The owner set out the coffees and donuts. “Even the Browns made the playoffs. You must be into pain.”
Sean coughed, “You have no idea.”
Detective Andre cleared his throat and held up two evidence bags. One held a chain with an expensive silver cross. "Recognize this?"
Checking back over his shoulder at the interested owner, Sean nodded. "That's the type he wore."
"How about this?"
The detective removed the cover from the other bag to make the next evidence clear. Sean controlled his expression. The bag contained a bloody piece of skin about eight inches across. The removed skin included a tattoo of the five-pointed crown of the Latin Kings sitting on a pile of cash with a large ‘A’ the background.
Charlie gave Sean the side eye. “And?”
“Left calf,” Sean said shortly.
It was unlikely anyone in the gang had exactly the same tattoo, particularly the A for Angel. El Socio had multiple tattoos, and Sean knew each and every one he'd had when he left prison, from the lion on his left chest to the pistol on his right shoulder.
“Not enough to make a positive ID,” Charlie said.
The detective grabbed one of the offered coffees. “We’ve got enough for DNA testing. Dental records don’t seem possible unless we find more evidence."
A great way to say ‘we need to find a head.’
Sean looked over at the owner and read his name tag, “Juan?”
The owner said, “It's a family name.
“What day do they come to collect the trash around here?”
“Usually today, but it’s a holiday, and the weather makes me think they won’t.”
“Who found the body?”
“I did. It wasn’t there when I went to sleep here last night. My night guy called off.” Juan spoke with a relative amount of nonchalant for a headless body outside his store. Then again, if Sean remembered correctly, most of the Korean immigrants served their mandatory military time in South Korea. It was unlikely any gang members could match the brutality of the North Korean dictators.
“Collect all the dumpsters for a three block radius,” Sean recommended.
The detective dropped his voice. “We can, but I think you overestimate our chances. They dropped the stiff outside their turf to make him difficult to trace.”
“There are many security cameras,” Juan volunteered.
They turned back to him. “How many?”
“Fifty or so. There was a big Labor Day sale on cameras. My nephew installed them for everyone. He’s ex-Navy,” Juan told them proudly.
The three of them sighed. This was not going to keep a low profile if they had to ask fifty different businesses for their security footage, but what else was there to do?
The detective shrugged and made a call on his radio. “Three blocks, fifty cameras. In a blizzard.”
“Nothing else to do,” Charlie agreed.
Sean reflected that there was a solid chance it would be a long time before anyone reviewed the footage of the cameras he was supposed to set up around Lillian’s building and hallways. The tech team would be quite busy for a few weeks.
He turned on his phone and checked the tracker he had planted on Lily’s badge last week. It was at MetroGen, and it was moving.
Chapter14
Lillian wished she could have spent the night at home, curled up around her slave boy, even if it turned her whole body green… instead she’d been saddled with the weight of almost the whole department of pediatrics on her shoulders.
