Alien Blues (11 page)

“My place, yeah.” Winston looked past David's shoulder.

“Did she get her ice cream?”

Winston's smile came, and died. “No. She didn't feel much like eating anything. She slept mostly. Looked out the window.”

David wondered if the cat had kept her company. Silence settled over all of them. A bee buzzed by David's ear, liked what he saw, and flew back, circling. David swiped at it.

“Is there anything else? I have some things I need to do.”

“Sure,” said Mel. “That's all for now. We'll be in touch.”

Winston had been moving away, but he stopped and looked at them. “In touch?”

“You want to know, don't you, when we catch this guy?” Mel said.

“Oh. Yeah. I sure do.”

David watched him walk away.

“Something not right there,” Mel said. “How come he didn't ask why we weren't out looking for Machete Man instead of bothering him? They all say that. It's getting to bother me when they don't.”

“He doesn't think we'll catch Machete Man.”

“Nervous too. Nervous as hell.”

“He's afraid.”

“Of what?”

“I got the feeling he was expecting trouble. He lets a squeaky window go for years, then he's suddenly over there installing locks.”

Mel scratched his chin. “You think he read about Machete Man and got worried?”

“He's scared
now
, Mel. It's not like it's over for him.”

“You trying to tell me he had something to do with it? Remember, she saw the guy.”

“People who own cats don't chop up their grandmothers.”

“Oh yeah, that's right. I remember reading that in the academy handbook.”

“He did put the lock on the door.”

“Could be to show what a concerned grandson he is. Maybe it was a copycat thing. He inherit?”

“We'll check.”

“You know, David, it took her a while to tell us about seeing the guy. Her first instinct was not to say anything. Suppose she thought it was Winston. I mean, consider her description—dirty, animal smell, red eyes.”

“I believe the smell, but the eyes are weird.”

“The demon killer.”

“Why give us a description at all?”

“Denial. It couldn't be
my
grandson. She convinced herself she saw something else.”

They passed Millicent Darnell's coffin. It was decked with flowers and David sniffed, but could not catch a fragrance. He stopped in front of Earl Darnell's tombstone.

Mel looked at the inscription. “What is that, Hebrew?”

“Looks like.”

“Can you read it? You must be reading something, you sure got a funny look on your face.”

“It says … no, that can't be right. I'm not very good at this.”

“What?”

“I think it says ‘the Sox stink.'”

Mel laughed. “Jewish, huh? How come he's not buried over on Wharton?”

“Millicent Darnell wasn't Jewish. He was waiting for her.”

“Earl and Millie.”

David shrugged. “You can't help liking a guy who got up every morning and fixed his wife biscuits. And left in-jokes on his tombstone.”

“You get up and fix Rose biscuits?”

“Rose doesn't like biscuits.”

They opened the car doors and waited for the interior to cool.

“Tell you what, David. If you get whacked, I'll be sure and tell Rose you want a Hebrew joke on your tombstone.”

“Thanks, Mel.”

Mel stretched. “How'd you know which guy was Winston?”

“I'm a detective.”

A light flashed on the control board. Mel slid into the front seat. David turned to scan the crowd. People were leaving. Winston was gone.

“David?”

He turned quickly. He knew that tone of voice. “What is it, Mel?”

“They found Dyer. Part of him, anyway.”

SIXTEEN

“This case is getting very weird,” Mel said.

David was quiet. He pictured Dyer giving candy to his girls, keeping food for the kids he ran across in vice. Mel looked at him, and David cleared his throat, hoping his voice sounded normal.

“They always do.”

“What?”

“Our cases. They always get weird.”

String was in the hallway outside the morgue, tottering on his fringe. Mel groaned. The Elaki was suddenly still.

“Please to say hello,” String said. “I must apologize for the abrupt taking of leave on our last occasion.”

“What brings you here?” Mel asked.

“I was informed by my superior. I am here to assist.”

Mel smiled. “You ever been in a morgue, String?”

“No.”

“Go ahead. Right through that door.”

There were four bodies on tables—all of them covered with sheets. A man and a woman, both wearing blue smocks, sat at a lab table, eating lunch and playing cards.

“Spid!” The man grinned. “Got you.”

