White Tombs (3 page)

Gabriela Pérez came up to him as he headed for the front door and gave him a picture of her father. Standing this close to her, Santana realized how petite she was. Even in this time of grief she exuded a sexual quality that clung to her like a tight-fitting dress.

The recent photograph of Julio Pérez looked posed and professionally done. He wore a red tie, blue shirt, and black pinstriped suit. He appeared fit and was smiling broadly.

“I’ll return the photo to you,” Santana said.

Her dark eyes held his for a time. Then her gaze shifted to the long, jagged scar on the back of his right hand and then to the picture of her father. “Make sure that you do.”

She turned and walked back into the living room, her slim hips swaying like a rope in a gentle breeze.

T
he scene outside the house reminded Santana of Lautréamont’s description of surrealism as the chance meeting on a dissecting table of a sewing machine and an umbrella. TV vans from the local NBC, CBS, and ABC news outlets were parked at the curb along with the mobile crime lab van, medical examiner’s van and six white St. Paul squad cars with gold shields on the front doors. Flood lights illuminated reporters who waved microphones in front of anyone who wanted to speak and those who didn’t. Yellow crime scene tape had been strung from oak to oak, cordoning off the house and yard. Neighbors had gathered behind the tape in the cold night air. A uniformed officer stood in the driveway recording the names of anyone who entered the house.

In his teens Santana had been fascinated by the paintings of Salvador Dali and the writings of André Breton. Now, he often filtered the dark and violent world of homicide through a surrealistic lens of both intention and chance. It was a world in which the real and the imaginary became one. A world in which bodies that could not speak were spoken for. Bodies beaten with bats and bricks and tire irons until their skulls looked more like smashed pumpkins than human heads; bodies and parts of bodies carved and sliced and sawed; bodies shot and suffocated and dragged bloated and blue from the Mississippi; bodies in bags and on gurneys and on cold slabs in the morgue with tags attached to their toes.

Only one would forever haunt him.

He gave a quick shake of his head to chase away that memory and focused on the current case. The most important hours in murder investigations were the first forty-eight hours after the discovery of the body. The longer the investigation went on, the less chance he had of finding the murderer.

Santana stood on the front walk and felt the cold, still air against his skin. The sudden absence of wind left him feeling as if the earth, like Julio Pérez, had quit breathing.

Rick Anderson walked across the brown grass toward Santana. “I gotta start hittin’ the gym again,” he said, rubbing his ample belly.

An unmarked car pulled up in front of the house and parked next to the ME’s van. The driver’s side door swung open and James Kehoe, special investigator from the mayor’s office, stepped out. He appeared disoriented for a moment until he spotted Santana and Anderson and headed toward them.

Santana said, “What the hell is Asshoe doing here?”

He used the nickname given to Kehoe by certain detectives within the department.

Anderson leaned closer to Santana and said quietly, “Take it easy, John.”

“Santana … Anderson,” Kehoe said, acknowledging each of them with a nod.

Tanning beds had leathered Kehoe’s once handsome face, and he wore his blond hair very short and an SPPD baseball cap to hide the fact that he was losing it.

“You got a homicide?” Kehoe said.

“Appears to be,” Santana said, unwilling to give him anything to work with.

“I understand the vic is Julio Pérez?”

Santana said nothing.

Kehoe waited a moment for a response and then looked at Anderson. “How’d he die?”

“Gunshot to the head.”

“Any idea who whacked him?”

“Nothing concrete.”

Kehoe pulled on the brim of his cap and glanced behind him. “You talk to the inkslingers?”

“Not yet,” Santana said. He could hear the reporters in the background yelling at them for a statement.

“What does the mayor’s office have to do with this?” Anderson asked.

Kehoe shot him a look. “Julio Pérez was known and respected by a lot of people in this city. Including the mayor. Santana should know that since he’s …”

“Hispanic?” Santana said.

“If the shoe fits. You a friend of Pérez’s?”

“We don’t all know each other.”

“Forget the sarcasm, Santana, and concentrate on results.”

“We will. Soon as you get out of the way and let us do our job.”

