Black Water

CHAPTER TWO

Sergeant Merci Rayborn nodded at the two deputies standing at the front door of the Wildcraft house. One of them handed her an Order-of-Entry log, which she signed after checking her watch. She was a tall woman with a dark ponytail that rode up the orange letters on the back of her windbreaker as she wrote, then down again as she handed back the clipboard.

"Who got here first and where are they?"

"Crowder and Dobbs, Sergeant. In the kitchen area, I believe."

The other uniform looked past her head and said nothing.

In the entryway Merci Rayborn stood still and received. Smell of furniture wax and wood. Smell of flowers. Murmur of voices. She looked at the entryway mirror, the living room furniture, the carpet. She looked at the hole in the blinds, which suggested a hole in the glass behind. She looked at a rock the size of a newborn's head lying near the middle of the floor. At the little pile of gift boxes. No alarm system-kitchen, maybe.

"Merci."

Paul Zamorra came softly down the hallway, light on his feet. And dark in his heart, Merci thought. He had the gentle deliberateness of an undertaker. And the black suit, too.

She turned to her partner. "Paul. Do you know this guy?"

"Not well. You know, just a friendly face. We'd talked."

"Wildcraft. I'm sure we talked, too."

Though she wasn't sure of that at all. The department was sharp divided into people who approved of what Merci Rayborn had do and people who didn't. Everyone had an opinion. Some of the deputies wouldn't talk to her, nor she to them unless she had to. This hurt Merci deeply, as if the two halves of her heart detested each other. She had come to distrust all opinions, even her own.

But Deputy 2 Archie Wildcraft? She remembered nothing about him but his unusual name. Now he was in the hospital with at least one gunshot to his head and little chance of living.

"His wife is the other, Merci. Gwen Wildcraft. She's in the bathroom."

Merci led down the hallway, noting the textured plaster, the black and-white Yosemite photographs in brushed stainless-steel frames, the way the track lights were aimed to display them. She stopped at the thermostat and saw that it had been set at seventy. She walked past another deputy then down into a large bedroom with French doors a gauzy curtains. Big sleigh bed with the covers messed up. Smell perfume and human beings.

The bathroom door was open. The doorframe was splintered a the lock plate dangled by two screws. Merci leaned over the crime scene tape and looked in.

Here, very different smells-the sharp after burned scent of nitrocellulose and something faintly metallic and sweet. Gwen Wilder lay beside the toilet, back to the floor but her head against the wall a hard angle, facing down and to her right. Eyes closed, mouth open arms and legs spread, purple robe almost matching the blood on the wall, the floor, the shower door, the counter and mirror. More from her nose and mouth. Merci noted the cell phone lying face up in right-hand sink.

This was Rayborn's sixty-seventh homicide scene as an investigator for the Orange County Sheriff's Department. For the six seventh time she told herself to see, not feel. Think, not feel. Work, not feel. But, not for the first time in her life, Rayborn told herself she couldn't keep on looking.

"Let's get Crowder and Dobbs."

"All right," said Zamorra.

The four of them stood in the breakfast nook. Looking into the kitchen, Merci noted the fresh pot of coffee on the maker, unpoured, the machine still wheezing. A timer, she thought, confidently programmed to make coffee that Archie and Gwen Wildcraft would never touch. A red colander filled with oranges sat on the counter and a curved wooden stand dangled a bunch of pale bananas. The word waste came to her mind, as it often did.

Crowder was a big man with short gray hair brushed into a severe 1950s flattop. He reminded her of a man she'd been in love with many years ago-three to be exact. Crowder watched as Merci brought out a new blue notebook and her good pen, and she wondered if he hated her.

"We were down on Moulton, stopped for coffee. Dispatch said possible gunshot reported in Hunter Ranch. Wasn't a nine-one-one but we rolled right then. It was five-ten. We came in quiet because it's a good neighborhood, wasn't a hot call. Got here at five-fourteen. The house looked okay from the outside. Nobody around, no neighbors, nothing. Houselights showing from a couple of places inside."

"What about outside?"

"No."

"The driveway?"

"No."

She asked twice because two floodlights had been on when she first walked up the Wildcraft driveway. That was just after six, on the cusp of sunrise.

Merci made notes in a loop-crazy shorthand, her subjects separated by slashes like lyrics quoted in a review. CK meant check, always capitals and underlined, sometimes circled if the question seemed extra important. She wrote, drive lights mo-det? CK/, then looked up at Zamorra.

"Paul, how many cars in the driveway when you got here?"

"Four."

"Let's have a look where they're not before we leave tonight. The concrete's new and it could hold a track. Make sure the CSI examine it before the battalion moves out."

"Yes."

