by Hopkin, Ben
To Darc’s credit, it only took him a second before he picked up what Trey was putting down. Maybe improvement was possible, after all.
“That was the Chief Operations Officer,” Trey’s partner responded. “He was expressing concerns with the timeline of our work here, as well as confirming what Mala had ascertained. Horace Walker is the only man who has consistent access to the tiger.”
“Did you run down Horace’s file?” Trey asked.
“Yes,” Darc responded. “And what I found was significant.”
Significant. That didn’t sound good. “What was in it?”
“He’s been brought in on multiple stalking charges. There was one incident in which he had separated two siblings from their parents and was plying them with treats.”
“Well, that explains why the suit was acting so squirrely. It isn’t going to look good for them if this gets out.” Trey called out to one of the uniforms who was standing next to the employee access door. “Hey, Simmons! Go grab the tiger trainer.”
The uni nodded and disappeared behind the door. Five seconds later he was back.
“Just talked to the C.S.I. guys. They say he’s gone.”
“What do you mean, he’s gone?”
Simmons shrugged his shoulders. “Dunno. They just said that one second he was right there, the next they couldn’t find him anywhere they looked.”
Great. So a creepy old stalker dude, who may or may not be a pedophile, was out loose in the zoo. Or worse, Seattle. That actually made for almost as good a story as the tiger chowing down on a murder victim. Death by Tiger or Kreepy Keeper. Dealer’s choice, really, when it came to punchy titles for the newscast. Trey heaved a sigh.
For what had started out as a sweet case, this was turning into a real headache.
* * *
It had been lucky for Mala that she’d been able to get Janey into a good daycare as quickly as she had. Granted, Janey hadn’t really had a chance to make that many friends. One, it was summer. Two, the little girl didn’t talk. And three, she kept getting involved in murder cases.
It was kind of the perfect storm. Unless Janey came across another mute victim of tragedy, she wasn’t apt to find many soul mates.
But, they had managed to find someone with whom Janey could at least play. It was maybe the exact opposite of the soul mate scenario, but it was looking like it might work. At least so far.
Riley, one of the girls from Janey’s daycare, had apparently taken Janey on as a project. Although, in watching them together, Mala was starting to suspect that it was just that Janey didn’t interrupt. So far, Riley had kept up a steady stream of chatter.
“And then after we finish playing house… you’re going to be the maid… we’re going to go out in the backyard and play on the swing set for fifteen minutes because my dad says that physical exercise is important. And then we’re going to dress up your bear…” The girl’s voice cut off as she dragged Janey into her bedroom and closed the door. But not before Janey could shoot a look at Mala that seemed to say, Save me!
Mala was doing the right thing for her, right?
Riley’s mother, Meredith, poked her head from around the corner from the kitchen. “The girls in the room yet?” Mala nodded, and Meredith heaved an exaggerated sigh of relief. “Perfect. Want a glass of wine?” She held up a bottle of Zinfandel and waved it back and forth.
“Oh, no thanks,” Mala demurred. “I’m going to have to drive back once they’re done playing.”
“Oh, honey. Once Riley’s gotten her claws into a new one, she’s not letting go any time soon. But suit yourself. I’m having a glass. Or two.” Meredith winked at Mala. “Maybe three. We’ll have to see how the afternoon goes.”
Mala was saved from having to respond to that statement by Meredith’s husband Carson walking into the kitchen. Meredith had introduced him when Mala and Janey had arrived, but he had been on his cell and had only given Mala the barest nod before disappearing into his home office. He appeared to be finishing up that same call.
“No, no, I’m telling you. The smell is temporary. A little Febreeze, some baking soda… completely gone. And they’re willing to take out the built-in aquarium.” He looked at Mala, pointed at the phone and made a face. “Okay. Yeah. You think about it. But this one’s a steal, and someone else is going to walk away with it.” He disconnected and heaved a sigh. “Buyers. Am I right?”
