Jonathan Kellerman - The Murder Book

His jaw hurt and his back ached as he opened the book to Janie Ingalls's case file.

Very thin file. Milo's own notes on top, followed by the official death shots and yes, Schwinn had lifted the photo out of this set. Body drawings with every wound delineated, autopsy summary. Not originals, nice clean photocopies.

Then, nothing else. No tox screens or lab tests, no investigative reports by the Metro boys who'd supposedly taken over. So either that had been a lie, or pages had been left out.

He flipped to the postmortem summary. No mention of semen- of anything much. This had to be the sketchiest autopsy synopsis he'd ever read. "This white, adolescent, well-nourished female's wounds were accomplished by sharp, single-bladed…" Thanks a heap.

No sign of the toxicology screen he'd requested. He didn't need official confirmation; Melinda Waters had said Janie began the evening stoned.

No semen, no foreign blood types. Forget DNA.

But one detail in the autopsy summary did catch his eye: ligature marks around Janie's ankles, wrists, and throat.

Same pattern of restraints as in the hotel.

Vance Coury spotting Janie and going for an encore.

This time, adding his buddies to the mix.

He reread the file. Nothing revelatory, but someone wanted to make sure Milo saw it.

He settled his head with vodka and grapefruit juice, checked the mail, punched the phone machine.

One message from Rick, who'd made it easy for him by taking on an extra shift.

"I won't be through until tomorrow morning, probably crash in the doctor's room, maybe go for a drive afterward. Take care of yourself… I love you."

"Me too," Milo muttered to the empty house. Even alone, he had trouble saying it.

Iopened the door for Milo at 9 A.M., doing my best impression of awake and human. Last night, I'd woken up every couple of hours, thinking the kind of thoughts that erode your soul.

Three calls to Robin had gone unanswered. Her hotel refused to say if she'd checked out- guest security. Next stop, Denver. I pictured her on the bus, Spike sleeping in her lap, gazing out the window.

Thinking of me, or anything but?

Milo handed me the blue binder. I thumbed through it and led him into my office.

"Your typing wasn't any better back then," I said. "Any theories about who delivered it?"

"Someone with a talent for grand theft auto."

"Same messenger who sent me the deluxe version?"

"Could be."

"Doesn't sound like Schwinn's secret girlfriend," I said. "Or maybe I'm being sexist; I suppose women can steal cars, too."

"This was no amateur. I print-powdered the wheel and the door handles. Nada. Nothing on the book other than my paws. They put the crook-lock back on. Picked it, didn't slice it."

"Same question," I said. "A criminal pro, the department, or a rogue cop?"

"A rogue cop would mean Schwinn had a buddy back then or made a new one. I never saw him hang with anyone. The other detectives seemed to shun him."

"Any idea why?"

"At first, I figured it was his charming personality, but maybe everyone knew about his bad behavior, could see he was ready for a fall. Everyone except me. I was a dumb-ass rookie caught up in my own paranoia. At the time I wondered if I'd been paired with him because I was seen as a pariah, too. Now, I'm sure of it."

"Not that much of a pariah," I said. "They got rid of him and transferred you to West L.A. "

"Or I hadn't accrued enough time on the job to accumulate embarrassing information."

"Or to develop street sources. Like the one who cued Schwinn right to Janie."

He fingered the edge of the blue cloth binder. "Another burnout cop… maybe. But why send this to me a week after the deluxe version?"

"More covering of the rear," I said. "Pacing himself. He couldn't be sure you'd be seduced. You started investigating and qualified for the next installment."

"More installments coming?"

"Could be."

He got up, circled the room, returned to the desk but remained on his feet. I'd kept the drapes drawn and a razor edge of light ran across his torso diagonally, a luminous wound.

I said, "Here's yet another theory: The IA man who interrogated you along with Broussard- Poulsenn. Any idea what happened to him?"

" Lester Poulsenn," he said. "Been trying to recall his first name, and it just came to me. No, never heard of him again. Why?"

"Because the real target of renewing interest in the case could be Broussard. John G. built his career on an upright reputation, exposure of a cover-up would destroy him. Lester Poulsenn could have a good reason to resent Broussard. Think about it: A black man and a white man are partnered, but the black man is put in charge. Then the black man ascends to the top of the department ladder, and the white man's never heard from again. Was Poulsenn also drummed out due to bad behavior? Or maybe he wasn't good at keeping secrets. Either way, we could be talking about one disgruntled gentleman."

"And Poulsenn would've known about Schwinn's resentment… yeah, it'd be interesting to know what happened to his career. I can't exactly waltz into Parker Center and stick my nose in the files…" He frowned, called DMV and identified himself as someone named Lt. Horacio Batista. A few minutes later, he had statistics on three Lester Poulsenns living in California but all were too young to be the man who'd played second fiddle to John G. Broussard.

"He could've moved out of state," I said, "meaning he's probably not our man. Or he's yet another disappearing act."

He got to his feet again and paced; the light razor bounced. Returning to the book, he touched a blue cover. "Installments- hey, folks, join the murder book club."

We divided up the workload this way:

1. I'd try to learn what I could about Lester Poulsenn, check newspaper microfilms for twenty- to twenty-five-year-old stories about misbehaving cops and chase down whatever details I could find about the disposition of their cases. A long shot, because the department kept corruption stories quiet, just as it had with Pierce Schwinn. Unless, as in the Rampart scandal or the Hollywood Division burglary case of ten years ago, the stink got too strong to mask.

2. Milo would go off to do his thing, not telling me what or where or when.

The search on my computer revealed no Lester Poulsenns who fit the bill. I made another futile call to Vancouver, comforted myself with self-pity, and drove to the U.

It took three hours to go through five years of microfilm, and I came up with several instances of felonious police officers. A pair of West Valley detectives had offered their services as contract killers. Both were serving life sentences in protective isolation at the state penitentiary at Pelican Bay. A Glendale traffic officer had been arrested for having sex with a thirteen-year-old baby-sitter. Ten years of jail, this prince was out by now, but an alliance with Schwinn and a child molester seemed unlikely. A female Pasadena gang officer had slept with several minor-age gang members, and two Van Nuys uniforms had been caught burglarizing pawnshops on their patrol route. Convictions and incarceration for all. In each instance a hookup with Schwinn seemed improbable. I copied down all the names, anyway, punched Lester Poulsenn's name into the periodicals index and felt my pupils dilate as a single reference popped into view.

Twenty-year-old reference.

Poulsenn, L.L. Veteran LAPD detective found murdered in Watts.

The Sacramento Bee . I located the spool, jammed it into the machine, twirled like mad until I came to the story. Associated Press wire service piece. The L.A. papers hadn't picked it up.

The Bee had run it in a side column at the back of the main section titled "Elsewhere in the State." Sandwiched between the account of a dead black rhinoceros at the San Diego Zoo and a Berkeley bank robbery.