Double Scotch

by Steven Henry

  “Erin, darling, it's a fine thing to be seeing you this evening.”

  She turned at the distinctive Irish brogue. “Evening, Cars,” she said to Carlyle. It was a nickname he'd picked up in his home country. It was an open secret that, before coming to America, he'd built car bombs for the IRA. Erin still couldn't believe she was on speaking terms with a retired terrorist, but in spite of his past, she actually liked him.

  Carlyle gestured to the stool next to her, which had opened up as if by magic. “May I?”

  “It's your bar.”

  “Thank you,” he said, taking the seat. “And how go your efforts to bring law and order to our fair city?”

  She snorted. “Shitty.”

  “Are you wanting to talk about it?”

  “To you?”

  “And why not? I've some insight into the world we both inhabit.”

  Erin shook her head. “You're a piece of work,” she said. “We can't give details of ongoing investigations. You know that.”

  “I'm wounded, Erin,” he said, giving her a pained expression. “I'm terribly afraid you're confusing me with a member of the press. I'm a respectable gangster, remember? We may do any number of things, but we don't go spreading information to the general public.”

  “Respectable gangster,” she repeated. But she couldn't deny he was right. Carlyle was a lot of things, but he wasn't indiscreet. All the same, she had to be careful what she told him. “I'm working an apparent suicide,” she said.

  “As a Major Crimes detective?”

  “We've got to treat them as homicides until we know for sure,” she explained. “Even if they look like suicide.”

  “Your careful use of the word 'apparent' suggests you think otherwise.”

  She hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah. It feels weird. Too many little details out of place.”

  Carlyle raised two fingers to Danny, then pointed to Erin's drink. Danny brought two more whiskeys, one for each of them. Carlyle curled his fingers around his glass, watching Erin. “Was it staged to resemble a suicide, then?” he asked quietly.

  She thought it over. “No,” she said finally. “Not staged... it was posed.”

  “As what?” he asked. “To implicate someone else, perhaps? Or to take the appearance of an accident?”

  “No,” she said again. “She was posed on the bed, wearing a nice dress, fresh flowers in her hands. Makeup on her face.”

  “How did your victim perish, may I ask?”

  “Poison. She drank it, we think. Still waiting on the final lab work.”

  “That certainly sounds like suicide,” Carlyle said. “Unless she was forced to drink it, or took it unawares, in which case it's exceedingly unlikely you'd have found her so composed.”

  “Which would mean the killer was in the room after she was dead,” Erin said. “Yeah, I thought of that. Problem is, the room was locked. From the inside.”

  “Hotel?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Upper floor?”

  “Of course.” She smiled sourly. “The windows don't even open, so no one could get in or out that way.”

  “Was it a deadbolt, or a chain lock?”

  “What's the difference?” Erin said. “It was a chain, but those can't be jimmied easily from outside. Not without leaving marks.”

  Carlyle shrugged. “It's not so difficult. I know a lad. In his younger and more foolish days, he'd a habit of entering hotel rooms and taking things which didn't belong to him.”

  “How'd he do it?” Erin asked.

  “He took a job with the hotel as a cleaner,” Carlyle explained. “He acquired access to the hotel's keycard program. Then he simply let himself into the relevant rooms and adjusted the chain locks.”

  “Adjusted how?”

  “He replaced the chain with a slightly longer one,” he said with a smile. “At a glance, the chain would appear no different, but this lad was slightly built and could ease his hand through the gap.”

  “So he could unlock it from outside, and even lock it again when he was done,” Erin said, getting it. “Shit. We didn't even think to measure the chain. But what about the keycards? I thought those were only good for a day or two.”

  “They are,” Carlyle said. “From my understanding, your lad would need access to the hotel's computers, in order to program his own card.”

  Erin's mind was racing. “So he's probably an employee.”

  “That follows,” Carlyle said. “But are you certain you're not pursuing a ghost? Your unfortunate victim may have drunk poison, wiped her mouth, lain down, and quietly perished.”

