Delaney’s phone chirped. He answered and then launched into what Sarah called ‘one of his phoning fits,’ texting and talking rapid-fire to one person after another. He was always multi-tasking and now, with the storm, had to rearrange several work sites.
Sarah and Jason moved too, hopping together from one clean spot to the next while she filled him in on the details about the table, the cracked window and the broken chair. When they came to a standstill near the back door they put their heads together and talked softly over Delaney’s ongoing phone conversations.
‘This victim,’ Jason said, ‘you got a read on him yet?’
She showed him the contents of the wallet, adding, ‘I still need to talk to the neighbor who called it in. She told the first responders he was a quiet old guy who never caused any trouble. He looks quite a bit more agile than I expected but the house matches what she said – plain but decent.’
‘See what you mean,’ Jason said, peering around. ‘One set of dishes in the cupboard by the table. Bed’s made in the bedroom.’ They were standing where he could see through the open door. ‘Cheap bedspread. No frills, for sure. One straight chair in there, clip-on light on the bed.’
‘But a reader, you see that?’ Sarah said. ‘Library card in the wallet, and besides the books in there he had, uh …’ squinting, ‘… Sports Illustrated and a couple of boating magazines.’
‘Funny, though, I don’t see any pictures.’ Jason went on scanning. ‘No family photos, none of the usual clutter. He live here long?’
‘Don’t know yet. The other thing we don’t know,’ Sarah said, ‘is how the attacker got here and left. I was hoping you’d find some vehicle tracks when you did the crime-scene report. But now, with this storm …’ She shrugged.
Another gust shook the house, followed by the rattle of hail against the roof and front windows. Lightning lit the room and thunder crashed, so loud they all jumped.
‘Wow, it came up fast, didn’t it?’ Sarah said.
‘Standard monsoon schedule, first storm on the Fourth of July,’ Jason said. ‘Now we got us a body we can go right ahead with our holiday thriller movie. But where’s Tony Soprano when we need him?’
‘Actually I don’t think we do need him; I think you’ll do fine,’ Sarah said, suddenly vastly amused by how bizarre he looked, mud-spattered and soaked in his skin-tight speedos with wet leaves plastered to his calves. ‘How come you’re turning up to work in bike jammies?’
‘Delaney caught me helping out at my nephew’s day-care Fourth of July pageant,’ Jason said. ‘I was in stars and stripes and a tall hat, the whole nine yards. I asked the boss if I should come as Uncle Sam or go home and change and he said, “Just find something decent to put on and get over there, Sarah’s all alone.” This is what I wear under my Uncle Sam costume and when I saw the weather report I thought it might be just the ticket. Turned out I was right about that.’
Tom Tobin burst in the back door, hugging his posse box, letting in a great gust filled with dirty rain. ‘Hoo,’ he said, ‘I gotta get in outta that.’
‘My God, I forgot about you,’ Delaney said. ‘Where have you been?’
‘I jumped in my car when the lightning started,’ Tom said. ‘I figured it would let up pretty soon and the rest of the crew would be along, but …’
The lights went out. Momentarily shocked into silence, everybody stood still, looking around. The air conditioner sighed once and died. Tom rolled his eyes toward Delaney along a darkening wall. ‘I guess this kind of wraps it up, doesn’t it?’
‘We’ll see,’ Delaney said, out of the gloom. ‘After the carpenters get here to seal up that window and secure the doors, if it clears up a little maybe we can start the canvass, hmm?’ Ignoring the dubious looks he was getting from his detectives, he said, ‘But you can go check out, Tom. You can’t stand out here in this weather. The crime scene’s already fucked and we can time ourselves out when we get back to the station.’
‘You got it,’ Tom said and fought his way out the door into the worsening storm.
‘Well, I’ve got a couple of LED lights in the van,’ Jody said, ‘but I honestly don’t think it’s worth the trouble to set them up. Really, I’ve got about all the prints I’m going to get here.’
‘I was just about to say I got all my DNA swabs too,’ Sandy said. ‘And have you thought about how hot it’s going to get in here in a few minutes?’
