The 5th Horseman (Women's Murder Club 5)

Chapter 23

IT WAS MIDMORNING, four long days since we’d found Caddy Girl dead in the Opera Plaza Garage. I’d just come back from a meeting with Chief Tracchio, who told me that he was rotating some staff, moving some of my people out of Homicide to plug openings in other departments. Tracchio wasn’t asking for my input, just informing me.

I hung my jacket behind the door, still seeing the chief in my mind, ticking off the reasons on his chubby fingers—Budget cuts. Too much overtime. Gotta backfill here and there. It’s just temporary, Boxer.

It was infuriating, crippling, bureaucratic bs.

And now I had a pounding headache behind my right eye.

“Tell me something good,” I said to Jacobi as he walked into my office, parked his large butt on my credenza. Conklin followed him in, moving with the grace of a lynx, crossing his arms as he leaned against my doorway. Hard not to stare.

“Keep your expectations low,” Jacobi growled.

“Okay, Warren. They’re subterranean. Give it to me.”

“We sent a text message over the NCIC system to all regional law enforcement agencies with everything we had on Caddy Girl.” Jacobi interrupted himself with a bout of coughing, a lingering symptom of the still-healing gunshot wound he’d taken to his right lung.

“Height, weight, approximate age, manner of dress, color of her hair, eyes, the works,” he continued at last.

“Checked all the possibles that came out of that,” said Conklin, optimism lighting his eyes.

“And?” I asked.

“We got a few approximate matches, but in the end they didn’t check out. One piece of good news. The lab found a print on one of her shoes.”

I perked up.

“It’s a partial,” Jacobi said, “but it’s something. If we ever get anything or anyone to match it to. That’s the problem so far. No links.”

“So, what’s your next step?”

“Lou, I was thinking that’s a trendy haircut on Caddy Girl,” Conklin said. “The cut and the color probably cost around three hundred dollars.”

I nodded, said, “Sounds about right.” How did he know about three-hundred-dollar haircuts?

“We’re going to canvass the fancy beauty salons. Someone might recognize her. Is that okay with you?”

“Let me see the picture,” I said, sticking out my hand.

Conklin reached out and handed me the dead woman’s photo. I stared at her angelic face, her tousled blond hair lying soft against the stainless-steel slab. A sheet was pulled up to her clavicle.

My God. Who was she? And why hadn’t anyone reported her missing? And why, four days after the girl’s death, were we absolutely clueless?

The two inspectors left my glass-walled cube, and I called out to Brenda, who settled into the side chair and flapped a notepad open on her lap.

I began to dictate a memo-to-staff about my meeting with Tracchio, but I found it hard to focus.

I wanted to do something today, something that mattered. I wanted to be out on the street with Conklin and Jacobi, showing Caddy Girl’s picture around “fancy beauty salons” and prospecting good neighborhoods for clues.

I wanted to wear out my shoes on this case.

I wanted to work in a way that made me feel as if I was doing my job instead of dictating useless, worthless memos.

Chapter 24

AT ABOUT 7:30 that evening, Claire called, saying, “Lindsay, come on down. I have something to show you.”

I tossed the Chronicle with Cindy’s front-page story about the Municipal trial into the file basket. Then I locked up for the night. I jogged downstairs to the morgue hoping for a breakthrough.