  Wiped her mouth, Erin thought. Then she made a double connection. “No way,” she said. “Her lipstick was fresh. It wasn't even smudged. It was put on after she'd drunk.” She looked at Carlyle with a triumphant smile. “And I saw her cosmetic kit in the bathroom. Her lipstick was there, but it was the wrong goddamn color. It's murder, all right.” She slid off her stool.

  He returned the smile. “I'm glad to be of assistance, Erin. But you've not finished your drink. Sit down again, if you please. There's many sins an Irishman can commit, and may yet be forgiven, but wasting good whiskey is unpardonable.”

  Erin laughed and returned to her seat. “I'll do that,” she said. She was feeling a lot better.

  “Then I'll drink with you,” he said, raising his glass. “To your success. Have you any idea why your lass might have been murdered?”

  “I don't know. It's possible she was dead before the perp was even in the room. But he took the time to lay her out, dress her up, put on makeup... Christ, he brought her a bouquet. The roses weren't even wilted when I saw the scene. It was creepy. It was like he wanted to see her dead, but still looking her best.”

  “You're saying it's a man who did this?” Carlyle inquired. “May I ask why?”

  She looked him straight in the eye. “Because nine times out of ten, serial killers are men.”

  Chapter 5

  Carlyle didn't say anything. He rubbed his chin and watched her thoughtfully. Erin drained the last of her double whiskey. The ice cubes clinked as she set the glass down on the bar. She stood up.

  “I've gotta go,” she said.

  “Of course you do,” he said, rising politely. “Thank you for stopping in. As always, it's a pleasure. I hope I've been some small assistance.”

  Her phone buzzed. “Yeah, thanks,” she said as she reached for it. She wasn't surprised to see Webb's name on the caller ID. She'd been about to call him anyway. “Catch you later, Carlyle.”

  She put the phone to her ear on her way out the door. “Sir,” she said. “I've got something on the hotel case.”

  “Is it an emergency?”

  “No, but—” she began.

  “Save it,” Webb said. “We're going to Pier 16. Meet us there.”

  “But sir,” she said. “This is important.”

  “So's this,” Webb snapped. “Tell me about it later. We've got the boat from the shootings, and we need your K-9. It's gonna be a late night.” He hung up.

  Erin stared at her phone, feeling a little sick to her stomach. Her good mood had evaporated instantly. It wasn't a big deal, she told herself. He was just preoccupied with the other case. But she had to fight the sudden urge to throw her phone on the pavement. She went home instead, to fetch her car and her dog. It was time to go back to work. She just wished she'd stopped at the first glass of Scotch.

  The sun was going down by the time she got to the dock. Jones met Erin and Rolf at the parking lot at the base of the pier. Jones had obviously been dragged back in without much notice. She was dressed for a night on the town: tall boots, a miniskirt, and a halter top. She'd hung her shield on a chain around her neck, where it nestled amid a jumble of charms and necklaces.

  “Hot date?” Erin asked, raising her eyebrows.

  Jones rolled her eyes. “I thought maybe I'd get lucky tonight, but I hadn't even gotten started. Come on, I'll take you to the ship. The others are already on boa
rd.”

  “What've we got?” Erin asked.

  “We heard from the Port Authority,” Jones explained as they walked. “A boat got flagged with a couple of crew missing. Skipper claimed they'd jumped ship before going through customs.”

  “Can they do that?” Erin asked.

  “Not legally,” Jones said. “Homeland Security gets pissed about it, but what can you do? The only reason this one came to us is because we asked specifically about two missing guys.”

  “What's the ship?” Erin asked. They were coming up on it now, a rust-spotted old tramp steamer.

  “The Loch Druich, out of Glasgow,” Jones said.

  “I'm not gonna have to spell that in my reports, am I?”

  Jones laughed. “I've got it written down.”

  On the deck, they found Webb and Vic talking to a rough-looking man who looked to be in his mid-fifties. It was a warm night, but he was wearing a thick woolen sweater and watch cap. He was edgy. His hands kept creeping toward his pockets, but every time they did, Vic cleared his throat and the guy dropped them again. Police didn't like interviewees' hands where they couldn't see them.

