Night Moves

Chapter 46

No news by ten the following morning.

I had a custody evaluation scheduled, initial session with an eight-year-old girl named Amelia buffeted by her parents’ guerrilla warfare.

She arrived with her father, a grim screenwriter with a history of depression. That, alone, wouldn’t prejudice his case; his ex, a former model, had been in and out of rehab.

Amelia held his hand but pulled it loose when she saw me. Chubby, ginger-haired kid with gray, war-orphan eyes. Tear streaks down her cheeks had dried to salty granulation.

Her father said, “You need to know: She didn’t want to come.”

I bent and smiled, made sure to talk normally, not with that saccharine I’m-so-sensitive shrink-voice amateurs use. “Hi, Amelia. I’m the kind of doctor who doesn’t give shots. We won’t do anything you don’t want.”

Her mouth twisted.

Grim said, “I just got her a dog and she wanted to bring it. I told her it was against your rules.”

“What kind of dog do you have, Amelia?”

Grim said, “Maltese mix,” as if letting out a state secret.

“What’s your dog’s name, Amelia?”

Whispered reply. I bent lower to catch it as Grim said, “Snowy.”

“You can bring Snowy next time, Amelia.”

Grim said, “Speaking of which, how many next times are we talking about?”

“Amelia, do you like all kinds of dogs or just Snowy?”

“All kinds.”

“Any allergies to other dogs?” I asked Grim.

“Not that I know so far. She’s into Snowy, not dogs in general.”

I said, “Hold on for one sec, Amelia,” left, and returned with Blanche trotting at my side.

Gray eyes expanded like a water lily encountering sunlight.

Amelia said, “Wow.”

Her father said, “Hmh. Do I wait here or out in the car?”

An hour later, a perked-up, affectionately licked Amelia was hugging Blanche near the front door as Grim tapped a sandal. “Gotta go, Meel. Meeting at Warner Brothers.”

He reached for her hand. She touched his fingers briefly, dropped her hand to her flanks.

I said, “Next week, same time. With or without Snowy.”

Grim said, “Hope this doesn’t drag on.”

Amelia smiled at Blanche, then stooped and kissed her. Her father waited for a while as child and dog communed.

Just as I finished charting the session, my private line rang.

Milo said, “Ahearn finally called.”

“The A-frame got processed.”

A beat. “In the process of being processed.”

“Great.”

“Not so simple. Not — how’s your schedule?”

“Just got free.”

“I’ll drive, you can look out for radar guns.”

He picked me up four minutes later. Meaning he’d called while driving over, confident of my answer.

I got in the unmarked, had barely closed the door as he sped off.

I said, “A few minutes earlier, I was in session.”

“You some kind of a doctor?” He told me why we were driving to Arrowhead. We spent some of the ride talking, most of it in silence.

We reached the A-frame by one fifteen p.m., asked for Ahearn, and were directed to the house’s rear deck.

The San Bernardino lieutenant was midfifties, stocky and barrel-chested, with a shaved freckled head and a bristly white mustache. He wore a white shirt, gray slacks, a blue tie, and black lace-up military boots.

The body lying faceup in the grass wore a navy shirt, jeans, a tan tie, and brown walking shoes. Male, around the same age as Ahearn, tall and long-limbed, with a heavy-jawed face blued by stubble.

He’d been shot once in the left side of his chest and once in the right cheek. Sidearm still holstered. Taken by surprise.

No problem identifying this victim or estimating time of death. Sheriff’s detective Roger Livingston had been sent by Ahearn at nine o’clock this morning and ordered to stand guard pending the ten a.m. arrival of the crime scene techs. He’d logged his arrival at nine eighteen, had recorded nothing further. At ten forty-four a two-person team from the San Bernardino lab showed up, delayed by a street-clogging truck collision on the north side of the city.

Livingston had checked out a squad car from the motor pool and parked it at a careless slant in front of the house, forcing the techs to walk around the black-and-white in order to reach the front door. They rang the front doorbell and when that brought no response, circled around back.

Techs are unarmed. The panic these two felt was understandable. Fleeing to their van, they drove a quarter mile and called in. Now they were inside, working their phones manically, waiting for the coroner’s investigator to release the body so they could move from Livingston to the house.

