by M. Z. Kelly
CHAPTER FIVE
“What the fuck happened?” Lieutenant Edna asked. He’d arrived as Charlie was being lowered in a stretcher down the stairway and out the front door to a waiting ambulance.
“We think it’s a heart attack,” I said. “He keeled over onto the murder scene upstairs.”
“He fuck’n what?”
“Right onto the dead bodies.”
“He contaminated a crime scene? Fuck me.”
Lieutenant Henry Edna had a condition that some of my fellow officers termed, coitus interrupt-us, because he had a habit of using a profane term for copulation to constantly interrupt us.
The fifty-something cop, who was nearing retirement age, seemed to process what I’d said for a moment. His brown eyes then drifted down to my dress. “What’s with the fuck ruffles?”
I explained about the party and then turned the lieutenant over to Pearl so that he could show him the crime scene. Natalie and Mo headed off to do what they could to help with crowd control while I went out to the ambulance where the attendants were securing Charlie for his trip to the hospital.
As the EMTs buckled him in, my partner said, “Could you do me a favor, Kate, and call Wilma? Maybe she can meet me at the hospital.”
“Of course. What about Irma?”
Wilma was Charlie’s new girlfriend after he’d divorced nearly three years ago. He and his daughter, Irma, had their differences, but I knew that she’d be concerned about him.
“She’s spending the night with a girlfriend. I don’t want her getting upset. I’ll call her as soon as I know something definite.”
Charlie looked pale. Even though he was overweight, he looked small in the ambulance. Maybe all the talk about jelqing and G-Stims had been too much for my partner’s blood pressure.
“I wish I could go with you,” I said.
“Stay here and catch the bad guy.” He chuckled. “And you’d better keep an eye on the snoop sisters. Wherever they go trouble seems to follow.”
Charlie was right about that. Natalie and Mo always did seem to land in a pot of haggis, as Natalie would say.
I made my way back upstairs after calling Charlie’s girlfriend and filling her in. I found Lieutenant Edna and Pearl with the coroner.
When Dr. Brie Henner saw me, she removed her gloves and came over to my side while Pearl and Edna chatted in the corner of the bedroom.
“How are you doing, sweetheart?” Brie asked.
Brie was new to the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office. We’d met at a crime scene a few weeks back and had become friends, going out for coffee and walks a couple of times.
“Not bad for a southern belle surrounded by dead bodies, a house full of drunks, and a partner who was just carted off to the hospital.”
“Heard about Charlie. How is he doing?”
“Stable. We won’t know anything definite until they run some tests.” I saw Brie taking in my dress. “I was at a costume party when the call came in.” I exhaled. “Didn’t have a change of clothes.”
“I always keep a bag with an extra pair of pants and a shirt in my car. I think we’re about the same size if you’d like to borrow them.”
“I’d be eternally grateful,” I said before following her downstairs to her van.
As we walked, I said, “How are Joe and Lily?”
“Joe’s working a lot of overtime at the station. Lily’s taking ballet classes. She thinks she’s a prima ballerina.”
Brie used her phone to show me a picture of her five-year-old daughter dressed in a tutu. Little Lily was a mini-version of Brie, with chocolate eyes, silky black hair, and a smile that illuminated her pretty face.
“She’s beautiful,” I said handing the phone back to her. My African-American friend and her fire-fighter husband were the perfect couple—successful, committed to their professions, still in love after seven years of marriage, and they were great parents.
I admired Brie, but had to admit that every time I was around her I felt like a failure. Brie and I were nearly the same age. She had everything going for her, while I was divorced, broke, and living with Natalie, Mo, a transvestite named Prissy, and his crazy great-grandmother. Not exactly where I’d imagined myself to be in my early thirties.
After Brie handed me the change of clothes, she said, “How are things going with Jack?”
I hesitated because I really wasn’t sure how they were going. “Well, the sex is great…”
Brie smiled. “And?”
“And, I’m really not sure about anything else. He’s gone a lot. We haven’t talked about anything long term. Sometimes I feel like I’m a convenience, if you know what I mean.”
“Maybe he’ll come around. What about mmm…sorry, I forget his name.”
“Mack. He’s in South America, working some high-profile kidnapping case. We talk every now and then, but he’s gone for weeks at a time.”
We stopped outside a spare bedroom where I could change. Brie smiled at me. “I think one of these days you’re going to have a choice to make.”
“What do you mean?”
“You have two men interested in you. At some point they’re going to find out about each other and it’s going to turn the heat up on everything.” She opened the door for me. “See you back at the crime scene in a minute.”
After shedding the parade float, slipping into a pair of Brie’s blue jeans and blouse, and trying to do what I could with my hair, I checked on Bernie. I found him in the living room where the uniforms had restored order and a couple of wedding guests were doting over him. I then met up with Brie and the others back in the master bedroom.
“I can give you a preliminary rundown on what happened,” Brie said as I came into the room. “We’ll need to run some additional tests when I get them on the table tomorrow, but I think I have a pretty good idea how things went down.”
“Let’s hear it,” Edna said, no doubt taking great pains to clean up his language in front of the coroner.
