Act of Deceit

Chapter 50

B lood-soaked Brother Melvin was lying in the back of an ambulance when Lieutenant Ramon Navarro arrived. Neighbors crowded the sidewalk across the street. The crime scene techs had bagged the dead man’s hands and had completed their gunshot residue swabs on Donnally and Melvin.

“You move anything?” Navarro asked Donnally, who was standing by the fireplace in the living room.

Janie had arrived home and was sitting on the couch, twisting a Kleenex in her hands.

“I rolled the dead guy off Brother Melvin, that’s all.”

Navarro glanced toward the front of the house.

“They’re telling me that the guy didn’t have any ID,” Navarro said. “You find a driver’s license?”

“I didn’t look. Just flopped him over, then called 911.”

“I don’t know, man,” Navarro said. “He didn’t look like a robber to me. Pressed slacks. Slick haircut. New shoes. Helluva nice gun.”

Donnally shrugged. “Times are weird.”

A n hour after the police had cleared the scene and Brother Melvin had been transported to SF General for stitches and observation, Donnally walked down to the basement. He reached into a box under the stairs, pulled out a paper bag, and dumped the contents onto the workbench.

“What’s that?”

Donnally spun around, startled by the sound of Janie’s voice. He turned toward her as she walked over.

“I thought you were asleep,” Donnally said.

He tried to block her view, but she elbowed by him. Her eyes locked on the Mexican police badge.

Her voice rose. “He was a cop?”

She started to reach for it, but then pulled her hand back.

“Gregorio Cruz from Quintana Roo,” Donnally said, turning toward her. “Cancun.”

“What do you think you’re doing? Why didn’t you give this to-”

“You want your name in the news as part of an international incident? You want the FBI knocking on your door? You want diplomatic shadowboxing to block me from finding out what’s going on?”

Janie didn’t have an answer.

“I don’t know how he did it,” Donnally said, “but Sherwyn is behind this.”

She pointed at the badge. “How do you know he wasn’t sent to get even for the Mexican pot grower who got hurt?”

“Because they don’t know who I am and I wouldn’t be worth the trouble. Cartels view guys like him as expendable.”

Donnally turned back toward the bench. “Somewhere in here is the connection to Sherwyn.”

He separated out the items: wallet, cell phone, passport, scraps of paper, and a Budget car rental key.

Janie pointed at the phone. “Maybe Sherwyn’s number is in there.”

Donnally smiled. “That only happens on television.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “I don’t know what you’re smiling about. I’ve haven’t seen a dead person since I did my residency, and there was one lying on my porch tonight.”

He reached around her shoulders. “Sorry. I didn’t think Sherwyn had it in him to try something like this.”

“It pisses me off.”

He pulled his arm away. “I said I’m sorry. What else can I-”

“Not you. Sherwyn. When I think of the lives he’s destroyed. And what he’s willing to do now to protect himself.”

Janie shuddered and looked up at Donnally. “Are you sure he won’t try again?”

“I’m sure he will. I think it might be better if you stayed at a hotel for a couple of days.”

Her face flushed. “I’m not going to let that man force me out of my house.” She glanced at the Mexican cop’s possessions, then turned and walked toward the stairway. “Do what you have to do.”

A fter she returned upstairs, Donnally searched the called and received logs in Cruz’s cell phone. All the calls were placed from within Mexico or from the U.S. back to Mexico. He made a list of the numbers and the dates and times, then used Janie’s computer to run them through Internet telephone databases. All were unlisted.

He then checked for text messages and found only one. It showed his addresses in San Francisco and Mount Shasta, and Brother Melvin’s in Vancouver. It, too, originated from a Mexican telephone.

How did Cruz communicate with Sherwyn? Donnally asked himself as he bagged up everything again except the car key. It had to be through an intermediary.

But who?

Donnally went out to his truck and cruised the midnight streets until he located the shooter’s rented brown Taurus parked in the dark driveway of an empty house for sale a few blocks from Janie’s. He searched it hoping to find a hotel room card key, but found nothing.

His cell phone vibrated as he locked up the car. It was Brother Melvin.

M elvin smiled up at Donnally from where he sat in a chair next to the hospital bed, then pointed at his bandage-ringed head.

“I know you were hoping I’d have it examined,” Melvin said, “and it looks like I just did.”

“That’s not what I had in mind.”

“I hope not.” Melvin’s smile faded. He gazed out of the third floor window toward the city lights, then looked back at Donnally. “I didn’t like lying to police about what happened.”

“What makes you think you lied?”

“I told them he was robbing us.”

“How do you know he wasn’t?”

“He said-”

“No. I’m the one who said he wasn’t there to rob us.” Donnally smiled. “He never actually addressed the issue.” He handed Melvin his duffel bag he’d brought with him from Vancouver. “You want me out of here while you change?”

“It’s okay, I’m used to the communal life.”

Donnally sat down on the edge of the bed as Melvin slipped off the hospital gown.

“What was the idea with the praying?” Donnally asked.

Melvin shrugged, then grinned. “I thought I was supposed to. I’m not sure whether I read it somewhere or saw it in the movies.”

“It sure ticked him off. Makes you wonder if maybe he had a problem with a priest when he was young.”

Melvin slid into a pair of pants, then rose and buttoned them. He then pulled out a long-sleeve dress shirt from the duffel bag.

“I thought you guys had to wear the… uh…”

“It’s called a clergy shirt, but not when we do detective work.”

“Detective work? I figured you’d want to put this behind you and you’d be asking me to take you to the airport.”

“I’ve spent a lot of years thinking about suicide,” Melvin said, “but homicide I’m not so thrilled with, especially my own.”

A nurse’s aide entered, pushing a wheelchair. She waited for Melvin to tie his shoes and collect the plastic bag containing his bloody clothes, then walked along with them as Donnally rolled him down the silent hallway toward the exit.