by Claire Booth
They stood wide-eyed at the door to the living room. The youngest one, who looked about eight years old, lit up when he saw Hank’s uniform. He elbowed the middle brother and grinned.
Hank felt sick.
He looked at Mr and Mrs Anderson. Don was still stunned, but Cathy understood his unspoken question. She shook her head and rose to her feet.
‘Thank you for coming, Sheriff. Sergeant.’ She nodded at them both and gestured toward the front door. Hank pressed her hand between his and promised to check on her tomorrow. She nodded.
He and DeRosia quietly let themselves out as Cathy Anderson gathered her sons around her.
It was parked three rows away from the theater entrance. It was an ordinary, beat-up, second-hand teenage ride. And the only car in the lot at seven thirty on a Sunday morning.
Sam wasn’t sure why the Chief cared about it. It wasn’t the car that had crashed out near twisty Airport Road, which of course wasn’t near any sort of airport. He double-checked the license plate and confirmed that it was registered to Edith and Charles Barton. Must be the parents of one of the dead kids. He wouldn’t know, though, would he? Because he hadn’t been called out to the scene. Even when he finally got brought into things, the Chief hadn’t bothered to tell him anything. Just ordered him to go and get a car that probably wasn’t important anyway.
He glared up at the IMAX marquee, which loomed over everything and advertised some stupid family movie he had no interest in seeing. Then he kicked an empty soda can around the parking lot until Buster showed up.
The dude drove an enormous tow truck, way too much for anything but a semi. But he’d had the sheriff’s tow contract since forever, so no matter what you needed towed – like a teeny Chevy hatchback – Buster roared in with his big ol’ rig and charged you for the gas. Sam knew that because Sheila was always bitching about it.
Buster unloaded himself – the guy was as big as his truck – and hooked up the Chevy. Then they argued about whether he was allowed to stop for breakfast on the way out to the sheriff’s department substation on Shepherd of the Hills Expressway. It took some pointing at the evidence tape on the car and waving his badge around before Buster gave in and promised he wouldn’t. Sam really hated when people treated him like a kid, and not a deputy. He gave the soda can one last kick and climbed into his Bronco.
Buster pulled out of the lot and Sam turned to follow. Then he sighed, slammed the Ford into park, and jogged over to a planter between parking rows. He picked up the can, threw it into the trash bag in his trunk and hauled out after Buster’s huge cloud of diesel exhaust.
EIGHT
‘We’re going to need to talk to this Lauren Blenkinship girl.’
DeRosia gave him a quick glance and then refocused on the road.
‘Why? It was an accident. We need to figure out what happened during the accident. What happened with the car. And the driver. We don’t need to figure out why these kids lied to their parents. It’s not a mystery. They’re teenagers.’
Hank ignored her and wrote Lauren’s name in his notes. He wasn’t going to leave any stone unturned. Maybe this girl knew something about what had gone on before the crash. Or where the group was really headed. Because he was still having a hard time believing that they would’ve been out on that curvy road after that stern of a sheriff’s lecture. There must’ve been some kind of sudden outside influence. Were they chased by another car, trying to get away at a high rate of speed? That would explain the lack of skid marks.
He put away his notepad, touched the cool window again, and tried to reach Sheila but got no response. She must still be with the Fitch family. He decided that since it’d been Alex Danzig’s mother’s car, they should go there next. He rattled off the address and ten minutes later, they pulled up to the Danzig’s mobile home off Highway 248. It wasn’t in the best shape. Certainly not the worst Hank had seen in his year as county sheriff, but it could definitely use some new siding.
The front yard had a Dodge pickup that appeared to work and a 1980s-era Chevy Camaro that appeared to not. He and DeRosia walked in between them on their way to the door, Hank with his hand on his baton the whole way. He’d learned fast that the underneath of derelict cars made good sleeping places for the kinds of dogs that didn’t take well to folks entering their masters’ property.
