Random Victim

by Michael A. Black

  “You look raring to go,” Ryan said.

  “Yeah, that makes one of us.”

  Ryan shook his head slowly, as if it hurt to move.

  “Oh, fuck me,” he said. “The girlfriend ended up working late, and I kept drinking till she got to Heaven and joined me.” His fingers massaged his temples. “We ended up closing the place down.”

  Obviously a match made in heaven, Leal thought.

  “Then today the bitch calls in sick,” Ryan said. “Shit, that’s what I should’ve done.” He took another small sip of the coffee.

  The door opened and Hart came in wearing a tan pants suit with a white blouse. Leal nodded to her and smiled.

  “Good morning,” she said.

  “Maybe for you it is,” Ryan said. “You seen Smith?”

  “No, Sergeant Ryan,” she said.

  “Oh, Christ, Hart,” Ryan said. “Don’t start with that ‘Sergeant Ryan’ shit this early in the morning.” His vocal cords stretched for tenor as he mimicked her voice.

  Leal watched Hart’s face redden.

  “Hey,” he said, “lay off my partner.” She glanced at him, her cheeks still showing circular red patches on each cheek. “Don’t mind him. He’s just extremely hungover.”

  Hart looked away without saying anything and Leal wondered if he’d done the wrong thing sticking up for her. Maybe she has to learn to hold her own around here, he thought.

  Ryan had procured an electric coffeemaker that was still half-full. Leal grabbed the pot and a paper cup, refilling Ryan’s before pouring his own. Just as he did this, the door flew open and Joe Smith hurried in, nodding and smiling. He looked sharp in a lightweight dark suit and pale blue shirt. His unknotted tie was draped around his lapels.

  “Sorry I’m late,” he said. “My wife’s pregnant and I thought I was going to have to take her to the hospital this morning.”

  “False alarm?” Leal asked.

  Smith nodded again.

  “Fabulous,” said Ryan. “Now why don’t we all sit down and decide how to proceed with this cluster fuck.” He drank some more coffee and closed his eyes.

  They each sat at their respective desks, turning the chairs so they faced each other.

  “Well, hopefully everybody’s had the chance to review the file. Any ideas?” Ryan looked at Leal first.

  Leal shook his head, holding his hand out for the others. At this point he was content to be a counterpuncher, seeing what the rest of them had to offer.

  Smith leaned forward and smacked his file into the palm of his hand. “It’s a cold trail, Sarge. The way I see it, she could’ve been a random victim. Somebody after her purse, her ride, or maybe even her. Maybe she got jacked, and it went too far, so they killed her and dumped the body.”

  Ryan stopped massaging his temples and looked up.

  “All right, I’ll buy that so far, but if it was just a simple car thief, why wouldn’t he have just followed her and ripped the ride when she went in the restaurant? Or if it was a carjacking, why not just dump her on the road if the killer did ice her on the spot. Why take the chance of riding around with a dead body on the seat next to you?”

  “Well, she was dumped in the pond,” Hart offered.

  “Yeah, in a fucking trunk,” Ryan said. “How many carjackers carry one of those around?”

  Hart sat back.

  “So you’re ruling out robbery then?” Leal asked.

  Ryan scratched his cheek, then reached in his pocket, withdrawing a pack of cigarettes. He stuck one in his mouth and lit it, exhaling a stream of smoke.

  “As big as this case is, we can’t afford to rule out anything,” Ryan said. “It could have been that she was targeted for a crime—robbery, rape, whatever, but we need to explore motives and figure out how they mesh with the facts we got.”

  “What about the husband?” Leal asked. “I remember something about them having a bad marriage.”

  Ryan wrote that down on his pad.

  “It’s definitely something we should check out,” he said. “But he also supposedly donated half the insurance money, didn’t he?”

  Leal nodded. “Who was originally assigned to the case?”

  “Roberts and Murphy,” Ryan said. “Roberts is out with a heart attack and Murphy’s been transferred to the State’s Attorney’s investigation section.”