‘The storm will cool it off a little. But let’s see,’ Delaney said. ‘Is the whole neighborhood dark or is it just—’
They all peered out the windows. Sarah said, ‘No light anywhere. Lightning must have hit a transformer.’
‘Damn. That’s not going to get fixed right away.’ Delaney took a breath. ‘OK, Sandy, Jody, guess you better go. You need any help getting your gear out to the van?’
‘No, we can manage,’ Sandy said, anxious to leave before Delaney thought of some jobs they might be able to do in the dark. Jason insisted on helping, though, as they struggled out the door and into the van. Sarah watched through a front window as their van lit up and rolled away and Jason made another heroic dash for the door through the crashing storm.
Then it was just the three of them hunkered in the dark, bloody room, listening as the storm battered the house.
‘Well, I suppose we could get some of the scene work done while we wait,’ Delaney said. ‘Try to find an address book. Measure and sketch this room. You got a tape with you, Jason?’
‘In the car,’ Jason said. He looked out the window at the chaos, raised his eyebrows at Delaney and asked, ‘You don’t have one?’ With an ugly cracking sound a branch split off a nearby mesquite tree and went tumbling down the street.
‘But listen, I’ve been thinking,’ Sarah said. ‘You haven’t found any more records on this victim so far, have you, boss?’
‘Just what I already told you, what I got in the initial complaint,’ Delaney said, looking resentfully at the phone he was holding. ‘And I think the first responders got that off Google. Fourth of July, the support staff isn’t working and I can’t seem to get any of my messages returned. Looks like I won’t get much till tomorrow.’
‘What if the body we just sent to the morgue isn’t Calvin Springer?’
‘What? Why would you think it wasn’t? He had this wallet in his pocket in his own house.’
‘Right. But if the homeowner won the fight and didn’t want to talk about the man he just killed … I’m just saying, it wouldn’t take long to switch wallets. And it might give him a whole day’s head start.’
‘That’s pretty far-fetched, Sarah. Haven’t we got trouble enough right here with this broken window and no lights? What are you suggesting?’
‘The only picture we’ve found here is in this wallet. On his driver’s license. Pretty miserable picture, as usual’ – she showed him – ‘but I took a couple of pictures of the body with my phone while Gloria was shooting hers, see? And surely the neighbor who phoned in the complaint could say if they look like the man who lives here.’
‘Is that worth going out in this storm?’
‘She might know other stuff about him. The neighbors are really all we’ve got right now, aren’t they? And didn’t you say the person who called this in is next door?’
‘Well, yes … let’s see. Martina Ybarra. Runs a day-care center here on Alameda – must be this stucco bungalow with the swing set, right across the little ditch with the river stones.’ He peered out through the water and grit leaking through the broken window beside him. ‘Ah, but that ditch is a little river now.’
‘Still,’ Sarah said, ‘I could run to my car. I’ve got my camera out there and my Glock.’
‘I don’t want you to go alone, it’s too crazy out there. And Jason can’t go to a door dressed like that; nobody’ll believe he’s a cop.’
‘That’s right, Sarah,’ Jason said quickly. ‘I’d be inappropriate.’
‘No problem. I’ve got a slicker in the car – you can put that over y
our biker suit and look like all-weather police. Come on, it beats squatting in here watching trees fall apart, doesn’t it?’
‘Aw, hell, I guess. And they’re sure to be home, huh? Not going out in the rain with all those babies.’
THREE
They stood on the front porch under Sarah’s big umbrella, holding up their badges. The door was opened by a pretty girl holding a baby.
‘Good afternoon,’ Sarah said. ‘We’re from the Tucson Police Department.’ People sometimes freaked if she said homicide; she’d learned to ease into it. ‘We need to ask you some questions about the complaint you called in—’
The girl turned away and yelled across the baby’s head, ‘Mama!’ Naked except for a diaper, the baby waved its arms and smiled, looking pleased to have company.
A dark-haired woman looked up from a round table at the back where she was minding several children. ‘What?’