But they made it to the little front porch without incident, and DeRosia knocked politely. They waited a few minutes, until a heavy tread and phlegmy cough got closer and finally opened the door. The poor guy looked like he’d stepped out of a NyQuil commercial. Mid-forties and portly, he stared at them through a decongestant haze.
‘Uh … yeah? Can I, um, help you?’
Hank and DeRosia took a discreet step back as he fought another bout of coughing. When he finished, Hank confirmed that he was Mike Danzig and asked if his wife was home. That penetrated Mr Danzig’s stupor.
‘Wait a minute. What are you here for? You’re both cops?’
Hank made the introductions and asked to come in.
‘What’s wrong? You wouldn’t be here if something wasn’t wrong.’
‘Sir, we really do need to speak with you and your wife,’ Hank said. ‘May we come in?’
Danzig stepped away from the door and mumbled something about his wife still being asleep. They walked into the living room, which was obviously where Typhoid Mike had spent the night. There were crumpled blankets on the couch and an explosion of tissues on the coffee table. A little humidifier chugged away in the corner.
Danzig staggered down the hallway and returned with a solidly built woman in a bathrobe who did not look pleased to find two strangers in her house so early on a weekend. She grunted confirmation that she was indeed Jenny Danzig.
‘We need to talk to you about Alex,’ Hank said.
‘What’d he do?’ she asked, crossing her arms over her chest and frowning.
‘He was involved—’ Hank started. Mrs Danzig cut him off.
‘Mike, go get him. He can stand here and look at the cops while they tell us what he did.’
Hank and DeRosia stared at her.
‘Ma’am,’ Hank said very carefully, ‘where do you think he is?’
‘In his room.’
Well.
Hank looked at DeRosia, who quite clearly had as little idea of what to do as he did. Hank turned back to the parents, but Mr Danzig was already halfway down the hall. He banged on a door and then tried to open it.
Like any self-respecting teenager, Alex had locked it. Likely before sneaking out the window. After more pounding and some yelling, Mr Danzig started to look worried. He hollered to his wife to find the key, which was met with a roll of the eyes.
‘We never had a key to any of those doors,’ she snapped.
Hank fished his notebook out of his shirt pocket and pulled off the paper clip that held the cover shut. It took more time to unbend the metal than it did to pick the cheap lock on the door. He pushed it open and found what he expected. An empty room with a rumpled bed and a screenless window cracked open an inch. A tuba sat in the corner.
Mr Danzig sucked in a noisy breath as the haze of cold medication gave way to the fog of worry. DeRosia took his arm and led him back out into the main room, where Mrs Danzig was sinking into the corduroy sofa with a panicked look on her face.
DeRosia guided him to a spot next to his wife and then pulled over a kitchen chair, sat down and told them both. Hank remained standing, looking out the window at the Camaro as they dissolved into tears and questions. If only he’d brought the kid home, he thought. Woken the parents up in the middle of the night and gotten him in a boatload of trouble. Helped install bars on his window right then. Locked all six of them in their bedrooms until they were out of high school.
He took a deep breath and lay his hand on the thin window glass, which still had a little of the night coolness trapped in its smoothness. He wondered when the Camaro stopped running and if it was even repairable.
And then DeRosia a
sked about the sedan.
‘What?’ both Danzigs said simultaneously.
‘We don’t own a sedan,’ Mike said.
‘What?’ both cops said simultaneously.
DeRosia rattled off the year, make, and model. They shook their heads. And then a thought occurred to Jenny Danzig, contorting her face like a seizure might have.
‘I. Am. Not. Jennifer Danzig.’
DeRosia balled her fists in frustration. Hank interrupted before she could give voice to it.
‘Ma’am, we seem to be missing something here. Can you—’
‘Oh, God.’ Mike groaned and dropped his head into his hands. ‘She didn’t …’
Not-Jennifer struggled to control her temper. She rubbed her hands along her legs until she could speak again. And then she spelled her name. G-i-n-n-y. Short for Virginia, you know? It’s his ex-wife who’s named Jennifer, she said, jabbing her finger toward her husband.