“Look,” Kehoe said, stepping close enough to Santana that he could smell the coffee on his breath. “If you want to play hardball, let’s take it downtown.”

“Come on, Jim,” Anderson said, raising his hands in a calming gesture. “Give it a rest.”

Kehoe’s jaw muscles clenched. His eyes flicked back and forth before settling on Anderson. “You got any wits?”

“We’re working on it.”

“So what’s the next step?”

“We start questioning the employees at
El Día
,” Santana said.

“All right. But keep me in the loop. The mayor wants to know exactly how this investigation is proceeding.”

“You’ll be the first to know.”

Kehoe stared at Santana for a long moment. Then he turned and headed for his car.

“Christ,” Anderson said. “What’s with him?”

“
Se cree la vaca que mas caga
. He thinks he’s the cow that shits the most.”

“Maybe. But you better not rub his nose in it, John. Especially if he’s in the mayor’s pocket.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Let’s talk with the reporters, and then we’ll go see Rafael Mendoza.”

“Who?”

“The last call Julio Pérez made on the phone in his study was to Rafael Mendoza.”

“But that’s not what you told Kehoe.”

“I lied.”

Santana could tell by Anderson’s wary expression that he felt uncomfortable with the lie.

“You know anything about Mendoza?” Santana said, quickly changing the subject.

“No. You?”

“I met him a couple of times when I was in uniform and worked off-duty security at parties for the mayor.”

“He a criminal attorney?”

“Immigration, mostly. Green Cards, visas.”

“Think he’s capable of murder?”

“I haven’t met many who aren’t.”

Chapter 2

S
ANTANA CHECKED HIS REARVIEW MIRROR
and saw Anderson cruising in the lane behind him as they drove over the Wabasha Bridge into downtown St. Paul. Mendoza lived in the Lowertown District, a block from the Farmer’s Market in the Riverview Lofts, an eight-story Romanesque building overlooking the Mississippi River. Lofts were the latest marketing tool designed to lure upscale singles and couples into the city. They were being built as fast as developers could acquire enough capital and historic, abandoned buildings could be gutted.

Ice crystals pinged off his car as Santana parked the Crown Vic in a NO PARKING zone along Kellogg Boulevard across the street from the lofts. Anderson parked behind him. He got out of his Crown Vic and into the passenger side of Santana’s car. Even in the dim light Santana could see his partner’s pockmarked complexion.

The digital clock on the dashboard changed to 7:15 as Santana listened to the bursts of chatter from the police radio. The Crown Vic’s heater was pushing out as much heat as a candle.

Cold weather had its advantages. Most gangbangers never ventured outside after dark when below zero wind chills could freeze bare flesh in minutes and hypothermia could mean a slow, silent death. Rape, robbery, burglary, arson, assault, theft and motor vehicle theft, seven of the eight crimes the SPPD classified as Part I crimes according to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting guidelines, all fell with frigid temperatures. Only homicide was unaffected.

“I’m freezing my ass off,” Anderson said.

Santana detected a hint of alcohol in the tiny clouds of carbon dioxide vapor forming as Anderson exhaled.

“Get yourself some breath mints,” he said.

Anderson looked quickly at Santana and then out the passenger side window.

Santana said, “Have you been going to your AA meetings?”

“Don’t worry. I’m fine.”

Santana hadn’t detected any alcohol on Anderson’s breath at Pérez’s house. He considered pressing Anderson but decided now wasn’t the time. Instead, he recounted his conversation with Sandra Pérez and her daughter, Gabriela.

“You think either of them are good for it?” Anderson said.

“Not the wife. We’ll have to check out the
Casa Blanca
restaurant. Make sure the daughter was there all afternoon.”

Anderson looked out the windshield at the city and the lights in the buildings that were burning like embers in the charcoal sky. “How long have we been together, John?”

“Nearly three years.”

“How many murder investigations?”

“I’m not keeping count.”

Anderson sat quietly, staring out the windshield.

“Something on your mind, partner?”

Anderson waited a couple of beats. Then he said, “Kehoe wasn’t a bad guy when I partnered with him in the Narcotic’s Division.”

“He ever work homicide?”

“No. But we were pretty close once. I remember he took the great divide pretty hard.”