Crowder looked out one of the mullioned breakfast nook window Merci followed his gaze to a large fenced yard, patio and orange tree all sharp with color in the August morning.

Dobbs let out a short sigh. He was young and hard-jawed, with arm muscles that almost filled out his green uniform shirt. Smoot ruddy face. "Look. We called for backup and paramedics when we found Archie on the other side of the house. We searched the house and found his wife in the bathroom. We taped it off. And by that time the driveway was full of vehicles, new concrete or not."

Merci looked at him. "Next time think before you open a parking lot."

Dobbs looked away.

"Anyway," said Crowder. "We rang the bell but didn't get an answer. Porch lights off, but lights on inside. Decided to walk around the house, see what we could see. Wildcraft was on his back on the walkway, about halfway around. Bleeding from the head but still breathing. Wearing a robe. Handgun beside him. Then, like Dobbs said, we called in, went inside and found the wife. I left two footprints and a knee print in that bathroom somewhere. You know, checked her artery, but there was nothing."

"Was there a bathroom light on when you went in?"

"Yeah," said Crowder. "I could still smell the gun smoke."

Merci smelled nothing of guncotton out here, just the faint sweet smell of wood polish and coffee.

"What did you see driving up?" Zamorra asked.

Dobbs crossed his big arms. "Yes, sir. A black, late-model Cadillac made the north turn at Jacaranda when we were turning up. That would be an expected car in this neighborhood, but it was still just a little past five in the morning. Two white males-early-to-mid-thirties, plus or minus five. There's a streetlight at the intersection, but it's weak "See faces?"

"Very briefly, sir. Passenger was dark-haired, bearded, big face, thick black glasses-you know, I mean the frame part was black and thick. What I thought was, heavy. The driver was blond, and I thought businessman. I mean, these were instant impressions, sir, just… flashes. But they both looked unusual."

"How?" Merci asked.

Dobbs ignored her and spoke only to Zamorra.

"Unusual facial structures."

"What do you mean?" Zamorra asked.

"You know, like when you're down in Laguna on the boardwalk and you can spot the tourists from other countries? Just the faces, you know, the way they formulate. I read in a magazine it's from the facial muscles used to pronounce different languages. You know, like a French face looks different from an American one because their face muscles help make different sounds."

"So, they were French?" asked Zamorra, with a small smile.

Dobbs chuckled. "I couldn't say, sir."

"Take a guess," said Merci.

"I wouldn't guess with so little information," Dobbs said, finally looking at her. "That would be pointless."

Merci felt the blast of anger go through her. After thirty-seven years of trying to stop it she still couldn't, but she'd learned to put her anger into thoughts that could contain it. And sometimes amuse her. What she thought about Dobbs and his condescending arrogance was give him the guillotine.

"Since you're big on points, Dobbs, what was the point of parking your car in the driveway of a homicide scene and letting everybody else do the same?"

Merci felt ashamed at harping on this but she had to say something and that was what came out. It was her nature to grab and not let go. If Dobbs disliked her for what she'd done, that was even more reason for him to suck it up, get along, do the job. In her opinion, anyway.

"Look, Sergeant Rayborn," said Crowder. "I'll take the blame for that. I thought about the concrete and figured this was another report that would come down to firecrackers or an engine backfire. I should have said something. I just let him park where he wanted. By the time we found what we found, the backup and medics were here. We were in the bathroom."

"I understand that," she said.

She walked around the quaint little breakfast table and stood in front of Dobbs, got up close and looked straight into his eyes. She saw the uncertainty there and enjoyed it.

"I might have parked there, too," she said. "I don't care about the driveway. The driveway is history. What I care about is you treating your fellow cops with respect, instead of something stuck to the bottom of your boot. It's still us and them, Deputy. If you don't like me, fine. If you don't like what I did, fine. But keep it to yourself and we'll be able to do our jobs better. You saw Gwen and Archie. I think we've got bigger things to worry about than our own opinions of each other. What do you think, Deputy?"

"Right, Sergeant," said Dobbs.

Merci heard a somewhat reduced hostility in the man. It was the best she could expect. In the year since her actions had publicly torn apart the department she loved, Merci had basically shut up. She'd taken the oath and told the truth. After that she had little left to say, and no one in particular to say it to. And she'd found that silence confuses the enemy.

But when it came to this, a subordinate officer trying to belittle her in front of fellow professionals, well, this was stomping time. It had happened before. In the last year she'd learned that confrontations were like haircuts-there were good ones and bad ones but none of them changed the essential truth. And the essential truth was that there were many people on the force who would never approve of what she' done, never forget and never forgive.

So if the man piped down even just a little, it was good enough

"Thank you," she said.

"I'm pissed off about this, Sergeant. Archie wasn't a close friend of mine but I liked him. He was a good guy."