“Pearl was right about what he told Kate and her partner earlier,” Brie said. “This was a crime, made to look like a murder-suicide. The bride and groom were murdered.”
CHAPTER SIX
“The liver temp indicates the TOD was consistent with when the bodies were discovered, around 9:00 p.m. this evening,” Brie said, as she began summarizing her preliminary findings. “There’s no doubt that Michael was killed first. There’s stippling and ecchymosis around the wound at the temporal region. The abrasion collar indicates an almost ninety degree angle of entry.
“Michael was in a supine position, lying almost flat in bed with his head slightly elevated, when the bullet was fired. As the round moved through the brain it began to lose axial stability, tumbling and tearing the internal tissues before creating an exit point and dislodging tissue, bone, and brain matter onto the bed. After exiting the brain, the round ultimately became embedded in the drywall.” Brie pointed to the bedroom wall where a marker had been placed.
“Let me see if I’ve got this straight,” Edna said. “The couple’s lying in bed and you think somebody just walked up and blew the groom’s f…I mean, his head off?”
“Not exactly,” Brie said. “Michael was in bed, but there was someone on top of him.”
“What the…you mean they were having sex when the groom was murdered?” Edna asked
As the lieutenant asked the question, I remembered Natalie’s earlier comment about wondering if China got to take a final ride on the big banana.
“Yes. China’s body shows evidence of recent vaginal penetration and abrasion consistent with sexual intercourse. We will, of course, swab and test for semen, and determine if there was ejaculate…”
“I’m still fucking confused,” Edna said, indicating there was a time limit on his ability to control his coitus interrupt-us. Maybe he didn’t realize that the wedding couple had apparently suffered from a similar condition, only their coupling had been interrupted by murder. “So China’s on top of Michael, they’re havi
ng sex, and someone walks up behind her, reaches in with a gun and puts a bullet in Michael’s brain?”
“That would be an accurate summary,” Brie said. “And just to be clear, China was facing toward Michael.”
“But what the…heck happened then…I mean, to the bride? Edna asked.
“The blood spray tells the rest of the story,” Pearl said.
“The killer wanted the crimes to look like a murder-suicide,” Brie said. “In order for that to occur, he had to manipulate China after Michael was killed so that GSR would be left on her right hand, making it look like she fired both the bullet that killed Michael and the fatal shot to her own head.”
“Did you find GSR?” I asked.
“Yes. We used one of the new instant shooter ID kits and it was positive. The results from the kits are accurate about ninety percent of the time. But once we’re in the lab, we’ll do skin swabs and electron scanning to confirm the result.”
“I’m still not getting the whole picture,” Edna said. “What does the blood spray show?”
“Here’s how I think the murder of China went down,” Brie said. “After Michael was shot, the killer had to manipulate China to make it look like she’d done the shooting. That required that the gun be placed in her right hand before being brought up to her temple. For that to happen, it’s likely that the killer pushed China off Michael and held her down on the left side of the bed. He then wrapped her hand around the gun and brought it up to her head before firing it.” Brie looked at Pearl. “You’re right, the blood spray tells the rest of the story.”
“My guess is that China resisted, fought back against what was happening,” Pearl said. “She pushed the gun and the killer’s hand away at the instant the fatal shot was fired. The entry point is higher on the head than you’d expect in a typical suicide. Because of that, the blood pattern from the impact was constrained to what we see behind and directly beside China’s head.”
“Bravo,” Brie said. “Couldn’t have explained it better.” She looked at Edna and me. “There’s one other piece of evidence that’s telling.” Brie motioned to China’s neck. “As you can see, China had delicate white skin. But there’s some very fine tearing of the soft tissues and capillaries, indicating that she was held down by her assailant while the killer manipulated the scene in the way I’ve described to make it appear to be a murder-suicide.”
The crime techies arrived and began processing the scene with Brie. I huddled with Edna and Pearl for a moment as they set up.
“Let’s head downstairs and begin the questioning,” Edna said. “I wanna make sure we get a statement from everyone in attendance, I don’t care if it takes all fucking night.”
“I’ll start with the bride’s mother and sister, since I’m already acquainted with them,” I said.
We were headed out of the bedroom when the lieutenant summed up his thoughts. “Imagine that. Your first fuck on your wedding night is the last fuck of your life. Somebody shoulda told the couple before they took the plunge that marriage is nothing but fucking murder anyway.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Wolf walks across the lawn behind the estate where the bride and groom were murdered. He pauses and draws in a long breath before mopping the sweat from his brow.
Below him, he sees a couple moving down a trail that leads to a road behind the property. The police probably don’t realize that someone can enter and leave the estate from the trail. Idiots.
It’s been almost two hours since the murders, but he feels like it’s been a week. What the hell is taking so long?
There’s no option but to conclude that the deaths are a murder-suicide. Everything has been executed with precision. Mistakes are not an option. Given the evidence and relationship the couple had, The Wolf knows that even fools like the cops have to come to that conclusion.
