Troubleshooter

Chapter 38

They stood back out on the street, breathing the dark air. Tim couldn't recall being more relieved to turn over a crime scene to CSI. The humidity had gotten to him. And the smell. They were indistinguishable, a paste on the skin. Bear and Guerrera flapped the bottom hems of their T-shirts, airing them out. Guerrera still looked a touch queasy, but he managed a stoic facade. The local would-be hoods had come out to watch the body bag load as if the scene were a sporting-event finale. They clutched cans of beer and pointed, and in not one of their faces did Tim note fear or consternation.

Den and Kaner had taken their time with Lash, twenty-five puncture wounds in all. Judging from the seepage on the kitchen linoleum, he'd been alive for most of it; they'd wanted him to talk. Den's knife work was surgeon precise, as touted, dodging arteries and bones until the decisive nick of the femoral artery. Tim tried to take a positive from it-the torture's escalation could be read as a sign of Den and Kaner's frustration after losing Chief, Goat, and Tom-Tom. But still he felt the gnawing of a quiet, determined guilt. He, Bear, and Guerrera had found Lash, and they'd pressed him. He'd been willing-happy, even-to inform, but that almost made it worse.

Freed emerged from the building, his thin face covered with a sheen of sweat. He nodded once. "All right, then. I'll take over here. Miller's holding down the post, Thomas is wrapping up at home."

"Did Jim get us the info from Border Patrol?" Tim asked.

Freed held out his notepad. A list of vehicle descriptions and license-plate numbers. Toe-Tag, Whelp, and Diamond Dog had crossed the border on their Harleys, except on December 7 at 2:13 P.M., when Diamond Dog had gone through solo in a burgundy Toyota Camry, plate number 7CRP497.

Tim tapped the car description.

Freed's eyes widened, an amusingly green response from a veteran. "Diamond Dog's missing bike at the warehouse was a car."

"Might be. We'll take a look. Who's it registered to?"

"It's a dummy reg. Valid but under a false name."

"Our girl Babe Donovan's work at the DMV?"

"I'm guessing."

"Such a giving soul," Bear said.

Freed's pager hummed on his belt, and he tilted it out so he could read the Blue Curacao screen. "Chief's credit-card statements just hit the fax. I'll rescue Thomas from the in-laws, and we'll get on it." He hustled back to his Porsche, a seal gray Carrera GT underwritten by his family's twenty-seven-state furniture chain. "Have Sheriff's take over here, see if you can find the car, and I'll meet you back at the office."

Bent into Diamond Dog's Camry, Aaronson contorted at an angle generally reserved for Playmates. Tim heard his breathy whisper-"Gotcha"-and then he eased himself out, grasping a 7-Eleven cup by the rim with a pair of tweezers.

Bear rolled his eyes and stepped back toward the curb; they'd been observing the slow-motion processing for the better part of a half hour. He and Guerrera had already voiced their preference for hot-assing it back to the command post to dig into the credit-card records. Tim, familiar with Aaronson's predilection for a deputy on-scene, had promised the criminalist some on-site time. Besides, Thomas and Freed were the best financial investigators they had, and he wasn't about to rush back to the post to stare at Visa statements over their shoulders.

They'd found Diamond Dog's car in minutes, parked less than a block from the warehouse where the biker had taken Guerrera's bullet in the chest. It was road-trip sloppy, which Tim had hoped for, but so far Aaronson had excavated little more than fast-food wrappers, a few issues of Easyriders, and a crumpled poncho that looked more like a movie prop than an article of clothing.

At Tim's request, Aaronson had left Lash's apartment early to process the car. He was an unhurried but meticulous worker, a finder of hidden gems. He'd once pulled a DNA sample from a piece of dental floss he'd found in the tread of a boot in the back of a crash-pad closet. Tim was looking for him to strike fertile soil again.

Bear tapped his watch. It was eleven forty-five. Christmas was still hanging on by its fingernails. Tim couldn't believe it was the same day he'd started with a visit to Uncle Pete at the clubhouse.

Aaronson peered into the 7-Eleven cup, nose wrinkled curiously.

"What do you see?"

He moved the cup under Tim's face, and Tim leaned back from the smell.

"What is that?" Guerrera asked, his interest piqued.

"Tobacco spit." Aaronson swirled the murky brown liquid. "Dip. Skoal Wintergreen from the smell of it. But look here." He tilted the cup, revealing a soaked piece of paper at the bottom. Through the sludge Tim could make out some faint lines, but the paper was too crumpled and stained for him to discern a pattern.

"Why would he put paper in the bottom?" Guerrera asked.

Tim, reformed stakeout dipper, said, "So it won't splash out of the cup when you drive." He peered over Aaronson's shoulder. "Can you dry it out to get a read on the markings?"

Aaronson was on his knees on the sidewalk, draining the liquid into a specimen jar. He used the tweezers to tease the paper flat without tearing it, and then he hooked a flexible-rod flashlight behind his ear and bent over the evidence with a magnifying glass. He looked like a Halloween costume come to life.

Flattened, the marks were clearer, if abbreviated by the torn edge. A few squiggles locked within a circular perimeter, almost like a yin and yang. They appeared to be part of a logo. An alphanumeric was left, apparently in its entirety: TR425.

Aaronson folded the soggy slip over and rubbed the back with a thin, blunt probe. "See that? It's gummy."

"Sticker?" Tim asked, jotting the number in his notepad.

"I'd say part of a shipping label. The number would be the confirmation or tracking code." Aaronson pulled over a pad and meticulously sketched the visible lines of the logo. He ripped the sheet off and handed it back over his shoulder to Tim, his eyes never leaving the sample. "This should do until I get it under the sterozoom."