Close to Home (The Tracy Crosswhite Series Book 5) Read online

  “You said she was eighty.”

  “Eighty-three, but still. They say that’s how that actor died, Bill Paxton. Stroked out after a surgery.”

  “He had a bad heart. What, are you reading obituaries for people that died of a stroke?”

  Just forty, Kins had put off the surgery for years by chewing ibuprofen. He said he only wanted to go through the procedure once, and the warranty on hip replacements was about thirty years. But lately the pain had become more frequent and more intense. “The doctor said I’d let him know . . . when the pain got too bad.”

  “Sounds like you have.”

  “Two weeks,” he said. “And I’ll be glad to get it behind me. Feels like a hot knife stabbing my joint and radiating to my knee.” He picked up the menu, studied it for a bit, then tossed it aside. “What number did you get in the pool?”

  The detectives and SPD officers paid twenty bucks to enter a pool predicting the number of homicides each year. The number this year had become a hot topic. The skull of death hung from Tracy’s cubicle wall, a macabre reminder that she and Kins were the detective team “next up” for one of those homicides, though they still had two open investigations. She was hoping to get through the week without another killing, but given the way things had been the first months of the year, the odds of doing so were poor. The Violent Crimes Section was still digging out from the previous week, when a jealous young man killed three high school students at a party with an AK-47 assault rifle he’d purchased online. The deaths brought the total number of homicides in Seattle—for just the first two and a half months of the year—to twenty-two. “Thirty-eight,” Tracy said, perusing the menu. “I thought it was going to be too high. Now I’m thinking it’s going to be too low.”

  Many attributed the increase in crime, including homicides, to being a byproduct of both the spike in population and the use of heavy drugs like meth and heroin, which was epidemic in Seattle and becoming epidemic in just about every other US city.

  “Well, if you’re too low, I’m screwed.” Kins tossed a slip of paper on the table. He’d pulled number thirty-six. “I think we might pass that by June.”

  It was warm inside the pub, which had become one of their regular haunts when working the night shift, or maybe Tracy just noticed the change in temperature from the chill outside. March usually brought wind and rain. Not this year. This year it had brought temperatures in the low twenties and, maybe, snow. It had felt cold enough walking down the hill from Police Headquarters at Fifth and Cherry Street. Tracy liked the pub’s ambiance. Across the room, a green digital clock counted down the days, hours, and minutes until Saint Patrick’s Day. It had just dropped below two weeks at thirteen days, two hours, and thirty-six minutes, which explained the heavy mix of the Irish band U2 on the playlist, and the decidedly green décor—even more than normal. Pennants hung overhead with sayings like: “Kiss Me. I’m Irish.” And three-leaf clovers on the wall advertised Guinness. Over Kins’s head, a sign in a wooden frame said:

  If I ever go missing I want my picture on a beer bottle instead of a milk carton. That way, my friends will know I’m missing.

  Tracy checked her cell phone, though it hadn’t rung; she’d provided dispatch with her number when they left the office.

  “Everything all right with you?” Kins asked. “You’ve been acting like you’re the one going under the knife.”

  After years as partners, they knew each other’s moods, knew when they were fighting with their spouses, when Kins had kid problems, when they’d gotten laid. “I’m fine,” she said. But she wasn’t fine. She’d been considering her appointment to see a fertility specialist the following afternoon. In the six months since her wedding, she’d never had so much sex and been so frustrated. At forty-three, Tracy was learning that deciding to have children and getting pregnant no longer went hand in hand.

  Far from it.

  Kins picked up the menu again. “I should lose weight before the surgery. That minimizes the chance of a stroke.”

  “Would you stop worrying about a stroke? That was a fluke. She was twice your age.”

  “I should order a salad. I say that every time, don’t I?” He did say it every time. “And then I get a burger. I have the willpower of a sausage.”

  Tracy ignored him. Kins used “sausage” to describe just about everything and everyone that bothered him. Lousy driver on the freeway—sausage. A slow cashier at the grocery store—sausage. A lying witness—sausage. He’d told Tracy he’d gotten in the habit as a kid when he’d slipped and said the F-bomb in front of his mother. After a good whacking, she told him to come up with something else. He’d come up with “sausage.”

