Beneath the Cracks

by LS Sygnet

  I nodded. "And she will tell everyone else when she's had time to process it. Right now, today…it's not the right time."

  "All right," he nodded solemnly. "I'll do what you asked."

  Forsythe was a harder sell.

  "That was nothing less than shades of Riley Storm," he spat. Riley Storm was probably the biggest insult he could've thrown at someone of Maya's caliber of forensic pathologist. In fact, no one had mourned the loss of Dr. Storm when Maya replaced him ten months ago.

  "That was entirely uncalled for, Ken. You're going to apologize when she tells you what's happened. Until then, I'm not sure I want to consider you a friend."

  He crossed his arms over his chest. "Let me see if I understand this correctly, Eriksson. You're down here apologizing for her and that's supposed to be good enough to smooth things over after she basically called me an incompetent fool?"

  "I don't know what happened when you talked, Ken. I do know that sometimes when people are in certain emotional states that the last people they want to hurt end up being the brunt of things they don't understand simply because they are in the wrong place at the wrong time. She doesn't think you're incompetent. She told me the exact opposite the night I met you."

  "So why isn't she down here apologizing herself?"

  "It's serious," I said softly. "Really serious. Like first stage of grief, Ken. She needs her friends to be there for her. Please don't personalize what happened upstairs. Maya is going through something –"

  "Serious," he muttered. "Yeah, you mentioned it."

  "If you didn't care about her, you wouldn't be so upset by her behavior," I tried to reason with him, but the wall seemed firmly entrenched. "I'm not asking you to forget, or even not to expect an apology from her personally. I'm just asking you to keep the door open and listen to her when she's ready to talk."

  It was all I could do to mend the bridges. I hoped it would be enough.

  Chapter 7

  Her eyes were still bloodshot, but the red blotches on her cheeks were ivory again, and the swelling in Maya's nose was considerably less. Nothing like cold water to restore emotional balance to the feminine façade.

  Briscoe was uncharacteristically obedient. He kept his questions focused on the case. "What've you got for us, Maya?" No snarling. No Winslow thrown out like an epithet.

  Good to know that I could still put the fear of jujitsu in people.

  "We got a hit on the fingerprint. Our victim was not homeless. In fact, he lived in Bay View." Maya pulled a printout from the file and handed it to him. "Although I can't fathom what a guy with a pricey address was doing dressed like a bum in Downey. His name is Jacob Cox, forty-one years old as of the fourth of July, and as I suspected I would find at the crime scene last night, he was in exceptional health. Had he not been murdered, the guy could've lived to be a hundred."

  "Cause of death?"

  "This is the big surprise," Maya said. She whipped back the drape on the corpse lying on the table. "He did not have a dissected diaphragm. Mr. Cox died of an overdose, the initial screen positive for methamphetamine."

  "I thought you said this guy was in perfect health. How the hell –"

  I shot Briscoe a warning glare.

  "Uh, what makes you think he ain't a meth addict, on account of him bein' so healthy otherwise?"

  "No track marks." Maya pointed to both arms, the backs of his hands, his feet. The telltale signs of chronic drug injections caused by scarring of the veins which resulted in dark "tracks" were glaringly absent. Only two puncture marks were visible near his left wrist, in what was once a prominent vein. "This guy does however have evidence of ligature restraint on both wrists and ankles. From the type of abrasion, the width and depth of tissue damage, I'd say it is consistent with shackles or handcuffs. His overdose was not accidental, nor was he an even casual user of drugs."

  "How can you tell that for sure?" Crevan asked.

  "His heart muscle. Methamphetamine users can quickly damage the cardiac muscle. While I have no doubt that his specific dose of methamphetamine was high enough to induce cardiac arrest, there were no signs of chronic damage we see in habitual use in an addiction. That aside, how many people do you know who cuff themselves before shooting up, detective? Did you miss the part where he was forcibly restrained shortly before he died?"

  "Could've been some sex thing," Briscoe shrugged. "I thought this was one of them drugs that makes people uh…horny, I guess. But you're sayin' this cause of death don't link him to our other victims."

