“Carbon monoxide poisoning. Faulty flue in the fireplace,” the sheriff explained clearly not enjoying their company. “How could this poor guy’s death have anything to do with your case?”
“Probably doesn’t.” Val shrugged. “But the boss, well you know how it can be.”
“That I do.” He finally smiled.
“I really hate wasting your time with this stuff.” Val prayed that she sounded sincere. “Was there anything unusual about his death? It sounds pretty cut and dried.”
“No.” If it weren’t for the slight crackle in his voice, Val might have believed him.
“Now you just lied to me,” Val playfully said. “If you do that, I’ll never be able to get out of your way. Did your team find anything odd with the flue?”
“The flue? No, but it had been recently installed. I guess there will be a lawsuit.”
“No doubt,” Val agreed with a slight sigh. “So what did you find at the scene that’s making you uncomfortable?”
“I knew this g-guy,” he stammered. “I never suspected he was into anything kinky.”
“Kinky?”
“When Archie was found, things weren’t quite normal.” He averted his eyes. “He was sitting in his living room, with a fine glass of scotch nearby, and…”
“And?”
“And he was wearing a blonde wig and more makeup than a working girl.”
“Excuse me?” Val hadn’t read anything about that in the initial report. “Anything else?”
“His pants were down around his ankles and his, you know, was in his hand.” The sheriff blushed.
“You know?” Val groaned.
“You mean his penis?” Ricky said.
“Yeah, that’s what I mean. I had no idea he was twisted.”
“Okay.” Val shook her head in an effort to process the information. “So, he was a transvestite?”
“He must have been,” the sheriff said grimly. “Or someone tricked him into it. We didn’t find anything else.”
“Such as?”
“Makeup, women’s clothes, there wasn’t even one of those heads for the wig.”
“No makeup?” Val asked.
“Nothing. I’ve been wondering if maybe he hooked up with a woman who was into some strange stuff. The coroner thinks it’s possible Archie was posed after he died.”
“It would make sense,” Val slowly began to say. “Except if someone else had been there, they’d be dead, too.”
“I know. I just keep hoping.”
“If there was another person, that could be the one we’re looking for,” Val said. “Would you mind e-mailing us all the files on this case? I know it’s a lot to ask, but if we can clear your friend’s name, it might be worth a look.”
The sheriff seemed eager to help clear his friend’s name. After Ricky downloaded everything to his tablet, they were back at the airport, this time heading for much more civilized weather.
“I swear if she sends us down the wrong street again, the bitch is going out the window.” Val aimed her tirade against the GPS that was badly leading their rental car around San Diego. She had been spewing her displeasure all the way from Boston.
“A favor, she asked for a favor?” Val’s disgust grew steadily. “A favor is will you help me move, not some cross-country, wild- goose chase.”
“Enough!” Ricky finally yelled. “Do you want to find out what happened to Brooks?”
“Ricky, I knew the guy.” Val seemed to calm down just a little. “I liked him, even if he did suffer from tunnel vision when it came to Fisher.”
“In the end he was right about the guy.”
“The first time. This new thing he and the crazy lady from Boston are fixated on is just ludicrous. Every time I met up with Brooks, the guy burned through two packs in less than an hour. The guy dying from a heart attack isn’t a surprise.”
“Everyone at the funeral seemed surprised. He had quit smoking, and I heard more than one person say that he was getting in shape.”
“Yeah.” Val clenched her jaw. “There’s something going on. Something no one wanted to talk about.”
“Then we have work to do, so quit your bitching,” Ricky said. “We were damn lucky the ME and his partner agreed to meet with us.”
“I doubt that I’d be up for a little interagency chitchat if I had just lost someone on my team. Sorry about my attitude,” she forced herself to say. “I’m not used to feeling this way. This thing with Brooks on top of being dumped, I’m not myself. Personally, I am convinced that they put something in all that Dunkin Donuts coffee they forced me to drink back in Boston. Tell me something, Ricky. When you did that background check on Calloway for me, did you find out where marksmanship ranked?”
“Above average.”
“How far above average?”
“Marginal. She’s a good shot, but not by our standards. The few times she’s had to discharge her weapon in the field she’s hit her target.”
“Ever kill anyone?”
“No.”
“How about physically. Is she in good shape?”
“The same, above average but not extraordinary. You took her down, what do you think?”
“I think she’s in good shape, but her strengths are her street smarts and intuition. If she’s right about any of this, those aren’t going to help her go up against a hired gun.”
“You’re worried?”
“Me?” Val scoffed at the notion. “I just think we need to find out whatever we can and get back to Boston as soon as we can.”
Three hours later, they were waiting not so patiently in a conference room at San Diego Department of Forensics. They had been sitting, waiting, and waiting. When they arrived, the greeting they received was anything but enthusiastic. There was the usual rumbling and grumbling about Feds interfering with a local case. After repeatedly explaining that they were simply doing some background work on an aiding and abetting case, they were shown to a conference room.
“What’s on your mind, Brownie?” Ricky asked.
“First Calloway’s partner and now Brooks,” she said, grinding her teeth. “Think there’s a chance she’s just having a bit of bad luck?”
