Five Scarpetta Novels (15 page)

I drove swiftly along West Cary Street, passing huge brick homes with roofs of copper and slate, and entrances barricaded by tall black wrought-iron gates. It seemed surreal to be speeding in the morgue wagon through this elegant part of the city while one of my employees lay dead, and I fretted over leaving Lucy alone again. I could not remember if I had armed the alarm system and turned the motion sensors off on my way out. My hands were shaking and I wished I could smoke.

Libby Hill Park was on one of Richmond's seven hills in an area where real estate was now considered prime. Century-old row houses and Greek Revival homes had been brilliantly restored by people bold enough to reclaim a historic section of the city from the clutches of decay and crime. For most residents, the chance they took had turned out fine, but I knew I could not live near housing projects and depressed areas where the major industry was drugs. I did not want to work cases in my neighborhood.

Police cruisers with lights throbbing red and blue lined both sides of Franklin Street. The night was very dark, and I could barely make out the octagonal bandstand or bronze soldier on his tall granite pedestal facing the James. My Mercedes was surrounded by officers and a television crew, and people had emerged on wide porches to watch. As I slowly drove past, I could not tell if my car had been damaged, but the driver's door was open, the interior light on.

East past 29th Street, the road sloped down to a lowlying section known as Sugar Bottom, named for prostitutes once kept in business by Virginia gentlemen, or maybe it was for moonshine. I wasn't sure of the lore. Restored homes abruptly turned into slumlord apartments and leaning tarpaper shacks, and off the pavement, midway down the steep hill, were woods thick and dense where the C&O tunnel had collapsed in the twenties.

I remembered flying over this area in a state police helicopter once, and the tunnel's black opening had peeked out of trees at me, its railroad bed a muddy scar leading to the river. I thought of the train cars and laborers supposedly still sealed inside, and again, I could not imagine why Danny would have come here willingly. If nothing else, he would have worried about his injured knee. Pulling over, I parked as close to Marino's Ford as I could, and instantly was spotted by reporters.

“Dr. Scarpetta, is it true that's your car up the hill?” asked a woman journalist as she hurried to my side. “I understand the Mercedes is registered to you. What color is it? Is it black?” she persisted when I did not reply.

“Can you explain how it got there?” A man pushed a microphone close to my face.

“Did you drive it there?” asked someone else.

“Was it stolen from you? Did the victim steal it from you? Do you think this is about drugs?”

Voices folded into each other because no one would wait his turn and I would not speak. When several uniformed officers realized I had arrived, they loudly intervened.

“Hey, get back.”

“Now. You heard me.”

“Let the lady through.”

“Come on. We got a crime scene to work here. I hope that's all right with you.”

Marino was suddenly holding on to my arm. “Bunch of squirrels,” he said as he glared at them. “Be real careful where you step. We got to go through the woods almost all the way to where the tunnel is. What kind of shoes you got on?”

“I'll be all right.”

There was a path, and it was long and led steeply down from the street. Lights had been set up to illuminate the way, and they cut a swath like the moon on a dangerous bay. On the margins, woods dissolved into blackness stirred by a subtle wind.

“Be real careful,” he said again. “It's muddy and there's shit all over the place.”

“What shit?” I asked.

I turned on my flashlight and directed it straight down at the narrow muddy path of broken glass, rotting paper, and
discarded shoes that glinted and glowed a washed-out white amid brambles and winter trees.

“The neighbors have been trying to turn this into a lanfill,” he said.

“He could not have gotten down here with his bad knee,” I said. “What's the best way to approach this?”

“On my arm.”

“No. I need to look at this alone.”

“Well, you're not going down there alone. We don't know if someone else might still be down there somewhere.”

“There's blood there.” I pointed the flashlight, and several large drops glistened on dead leaves about six feet down from where I was.

“There's a lot of it up here.”

“Any up by the street?”

“No. It looks like it pretty much starts right here. But we've found some on the path going all the way down to where he is.”

