by Neal Griffin
Livy stared back, incredulous, and, Tia thought, maybe even a little bit scared. “Tia, I removed currency from the evidence locker without authorization. I accessed a person’s criminal history file for a case that isn’t even open. On top of all that, even if there was an open case, I’m not cleared to work on it. If I even think about writing this up as a formal report on ME letterhead? Mort will go bat-shit crazy. For sure I’ll be fired.”
“Bullshit,” Tia said. “We’re going to find a way to work around Kowalski. I haven’t said anything to Chief Sawyer yet, but if I need to I will. Livy, Gosforth’s fingerprints on the money? This is huge.”
“Mort’s already signed off on suicide. He’s not the type to change his findings, especially after all that has gone on.”
“What about Henry’s prints?” Rich asked, startling Tia. She’d almost forgotten he was there. But yeah, the victim’s prints were important, too.
“Page three of my unauthorized report that doesn’t really exist,” Livy said. “His prints are only on the envelope.”
“Then he probably had just gotten the money, right?” Rich said.
That made sense to Tia. Henry hadn’t handled the money, just the envelope. He’d probably looked at it, but he hadn’t touched it. “So there probably wasn’t a lot of time between him getting the envelope and his getting killed.”
“And he must have gotten the envelope from Gosforth,” Livy said.
“If you’re not clear to work the case,” Rich asked, “how did you get away with doing all this?”
“I turned off the overhead surveillance cameras in the evidence locker while Mort was out to lunch. I processed the bills right there in the evidence room, and photographed the latents with a digital camera. Couple of close calls but I got away with it.”
“Geez,” Rich said and Tia wasn’t sure if he was shocked or turned on by this different side of Livy’s personality.
“I did the actual comparison work at home. I was up most of the night.
“Look here.” Livy pointed to the last page of the report. “I also compared Gosforth’s record prints to the partial latents I lifted off the gun. No matches. I did find Henry’s prints on the gun, along with several other prints that don’t belong to Henry or Gosforth.”
“No chance for DNA analysis on the shotgun?” Tia asked.
Livy shrugged. “Not from me.”
“How so?” Rich said, smiling. “I’ll bet you could do it.”
“Not without a degree in molecular biology and a million-dollar lab. This?” She winked, motioning to the report in Tia’s hands. “Easy. I did the actual comparison work in my basement with a five-dollar magnifying glass.”
The DNA evidence would be incontrovertible, Tia knew, but this work was solid evidence implicating Robert Gosforth in Henry Hayes’s murder. In fact, Gosforth’s prints on the money practically put him at the scene of the crime. It wasn’t a slam dunk, but Tia wanted another shot at questioning Gosforth. If things went right, she’d have a signed confession to shove up the ass of his attorney. But to do that, she’d have to disclose the fingerprint report.
“This report practically gives us probable cause for arrest,” Tia said. “What we need now is to get Kowalski to knock off his obstructionist bullshit so we can formalize your findings and get DNA analysis of the shotgun.”
“Good luck with that,” Livy said. “If you need me, I’ll be at my desk. Sorting pocketknives.”
Tia did her best to set Livy’s mind at ease. She told her she’d keep the latent-print work off the books for now. They said their goodbyes and Tia once again picked up on some chemistry between Rich and Livy.
Tia and Rich headed back to the car and Tia couldn’t help herself. “Not your girlfriend, my ass. Why don’t you just ask her out, already?”
“You really think I should?”
“Sure, Rich,” Tia said, doing her best imitation of giving helpful advice. “I mean, think about it. Nowadays, sometimes the guy takes the girl’s name. Play your cards right and you could finally get out from under the Dick Puller thing.”
THIRTY-EIGHT
Tia headed for Travis’s office with Livy’s report in her hand. She’d left Rich in the bullpen, thinking that if this didn’t go well, she needed to keep him clear. Tia knew the stakes. She had encouraged Livy to disregard the direction of the deputy medical examiner. To disobey the orders of her superior. Tia had no intention of letting Livy take the hit. It had been Tia’s idea and she was going to let her boss know it. If Travis did what he should do, Tia figured, in about thirty minutes she’d be joining Youngblood on the couch, watching reruns of The Price Is Right on the Game Show Network.
