The Phantom Photographer: Murder in Marin Mystery - Book 3 (Murder in Marin Mysteries) (31 page)

“Hello,” he said with a smile. “Remember me?”

“You’re that nice detective with the sheriff’s department that was here last week, when Michael, that poor boy, was killed. Eddie Austin, right?”

“Guilty,” Eddie said with a warm smile. “I don’t mean to trouble you, but I need to enter Michael’s unit. Would you have a key handy?”

“Of course, let me get it. Do you need me to come along?”

“No need to disturb you; I’m just taking some measurements out on the porch so we can make sure our records are straight.”

“Well, let me go get that key. You know, I’ve had trouble sleeping these last five nights. The night it happened, I don’t think I slept a wink. What an awful, awful thing. Do you know when the crime scene tape will be removed and I can have people come in there and clean? I don’t know if or when I’ll re-rent the unit. I’d just like to know it was cleaned out. I don’t know what I should do with his things.”

Eddie smiled benignly, hoping she would soon stop and get him the key to Michael’s unit. He knew in such situations it was wiser for him to smile and nod than to engage in conversation. Finally, she sighed, smiled, and said, “Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

Eddie had no intention of taking any measurements, and knowing that the placement of Michael’s porch left her no angle to see what he was doing anyway, he came in and went straight to the spot he had just learned about. There was a small oriental throw rug thrown over the floor of the closet. On top of it were several pairs of shoes that Eddie took care to pull out and place behind him. He then lifted the carpet and turned on a small powerful flashlight. It was then he could make out the outline of where the floorboards had been neatly sliced and then sanded and polished back over. It was a well-done bit of work, and Eddie believed that Michael must have taken care in the hope that it would have gone unnoticed.
 

Eddie removed a Swiss Army knife he always carried with him and slid its longest blade into the tight space between the floor and the cut panel. Just a couple of pulls and it lifted out. It was a solid SentrySafe waterproof fire chest, approximately the size of a large shoebox, with a quality barrel key locking mechanism. Clearly, a much improved and more secure strong box than the one Joanne Hill opened a quarter century earlier.

It was tempting to look for the key, which might have been easy or difficult to find, but Eddie knew the smart move was to take it up to the county crime lab and have the box swept for prints and the contents checked over in a clean secure environment.
 

Minutes later, with the floorboards back in place and the small carpet and shoes back where he found them, and the apartment key back in the hands of Mrs. Fitzsimmons, Eddie carried the safe up to the county crime lab, reaching there shortly before five. The lab techs had finished for the day, so he made certain the box was secured, and told one of the remaining support staff that he’d be back in the morning to check on the contents of the box.
 

As he headed back out of the building, planning to drive south to Sausalito, he ran into Sheriff Jack Canning.
 

“Where are you headed?” Canning asked.
 

“Home, it’s been a long day. Why?”
 

“Well I’ve got some bad news; you’re going to have to work overtime tonight. Got a homicide up in Novato.”

“Yeah, who?”

“Some guy named Cook. Killed at his store up in Novato. Probably a robbery.”

“Not Milton Cook?”

Canning looked down at the text message on his phone. Yeah, Milton. You know the guy?”

“Apparently not well enough?”
 

Eddie raced to his car put the lights on that sat atop the center of the dashboard, turned on the siren, and began pushing his way up through rush hour traffic along the 101 corridor. Unmarked cars with one light and a siren never get the attention of clearly marked emergency vehicles.

The longer than expected drive up to the San Marin exit gave Eddie ample time to chastise himself. Fuck, I should have gone up there earlier today, he said to himself repeatedly, beating the steering wheel with his closed fist. Shit, shit, shit! How stupid am I?

When he arrived at Cook’s Cameras, the store’s small showroom area looked undisturbed. The only sign of trouble was the half dozen police cars and emergency vehicles scattered around the small strip shopping center.
 

Eddie, feeling the weight of the world on his shoulders, walked inside and was surprised to see Max Brownstein leaning over the body, which was partially hidden behind one of three large camera display cases.
 

“Max, you’re making a habit of showing up at murder scenes these days. This is twice in less than a week.”

The ME looked up and smiled at Eddie. “Why should you guys have all the fun? I need to get out of the office now and then; too many dead people hanging around there, all demanding my attention.”

“Well, I’m not having much fun right now.”

“What’s wrong, long day?”

“No, I’m pissed at myself because I wanted to come by earlier today and interview our victim here.”

“Well, apparently, this is your busy season.”

“Two murders in less than seven days in Marin is about as crazy as it gets. More troubling than that, Max, is the victim here was Michael Marks’ first employer.”

“So, you think there’s a possible connection?”

“Helluva coincidence if there isn’t.”

“True. And here’s something to add to that suspicion. The victim’s wallet was found in his back pocket, apparently undisturbed, and as best as we can tell, everything from the cameras to the cash register was also left untouched.”