“All right. Let's do it.” I looked around and began careful steps, Marino's heavier ones behind me.

Police had run bright yellow tape from tree to tree, securing as much of the area as possible, for right now we did not know how big this scene might be. I could not see the body until I emerged from the woods into a clearing where the old railroad bed led to the river south of me and disappeared into the tunnel's yawning mouth to the west. Danny Webster lay half on his back, half on his side in an awkward tangle of arms and legs. A large puddle of blood was beneath his head. I slowly explored him with the flashlight and saw an abundance of dirt and grass on his sweater and jeans, and bits of leaves and other debris clung to his blood-matted hair.

“He rolled down the hill,” I said as I noted that several
straps had come loose in his bright red brace, and debris was caught in Velcro. “He was already dead or almost dead when he came to rest in this position.”

“Yeah, I think it's pretty clear he was shot up there,” Marino said. “My first question was whether he bled while he maybe tried to get away. And he makes it about this far, then collapses and rolls the rest of the way.”

“Or maybe he was made to think he was being given a chance to get away.” Emotion crept into my voice. “You see this knee brace he has on? Do you have any idea how slowly he would have moved were he trying to get down this path? Do you know what it's like to inch your way along on a bad leg?”

“So some asshole was shooting fish in a barrel,” Marino said.

I did not answer him as I directed the light at grass and trash leading up to the street. Drops of blood glistened dark red on a flattened milk carton whitened by weather and time.

“What about his wallet?” I asked.

“It was in his back pocket. Eleven bucks and charge cards still in it,” Marino said, his eyes constantly moving.

I took photographs, then knelt by the body and turned it so I could get a better look at the back of Danny's ruined head. I felt his neck, and he was still warm, the blood beneath him coagulating. I opened my medical bag.

“Here.” I unfolded a plastic sheet and gave it to Marino. “Hold this up while I take his temperature.”

He shielded the body from any eyes but ours as I pulled down jeans and undershorts, finding that both were soiled. Although it was not uncommon for people to urinate and defecate at the instant of death, sometimes this was the body's response to terror.

“You got any idea if he fooled around with drugs?” Marino asked.

“I have no reason to think so,” I said. “But I have no idea.”

“For example, he ever look like he lived beyond his means? I mean, how much did he earn?”

“He earned about twenty-one thousand dollars a year. I don't know if he lived beyond his means. He still lived at home.”

The body temperature was 94.5, and I set the thermometer on top of my bag to get a reading of the ambient air. I moved arms and legs, and rigor mortis had started only in small muscles like his fingers and eyes. For the most part, Danny was still warm and limber as in life, and as I bent close to him I could smell his cologne and knew I would recognize it forever. Making sure the sheet was completely under him, I turned him on his back, and more blood spilled as I began looking for other wounds.

“What time did you get the call?” I asked Marino, who was moving slowly near the tunnel, probing its tangled growths of vines and brush with his light.

“One of the neighbors heard a gunshot coming from this area and dialed 911 at seven-oh-five
P
.
M
. We found your car and him maybe fifteen minutes after that. So we're talking about two hours ago. Does that work with what you're finding?”

“It's almost freezing out. He's heavily clothed and he's lost about four degrees. Yes, that works. How about handing me those bags over there. Do we know what happened to the friend who was supposed to be driving Lucy's Suburban?”

I slipped the brown paper bags over the hands and secured them at the wrist with rubber bands to preserve
fragile evidence like gunshot residue, or fibers or flesh beneath fingernails, supposing he had struggled with his assailant. But I did not think he had. Whatever had happened, I suspected Danny had done exactly as he had been told.

“At the present time we don't know anything about whoever his friend is,” Marino said. “I can send a unit down to your office to check.”

“I think that's a good idea. We don't know that the friend isn't somehow connected to this.”

“One hundred,” Marino said into his portable radio as I began taking photographs again.

“One hundred,” the dispatcher came back.

“Ten-five any unit that might be in the area of the medical examiner's office at Fourteenth and Franklin.”

