Макс Коллинз - No One Will Hear You

She came right over. When only the yellow-and-black barrier separated them, she smiled and said, “Mr. Anderson, good evening.”

“Am I glad to see you , ma’am.”

The “ma’am” seemed to amuse her. “All you had to do, son, was tell the officer who you were, show some ID, and step on over. We have clearance for your entire Killer TV team.”

“No kidding?”

He glanced behind him, hoping that darn TV crew was catching this, but they had moved on.

Chris ducked under the tape, asking Amari, “What’s this about a body dumped at UBC?”

“Don Juan. He left a victim here. Follow me.”

He did, saying, “We just got a tape from that creep. That’s why Mr. Harrow called us in, but nobody said anything about this.”

“Don’t you have cell phones in Georgia?”

“It’s Mississippi, and of course we have cell phones.”

“Well, where’s yours? I know your boss tried to call you with the update.”

“Uh, it’s back at the house.”

“You see, you need to take these newfangled gadgets along with you, Mr. Anderson.”

“You having a little fun with me, Lieutenant?”

“Just a little. It’s a night that could stand some levity.”

She led him over to the front of the building, where walls of canvas, held in place by steel poles, gave the police and coroner’s people a place to work in privacy.

“Can’t let you in there,” Amari said. “I know you’re an expert, but you’re not LAPD, and that’s an active crime scene.”

“Understood.”

But he could see inside, the work lights giving plenty of illumination to the corpse as various techs moved around in there.

He’d been to his share of crime scenes and seen hundreds of photos of others, but the tableau on the sidewalk outside his workplace made his gut tighten.

Not that it was gory — barely any blood. The shapely naked blonde on the sidewalk looked impossibly white against concrete gray and the red of the bouquet of roses arranged beside her. Her face was turned away, but Chris just knew she’d be pretty, like the last victim.

Don Juan had made sure he could no longer be ignored, leaving this one on their doorstep and alerting the media.

Amari asked, “You okay, son?”

“Yeah. It’s just so sad. Feel kind of... embarrassed for her.”

“She’s past that. Past any suffering, too, remember. Nothing left to do for her but solve this.”

“I hear that, Lieutenant.”

He followed Amari inside, the quiet of the lobby a welcome sanctuary from the bustling surrealistic scene behind the tinted glass.

At the elevator, Amari said, “Rest of your team is already here, except for you and Jenny.”

Chris stopped cold. Jenny might need help getting through that zoo out there.

“Can I use your cell, Lieutenant?”

“Sure...”

Soon Jenny was in his ear, saying, “Lieutenant Amari, I just got here...”

“It’s not the lieutenant,” he said. “I’m using her cell. Left mine at home.” “Ah.”

This single word meant she had tried to call him perhaps a dozen times.

“Just got here myself,” he said.

“You made good time,” she said, but not on the phone. Right behind him.

He whirled and there she was, laptop in a bag slung over her shoulder.

In short order, they were upstairs, joining the rest of the team at the conference room table.

Jenny was in her usual jeans and T-shirt, everybody else casually attired, dragged away from their Sunday evening. Only the normally extra-casual Choi seemed overdressed, in a black sport coat and dress shirt, new-looking jeans, and Italian loafers (no socks).

Choi noticed Chris staring, and said with a glower, “Don Juan ruined a perfectly good date. This time it’s personal.”

Chris took the chair next to Jenny while Amari took a waiting seat next to Harrow at the head of the table. Choi, Pall, and Chase were opposite Jenny and Chris. Carmen had taken a seat at the far end, off by herself.

When Harrow explained that the Don Juan video had come in over Carmen’s e-mail, Chris understood why the young woman looked so shell-shocked and pale.

As Harrow was addressing the group, network president Dennis Byrnes — in a dark brown suit, looking sharp as to attire but otherwise ragged — slipped in a door toward the back and, leaving a seat between them, deposited himself near Carmen.

Harrow said, “Thanks for joining us, Dennis.”

The executive nodded, but said nothing.

“I’ll get the lights,” Harrow said.

He did.

Carmen averted her eyes as Harrow showed the video of the second Don Juan murder, uncomfortably large on the wall screen behind him and Amari.

The rest watched with cold, clinical eyes, and if any emotions showed among these seasoned investigators, shock or horror weren’t among them — only controlled anger and resolute purpose.

Lights up again, Harrow said, “Lieutenant Amari understands that this crime has come to our doorstep. Literally and figuratively. She is willing to work with us.”

Quiet expressions of thanks all around the table were accepted by Amari with a single nod.

Chase said, “So we get to work?”

“We get to work,” Harrow said. “Billy, go down to security. You’ll find Detective Polk waiting there for you. Get all the security footage. No way this maniac got this close carting a dead body and those roses without getting snagged on video.”

Choi nodded and went.

Harrow said, “Michael, you’re our profiler. What’s your read?”

“He’s going to kill again,” Pall said with a matter-of-fact shrug.

“Anything else?”

“Yeah. It’ll be soon.”

Chase said, “Then we need to find something fast. This guy has us chasing shadows and smoke. Maybe at least this grandstand stunt will give us some real clues to work with.”

Harrow asked, “What about Wendi Erskine’s finances?”

Jenny said, “Money’s gone. Not in the Caymans anymore either. And the trail is cold.”

“Do we have anything ?”

Nobody offered a response.

“Do we think there’s a connection between Don Juan and Billy Shears?”

Chase shook her head, but nobody else responded.

Then Pall said, “I grant you there are similarities — the sexual aspect, chiefly. But remember Don Juan was self-named and the cops came up with Billy Shears. Two serial killers of this stripe turning up simultaneously strains credulity, I admit, but the signatures are decidedly, distinctly different.”

“First thing tomorrow,” Amari said, “we’ll be looking into the second Shears victim, the off-duty Santa Monica officer, Danny Terrant.”

Chase said, “You’ll have to talk to his cop buddies. That’ll be touchy. They may have payback on the brain.”

“We could interview them,” Carmen said, way down the table. “Might take the edge off any cop-to-cop strain.”

“No, Detective Polk and I will handle that,” Amari said. “You’d just be media to them.”

Carmen raised her eyebrows and nodded.

Byrnes was just sitting there, taking it all in.

Harrow said, “I understand Vicker’s family and friends insist he was straight.”

“Supposedly a regular... Casanova,” Chase said.

Chris wondered if she’d almost said Don Juan .

Harrow asked, “Do we know Officer Terrant’s sexual proclivities?”

“Haven’t got that far,” Amari admitted.

“Okay,” Harrow said, took in air, let it out. “Let’s look hard at Officer Terrant... You don’t mind, Lieutenant Amari?”

Amari answered by asking a question — of Chris. “Do you guys have a mass spectrometer?”

“Yeah, we got a mass spec,” Chris said. “Mr. Harrow got us all kinds of toys last year, and it wasn’t even Christmas. Whatever lab equipment you need, we should have.”