"Then let's work together and get the creep who did this a nice stiff death sentence."

"Yes."

"Okay. Now-French, German, Latvian, Croat, Russian, Finn or Dane? I'm confident that any Orange County sheriff deputy could tell the difference in two seconds at five in the morning under a weak streetlamp."

Dobbs smiled but still colored. Merci stepped away with a very minor grin.

"Deputies," she said. "Call Dispatch and get us an all-county stop-and-question on that car. Sheriff's Department only. Tell them to use the computers and not the radios, because Sergeant Rayborn doesn't want any gawkers involved. We're one hour cold but it's worth a try. If they're tourists, maybe they got stuck in our famous traffic."

"Yes," said Dobbs.

"Then, go round up the caller. If he won't come over, tell him I'll be knocking on his door real soon and real loud. On the way back, one of you should count your steps between his place and this one."

In her small blue notebook-blue because the man who had taught her to be a homicide detective used blue, and because she had loved him-she scribbled the name and address of the caller who'd reported hearing gunshots, tore off the small sheet and gave it to Dobbs.

"Go ahead, and hear him out on your way back here."

She saw that Dobbs understood her vote of confidence, her encouraging him to informally question the witness. She winced inwardly at what the muscular but not stupendously bright Dobbs might come up with on his informal interview. But in her experience two versions from the same witness were always better than one because contradictions stood out like billboards.

Dobbs nodded and they walked away. At the front door they parted and stood back for District Attorney Clay Brenkus and one of his prosecutors, Ryan Dawes. Merci swallowed hard, tried to keep her blood pressure from going berserk. Dawes was the DA's most aggressive and best homicide prosecutor and he had a conviction rate of ninety-six percent. He was mid-thirties and looked good in what Merci considered a men's magazine kind of way. An "extreme" athlete, whatever that was, rock surfing or sky skiing or some such thing. His nickname was Jaws and he liked it. He was the only person in the district attorney's office who'd spoken out when Merci was going through her own public and private he less than a year ago. Jaws had told the Orange County Journal that what Merci was doing was "a self-serving disgrace."

Rayborn and Zamorra watched the crime scene investigators shoot video and stills of Gwen Wildcraft and everything around her. The coroner's team removed the thermometer and fastened clear plastic bags around her hands, feet and head. Then the CSI turn again, to measure the distances between body and wall, body and door, body and tub, etc.

Then, grunting and slipping in blood, four of them pushed and pulled her into a plastic bag. Rayborn saw two small, round wounds-one at the hairline, just above the left temple; one under, and toward the inside of, her left breast.

Rayborn felt great disgust and pity for the human race. She imagined a pink casita on a white beach in Mexico. She had never been to such a place but liked to picture it sometimes. She could see it now. She pictured her son, whom she had seen less than one hour ago, splashing happily in the ocean by the pink house. She watched the engagement ring on Gwen's finger, a small diamond caked in dark red, disappear as a tech worked her arm inside the bag ahead of the advancing zipper.

"Rectal temp ninety-seven degrees, Sergeant Rayborn," said the deputy coroner.

"Then she's been dead for less than an hour."

"Maybe longer, if her BT ran high."

A CSI Merci had never worked with handed her two small clear evidence bags. Each contained an empty cartridge case-a nine millimeter by the look of them. One was labeled "1" and the other "2," The CSI stared at the bags as he gave them over. The writing on the cartridge bottoms confirmed her guess: S amp;W 9mm.

"I marked the floor tile with circled black numbers, and arrows to show the direction of the openings. Had to get them out of there before they got kicked around and lost. Both were to her right. One in the corner and one next to her knee. I've got a sketch with the relate positions and time. I made sure the video guys got close-ups."

Rayborn glanced at the glass shower door to see if the casings, ejected by an automatic pistol, could have bounced off and left a pit or nick. But the lights glared off the glass and she could see no marks at all. Just the faint outline of herself: square shoulders, strong body, an almost pretty face.

The CSI had placed a small wad of toilet paper in the mouth of each bag to keep it open, keep the moisture from building up and maybe wrecking a print.

"What's your name?"

"Don Leitzel."

"I'm Merci Rayborn. Thank you and good work."

She looked at the dresser in the Wildcraft bedroom, noting the sapphire earrings in a still-open box.

They stood in the rock room. Scores of stones, most of them dark in color, all of them elegant in some way that Merci Rayborn couldn't describe. Some small as golf balls, others a couple of feet long. Many of them rested in form-fitting stands. Some of the stands were wood. Others were plaster or clay, some even brushed steel.

"What are these things for?" she asked.

"I don't know," said Zamorra.

"They look Japanese," said Merci. "Maybe Bob would know."

"I'll get him."

