Foreign Relations: A Finn O'Brien Thriller (Finn O'Brien Thriller Series Book 2)

by Rebecca Forster

  "But you're not ruling out suicide, are you?" Finn pressed.

  "No, I'm not, but let me put it this way: she might have survived the beating except the fall exacerbated those injuries; she wouldn't be dead from the fall more than likely except her neck was already injured. It might not be murder, but someone helped her die."

  "Good of you to be clear." Finn sighed and parked his tongue in the side of his cheek. He hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his jeans. "Well, then, I'll try to convince the captain to approve the time and resources, but I can't promise anything. The man has priorities as he's always telling me."

  "Priorities might change depending on who comes looking for her."

  Paul pushed away from the counter and walked to the table. He lifted the sheet to expose the woman's feet, one was blackened and burned and one was not.

  "Those are not the feet of a homeless woman, Finn. And look at her hands."

  Paul put the sheet over her feet and then lifted it where it covered her at hip level. He withdrew her narrow, lifeless hand. Her fingers were so long and slender that Finn thought they must be those of an artist.

  "Look at those nails. No polish, but definitely tended to."

  He tucked that hand back by the corpse's side and smoothed the sheet over it again.

  "Look at her hair. No one can do that kind of braiding by themselves so there's a hairdresser somewhere who knows her. I found no natural debris in her hair so we know she's been sleeping somewhere decent. If you've got a middle class lady killed by a homeless guy off his meds the city is going to go berserk. That might just change Captain Fowler's priorities a wee bit as you would say."

  Finn smiled. Paul's attempt at a brogue was fetching but his logic was flawed.

  "I'm not disbelieving you, Paul, but things aren't always what they seem. When I was a young uniform, I picked up an older woman named Sally for shoplifting. She looked like the president of the garden club, all turned out nice she was in a white suit and high heels, her hair done just so."

  "And this is relevant because?" Paul raised a brow.

  "Because it turned out that Miss Sally's rich husband had divorced her and got a younger model. That one was a shrew, don't you know. She didn't want the old wife to have a penny. After the lawyers got done with her, Miss Sally was left with the clothes on her back and her car. She slept in her Mercedes, and when that got towed she couch-surfed until her fancy friends found her presence too much of an embarrassment. Then she lived by her wits.

  "Every morning Miss Sally would clean up in the ladies room at the department store. Then she would have her make-up done by one of those women in the cosmetics department," Finn waved a hand in front of his face suggesting he had only a vague idea of what women did to their faces. "She went over to the beauty college way down on Beverly and let them practice doing her hair because it was free. You would never know she lived on the streets.

  "One day she was caught filching a fancy blouse in a boutique on Rodeo Drive and the owner wanted her prosecuted. That's how she was found out."

  "And the moral of the story is don't jump to conclusions?" Paul cut to the chase.

  "No pun intended, I'm sure," Finn answered. "Listen, this is the land of Hollywood. Smoke and mirrors are currency in this town. That being said, I will not discount your gut feeling, so let's have a look at her things."

  ***

  While Paul put the body away, Finn stationed himself at the counter and had a look in the two plastic bags in which the coroner had placed Jane Doe's earthly possessions.

  Finn pulled out a blouse, a skirt and a light sweater. Despite the dried blood and the rips, he could see that they were well made and modest. The labels were intact. Finn did not recognize the manufacturers but he would do some research. Even with that, there would be no way to tell if the items had been thrift store finds, charity or were bought and paid for in a real store.

  He pushed them back in and looked into the small paper envelope attached to the outside of the plastic bag. Inside was a necklace with a fancy cross dangling from it. Sure he'd never seen anything like this in his church with serpents running up the sides where Jesus hung. Finn looked up as Paul came back into the room.

  "Did you take anything off the body?" he asked.

