“I comb my hair,” Doyle protested, hand automatically going to his head.
Larkin pursed his lips.
Baxter continued.“I got about an hour’s sleep before this meathead—” He pointed at O’Halloran before course-correcting with “Y’know, there’re thirty of us MEs in the city.I know I’m charming to be around, but you Homicide boys—”
“Cold Cases,” Larkin corrected.
“I’m not the only one with a telephone,” Baxter growled.
“Doesn’t the Chief want you on Detective Larkin’s investigations?”Marsha asked sincerely, her voice not quite a whisper.
“I’m trying to make a point, Marsha,” Baxter murmured.
O’Halloran puffed his chest out and plastered on his best schoolyard bully smirk, clearly considering himself on the winning end of this argument, even if it meant hitching his wagon to Larkin’s name.He pivoted on his heel and said to Larkin, “Happened just after six this morning.Inmates were coming out of their cells, lining up to head to the chow hall.He got jumped and shanked.”
Larkin and Doyle crossed the remaining distance to the autopsy table and looked down at the bodily remains of Sal Costa.His cropped white hair was in disarray, goatee a little overgrown, the chain of his religious medallion visible in the thick pelt of chest hair poking out at the collar of his jail-wear.He looked like he’d put on some weight—nothing to do and all day to do it—and his chubby face was twisted into a grotesque mask of horror.
“Sonofabitch,” Larkin whispered.
“What’d they use?”Doyle asked O’Halloran, who stood a foot or so from the head of the table.
“A sharpened toothbrush.”
Baxter carefully lifted the tattered and bloody shirt.“I’m not speaking officially, but a stabbing certainly seems to be the case.His abdomen looks like steak tartare.Marsha, you might as well start taking external photos.”
“I can’t fucking believe this,” O’Halloran growled.“Coulda had Wagner on two dozen counts of first-degree murder.Coulda had thembothon conspiracy charges.This was a slam-dunk promotion, a raise—” He looked at Larkin and motioned between them.“—a goddamn federal holiday in our honor.”
“That last one is simply not true,” Larkin replied.“Did you get the name of the inmate who attacked Costa.”
O’Halloran grit his jaw like hewantedto crack a tooth.He reached inside his suit coat, retrieved a small notepad, and flipped through the pages.“Tony Vargas,” he eventually said.
—twenty-five pounds of gear weighing down the utility belt cinched tight to his slender waist, sweat prickling under the standard-issue ballistic vest and heavy winter patrol coat, boots in need of new insoles, adjusting the eight-point cap on his head to keep his hand in a ready position as the belligerent neighbor of 2F got closer, spouting bullshit: “Vargas sellin’ pills ain’t no different than Big Pharma pushin’ a new drug every commercial break.He ain’t no millionaire, man, just a guy tryin’na eat, tryin’na take care of his girl!”before a scream from the crime scene at his back spurred him into action—
The weight of Larkin’s old uniform pulled at him, the bite of gunpowder hung heavy in the air, that howl of pain echoed in his ears like the reverb of a cymbal.January 3, 2013, was seven years ago, seven months ago, seven days ago, seven seconds ago.
He had been dispatched for crowd control.
Larkin had been arguing with the neighbor defending Anthony Vargas’s decision to sell ten thousand pills to an undercover cop.An associate of Vargas’s had entered the apartment as the deal had gone down, had somehow identified the officer to be active law enforcement, and shot.The officer fired back in self-defense.
Larkin had been there for crowd control.
In the ensuing chaos, first responders hadn’t properly secured the apartment, and Vargas’s girlfriend had been hiding in the closet as it turned into a crime scene.She’d come out screaming like a banshee and stabbed an OCME driver in the leg.The on-site medicolegal had a panic attack afterward, and Larkin had driven the van back to the office.
He had just been there for crowd control.
What were the odds ofthisTony Vargas being the very same Anthony Vargas of Larkin’s patrol days?The probability of coincidence could be calculated by studying the base rate of two independent events.The act of Larkin, of all available officers, having been assigned to that specific crime scene was 1 in 35,000, and the number of busts involving pharmaceutical drugs in 2013—fuck, Larkin wasn’t sure.He hardly ever had reason to interact with the Narcotics Division.
He asked, “What was Vargas doing time for.”
“I don’t know.”
“O’Halloran.”
“Do I look like his fuckin’ CO?”O’Halloran shot back.
“I know it’s early and we’re all tired,” Doyle said cooly, “but shouting isn’t—Larkin, where’re you going?”
Larkin was already at the double doors, shoving them open, stepping into the hall.He looked toward the elevator at the far end before calling, “Wait!”and jogging toward the correctional officer just as he was stepping inside the car.
