Shadows May Fall (5 page)

Lou snickered. “Well he’s about to freak out a lot more when we tell him this place is closed for business for a while. Are there guests upstairs?”

“No ma’am. No one has been upstairs since last week.” Russell checked his notes. “Most of the bungalows are empty. Only the two at the far end had guests, and they both checked in Friday night and checked out this morning. The manager said he’d get their contact info but honestly, I think he’s full of shit. He doesn’t want anyone to know what’s going on out here.”

“Well that’s just too bad, isn’t it?” With that, Lou headed out to the patio to join Dillon and their pain in the ass manager.

The corporate surfer, Tim Blain, stammered with exasperation. Sweat stains had formed through his linen suit that must have set him back a week’s pay. His severely parted bleach-blond hair glared in the light due to his liberal use of hair gel and his palms were stained orange from excessive use of self tanner. It always struck Lou funny that Southern California people felt the need to use fake tanner when all they had to do was spend ten minutes a day in the sun. Not that the threat of skin cancer wasn’t real, but there were acceptable limits even healthy limits. Doctor Oz even recommended ten minutes a day for the vitamin D. This guy, well, he could have at least washed his hands better after application.

“Mr. Blain...” Dillon tried to cut the man off, but he was not hearing him. “Mr. Blain!”

“Hey!” Lou shouted at the ranting man, causing him to stop in his tracks and stare at her as if she had just tossed her drink in his face. “Do you understand that if you do not become real cooperative in the next five seconds, we will haul you off to jail for obstruction? Us screwing up this stupid ass party of yours is gonna seem real petty after the meth-head in holding with you asks you to go steady?”

It took a second or two for Lou’s words to sink in but once they had, Tim Blain blew out a breath and just sat down, right there on the ground. “I am so screwed.” He dragged his fingers through his hair, destroying the perfectly shellacked style. He continued tugging at his hair as he spoke, causing it to stick out in glued clumps. “The guy was a regular. He came in once a month for a little Do-Not-Disturb time. You could set your watch by him. He’d check in on Friday morning, check out Monday morning. No housekeeping, no visitors unless he called ahead. He pre-arranged all of his room service, down to the minute he wanted his breakfast delivered. He had standing spa treatments on Saturday and Sunday. That’s where he spent the days before vanishing back to the bungalow for the night. I expect he had a friend stay over but that was none of my business. Everyone here is always generously compensated for their discretion.”

“Boy-friend or girl-friend?” Lou asked him pointedly.

“I don’t know for sure!” He sighed. “One of the maids said they saw a real pricey looking lady head in about a month ago but I don’t know. Its L.A.! It could have been a guy dressed as a girl! And even if it was a girl that night, it could have been a guy the next night, or the next stay here. I just don’t know.”

“All right. Now, I thought all the bungalows were rented for this movie thing?” Lou remembered what Russell had told her.

“They were!” Tim exclaimed. “They are! I mean yes. But Mr. Griffen is always gone before check out. He never comes to the desk, ever! He just has us charge one of the credit cards he has on file. He’s been a regular since the place opened!”

“What sort of security surveillance do you have here?” Dillon asked.

“Nothing on this end of the bungalows! That’s why he wanted this one, not even the top floor! Personally I think that one has the best view but no! It always had to be this one!” Tim resumed yanking on his hair. “The parking lots are covered for the most part because we’ve had some break-ins in the past but that was just minor kid’s stuff. Still, they put in the cameras and we have a patrol that roams the facility on golf carts twenty-four seven.”

“We need all your surveillance for the past week and we need to talk to any guests or staff that were around this place this weekend.” Dillon offered a hand to the man to help him up. “And we need you to do that now.”

“What am I supposed to do about the arriving party?” Tim Blain was on the verge of tears. “This is my first big gig alone, without supervision. If I screw this up I can kiss this job goodbye.”

“Mr. Blain, the best way to save your job right now is to cooperate with us as expediently as possible so we can wrap this up and get out of here.” Dillon placed a hand on his shoulder. “Find another section of the facility to put your arriving guests in, even if it means taking a hit on the expense. Delegate the party to your most reliable staff and that’s all you can do. Now let’s get moving.”