  “We should talk to them,” Leal said. “See what ground they already covered. Figure out what we might want to look at again.”

  “Yeah, I’ll do that,” Ryan said, bringing the cigarette up to his lips again. “You got any more ideas on this, Frank?”

  Leal noticed that Hart was leaning way back, as if the cigarette smoke were killing her. He thought momentarily about telling Ryan to put it out, but then remembered he shouldn’t be fighting any battles for her. He set his coffee cup down.

  “It’s been my experience that we’d have a lot more evidence if she was a random victim. Those types of crimes are usually based on opportunity, and a lot of unexpected things always go wrong. They throw the offender off his game. Cause him to make mistakes, drop the ball.” Leal held up his hand and made a chopping action. “But this one’s almost too neat. The car disappearing, the body being placed in a trunk, the trunk being dumped in a pond…It shows planning, not quick scrambling.”

  “You’re right,” Ryan said. “It’s too nice a package.” He blew twin plumes of smoke from his nostrils. “I was thinking along those lines myself.”

  Leal noticed both Hart and Smith looking at him. He continued. “And most of these planned things are engineered by somebody who knew the victim. Somebody had a reason, either monetary or emotional or both to kill her.” Leal paused. “You always hurt the one you love.”

  Ryan drew deeply on his cigarette and blew the cloud of smoke up toward the ceiling.

  “So you think it was the husband?”

  “Alibi,” Smith interjected. He smiled sheepishly when everybody looked at him. “Sorry, Sarge. But what I mean is, don’t the file say he was at some kind of dinner or something?”

  “A meeting for his fraternity reunion,” Leal said. “But what I’m getting at is, what did he stand to gain from his wife’s death?”

  “He gave away half the insurance settlement to her abused women group, didn’t he?” Ryan said.

  “Supposedly,” said Leal. “Anybody verify that? And the reason might not have been financial, either. We can’t afford to rule anything out at this point.”

  “In other words he could have had ulterior motives and hired someone to do it,” Hart said.

  “Whoa, Iron Maiden,” Ryan said. “Before we go jumping to conclusions, let’s huddle. One thing’s for sure, if we’re gonna be taking on some executive with a law degree, we’d better be sure we’ve got all our bases covered. I’d better run it by Brice, too.”

  “And shouldn’t we rule out the random victim theory first?” Hart asked. “I mean, if we can definitely eliminate it…”

  “Then it’ll point to a suspect familiar with the victim,” Ryan said. His voice had an almost petulant edge to it. He took one more drag on his cigarette, then dropped it in his paper coffee cup and swirled it around. “Got to remember to get an ashtray for in here tomorrow. Everybody bring your own coffee cup, too.” He tossed the cup into the trash can. “Okay, here’s what we’ll do. Joe, you run downtown and check out all the victim’s associates, other judges, clerks, deputies, secretaries …anybody who remembers anything about her, especially how she was acting right before she disappeared. Write it all down, get names and phone numbers in case we have to follow up. Frank, you and Hart can check with the ME and see if he has anything to add as far as the autopsy. Then we’ll start backtracking on the victim. Let’s compile a list of people we should talk to. See what else she had going.” He glanced at his watch. “We might as well get started and compare notes tomorrow at nine.”

  Ryan had obviously done his homework, Leal thought. He had it pretty well planned out for a guy who claimed to be as
hungover as he looked. But he also had the luxury of reviewing the file before any of them.

  “Getting close to lunchtime,” Ryan said, grinning as he glanced at his watch. “An early lunch. Give me a buzz if you come up with any brainstorms. Otherwise, I’ll see you all tomorrow. This is our first day, so let’s all hit the ground running, as they used to say in the army.” He stood and plucked his jacket off the back of his chair.

  Leal concealed his displeasure with the rather lackadaisical approach. It was a step in the right direction, but a small step. If he were running things he would have really hit the ground running, not be going for an extended lunch break right off the bat. But then again, he wasn’t.

