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“Which means the shops were protected?” I guess.
“As upside down as it sounds, no mafia involvement means less protection for those who work here. That’s why folks either up and moved, or they went out of business over the years. Looters took what they wanted, often they threatened to take more. Most of the mom and pop stores packed up back in the nineties, and those who stayed quickly learned their lesson.”
“Do you recognize this man?” I look down at our vic and wait for the officer to do the same. “Seen him around before?”
He stands over our John Doe and tilts his head to get a good look. But he shakes his head again, crinkling his lips like the actions helps him think. “No, Detective. I don’t recognize his face.”
“Grab a picture and start canvassing.” I turn back when Fletch slams thecruiser trunk closed and places a measuring wheel on the road. It’s a simple wheel set on the end of a long handle, and when we roll it, each click gives us a foot. Simple as that, and yet, easy to screw up if we lose count. “Grab a handful of your buddies and knock on doors for us. I want you to talk to every single person who is currently on this street. Even if they say they saw nothing, heard nothing, dig in. They might’ve seen our perp arrive in a car. They might’ve heard his wheels on the road as he peeled out of here.”
I turn as a stark white van arrives on the other side of the barricades. The medical examiners’ ride, with black bags and gurneys strapped in the back. Doctors examine a dead body and tell us the science-y medical stuff, while cops examine the environment he died in. Together, we create a team that usually, eventually, leads to an arrest.
If we’re lucky.
“Let’s move that cruiser.” I raise my hand and my voice to alert the distracted cops to our new arrival. “M.E.s need access.”
“I see Delicious in that van, Malone.” Fletch rolls his wheel closer, grinning when my eyes shoot across to the slender form sitting in the front seat. Sunlight glints off the windshield, making it impossible to see her face. But the closer they come, the more my brain understands. “I thought she was delegating?”
“I thought she was, too.” Narrowing my stare, I start forward and wait for them, as barricades are moved and media starlets attempt to slide through the gap. I firm my lips and glower when Aubree’s playful smile shines almost as bright as the almost-winter sun, then I start forward and grab the door the second the engine cuts out.
“Why are you here?” I snag the med-bag from Aubree, then Minka’s hand as she slides out second. I don’t hold on for long—God forbid the reporters snag footage of something they shouldn’t—then I give the cameras my back and stride beside the doctors as they move toward our vic. “Minka Mayet?” I snarl when she doesn’t answer me. “Why are you here?”
“You asked for an M.E.”
“I asked for adifferentM.E.” I grab her jacket, the too-thin, too-old fabric I swear to replace before winter kicks our asses, and spin her just ten feet from the police tape. “This is gang related, Mayet. I need you to assign someone else.”
“Aubree’s taking the lead.” She snatches her med-kit back and sets it on the ground, bending over it and selecting a heavy, overly large camera. “I’m playing assistant. Aubree can continue the case while we’re in New York. That way I’m still busy, but I’m not bogging myself down as lead.”
“Excuse me, lowly assistant?” Aubree snaps on a pair of latex gloves and beams when her surly chief looks her way. “Document the scene, please. Make certain to pay attention to his G.S.W. Please also confirm the decedent is, in fact, deceased.”
Rolling her eyes, Minka peels away from me and growls when she passes Fletch. Things are tense between the two right now—as expected. “Detective Fletcher. Screw my life up any more since we last spoke?”
He flattens his lips and bites down on the not-very-nice things I know he wants to say. He won’t, because he respects her too much to shoot off at the mouth. Besides, he wouldn’t dare say shit when I’m near enough to knock his teeth out.
“I checked for a pulse,” he decides instead, passing a photographing Minka and talking to Aubree instead. Since she’s the boss and all. “Couldn’t find one. We’ve been here about ten minutes. Calls came in to dispatch about an hour ago. Uniforms arrived first and shut the street down. I’m seeing only one puncture wound so far. Unis have three shell casings. Two slugs.”
“Crappy shot,” Aubree murmurs. She, too, checks for a pulse while Minka joins the fray and searches her bag for a scalpel and thermometer. “How do you shoot three times and hit only once?”
“Most folks are crappy shots.” I wander closer, standing at Minka’s back while she’s bent over a body and unable to pivot easily if danger arrives. “Other two bullets are over there,” like the uniform, I nod in their direction. “Says our shooter was here-ish. Pointing this direction. We haven’t established if he was on foot or in a car yet.”
Soundless, Minka slides the end of the thermometer into John Doe’s belly, holding it still as she awaits the reading, then she casts a glance back past me. “There’s no rubber on the road. No skid marks to indicate your killer sped out of here.”
“Shell casings are on the road, though.” Already, the uniforms have little yellow markers set out for the crime scene techs to document. “Folks rarely walk in the middle if they’re looking to commit a crime. It draws attention.”
“Witnesses?” She’s a doctor for the dead, but I swear, she could have been a cop if she wanted to. She asks the questions and studies more than just a body when she’s on a crime scene. “Anyone see anything?”
“Unis are canvassing now,” Fletch answers. Though when she swings her furious gaze back around, he shrinks into himself.
“No witnesses, as far as we know.” If only to save my partner from dying at the hands of my angry wife, I draw her focus my way. “Unis are headingout now to knock on doors. Typically, witnesses like to stick around and tell us what they saw. Often, they make shit up just to be relevant. The fact no one except the media is rubbernecking right now adds credence to my theory this is a gangland hit.”
“People are too afraid to talk to the cops?” Aubree guesses. “Because retribution follows?”
“Generally.” I set my hands on my hips and glance down when Minka’s thermometer beeps and the doctor takes it out again. She writes notes in a little book, similar to what Fletch and I do when we’re on the job. “Rigor hasn’t set in yet, and the body is still warm inside and out. Your guy died no more than an hour ago.”
“That works with the dispatch call,” Fletch announces. Bravely speaking over Minka’s sneer. “We gotta do the job, Dimples. Be mad at me when we’re off the clock.”
“I’ll be angry with you onandoff. Consistency makes me happy. Which, oddly enough, is precisely what you’ve disrupted by upsetting my media relations staff member.”
“I’m working on fixing it.” He pushes up straight and inches behind Aubree. One could say he makes her his shield. But I know better. He’s guarding her back, much the same way I guard Minka’s. “If she’d take a fucking call now and then, my grovel game would be stronger.”