The woman handed him a carrot stick. She took a sandwich from a brown bag and took a bite. “If you'd bring your own lunch, Bradston, you wouldn't have to work so hard to win mine.”

Bradston crunched the carrot. “This way at least
one
of us loses weight. Want to go again?”

“What are you after this time?”

“I got my eye on that pickle.”

The woman looked up. “Hi, David.” She spotted the Elaki and stiffened. “Good afternoon, sir. May I help you?”

“I am to accompany these gentlemen.”

“Say
hello
, Miriam,” Mel said.

“
Hello
, Mel.”

“You never did come back for your bathrobe.”

“It wasn't mine, you shit.” She stood up, still holding her sandwich. “Have this chair,” she told String.

“They don't sit,” Mel said.

“What?”

“Elaki don't sit, Miriam.”

She blushed and motioned for them to follow her toward an examination table. “You guys here to see Dyer?”

“What there is of him,” Bradston said. He reached toward Miriam's sack.

“Keep your hands off that pickle,” she said.

“Eyes in back of her head.”

Mel looked at Bradston. “What you playing?”

“Spid,” Bradston said. “You never played?”

“Never heard of it.”

“Elaki version of poker,” Miriam said. “Probably over your head.” She took a bite of sandwich and stopped beside a table. “Here he is.”

The sheet was wet. David lifted the corner and pulled it back. Dyer's head and one of his legs had been fished out of Deer Lake, twenty miles northwest of Possum Head Lane.

Dyer's hair, still wet, was matted with dark mud and blood. His eyes were open, sleepy-looking, the face a pinched-looking bluish white. The head was severed just below the chin. The right leg, cut about six inches above the knee, was stretched on the table, also wet.

A sandal was strapped to the foot. Dyer's big toe was smashed and was swollen and blue. David looked at Miriam and pointed to the toe.

“Before death?”

She nodded. “Somebody stomped on it, somebody wearing boots of some kind. Leather heels. Probably couldn't resist that open shoe.” She switched her sandwich to her left hand and pried Dyer's mouth open with her right. “See here?”

David walked around the edge of the table. Miriam peered into Dyer's mouth.

“Look at the tongue. Bitten, hard. The front tooth there is broken.” She peeled back the lip. “And the tissue severely abraded.”

The teeth had dark stains on the back.

“Blood?” David asked.

“Tobacco. But here.” She pointed to a molar. “In the crown.
That'll
be blood.”

“He was beaten then.”

“Badly,” Miriam said. “Bit his tongue almost clean through when the pain got bad.”

String began to sway back and forth and David realized that the Elaki was losing his pinkness. The droop in String's left eye prong gave him a lop-eared look. There were two bald patches in his scales and the edges of his side flaps were slightly irregular—a far cry from the symmetrical elegance of Puzzle.

“Death bothers you?” David asked gently.

“It is not that. The corpse is, after all, not Elaki.”

David frowned.

“It is … may I be honest? It is the smell of the corpse, and so many humans in a small room. And mixed with this chemical odor.”

“Wait outside, then. I'll brief you later.”

“No. Please. It must be more difficult for you—you knew the human. I will do what must for the job be handled. Could the window be raised?”

Bradston looked up. “Hell, no. We'd get a yellow code in our printout. Opening a window constitutes a security violation.”

“I am not sure I follow.”

“He means no,” Mel said.

David looked back at Dyer. “Was he dead before they cut him up?”

Miriam stopped in front of the terminal next to the exam table. “Case number—” She looked at the ID stamp on Dyer's foot. “Two six three A four. Crime scene.”

The computer beeped and flashed a drawing. David saw an empty chair in a ramshackle kitchen. Bloodstains fanned the wall behind the chair. He recognized the kitchen in the abandoned house on Possum Head Lane.

Miriam pointed to the arc of blood behind the chair. “Look at that. Now look at him.” She took another bite of sandwich, smearing egg salad on the corner of her mouth. “I haven't programmed the data in, this is all prelim guessing. But I'll bet we'll find the guy was sat in this chair and beaten. He was tied up most likely—the wounds are close, he wasn't able to move much to protect himself. Then, somebody took his head off. Very little blood on the floor. You can see where it slid down the walls and went … nowhere. So there was plastic down, or something. Under the chair. They knew they were going to kill him. Whoever it was had a long blade, razor-sharp. Not your average pocketknife, folks.”