  She looked over the menu again. Kins’s mention of a burger was tempting, but she’d order a salad. At five foot ten, she wasn’t petite. Working out was good for the cardio, but it was getting tougher and tougher each year to keep the weight off. What went in the mouth migrated to the hips and thighs.

  Kins slapped his menu down on the tabletop. “Salad. I’m getting a salad.” His cell vibrated. He checked it and set it aside. “Faz and Del are coming down.”

  Vic Fazzio and Delmo Castigliano constituted the other half of the Violent Crimes Section’s A Team. The letter was just a designation, but that didn’t keep the four of them from professing to the other three teams that it was a designation of quality.

  “Del’s back at work?” Tracy asked.

  “Started back tonight. He and Faz were out running down that witness in White Center. Faz wants me to be sure to ask whether they still have the corned beef on rye.” Kins shook his head. “It’s an Irish pub. He’s just being Faz.”

  “Did he say how Del is doing?”

  Kins played with a pack of sugar, folding the corners. “I talked to him yesterday about it. He said he’s still pretty down. Can’t blame him.”

  The previous Saturday, Tracy and Kins had joined Faz at the funeral for Del’s niece. Just seventeen, she’d overdosed on heroin. She’d started on marijuana at fifteen, progressed to prescription drugs, and eventually became hooked on heroin. Del got her into a detox program in Yakima, and when she’d returned home, he’d said she’d turned a corner. Then she’d overdosed and died.

  “Faz said she’d overdosed four times. Did you know that?”

  “Del told me,” Tracy said.

  Kins shook his head. He had three teenage boys. “Four times? It would kill me if one of my kids was taking that shit.”

  Liam, the owner, approached their table. He worked tables and behind the bar when it got busy. “You guys must be working the night shift again.”

  “It’s just us and prostitutes, Liam,” Kins said. “Only they make a whole lot more money than we do, and they don’t have to report it on their income taxes.”

  “You’re preaching to the choir,” Liam said. “The city is telling me I have to pay my employees fifteen dollars an hour. One of the busboys asked me to cut his time so he wouldn’t lose government aid. Sometimes I wonder if the city council actually thinks this crap through.” He groaned. “You want something to drink?”

  “I’d take the soup special if I wasn’t on duty,” Kins said. A billboard at the entrance advertised the soup special to be whiskey on the rocks.

  “I hear you.” Liam looked to the window. “Full moon tonight. The crazies will be coming out. Ordinarily we’re dead on a Monday night.”

  Violent Crimes got the crazies every night, like the woman who called claiming she knew who’d killed the singer Kurt Cobain, or the man who said his dead wife was threatening to cut him up and deposit his body around town in suitcases. When Tracy had been single, she’d liked working the night shift, which was from 3:00 p.m. to midnight. At least the crazies were entertaining, and the solitude allowed her to get caught up on paperwork. Since her marriage to Dan, however, Tracy wanted to be home nights.

  “Iced tea,” Kins said.

  “Put some lemon in mine,” Tracy said.

  “I assume you’re waiting
for the two gumbas?”

  “They’re on their way,” Kins said. “Faz asked me to find out if you had the corned beef.”

  “What self-respecting Irish pub wouldn’t have corned beef this close to Saint Patrick’s Day?” Liam crossed himself, kissed his thumb, and departed the table.

  Kins glanced past Tracy’s shoulder in the direction of the front door. “Here they come now.”

  Tracy turned. Del and Faz entering a restaurant were like two moons eclipsing the sun. Each stood at least six foot four and weighed better than 250 pounds. Each wore a suit, though without the tie. Seattle might be changing, but Faz and Del were not. No tie was dress casual for them.

  Del removed his raincoat and hung it on the hook. Tracy thought he looked tired. Bags under his eyes indicated a lack of sleep, and he moved as if doing so was a chore. Faz said Del had been spending nights on his sister’s couch while caring for his twin nine-year-old nephews.

  Del slid into the booth beside Kins. Faz slid next to Tracy. He was on Kins like a Labrador on a shot duck. “Did you ask about the corned beef?”