Danny had been shot from behind, the wound close range, if not contact. I started to ask Marino about cartridge cases when I heard a noise I knew all too well.

“Oh no,” I said as the beating sound got louder. “Marino, don't let them get near.”

But it was too late, and we looked up as a news helicopter appeared and began circling low. Its searchlight swept the tunnel and the cold, hard ground where I was on my knees, brains and blood all over my hands. I shielded my eyes from the blinding glare as leaves and dirt stormed and bare trees rocked. I could not hear what Marino yelled as he furiously waved his flashlight at the sky while I shielded the body with my own as best I could.

I enclosed Danny's head in a plastic bag and covered him with a sheet while the crew for Channel 7 destroyed the scene because they were ignorant or did not care, or maybe both. The helicopter's passenger door had been removed, and the cameraman hung out in the night as the
light nailed me for the eleven o'clock news. Then the blades began their thunderous retreat.

“Goddamnsonofabitch!” Marino was screaming as he shook his fist after them. “I ought to shoot your ass out of the air!”

W
HILE A CAR
was dispatched there, I zipped the body inside a pouch, and when I stood I felt faint. For an instant I had to steady myself as my face got cold and I could not see.

“The squad can move him,” I told Marino. “Can't someone get those goddamn television cameras out of here?”

Their bright lights floated like satellites up on the dark street as they waited for us to emerge. He gave me a look because we both knew nobody could do a thing about reporters or what they used to record us. As long as they did not interfere with the scene, they could do as they pleased, especially if they were in helicopters we could not stop or catch.

“You going to transport him yourself?” he asked me.

“No. A squad's already there,” I said. “And we need some help getting him back up there. Tell them to come on now.”

He got on the radio as our flashlights continued to lick over trash and leaves and potholes filled with muddy water.

Then Marino said to me, “I'm going to keep a few guys
out here poking around for a while. Unless the perp collected his cartridge case, it's got to be out here somewhere.” He looked up the hill. “Problem is, some of those mothers can eject a long way and that goddamn chopper blew stuff all the hell over the place.”

Within minutes, paramedics were coming down with a stretcher, feet crunching broken glass, metal clanging. We waited until they had lifted the body, and I probed the ground where it had been. I stared into the black opening of a tunnel that long ago had been dug into a mountainside too soft to support it, and I moved closer until I was just inside its mouth. A wall sealed it deep inside, and whitewash on bricks glinted in my light. Rusting railroad spikes protruded from rotting ties covered with mud, and scattered about were old tires and bottles.

“Doc, there's nothing in there.” Marino was picking his way right behind me. “Shit.” He almost slipped. “We've already looked.”

“Well, obviously, he couldn't have escaped through here,” I said as my light discovered cobblestones and dead weeds. “And no one could hide in here. And your average person shouldn't have known about this place, either.”

“Come on.” Marino's voice was gentle but firm as he touched my arm.

“This wasn't picked randomly. Not many people around here even know where this is.” My light moved more. “This was someone who knew exactly what he was doing.”

“Doc,” he said as water dripped, “this ain't safe.”

“I doubt Danny knew about this place. This was premeditated and cold-blooded.” My voice echoed off old, dark walls.

Marino held my arm this time, and I did not resist him. “You've done all you can do here. Let's go.”

Mud sucked at my boots and oozed over his black military shoes as we followed the rotting railroad bed back out into the night. Together, we climbed up the littered hillside, carefully stepping around blood spilled when Danny's body had been rolled down the steep slope like garbage. Much of it had been displaced by the helicopter's violent wind, and that would one day matter if a defense attorney thought it did. I averted my face from the glare of cameras and flashing strobes. Marino and I got out of the way, and we did not talk to anyone.

“I want to see my car,” I said to him as his unit number blared.

“One hundred,” he answered, holding the radio close to his mouth.

“Go ahead, one-seventeen,” the dispatcher said to somebody else.