Lou rolled her eyes as Dillon led the man out and they headed for the main office. After putting her booties back on, she stepped back in to the bungalow. Now that things were quieter, Lou took out her camera and began snapping pictures while taking in the scene. Russell instinctively backed off to give her plenty of space.

Aside from the carnage, the bungalow was pristine. Nothing looked out of place in the living area at all. There were no papers, no dishes, the pillows on the sofa were perfectly placed as if the room had just been staged. As Lou worked back to the kitchen, she noticed an empty bottle of wine next to the sink and two spotless wine glasses set to the side. The granite countertops were spit-shined without even a watermark. Now that was odd. Where was the cast off? There was no blood at all on any of the counter tops, and there should have been a lot of it. Someone had cleaned up and done a damn good job too. By the smell of him, Gerald Griffen had been dead for around two days. Lou made a bet with herself that the medical examiner would say he died between midnight Friday and four Saturday morning. Given Caroline was tied up on the gang shootings, she wondered who would be assigned to this case.

“Hey Russell.” Lou called out as she made her way to the bedroom. “You know when the crime lab people will be here?”

“Any minute.” He called back. “I just got a text from one of the deputies up at the parking lot that they’re unloading gear and on their way.”

“Excellent. Do we have deputies on the other side of the bungalows?” Lou wondered if Mr. Blain had made them hide in the bushes.

“Yes ma’am. We’ve got four more guys set up around the bungalows. Much to Timmy’s chagrin.” Russell referred to Mr. Blain as Timmy, that made her laugh.

“Thanks Russell.” In the bedroom, the theme continued. The room was immaculate. The victim’s suitcase was packed and neatly arranged on the end of the bed. It looked like no one had even breathed in the room since maid service. The tops of the dresser and bedside tables looked freshly polished, not one glint of a fingerprint. Upon entering the bathroom, Lou smelled a strong antiseptic odor, more than just bleach. She leaned down and sniffed the sink and the residual fumes from whatever chemical was used to clean the place made her eyes water. Someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to clean up. Forensics was going to have one heck of a time. They would take pictures of the scene but Lou liked her own, and from different perspectives for her own analysis. When she made her way back into the kitchen Lou squatted as close to the body as she could without hitting the blood pool. From about the victim’s Adam’s apple, everything was nearly flattened. Shattered bone, mats of hair and clumps of flesh melded into a pile of what once was Gerald Griffen’s head. It had taken a lot of strength, or a lot of time and training to beat a person’s skull to a pulp, literally. Someone hated this man with a passion. That was an up-side. Someone who hated him that much would be easy enough to track down. There would be a reason, a history and some sort of preceding act that lead to this crime of passion. Yeah, having your brains bashed in had to be a crime of passion to Lou. You had to have a lot of emotions and energy to put this much effort into killing someone. Especially when a shot to the brain would have had the same result with far less fuss. Yes, someone hated Gerald Griffen a whole bunch.

The Crime Lab arrived just as Lou finished taking the last of her pictures. She requested full work ups of the whole place, including the patios. Lou would have liked to have gone through the victim’s suitcase herself, but with how thorough the place had been scrubbed, she didn’t want to risk losing one single epithelial. Provided there there was one to be found at all. She moved out of the way and stood next to Deputy Russell so the techs could get down to business.

“What do you make of this, Russell?” Lou asked.

“Me?” He seemed surprised.

“Yeah. What do you see?” This was one reason Lou was so well liked. She would include the other officers, ask opinions, took their assessments under advisement. She knew they all had good instincts, and she encouraged that. Many other detectives treated them like grunts and gofers but Lou saw them as support staff. They were valuable assets and an extra set of eyes that saw from a different perspective. That’s how she was treated on her first dead body call. Lou remembered that feeling to this day.