‘But this is the address on the registration,’ DeRosia said, still puzzled. Her accident analyses and careful reconstructions didn’t tend to include divorces. She wasn’t used to the messy family dynamics that commonly littered Hank’s investigations. He stepped forward and started to speak, but the current Mrs Danzig beat him to it.
‘That bitch. She used our address.’
Mr Danzig still had his head in his hands. Hank didn’t blame him. The guy didn’t look up as he told them where he thought Jenny was living now. But she moved around a lot, so he wasn’t sure. They’d been divorced for eleven years. She didn’t have much contact with Alex, who was their only child.
‘How do you think Alex got a hold of your ex-wife’s car?’ Hank said.
‘Hell, she probably came and picked him up,’ Mrs Danzig muttered. ‘Probably helped him climb out the window, too, the lyin’ little—’
Hank stopped her before she really got going. There wasn’t much else they were going to learn right now. Mr Danzig was too grief-stricken and Mrs Danzig too mad. They again offered their condolences, and left the trailer quietly.
‘So, they weren’t familiar with any of the other kids in the car,’ DeRosia said as they walked back to the truck. ‘They said they knew who the Fitch girl was, but that she and Alex weren’t friends.’
‘Yeah, I heard that,’ Hank said.
‘Oh. Sorry. It didn’t look like you were paying attention.’
He tried for a smile but had a feeling it came out as a grimace. ‘I was. Just thinking some things through.’ Or trying to. ‘Thanks for doing the talking this time.’
DeRosia looked at him like she wanted to say something. Instead, she slid behind the wheel. Hank climbed into the passenger seat and slammed the door.
‘Only one more,’ he said. ‘Let’s get it over with.’
NINE
Johnny Gall lived in a newer apartment complex. Bellflower Apartments was just off the Strip, which was why Hank remembered the address on his driver’s license. They walked along the balcony until they found Unit 213. DeRosia rapped officiously on the door. Nothing. Hank hoped the parents weren’t shift workers at one of the dozens of theaters and restaurants nearby. They’d be impossible to track down there. And the poor people deserved to know as quickly as possible. He knew he would want to. The nausea bubbled up in his throat. The only thing that kept it down was that he couldn’t breathe. He had to lean against the wall as DeRosia knocked again.
There was the suck of a weather-stripped door back the way they’d come, and an old lady appeared on the narrow concrete walkway. She blinked rapidly at them and then fished a pair of glasses out of her bowling bag of a purse. She shoved them on her nose and took a long look at them and then at the number of the unit.
‘Nobody’s there right now,’ she said.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ said DeRosia, who was standing closer. ‘Do you know where they might be?’
She closed her purse, which was the same shape as her sizable frame, and sniffed.
‘No, girlie, I don’t. I don’t keep track of people I got the bad luck to live near. None of them deserve my attention.’
She gave a nod that indicated she considered the matter settled and weeble-wobbled her way down the balcony toward the stairs. Hank tried to peer in the blind-blocked window. The little he could see was completely bare.
‘You think there’d be at least a chair or something, right?’ He shifted around to get a different angle through the mini-blinds. ‘There’s nothing in there.’
Ten minutes later, a still sleepy building manager told them that a man named John Kalin had rented the place three months prior. He consulted the creased rental application. Age, twenty-two. Occupation, waiter. Currently four days late on the rent. Hadn’t said he was moving out.
‘It doesn’t look like there’s anything in the apartment,’ Hank said.
The look on the guy’s face clearly indicated that he didn’t care. DeRosia, who had stepped outside, came back in holding her phone.
‘There’s nothing in the state databases on this Kalin guy. And there’s nothing on Gall. I had dispatch run a quick check. They didn’t do a deep dive, but even a surface one should have turned up something. And it didn’t.’
Now Hank was curious. And that tended to kick patience right out the window. He turned to the manager.
‘Is there anything in the rental contract about when you can enter an apartment without the resident’s permission?’
He heard DeRosia’s sharp intake of breath.