“I checked the lot front and back, Captain,” Unit 117 said to Marino. “No sign of the vehicle you described.”

“Ten-four.” Marino lowered the radio and looked very annoyed. “Lucy's Suburban ain't at your office. I don't get it,” he said to me. “None of this is making sense.”

We began walking back to Libby Hill Park because it really wasn't far, and we wanted to talk.

“What it's looking like to me is Danny might have picked somebody up,” Marino said as he lit a cigarette. “Sure sounds like it could be drugs.”

“He wouldn't do that when he was delivering my car,” I said, and I knew I sounded naive. “He wouldn't pick anybody up.”

Marino turned to me. “Come on,” he said. “You don't know that.”

“I've never had any reason to think he was irresponsible or into drugs or anything else.”

“Well, I think it's obvious he was into an alternative life, as they say.”

“I don't know that at all.” I was tired of that talk.

“You better find out because you got a lot of blood on you.”

“These days I worry about that no matter who it is.”

“Look, what I'm saying is people you know do disappointing things,” he went on as the lights of the city spread below us. “And sometimes people you don't know very well are worse than ones you don't know at all. You trusted Danny because you liked him and thought he did a good job. But he could have been into anything behind the scenes, and you weren't going to know.”

I did not reply. What he said was true.

“He's a nice-looking kid, a pretty boy. And now he's driving this unbelievable ride. The best could have been tempted to maybe do a little trolling before turning in the boss's ride. Or maybe he just wanted to score a little dope.”

I was more concerned that Danny had fallen prey to an attempted carjacking, and I pointed out that there had been a rash of them downtown and in this area.

“Maybe,” Marino said as my car came into view. “But your ride's still here. Why do you walk someone down the street and shoot them, and leave the car right where it is? Why not steal it? Maybe we should be worried about a gay bashing. You thought about that?”

We had arrived at my Mercedes, and reporters took more photographs and asked more questions as if this were the crime of all time. We ignored them as we moved around to the open driver's door and looked inside my S-320. I scanned armrests, ashtrays, dashboard and saddle leather upholstery, and saw nothing out of place. I saw no sign of a struggle, but the floor mat on the passenger's side was dirty. I noted the faint impressions left by shoes.

“This was the way it was found?” I asked. “What about the door being opened?”

“We opened the door. It was unlocked,” Marino said.

“Nobody got inside?”

“No.”

“This wasn't there before.” I pointed to the floor mat.

“What?” Marino asked.

“See those shoe impressions and the dirt?” I spoke quietly so reporters could not hear. “There shouldn't have been anybody in the passenger's seat. Not while Danny was driving, and not earlier when it was being repaired at Virginia Beach.”

“What about Lucy?”

“No. She hasn't ridden with me recently. I can't think of anybody who has since it was cleaned last.”

“Don't worry, we're going to vacuum everything.” He looked away from me and reluctantly added, “You know we're going to have to impound it, Doc.”

“I understand,” I said, and we started walking back to the street near the tunnel, where we had parked.

“I'm wondering if Danny was familiar with Richmond,” Marino said.

“He's been to my office before,” I replied, and my soul felt heavy. “In fact, when he was first hired, he did a week's internship with us. I don't remember where he stayed, but I think it was the Comfort Inn on Broad Street.”

We walked in silence for a moment, and I added, “Obviously, he knew the area around my office.”

“Yeah, and that includes here since your office is only about fifteen blocks from here.”

Something occurred to me. “We don't know that he didn't just come up here tonight to get something to eat before the bus ride home. How do we know he wasn't just doing something mundane like that?”

Our cars were near several cruisers and a crime scene van, and the reporters had gone. I unlocked the station wagon door and got in. Marino stood with his hands in his pockets, a suspicious expression on his face because he knew me so well.

“You aren't posting him tonight, are you,” he said.

“No.” It wasn't necessary and I wouldn't put myself through it.

“And you don't want to go home. I can tell.”

“There are things to do,” I said. “The longer we wait, the more we might lose.”