Lou was charged with the same duty Russell was now, securing the body and standing guard. She remembered one particular detective that night was the reason she focused in on Homicide like a dog with a bone. The detective had asked her opinion on the two bodies she and her partner had found after a neighbor reported a strange odor coming from the house. Lou had been staring at the scene for hours before detectives got there so she had plenty of time to theorize. Two dead men in a garage that had all the bells and whistles of a do it yourself mechanic, immaculately organized. The garage door was open just a little when they arrived. Her partner was sure the perpetrator had gotten away, so he called for back-up and had her stay put. It had appeared that one of the men had been stabbed through the abdomen with a crowbar but there was little blood on the other man. His hands were bloody and a portion of his shirt, but there was no blood pooling, no visible injury she could see that would give cause of death. She kept looking, just looking. After the detectives had come and done their thing, one stood beside her and lit a cigarette. He looked from her vantage point, not saying anything to her for a long time until he finally asked what she though. Lou was hesitant at first, just as Russell was now, but she was far more curious if her theory was right than nervous about being wrong. As they watched the coroner do their thing, Lou told him she didn’t think there was a third person. She believed it was an altercation between the two deceased. The man at the far side of the garage had impaled the other man with the crowbar. The man killed by the crowbar had grabbed for the nearest thing to defend himself. While standing there, Lou had noticed the garage was outfitted with a slick air tool and compressor system. The hose was strung along the ceiling with coiled ends dangling over the work spaces for easy access. The hose on the far side of the garage was dangling about seven feet in the air and about three feet to the left of their impaled victim. Attached was an air gun, with an air needle affixed to it. It was the only hose fitted with any sort of tool. Lou theorized to the detective that victim number one impaled victim number two, and victim number two grabbed the first thing he could, the air tool that was dangling next to him. He stabbed the needle into victim number one’s side and let the compressor rip, injecting him with air. This would cause him to back up a good distance before dropping, as well as the lack of blood. After Lou gave him her theory, the detective smiled, patted her on the back and told her to look him up when she made detective. Turned out that detective would be her captain when she hit Homicide. “Come on Russell, I know you have ideas running through that dense head of yours.”

“Well, the absence of blood and tissue in the cast off trail, on all the counters, someone cleaned up. The wine glasses too.” He noticed her nod in agreement so he continued. “The thing that gets me is the fridge.”

“How so?” Lou liked that he was on the same page as her.

“She could have cranked up the air but she chose to open the fridge. Cool air sinks, it’s a smart idea but she could have super cooled the place by cranking the air.”

“Good call, Russell.” The same thing had crossed her mind. “If you want to keep a body on ice, you use all the ice you’ve got. You said
She
?”

“Well I don’t know.” Russell shrugged.

“No, that was a gut statement. Why do you think our murderer is female?” Lou had other reasons to think the same, but she was curious as to his.

“The two glasses.” Russell shrugged again. “Guys I know don’t drink wine together, that’s a thing we do to impress the ladies. A good bottle of wine? That’s romance.”

“Cops tend to be a beer group, don’t they?” Lou snickered.

“Not just cops, most guys just kickin’ around grab a cold one from the fridge.” Russell seemed hesitant to continue. “I mean think about it, we’re like ‘
Want a cold one, bro?
’ not
‘Hey man, lets crack a Cabernet and watch the game.'
ya know?”

Lou laughed. “You’re stereotyping, you know?”

“Maybe, but you get what I mean, right?” Russell hoped she did.

“I do. I was thinking along those lines too.” Lou saw more than that though. It was the patience that went into cleaning the place. The specific areas that were cleaned. “But you think a woman could bash his skull in like that? That’s a lot of upper body strength.”

“Now who’s stereotyping?” Russell gave her a sideways grin. “Whoever did this really hated this guy. She could have stopped, had a glass of wine and came back to it. This could have taken hours. She didn’t necessarily do it all at once.”

“Now that’s a smart observation.” Lou was relieved someone thought the same as she. “Why assume she started bashing and didn’t stop until he was goo?”

“That’s just gross, Detective.” Russell’s face puckered.

“Gross, but accurate.” Lou moved in closer to the body, careful not to get too close or in the way of the forensics guy working around it. Russell had validated her theory that someone really really hated this guy and took great pleasure and time in caving in his cranium.