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I heard sirens coming up Lake. Joe flashed his lights, and after the squads parked in front of the building, he had a few words with the uniforms. Minutes later he was again inside our apartment, throwing the lock, stowing his gun.
“I saw nothing,” he said.
“Good,” I said. “Am I getting paranoid?”
“I heard shots, too. Really. Come here,” he said.
Sunlight woke me up, I felt rested because it was half-past nine. I threw on a robe and did some apartment surveillance. Julie’s lunch box, backpack, and her cute little girl self were gone. So was Joe. From Martha’s absence I knew she’d been walked and must be with Mrs. Rose across the hall.
I looked down on Lake Street and saw a patrol car idling outside the building, my watchdog. Everything else looked completely normal. And I felt normal too. The good sleep had cleansed away much of yesterday’s trauma. My anger had cooled and my thoughts were clear.
Marty Boxer was dead and he’d left plenty of evidence that he was just as bad as I’d thought he was. Actually worse. Cat had loved him and would handle the funeral arrangements with Darla. Finding out who killed Marty was my job, and as soon as I got to work, I’d be on it.
I put myself together, then called the squad room to let Brenda know that I’d be at my desk by ten-thirty, latest.
Brenda said, “Brady wants to see you.”
“He’s my first stop when I get in.”
Downstairs, I greeted Officers Dench and Ementhaler and released the patrolmen back to their regular assignments. My car was where I’d parked it on 12th Street last night. Since then, one car had parked in front of it and another had parked behind. It took me a moment to see that something was off.
My heart jumped without knowing why, then my brain caught up. The car was on an odd slant. There were a couple of shiny shell casings on the street beside it, and all four tires were flat. Then I noticed something under the windshield wipers. It was a paper napkin, a note penciled in block letters: “Let Marty RIP. Or yr next.”
No signature.
The killer was writing to me? Warning me off? There were evidence bags and latex gloves in my glove box. I opened the passenger-side door with my key, extracted a glassine envelope and a pair of gloves, and secured the casings and the note.
The traffic light was red on Lake and the squad car was waiting for it to change. With the bagged shell casings and note inside my pocket, I dashed to the cruiser, knocked on the window, and hitched a ride with Dench and Ementhaler to the Hall.
I hadn’t charged my phone last night, but if I worked fast, the battery would last. I called Joe. I called Brady. And I called Claire.
CHAPTER 22
THE CRUISER LET me out on Harriet Street where Claire was waiting for me in scrubs and tennis shoes.
“Where’s your car?”
I said, “On the way to the crime lab.”
“What? Why?”
I told her the little I knew, but her shocked expression told me that she’d seen through my casual description of the holes in my tires, the death threat on the windshield.
“How are you doing?” she asked me.
“Much better than yesterday. It could only be better.”
Claire drew me into a hug, then stepped back and said, “I’ve got the autopsy report.”
“I’m guessing cause of death is a bullet to the back of the skull.”
“Yes, Sergeant smarty-pants. The .38 slug is mushroomed but it’s on its way to the lab. But that’s not all. Marty had liver cancer.”
“Awww, geez.”
Claire said, “He wouldn’t have made it to Christmas. Other nonfatal disease and injury will be in my report.”
“Thanks, girlfriend.”
