Bury the Past

by James L'Etoile

  Karen smiled. Then back to business. “My takeaway from this is he was attacked behind the storage shed, hit a second time here, and the killer tossed the hammer back up to the shed.”

  “Why toss it there when you have a nice deep lake three feet away?” John asked.

  She shrugged. “That’s what the physical evidence says.”

  “Send me your photos when you can?”

  “Always do.”

  Karen went about documenting the crime scene, and John crouched down near Wing’s body. Granted, it was a few years since he’d last seen the man, but the year off from the police force had not been kind. Wing’s face was puffy and blotched from too much time in the sun. A scraggly growth of gray-and-red chin hair gave him the look of a crack-addicted garden gnome. The clothes were worn but serviceable—definitely not new.

  “What brought you out here?” John said.

  The dead man’s pockets were turned inside out, a sign that someone—perhaps the killer—had targeted him for a quick score.

  John sat back on his haunches, and a glimmer of something in the water a few feet away took his attention. He rose, went to the waterline, and whatever it was glinted in the sunlight. Karen was halfway back to her van with her equipment, so John pulled out his cell phone and snapped off a few photographs of the object in the water.

  He retrieved a wide-mouthed net from the storage shed and scooped up the shiny thing, dropping the object at his feet. John didn’t need to clean the leaves and moss off of it to identify what it was. Wing’s Sacramento Police Department badge and wallet lay on the ground. Credit cards and cash were visible in the creases of the black leather bifold.

  Who would kill and rob a man and leave this behind? If this was about robbery, they wouldn’t.

  John went to the picnic table where Officer Tucker sat with a Latino boy who held a soccer ball in his lap, tossing and catching it. He looked to be about nine years old. A woman in her midthirties in bulging yoga pants and an oversized T-shirt stood nearby. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, her patience obviously having worn thin.

  “Officer Tucker, who do we have here?” John said.

  “This is Mario Luna and his mom, Antonia.”

  John sat on the bench with Mario. “I understand you were playing soccer and saw something unusual.”

  The boy shrugged.

  “The man near the water,” John prompted.

  “Yeah. I seen him.”

  “Did you notice anyone around when you were playing?”

  Mario shook his head.

  “You come here a lot to play?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “You ever see him here before?”

  “I think so.” Mario dropped his soccer ball, and his mom gathered it in her arms.

  “Is this gonna take much longer?” the boy’s mother asked.

  “Mario, I need you to remember the last time you saw him. What was he doing?”

  The boy’s face scrunched up in concentration. “Day before yesterday, I think. He was talking to another man. He seemed mad.”

  “Who was mad?”

  “That man.” Mario pointed in the direction of the dead man. “He was yelling loud about not wanting to do something.”

  “What didn’t he want to do?”

  The boy shrugged.

  John tried a different angle. “What did the guy look like? The one he was arguing with?”

  “He was tall, big, and shaved his head. A white dude. He was like you.”

  “Had you ever seen this other guy before?”

  Mario shook his head.

  “I gotta get my boy to his tia’s so I can get to work on time,” Antonia said.

  “I understand. Officer Tucker took your contact information?”

  Tucker nodded.

  “Mario, if you can think of anything else, I’d like you to call me, okay?” John handed the boy one of his business cards and a second one went to his mom.

  “I don’t know what else I can think of. He was just like you.”

  “Come on, mijo,” she said. The boy hopped off the bench and followed his mother out of the park. John noticed the mother snatch the business card from the boy’s hand.

  “I think that’s going to be a dead end,” Tucker said.

  “You heard what he told me. You pick up anything else from them before I got here?”

  “Nope, other than the kid comes here almost every day after school before his mom has to head off to work.”

  John leaned back on the bench and watched as the medical examiner’s crew began loading up Wing’s body. “You notice anyone showing up at the crime scene who looked out of place?”

  “How so?”

  “Wing was one of us at one time,” John added.

  “There were a couple of units that did a drive-by and wanted a look-see. Stark and his new partner for one.”

  “Stark keeps showing up. He say anything?”

  “He’s always saying something. But no, now that you mention it, he didn’t say a damn thing. That’s unusual behavior, wouldn’t you say?”

  SEVENTEEN

  The receiving-and-release unit at the prison was the central control point for all prisoners coming in and out of the maximum-security institution. Charles Sherman returned from his OTC—out to court transport—and stepped down from the caged van. The same sheriff’s sergeant who picked him up signed the paper work returning him to state custody, reported no issues with the prisoner, and didn’t want to stick around and swap stories with the R&R staff like most other transport details did. Once again, Sherman was the only inmate in the transport van.

  The evening meal was almost ready, the smell wafting from the central kitchen, two facilities to the north. It didn’t matter what was on the menu; everything held the same cloying odor and every prison kitchen smelled the same. Sherman was hungry on the drive back to the prison, but the sergeant didn’t stop for food like some do. Luckily the starchy, potted-meat smell quelled his hunger pangs.

  “How’d you hurt your hand?” one of the R&R officers asked.

  Sherman’s right palm bore a fresh cut. It had stopped bleeding, but it was a ragged gash. Sherman didn’t answer.

