Rick Mofina - Perfect Grave

Dimitri exchanged a look with Franz, nodding to the girl’s man, waiting in the lot behind the wheel of a Chrysler. The exhausted driver’s head was thrown back to the headrest. His eyes were closed. He was too tired or too stupid to realize he’d rolled up alongside a marked Seattle police car.

Obviously the girl and her man had been working it all night.

While the music assaulted the air, Franz had slipped into the patrol car and typed into the small computer keyboard to query the Chrysler’s tag. His eyebrows climbed a titch when it came back and he saw what they had.

“Oh, my.” He pivoted the terminal so his partner could see.

The two cops set their coffees down gently.

Murder suspect Roberto Martell felt the barrel of a police pistol against his head and opened his eyes to see a second pistol leveled at him. He was arrested without incident, except for the sound of a bottle of mouthwash hitting the pavement.

Roberto’s girlfriend had not expected her night to end like this.

Less than an hour later, Perelli folded his arms and looked hard at the man sitting across from him and Grace Garner at the table in the homicide squad’s interview room.

“Don’t lie to us, Roberto,” Grace said. “You were the last to see Sharla May alive.”

“No.” The chains around Roberto’s neck chinked as he shook his head. “Your information is incorrect. The last person to see her alive would be the person who killed her. I swear the truth to you on this.”

“What size shoes do you wear?” Perelli asked.

“What? What size? Why?”

“Give me your right shoe.”

Roberto looked at Perelli, then at Grace, who nodded.

“I do this, then you let me go?”

“Just give it to me.”

Roberto put his sneaker on the table.

“Size eight.” Perelli and Grace exchanged a look. No way could Roberto be the killer. Perelli passed it back. “Man, you’ve got very small, stinkin’ feet, Roberto.”

“People saw you arguing with Sharla May,” Grace said.

“Yes, sure, I’m going to tell you what happened.” Roberto slipped his foot back into his shoe. “She owed me two large for her habit.”

Grace made notes.

“I was getting angry with her. I’m not her banker, I’m her agent.”

“Her agent?”

“She had talent and I introduced her to talent scouts.”

“You were her pimp and you beat her,” Perelli said.

Roberto held up his hands and appeared offended.

“Okay”-Grace shook her head-“you’re her agent.”

“In a business sense. And she owed me and, yes, I make my point that she has to pay me.”

“You make your point?”

“She brought it on herself. But I can understand how people in the community might misinterpret things, give you incorrect information, make you think I killed her.”

“You don’t seem too choked up about losing her.”

“I’ve come to terms with my pain in my own way.”

Perelli had to restrain himself from drilling his fist into Roberto’s head.

“So who was her trick, uh, the last talent scout?” Grace asked.

“I set her up with some guy I met around the ID, at a bar. The Black Jet Bar.”

“When was that?”

“I don’t know, two, three months ago, like before you found her dead.”

“You have a name on this guy?”

Roberto shook his head.

“What did this guy look like?”

“White guy, forties.”

“Height? Facial hair?”

“About six feet. He was clean-shaven as I recall.”

“His build?”

“Good. Average, but muscular, like he worked out. He was an ex-con.”

Grace and Perelli maintained poker faces.

“How do you know he did time?”

“You’re forgetting that I was unjustly incarcerated due to the lies a slut told the prosecuting attorney.”

“Was her broken jaw also a lie?” Perelli said.

“You want to know about the last man to see Sharla, or do you want to call me a lawyer?”

“Go ahead.”

“I got that he’d been inside for a stretch from our little conversation. He was having a beer by himself, looked kind of depressed. I said he’d feel better if he met someone like Sharla May, someone with talent, and that I could set him up.”

“Where did this guy live?”

“I don’t know.”

“Where did he work?”

“I don’t know.”

“What was he in for?”

Roberto shrugged. “We didn’t become soul mates. I just pointed to Sharla May, who was picking songs on the jukebox, doing that little sexy dance she always did, and that sealed the deal. I could see him come alive, once he set eyes on her talent.”

“You’re a fine slab of humanity, Roberto,” Perelli said.

Roberto nodded. “I help girls in trouble.”

“Sure, you do,” Perelli said. “You’re just like the nuns at the shelter.”

Grace defused the tension with a question.

“Where did this guy do his time?”

“It was not a subject of conversation.”

“Did he have any tattoos?”

“Maybe, on his neck.”

“What was it, do you remember?”

“I don’t recall, just that maybe he had something on his neck.”

Grace threw an over-the-shoulder glance to the one-way glass and Stan Boulder, who was on the other side.

This may have brought them one step closer to the killer.

T he West Pacific Trust Bank on Yesler Way near 23rd Avenue was a small stand-alone branch, built in the 1980s.

It was a one-story structure with concrete columns and tempered-glass walls that captured Henry Wade’s reflection after he’d parked in the lot.

Leon Dean Sperbeck, using the alias Sid Foley, had cashed his welfare check here a few days ago.

Quite a trick for a dead man, Henry thought as he entered the bank. He removed his sunglasses and announced himself to the branch manager, Eloise Sherridan, who’d agreed to a meeting. On the phone with her earlier, Henry had guessed Eloise might be near his age, but in person she looked younger, quite striking in her business suit. Her hand was warm when she shook his.

Eloise closed the door to her neat office.

“So, Mr. Wade, how can I help you? You said you were investigating a security matter, concerning…” She began typing on her keyboard and studied her monitor over her half-frame glasses, “Mr. Sperbeck. The name and information you’d provided concerned a Mr. Leon Dean Sperbeck and a Sid Richard Foley?”

“My client is the insurance firm for a financial institution that suffered a substantial loss several years ago because of Mr. Sperbeck. He was convicted of that crime, which also involved”-Henry paused to clear his throat-“the shooting death of a customer.”

“I see.”

“It was many years ago, but since his recent release, it’s now believed Sperbeck may still profit from that crime. And in the course of my investigation, I’ve learned that he may have recently committed another crime, welfare fraud, cashing a check under the name of Sid Richard Foley.”

“I see. And you say he cashed that check at this branch.” Eloise stared at her monitor.

“Here’s his picture. I’d like to confirm by visual ID if he in fact was the person who cashed the check here.”

Henry showed Eloise the Department of Corrections photograph of Sperbeck, hoping the psychological effect of a prison photo would help him navigate through the bank’s privacy policies.

As Eloise looked at it, Henry nudged her by emphasizing the key facts.

“As I’d mentioned, he was recently released from prison, where he served time for his role in the murder of an innocent bank customer during an armed robbery.”

“And you’d like to confirm if he cashed the check for $346.23 three days ago?”