  Webb glanced at the two women. “O'Reilly, glad to see you,” he said. “This is Captain MacIntosh. The captain was just explaining to me how we don't need to look around, because we won't find anything.”

  “Tha's right,” MacIntosh said with a thick Scottish burr in his voice. “I dinnae know what ye think ye're looking for, but there's nae lad aboard to be found, and nae sign of them. I tell ye, they've buggered off.”

  “Then you won't mind us taking a look,” Vic said, in a tone that suggested he didn't care whether the captain minded or not.

  “Och, as ye will,” the captain said. Then he caught sight of Rolf and blinked. “What is that beastie doing aboard?”

  “Taking a look,” Erin said. Then, to Webb, “Do we have anything belonging to the victims?”

  Vic smiled grimly and produced a pair of paper bags. Each one contained a sock. He’d come prepared.

  “Okay,” she said. “Let's do this.”

  Vic knelt in front of Rolf and opened the bags, being careful not to touch the contents.

  “Rolf, such,” Erin said, giving him his search command.

  The German Shepherd sniffed carefully, then planted his nose on the deck and was off.

  It wouldn't hold up in court, but Erin was very quickly convinced that the victims had been on this ship. Rolf crisscrossed the deck, side to side, to and from the door to the bridge. It would've looked aimless to an untrained observer, but Erin knew he was following the paths the men had taken. Unfortunately, they'd been all over the ship, and the dog didn't know which trail to follow. But he was particularly interested in a straight line from the hatch to the stern rail.

  Vic walked alongside them, staring at the deck. The pier was floodlit, but the ship had patches of shadow, and he played a big D-cell flashlight along their path. He had an evidence kit in his other hand, in case they found anything. “I think we might have blood here,” he said, pointing to a dark brown smear. “Hard to tell with all the rust.”

  “Mark it for the CSU guys,” she said. “You think this is where they bought it?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe. Or someone did 'em in the hold, then dragged 'em and dumped 'em over the side.”

  “Let's check inside,” she said. “The captain said it was okay, so we're clear, right?”

  “The LT's got a warrant,” Vic said. “We can go anywhere.”

  The corridors of the Loch Druich were in lousy shape. Pipes were leaky and corroded. Something green seemed to be growing on the lower panels of the bulkheads, and there was a smell Erin couldn't identify which reminded her of a locker room that hadn't been cleaned in a while. Rolf made a beeline straight for a steep stairway. They followed it down. The only light belowdecks was Vic's flashlight.

  “Hope we didn't pull you off a big night,” Erin said, trying to take her mind off their surroundings. The place was giving her the creeps.

  Vic snorted but didn't say anything.

  “You doing okay with... everything?” she asked awkwardly. They still hadn't talked about the shooting they'd been involved in.

  “Why wouldn't I be?” he retorted.

  She didn't have an answer for that, even though she guessed it was bullshit, so it was almost a relief when she caught a glimpse of a smear of rusty brown on the wall. “Hold it! Pan right, where you just were.”

  He saw it too. “That's blood. This is it.”

  Rolf went to the end of the corridor and whined at the closed hatch. Erin donned her gloves and turned the circular handle in the middle of the door, swinging it open.

  The smell of blood wasn't strong, and almost got lost in the greasy, mechanical odors of the engine room, but to Rolf it might as well have been the only scent in the world. He homed in and went to the middle of the room. There wasn't much space. The steamer's engine took up most of the area. Vic, intent on the ground, bashed his head on a low-hanging pipe. He cursed and rubbed his forehead.

  “What the hell,” he muttered. “There's nothing here. Maybe if CSU can match the blood, we've got something, but it'll take weeks to get the DNA back from the lab.”

  Erin nodded. She flicked the light switch, hoping to get a better look. It didn't help much. There was a single dim bulb in the ceiling. It made an obnoxious buzzing sound when she turned it on, as if a fly was caught inside.

  Then Rolf shoved his snout underneath part of the machinery. He took deep, heavy sniffs and whined again.

  “What's he after?” Vic wondered aloud. “We've got the bodies already. There somebody else stuffed under there?”

