‘That’s the million-dollar question.’
‘Like I said,’ Garcia breathed out. ‘This case keeps on getting weirder by the minute.’ He paused and straightened his body. ‘Shall we call forensics and tell them not to bother? There’s noway they’ll be able to process all this crap. It will take them weeks and it will no doubt turn out to be a waste of time. There’s probably a wrapper from every junk-food joint in the city in there.’
From Garcia’s car, on their way there, Hunter had called Dr. Susan Slater, one of the best lead forensics agents California had to offer. She and her team had worked together with the UVC Unit on innumerable cases before. In the call, Hunter quickly explained what they had so far before asking Dr. Slater if she could dispatch a couple of agents to the police garage in San Fernando Valley to process Shaun Daniels’s car. She’d replied that she wouldn’t have anyone available until the morning, but that she would have it done by lunchtime tomorrow.
‘You’re right,’ Hunter said. ‘The trash in there will give us nothing, but we do need them here.’ He moved over to the passenger side. ‘They can concentrate their efforts on the door handles – inside and outside – steering wheel, gearshift, trunk handle and the center-console controls – radio, aircon and whatever else. Who knows? We might get lucky with something.’ Hunter pressed the button on the key fob to unlock the doors.
Garcia took a step back. ‘You’re a brave man. The floor in there must be like the ground in the Amazon rainforest, you know what I’m saying? A breeding ground for insect species not yet known to man – like mosquitos with teeth, or something.’
‘I’m not really getting inside.’
Hunter pulled the passenger door open and some of the trash that was wedged between the seat and door dropped to the ground.
Garcia joined Hunter and immediately cupped his hand over his nose. ‘Jesus! I think the heat has cooked some of the leftover food in there from at least five years ago. It smells of puke and cigarettes.’
Hunter too cupped his left hand over his nose and used his right one to open the glove compartment – more trash, a set ofscrewdrivers and the vehicle’s user manual. He moved some of the trash out of the way, pausing at times to study some of the wrappers a little more closely.
‘Looking for anything in particular?’ Garcia queried.
‘Any kind of drug paraphernalia,’ Hunter replied. ‘Burned tinfoil, needles, glass pipes, cut water bottles, that sort of thing.’ He moved some of the trash from the passenger seat, before doing the same to the junk on the floor.
Back at the morgue, Dr. Hove had told them that she had found no track marks on Shaun Daniels’s arms, but most addicts were experts in hiding their track marks by using different veins around their bodies to shoot up – veins that could’ve been easily hidden by the large number of bruises to his body.
Hunter found nothing to indicate that Shaun Daniels was a user. Not even an old prescription bottle. He tried the center-console compartment – a pack of cigarettes, two unopened packs of gum and a set of keys.
Hunter reached for the keys.
Garcia looked over his partner’s shoulder.
‘House keys?’
‘I’m guessing so, yes.’
‘His home address is in the file,’ Garcia said, his head angling left. ‘In the car.’
Hunter nodded and checked his watch – 5:38 p.m. ‘Let’s hope that his house isn’t the same kind of train crash his car is.’
Six
Shaun Daniels lived in a small, one-bedroom apartment on the second floor of a two-story building, right on the corner of Eshelman Avenue and 250th Street, in Lomita – part of the Metropolitan Area of Los Angeles. The building itself was nothing more than a dilapidated, rectangular structure, painted avocado green, with a front yard that was in much need of some attention. Two concrete staircases – one at each end of the building – led to the exposed upper deck, with a rusty, vertical, iron-bar rail running the length of the whole deck. In all honesty, the building looked more like one of those cheap, old, side-of-the-road motels than a residential building.
At 6:31 p.m., the street wasn’t exactly busy, which allowed Garcia to park directly across the road.
Three kids, none of them older than twelve, were hanging out on the sidewalk by the street corner. Two of them watched, while the third one was trying hard, and failing, to do a kickflip on a battered skateboard.
As he and Hunter stepped out of the car, Garcia indicated a baby-blue door on the upper deck. The first door if they took the staircase at the left end of the building. ‘Apartment twenty-one.’
‘Yeah, I see it.’ Hunter nodded.
They crossed the road and took the stairs up to the second floor. The curtains on both windows to the right of the doorwere drawn shut. Both detectives gloved up before Hunter used the keys he’d found in Shaun’s car – first on the metal security grill gate, then on the actual apartment door, which opened with some resistance, not much, and a high-pitched squeak at the hinges.
As Hunter pushed the door ajar, he and Garcia were met by a heavy breath of warm and stale air. Not really surprising, given that the building faced west, therefore getting the sun pounding on the apartment’s front door and windows for the entire afternoon. What was disconcerting was the scent that accompanied that warm breath. It was as if the smell that they had gotten from Shaun’s car had acquired a new overpowering kind of punch-to-the-gut that brought tears to the eyes.
‘Jesus!’ Garcia said, reaching into his pocket and retrieving two teal-colored surgical masks. ‘After the storage garage, I had a feeling that we’d be needing these.’
Hunter took the mask from Garcia and put it on before pushing the door fully open.
Despite the sun still being high in the sky, the apartment looked somberly dark. Hunter reached for the light switch on the wall to the left and flicked it on.