  "There were some fibers in her hair and on her sweater – I took a quick look under the microscope but I'm not a lab guy. I'd say they came from two or three different sources. I have some skin under the nails and something else I didn't recognize. Fabric, perhaps. I packed up hair samples, too. She uses some sort of pomade. I don't know if that is important or unique but you might as well have the lab look at it.

  "I also have a packet of photos for you. Full face and profile, plus close ups on the bruising. Fingerprints have been taken. There are no abrasions on the hands to indicate she tried to stop her fall – not that I think she would have had much grip strength given her other injuries. You'll have the full report tomorrow all typed up nice. Whatever hit her is pretty interesting. It had a squared edge but it was smooth. It wasn't a fist, or a bat or anything like that."

  "You're thinking what? A brick? A two-by-four? There's construction in the area. Could it have been something like that?" Finn asked.

  "I wouldn't think so. Either one of those would have left some trace evidence. Maybe dust from a brick or a wood splinter, something to indicate that's what was used. I'm thinking metal or stone."

  Finn was listening but he segued when he reached to the bottom of the bag.

  "There were pockets in her skirt and on her sweater. You didn't find a phone did you? A purse? Keys?"

  "None came in with her," Paul said. "That other bag has her shoe, though. There's some greenery I took out of the seam between the vamp and the sole. Given how I found the stuff wedged in the seam, she would have had to be dragging that foot. She was roaming far afield which brings us back to the question of how she got on the bridge. A woman with decent clothes, a pedicure, fancy braids and greenery in her shoes wasn't living up there. I'd bet on it."

  "And so you've forgotten Miss Sally," Finn chuckled.

  He picked up the clear plastic bag while Paul was talking. The shoe was scuffed and worn at heel but not with the kind of wear that comes from walking the streets for an extended period of time. The other one was probably on the bridge in someone's shopping cart. As for the phone, if she had one and if it fell out of her pocket it didn't fall onto the freeway. The police and clean up crew had done an extensive sweep of the freeway before they reopened it. They had also swept the bridge but most of the people who had set up camp had scattered by the time they got there. The few who remained knew nothing about anything.

  Finn closed up the bag with her clothing, put the shoe bag atop it and gathered them both up. He tucked them under one arm and steadied them with his good hand as they left the room, talking shop all the while.

  "I'll have the stomach contents analyzed and get that back to you soon as. She had a full meal within a few hours of all this." Paul opened the door that led to the outer office. "If she was killed by someone on that bridge, you better get a handle on it now. And if she wasn't—"

  "We've still got a bad guy who hits people hard enough to do real damage," Finn said. "I'll do my best for her, I promise."

  Paul put his hand on Finn's arm, stopping him before he walked through the door.

  "There's something else you might want to know about our Jane Doe. I doubt it has anything to do with what happened to her but…"

  Paul hesitated and when his dark brown eyes met Finn's blue ones they were troubled. The coroner took a deep breath, but found no polite way to tell the detective what he had found so he said it plainly.

  "She was circumcised Finn. A pretty crude operation and it wasn't done when she was a child. I would venture to guess that our lady with the braids is probably not from around here and wherever she's from is damn barbaric."

  CHAPTER 4

  Bob Fowler's chair was pushed back against a credenza that wa
s home to a stand of books held upright by a pair of brass elephants with their trunks raised, three pictures in gold frames and an award made of Plexiglass that, had Finn been a different sort, would have reminded him of an erect penis. The captain had one ankle crossed over his knee, his elbows rested on the arms of the chair, his hands were clasped and his pointer fingers were held up along side one another. Those fingers tapped against his lips as he looked into some middle distance between Cori and Finn who were waiting for his decision regarding their request to open a jacket on Jane Doe.

  Both detectives were silent but only Finn was still. Cori was moving around on her chair like she was sitting on one of those burrs that seemed to find their way under her proverbial saddle now and again. She had been in a foul mood ever since Finn filled her in on what Paul told him. Now he was thinking that he had been wrong in not asking for her input before he dragged her to Fowler's office. Or maybe her morning hadn't been all sweetness and light. Cori had, after all, a few other things going on in her life that could make her wake up on the wrong side of the bed: a daughter who partied, her grandson to whom she was more mother than grandmother, or the fact that she had willingly partnered with a pariah and was having second thoughts about the arrangement.