‘These people say they police!’ the girl yelled.
‘What?’ The woman peered toward the open door, said something to the children and came forward, carrying a lighted candle in a small glass holder. The flame wavered in wind from the door and she protected it with her hand. Peering over it at the two of them huddled under the dripping umbrella, she said, ‘Your car break down or something?’ Then she saw their badges and said, ‘Oh.’
‘Tucson Police,’ Sarah said again and explained that they were detectives investigating ‘the problem’ next door. ‘Was it you who called in the report about the fight?’
‘Yes. But I don’t know nothing more,’ the woman said firmly. ‘That man never talked to me; I don’t know him at all.’
‘I understand. Could we just come in a minute so I can ask you a couple of questions?’ The wind blew her hair across her face and she scrabbled at it with her free hand, feeling disadvantaged. She tried to stay tidy so people would know she was trustworthy.
But windblown worked for her this time. The dark woman took pity on her, standing there getting pelted by the storm. ‘Oh, sure, come in …’ She clucked. ‘Such weather.’
They edged in and closed the door. In the sudden silence they wiped their feet on the aged doormat and looked around them at the crowded room. Then Jason reopened the door and leaned out to close the umbrella and leave it. Before he got the door closed, lightning flashed again, very close, followed quickly by a roll of thunder. Jason flinched as he pulled the door closed and turned to face the two women. Water dripped off his naked skull onto his shoulders.
The girl with the baby handed Jason the towel she had slung over her shoulder. Smiling, she said matter-of-factly, ‘Here, you wanna wipe off?’
Jason was so dumbfounded he took it and dried his head. Handing it back, he said, ‘Thanks,’ and smiled into her lovely dark eyes. She smiled back, watching him attentively, as if he were some exotic life form in a museum she was visiting for the first time.
Sarah said, ‘We need to ask you a few questions about the trouble you reported next door.’
‘I made the call,’ the older woman said, ‘but I don’t know nothing else. Only it sounded like a big fight. They broke the window.’
‘Do you know the man who lives there? Your neighbor?’
‘Know what he looks like. We don’t talk much at all.’ She was apprehensive and careful again. ‘He’s an old Anglo guy – quiet.’
‘Is his name Calvin Springer?’
‘Don’t know his name. He probably don’t know mine either.’ They saw her making a decision, getting firmer. ‘And I got all I can manage here – I don’t think I can help you anymore.’ She cleared her throat and then, carefully respectful, added, ‘Officers.’
Jason said sympathetically, ‘We can sure see got your hands full here, um, Martina. Have I got that right? You’re Martina Ybarra?’
‘That’s right. This is my daughter, Sofia.’ She pointed to his name on his shield and said, ‘That’s how you spell Peete, with all those e’s?’
‘Well, Peete’s my last name, see. My first name’s Jason. That is a little confusing, I guess. And this is Detective Sarah Burke – she’s the lead detective on this case. We’ve got just a, you know, a few questions.’
‘Well … I’d like to help if I could, but …’ The woman looked from one of them to the other. ‘But I don’t know him,’ she said again.
‘You’re very alert and observant, though, aren’t you? You did such a terrific thing already, using your head and calling us so promptly in spite of this awful storm.’ He leaned a little toward the older woman, oozing respect. ‘And all these children … how many babies you got in here?’
‘Oh, just five today. I got more clients than this but some people kept theirs home today because of the holiday.’
‘Oh, sure, the Fourth,’ Jason said. ‘Celebrations all over town, I guess. I got called away from my nephew’s school pageant.’ For one dizzy instant he grew an antic expression and Sarah was afraid he was going to show her what he was wearing under the slicker. But he stifled the impulse and went back to smiling kindly at the two women.
Sofia said, ‘Yeah, we even had a mariachi band go by here. With little US flags stuck to their instruments – ain’t that crazy? And something else different – a clown with a limp.’
‘Still not sure I believe that part,’ Martina muttered.
‘You weren’t looking. I saw him,’ Sofia said. She had a sweet face but resentment seethed in her when her mother put her down.
