Forgotten in Death(60)

“Youth is often tragically foolish. But you’re here about your newest victim.”

He gestured to his wall of drawers before walking over to open one. “His wife and children are coming in this morning. We’ll have him ready.”

“You found the paralytic in his system before it had time to dissipate.”

“Another sixty to ninety minutes, there wouldn’t have been a trace of it. His killer obtained a high-grade, controlled medical substance. Dexachlorine. It’s used in conjunction with an anesthetic during surgery so the patient is not only asleep but immobile, which is equally important. Dexachlorine doesn’t require a counteragent post-surgery to restore mobility.”

“It just goes away.”

“In surgery, the anesthesiologist would monitor the patient, administer more if need be. Its effects are immediate but relatively short in duration. Two and a half to three hours at most, depending on the dosage.”

“Can’t be easy to come by for a layperson.”

“If whoever administered it didn’t manage to steal it himself, he would have paid dearly for it.”

“Or he had a medical source he could lean on, threaten, blackmail. Anyway, your quick work screwed the killer’s plans for Delgato to go down as a suicide.”

They stood on either side of the drawer tray, with the corpse on it. Eve held out the glossy bakery box.

“And what is that seductive smell?”

“A couple of cinnamon buns. I’ve got a source.”

“I should point out that if you hadn’t found Delgato on the line between life and death, it would’ve been very unlikely for me to find the paralytic.

“But I’m taking the buns.”

“If this place runs anything like my department, you’d better have a good place to stash them.”

Morris brought the box closer to his nose, inhaled. “I have my ways.”

“If I have mine, I’ll have Delgato’s killer—who damn well killed Alva, too—in a cage by end of shift. Her siblings are probably going to come in for her in the next day or two.”

“I saw in your report you’d found next of kin. We’ll take care of her until then.”

She knew he would, and left him with his soft music and harp strings.

She hit the lab next, and made her way through the cubes, around the counter, by the glass enclosures manned by the lab geeks.

She spotted the head geek’s egg-shaped skull as Dick Berenski worked at his station. He hunched, skinny shoulders bent as he slid from one end of his counter to the other on his rolling stool.

Eve walked to the far end, waited while he ran his spider fingers over a keyboard.

“We got your tox back on the hanging guy.” He kept tapping, and his voice already sounded aggrieved. “Harvo’ll get to your fabric trace when she gets to it. I got drones going through the contents of the dumpster on your other victim. Not going to find squat, but you gotta look. Got her tox back—zip and nada there, like it said in the report. Only blood on her or the tarp’s hers. Tarp came from the roll in the storage shed inside the fence on the construction site.”

He rolled back in her direction, and Eve saw he was trying to grow a goatee. He’d worked on a mustache once that had resembled a skinny caterpillar with mange.

She doubted this would be any more successful.

“Just because you’re stacking ’em up, Dallas, doesn’t mean we don’t have other cases, other work without your name on it.”

Eve said nothing, just held up the bakery box.

His beady eyes went nearly as glossy as the box.

“What’s in there?”

Since this was a bribe instead of a gift—they didn’t call him Dickhead for nothing—Eve had increased the amount. “A half dozen of the best sticky buns in the city. Possibly the state. Maybe the Eastern Seaboard.”

He wet his lips. “Whaddaya want?”

“I had three crime scenes yesterday. The second, unidentified female and fetus.”

“Yeah, yeah, DeWinter’s got the bones. We got the shoe, some jewelry, bullets. We’ll get to them.”

“The sweepers sent you samples. Dirt, brick, concrete, block, wood.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. So?”

“I need a full analysis on the brick from the inner wall, the materials in the outer wall, the ceiling between the inner and outer wall, and the floor and ceiling outside the inner wall.”

He gave her a sneer she found severely compromised by the attempted goatee.

“I want a pair of frosty blondes and a pitcher of vodka martinis all served up on a tropical beach. Naked.”

She refused to let that terrifying image into her head. “I get the analyses, you get the buns.”

She heard Peabody’s pink boots clomping her way, but kept her eyes on Dickhead’s.

“Lemme see ’em.”

She untied the cord, opened the lid a few inches, tilted the box toward him. The scent streamed out, and could have made a grown man cry.

Peabody gave a yip from behind her. “You went to Jacko’s!”

Dickhead’s long fingers reached; Eve shut the box.

“Did you get any extra?” Peabody all but bounced in her boots. “I’ll work out a full hour for half a sticky bun from Jacko’s.”