“Machete?” Mel asked.

She nodded. “Easily. This may be our boy again. You okay, Silver?”

“Sure. When was the leg taken off?”

Miriam set her sandwich down on the terminal. “Dyer worked vice, didn't he? You know him?”

“Not well.”

She peeled back the sliced edge of the pant leg, and David made himself look at the bone and muscle of the leg.

“He was cut up
afterward
, Silver. They tied him to the chair and beat the crap out of him. Then one of them chopped Dyer's head off, and it was over. They cut him up and dumped him in the lake.” She lifted the cuff of the pant leg, her elbow resting on Dyer's big toe. “Look at the indentations on the shin here.”

He folded his arms. “Tell me.”

“Trunk latch, I'll bet you money.”

“She'll bet you pickles,” Bradston said.

“So cheer up, guys. He was stuffed in a trunk, which means there may be a car in the lake. Get me the car, and we'll find a million ways to nail your perp.”

David touched Dyer's left ear. It was lacerated from the center to the edge of the lobe. Someone had ripped the unicorn earring out. Souvenir?

David looked up. “You said they, Miriam.”

“Please?”

“You said they. More than one killer?”

“Oh. Yes, I think so. Unless the guy who worked him over had a powerhouse left
and
a powerhouse right. Most have one or the other. But I'm not sure.”

Mel headed for the door. “Okay, David, let's split up. You go after vice. I want a talk with that Elaki shit in the museum.” He crooked a finger at String. “Whyn't you come with me? We'll go and talk to your boss.”

“You must promise no disrespect to this personage. Please, he is most eminent.”

“You mean 'cause I called him a shit? Oh, String,
String
. No disrespect intended. It wasn't an insult or anything.”

“No?”

“No, not in the idiomatic sense. Come on, I'll explain it on the way.”

Bradston waved a pickle at them. “Don't be strangers.”

SEVENTEEN

It was cool in the stairwell, and dark after the harsh afternoon sun. David hooked his ID to his belt. It had been a while since he'd been downtown to Avery Street and police headquarters. Two years, exactly, since Homicide Task Force had moved to Mitchell Avenue. David's footsteps echoed on the concrete stairs, and he stepped on a wad of dirty pink bubble gum. The gum was old and dried and did not string from his shoe, for which he was grateful. Stale cigarette smoke hung in the air, mingling with the familiar, musty odor he always associated with headquarters.

David went through orange double doors, down a hall, and through another set of doors that led to vice. There were eight desks, all but three empty. A man and a woman stared blearily at computer terminals, and another man talked on the phone. None of them looked up when David walked in.

At the back of the room was a glassed-in office. The name on the door was Lieutenant Coltrane. David knocked. The guy on the phone looked up.

“I help you?”

The man was fat and tired-looking. His black hair was combed back with something sticky, but his eyes were alert and friendly. The nameplate on his desk said Detective Harry Myer.

“I'm looking for Coltrane,” David said.

“He's off taking a leak. Should be back soon, if that's his only business.” Myer waved him to a chair. “Sit down, if you want. Coffee?”

“No thanks.”

The woman looked up from her terminal. “He's not supposed to be in here,” she said.

“Look at the ID,” Myer said. “Purple code from upstairs. He's okay to be here.”

“It gets us killed,” the woman said grimly. “Let these guys in here, and surprise, surprise, we get fingered on the streets.”

Myer shrugged and went back to the phone. “You still there, sir? Sorry to keep you waiting. Look, it's like I said. You want a hooker, you call your
local
precinct. What? I ain't interested in what you want to do with
peanut
butter. You got to talk to the service about that.” Myer looked at David and rolled his eyes. “No, I can't do referrals. I don't care what they do in Cleveland, buddy, here they got assigned areas. You got to go with the girls in your area. Or boys, yeah, whatever, I don't want to hear … they won't, huh? I don't think they
have
to do anything. Maybe if you was to bring your own? Tell me, since you brought it up, you use crunchy or smooth? I see. Maybe that's your problem. Ask 'em if they'll do crunchy.” Myer hung up and shook his head. “Asshole.” He looked over David's shoulder.