She waited in the quiet room. Her gaze went from a rock that looked like a mountain with rivers running down it, to a rock that looked like an island with coves, to a rock that looked like nothing at all. Collections bothered Rayborn because she'd once interviewed a man who kept a collection of hollow, decorated birds' eggs. In a nearby apartment, he kept a collection of hollow, decorated human beings. But as she considered the rock that looked like nothing she thought it was the most graceful nothing she'd ever seen.

Bob Fukiyama and Zamorra stood on either side of her.

"Suiseki," said the assistant pathologist. "Viewing stones."

"What do you do with them?" asked Merci.

"You view them. Appreciate. Meditate."

"Then what?"

"Sergeant?"

"Then what do you do?"

"I think that's all."

Rayborn looked incredulously at the assistant pathologist. She had never meditated. Thought about things, sure, like a tough case she was working, but everyone did that. Appreciated, yes, occasionally. She appreciated her son and looked at him a lot, but Tim Jr. wasn't a rock.

"Collecting and displaying suiseki is an ancient Japanese pastime, Fukiyama said. "My grandfather collected stones. There are societies, shows and displays. Some suiseki can be very valuable. Some look like islands. Some look like mountains with snow and streams. Some are more abstract. People in crowded cities keep the stones in their homes, ponder the shapes and what they suggest. The stones take them away from the city and into nature."

"Do they have any left?" she asked absently. She was staring at one that looked like a water buffalo, curled up with its head on its flank, resting.

"Left, Sergeant?" asked Fukiyama.

"In Japan, Bob. If it's an ancient hobby and a small island, have they found all the good ones?"

"I don't think so, Sergeant. And they're collected all over the world."

"I like the buffalo."

Fukiyama stepped forward and looked at it. "You know, that's really good stone," he said. "If I remember right, water buffaloes are an entire category in themselves. Hard to find. Grandfather's was good one, but not as good or as big as that. Or as jadelike."

"See?" Zamorra asked her. "You understand suiseki, you just don know you do."

"I know a good rock when I see one," she said, still looking at the buffalo stone.

The men laughed quietly but Rayborn didn't. She could still smell Gwen Wildcraft's blood every time she took a breath. Across the hall was a music room. Merci looked at the keyboards and speakers and mixing board, then at the twisting river of cables, jacks, plugs and cords running beneath them.

There were two CD towers full of discs. Merci looked to see who the artists were, but didn't recognize them.

"How old was she?"

"Twenty-six," said Zamorra. "Yesterday was her birthday."

Merci figured that a musically inclined person ten years her junior would listen to an entirely different kind of music than she did.

"What about Archie?"

"Thirty."

On the walls were bright oil paintings of beaches and hills. They looked like the work of one artist and Merci checked the bottom right corners on three of them: GK. She made a note to confirm Gwen's maiden name.

There were several photographs of Archie and Gwen. Archie had a strong neck, a broad, genial face and big dimples. Straight short hair. Good teeth. Gwen's face was compact and beautifully proportioned beneath a high forehead. Strong eyes. Intelligent and sexual. Eight of the photographs were professional portraits with brass date plates at the bottoms of the frames, going back to 1994. The '94 portrait was from their wedding.

Merci looked at the dates and the photographs and watched the Wildcrafts age over eight years. First they looked like a couple on the high school homecoming court. Last they looked like a couple you'd see in a celebrity magazine. In between, six years of gradually evolving handsomeness and beauty.

Dead in her bathroom on the night of her birthday. Shot in the head in his own backyard.

One of us.

Merci stood behind the synthesizer looking down at the keys and controls, then over at the knobs and slide controls of the mixer. She noted the microphone, which was on a stand beside the keyboard. The black paint on the mesh had been worn away by Gwen Wildcraft's lips, and the metal was touched by a red substance that Merci realized was lipstick.

"I'm firing up this tape deck," said Zamorra.

The speakers crackled and Merci watched him turn down the volume. A tentative four-chord intro, then another one, tighter, like the player was figuring it out as she played. The woman's voice was high pitched and clear. Not strong, but breathy and light:

We went out and got it all

Gold and diamonds wall to wall

And I got you and you got me

We 're who everybody wants to be

Turn it up loud turn it up high

Do what you have to

But don't say goodbye

Don't even joke about saying goodbye

Rayborn pulled out her blue notebook and wrote,

Dep. 2 30 a $40K base/Wife 26 paints and plays/house a mil plus/pool, furn pricey/CK$.

Zamorra clicked off the music mid-chord.

Merci stood in the terrible silence for a moment, then turned as green uniform full of muscles came into the room. "The wit's waiting outside," it said. "One hundred and fifty-five steps from where he hear the shots to the front door of this house."

"Good work, Dobbs."