“What exactly happened to her partner?”
“If anyone asks, he’s dead.” Val scanned the room in an effort to see if their conversation was being observed. “He was dumped in an abandoned building. They found a stash of high-grade coke on him.”
“That doesn’t jive with the background check you had me do,” Ricky said in a hushed tone.
“I don’t know. The guy was heading south after buying a new house, and from what I hear, he was shopping for a boat.”
“He could afford it,” Ricky said.
“On a cop’s salary?”
“On his wife’s inheritance. Her old man owned a very successful brokerage firm. Guy had a knack for picking winners. He died last year and left most everything to his only child and her husband. After Sampson and his wife paid off the taxes and enormous fees, they pocketed a cool three point six million.”
“That guy is rich, and that’s how he dresses?” Val sputtered.
“Yeah, they paid off their bills, made a couple of investments, bought a place in Florida. Other than that, they haven’t touched the money. Probably don’t want anyone to know. How many times has someone hit the jackpot only to have long-lost friends and family crawling out of the woodwork? Based on his history and the fact that he has more than enough money tucked away, I don’t see him peddling drugs. Had to be a setup. Speaking of setups, how long do you think they’re going to leave us sitting in here?”
“Maybe they think if they leave us in here long enough we’ll just take a hike.” Val did some research on her laptop. Ricky kept pace with his tablet.
“They could have at least offered us a cup of coffee.”
“Sorry about that.” A booming voice cut through the room.
“I’m Detective Loomis and this is Dr. Hutchinson. Can I ask just why you
are looking at cases that have no federal jurisdiction?”
“Can we have some coffee?” Val couldn’t resist tweaking the weary-looking detective. “Kind of falling asleep here.”
“Coffee?” Loomis barked while the young Doctor Hutchinson chuckled. “Yeah, answer my question, and you can have all the java you want.”
“We’re working an aiding and abetting,” Ricky said. “We might have a connection to a couple of your cases. Now, about that coffee? I like mine black, and Deputy Brown likes hers light with one sugar.”
“Sure.” Loomis rolled his eyes and stormed out of the room
“I love seeing him frazzled.” Hutchinson chuckled once again and took a seat. “Still you have to understand that today is not the best day.”
“I understand. I knew Detective Brooks. Can you tell us what really happened to him? Or perhaps shed some light on these other cases?” Val nodded towards the stack of files the good doctor had placed on the table.
“I have to wait for Detective Loomis.”
“I won’t tell, if you won’t tell.”
“I’ll tell.”
“Coffee!” Loomis slammed down two paper cups.
“Not bad,” Val said after taking a sip.
“This is still California. None of that government issue crap.”
“Glad to hear that. Now, down to business. I just spent a long stint in Boston. The reason I was in Boston and the reason that I’m here is because I was tracking a child molester. This creep skipped out of his halfway house.”
“Halfway house for a piece of crap like that? God save us. Did you catch the guy?”
“Yes, but someone was helping him.”
“Someone who might be connected to your unusual deaths,” Ricky added, giving Val a chance to grab another well-needed sip of coffee. “It’s a maybe, but we need to check it out.”
“How so? I mean a child molester and our deaths don’t sound like a match. No one here was involved in anything like that.”
“No one in San Diego, or no one in your department?” Val asked, and her stomach suddenly turned.
“I don’t know what you think you’re looking for,” Loomis barked.
“Look I’m working with a maybe here. If there’s a chance you know something,” she quickly cut in in an effort to calm him down. “I’d like a shot at the person who was helping this guy.”
“So would I.” Loomis snarled the anger still evident in his eyes. “What’s the connection? I’m telling you right now Brooks was clean.”
“Brooks? Hold on.” Val asked. “I knew the guy. We worked a couple of cases together. I thought he was a good guy. The way you’re acting is making me feel sick. What happened?”
“Brooks was a good guy. One of the best. He had a heart attack plain and simple. It’s just that when they found him…” Loomis’s voice trailed off while Val held her breath. “He was in bed naked, and there was a DVD playing. It was kiddy porn.”
“No!” Val pounded her fist on the table. “I don’t believe that Brooks was into something sick like that.”
“Now you have my undivided attention,” Loomis said with relief. “It had to be a setup. Now that I know that you aren’t here on some kind of witch hunt, how about you tell me what you need to know? Better yet, tell me what you know.”
Val hesitated for a moment. This is where things would get tricky. In her mind, everything added up. Saying it out loud, the entire theory sounded ludicrous.
“When I was chasing my scumbag, we kept getting tips on where to find him. The tips were a day late and a dollar short. They originated from a burner phone pinging off a cell tower in this area. More precisely, in the areas of where your deaths occurred.”
“That’s it?”
“It’s all I’ve got,” Val said with an exasperated sigh. “I just need a little info on Brooks’ death. Also, Bitsy Marsden, Malcolm Fisher, and a junkie by the name of Billy Ryan. Whatever you can tell us might help exonerate Brooks and put away the person who used a child molester as bait.”