In San Bernardino, the sheriff is the coroner and C.I.’s are uniformed deputies. On duty this morning was Deputy Sandra Kolatch, forty or so, square-faced and stunned. She’d been held up by a gang shooting, had entered the scene just before Milo and me.

She went through Livingston’s pockets. “No phone.”

Ahearn said, “Got it in my car, Sandy. It was on the ground out back so I bagged it.”

Breach of procedure. Kolatch nodded, took notes, and shut her eyes. When they opened, she looked defeated. It’s different when making an I.D. isn’t necessary.

The basics accomplished, she stood, said, “Sir,” to Ahearn, and left. As if part of a meticulously choreographed revue, two morgue attendants techs appeared with the collapsible morgue gurney — a contraption I’ve seen so many times but always find jarringly efficient.

They worked fast, slipping Livingston into a body bag, zipping and loading.

Ahearn watched, eyes dry and bloodshot. His mustache did a poor job of concealing a lip tremor.

Milo said, “So sorry, Al.”

“He must’ve walked right into it.” Ahearn clenched both fists. “I sent him ’cause I figured it was a piece of cake.” Grinding his jaws. “I figured it was something he could handle.”

Milo said, “This was an ambush, no way to know.”

Ahearn said, “Watching an empty house? What could be more Mickey Mouse?”

He headed out of the yard, toward the driveway. The three of us stood by as the gurney made contact with the butt-edge of the van’s rear compartment and snapped flat with a cruel snick. Body straps were checked, rear doors slammed shut, the van was gone.

Ahearn said, “I had problems with Roger. Not my sharpest blade in the drawer. An empty house and he was armed for God’s sake.”

Moisture had collected in the corners of his eyes, turning the bloodshot vessels maroon.

Milo said, “No way to know, Al.”

“Try telling that to his widow. Like she could ever admit he was an idiot — oh, screw it, I’m not going to blame him, could’ve happened to anyone.”

We said nothing.

Ahearn said, “It was so Mickey Mouse, I almost sent a rookie. Could’ve been Ramona.” He eyed a dark-haired deputy standing on the deck. Easy pass as a high school junior. “She has no idea how lucky she is — sorry we didn’t process when you first asked, Milo. That was Roger, too, sometimes he got like that. I’m not going to make excuses but it gets insane down in the city. Don’t know about your situation but the gangs here are multi-racial, you have no idea who you’re dealing with.”

A click rose from his throat. “You think your suspect — Mearsheim — did this?”

Milo said, “If we’re guessing right, he’s got no problem killing people.”

“So that’s how many?” said Ahearn.

“My two male victims, Brassing, your guy, probably his first wife, maybe his second — or she’s his third or fourth, who knows?”

“A psycho. Shit. Someone was keeping house here recently. I did a walk-through, there’s coffee, cereal, milk, lunch meat. Not a lot of grub, nothing that looks the long haul, and beds are made. Don’t worry, I bootied and gloved, didn’t touch a thing. If there was visible blood, it’s been cleaned up. I think I did smell some bleach near the kitchen. How was the traffic coming in?”

Sudden injection of trivia as a pathetic distraction.

Milo said, “Not bad. When we were here, there was none of that, whoever did it came back recently.”

Ahearn said, “I was planning to have a sit-down with Roger tomorrow. Suggest he think about something else, maybe detective wasn’t his thing. I was going to go easy but also firm, our kids go to the same school — you really think you’ve got a Manson on your hands? I mean the other alternative is what, a random psycho squatter? Sometimes we get that in the rurals — cabins and lean-tos and hunters’ blinds that aren’t used much, you’re a homeless, why not? Here, in the nice neighborhoods, what we get is burglaries. But from what I saw, no sign of break-in and no obvious toss.”

The crime scene techs left their van and came toward us, carrying equipment cases. “Okay to continue, sir?”

Ahearn said, “I might’ve smelled bleach near the kitchen. But do the yard, too.”

I said, “Any sign more than one person was here?”

“I didn’t observe on that level, Doctor, just did an in-and-out looking for obvious. Why?”

“Looks like Mearsheim abducted his wife. Bringing her back here made sense if he wanted to humiliate her.”

“Humiliate her how?”

“Same place she stayed with Corvin.”

Milo said, “Like I told you, they also shacked up in hotels but harder to hostage in the Hilton.”

