Jeff Mariotte: Blood Quantum

Second, it wasn't every day that he saw a word written in blood. The way he'd heard it, in what seemed like a dozen bad crime stories, it was the victim himself who wrote his killer's name in blood. But this victim was sprawled on the floor, and the word was five feet up on the wall. It didn't seem likely that the dead man had managed to stand up – especially once enough blood had flowed to give him something to write with – and if he had, why write that word? Was the killer named Quantum? Ray had encountered some strange names, but he'd never heard of anyone with that one.

So it was the word on the wall, rather than the body on the floor, that started his mind spinning first. The body was the important thing, and he knew he would have to turn his attention to it momentarily. The deceased was the reason they were there. A human being's life had been snuffed out, most likely at the hands of another, and they would have to search for the who, the why, the wherefore, to make sure the guilty were punished and the victims avenged to the extent the law demanded. In the most recent part of Ray's career arc, questions of life and death, crime and punishment, had been academic ones. No longer. Now they were specific and real, and the consequences were huge.

For the moment, though, he was most curious about who had written QUANTUM on the wall and even more curious about why. "Quantum," he repeated, aware that an uncomfortable length of time had passed since Nick had said it.

"Anybody have a guess what that's all about?" Nick asked.

"Not a clue," Jim Brass said. His voice was a low growl, like a bear just awakening from hibernation. "I was hoping maybe it was something you learned in CSI school."

Ray had to glance at the cop to ascertain that he was joking. Brass's sense of humor was as dry as a Nevada autumn, and Ray hadn't known him long enough always to be certain when it was being employed. Brass looked like a serious guy, sturdy enough to stand up to a hurricane, with a short, no-nonsense haircut and a face that could go from solemn to unexpectedly sunny in the space of a heartbeat.

"If it was, I was absent that day," Ray said.

"And I must have skipped school," Nick added.

Brass folded his arms over his chest and glared at the wall, as if warning it to give up its secrets or face his wrath. "Well, if you come up with anything, let me know, because I'm stumped."

"What do we know about the vic?" Nick asked, returning everybody's attention to the most important topic of the moment.

"His name's Robert Domingo," Brass said. "He owns this house. He also owns another one on the Grey Rock Paiute Reservation, where he's the tribal chairman."

"He's the chairman, and yet he lives off the reservation?" Ray asked. "Is that normal?"

"I don't know," Brass said. "I only know it's the case here, because when I found out who he was, I ran a background check. He's an important man in the Grey Rock tribe."

Nick nodded his head. He was wearing a dark blue ball cap with "Forensics" printed on the front in yellow letters. "No kidding… that's like being the president, right? Top of the heap."

Ray sniffed the air, trying to isolate the smells. Blood, death, and cigar. Cigar odor permeated the room – the draperies, the black rug covering part of the expensive tile floor, maybe even the paint on the walls. There had been one smoked recently – a butt rested in an ashtray on an end table – but Ray got the feeling Domingo was a man who liked a cigar or two a day, every day.

Finally, Ray let his gaze drift back to the body and linger there. Robert Domingo was facedown on the slate-gray tiles. He was wearing a black silk shirt, black pants, a sleek black leather belt, and black socks. A pair of black leather wingtips was parked beside the door, as if Domingo habitually removed them there when he came in. There was blood all around the body, and in the middle of that blood was a gold cigarette lighter with a chunky base, the kind that sits on a table instead of going into a pocket or a purse. The gold was flecked with blood.

The back of Domingo's skull was caved in, probably not coincidentally by an object the approximate size and shape of the gold lighter.

"Cause of death looks pretty straightforward," Nick said, crouching for a closer look at the wound.

Ray agreed. "That lighter."

"That's my guess."

"I gave you the victim's identity," Brass said. "And you're probably right, I think we'll find that the COD is blunt-force trauma caused by a blow to the head by that cigarette lighter. Didn't help him, anyway, that's for sure. But I know how you crime-lab types love a mystery… so I guess that's what the 'Quantum' is there for."

Ray adjusted his glasses and looked at the captain. "What, figuring out who hit Mr. Domingo with the lighter isn't mystery enough?"

"Just trying to make sure you're intellectually challenged, Professor."

"I appreciate the consideration, but don't put yourself out on my account."

Nick straightened up again. He was handsome, square-jawed, broad-shouldered. Looking at him now, Ray could still detect traces of the Texas high-school football star he had once been. "You know what?" Nick asked. "And before you say that I'm stereotyping, you're right, I am. But it just occurs to me that this is the home of a Native American tribal chairman, and you'd never know it from the dйcor."

He was right. The furniture was sleek and modern, the art on the walls contemporary and most of it as meaningless to Ray as motel art. A flat-screen TV almost as wide as a barn door dominated the room. The whole place could have been an upscale hotel or a model house, for that matter, for as much of Domingo's personality as it revealed. There didn't even seem to be a family photograph around that Ray could see.

Or maybe it did reveal something after all. Ray just wasn't sure precisely what that might be. That Robert Domingo was a colorless man, who lived a sterile existence? Maybe. Or that he was hiding out here, seeking an escape from the untamed hues of real life? At any rate, Domingo seemed fond of black and white; even the abstract paintings he had chosen were mostly black, white, and shades of gray. They looked to Ray as if an artist had dripped paint chosen from a very limited palette onto canvases and then left them out in the rain, but he wasn't there to pass judgment on the deceased's taste in art or his other decorative choices.

The stereotype would have been native blankets and baskets and pots scattered around, maybe a spear or a bow on a wall. Maybe even kachinas and carved coyotes, to take it to the absurd extreme. Ray wasn't surprised that some Native Americans would choose to pass over those traditional trappings, to adopt a different style. But he wondered how the people living on the Grey Rock Reservation felt about their chairman having a luxurious home off-reservation, a home that showed no traces of the chairman's heritage. If they even knew about it.

"What do you know about the Grey Rock Paiutes, Jim?" he asked.

"Not a hell of a lot," Brass admitted. "Their reservation is one of the closest to Las Vegas – I believe some of its holdings actually fall within city-limit lines, although, of course, those limits are carved out by the tribe's sovereign territory. Lots of poverty on the reservation, which is unfortunately not unique to this tribe. For decades, they had a gas-station and smoke shop on the interstate outside of town. In the past ten or fifteen years, though, they've expanded their commercial ventures to include a casino, a hotel and spa, a golf course, and I think more that I can't remember just now. So they're bringing in some cash, but apparently, it hasn't flowed out to all the members yet."

"How long has Mr. Domingo been chairman?"

"Quite a while, I think, but I'd have to check."