  Better not rock the boat at this point, he thought. Besides, if I get something good, I can always follow up on it myself. Or with my partner, he thought as he looked at Hart.

  “You want to wait to eat?” he asked, “until after we get back from the medical examiner?”

  “Oh, whatever you want,” she said. “I’m just going to have salad anyway.”

  “Ever been to the morgue?”

  She shook her head.

  This could be a good character test, he thought. See how tough she is. See if she loses her cookies once she smells that smell.

  She was his partner, so he knew he had to find out sooner or later. Better that it was sooner, just in case. She was a rookie, and totally unproven in his eyes. That would have to change if this partnership was going to work. Of course, she might have reservations about me, too, he thought. But still…

  “Let’s eat first,” he said. “I know a place on the way.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Welcome to the Morgue

  After checking out a dark blue Ford from the motor pool, Leal drove to a nearby fast-food chicken joint. Leal caught a glance of the teenaged girl behind the counter eyeing him and Hart as they sat at one of the Formica-topped tables in the small restaurant. Maybe she’s wondering if we’re lovers, he thought, smiling to himself. He dipped a few of his fries into the smear of catsup and watched Hart eating her salad. She’d folded her jacket over the chair next to her, but sat with her right side to the wall so no one could see her weapon. Her muscular arms extended from her sleeves, rippling as she ate her salad.

  Jesus, why would a woman want to have muscles like that? he wondered. Maybe she is a lesbian, like Ryan said. In reality it shouldn’t really make any difference, but he knew it would. If it were true, he’d have to be extra careful not to say something, anything that might be misconstrued as being antigay, or taken the wrong way.

  Hart placed a bit of lettuce into her mouth with a daintiness that belied her powerful build.

  She’s feminine in a lot of ways, though, Leal thought. She looked up at him and seemed to notice his stare. He felt himself blush.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked.

  “No, why?”

  “I was just wondering why were you looking at me like that just now?” she said, smiling. “Do I have something stuck between my teeth?”

  “No, I was just wondering if you’d want to carpool tomorrow. That way I could drive the unmarked back and then we could start using the county’s gas instead of our own.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” she said. “Want me to pick you up?”

  “Yeah, if you don’t mind,” he said, thinking that he didn’t want her to see how pathetic his rust-bucket car looked from the inside. She took another bite of salad, then looked at him again, her plastic fork poised between them.

  “Is that all?” she asked. “You look like you wanted to say something else.”

  “I was just admiring your rings,” he said, pointing at twin topaz rings that she wore on each hand.

  “Thanks, the necklace belonged to my grandmother,” she said, holding up a matching blue stone set in ornate silver. “I wear the rings when I’m out in public so people won’t notice my palms so much.” She turned her hand over and displayed a thick crust of yellowish ridges. “Calluses from the weights. I’ve been wearing gloves more lately trying to get rid of them.”

  “Why did you get so heavy into weight lifting?” Leal asked. He tried to soften the bluntness his voice had betrayed by asking a quick follow-up question. “I mean, you trying to get ready for the police Olympics, or something?”

  “Actually, I’m a bodybuilder, not a weight lifter. I still have to pump a lot of weights, but the aim is to develop and shape the muscles rather than lift more poundage.”

  “I see,” Leal said, biting into his chicken sandwich, and wishing that he’d kept his mouth shut.

  “My ex and I used to compete in couples’ competitions,” she said. “He was really into it, too. Unfortunately, he was also into ’roids real heavy.”

  “Those as bad as I’ve heard?”

  Hart raised her eyebrows and nodded. “Worse, actually,” she said. “Bodybuilding’s all about looking good, not being healthy. The dieting, the training, it can all get to be too much sometimes. Add chemicals that destroy your liver into the mix and you can end up with some serious problems.”

  Leal found himself wondering if she was injecting anything to achieve her build. But that seemed a stretch for someone so health conscious.

  “Is that how you met? In the couples’ competitions?”