  “Just like those county cops to drop someone off and leave us the paper work. I’ll get in a request for a medical technical assistant to check him out.” The officer typed in a message into the prison-wide computer system noting the injury to the inmate’s hand.

  The officers got the usual nonverbal but compliant response from Sherman. He didn’t resist during his escort back to his cell. The housing unit was louder than normal, with most of the noise coming from a cell on the second tier. The cell directly above his had flooded; its occupant had been stuffing his toilet with his sheet again. A cascade of water fell from the tier and pooled on the dayroom floor. The inmate kicked the cell door, and the blaring, rhythmic sound echoed in the enclosed unit.

  “Someone’s gonna have a headache later,” one of Sherman’s escort officers said.

  Sherman got to the cell front, and the control booth officer pressed the button to open his door. At the same time, a cell extraction team entered the dayroom: a half dozen officers assembled with helmets, pepper spray, and large Plexiglas shields. Another officer carried a video camera to document the process and ensure that all use-of-force policies were followed.

  “Lock up your prisoner,” a lieutenant with the extraction team said to Sherman’s escorts.

  Sherman stepped inside, and the door slid shut. The officers removed his handcuffs and waist chain through the food port.

  “Let’s get out of here before we end up writing reports on this,” one of the escorts said.

  Inside his cell, Sherman went to his bunk, sat, and faced his pencil-drawn image of Paula Newberry. He glanced out his cell window, waiting until all the officers in the cell extraction team were occupied with the disruptive prisoner above on the second tier. Sherman stood and fished a hand down his jumpsuit, around behind, and found a sho
rt piece of string and pulled, grunting. He lifted his hand out and stepped to his stainless-steel sink and rinsed the shit off of the plastic-wrapped bundle he’d just pulled from his rectum.

  Sherman untied the string and unwrapped the plastic from around a brass key, freshly cut based on the brightness of the metal on the business end. At the rear of the cell, Sherman pried up a piece of caulking from the window. The key went into the space behind the caulk, and Sherman rubbed the flexible material back into the gap, the broken seam almost invisible.

  He sat back on his bunk once more, smiling at Paula’s image while a symphony of metal batons on human bone rang from above.

  EIGHTEEN

  “Kari wasn’t home when I got back from picking up Tommy after school.” Melissa pounced before John had a chance to take off his jacket and lock his service weapon in a gun locker inside the entry closet.

  John glanced at his watch. “It’s after six.”

  “She’s not taking my calls; she’s letting them go to voice mail,” Melissa said.

  “We took her phone last night, remember? It’s in the desk drawer.”

  Melissa huffed to the office, opened, and slammed drawers.

  “Bottom drawer,” John called out from where he stood at the front door. He hung up his jacket and went to the kitchen. He thought about a tall gin with a splash of tonic but decided he didn’t need the ration of crap he’d get from Mel.

  Melissa returned with the cell phone listing her missed calls to her daughter. All ten of them.

  “She’s never done this before. Getting suspended, then she doesn’t come home. What’s going on with her?” Melissa said.

  “You tried calling any of her friends?”

  “They acted like they were covering for her. I’ve known these girls since they were in diapers, and I know when they’re lying.”

  “Why would they need to cover for her?” John said.

  “Because she’s changing. She’s not the Kari we used to have.”

  Tommy came down the hallway with a math book. “Hey, I’m having a problem understanding this—could you?”

  “I can try,” John said. “This Common Core stuff makes no common sense to me. Hey, where do you think your sister is?”

  “I don’t want to get her mad at me,” Tommy said.

  “Did she tell you where she went?” Melissa asked.

  The boy shook his head. “She didn’t tell me.”

  “Dammit,” Melissa muttered.

  “But I kinda overheard what she was doing.”

  “And,” his father prompted.

  “Kari was gonna go meet some friends after school and hang out. The mall, I think.”

  “Mall, which mall?” Melissa said.

  Tommy shrugged.

  A rustle at the front door drew everyone’s attention. Kari opened the door and tossed her purse on the sofa. She raised her chin and gave a defiant stare to her mother. “What?”

  “Where have you been?” Melissa asked.

  “Out.”

  “Out where?”

  Kari rolled her eyes. “What does it matter?”

  “It matters because you’re sixteen.”

  “I’m sixteen, and I can be with my friends.”

  “I never said you couldn’t! The courtesy of a call to let me know isn’t asking too much.”

  “You took my phone! How was I supposed to call?”

  Tommy slithered back to his room and closed the door.

  “What’s his name?” John asked.

  Kari’s face flushed. “What?”

  “What?” Melissa echoed, turning toward him.

  “His name, Kari. Who’s the guy?”

  Kari pursed her lips.

  “Spill it, Kari,” John pressed.

  “Cameron. His name is Cameron, all right?”

  “Does Cameron have a last name?”

  “Meadows.”

  Melissa started to speak, but John put up his hand. “Does he go to your school?”

  “Uh-hum.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is this why you got into a fight with Lanette?”

  “She tried to come between us—” Kari said.