“Which places do you want to try?” he asked, because he knew what it was like to have someone you worked with killed.

“Well, there's a number of places to eat right around here. Millie's, for example.”

“Nope. Too high-dollar. Same with Patrick Henry's and most of the joints in the Slip and Shockoe Bottom. Remember, Danny's not going to have a lot of money unless he's getting it from places we don't know about.”

“Let's assume he's getting nothing from anywhere,” I said. “Let's assume he wanted something that was a straight shot from my office, so he stayed on Broad Street.”

“Poe's, which isn't on Broad, but is very close to Libby Hill Park. And of course there's the Cafe,” he said.

“That's what I would say, too,” I agreed.

When we walked into Poe's, the manager was ringing up the check of the last customer for the night. We waited what seemed a long time, only to be told that dinner had been slow and no one resembling Danny had come in. Returning to our cars, we continued east on Broad to the Hill Cafe at 28th Street, and my pulse picked up when I realized the restaurant was but one street down from where my Mercedes had been found.

Known for its Bloody Marys and chili, the cafe was on the corner, and over the years had been a favorite hangout for cops. So I had been here many times, usually with Marino. It was a true neighborhood bar, and at this hour, tables were still full, smoke thick in the air, the television loudly playing old Howie Long clips on ESPN. Daigo was drying glasses behind the bar when she saw Marino and gave him a toothy grin.

“Now what you doing in here so late?” she said as if it had never happened before. “Where were you earlier when things were popping?”

“So tell me,” Marino said to her, “in the joint that makes the best steak sandwich in town, how's business been tonight?” He moved closer so others could not hear what he had to say.

Daigo was a wiry black woman, and she was eyeing me as if she had seen me somewhere before. “They were crawling in from everywhere earlier,” she said. “I thought I was going to drop. Can I get something for you and your friend, Captain?”

“Maybe,” he said. “You know the doc here, don't ya?”

She frowned and then recognition gleamed in her eyes. “I knew I seen you in here before. With him. You two married yet?” She laughed as if this were the funniest thing she had ever said.

“Listen, Daigo,” Marino went on, “we're wondering if a kid might have come in here today. White male, slender, long dark hair, real nice looking. Would have been wearing a leather jacket, jeans, a sweater, tennis shoes, and a bright red knee brace. About twenty-five years old and driving a new black Mercedes-Benz with a lot of antennas on it.”

Her eyes narrowed and her face got grim as Marino continued to talk, the dish towel limp in her hand. I suspected the police had asked her questions in the past about other
unpleasant matters, and I could tell by the set of her mouth that she had no use for lazy, bad people who felt nothing when they ruined decent lives.

“Oh, I know exactly who you mean,” she said.

Her words had the effect of a fired gun. She had our complete attention, both of us startled.

“He came in, I guess it was around five, 'cause it was still early,” she said. “You know, there were some in here drinking beer just like always. But not too many in for dinner yet. He sat right over there.”

She pointed at an empty table beneath a hanging spider plant all the way in back, where there was a painting of a rooster on the white brick wall. As I stared at the table where Danny had eaten last while in this city because of me, I saw him in my mind. He was alive and helpful with his clean features and shiny long hair, then bloody and muddy on a dark hillside strewn with garbage. My chest hurt, and for a moment, I had to look away. I had to do something else with my eyes.

When I was more composed, I turned to Daigo and said, “He worked for me at the medical examiner's office. His name was Danny Webster.”

She looked at me a long time, my meaning very clear. “Uh-oh,” she said in a low voice. “That's him. Oh sweet Jesus, I can't believe it. It's been all over the news, people in here talking about it all night 'cause it's just down the street.”

“Yes,” I said.

She looked at Marino as if pleading with him. “He was just a boy. Come in here not minding no one, and all he did was eat his sailor sandwich and then someone kills him! I tell you”—she angrily wiped down the counter—“there's too much meanness. Too damn much! I'm sick of it. You understand me? People just kill like it's nothing.”