Victims (2 page)

Fresh pizza!

Lotta taste!

Ooh la la!

Yum yum!

Bon appétit!

The box was pristine, not a speck of grease or finger-smudge. I bent down to sniff, picked up no pizza aroma. But the decomp had filled my nose; it would be a while before I’d be smelling anything but death.

If this was another type of crime scene, some detective might be making ghoulish jokes about free lunch.

The detective in charge of this scene was a lieutenant who’d seen hundreds of murders, maybe thousands, yet chose to stay outside for a while.

I let loose more mental pictures. Some fiend in a geeky delivery hat ringing the doorbell then managing to talk himself inside.

Watching as the prey went for her purse? Waiting for precisely the right moment before coming up behind her and clamping both his hands on the sides of her head.

Quick blitz of rotation. The spinal cord would separate and that would be it.

Doing it correctly required strength and confidence.

That and the lack of obvious transfer evidence—not even a shoe impression—screamed experience. If there’d been a similar murder in L.A., I hadn’t heard about it.

Despite all that meticulousness, the hair around the woman’s temples might be a good place to look for transfer DNA. Psychopaths don’t sweat much, but you never know.

I examined the room again.

Speaking of purses, hers was nowhere in sight.

Robbery as an afterthought? More likely souvenir-taking was part of the plan.

Edging away from the body, I wondered if the woman’s last thoughts had been of crusty dough, mozzarella, a comfy barefoot dinner.

The doorbell ring the last music she’d ever hear.

I stayed in the apartment awhile longer, straining for insight.

The terrible competence of the neck-twist made me wonder about someone with martial arts training.

The embroidered towel bothered me.

Vita
. Life.

Had he brought that one but taken the rest from her linen closet?

Yum. Bon appétit. To life
.

The decomp reek intensified and my eyes watered and blurred and the necklace of guts morphed into a snake.

Drab constrictor, fat and languid after a big meal.

I could stand around and pretend that this was anything comprehensible, or hurry outside and try to suppress the tide of nausea rising in my own guts.

Not a tough choice.

CHAPTER
2

M
ilo hadn’t moved from his position on the landing. His eyes were back on Planet Earth, watching the street below. Five uniforms were moving from door to door. From the quick pace of the canvass, plenty of no-one-home.

The street was in a working-class neighborhood in the southeastern corner of West L.A. Division. Three blocks east would’ve made it someone else’s problem. Mixed zoning allowed single-family dwellings and duplexes like the one where the woman had been degraded.

Psychopaths are stodgy creatures of routine and I wondered if the killer’s comfort zone was so narrow that he lived within the sawhorses.

I caught my breath and worked at settling my stomach while Milo pretended not to notice.

“Yeah, I know,” he finally said. He was apologizing for the second time when a coroner’s van drove up and a dark-haired woman in comfortable clothes got out and hurried up the stairs. “Morning, Milo.”

“Morning, Gloria. All yours.”

“Oh, boy,” she said. “We talking freaky-bad?”

“I could say I’ve seen worse, kid, but I’d be lying.”

“Coming from you that gives me the creeps, Milo.”

“Because I’m old?”

“Tsk.” She patted his shoulder. “Because you’re the voice of experience.”

“Some experiences I can do without.”

People can get used to just about anything. But if your psyche’s in good repair, the fix is often temporary.

Soon after receiving my doctorate, I worked as a psychologist on a pediatric cancer ward. It took a month to stop dreaming about sick kids but I was eventually able to do my job with apparent professionalism. Then I left to go into private practice and found myself, years later, on that same ward. Seeing the children with new eyes mocked all the adaptation I thought I’d accomplished and made me want to cry. I went home and dreamed for a long time.

Homicide detectives get “used” to a regular diet of soul-obliteration. Typically bright and sensitive, they soldier on, but the essence of the job lurks beneath the surface like a land mine. Some D’s transfer out. Others stay and find hobbies. Religion works for some, sin for others. Some, like Milo, turn griping into an art form and never pretend it’s just another job.

The woman on the towels was different for him and for me. A permanent image bank had lodged in my brain and I knew the same went for him.

Neither of us talked as Gloria worked inside.

Finally, I said, “You marked the pizza box. It bothers you.”

“Everything about this bothers me.”

