Shattered (Michael Bennett #14)(24)

Then, without missing a beat, the detective unleashed that perfect smile and said, “C’mon, I’ll give you a tour and brief you on the entire case.” She handed me a copy of her case file on the Michelle Luna homicide.

A few minutes later, we were in her city-issued Crown Victoria. A real police car. I was relieved she hadn’t asked me to drive my rental. That would’ve been humiliating.

My impression of Baltimore was that it was like most cities on the East Coast. To a New Yorker it seemed smaller but rougher. There was little new construction, residential or commercial, in this part of town. Young men lingered on the corners, their eyes following our car.

Detective Holly said, “We don’t concede Baltimore to New York as being the toughest police job.”

“We have about forty thousand cops.”

“I don’t think that would be enough to get Baltimore under control. And we only have about twenty-five hundred cops. Between gangs and a DA who’s not much interested in prosecuting, crime has spiraled out of control. We’ve had mayors go to jail, and no one trusts a single council member. We were hoping some of the national attention we’ve been getting lately might lead to some relief. But the city administrators don’t seem to care.”

I said, “I think most cops feel that way. Although, I agree: Baltimore does get its share of time in the spotlight on the national news.”

We pulled down a street with two abandoned cars on one side and no vehicles at all on the other. It reminded me of a postapocalyptic movie. Or of Newark. Only a few people were on the sidewalk, and more than half the businesses appeared to be closed. A cat sprinted across the street.

Detective Holly said, “I’m a little short on time, so I’m showing you one of our rougher neighborhoods closer to the PD. The Fairfield area, where Michelle Luna was murdered, is closer to the water.

“The body was found in the front seat of a newer Audi the victim had leased in DC.”

I tried to visualize exactly how crowded the streets might be on a Saturday night. I had read in the report that the medical examiner put her time of death sometime between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. Her body wasn’t discovered until nine o’clock the next morning.

Detective Holly said, “It’s one of the few WWHs in that part of the city.”

“WWH?”

“White woman homicide.” She did a tactical 360 sweep with her eyes all around the car. “At the time the body was found, the news was calling her a victim of street gang violence. I don’t buy that for a minute. Street gangs commit violence to protect their territory or their drug routes. They don’t give a shit about a woman from Washington coming up to get her kicks.”

“Do you have any suspects?”

“Nothing decent. The killer seemed to know what he was doing. He sprayed the entire interior of her Audi with WD-40 to screw up any forensics. But an industrious forensic scientist checked everything and came up with some DNA on the back of the victim’s earring. We believe it’s from the killer. He choked Michelle Luna from behind.

I thought about this for a moment. They had DNA evidence. This could get interesting.





Chapter 30



I made sure to say good-bye to Detective Holly at the front door of the police department. I wasn’t about to risk her seeing my rented purple Prius. I thanked her and made sure she had my contact information.

Sitting in the Prius, I flipped through the file Detective Holly had given me. It was very thorough. Using the victim’s cell phone, they’d made lists of everyone Michelle Luna had talked to in the previous month. Just scanning the list, I happened to notice one of the numbers belonged to Justice Steinberg’s wife, Rhea Wellmy-Steinberg. That was going to take some following up. And it gave me some ammo for when I actually spoke to the justice.

I drove south, crossing the Patapsco River, then along Chesapeake Avenue, not far from Interstate 895, into what many people considered the toughest neighborhood in Baltimore: Fairfield. I looked at a hand-drawn map I’d taken from the police file and tried to figure out where her Audi would’ve been parked.

I triangulated my position based on an out-of-business pawnshop opposite a methadone clinic. There were few pedestrians, few parked cars, and a single bus carrying only two passengers rumbled away from me. I pulled the Prius into the spot where Michelle Luna’s was found almost two years ago. I looked up and down the street and saw nothing that was wildly out of place.

The place reminded me of parts of New York in the nineties. Desolate, hopeless, and not interesting enough for investors. But the story of New York was informative. It taught me not to give up on neighborhoods. People were able to turn around New York. I had hope that could happen here as well.

The homicide case file for Michelle Luna was fairly standard. Detective Stephanie Holly had done a good job coordinating forensics and canvassing the neighborhood. No investigative information jumped off the page as pointing to the murderer. But I was confident the clues were in there somewhere.

As I got lost in the case file, I didn’t pay careful attention to what was going on around me. In fact, I did exactly what I tell my kids not to do: I was not aware of my surroundings.

The loud rap on my driver’s side window startled me. I looked up and to my left to see two young black men staring at me. One of them motioned for me to roll down the window.