“I’m sorry?” Mala wasn’t used to being thrust into awkward conversations with people she hadn’t really met. She turned to Meredith, who was deep into her first glass of wine already. Meredith pulled a face and shrugged at her, as if to say that Mala was on her own on this one.
“Forget about it. Real estate stuff. Guy’s a real bleeder.”
“Bleeder?” This was a strange conversation. Mala knew the words coming out of Carson’s mouth were English, but there seemed to be little sense to them. And while Carson seemed charming enough, he had an odd way of treating Mala as if they were already best friends. Intimates. Again, charming, but it was getting under Mala’s skin.
“Yeah. It’s what I call the needy clients. You know, the ones that want you to wipe their asses for them through the whole thing. Bet you weren’t like that.” Carson gave her a conspiratorial wink.
“I wasn’t… What?” Mala was regretting not having taken Meredith up on that glass of wine. Glancing over at her hostess, Mala saw Meredith wince and start in on her first refill. Mala was starting to understand Meredith a little better. Carson was a lot to handle. It must be like being married to the Energizer Bunny.
“When you bought your house,” Carson explained. “I bet you were the model buyer.”
“Oh, I haven’t… I don’t own a house.”
Carson stopped and looked at her with his jaw hanging open. He shook his head in exaggerated disbelief. “You don’t own your own house?”
“Carson,” Meredith started, her tone sharp. Her husband waved her off with a negligent hand, his attention never leaving Mala’s face.
“You should own a house,” he scolded Mala. “Best investment you can make, no matter what people say these days. The rent you’re paying could be going right into your pocket instead of into someone else’s.”
“Carson, knock it off,” Meredith interrupted once more. “Maybe she doesn’t want to buy.”
“Why not?” Carson fired back. “She’s obviously got the money. Nice clothes. Smells good. There’s the kid back there that has to be adopted. That takes bucks.”
“Carson!”
“What?” Meredith ‘s husband’s face was blank for a moment. “Oh, the adoption thing? C’mon. Am I supposed to ignore what’s right in front of my face? The girl’s blonde. Our friend here looks like she’s Arabic or something. I didn’t offend her. I didn’t offend you, did I?” He turned back to Mala, who at this point was just trying to figure out a way to get her hands on one of those glasses of wine.
“Um. No,” she managed.
“See?” Carson gloated at his wife. “Besides, a house is going to be more stable for that little girl of hers. She has to know that.”
All of the sudden, what had started as an obnoxious and borderline racist sales pitch had ended up hitting Mala right where she lived. Stability for Janey was one of her highest priorities, and while she didn’t want to react to an obvious ploy for Carson’s business, she’d be foolish not to at least explore the possibility. Right?
“It’s true that I want Janey to feel settled,” Mala admitted.
“Of course you do,” the real estate agent crowed, giving his wife a significant look. “Where are you living now?”
Rattled again, Mala stammered out a response. “That big apartment complex around the corner from the Goodwill on 8th.”
“I know it. That’s a nice place. And for what I know you’re paying in rent there, you could be in a home by the beginning of next month, I’m telling you.” He grabbed the top sheet off of a stack of fliers that was resting on the kitchen counter. “In fac
t, here are the newest listings. Take a look at the top one. Four blocks away from here, right next to a park. Just went on the market today.”
Glancing at the glossy pictures of the first house, Mala had to admit she was impressed. She’d thought of owning a home before, of course, but it had never seemed to be the right time for it. But now with Janey…
Carson’s cell phone rang. He glanced at the number that popped up on the screen and grunted. “Gotta take this in the office. But look over that flier, and here’s my card. I mean it. Think about a home.” He gave her one final appeal with his eyes before darting back into the office down the hall.
“Sorry,” muttered Meredith. “I swear I can never bring people home with me. Happens every time. Real estate agents,” she griped, taking another swig of her wine, “are one step up from ambulance chasers.”
Mala could understand what she was talking about. That conversation hadn’t been all that pleasant. But maybe it was the beginning of something good. Maybe it was the start of Mala and Janey finding a home together.