The man’s cranky sleepiness started to fade. He thought for a second and then yanked a document out of the battered filing cabinet next to his desk.
‘Fire, water damage, smells extending more than twenty feet from the apartment and lasting more than two days … ah … nonpayment of rent. I don’t think it means just four days, but …’ He looked up at Hank, whose nod was the go-ahead he needed. He quickly unlocked the bottom desk drawer and pulled out a master key.
Hank ignored the disapproval that radiated from DeRosia like a space heater as they walked back to the apartment. The manager – ‘Name’s Jim’ – jiggled the key around, gave a shove that broke the weather-stripping seal and swung the door open.
The front room and the kitchen were completely bare. They walked inside. DeRosia stayed by the door, frowning.
There was a McDonald’s bag in the refrigerator with a few shriveled fries and one hardened McNugget. That was it.
‘This a one-bedroom, or two?’ Hank asked.
‘One,’ Manager Jim said. ‘He didn’t tell me he was moving out.’
‘And this Kalin guy is the only one on the lease?’
‘Yep,’ said Jim, scowling down at the McNugget.
Hank gave DeRosia a smile and headed toward the bedroom door. He stopped two feet away. The barest whiff of something had him wrinkling his nose.
No.
He took another step, then ordered Jim outside at the same time he drew his Glock. DeRosia was at his side instantly, her gun in her hand. She covered him as he slowly turned the knob and pushed.
The room was bare, except for a sleeping bag in one corner and a stack of textbooks in another. And a dead man in the middle. The stab wounds were obvious, even from where Hank stood. He’d bled out quickly, from the look of it. A huge, amebic pool of blood, tacky with time, lay all around him.
DeRosia checked to make sure the closet was clear and then holstered her weapon. Hank stepped as close as he could without getting his boots bloody. Twenty-to-twenty-five-year-old male. Black hair. Brown eyes. Height and weight difficult to estimate due to current position of the body.
He put away his Glock without taking his eyes off the corpse. Then he bypassed the radio mic on his shoulder and pulled out his cell. He punched Sheila’s number and waited. There was no answer.
Sheila watched a man lean over the railing on a second-story balcony and lose his lunch.
That must be where Hank was.
She didn’t wait for Jenkins to get out of the car, instead heading directly for t
he nearest set of stairs. By the time she reached the apartment, the man had hauled himself upright.
‘Who’re you?’ she asked.
‘The manager,’ he said.
‘You OK?’
He shook his head and pointed a trembling hand toward the apartment.
‘I went in to see what was taking them so long …’ he moaned.
She looked inside. It didn’t look like anything in Johnny Gall’s apartment could have made the guy sick like that. She stepped through the door. It was completely empty. That was weird. The living room was small and carpeted in that non-color of beige that was supposed to hide stains but didn’t. The kitchen was off to the left. The bedroom must be behind it, with the door hidden by the wall with the refrigerator.
Her phone vibrated in the pocket of her windbreaker. She pulled it out. Hank. She put it back in her pocket and stepped around the wall.
‘Yeah?’
He jumped about three feet. The lady sergeant jumped four. The guy on the floor didn’t move. For obvious reasons.
Sheila stepped forward and eyed the body. White guy, mid-twenties, black hair. Skinny. Stylish tennis shoes.
‘Well. I thought our Sunday morning was bad already.’
DeRosia nodded. Hank, who was standing much closer to the body, pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers and took a deep breath. But when he turned to her, his gaze was sharper than it had been all night. He started issuing orders.
DeRosia was told to hurry and try to find the ‘round neighbor lady.’ And she was instructed to take the statement of the manager, who should still be out on the balcony.
‘Oh, we’ve met,’ Sheila said. ‘I’ll go see if he’s coherent yet.’
She turned to go.
‘Wait,’ Hank said. ‘Are you by yourself?’
‘No. I’ve been lucky enough to have Jenkins for company. We’re in his truck.’
Hank smacked his hands together. ‘Great. He’ll have crime scene tape. Have him get up here with it and start securing the scene.’