‘A band went by during the fight?’ Sarah looked dubious.
‘Yes,’ the mother said. ‘It was a parade.’
‘At the same time as the fight? But no connection, right?’ Sarah had her tablet out, typing. People like to see their words noted down but this story seemed so unlikely. ‘When did you notice the fight – you saw something, or …?’
‘No, it was a noise. Like a thump.’ She looked at the girl. ‘And then Sofia ran to look.’ They took turns, then, telling the story – the noises, the broken glass and blood on the window.
‘Could you hear sounds? Did they say anything, yell anything?’
‘Once I heard … high voices, like screaming,’ Martina said. ‘But there was so much noise here then, with the bands and a queen outside.’
‘A queen? Like a homecoming queen?’ She was typing fast.
‘This is so great,’ Jason said, spreading his hands out as if getting ready to give them a prize for passing the memory test. ‘Ain’t they terrific? Giving us all the details.’
‘Yes, great.’ How the hell do you write this in a report? ‘So it all happened at once – the fight and the parade, right? And you had the children to take care of so you never left the house, is that right?’
‘Yes. I mean no. I never went outside so I still don’t know what started it or any of that. We’re too busy in here to be spying on the neighbors.’
‘I hear you. But when they broke the window and you could see blood—’
‘And we heard the yelling,’ Sofia said.
‘That’s when you called us – is that about it?’
Mother and daughter nodded, yes, yes – agreeing for once.
Then Martina added, ‘But we don’t know him really.’ Her face was growing that set-in-cement look again.
‘But you know what he looks like,’ Sarah said. ‘You’ve seen him plenty of times? How long has he lived there?’
‘As long as I can remember,’ Martina said.
Sofia, nodding again, said, ‘All my life.’
‘Do you know if he has relatives here in town?’
‘No idea,’ Martina said. ‘Never seen any.’
‘But you could identify the, uh, the body?’
‘The body? Mother of God, you saying he’s dead?’
‘Well … we think so.’
‘You ain’t sure? Shouldn’t you take him to the hospital then?’
‘No, I mean, we’d like to ask you to look at this picture we’ve got here on the driver’s license we found over there. And just … tell us if th
at looks like the man who lives there – lived.’
Jason pulled the little plastic card, nice and dry, out of an inside pocket of the slicker and held it out to Martina, smiling. She took it from him reluctantly, held it at arm’s length and gave it one quick peek. Seeing nothing alarming, she looked again, shrugged and said, ‘I think so. Them driver’s license pictures … hard to tell, huh?’
‘Well, take a look at this picture on my camera, will you?’ Sarah said. ‘And tell us if that looks like the same man to you?’ The woman, who had been getting quite friendly, began shaking her head. ‘Is this a picture of a body? Please don’t ask me to look at no body.’
‘I’ll do it,’ the pretty girl said quickly. ‘I know what he looks like.’
‘Sofia,’ Martina said, speaking very softly, ‘ya basta.’ The girl gave her back an impudent stare and shrugged.
‘Well, now, Martina,’ Jason said, ‘you did such a great job of calling us right away, I’m sure you’re strong enough to do this one more thing, which is take a good look at the picture on Detective Burke’s camera. Because, see, we need to be sure that was actually the homeowner that we sent to the morgue.’
Martina did not want to look at a picture of a dead body. It would give her nightmares, she thought. But people so seldom gave her the respect she knew she was entitled to for all the hard jobs she did. Here was her chance. Not to mention that Jason Peete had looked kind of cute with rainwater dripping off his skull. And Sofia was right there poking her nose in, determined to get her some of that. Martina, suddenly looking solid as a rock, reached out to Sarah and said, ‘Lessee that camera.’
Sarah brought the photo up on her phone and handed it over. Martina made one small sound, like a child’s whimper, at her first sight of the abused corpse. Then she took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and looked at it long and hard while Jason peppered her with questions.
‘I know his face is messed up, but … you see anything familiar? The shape of his arms, his haircut? Any of the clothes? I know they’re pretty torn, but—’
Denny's Law Page 3