“Maybe if he had spent more time pumping his wife rather than iron,” Santana said, “he would still be married to her.”

A large orange snowplow rumbled by with its plow up. The ground underneath the Crown Vic shook from the plow’s weight as the spinning rotor attached to the rear end spread a special mixture of salt and sand over the ice that coated the street. A sign across the back of the cab read: STAY BACK, STAY ALIVE.

Santana checked his watch. It was 7:29. He turned off the car, got out and headed toward the Riverview Lofts. The cold night air smelled of diesel from a Metro Transit bus stopped at a corner. A slippery film underneath his feet slowed him down, made him feel like a child just learning to walk. Behind him, he could hear Anderson cursing the treacherous footing.

Santana had nearly reached the main entrance when he felt a sudden rush of air a moment before the body falling out of the dark January sky crunched like a bag of ice against the pavement.

Instinctively, he looked up. Saw a figure move in the dim light on a balcony above him — then it was gone.

The broken body lay face up. The impact had fractured the femur bone in one leg. Pushed it through the skin like a spike through paper.

“It’s Rafael Mendoza,” Santana yelled to his partner. “Call for back up and then watch the main entrance.”

Santana ran into the building and up a set of stairs to the first floor where he waved his badge at a man in a security guard uniform.

“St. Paul P.D. What’s Rafael Mendoza’s number?”

The security guard pointed in the direction of the occupant names and numbers on the wall.

“Officers will be here soon,” Santana said. “Don’t let anyone leave.”

As he rode the elevator to the eighth floor, Santana pulled his .40 caliber Glock out of the holster attached to his belt. A sound like wind rushing through an open door filled his ears, and his mouth felt as dry as sand. He removed his wool overcoat and dropped it on the floor. Inhaled a deep breath and let it out slowly.

When the elevator door slid open, he flicked on the emergency stop switch and peered out. Quiet. At the far end, the cement hallway turned ninety degrees to the left. He estimated Mendoza’s loft would be halfway between the elevator and the angled turn.

He moved quickly across the hallway and flattened his back against the wall. Held the Glock at an upward angle and slid along the wall until he came to Mendoza’s door. It was ajar. He pushed the door fully open with the gun barrel. Stepped inside.

The loft had brick walls and a high timbered ceiling. Light from a table lamp pooled on the hardwood floor. Drapes concealing the balcony and iron railing fluttered like angel’s wings in the icy air blowing through an open sliding glass door.

Santana crossed the room in a crouch and went out the slider onto the balcony. He stood for a moment in the sleet that pinged off the railing and concrete. In the wind he heard the cry of distant sirens.

He went back inside and moved slowly down a narrow hallway until he came to a closed door on his left. He reached for the doorknob and then stopped, trusting his instincts. He waited.

Warm air poured through the heat vent on the floor. The sirens grew louder.

Then he heard someone running down the hallway outside the loft, the click of a crash bar.

He turned and sprinted out of the loft to the emergency exit door near the elevator and shoved it open. Fleeing footsteps reverberated off the concrete walls and metal handrails below him.

Santana raced down the stairs two at a time. When he reached the third level, he heard a heavy door slam shut beneath him.

“Rick!” he said, calling on his two-way. “I’m in pursuit of a possible suspect coming your way.”

Santana wasn’t certain what he would encounter when he pushed open the emergency exit door on the main floor, but he didn’t hesitate. Still, the scene surprised him.

A crowd had gathered around a temporary stage in the center of a large atrium where an Irish band was preparing to play. A red and white St. Paul Winter Carnival banner hung from steel beams in the ceiling. Beyond the stage a boutique and gift shop flanked a market. Couples sat at tables behind a wrought iron railing of the Italian restaurant to his right.

Santana held his gun inside his sport coat pocket as he worked his way through knots of people. Their attention was focused on the stage and the upcoming performance, and they paid little attention to him.

At the edge of the crowd, he spotted a man in a brown bomber jacket. Their eyes met and the man suddenly turned and hurried away.

A moment later Anderson emerged from the throng and lumbered after him.

“POLICE!” he called.

The man froze for an instant. Then broke into a run.