  I shook my head, followed exactly where Maya had led us. Maybe I'd rattled them a little more than I intended and made them focus on the wrong thing. "The case files you sent me indicated that these previous murders were low profile, Tony. Which page in the papers were any details made available to the press?"

  "They weren't in the papers," Crevan said. "Nobody inquired about dead homeless guys. The press wasn't interested."

  "And nobody knew about our dumpster boys 'cept for the people that put 'em there," Tony quickly followed. "Shit."

  My mind leapt back in time a little more than twelve hours while my heart sank. "Shit is right. Orion told me he has somebody undercover working this case."

  "Well hell's bells, Helen! Why didn't you say somethin' sooner?" Briscoe growled. He had his phone out, thumb dialing when I snatched it from his hand. "What in the hell did you do that for?"

  "Johnny told me the man's first name." I paused and glanced at the body on the table with Maya's neatly closed Y incision. "He called him Jake."

  Crevan's hands rested on his hips, face uplifted toward the ceiling. "You're saying that this is Johnny's undercover, that this case just graduated from John Doe victims nobody cared about enough to miss to a murdered cop."

  "We won't know that for sure 'til Dr. Smarty-Pants gives me the phone so I can call Johnny."

  "I think we should contact Darnell," I said.

  "What?" Three protests instead of the two I expected.

  "I'm saying that we should contact Darnell to confirm. Very few people know about Johnny's status with OSI. If we really have a dead state detective, how do you think he'll react? He'll demand to be in the thick of this case, just like he did when his friend Gwen Foster was murdered. Our case against Jerry Lowe is seriously hampered because Orion still has to keep his identity with OSI protected. It'll be a hell of a lot easier to proceed if we call Darnell and explain why Orion can't come near this case."

  "She makes a good point," Maya said. "I know how close you two are to Orion. Hell, we all like the guy, but this'll be a minefield with the press. What if they notice Orion is involved in the investigation? He's a private citizen as far as the rest of the world is concerned. With Foster, it was different. She was an old family friend. He was the one who found the body."

  "Wild horses ain't gonna keep him outta this case, Eriksson. Undercover or not, Johnny will be part of this investigation."

  I was certain Briscoe was right, but counted on Darnell being able to reason with Orion. "We've got to at least try."

  "Let me have the phone," Briscoe said. "I'll call Darnell."

  "Give me the number," I said.

  "This is my case, Eriksson. I seem to recall you tossin' back the badge George Hardy gave you in June. You was done with this stuff, remember?"

  "Tony, don't do that," Maya said. "If this victim really is a dead police detective, you're going to need Helen's help more than ever. Think about this rationally. Someone killed five homeless men – and when they realized that the police do give a damn about it, they were willing to murder a cop to halt the investigation."

  Briscoe rattled off the phone number, and I made the call.

  Darnell darkened the doorway of the morgue in less than ten minutes. Sweat dotted his brow, and I could hear the wheeze of air pushing past his windpipe. "Son of a bitch," was all he said for a good five minutes.

  Finally, I spoke. "Commander Darnell, does this man have family that needs to be notified?"

 
; He nodded. "I'll take care of it. Jake's folks are in Montgomery. He relocated out here when OSI opened almost two years ago. Dammit."

  "I've agreed to stay on and help close this case," I announced the decision Briscoe and Conall hadn't heard yet. "We'll catch whoever did this to him. I don't care how long it takes."

  He nodded. "I appreciate that, Helen."

  "This case will attract media attention. I don't think we should avoid it completely," I said. "A police detective is dead. Maya has listed cause of death as a drug overdose."

  "Homicide, not accidental," she clarified beyond the cause.

  "What I'd like to propose is that we hold back as many details as possible, including manner of death. If we release that it’s just another John Doe, that it’s being investigated by Downey Division, whoever killed him won't be as wary as he would if it comes out immediately that this was a murdered cop. There will be less questions if the public believes a homeless man was found dead from a methamphetamine overdose."