  Kins grimaced. “Damn, I forgot, Faz.”

  “How could you forget? I just texted you.” He pulled up the text and held up the phone.

  Kins shrugged. “I got distracted.”

  As Faz swiveled in his seat, searching for Liam, Tracy turned to Del. “How are you doing, Del?”

  “Hanging in there,” he said, voice soft.

  “Where the hell is Liam?” Faz said, head on a swivel.

  Del motioned to Liam, who’d been behind the bar and came over quickly. “Coffee,” Del said. “Black.”

  “You got the corn beef?” Faz asked.

  Liam grimaced. “Kins ordered the last one, Faz, but we got a Polish sausage with sauerkraut.”

  Faz looked wounded. “Polish . . . You’re shitting me.” He looked to Kins. “Is he shitting me?”

  Kins and Liam laughed. “What do you take me for, an Italian?” Liam said. “An Irish pub without corned beef this close to Saint Patrick’s Day—that’s a felony.”

  “What, are you trying to give me a heart attack?” Faz said to Kins. “Don’t do that to me.”

  “Anything to drink?” Liam said.

  “Coffee,” Faz said. “I’m trying to warm up—cold as my Nets the last ten games.” A New Jersey native, Faz still rooted for his hometown teams.

  Tracy ordered a salmon Caesar salad.

  “Irish whiskey mac and cheese,” Kins said. He looked at Tracy as he handed back the menu. “Told you I have the willpower of a sausage.”

  Liam waited for Del. “Just the coffee,” Del said, which was unlike him. Del loved food as much as Faz.

  After Liam departed, Tracy said to Del, “How’s your sister?”

  “Not too good. It’s gonna take some time.”

  “Just so you know,” Faz said to Tracy, “we’re going after the dealer.”

  “We who?” Tracy asked.

  “We ‘us,’” Faz said, catching Tracy’s look of concern. “But Del’s not officially involved.”

  There was no way Del should be working a homicide involving his niece. “You ran this by Nolasco?” she asked, referring to the Violent Crimes Section captain.

  Faz gave her a look intended to convey that he’d talk to her more about it later. “He gave his blessing so long as I’m the lead.”

  She wondered if Nolasco’s capitulation, rather than assigning a different team, had to do with the extraordinary rash of recent murders. Every homicide detective on every team was struggling just trying to keep up.

  “Does your sister have any leads?” Kins asked Del.

  “She’s not ready to go there yet,” Del said. “We’re going to give her a few more days. I’m guessing my niece used her cell phone to make the buys and there’s a boyfriend involved. If he is . . . he’ll give up his dealer.”

  Tracy glanced again to Faz, who gave her a gentle nod that things were under control. “She just needs some time,” he said.

  Del considered Tracy. “I keep thinking about that saying, you know? I keep thinking about you.”

  “Me?” Tracy said.

  “You know that saying, ‘No parent should ever have to bury their child’? I don’t think I fully appreciated what that meant. I’m sorry about your sister. I’m really sorry for your parents. I can see now what it did to them, what it did to your father.”

  Two years after Sarah disappeared, Tracy’s father, overcome with grief, depression, and likely prescription drugs, took his own life.

  The thought of a child made her think again of her attempts to get pregnant. As much as she wanted a son or a daughter, she couldn’t imagine the grief and the agony of losing a child. Her sister’s kidnapping and disappearance had devastated her, but it was nothing compared to the havoc it had wreaked on her parents.

  A cell phone rattled on the table. Both Tracy and Kins picked up their phones. Tracy’s phone lit up. “Dispatch,” she said, shaking her head.

  Kins groaned. “That homicide number just keeps inching higher, doesn’t it?”

  CHAPTER 3

  A basketball rested motionless in the gutter near a white sheet draped over a body. Tracy and Kins had speculated on the drive about the reason for the A Team’s presence at a traffic fatality, which was ordinarily handled by the Traffic Collision Investigation Unit. For homicide to be called out was unusual.

  Kins parked along the curb on South Henderson Street. Del and Faz pulled their car in behind Kins and Tracy. The call to Tracy’s cell had been from Billy Williams, the A Team’s sergeant. Williams had received a call from the TCI sergeant, Joe Jensen.