Tia stood outside the office door and took a deep breath. She gave a soft knock, and not wanting to lose her nerve, walked in without waiting for a reply. Travis sat behind his desk. A man Tia didn’t recognize sat in the visitor’s chair. He looked her way, aiming his gaze at her chest, took a quick tour, then finally rose to make eye contact.
“Great. I was just getting ready to call you,” Travis said, getting to his feet. “Tia, this is Detective O’Donnell. He’s a background investigator for the San Diego County Sheriff’s Office. I know you’ve heard I applied out there. He’s got a few questions for you.”
“Tia Suarez. Good to meet you.” She stuck out her hand. Though O’Donnell was still slouched in his office chair, at least now his eyes were focused somewhere above her neck.
“I’ve heard a lot about you, Suarez.” O’Donnell shook her hand, holding it longer than was polite. “Looking forward to talking with you. Do you have a few minutes now?”
“Actually, I don’t,” Tia said, sounding as dismissive as possible. “Travis, we need to talk. In private.”
Travis glanced at O’Donnell. “Tia, Detective O’Donnell has a flight out tonight. He just needs a few minutes. We can get together later.”
“I need to meet with you and the Chief about the Hayes case. It’s important.”
“Chief Sawyer is out of the office,” Travis said. “I’ll get ahold of him. By the time you and Detective O’Donnell are done, the Chief should be back. Sound good?”
Unhappy, Tia turned back to the detective. “How long’s this going to take?”
O’Donnell looked at Travis and winked, then turned to Tia. “I don’t know. You gonna tell me he’s a wife beater? Maybe a serial rapist?”
O’Donnell laughed out loud, and Travis smiled uncomfortably and looked at Tia, silently pleading for her to just go along.
“How long, Detective?” Tia said, staring at Travis.
O’Donnell shrugged. “We can get it done in fifteen minutes or so.”
“Fine.” The look Tia shot Travis’s way made no attempt to hide her frustration.
Travis smiled in return. “Good. Use my office. I’ll go find the Chief. Come over to his office when you’re done here.”
Once the door closed behind him, Tia turned to O’Donnell.
“I don’t mean to be rude, Detective, but can we make this quick?” She took a seat behind Travis’s desk.
“Call me John,” the San Diego cop said. “Sorry. I can see you’ve got a lot going on.” O’Donnell opened a leather binder, revealing a preprinted questionnaire that, even from Tia’s angle, looked lengthy.
“First, I just need to get some background on you.” O’Donnell’s eyebrows lifted as he added, “Everything I’ve heard so far is pretty impressive.
“So,” he continued, “first let me get your full name, date and place of birth.” Tia rattled off the information and made sure to maintain a consistent cadence and tone as she went on. “Place was Brownsville General in Texas.”
“Really?” O’Donnell said. “How did you end up in Wisconsin?”
“My dad’s job was here.”
“What kind of work did he do?”
“Hey, John, this is about Travis, right?”
“Yeah, sure.” O’Donnell’s eyes went back to his notepad. “I forgot. You’re in a hur
ry.”
“Like I said, I don’t mean to be rude and I don’t want to blow this for Travis,” Tia said. “I mean, I’ve known the guy since third grade and I honestly don’t have a bad thing to say about him. His personal life, he’s like a damn choirboy. We were partners in Patrol before he was promoted and he’s an amazing cop. Didn’t matter how crazy shit got, I never saw him go high and right on anything.”
Tia was glad to see O’Donnell taking notes. He looked up and smiled. “So you’re former military, huh?”
“Excuse me?” Again she wondered why they weren’t talking about Travis.
“You said ‘high and right.’ Military term. What branch?”
Tia took a deep breath and smiled, remembering that Travis really wanted this job. “Marines.”