“No brand name on the box. Any indies around here deliver?”

He drew out his cell phone, clicked, and produced a page. Phone numbers he’d already downloaded filled the screen and when he scrolled, the listings kept coming.

“Twenty-eight indies in a ten-mile radius and I also checked Domino’s
and Papa John’s and Two Guys. No one dispatched anyone to this address last night and nobody uses that particular box.”

“If she didn’t actually call out, why would she let him in?”

“Good question.”

“Who discovered her?”

“Landlord, responding to a complaint she made a few days ago. Hissing toilet, they had an appointment. When she didn’t answer, he got annoyed, started to leave. Then he thought better of it because she liked things fixed, used his key.”

“Where is he now?”

He pointed across the street. “Recuperating with some firewater down in that little Tudor-ish place.”

I found the house. Greenest lawn on the block, beds of flowers. Topiary bushes.

“Anything about him bother you?”

“Not so far. Why?”

“His landscaping says he’s a perfectionist.”

“That’s a negative?”

“This case, maybe.”

“Well,” he said, “so far he’s just the landlord. Want to know about her?”

“Sure.”

“Her name’s Vita Berlin, she’s fifty-six, single, lives on some kind of disability.”

“Vita,” I said. “The towel was hers.”

“
The
towel? This bastard used every damn towel she had in her linen closet.”

“
Vita
means ‘life’ in Latin and Italian. I thought it might be a sick joke.”

“Cute. Anyway, I’m waiting for Mr. Belleveaux—the landlord—to calm down so I can question him and find out more about her. What I’ve learned from prelim snooping in her bedroom and bathroom is if she’s got kids she doesn’t keep their pictures around and if she had a
computer, it was ripped off. Same for a cell phone. My guess is she had neither, the place has a static feel to it. Like she moved in years ago, didn’t add any newfangled stuff.”

“I didn’t see her purse.”

“On her nightstand.”

“You taped off the bedroom, didn’t want me in there?”

“I sure do, but that’ll wait until the techies are through. Can’t afford to jeopardize any aspect of this.”

“The front room was okay?”

“I knew you’d be careful.”

His logic seemed strained. Insufficient sleep and a bad surprise can do that.

I said, “Any indication she was heading to the bedroom before he jumped her?”

“No, it’s pristine. Why?”

I gave him the delivery tip scenario.

“Going for her purse,” he said. “Well, I don’t know how you’d prove that, Alex. Main thing is he confined himself to the front, didn’t move her into the bedroom for anything sexual.”

I said, “Those towels make me think of a stage. Or a picture frame.”

“Meaning?”

“Showing off his work.”

“Okay … what else to tell you … her wardrobe’s mostly sweats and sneakers, lots of books in her bedroom. Romances and the kinds of mysteries where people talk like Noël Coward twits and the cops are bumbling cretins.”

I wondered out loud about a killer with martial arts skills and when he didn’t respond, went on to describe the kill-scene still bouncing around my brain.

He said, “Sure, why not.”

Agreeable but distracted. Neither of us focusing on the big question.

Why would anyone do something like this to another human being?

Gloria exited the apartment, looking older and paler.

Milo said, “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said. “No, I’m lying, that was horrible.” Her forehead was moist. She dabbed it with a tissue. “My God, it’s grotesque.”

“Any off-the-cuff impressions?”

“Nothing you probably haven’t figured out yourself. Broken neck’s my bet for COD, the cutting looks postmortem. The incisions look clean so maybe some training in meat-cutting or a paramedical field but I wouldn’t put much stock in that, all kinds of folk can learn to slice. That pizza box mean something to you?”

“Don’t know,” said Milo. “No one admits delivering here.”

“A scam to get himself in?” she said. “Why would she open the door for a fake pizza guy?”

“Good question, Gloria.”

She shook her head. “I called for transport. Want me to ask for a priority autopsy?”

“Thanks.”

“You might actually get it because Dr. J seems to like you. Also with something this weird, she’s bound to be curious.”

A year ago, Milo had solved the murder of a coroner’s investigator. Since then Dr. Clarice Jernigan, a senior pathologist, had reciprocated with personalized attention when Milo asked for it.

He said, “Must be my charm and good looks.”

