Mike Faricy - Russian Roulette

Once through the heavy metal door things became very industrial. The autopsy suite, in all its clinical chill, was straight ahead. Off to one side stood a large, low-dose radiation scanner. To my immediate left, Lieutenant Aaron LaZelle, was chatting with an attractive blond of about forty with her hands stuck in the pockets of her white lab coat.

“What’d I tell you, Doc? Doesn’t he look like he should be in your cooler?” Aaron said.

She chuckled but didn’t say no.

“Oh, I’m sorry, pretending to look like you’re working. You must be undercover.” I replied.

“Let’s get started.” Aaron gestured toward the massive walkin cooler, all stainless steel, not that the occupants cared.

“Oh, Doc, the world’s top crime investigator, Devlin Haskell of Haskell Investigations. Dev, Dr. Mallory Bendix, medical examiner extraordinaire and big fan of mine.”

“Dr. Bendix, nice to meet you,” I said then waited for her to say please call me Mallory or Mal or Doc or snookums. She didn’t.

I’m going to blame a walkin cooler full of bodies to her not being bowled over by me. There are some things even my charm can’t overcome. I thought it might be wise to hold off at least for the moment on the stiff jokes.

“You got that photo?” Aaron asked, following sexy little Dr. Mallory into the cooler. It was obvious the two of them had already gone through this drill. They walked directly to a stainless-steel drawer, number seventeen, labeled Doe, Jane. Aaron stood to the side as the good doctor pulled the drawer open, then unzipped the heavy, black body bag, gradually revealing a small dark-haired female.

“You gonna hang onto that photo all day?” Aaron asked, breaking me out of my trance. He grabbed the photo from my hand as he asked, “You okay, Dev?”

I nodded, took a deep swallow. The fans were running continually so that you had to raise your voice slightly to be heard over the noise. Even with the fans there was still that hint of decomposition in the air. The woman laid out in the drawer was the Asian beauty in the photo on the beach standing naked next to Nikki. Only now her lips were blue, the left side of her face was bruised purple, her nose had been broken. There were bruises up and down her arms, a large bruise on her rib cage. Her breasts, once the pride of the beach, looked like damaged fruit resting on her chest. The sunburst tattoo surrounded her navel.

“Well Doc, at least we got a photo of her in happier times. No name?” Aaron looked at me for a possible update.

I shook my head no.

“I’d like to make a copy of that photo if I may, and add it to our file,” Dr. Mallory said.

“Make two, one for you, one for Dev, here. I’ll keep this, it’s evidence,” Aaron said, then smiled as he handed her the photo once she pushed the drawer closed.

I could have protested, but it wouldn’t have gotten me anywhere. There’s nothing like looking at a dead body to take the wind out of your sails.

Just outside the door of the building Aaron paused next to his car resting in a no parking zone.

“Man, the old Doc there is a little cutey, isn’t she?”

“I don’t know, it must have been the setting. I didn’t pick up any vibes.”

“You just don’t know a good thing when you see it.”

“And you’re working Vice?”

“Oh Jesus, relax will you? Doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy a couple of the finer things in life. Anyway, I ran down that license number you gave me. You really struck pay dirt with this client of yours. You got a photo with a Jane Doe homicide who’s been cooling her heels in the meat locker here for six weeks. Two former lowlifes, one blown up and the other blown away. And it’s all tied together with a beautiful redhead who seemed to just vanish into thin air. Meanwhile her sister’s driving around town in a car leased to Lee-Dee Enterprises.”

“Lee-Dee, never heard of ‘em. What do they do?” I asked.

“Well, for starters they don’t do anything, anymore. Lee-Dee, Leo Tate, Lee and Dennis Dundee, Dee, ring any bells? Most likely bogus from the start, just a tax dodge so they could write off the wheels.”

“The two guys in the photo?”

“Yeah, the two dead guys in the photo, Lee-Dee. Now this gal, and by the looks of her I’d guess she didn’t exactly go peacefully.”

“You think that photo will help ID her?”

“Can’t hurt. What might help a lot more is if I talk to the sister, what’s her name, Kerri?”

I nodded.

“You gonna see her anytime soon?”

There was that little voice in my head again, saying tell him you dope, yeah, I have a lunch date with her in about forty-five minutes. You should come along .

Instead I said,

“I don’t know when I’ll see her next. How ‘bout when I do, I give her your number? She can give you a call.”

Aaron gave me a long look, then shook his head.

“You can do what you want, free country and all that. But you’ve seen some of the action you’re getting involved with stretched out in the cooler here this morning. That body bag didn’t get your attention, nothing I say will. Just know, if someone else gets hurt and I find out you’re holding back on me because you thought you could take care of it or some bullshit ‘my client’s rights’ brain-fart sort of thing, then you got me on your ass, big time.” Aaron gave me a slight nod then pulled his car door open and climbed in.

“I’ll keep it in mind, try and stay on your good side,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound too worried, depressed, anxious, cocky, or just plain stupid.

It was eleven-forty, I’d just sat down at a corner table in Bon Vie. I stared out the window at the traffic. Bon Vie is a nice place, small, maybe just eight or ten tables, fourteen-foot ceilings covered in stamped tin and painted flat black and gold. Marble topped tables, pastel walls dotted with original artwork, a trendy sort of place, no bar. I was twenty minutes early for my Kerri breakfast at noon. I ordered a mug of coffee, remembering I’d left my travel mug on a stainless-steel counter at the morgue. They could keep the damn thing, it wasn’t worth going back there just to get the mug. I could steal another one anytime I wanted.

I think I was on my third refill when Kerri waltzed through the door a good thirty minutes late. I’d been withering under the stares of the rather large hostess who must have concluded I was some sort of groveling, love-sick puppy about to get stood up.

Kerri’s appearance did nothing to help. She was eye stopping in some sort of white knit top, about four sizes too small, jeans that fit like a surgical glove, and hair damp with that fresh out-of-the-shower look.

“Oh Dev, I was out late last night,” she said bending her head down so I could kiss both her cheeks before she sat. Once seated she shook her hair back and forth a few times. I thought the two guys at the table next to us were going to have heart attacks. I didn’t mind them staring and ogling, but the least they could have done was pay for our breakfast.

“Meeting last night go into extra innings?” I asked.

“Meeting? Oh no, just running late ever since I got out of bed this morning.”

I was going to say something about the long drive home once she got out of bed but decided instead to be clever.

“Oh, found something of yours,” I said reaching into my pocket and pulling out the green thong, then cleverly handed it to her across the table. I heard a fork bounce off a plate, one of the guys next to us.

“That certainly is not mine?”

“Come on, it’s green,” I forced a laughed, my hand still extended across the table, the thong hanging out either side of my fist, face reddening by the second.