  "I agree," Darnell stared at the body without turning away. "Given the lack of interest in the previous homeless men’s deaths this year, it’ll keep the case off the radar. I’ll stress to the family the need to keep other details quiet for the time being. You can be certain that Jake will be honored fully by the department either way."

  "What we absolutely cannot do is reveal his identity to the media or given any hint that Jake was undercover for OSI or that his death is related to the homeless murder cases, or that he died working in Darkwater Bay."

  "We'll keep his name completely out of any release, Helen."

  "And I need your assurance that you'll keep Johnny Orion as far away from this investigation as possible."

  It jerked Darnell's attention away from his dead detective. "I have no authority to tell Johnny what he can and cannot do, Helen. You know that."

  "In this case, if you have to go over his head, I think you should do it."

  "Why?"

  "Because the press will be all over this if anything gets leaked to them, and that’s always a possibility. And if Orion wants to remain covert, he cannot be part of the investigation. He skated by with Gwen Foster because there was a logical link between him and that case."

  "Are you sure that's the only reason you don't want to work with him again?"

  Men. Gossips. I looked down and rolled my eyes in a private moment of disgust at Orion's big mouth. "This is about solving the case with the least amount of outside interference possible, commander."

  "And Johnny is interference?" His voice pitched sharply.

  "No, but the questions that the press would inevitably ask about his involvement are. If his work undercover isn't integral to OSI, perhaps he should simply announce his true role in the organization right now. Then he'll have the green light to investigate right along side us."

  Darnell frowned. Point taken apparently. He cleared his throat. "I can make sure you've got access to whatever Jake reported to Johnny regarding his investigation. I'm not sure the last time he gave a status report."

  "Two weeks ago," I said. "He mentioned it last night after Tony called and asked for my help on the case. Johnny told me that he talked to Jake, his undercover officer, two weeks ago."

  Darnell's mouth twisted downward, but whatever he thought of Orion's loose lips remained unspoken. It seemed I was trustworthy enough to break bread with on occasion, but not enough to know the identity of one of OSI's undercover detectives.

  "In any case, we'll need that file as soon as possible," I said. "If you'd prefer that it come directly to my fax machine rather than possibly being intercepted by someone not directly involved in this case at Downey Division, that's fine. I have a feeling Briscoe, Conall and I will be joined at the hip for the duration."

  Maya's eyes widened.

  "Except for tomorrow. I have a prior commitment that cannot be changed."

  Darnell turned to the actual detectives. "I trust I don't have to ask that you keep me abreast of any developments, gentlemen."

  It irritated me that he cut me out of the investigation the way he did, but at the same time, part of me was relieved to remain as far from OSI as humanly possible. Buried in work Saturday night had kept the dissection of Orion's kiss from happening. My nerves relived the moment standing in Maya's autopsy bay. Knees wanted to buckle. Again. I gripped the edge of the table.

  I refocused on the murder investigation. "Briscoe, are you and Crevan planning to search this man's house today?"

  "We're on it, Helen. You want us to drop you off at home on the way out to the bay?"

  Maya interrupted, "I'll take her home. Unless you want to go with them."

  I didn't. "I'd rather go with you, Maya," I said. "The detectives can call me at home if they find anything that might help build my –"

  "Helen, I really think you should come with us," Crevan said. "We won't get the same sense of this guy by looking at his home as you will. Isn't that going to be important in figuring out the kind of person we're looking for?"

  I sighed. Maya smiled bravely.

  "Maybe you can call me later, if you have a spare minute or two, Helen. Go ahead and work the case with them."

  "Are you certain?"

  She nodded.

  It went against my better judgment to leave her alone today, but duty called.

  Duty.

  This wasn't supposed to be my job anymore, and suddenly I felt thrust onto a roller coaster that had no stop in sight. What I really wanted was my home, my friend, a life without dead bodies and people who so desperately wanted to escape the criminal justice system that they'd kill a police officer to avoid prison. I wanted the solitude that allowed me to quietly work toward my own goals, prioritize an agenda that had nothing to do with following civil laws.