  “No, actually we met at Western Illinois University,” she said. “Both law enforcement majors. I was into track and field in those days. A little gymnastics until I got too big.” She smiled. “We got married right after graduation. I got on County, and he became a personal trainer. He kept flunking the urine tests until he went off the juice. Then he finally got called by Chicago.” She ate more of her salad, then said, “That’s when I found out that cops make lousy husbands.”

  Leal smirked.

  Hart looked at him quickly.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”

  He waved his hand dismissively. “Don’t worry, it’s true.

  I was so busy playing supercop, spending all my time at stakeouts and bars that I let my marriage go down the tubes.”

  “That’s too bad,” Hart said. “Kids?”

  “Yeah. Two girls.”

  “Wow, how old?”

  “Six and eight. They live with their mother. She remarried and moved to California. A suburb of LA. Thousand Oaks. Beautiful place, but far, far away.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.”

  He blew out another slow breath and realized he was telling her much more than he had intended. But what the hell, we’re partners, he thought. “I get them for two weeks around Christmas, and for a month in the summers. That’s when I usually take my vacations.”

  “It must be hard not to see them more.”

  “Yeah, it is,” he said, thinking that at least they didn’t have to sit through the panic of seeing him in the emergency room with his chest half-open. “But they’ve got a stable family life, and they’re both doing good in school. Great schools out there.” His voice trailed off. “How about you? Kids?”

  She shook her head. “I guess it’s probably better that we didn’t have any.”

  The ubiquitous odor of the dead and decaying bodies hung in the air so pervasively as Leal and Hart walked through the main refrigerated depository, that Leal was once again reminded of his initial trip to the morgue. It had been many years ago, but the memories never seemed to quite go away. His partner had taken him for a meal first, too. A late breakfast. Then he’d laughed as Leal subsequently covered the sidewalk with remnants of his scrambled eggs.

  Leal glanced at Hart to see her reaction at the room full of black body bags, stacked on carts and shelves around the room. She seemed to be concentrating on just staring straight ahead, but he could see that her bare arms were already getting goose pimples from the cool temperature. Her nipples were starting to stand out, too.

  I should have told her to keep her jacket on, thought Leal.

  “Keep breathing through your nose,” he said. “You’ll get used to it quicker.”
r />   “You’re supposed to get used to this?” she said.

  Leroy, the attendant who was leading them to Dr. Sprinklien, turned and grinned, showing his gold capped front tooth.

  “We got a bunch of bodies from a fire,” he said. “Them extra crispies don’t smell real bad as a rule.”

  Leal chuckled. Morgue humor. He forgot how much he missed it.

  The refrigerated room opened into a hallway, and another set of doors. Leroy pushed through them and they were all suddenly in a large autopsy room with several steel tables butting up against sinks and small desk areas. Numerous dead bodies lay naked on top of steel carts, lined up in haphazard order. Dr. Sprinklien looked up from over one of them, the body of a huge black man. The body’s midsection had been sliced open, exposing layers of yellowish, waxy fat between the skin and organs. The doctor’s half-glasses sat upon his rather longish nose. A blue cap covered his hair and a surgical mask hung around his throat. He looked to be in his late sixties or early seventies, and his face seemed slack and droopy.

  “Ah, guests,” he said as he finished snapping on a new pair of latex gloves. “To what do I owe this distinct pleasure, Officers?”

  Leal introduced himself and Hart and said they were working on the Miriam Walker case. He noticed that Sprin-klien took an unusually long time eyeing Hart. Maybe the doc’s got the hots for her, he thought.

  “We wanted to know if you had a few minutes to go over your file, Doctor?” Leal asked.

  “Ah, most certainly,” Sprinklien said. His speech had a distinctly foreign accent, although Leal couldn’t quite place it. “Just give me a few minutes to complete some notes on this fellow.” His gloved hand patted the distended stomach, causing it to jiggle lugubriously. Leal noticed that the dead man’s flaccid penis was uncircumcised and looked like a dead anteater. He glanced over at Hart.