  He looked her way and waited until she acknowledged him. When she did, Finn raised not only his brow but tipped the edge of his lips so she would know he was sorry for whatever it was that bothered her – his fault or not. For his trouble, Cori gave him a look that told him to mind his own business. Knowing there was nothing more to be done, Finn attended to their captain. Finally, Fowler raised his eyes, dropped his hands and asked:

  "Do you agree, Anderson?"

  "Definitely," she answered. "At the very least, I want to I.D. her and find out where she hails from."

  Mentally Finn chalked off disinterest as the source of Cori's displeasure. Fowler breathed deep through his nose, put his hands flat on the desk and pulled his chair up close. He spent fifteen seconds touching things: a stack of papers, a paperweight with the LAPD seal embedded in the glass, a coffee cup that he centered so that the handle was at a ninety-degree angle to the edge of his desk. His motions were precise, as if all this was necessary to help answer the question at hand – which it was not because his office was always as tidy as the man himself.

  Today Bob Fowler wore a crisply starched shirt of a soft blue color that did justice to his well-tanned complexion. His tie was pink and Finn thought that was a bold choice for a man in his position. The captain, he decided, was quite secure in manhood or else his wife held great sway over him. If the latter was the cause of his fashion sense, Finn was admiring of him. A man who knew when to bow to the woman in his life was a smart boyo indeed.

  "What's your case load again?" the captain asked when he was done with his housekeeping.

  "Four assaults, one homicide during commission of a robbery. We still have six witnesses to interview in the latter. We're also awaiting ballistics. We have two meetings scheduled with the D.A. and Detective Anderson is testifying downtown next week in front of Judge Pregerson. Our assignments are light, captain. Nothing will be put aside for this. Oh, and we're scheduled for three more high schools. Outreach, you know."

  Finn now had all of Fowler's attention. The captain looked at him closely, wondering if the editorial comment on assignments might be more a dig than a report. Bob Fowler decided there was none of the attitude of defiance that had been the grit in his administrative oyster since Finn O'Brien landed in his division. What he saw was determination and that meant that O'Brien was going to check this out on his own time or on the city's, so Fowler knew that he might as well hedge a bet and make it official.

  "Open a file," the captain directed. "But keep it tight. Unless you find something substantial out of the gate, I don't want a lot of resources put into this. Is that understood?"

  "Yes, captain." Cori put her hands on the arms of her chair, ready to take the orders and start marching. Finn was in no hurry.

  "O'Brien? Is there a problem?"

  "No, captain," he answered. "I am just surprised you don't think we already have something substantial. The coroner has good reason to think we are looking at manslaughter if not murder. I wouldn't think the victim's social standing would be a mitigating factor in expending resources."

  Fowler's lips twitched in an expression of annoyed resignation. Finn O'Brien, an inherited PR mess, a man ostracized by his fellow officers because he had taken his oath to serve and protect to horrific heights, still insisted on stalking Lady Justice. One of these days the detective was going to find out that even the lady herself could tire of such righteousness, and that sword of hers would deliver a deathblow through Finn O'Brien's heart instead of just cutting him off at the knees. Fowler didn't want that to happen on his watch, nor did he want to be painted with a broad brush when it came to his commitment to the people he served.

  "I hear you," Fowler said. "But you know as well as I do that trying to investigate something like this is like stepping into quicksand. People living on the streets are abused every day. If I had to guess, I would say there was an altercation on the bridge and she got whacked. That doesn't mean the situation is actionable. It could have been an accident or it could have been self-inflicted. It will be hard for you to find intent in that kind of environment. Unless there is a clear path, you will not pursue. Is that understood?"

