Mission Road (Tres Navarre #6)(56)

It boggled Maia’s mind that anyone would keep such a thing, rather than just making a cast of the wound, but her contact had assured her it wasn’t the strangest thing in the evidence room’s freezers.

“Here you go,” the supervisor said proudly.

“Wow.” Thankfully, Maia’s nausea was never bad at night, but it still took all her willpower not to gag. She promised herself she would never stand in front of a refrigerator wondering what to eat again as long as she lived.

“That’s a pelvis, all right,” she managed. “You sure it’s okay . . .”

“Oh, hell, nobody cares about this stuff. Help yourself. It’s a cold case. Literally, right?”

He sounded proud of his little joke. Maia tried to smile.

She took a closer look at the entrance wound, acting like she knew what she was doing. Finally she sighed. “No . . . damn. I was looking for a secondary laceration, but . . . well, I guess it’s back to the drawing board.”

“Aw, really? I’m sorry.”

She closed the refrigerator. Her host didn’t notice the blood kit in the small evidence bag which she’d slipped into her pocket.

They walked together toward the front of the evidence room.

“So,” she said, “hypothetically speaking, if somebody wanted to switch a DNA sample in the evidence room, how easy would that be?”

“Impossible.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “I witness everything in and out. No chance.”

“What if the person were a cop?”

He laughed uneasily. “You’re kidding, right?”

Maia smiled, though she felt depressed as hell. She’d found out what she wanted. Sure—the supervisor on duty would keep out ninety-nine percent of the people. Nobody off the street could waltz in. But with somebody who was determined, who knew how departments worked—no evidence was safe. Like beat cops who regularly left their patrol cars unlocked, most deterrence inside a police station was cop aura. Cops had a hard time believing that anyone would be crazy enough to mess with police property.

And the names on the log-in book . . . Maia was trying to figure what to do with that information when her supervisor friend stopped dead in his tracks.

Detective Kelsey had understood her phone call. He was standing red-faced at the Dutch door, swinging the supervisor’s clipboard by its broken pen chain.

KELSEY SLAMMED THE INTERROGATION ROOM DOOR. “You have any idea how many charges I could level?”

Maia nodded. “I also have a fair idea how much embarrassment I could cause the department.”

“Worth it, to get you disbarred.”

Maia took the evidence bag out of her pocket, put it on the table. She did not feel particularly calm, but she was determined to act it.

“Detective, I didn’t lie. I didn’t coerce. I just batted my eyes and walked out with some poor fool’s DNA sample. Help yourself, your supervisor told me. Your security is a joke. The blood match on Arguello is a joke. Somebody tampered with the evidence.”

Kelsey looked at the evidence bag like it was poison. A vein throbbed under his left eye.

“Check the logbook,” Maia said. “You won’t find my name. How many other holes do you think there could be?”

“You will not drag this department into the mud.”

“Kelsey, the DNA testing for the White murder was sent to the lab about ten days ago. Your name is on the logbook several times for that week. Lieutenant Hernandez’s, too.”

“Every detective in homicide—”

“Yes,” she agreed. “Makes it easy to prove access, doesn’t it?”

Kelsey leaned across the table. “Miss Lee, tomorrow morning we’re issuing a warrant for Arguello for Franklin White’s murder. We’re pressing charges against Navarre for aiding and abetting. When that happens, your carping is going to look exactly like what it is: typical defense attorney crap.”

“You gave us a window. Forty-eight hours.”

“That window just closed.”

She forced herself to breathe normally. Not to think that she’d just signed Tres’ death warrant.

“Detective.” She tried to moderate her tone. “We have a mutual problem.”

She opened her purse and unfolded the police printout. She pushed it across the table.

Kelsey read it, at first blankly. Then she could see comprehension spread across his face like hardening cement. “Where did you get this?”

“Titus Roe, a two-bit assassin. We had a little misunderstanding earlier. He, ah, got away from me before I could ask him many questions, but he gave me that. He said I could figure out who gave it to him.”

For the first time, Maia saw something human in Kelsey’s eyes: fear. But fear for what, she wasn’t sure.

“I have only your word for this,” he said slowly.

“It’s a police printout. Directions for an assassination.”

“No.”

“Titus Roe was an obvious choice. He was a suspect in the Franklin White murder eighteen years ago. He’s a Judas goat. Just like Ralph.”

“Ralph Arguello is a murderer.” The words didn’t need to be loud. Kelsey’s voice was saturated with loathing.

“Kelsey,” Maia said, “tell me you didn’t try to have me killed.”