“I’m guessing the call came in when a customer walked in and discovered the body.”

“Correct!. One of Cook’s longtime customers, in fact. Poor guy freaked out when he found the body. His heart was still racing when the EMTs arrived. Come back here and let me show you something.”

Eddie stepped behind the display counter, where Milton’s body lay face down in a pool of dark blood.
 

“I suspect the killer came in posing as a customer, probably carrying a shopping bag or something to conceal what was likely a 9mm handgun with a suppressor attached.”

“Someone at the nail salon next door would have heard that gun go off if it didn’t have a silencer on it.”

“Second correct answer,” Max said, as he patted Eddie on the back. “Mr. Cook was shot in the back; the bullet exited and went into the wall here.” Max pointed to the spot on the wall where the unmistakable mark of the bullet’s entry was made.
 

“The victim crumpled and landed here,” Eddie said. “Then, from what I can see, the shooter, wanting to make sure he finished the job, fired a second bullet into the base of the victim’s skull.”

“And with that third correct answer, you win a ten-dollar Starbucks gift card.” With that, Max took out his wallet and handed Eddie a ten-dollar bill. “I’m completely out of those little gift cards. Take cash; they also accept that.”

“Keep your money, Max; I’m going to be busy here for a while.”
 

Back home in Sausalito shortly before eight, Eddie called Rob.

“You finish dinner yet?”

“Yeah, kids are in their PJs and Karin is reading to them.”

“Good, tell them Daddy has to go for a ride with their Uncle Eddie.”

“Something tells me this isn’t good.”

“I’ll be outside your place in twenty minutes.”

“What’s up?” Rob asked, as he slid in and closed the door to Eddie’s white, unmarked sheriff’s car.
 

“Well, I’m glad you’re sitting down. You’re not going to believe this one.”

“What the fuck happened, Eddie?”

“Remember Michael’s first employer, the guy that I was hoping you or one of your other partners in print would run into at the funeral service?”

“Sure, Milton Cook.”

“Well, Mr. Cook is no longer with us.”

“He split town?”

“No, he was shot and killed at his camera store this afternoon.”

“Fuuuck!”

“That was my first thought when I heard.”

“You went to the scene?”

“Yup, got a tour from the ME himself.”

“So, who wanted him dead and why?”

“That’s the topic of this little meeting we’re having, and before you give this anymore thought, let me add a couple of things you don’t know. It was a clean kill. No weird coincidence here. No robbery. One bullet to the back and then one more placed into the base of the victim’s skull. Chinese execution style; just like putting down an animal.”
 

“So, like Michael’s killing, probably a professional killer.”

“Possibly a professional; certainly someone who knows how to use the right weapon for the right job.”
 

“Wow.”

“But why Milton Cook? You’re pissed off about making monthly payments to Marks, so you figure it’s cheaper to contract a hit on him, and if so, how does Cook fit into that scenario? I had not gotten around to interviewing him, but I did a background search. He comes up squeaky clean. You should see his customer reviews on Yelp; they’re love letters.”

“But you think there’s a connection?”

“How could there not be? The odds of this not being connected are astronomical, especially when you throw in the fact that from what we know nothing in the store was taken; even his wallet was sitting, apparently untouched, in his back pocket.”

“So what could possibly be the connection?”

“Well, if you can’t tell me, then get the hell out of my car, ya bum.”

“Very funny, Eddie. If I come up with anything I’ll holler.”

“Yeah, you do that. I’m going to Fresno Friday morning. Paying a visit to Michael’s father and brother. I want to interview them before they show up dead as well. When I went back to check on Michael’s rental unit in Mill Valley, I saw his landlady Mrs. Fitzsimmons. I don’t know if you were ever at his place.”

“No, Eddie, Michael and I were friendly, not familiar.”

“That’s a good line. Turns out, Michael kept a strongbox under the floorboards of his bedroom closet.”

“What’s in it?”

“It’s getting opened tomorrow morning at the county’s crime lab. First thing we have to do is be sure it’s not booby-trapped. We don’t want any surprises.”
 

“Particularly not those kind of surprises…”

“Speaking of surprises, maybe Cook introduced Marks to the business of blackmailing people with pictures you’ve taken of them.”

“Anything is possible, Rob. If that was the case, Cook might have been Michael’s linchpin.”

“What the hell is that?”
 

“That’s a human form of the pin ring in a grenade. Call it insurance. The guy shaking you down warns that if anything happens to him, you’ll go down as well, because his buddy is going to release everything he has on you…yada yada.”

“But Cook couldn’t be that because there should have been one big data dump within hours, or certainly a day or two after Michael’s murder.”

“True, Rob, but Cook could have been shaking down our killer, particularly if he knew who hired the gun to kill Marks. Bottom line, right now I’ve got too many questions and too few clues.”