Seven ways to die

25

Cody judged the room to be about twenty feet square. It had no windows. The wall facing the door and the two adjacent walls were lined with bookcases about five feet high to accommodate Tony’s height, the books neatly arranged with bric-a-brac filling in the empty spaces. Paintings and photographs adorned the walls. Crosetti’s desk was centrally positioned in the room, with a moveable computer desk and printer angled beside it. A leather sofa occupied the wall facing the desk with a large painting of an ancient church mounted on the wall above it. A four by six Oriental rug lay between the desk and the wall adjacent to the entrance and the hat rack was angled in the corner facing the door. The room was compulsively neat. From the small crystal chandelier over the desk to its polished wood floors, everything about it reflected the ritualistic mien of Anthony Crosetti; everything except the messy dinner plate on the desk.

The dog seemed a little confused at first. He turned away from the hat and walked to Tony’s desk chair, worked it over before the scent led him to the top of the desk. His nose worked the area in front of the chair, initially distracted by the messy food platter, but then he shifted his attention to the area around the corner of the desk and from there to the rug, where his scrutiny became more intense.

Ignoring a smear of food near one corner, he circled the length and width of it and then, his nose an inch above the floor, he walked through the door and headed for one of the swinging doors that led to the kitchen. Cody was close behind, his flashlight surveying the scene before them. When Charley reached the doors he stopped, tapping it with his nose and scratching the door with one foot.

“Stay,” Cody said. As the dog sat, he pushed one side of the door open a foot or two and, leaning in, flashed the light around the large kitchen. The beam swept past two shuttered windows on the back wall, then streaked around the darkened kitchen as it reflected off the stainless steel pots and pans hanging from the overhead racks. He knelt down, scanning the floor.

Charley wasn’t waiting. He shoved his nose past Cody and went through the door.

“I said ‘Stay’,” Cody snapped.

Charley stopped but did not sit. He stood, head forward, tail curved downward and looked back at Cody who peered around the edge of the door, threw a switch.

An aria from “Tosca” blared into the room. Cody jumped a foot off the floor. Charley’s ears stood straight up and almost spun around as the sound blasted them. Cody quickly flicked the switch off and tried the other one.

The room lit up like Times Square.

“Sorry about that, pal, didn’t mean to break your ear drums.”

Charley shook his head and yawned.

Uncle Tony’s penchant for cleanliness was obvious. The big kitchen glowed; grills and stoves lining the island in the middle glittered as if new; sinks and ovens were greaseless; the white tile floor was radiant.

Except…

Cody knelt down and gently flicked a tiny thread of cloth stuck in slender black grout between the tiles. He leaned forward and squinted down a straight line ahead of Charley’s intended path. More specks. Some streaks adjoining them. He looked over at Charley who was staring impatiently at him.

“Okay, swifty, so far, so good. You’re in such a hurry, show me how good you really are.”

Charley walked straight ahead. To his left was the kitchen, to his right a wall. Ahead of him was the back door. A long counter and stainless steel sinks ran the length of the wall to the left of the door and curved back along the opposite wall. A narrow hallway ran to their right at the end of the wall beside them.

Charley, his nose roaming left and right, walked straight ahead and stopped at the hallway. Cody joined him. The hallway to their right ended at the restaurant’s private dining room and another hallway stretched back toward the main dining room from its entrance.

They were in a small alcove formed by the rear entrance, the hallway, and a heavy steel door to their right. Charley followed his nose to the rear door, sniffed around, came back, still working the floor. He stopped at the heavy steel door, sniffed along its bottom edge.

He sat down and looked up at Cody.

“Annie?”

“Right here.”

“I’m gonna open the back door. Hand me the two kits and then hop inside. I’m gonna close the door behind you and lock it. Frank, pull down beside the dumpster.”

“Right.”

“Here we go.”

He opened the door. Annie handed him the two kits which he put behind him. He grabbed her hand as she hopped inside, slammed the door and locked it.

“What have we got?” Annie asked.

Cody nodded toward Charley who had not moved.

“I’m guessing that’s the door to a walk-in meat freezer.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah. Your headset hooked up?”

She nodded. Cody hooked his up.

“Copy me, Hue?”

“Yep.”

“How about me?” Annie asked.

“Yep.”

“We are about to open the door to what I assume to be a large walk-in meat freezer near the rear entrance of the restaurant. Dr. Rothschild is the forensic pathologist on the scene. She will take it from here.”

Cody moved Charley to one side and opened the hatch of the door. As he pulled it open there was a hurricane of frigid air which turned immediately to a thick mist as it rushed into the hot air in the kitchen. Annie and Cody tried to flap the swirling fog out of the way. Then, as it began to dissipate, a human being took form.

They saw his face first.

His skin was blue, his eyes partially open, his mouth agape. Frost covered his hair and head. Small icicles hung from his eyelids and nostrils. A thin film of frost started in his mouth, coated the side of his face and ended in a large icicle which hung from his jaw.

The rest of his body quickly became visible as the steam vanished. He was naked, seated on a dining room chair. His fragile body emerged, blue and rigid, hands in his lap, feet flat on the floor. A partially filled bottle of wine and an empty glass sat beside the body. The floor was covered with a thin sheet of ice.

Annie’s expression did not change.

“Is it Crosetti?” she asked.

Cody nodded.

She stepped carefully into the doorway and leaned forward, wrapping her left hand around Crosetti’s throat for a second or two and pulled it back.

“Not anymore,” she said. “We’ve got us an iceberg that used to be Mister Crosetti.”

Cody sighed and leaned against a counter. “Annie, I think what we’ve got is Androg 2.”