  Erin, trying not to think about the condition of the floor, dropped to her belly and laid her head alongside her dog's. “Hand me the light,” she said. Vic passed it to her. She shone it into the space. The beam reflected off something small, about the size of a dime, that was white and red.

  “Got something here,” she said. “You got tweezers?”

  Vic opened his evidence kit and handed down the forceps. Erin eased her hand into the space. Even with her small frame, her arm barely fit. She carefully took the small thing between the tips of the forceps and slowly drew it out.

  “Looks like a guitar pick,” Vic observed.

  “Yeah,” Erin said. “I think it's a fingernail.”

  “Damn,” Vic said. “I'm never gonna look at a musician the same way again.”

  “I don't know if they were killed here,” she said. “But I'll bet this is where they were tortured.”

  “What for?” he wondered.

  She shrugged. “How the hell do I know?” She got a baggie from Vic's kit and bagged the nail. “We gotta get CSU in here, do the whole room.”

  “Let's go tell the boss,” Vic said.

  Webb was so happy with their news that he actually smiled. The first thing he said was, “Good work.” The next thing out of his mouth was, “Captain MacIntosh, you're going to need to come in to the station with us.”

  “Why?” the captain demanded. “I dinnae do anything.”

  “Just to answer some questions,” Webb said.

  “Am I under arrest?”

  “Of course not,” Webb said.

  “Then I will nae come with you.”

  “In that case,” Webb said, “you're under arrest. Neshenko?”

  Vic produced his cuffs.

  “Och,” MacIntosh said. “Ye're a bloody great bloke, aren't ye? Nae need for the bracelets, I'll come quietly. But I'm a Scottish citizen.”

  “And the victims died in American waters,” Jones said. “We have jurisdiction.”

  “I demand to speak to my consul,” MacIntosh said.

  “You'll have your phone call,” Webb sighed.

  “I hate when it gets political,” Vic muttered.

  “Jones,” Webb said. “Call some uniforms and secure the ship. Get CSU to go over the whole thing, stem to stern. Once they're here, you and O'Reilly come back
to the precinct. Neshenko, you're escorting Captain MacIntosh with me.”

  “I was kinda thinking I'd go home,” Vic said.

  “Am I interrupting your evening, Detective?”

  “Yes, sir, you are.”

  “Were you planning a busy night of staring at your TV and drinking vodka straight from the bottle?” the Lieutenant asked.

  “Something like that.”

  “You'll have time for that later. We need to talk to the captain here.”

  “Och, dinnae trouble yourself on my account,” the captain said.

  While they waited for the uniforms and the evidence techs, Jones filled Erin in on what they knew about the ship.

  “She's Scottish registered, home port of Glasgow,” she explained. “Sailed with five crew, including the captain. Cargo of woolen clothes and a few cases of whiskey. It's a brand I haven't heard of. Glen something-or-other.” Jones glanced at her notebook. “Docherty-Kinlochewe. I have no idea if I'm saying that right.”

  “Glen D?” Erin said, sparked with sudden interest.

  “You know it?” Jones asked, surprised.

  “Hell,” Erin said. “I had some right before I came down here.”

  “How is it?”

  “It's the good stuff.”

  “Anyway,” Jones said, “Captain MacIntosh and two of the crew sailed in. Reginald McCandless and Simon Wright. The other two, Sean Garrity and Daniel Carr, weren't on board.”

  “So they're our victims?”

  “Probably. The Lieutenant's going to have MacIntosh take a look at the bodies, see if he'll ID them.”

  “What if he doesn't?” Erin said. “I didn't get the feeling he wanted to help us solve this one.”

  “Then we tie them to the boat with the physical evidence,” Jones said. “The evidence you and your boy got us.” She nodded to Rolf, who gave her a brief, disinterested look and went back to his Kong chew-toy. Erin had given it to him as a reward for finding the fingernail, and Rolf was enjoying his wages. “Then we threaten to charge him as an accessory,” Jones went on, “and see if he cracks. Hell, for all we know, he did it himself.”