“No shit? I was Air Force Reserve. Got called up and deployed to Bagram in Afghanistan. Loaded jets for bombing missions,” O’Donnell said. “How about you? Stateside mostly?
“How’s that?” Tia asked.
“Well, I mean, since WM’s are mostly in support roles, right?”
“WM?” Tia knew the acronym. But for some reason, she just didn’t like this guy using it.
“Women Marines, right?”
Tia stared at the detective long enough to wipe the smile off his face. Tension rose in the room, which was exactly the result she wanted. “I did six months at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, crash course in Farsi. After that another six months immersed in Saudi Arabia. Once my skill level was satisfactory, I hooked up with a recon platoon in the Helmand Province. We were responsible for locating high-value targets. I was the unit interrogator/translator. Spent three years in an FOA.”
O’Donnell’s pen had stopped moving. Tia motioned toward his paper. “FOA. That’s the acronym for ‘forward operating area.’ If you want to write it down, that is. Now, did you have any questions about Travis?”
The detective began to stumble through inquiries about Travis’s honesty and temperament. There was a knock, then the office door opened and Rich walked in, carrying a FedEx packet.
“Excuse me, Detective Suarez?”
“Yeah, Rich.”
“This just came for you.” Rich looked to the man in the chair and Tia could see he was speaking carefully. “It’s about that lead you put out? The search warrant?”
Tia looked to Detective O’Donnell. “We good, John? I really need to get back to work.”
“Uh, sure.” O’Donnell was all business. “I think I got everything I need.”
Tia headed for the door. She stopped, smiled at the detective, and did her best imitation of polite. “Good meeting you, John. Truth is, you guys are nuts if you don’t hire Travis. My guess is in five years, you’ll all be working for him.”
THIRTY-NINE
Tia and Rich left the sergeant’s office and headed down the hallway. Tia took the cardboard envelope from Rich and started opening it as they walked. Most search warrants that involved the release of phone records were handled via email, but hardcopies through the mail weren’t unheard of. Tia was already reading when they made it back to the bullpen.
“Who were you talking to?” Rich asked.
“Forget it. Above your pay grade.”
Tia got to her desk and sat down. She pulled out the documents and again found a cover letter addressing legal issues. She turned to the sheet marked ‘Captured Call, Text and Data Transmissions’ and began to read. The list was two pages and contained more data than the first carrier, but still the call traffic was light and easy to sift through.
After 3:00 A.M., she saw calls she recognized—her own number, Travis’s cell, and Livy’s. Above them Tia found the 911 call that had been made by the burner phone at two-eleven in the morning.
“Well, what do you know,” she said, “Youngblood got something right. Here it is.”
With Rich looking over her shoulder, Tia pointed to the number that had been captured on the 911 call. But that didn’t tell her anything she didn’t already know. She began to scan the report for any other calls connected to the same number that had dialed 911. Rich beat her to it.
“Here,” he said, pointing to a call made just a few minutes after midnight. “An outgoing call from that number. Two hours before the nine-one-one call. Looks like they talked for about eight minutes.”
Tia was jotting down the number when Rich pointed again. “Here’s another outgoing call. Just ten minutes before the nine-one-one.”
Tia looked closer at the printout and saw the second outgoing call was in fact to the same number and had lasted one minute.
Tia scanned the two pages of call activity but there were no other incoming or outgoing calls associated with the phone that had made the 911 notification. She was pretty certain, that like the documents she had received via email, most of the other data listed was from the pinging cellphones of passing motorists. She couldn’t help but think how enlightening it would be to track a couple of weeks of the calls between these two numbers, but that would have to wait. For now, this was all they had to work with.
“All right, so here’s what we know,” Tia said, pointing her pen at the precise call line. “Whoever called in the dead body also made two other phone calls. The first call was a couple of hours earlier and lasted eight minutes. Then, the second call was just ten minutes before the nine-one-one call. That call only registered for one minute, which means it was somewhere between zero and sixty seconds.”
Tia looked at her partner. “Rich, you know this case as well as I do. What do you think this tells us?”