  “You fought with your friend over a boy?” her mother asked, cutting her off.

  “You don’t understand.”

  “If this Cameron is thoughtless enough to let you and Lanette come to blows over him, then he’s an insecure ass who doesn’t deserve your attention,” John said.

  “Can I go to my room now?”

  “We’re not done with this—” Melissa started.

  “Go,” John said.

  Kari put her head down, grabbed her backpack, and stormed down to her room.

  After Kari’s door slammed, Melissa turned on John. “How dare you undermine me in front of her. It’s bad enough trying to parent by myself.”

  “There was nothing more to gain from bitching at her.” As soon as the words left his mouth, he regretted them—again.

  “Bitching? Really? You’re going to make this my fault? Don’t you think we need to know where our daughter is and who she’s with?”

  “I didn’t say it was your fault. And she told you. She has a boyfriend—Cameron. Maybe if she didn’t think you’d jump down her throat, she’d have told us sooner.”

  “You’re an asshole.”

  “I’m getting that a lot lately.” John went for the gin bottle after all. He poured himself a double.

  Another door slammed, and John found himself all alone. He carried his drink out to the patio and pulled out his cell phone. He hit Paula’s number and sat in a lounge chair.

  Paula must have looked at the caller ID because she answered, “How’s your supersecret Bobby Wing case going?”

  “Nothing secret about it. Even Stark showed up to pay his lack of respects.”

  “Stark?”

  “Uh-huh. He keeps showing up, and it’s not from a desire to do a crackerjack job of his police work.” John took a sip of his drink. “How’d it go with Kamakawa?”

  A sigh from Paula’s end of the connection. “That man is infuriating. I mean, I get it. He has a job to do. Believe me, I get that. But he doesn’t have to be an absolute prick about it.”

  “I’d worry if he wasn’t.”

  “So his big deal was someone signed for a check requisition for five grand for a payment to Burger,” she said.

  “That much we already knew. The DA told us that much.”

  “Apparently, I submitted the request. At least that’s what the paper trail shows. Just like the spike strip, someone signed my name.”

  “No shit? Why you?”

  “That was Sammy’s unending question. The signatures didn’t match each other and certainly didn’t come close to looking like mine. Sammy said that could have been deliberate on my part.”

  “We need to come at this like we’re working a case. Who’d want to drag you through the shit?”

  “Really?”

  John could visualize Paula’s incredulous expression, head tilt, and scowl. “Who jumps to the top of that list, then?”

  “I can’t think of anyone I’ve arrested who would have enough access to departmental resources to pull something like this off. Which, as shitty as it sounds, means it’s someone from inside the department.”

  “Someone with a history with Burger and Bobby Wing. The SSPNET files came in today—four boxes of them. We add the Sherman connection to the mix, and we’ll find the key to this mess.”

  “Yeah, I don’t think I’m gonna get any help from Sammy, that’s for sure.” She paused. “Thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “You never asked if I paid Burger to testify.”

  “Never crossed my mind. Threatened him perhaps, but not pay him.”

  Paula laughed. “You’re an asshole.”

  “So I hear—repeatedly. See you first thing in the morning, and we’ll start going over the SSPNET files.”

  “Yeah, I’ll be a few
minutes late. I have to replace the lock on my garage. I’m not sure when, but someone tried to break in and messed up the dead bolt on the side door. I want to say kids, but with all the shit going on, I’m feeling a bit paranoid.”

  “Need me to come over?” John offered.

  “No—I’ve got this. I’m sure it was nothing. I shouldn’t have said anything. See you tomorrow.”

  They hung up, and John settled back into the patio chair. He felt a twinge from the surgical scar on his side. The pain was good. It reminded him of what was really important. Every new case began as a faceless paper file, another in an endless line of victims. There would always be another one. But he only had one family, and it was falling apart around him.

  John tossed the last inch of his drink on the lawn and went back inside. Kari was in the kitchen, getting a bottle of water from the refrigerator and looking like she was hoping to avoid parental contact.

  “How long have you been seeing Cameron?” John rinsed his glass in the sink and placed it in the dishwasher.

  “A couple of weeks maybe.”

  “You like him? Never mind that; you do or you wouldn’t be smacking Lanette around for trying to poach him.” John leaned back against the counter.

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “You gonna bring him around here so we can meet him?”

  “Are you kidding? You and mom will act all weird and freak out.”

  “Why? Does he have a tail or something?”

  “You just will.”

  John pushed away from the counter and gave Kari a hug. She was a little stiff at first but then hugged him back. “Do me a favor. Give your mom a break, okay?”

  “She treats me like a little kid. I’m not five anymore.” Although the pout on her face would say differently.

  “Give her some respect; she deserves that much. You act differently, and she might treat you differently.”

  “I guess.”

  “But you do need to let us know when you’re going somewhere. Parents worry enough without throwing that into the mix. Okay?”

  Kari nodded. She hugged her father once more and took her water bottle back to her room.

  John grabbed two glasses of water and took them to the master bedroom. Melissa was propped up on the bed reading a novel, one of those popular fantasy books with vampires. She glanced up and gave a bit of a smirk.