Back on Murder by Mark J. Bertrand Read Free Book Online Page B

the side of a red Jeep, stabbing at the lock with her keys. While I pause to watch, she gets down on one knee, eyeball to eyeball with the lock, slotting the key in with the care of a surgeon.
    Later tonight, sitting in my driveway with the ignition off, I’ll try to remember how I crossed the distance between us. Try to recreate the steps, and envision my hand seizing her bicep, jerking her up from the ground. I’ll try to recall the instant before I pushed her, wondering what I was thinking to put so much force behind it.
    And I’ll try to forget, too. The sound of her body thumping against the Jeep, her choked-off yelping. The sight of the tears.
    But now it all happens in a blur, and the next thing I know she’s screaming and flailing blindly with her bangled arms.
    “Are you crazy?” my voice is shouting. “I’m doing you a favor!” My hands shake her silly, leaving marks on the skin. “What’s wrong with you, getting behind the wheel in your condition?”
    She’s not listening. She can’t even hear me over her moaning. And then her face changes, her mouth forming an O, her veiny throat jutting like the neck of a teapot. I realize too late what’s coming, and step back just as the first ropey torrent pours out, splashing down my pants leg and all over my shoes. She twists free, staggering toward the bar’s door, her hand over her mouth. Another wave hits, bubbling through her clamped fingers. That image, caught in slow motion by the amber glare of a streetlight, sears me.
    What have I done?
    She disappears into the bar, and I head off shaking my damp leg. Disgusted with her and with myself. My car is parked on the other side of the lot. I get the door open just as the first patrons stream out of the Paragon, glancing left and right for the man who accosted the glitter-eyed girl.
    I don’t bother explaining. I couldn’t if I tried. I just leave, knowing one thing for certain.
    They won’t let her drive home like that.

CHAPTER 4
    About the paperwork. You spend the first hours and days waiting on reports – crime scene, autopsy, results of various tests both standard and specially requested – then suddenly, it all comes flooding in. And you go from not having enough information, building theories on hunches and the thinnest observations, to positively drowning in the stuff. Sifting the data for what’s important, that’s a skill not everyone possesses.
    Take Lorenz, for instance. He sits in his cubicle, scanning an index finger back and forth over the page. I’ve been watching him for a solid minute. Every couple of seconds he licks his fingertip, turns the page, then nods slowly, as if he’s assimilating an important bit of info. Problem is, assuming our boy Octavio died from the shotgun wounds to his gut, there’s nothing in the standard tox screen that warrants assimilation.
    “Something interesting?” I ask.
    The funny thing is, he looks up in surprise. Like he didn’t even realize I was watching. So the whole act was for no one’s benefit, unless it’s himself he’s trying to convince.
    I reach for the stack of paper at his elbow. “Mind if I – ”
    His forearm drops like a gate, blocking my reach. Nice. Lorenz had some muscle on him when he joined HPD, but somewhere along the line he reversed the balance between workouts and red-meat consumption. Now his blue blazer, which he keeps buttoned even when sitting, pulls at the belly and his shoulder pads ride up around his ears. On his lapel there are series of discolorations, spilled milk allowed to encrust, then brushed away without being cleaned. For a homicide detective, this verges on the slovenly.
    “I’m kind of busy here, March. If you want to make yourself useful, why don’t you start on those call-backs? A couple of tips came in over the weekend.”
    “I already looked. Nothing there. Can I just get the blood report? I want to see if there’s an id on the missing victim.”
    “If there even was one,” he says, not