitty student?”
Ryan looked down at his notebook. “He was a freshman, living in a dorm, drilled a hole in the wall, set up a little camera, videoed a guy and a girl going at it—”
“And put it on the Web?”
“Very good.”
“Okay, don’t tell me. I’m channeling this guy.” I closed my eyes. “Let me think. I’m a total douche missile. I video the guy in the next room slamming a girl. What do I do next? What do I do?” I thought for a moment. “I got it! I blackmail him and the girl. A hundred bucks each or it goes on YouTube.”
“No, I’m sorry,” Ryan said. “You’re overestimating Jared’s entrepreneurial spirit. One more guess.”
“All right, he isn’t doing it for the money.” I paused a moment. “Then it’s about embarrassing them.”
“You’re getting very warm.”
“He lost wood?”
“No.”
“She farted?”
“Thanks for playing the game, Detective. The correct answer is, the YouTube video was titled ‘Zit Face Screws a Fat Girl.’”
“I think I deserve credit for my answers.”
“Your answers were very good, but wrong is wrong.”
Ryan and I were silent for a little bit. I enjoyed our little game, but Ryan was wearing a cloudy look, like he was ashamed. He’s the kind of guy doesn’t think he should get any pleasure out of someone else’s misfortune. I say, screw it. I didn’t video the two kids humping. I didn’t put it on YouTube. If I can get a fifteen-second break without doing any more damage, I’m going to do it and feel good about it.
“So what did the university do to him?” I said.
“They suspended him for a semester.”
“He got off easy.”
“Agreed,” Ryan said.
“I’d like to bring him in. Let him sit in Holding for a night or two. Watch him cry.”
“Not sure the chief would approve.”
“We should go talk with the chief,” I said, “get him up to speed. Maybe he’ll let us check some more on Hector and Jared.”
We walked out of the detectives’ bullpen, down the hall to the big office.
“The chief in?” I said to Margaret, his secretary. The door to his office was closed.
She picked up the phone. “Detectives Seagate and Miner, Chief.” He must have told her to let us in. “Go right ahead,” she told us.
I nodded thanks.
The chief was standing behind his desk, looking down at some papers. He lifted his eyes when he heard us come in, then motioned for us to sit. “The exchange student?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Maricel Salizar.”
“What have you got?”
“She’s from the Philippines. Staying with the Provost, Albert Gerson. He tells us she had a boyfriend, a Hector Cruz, works at the university.”
“A professional position?”
“No, maintenance. He’s got a short sheet with us, passed the university’s screening. But he didn’t come to work yesterday, and didn’t call in, which his boss says he’s never done. We tried him at his trailer park. He’s not there. So we’re waiting on him.”
“Who else are you looking at?”
“She had this Big Sister—not a real big sister, just another student supposed to look out for her—named Amber Cunningham, a pre-law student, good grades, no record. When we interviewed Amber, she hadn’t heard about the murder, told us she and Maricel were no longer friends. She called Maricel a bitch. Amber’s got this boyfriend, Jared Higley, he’s a little gamier. He’s a student, but a shitty one, got a criminal trespass and vandalism when he was a minor, a felony DUI just last year.”
“How do you know about Jared?”
“When we went to interview Amber yesterday afternoon, Jared’s in her bed.”
The chief raised an eyebrow. “So I take it you don’t like Amber for this because she didn’t know Maricel was dead?”
“That’s what we’re thinking, but Amber had a big black eye and a busted up cheek.”
“How old was the black eye?”
“Five days, Chief,” Ryan said.
“So she might have gotten into it with Maricel,” the chief said.
“Or maybe Jared popped her,” I said.
“So what do you want to do next?”
“We want to get to Hector as soon as he comes up for air. Do we have manpower for surveillance at his trailer?”
The chief sat down at his desk and hit a few keys on his computer. He frowned at the screen for a few moments. “Sorry,” he said. “If he doesn’t show up in another day, ask me again and we’ll shift some people around. But we don’t have anything sol
id on him yet. In the meantime, you can put out an alert for his car.” He looked up at us. “Any other players?”
Ryan said, “Al Gerson’s got a son named Mark, who we haven’t interviewed yet.”
“What do you know about him?”
“Nothing, really,” I said. “Gerson said he’s … What’d he say about his kid?”
Ryan said, “Said he’s got his own challenges. He didn’t give us any details. The kid’s about eighteen. Dropped out of high school. Parents don’t know where he is half the time. Apparently he’s big into online games.”
The chief said, “You’re thinking since he spent some time at the house with Maricel, he might know something about her and Hector?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Her and Hector. Her and his father. Or maybe Mark had his own motive for hurting Maricel.”
“Okay, thanks,” the chief said, nodding his head. “We really need to find Hector and Mark.”
Chapter 10
“Detective Seagate, this is Bill Saffert, Building and Grounds at the university?”
“Yeah, Mr. Saffert, what’s up?” I put the call on Speaker.
“Just want to tell you Hector Cruz came in to work today. He’s on a one-to-ten pm shift.”
“Great, thanks a lot. Can you tell me where he is?”
“You want me to call him in?”
“No, don’t notify him. If you don’t know where he is, you can contact his supervisor to find out, but I don’t want you to notify him.” I paused a second. “You understand what I’m saying?”
“Yeah,” Saffert said. “Let me get back to you in a minute.”
“Thanks.” I hung up. “I don’t think he’s going to bolt.”
“I don’t, either. If he was taking off, he’d be long gone. He has to know if he shows up on campus we’ll find him.”
“And he’s going to have his story thought out and well-rehearsed.”
“There might not be a story,” Ryan said. “He might be straight.”