  “Billy say what we’re doing here?” Kins asked.

  Tracy shook her head. “TCI thinks it’s a hit and run. That’s all I know.”

  They stepped out into the cold, waiting on the sidewalk for Del and Faz. Blue and red lights painted the stucco walls and barred windows and doors of the local businesses. Multiple patrol units had been parked at angles, blocking off Renton Avenue South. Uniformed officers dressed in gloves and thick jackets redirected approaching traffic. A fire truck and ambulance were also part of the ensemble though the firefighters and paramedics stood still, looking frozen.

  Tracy said, “What do you think about Nolasco allowing Del to work his niece’s death?”

  Kins glanced at her, then continued to survey the scene. “Faz will keep Del in check.”

  “He shouldn’t be working it.”

  Kins gave her a look. “You going to tell him that?”

  “That’s not my job. That’s Nolasco’s job.”

  “You think you might be letting your personal feelings influence you?” Tracy and Nolasco had a long and rocky relationship that went back to the police academy.

  “Nothing to do with my personal feelings. It’s section policy.”

  “Faz said he’s got it under control. I’d say you and I should let it be.” Kins turned and looked up the street toward the white sheet. “How far do you think the body is from the intersection?”

  Tracy knew he was changing the subject, but she let it go and gave his question some thought. “Maybe twenty-five feet.”

  “This is not going to be pretty,” he said.

  Del and Faz joined them, and they started toward Williams.

  A heavy cloud layer that gave every indication of snow had dampened all sound. Williams stood speaking to two men wearing fluorescent yellow jackets with gray reflective tape, the words “Seattle Police” across their backs. Williams, a dead ringer for Samuel L. Jackson, looked fashionable in a red-and-black-checked driving cap and matching scarf, which he’d wrapped around his neck and tucked beneath his coat.

  “Wouldn’t have guessed you were Scottish,” Faz said to Williams. “Sean Connery give you that hat and scarf?”

  Williams responded with a sardonic smile. “According to Ancestry.com, I’m a lot of things you never would have guessed. I have your people to thank for that.”

  Faz said, �
�I’m a hundred percent Italian; you can thank me for good food and The Godfather.”

  Tracy spoke to Joe Jensen, the bigger of the two men, who wore a black ski cap pulled low on his head. “You call us in on this one, Joe?”

  Jensen had served in the TCI unit for nearly three decades. When Tracy had worked patrol, and a promotion to homicide seemed a pipe dream, she’d looked into TCI as a way to expand her base of knowledge and experience. The unit’s requirements included a boatload of math and physics, and theories such as linear momentum. She’d always been good in chemistry, which she’d taught for three years at the high school level. However, after her sister’s disappearance and Tracy’s decision to become a cop, she’d left math behind for good.

  “When are you coming over to Violent Crimes?” Kins asked Jensen.

  “After I retire,” Jensen said, his standard refrain. He’d been asked to move to homicide often. He told Tracy the cases were too generic, that “This week’s suspect is next week’s victim.” Besides, he was a proud math geek. Jensen adjusted the ski cap. “This one’s tragic.” He looked down Renton Avenue to the white sheet. “It’s a twelve-year-old boy.”

  “No,” Tracy and Kins said in unison.

  Del stepped away.

  “African American kid on his way home from playing basketball,” Jensen said.

  “Some of the brass are concerned, given the current climate, that this be handled with some sensitivity,” Williams said.

  “‘Black Lives Matter’?” Faz asked. Like the rest of the United States, the movement had hit Seattle hard, and no one had to tell them they were standing in a predominantly African American community.

  Williams nodded. “The brass wanted a homicide team.” He looked to Jensen. “No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  “It’s politics,” Williams said. “We’ll work with TCI.”

  “That okay with you?” Tracy asked Jensen.

  “Not my call, but as far as I’m concerned, the more the merrier, though nothing merry about this one.”

  “What happened?” Tracy asked.

  “Car knocked him out of his flip-flops. His basketball shoes are another ten feet down the road.”