  "We'll need time—" Finn began.

  "I believe I've made myself clear," Fowler responded.

  "I'm just thinking of San Diego, captain," Finn countered. "We don't want that."

  "No," Fowler mumbled, impressed at the card the detective had played. "We don't want that."

  Even Cori Anderson paused at the mention of the nightmare that had a stranglehold on San Diego. Someone was getting their jollies by setting sleeping transients on fire. This split the regular folk into two camps. One camp wanted the homeless cleared out of the city to stop the problem, and the other camp wanted to house, feed and protect every last one of the poor souls until the guy with the matches was caught. With no compromise in sight, the situation had been artfully ignored until two weeks ago.

  Two weeks ago the man who was burned alive in an alley at four in the afternoon turned out to be the son of a prominent businessman. The victim was a schizophrenic, a kid who had been the light of his parents' life until the illness grabbed hold of him and wouldn't let go. Now he was the poster child for homeless abuse.

  San Diego cops were doing everything they could to find whoever was having sport with those people but it was like searching for a particular grain of sand on the beach; just when you thought you were close to finding the right one the wind kicks up, waves lap at the shore, and the landscape changes.

  No, the captain did not want to be San Diego.

  "Three days and we reconvene and reassess."

  Fowler picked up a pen with his right hand while the fingers on his left wiggled, dismissing them. Cori was out the door first, but Fowler called Finn back. Cori looked over her shoulder. Finn shook off the backup and went into the captain's office alone. Fowler multi-tasked, pulling his pen along the lines of the document he was reading even as he asked:

  "Just for the record, O'Brien, this isn't personal, is it?"

  "Personal?"

  Fowler raised his eyes. "Don't try to bait me. I'm not looking for you to go on a crusade. Your last one didn't turn out too well."

  "A woman is dead. The coroner suggests foul play. By the book, captain."

  "Fine. You can go."

  Finn walked out of the office and past Tina, the captain's assistant. She looked at him long enough and at just the right angle to remind him of Sister Mary Gertrude. The nun had looked at him like that when she was sure he was up to no good. Finn gave the captain's assistant the same smile he had given the nun; the smile that assured her that one could hope for the best but he was making no promises.

  The window of opportunity on this matter was narrow and Finn would
have to squeeze through it any which way he could. It was already after five and the camp on the bridge would be setting up. After dark those folks wouldn't take kindly to the cops moving around their living room, so he hurried on. Cori was waiting for him outside the office, leaning against the wall. She pushed herself off and hugged her purse tighter when he came up beside her.

  "What was that about?" she asked.

  "Captain wanted to tell me how much he liked my jacket."

  "Cut the crap. I'm not in the mood." Finn did not point out that came as no surprise. She asked, "Is he tying our hands?"

  "No, Cori," Finn said. "Just making sure my intentions are honorable."

  "Damn straight they are."

  Cori moved toward the door that would lead them to the parking lot and their new car. As she put her hand on the metal lever the door was opened from the other side. Officer Gordon and Detective Smithson stopped talking when they saw Cori and Finn.

  "Look who's here," Smithson said, an obnoxious grin spreading over his face. "The super heroes fighting for right and skanks."

  "Good to see you, too," Cori said.

  Finn put an arm out to hold the door for her and let the other two pass but Gordon still had hold of it. Smithson moved inside and borrowed some of Finn's personal space. He put his hand on Finn's chest, his grin twisting.

  "We're just trying to be friendly here," Smithson said. "We want to take a second to, you know, tell you how much we admire all the James Bond stuff. Cars exploding, dead babe – "

  "A deceased woman," Cori corrected.

  Impatient with the man's idiocy, she tried to push on through but Gordon took a half a step. He was a big man and he filled the doorway. Even Cori couldn't have gone through him although from the look on her face she was ready to try going over him.

  "Oh sorry, Anderson. A deceased Wo-Man," Smithson drawled. Gordon chortled.