“Well, we’ve pretty much decided that the thousand dollars is some kind of payoff, right? So that first call, it’s a discussion. Some kind of delivery instructions, maybe. That’s why they talk for so long.”
Impressed, Tia waved a hand. “Keep going.”
“That second call, the shorter one. That was the call just before the meet. Final arrangement kind of thing.”
“So what do we need to know now, Rich?”
There was no hesitation in his voice. He tapped the report with his finger. “We need to figure out who’s at the other end of these calls. We need to know whose phone that is.”
“Any suggestions?”
Rich shrugged and spoke with a new confidence. “Let’s dial it up.”
Tia looked at her watch. “School’s not out yet. Want to bet it goes to voicemail?”
Rich grinned so broadly that Tia knew he had come to the same conclusion. If the phone number belonged to who they were both thinking, they wouldn’t need to disclose Livy’s unauthorized print report. Tia dialed the number and put the phone on speaker. After four rings, the familiar voice came on.
“Hello, you’ve reached Robert’s cell phone. I’m probably in class with my kiddos or hopefully out having fun with the family, but either way, leave me a message and I’ll call you back. Have a blessed day.”
“‘Kiddos’?” Rich said. “What a fucking tool.”
Tia looked at the wall clock. Briefing the Chief and Travis would have to wait. “School’s out in less than an hour. We’d better take the Goat.” She gave Rich a playful push as she moved past him to the door. “And don’t ask.”
FORTY
At the last intersection before Evansville Elementary School, they found Robert Gosforth acting as a crossing guard, wearing a brightly colored vest and holding a stop sign up high in one hand. A dozen kids were gathered on the sidewalk, waiting to cross the street when he looked at the approaching GTO and made eye contact with Tia.
Seeing his fight-or-flight instincts kick in, she down-shifted while mashing on the accelerator. The engine’s RPM’s revved and the car raised up like a thoroughbred waiting for the gate to open. Gosforth’s body deflated with the knowledge that there was no escape. Tia parked along the curb and told Rich to wait with the car. She knew she was going to push the legal envelope and she didn’t want Rich caught up in any potential fallout. She stood at the edge of the road while Gosforth escorted the child
ren across the street, then walked back toward her, his face a mask of dread.
“I don’t know why you’re here, Detective, but I want—”
Tia was certain the next words he spoke would be about his attorney. She cut him off. “It’s important you stop talking right now, Robert.”
Shocked, Gosforth did just that and Tia was quick to start in.
“Here’s what you need to know,” she said. “I have evidence detailing your cell phone calls from the night Henry was killed. With those records I can put you at the crime scene at the time of the murder. With that information, I can get a warrant for your bank records and I’m pretty sure I’ll find a thousand-dollar cash withdrawal, won’t I? Knowing banks these days, they probably even have high-definition video.”
Tia leaned in, wanting to plant a seed she already knew would take root. “I’m even willing to bet at some point I’ll find your fingerprints on the money that we found in Henry’s pocket.”
Tia paused for effect and saw that Robert’s lips were trembling. She went for a big finish. “I’ll arrest you. I’ll book you. I’ll collect your DNA to test against the shotgun. Then I’ll send your ass to prison for murder. I can do all that, starting right now.”
“It isn’t like that, Detective.” She knew he was trying not to cry. “You have it all wrong.”
“No, I don’t. I might have some of it wrong, but I don’t have it all wrong. You want to help me get it all right? Then we need to talk. Just you, me, and my partner.”
“What about—”
“Ah, ah, ah. Don’t say it.” She shook her finger. “Because if you do, you can make that call from a jail cell.”
His voice conveyed his complete surrender. “What do you want me to do?”
“You finish up here. Then you meet me back at that cheesy-ass restaurant. We’ll finish our discussion. If you’re not alone, and if that L-word so much as crosses your lips…” Tia punched him lightly on the arm. “You’re tomorrow’s headline, baby. And I’m talking every newspaper in Wisconsin.”