Ahearn said, “Humiliate — you’re thinking ultra-nasty happened here. Shit.”

He showed us the spot that had been found. Shallow depression beginning to fill as the grass perked up.

Ahearn said, “Cadaver dogs are good but we both know they’re not perfect. They don’t find anything, I should probably still dig.”

“I would.”

“Unbelievable,” said Ahearn. “From bad to worse.”

Milo said, “There could be evidence back there in the neighbor’s property.”

Ahearn’s eyes shifted to the forest. “That’s a rich guy. Request to disrupt a fancy property? Can’t wait.”

I said, “Did anything interesting come up on Livingston’s phone?”

“He called his wife when he got here. Knowing Roger, he probably fell asleep in the car, decided to take a stretch out back, and got surprised.”

“Way he blocked the door with his cruiser, the bad guy mighta felt he was being hunted.”

“Makes sense.” He sucked in breath. “Roger was a regular guy. You can’t be regular and do what we do, right?”

Milo said, “Ain’t that the truth.”

I said, “No streetlights, must get pretty dark at night.”

Ahearn said, “With no stars or moon it’s a total blackout. You’re figuring your boy’s been coming and going at night?”

“Maybe when Brassing surprised him. Any idea what time of day that happened?”

“Still waiting on the pathology, Doctor, but you’ve got a point. For sure Brassing was shoved off that cliff in the dark. That section of 18 isn’t always traveled heavily but there’s always some day traffic, you couldn’t count on not being seen.”

Milo said, “A fire would be more visible at night but no one reported any.”

Ahearn knitted his fingers and cracked his knuckles. “If it was timed right — two, three a.m., put the car in neutral, soon as it starts rolling, toss the match, it could’ve been mostly shielded from view. And the arson guy says the fire was brief, not successful if evidence destruction was the goal. Most of the scorch marks were in the rear section of the Rover and that’s where they found the accelerant splashes. The body was damaged but not burned up so it weakened as it moved forward. I’d still bet on a night thing.”

He unfolded his hands, stretched a few fingers, and produced more pops. “Something’s bound to come up.”

Milo said, “You’re an optimist.”

“I’m a realist. Or as my college son says, a surrealist. Whatever that means. Kid wears black, is writing one of those plays where they dance around like who-knows-what.”

He laughed. “Kid used to like football.”

One of the techs emerged. “We smell bleach, Lieutenant, but so far no visible blood or bloody swabs. But there’s a lot of area and with all the glass and no drapes it’s too bright for Luminol.”

“You’ll do it after dark.”

“Someone will, sir. The next shift.”

“Don’t want any communication issues,” said Ahearn.

“There shouldn’t be any, sir.”

The tech returned inside.

Ahearn faced us. “It’s all about communication, right? That’s always what goes south. So what else should we talk about?”

Milo said, “Who does what.”

“One of ours goes down, it’s ours. We’ll handle everything in our jurisdiction.”

“Fair enough, Al.”

“No one will screw up.” He walked us to the unmarked, specified his plan. Nervous, like a kid delivering an oral report.

The house and yard would be processed “to the nth,” including the use of infrared sensors and cadaver dogs. The neighbor to the rear would be contacted and if an informal request to process the forest wasn’t granted, a request for a warrant would be submitted to “the best judge I can find.”

Ahearn would also make sure all the hotels where Chet Corvin had stayed would be re-contacted about sightings of the Weylands.

I said, “Expanding to some of the nearby motels might be a good idea.”

Ahearn’s glance at Milo said, This one’s full of ideas.

Like the true friend / ace detective he is, Milo said, “He means the whole synchrony thing. Mearsheim did Corvin in a cheap motel, maybe he stalked him at others but the situation wasn’t right.”

Ahearn said, “Cheapie dump... we’ve got our share of those. I’ll try. Anything else?”

Milo said, “Be on the lookout for Cory Thurber, the kid in the Camaro.”

“You see him as a suspect or a potential victim?”

“At this point, victim makes more sense. But Mearsheim’s likely to have an accomplice, so who the hell knows?”

I said, “With Donna out of the picture, the accomplice could be the new woman in Mearsheim’s life.”

Ahearn said, “He trades them in, huh?”

Milo said, “More like sends them to the wrecking yard.”