Gloria grinned and patted his shoulder again. “Anything else, guys? I’m on half-shift due to budgetary constraints, figure to finish my paperwork by one then go cleanse my head with a couple of martinis. Give or take.”

Milo said, “Make it a double for me.”

I said, “Was significant blood pooled inside the body cavity?”

Her look said I was being a spoilsport. “A lot of it was coagulated but yes, that’s where most of it was. You figured that because the scene was so clean?”

I nodded. “It was either that or he found out a way to take it with him.”

Milo said, “Buckets of blood, lovely.” To Gloria: “One more question: You recall anything remotely like this in your case files?”

“Nope,” she said. “But we just cover the county and they say it’s a globalized world, right? You could be looking at a traveler.”

Milo glared and trudged down the stairs.

Gloria said, “Whoa, someone’s in a mood.”

I said, “It’s likely to stay that way for a while.”

CHAPTER
3

S
tanleigh Belleveaux’s house was as meticulous inside as out.

Cozy, plush-carpeted place set up with doily-protected too-small furniture. The dollhouse feel was heightened by a brass étagère filled with bisque figurines. Another case bore photos of two handsome young men in uniform and an American flag paperweight.

“My wife’s thing,” said Belleveaux, wringing his hands. “The dolls, they’re from Germany. She’s in Memphis, visiting my mother-in-law.”

He was black, fiftyish, thickset, dressed in a navy polo shirt, pressed khakis, and tan loafers. A fleece of white blanketed his scalp and the bottom half of his face. His nose had been broken a few times. His knuckles were scarred.

“Her mom,” said Milo.

“Pardon?”

“You called her your mother-in-law rather than her mom.”

“Because that’s how I think of her. Mother-in-law. Worst person I
know. Like the Ernie K-Doe song, but you probably don’t remember that.”

Milo hummed a few bars.

Belleveaux smiled weakly. Turned grim and wrung his hands some more. “I still can’t believe what happened to Ms. Berlin. Still can’t believe I had to
see
it.” He closed his eyes, opened them. No booze on the table before him, just a can of Diet Coke.

Milo said, “Change your mind about the Dewar’s, huh?”

“It’s tempting,” said Belleveaux. “But a little early in the day, what if I get a call and have to drive?”

“Call from who?”

“A tenant. That’s my life, sir.”

“How many tenants do you have?”

“The Feldmans down below Ms. Berlin, the Soos and the Kims and the Parks and the other Parks in a triplex I own over near Korea Town. Then I’ve got a real problem rental down in Willowbrook, inherited from my dad, a nice family, the Rodriguezes, are there now but it’s been tough because of the gangster situation.” He rubbed his eyes. “This is my best neighborhood, I chose to live here, last place I thought I’d have … a problem. Still can’t believe what I saw, it’s like a movie, a bad one, a real horror movie. I want to switch to another channel but what I saw won’t budge out of here.” Placing a thumb-tip on his forehead.

“It’ll fade,” said Milo. “Takes time.”

“Guess you’d know about that,” said Belleveaux. “How much time?”

“Hard to say.”

“It’s probably easier for you, this being your job. My job, the worst thing I see is a bat in a garage, sewage leak, mice eating wires.” Frowning. “Gangsters in the Willowbrook place, but I keep my distance. This was way up close,
too
close.”

“How long have you owned the property across the street?”

“Seven years eight months.”

“That’s pretty precise, Mr. Belleveaux.”

“I’m a detail-man, Lieutenant. Learned precision in the army, they taught me mechanics, a little mechanical engineering, I didn’t need a college degree to accumulate adequate knowledge. Later when I was out and repairing washing machines and dryers for Sears, what the army inculcated in me came in handy: Only one way to do a job: right. Machine needs three screws, you don’t put in two.”

I said, “The same goes for boxing.”

“Pardon?”

“Your hands. I used to do karate, you pick up the signs someone else is into martial arts.”

“Martial arts?” said Belleveaux. “Nah, none of that for me, I just did a little sparring in the army, then a little more when I got out, light welterweight, used to be skinny. Busted my septum three times and my wife, she was my girlfriend back then, said Stan, you keep scarring yourself to the point where you’re ugly, I’m going to go find myself a pretty boy. She was kidding. Maybe. I wanted out anyway, what kind of life is that, getting knocked around, feeling dizzy for days? The money was terrible.”