‘For godsakes,’ Faith said. ‘You know my mom, Collier. Our boss is her old partner. What do you think she’s gonna say when we have to ask her to catch us up to speed?’
Collier gave a weary sigh. He rubbed the back of his neck as he looked off into the distance. The sun picked out slivers of gray in his hair. There were deep lines at the corners of his eyes. He was probably in his mid-forties, which made him a few years older than Will, which for some reason made Will feel better.
‘All right.’ Collier finally relented, but not before doing the fingers-through-the-hair thing again. ‘Switchboard gets an anonymous tip there’s a dead body, this location. Twenty minutes later, a two-man uni rolls up. They sweep the building. Find the DB, male, upstairs inside one of the rooms. Stabbed in the neck. A real bloodbath. One of ’em recognizes Harding from choir practice—drunk, gambler, poon hound, typical old-school five-o. I’m sure your mom’s got some stories.’
Ng said, ‘We were working a domestic when we got the call. That was some violent shit. Chick’s gonna be in surgery for days. Full moon always brings out the crazy.’
Faith ignored his war story. ‘How’d Harding or whoever gain access into the building?’
‘Looks like bolt cutters.’ Collier shrugged. ‘The padlock was cut clean, which probably took some muscle, so we’re thinking a man did it.’
‘You find the bolt cutters?’
‘Nope.’
‘What’s the story on the car?’
‘It was throwing off heat like Chernobyl when we got here. We called in AFD to hose it down. They say an accelerant was used. Gas tank exploded.’
‘No one called in a vehicle fire?’
‘Yeah, it’s shocking,’ Ng said. ‘You wouldn’t think all the junkies and whores squatting in these warehouses would pull a Kitty Genovese.’
Faith said, ‘Look who knows his urban legends.’
Will scanned the abandoned warehouses—one on either side of Rippy’s club. A construction sign advertised mixed-use housing coming soon, but the faded condition indicated that soon hadn’t come soon enough. The buildings were four stories each, at least a block deep. Red brick from the turn of the century before last. Gothic arches with stained glass that had been broken out long ago.
He turned around. There was a matching office building across the street, at least ten stories tall, maybe more if it had a basement. Yellow signs posted over the chained doors indicated that the building was scheduled for demolition. The three structures were massive relics of Atlanta’s industrial past. If Rippy’s investors had gone all in now that the rape case had disappeared, the project could net them all millions, maybe billions, of dollars.
Faith asked, ‘Were you able to pull the VIN off the car?’
Collier supplied, ‘White, 2016 Kia Sorento, registered to one Vernon Dale Harding. AFD says it was probably burning for four or five hours.’
‘So, someone killed Harding and torched his car, then someone else, or maybe the same guy, called it into nine-one-one five hours later.’
Will stared at the nightclub. ‘Why here?’
Faith shook her head. ‘Why us?’
Ng didn’t understand that the question was rhetorical. He threw his hand out toward the building. ‘This was supposed to be some kind of nightclub. Dance floor below, VIP rooms circled around the top, like an atrium in a mall. I thought there might be a gang involved, slinging up a dope club like this in the middle of Shitown, so I called my girl, she did a record check, Rippy’s name came up and I was like, “Oh shit.” So I kicked it up to my boss. He gives your ballbreaker a courtesy call and she’s out here ten minutes later flossing her teeth with our short hairs.’
They all looked at Amanda. Charlie Reed was gone, and a tall, willowy redhead had taken his place. She was pinning up her hair as she talked to Amanda.
Ng gave a low whistle. ‘Damn, son. Lookit that fine Girl Scout. Wonder if the paint matches the trim?’
Collier grinned. ‘I’ll let you know in the morning.’
Faith glanced down at Will’s clenched fists. ‘That’s enough, guys.’
Collier kept grinning. ‘We’re just having fun, Officer.’ He winked at her. ‘But you should know I got kicked out of Girl Scouts for eating some Brownies.’
Ng guffawed, and Faith rolled her eyes as she walked away.
‘Red,’ Will told the detectives. ‘Everybody calls her Red. She’s a crime scene tech, but she gets in the way a lot, so keep an eye on her.’
Collier asked, ‘She seeing anybody?’
Will shrugged. ‘Does it matter?’
‘Not a bit.’ Collier spoke with the extreme certainty of a man who had never been rejected by a woman. He gave Will a cocky salute. ‘Thanks for the four-one-one, bro.’
Will forced his fists to unclench as he walked toward Amanda. Faith was heading into the building, probably to get out of the heat. The red-haired woman was signing herself into the crime scene at the front gate. She saw Will and smiled, and he smiled back, because her name wasn’t Red, it was Sara Linton, and she wasn’t a crime scene tech, she was the medical examiner, and it was none of Collier’s and Ng’s God damm business what matched where because three hours ago she had been underneath Will in bed whispering so many filthy things into his ear that he had momentarily lost the ability to swallow.
Amanda didn’t look up from her BlackBerry when Will approached. He stood in front of her, waiting, because that’s what she usually made him do. He was intimately familiar with the top of her head, the spiral at the crown that spun her salt-and-pepper hair into a helmet.
Finally she said, ‘You’re late, Agent Trent.’
‘Yes, ma’am. It won’t happen again.’
She narrowed her eyes, dubious of the apology. ‘That odor in the air is the smell of shit hitting the fan. I’ve already been on the phone with the mayor, the governor and two district attorneys who refuse to come out here because they don’t want the news cameras capturing them anywhere near another case involving Marcus Rippy.’ She looked down at her phone again. The BlackBerry was her mobile command post, sending and receiving updates from her vast network of contacts, only some of them official.
She said, ‘There are three more satellite trucks on their way here, one of them national. I’ve got over thirty emails from reporters asking for statements. Rippy’s lawyers have already called to say they’ll be handling all questions and any indication that we’re unfairly targeting Rippy could lead to a harassment lawsuit. They won’t even meet with me until tomorrow morning. Too busy, they say.’
‘Same as before.’ Will had been granted exactly one sit-down with Marcus Rippy, during which time the man had remained almost completely silent. Faith was right. One of the more galling things about people with money was that they really knew their constitutional rights.
He asked Amanda, ‘Are we officially in charge or is APD?’
‘Do you think I would be standing here if I wasn’t officially in charge?’
Will glanced back at Collier and Ng. ‘Does Captain Chin Cleft know that?’
‘You think he’s cute?’
‘Well, I wouldn’t say—’
Amanda was already walking toward the building. Will had to trot to catch up with her. She had the quick gait of a Shetland pony.
They both signed in with the uniformed officer in charge of access to the crime scene. Instead of going inside, Amanda made Will stand just out of reach of the shade so that the sun would turn his skull into a kiln.
She said, ‘I knew Harding’s father when I was a rookie. Senior was a beat cop who spent his money on whores and the dog track. Died of an aneurysm back in eighty-five. Left his son his gambling habit. Dale took a medical retirement that ran out two years ago. He cashed out his pension earlier this year.’
‘Why was he on medical leave?’