He swishes a gulp of Eternal around in his mouth and then spits it into some rose bushes. The exotic artesian water tastes sour. It reminds The Wolf of an assignment he had in Mexico many years ago. Finding the target and killing him took longer than he’d expected and dehydration had set in. It was hours before he could make the border crossing through the desert. It was after that assignment he was given the name—The Wolf. It was fitting. The killer always operates alone.
How many bodies? He thinks the count is somewhere in the twenties. But there are probably more. People and assignments have come and gone. Sometimes it’s hard to keep track of everything.
There was a time when he could recite the date, hour, and location of each victim. For the first few years, the killer could even remember the faces when death came knocking on their door—the dawning awareness, the denial, the desperation, and finally the acceptance. Just the thought of it all was once enough to make his pulse race. Now, it just isn’t the same.
Even this killing, the first one in years, has left him feeling hollow. It’s not that the couple didn’t have it coming. The bride was nothing but a gold digging whore.
There’s no doubt that China Warner was stunning, in fact, everyone who’d ever met her thought China was one of the most attractive and charming women they’d ever met. She was like a precious stone, something quite exquisite and exotic.
But when you looked past the superficial, down into the soul of the woman, she was nothing but a cheap little bauble that Michael Clinton, like so many others, had worn like a bracelet. China’s death was a necessary part of the plan. He had no regrets about killing her that would make for sleepless nights.
As for the groom, well, that was another matter. There were lots of feelings there—some of them still buried. But in the end, the killer knew that Michael Clinton had been a user who took advantage of everyone he’d ever known. The dead groom had been an incorrigible womanizer. He was also brilliant and wealthy. And The Wolf knew one thing—he deserved a share of that wealth, a big share.
He remembers the groom’s face at the instant he died. Michael, the arrogant, superior prick realized with his last breath who had taken his life. All things considered, it was a fitting end.
The Wolf’s phone rings as the uniforms are telling the guests to gather in the house and be prepared to give their names and statements to the detectives.
The phone number is familiar and The Wolf’s apprehension rises as he finds a secluded spot in the yard and answers. “It’s done. Everything went without a hitch.”
“We plan this for weeks and this is the best you can do?” the caller says. “You kill them on their wedding night, with dozens of people around? What the hell were you thinking?”
“There was no other choice. You know I didn’t have a lot of access. I had to take the only opportunity that was available.” The Wolf takes a deep breath. He hates the caller’s second-guessing, his condescending attitude. “Besides, it’s all been perfectly set up to look like a murder-suicide. Given their history, the cops will realize something like this was probably bound to happen someday anyway. I just helped things along.”
“You’d better be right.”
“You worry too much. Besides, I left the gun we talked about as a backup, just in case there’s a problem. I’m just glad the debt is paid in full now and I can put this behind me.”
“I’m afraid you don’t understand.”
The Wolf looks down into the skyline of Los Angeles, his blood vessels contracting as his anxiety rises. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about this being a down payment. Think of it as just an installment payment on a very big debt.”
“You don’t understand…”
“I understand perfectly. You will do exactly as you’re told. This is not over until we are told it’s over. We both know the price of failure.”
The line goes dead. The Wolf pockets the phone, takes another sip of Eternal. He spits it out, cursing under his breath as the shadow of a cop descends.
“Everything okay?” the officer asks.
“Yes, it’s just that…” The Wolf sighs. “I need to
get home. It’s been a long day.”
“The detectives are ready for your statement. After that, we’ll see about you leaving. Please follow me, Sir.”
The Wolf follows the cop into the house, takes a deep breath, and, just like so many times before, hides that part of himself that kills alone and without remorse.
CHAPTER EIGHT
We broke into teams to interview the wedding guests. Since Charlie was out of commission, a couple of other detectives were brought in to assist.
I was headed down a hallway to find China’s sister when Harmon Sanders, the mayor’s chief of staff, stopped me.
I’d met Sanders before when Bernie received the Medal of Valor for his actions on a recent case. The mayor’s fifty-something aide was big, pushy, and always seemed to be in a hurry.
“I’ve been here for several hours, Detective,” Sanders said, wiping a sheen of perspiration from his forehead. “Is there any way you can expedite someone taking my statement? I was supposed to just make an appearance here and then attend the mayor’s housewarming party.”
I thought about my earlier romp on the grounds of Eastlake with Jack. It all seemed a long time ago. “There’s an older African-American detective, Pearl Kramer. One of the uniforms can direct you. He should be able to take your statement.”
Sanders rushed past me, calling out to one of the uniforms, without so much as a thank you. Typical politician.
I located China’s sister, Mags, on the patio and asked her to find her mother and meet me in the downstairs home office where we could talk.
“I’m afraid Mother is indisposed,” Mags said. “If you’d like, I’ll show you.”
We stopped by a downstairs bedroom where Linda Warner, or the Bride Mama, as Natalie referred to her, was snoring loud enough to rattle the windows. It reminded me of Charlie when he dozed off.
“Mom’s working on her second liver,” Mags explained. “I think the wedding was her chance to break it in.” She sighed and shook her head, pushing her blonde bangs out of her eyes. “Actually, she’s not always as bad as she was tonight. I think what happened was just too much for her.” Mags used a tissue to blot a tear. “She took a valium and will probably be out for several hours.”
