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“What will you do to investigate?” I asked.
She looked at me, finally lifting her sunglasses up so I could see her narrowed dark brown eyes. “There’s really not much we can do.” She glanced toward the house. “Do you have a security camera?”
“We just purchased the house. We haven’t had a chance to set it up yet.”
“How about the house over there? Did you ask them?”
“Not yet. I was waiting for you.”
She walked around to the front of the SUV, lowered her sunglasses, studied the neighboring house, then returned to where I stood. “If there is a camera on their structure, it wouldn’t capture your driveway. Too far away, too many trees. Unless they have one mounted in a tree.” She turned again and looked up.
“I don’t think so.”
“Then that’s about it.”
“Someone can just smash my SUV and get away with it?”
She gave me that calm smile again. “Let’s be logical. How would we find the perpetrator? We have no security footage. No one saw or heard it happen, so you don’t really know the time. And there are no other houses. No one to ask.”
“I’m a firefighter.”
She tilted her head slightly as if she was trying to figure out what that had to do with anything.
“I work with the police often enough, so I know they prioritize what crimes deserve attention and the crimes that don’t get resources. It sounds like you don’t think this is a priority.”
“It’s not about priorities. It’s about leads. We have none.”
“You must have some way of investigating things like this. I can’t be the first.”
“We don’t. I know that’s frustrating to hear, but it’s reality.”
“Then why did you even respond to my call?”
“So you’ll have a report for your insurance claim.”
“That’s all this is? Insurance? I’ll have a deductible, so I’m paying for someone to destroy my property. And if it’s that easy, maybe they’ll be back to do worse.”
“It was probably an impulsive act. Someone drunk or high. And I know you know that kind of incident is impossible to investigate.”
She was half right. I did know that, but my outrage at the violation, at the absolute senseless nature of the crime made me long for a sense of justice. If thugs and drug addicts know law enforcement won’t even try to find them, they’ll grow bolder every time. They might return to smash our other windows, or Keith and Emily’s window. They might turn their bottled-up rage on the house.
Listening to her, I half understood Keith’s point of view on not reporting the murder. Would she take the same approach? Of course, they’d send a detective in that case, but still, would the attitude be the same? There’s no security footage; we don’t know when he died because we weren’t here. There was no one around who might have seen or heard anything except Linda and Jordan. If they denied knowledge, maybe they’d drop a murder investigation as easily as they were taking a pass on this crime.
But at least they could identify the body. Couldn’t they? If we knew where the body was. I heaved a deep sigh.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “The reality of apprehending vandals is a nonstarter.”
“Yeah.”
“If you give me your email address, I’ll send over a copy of the report.”
I gave her the information. We stood looking at each other.
I felt like a criminal myself, harboring the knowledge that a man had been murdered in our swimming pool. That threatening notes had been left. This was my chance to tell her. Even if they never identified him, never found any leads, I was only responsible for my part. Whatever happened after was on them. Still, without the body, it was tricky. The others were a hundred percent correct about that. I recalled the note and Samantha’s terror.
“Take care.” Deputy Corrigan began walking toward the street.
“One other thing…” I said.