There was nothing in the world she wanted more than that, and she’d sit through as many awkward chats with annoying people as she had to in order to make it happen.
CHAPTER 3
Darc sat next to Trey and observed the old man across the table. The glowing traces left by the lines of logic that swirled around Horace Walker, collecting data, gave Darc a continual stream of information.
Horace was strong, much stronger than he appeared. He had sharp hearing, possibly as sharp as Darc’s. His age of 77 did not seem in any way to have diminished his mental capacity. The man was also the sole caregiver to the aging tiger that had been found eating a human foot. In short, he was a prime suspect in the murder.
“I’ve told you a thousand times. What kind of a moron would I have to be to serve my own tiger somebody that I’d killed?” Horace spat. His attitude had done nothing but degenerate from the moment the uniformed cops had discovered him in a remote corner of the zoo, giving ice cream to a lost little girl.
“The C.S.I. guys figure the foot to be at least a few months old, maybe as much as a year… it’d been frozen… and that it belonged to the body of a teenage boy. Something about looking at the talus and comparing it to the third cune-do-hickey and checking the epiphy-hoo-ha for ossifi-whatsit. It’s all geek speech to me,” Trey rapped the crime scene photos in front of him and brightened. “But hey, here’s something weird that might be of interest to you. There were teeth marks on the bone.”
“Of course there were. He was eaten by a tiger.” Horace groused.
“Human teeth. They’re checking those bite marks now, looking to see if they’re a match for your dental records that we pulled.” Darc watched for any flicker of expression on the old man’s face, but the streams of data came up empty.
Horace griped, “I hate most people. Think they’re disgusting most of the time. Certainly don’t want to eat ‘em.”
Trey pointed to Horace’s file. “You seem to like young kids.”
The old man scowled, an expression that Darc attempted to process, using a combination of the grey emotional terrain that so puzzled him and then applying the gleaming strands of information to the equation. The non-precise answer came back, but with question marks. Anger? Possible defensiveness?
“Everyone gets all hysterical about that, but I was just helping those kids. I like children. They’re not as gross as the adults.” Horace mumbled the last, moving his lips across an empty gap in his teeth. “All my grandkids live back east. Never get to see ‘em.”
“Come on, Horace,” Trey goaded him. “You’re the only guy that has access to the tiger. The C.O.O. said that the tiger won’t let anyone else near him.”
Horace chuckled at that. “Yeah, he’s a cranky one, that Scar. Hates people. Well, except me.” He sobered up and stabbed his index finger at the table. “But that’s just the point. I hate people. He hates people. I know that about him.” The old man got tears in his eyes. “I love that cat. I would never feed him a human. That’s just cruel.” He sniffed. “Besides, the food comes in frozen and prepackaged. Horsemeat, most of it. Comes from Canada or Nebraska or something. I never do anything but just defrost the stuff.”
“One moment,” Darc said, sitting up. “Who handles the food coming in?”
Shrugging his shoulders, Horace glared back and forth from Trey to Darc. “I dunno. One of the techs, I guess. You’ll have to talk to H.R.”
Darc could see the tendrils of gleaming logic bearing out portions of the story put forth by the man. What Horace said was making sense, even if there were some obvious holes in his information. He remained the strongest suspect at this point, but the food chain merited a closer look.
There was a rap at the door, and Darc and Trey stepped out into the hallway. It was one of the forensic investigators, Daniel Krause.
“The teeth marks aren’t a match to the guy you’ve got in custody. He might be the killer, but he didn’t chow down on the kid.” Daniel handed Darc the paperwork.
Almost every strand of logic surrounding Horace Walker evaporated. There were still streams of logic left, but the same number now pointed to the food chain as the likely place to find the killer.
It was time to track down imported horsemeat.
* * *
Trey had now discovered more about how tigers got their food than he had ever wanted to know. For example, he now knew that there had been, up until about 2006 or so, three meat packing plants that dealt almost exclusively in horses, but that now most of the stuff came in from Canada. There was one plant out in Nebraska and another one in Colorado that still would send the stuff out, but most of what came into the Woodland Park Zoo was coming in from up north.