  In other words, I was wandering through another mine field that felt an awful lot like the last one.

  Chapter 8

  There's an old English idiom: when it rains, it pours. I don't find it apropos for Darkwater Bay only because of the soggy climatic conditions. From what I've seen in my short time here, murder seems to be a normal occurrence as well. But in this instance, it applies exactly to my life. When one thing goes wrong, it all goes wrong. At the same time.

  Briscoe, Conall and I spent hours searching every nook and cranny of Detective Jacob Cox's sprawling ranch-style home in Bay View. I summed up my impression of the search when Briscoe asked:

  "Well, what do you think?"

  "Bupkis," I muttered. "We got bupkis."

  "Johnny sent me a text."

  I glanced at Crevan. Did I really want to hear this? Probably not. I knew they were right. Keeping Orion at bay would be as likely as the killer walking in off the street, and in an attack of genuine conscience, confessing his crimes. Throw Orion’s personal interest in me into the mix and there was no way I could expect to continue to avoid him even a little longer.

  Then again, I could always back out. Do it right now. Maya needs me. The homicide problems of Bay County are none of my business. I'm retired, a private citizen, a –

  My eyes caught a glimpse of the photographs arranged on Cox's mantle in the living room. His college graduation. His ceremony at the state police when he was awarded for some outstanding act or another. The beaming parents ever present at his side.

  Ordinarily these mementos wouldn't sway me in the least. Like I said. Not my problem. But today, after memories of Wendell invading almost every thought, I wondered what our family photos might've evolved to look like over the years. Would Dad have been beaming at my side when his daughter successfully completed training at Quantico? Would he have bragged to the guys at his precinct that his little girl was all grown up, and a fed to boot? My wedding, the lack of a father to give me away, and a million other little moments wherein pangs of regret pricked my heart resurfaced. If Dad were still in the picture, I wouldn't have resorted to murder. He'd have done it for me.

  Could I really turn a blind eye to the pain Jacob Cox's parents we
re about to experience? No, in my vulnerable state, I could not. My thoughts drifted back to Maya. Where was her family at her time of need? Did she have proud parents out there somewhere who might get devastating news tomorrow?

  "And…she's gone again," Briscoe's words floated into my ears a millisecond before his fingers snapped in front of my face.

  I swatted them away. "What?"

  "When is a good time for you? You said you got some previous engagement tomorrow. How about right now?"

  "For what?"

  Crevan sighed. "Johnny wants to know when he can meet us to discuss what Jake said during their last conversation. There is no file per se."

  "No wonder this state is such a mess." Yeah, I sounded as cross as I felt. "How the hell do you people get anything done when no one makes an official case file on open investigations? Even undercover detectives are required to keep records of what they learn. Now, if this thing ever goes to court, what have we got? Hearsay. Cox told Orion. It's inadmissible."

  Both detectives fell silent.

  "Well, what are we waiting for?"

  Briscoe muttered something to Conall about hormonal issues being contagious. It took all of my willpower not to pin him to the ground with my thumb.

  "Where should I tell Johnny you want to meet?" Crevan asked.

  I shrugged. "I'm sure he's already decided that it should happen at my place or his penthouse. God forbid it look like a normal police conversation. He can come to my house, but so help me God, if the two of you find some convenient excuse to leave him there with me, I will slit your bags and staple them to your chins."

  Briscoe winced, understanding full well what I meant. Conall simply looked confused.

  "I've got an early morning, and I haven't slept yet. You've got exactly an hour to get him to my house to hear what he has to say and escort him away before I throw the lot of you out."

  "What crawled up your ass?" Briscoe's torso puffed out.

  "What crawled up my ass? You did. And you," I poked Crevan in the ribs. "And Orion, and Darnell. I never asked for this. I didn't want to get dragged into your cases. I didn't intend to continue doing this work for the rest of my life. Maybe I'm sick of death and murder and liars and –"