“That’s a compelling argument,” Loomis finally said. “The first tip-off we had was the Marsden case. On the surface, it seemed like your usual random act by a group of thugs. The only hiccup was our thugs were all the way up in East LA. It just didn’t seem likely that someone would travel all the way down here just to attack a woman at random and then hightail it back up to LA with her car.”
“It does beg the question as to how they got all the way down here.” Ricky said while he made notes.
“It bugged me,” Loomis conceded. “The choir boys who were nabbed using her credit cards ended up having an alibi. That’s when we started looking into Ms. Marsden’s life.”
“What was their alibi?” Ricky asked.
“At the time Ms. Marsden was attacked, they were at St. Agnes attending choir practice.”
“Oh, so they were literally choir boys?” Ricky stifled a laugh.
“Uh-huh.” Loomis snorted. “They went from choir practice to the local skateboard park. Hung out there for a few hours. On their way home, they spot the BMW. Keys in the ignition, wallet in plain sight. They jacked the car. Dumped it at the local chop shop. The following day, they started their shopping spree. They got pretty far, until the system caught up with the cards. LAPD had them in custody by dinnertime.”
“What did you dig up on Ms. Marsden’s personal life?” Val asked.
“Marsden worked for a very conservative financial firm, and she was about to be fired.”
“Why?”
“She was about to be named in two sexual harassment suits. Both complainants were under her direct supervision. One was a married man, and the other was her female personal assistant. The old man who owns the company was not pleased.”
“I take it you looked at her disgruntled staff members?”
“Both of them had alibis, and the lawsuits were about to be quietly settled.”
“The case that caught my attention was Malcolm Fisher,” Dr. Hutchinson eagerly added. “He was already dead by the time the EMTs arrived, but he should have been fine. On the surface, the case did seem routine. I dug deeper than I normally would in a case like this one. One of the EMTs bagged the EpiPen.”
“Our labs guys ran some tests,” Loomis said. “Everyone expected to find nothing, other than perhaps the pen had malfunctioned in some way.”
“And what did the boys in the lab find?”
“Instead of traces of epinephrine,” Hutchinson said, “they found bee venom. I also found a substantial amount of bee pollen in Mr. Fisher’s tissue samples. In addition, there was bee venom in his blood work. Instead of receiving a shot of medicine, he was injected with the one thing in the world he was deathly allergic to. Very clever if you ask me. Detective Loomis retrieved the sports drink he had been drinking that day from his golf bag. The lab found large amounts of bee pollen.”
“According to his caddy, he was drinking from the bottle from the time he teed off,” Loomis explained while Ricky furiously scribbled on his notepad.
“The pollen set off a reaction,” Hutchinson excitedly told them his theory. “The pollen alone wouldn’t kill him, just make him uncomfortable as hell. When he was injected with the venom, that was what sealed his fate. The high dosage shot directly into his system caused his breathing to be obstructed and his heart to seize. His death was very painful but thankfully very quick.”
“What about Ms. Marsden?”
“It looked like a sexual assault,” Loomis grumbled.
“But it wasn’t,” Hutchinson said. “Her clothing was in disarray, but the only injury she suffered was the large gash across her throat. She bled out in a matter of minutes.”
“Detective Loomis, is there anyone you can think of that would go to such lengths to kill her and try to make it look like an attempted rape gone wrong?”
“Other than the trouble at work, nothing else was evident in her life.” He seemed to lose his patience. “Listen, tell me what’s going on, or get the he
ll out of my house.”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out,” Ricky said. Val smirked when she spied the veins in Loomis’s neck bulge. “What did you discover when you performed the autopsy on Detective Brooks?”
“Back up.” Loomis slammed his fist against the table. “I want to know who the hell is behind this?”
“At this moment we don’t…” Ricky began to say.
“Bullshit.”
“They have one person in common.” Val decided to be up front. The theory was so farfetched Loomis would probably laugh them out of the state.
“Who?”
“A skell by the name of Fisher.”
“Fisher? Simon Fisher? He’s locked up.”
“Yes, I know.” Val didn’t even blink when he waved dismissively at her. “His original alibi was Billy Ryan wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, we could have saved some lives if that little junkie had told us the truth,” Loomis growled. “Didn’t ’fess up that he couldn’t account for Simon for the whole weekend until after Fisher was locked up. Junkie putz. All he had to do was tell us he was partying all weekend and we would have looked at Fisher right off the bat. Instead, we were chasing shadows.”
“Ryan’s dead. Overdosed.”
“What a surprise.” Loomis snorted with disgust. “This is what you’ve got?”
“Brooks thought Fisher was worth looking at,” Val said coldly. “Now he’s dead. Doctor what did the autopsy reveal?”
“It was troubling.”
“Because?”
“He had a heart attack.” Hutchinson shifted in his chair. “But, thanks to living a much cleaner lifestyle for the past few years, he was in very good health. I couldn’t find any sign of heart disease.”
“He died of a heart attack, but his heart was healthy?”
“Yes.”
“Did you find anything else? Toxins or some other explanation?”
“Nothing except a blemish on his neck.”
“Blemish?”
“A bruise consistent with an injection, but I can’t be certain.”
“By his carotid artery by any chance?”
Checkmate (Caitlin Calloway Mystery Book 2) Page 36