The horsemeat thing had kinda grossed Trey out, but according to the vets at the zoo, it’s what most closely matched the animals’ diet in the wild. Okay. He guessed he could deal with that. Still, unless their killer was a Canuck, the food chain didn’t seem to be panning out all that much.
Looking around, there didn’t seem to be all that much to go off of. The food came in frozen, so it didn’t seem likely that a human foot could accidentally end up in the food. That led them back to the old guy, Horace.
But the human teeth marks didn’t match the old man’s… dentures? Whatever. The man wasn’t the one who chowed down on the foot. But he still might’ve had something to do with it ending up in the tiger chow.
Trey sighed. As much as he wanted this to be simple, the creepy old man hadn’t seemed quite so creepy when he was talking about the tiger, Scar. Horace really seemed to love that old cat.
“Hey, Darc,” Trey called across his desk to his partner. “What about the other employees at the zoo? Can we get their dental records, too?”
Darc shook his head. “Not indiscriminately. But I have asked for a warrant for those most closely connected to the food chain.”
Yeah, that sounded about right. The only good idea that Trey had, and Darc had not only gone there, but he’d come back with a better answer. Sometimes Trey wondered why he even tried.
There was the fact that the DNA had come up a match for an unsolved cold case. Teenage boy had gone missing, and they’d found a pool of blood in a nearby park. A big pool of blood. There might be some evidence in the file, although there couldn’t be that much, seeing as how is hadn’t been solved the first time around. That was a crapshoot, but it was always possible that something could pop.
And then the phone rang. It was dispatch.
“There’s been another body part found. Different part of the zoo. Aviary, this time. Eagle’s nest.”
“Got it. On our way.” Trey hung up and turned to Darc. “We’ve got another piece of the body. Or, I guess it could be another victim. Man, this thing is creepy. I’ll never be able to look at another eagle again. Or tiger. We’ve got to get this one solved before the whole freakin’ zoo’s off limits.”
Darc got up to follow Trey, but then stopped. “It is un
fortunate that we cannot call Mala in to assist us with this.”
A week or two ago, that statement would have floored Trey. Darc admitting he needed help? Trey never would’ve thought it could happen. But Mala had gotten under his bald partner’s skin in a way that no one else ever had.
And what was even better, Mala knew what she was doing. She’d already helped them solve two murder cases, and with nut job killers that had been way beyond the pale.
It was a really good idea.
Too bad there was no way they’d get her out here right now. She was deep in the middle of Janey-needs-normal-experiences mode, so they weren’t going to get much out of her.
Then Trey stopped himself. Even if she didn’t want to come out to the crime scene, that was okay. They might at least get her to check out the cold case stuff. With her background in child psychology, she might be able to weed out something that no one else had. Not the most effective use of her talents, maybe, but you never knew when something might help.
“I’ll give Mala a call, Darc. I’ve got an idea. Maybe not a great idea, but that’s not really what I do.”
Trey pulled out his cell and dialed. It would probably come to nothing, but at least he was trying.
And with Darc as his partner, that was all anyone could expect him to do.
* * *
There had been a couple of times when Janey had questioned whether or not she really wanted to be a detective, but playing house with Riley for two hours had made her super-duper sure. Janey had never been so bored ever, ever, ever.
It didn’t seem like that could happen, especially with Riley being so bossy and talking all the time. But just because she was talking didn’t mean she was saying anything that Janey wanted to hear. It was all about babies and husbands and houses and dishes and stuff like that. Booooring.
Popeye said that he had almost tried to cut his own ears off just so he wouldn’t have to listen to her any more. That was mean, but Janey didn’t blame him too much. Riley had dressed him up in a tutu, so he had a right to be mad… and mean. Besides, Janey had thought the same thing a few times today. Maybe she was mean, too.