Web of Silence: A Ray Schiller Novel (The Ray Schiller Series Book 4) Read online

  “And the woman who was with him…” Waverly said. “What about her?”

  “She was taken to HCMC before I got here. She was unconscious when the two of them were found. That’s as much as I know.” He stood and buttoned his coat. “It’s getting downright cold tonight. Well, that’s it for me, gentlemen. I’m going home to bed.”

  “We should all be so lucky,” Ray said. “Catch a few ‘Zs’ for us while you’re at it.”

  The coroner bobbed his head and walked away.

  Waverly took a closer look at the victim’s body. “Mid-fifties would you say?”

  “Yeah, mid-fifties, early sixties,” Ray agreed. “Around there.”

  “Great head of hair,” Waverly added. “Steel-gray and thick as a dog’s coat.”

  “Yeah, and it looks like he kept himself in great shape.”

  “A lot of good that did him,” Waverly said, buttoning his coat.

  Ray got the attention of a nearby officer. “The female victim… How old?”

  “Late twenties, early thirties maybe. A good-looking blond,” the cop added.

  “Notice anything else that might be helpful?”

  “Her knees were scraped up like she fell forward. No defensive wounds, so there probably wasn’t a struggle.” He looped his thumbs over his gun belt and jerked his chin toward the man’s body. “That lucky bastard must be loaded; he’s like twice her age.”

  “At this point, lucky is the last thing I’d call him,” Waverly said.

  “Have you seen her around here before?” Ray asked.

  “No, but she’s not a hooker if that’s what you’re thinking—not your average hooker anyway—not dressed the way she was. I suppose she could be a paid escort, or maybe it was one of those May-December affairs. Like they say: just because there’s snow on the roof doesn’t mean there’s no smoke in the chimney… however that saying goes.”

  “It’s ‘Just because there’s snow on the roof doesn’t mean there’s no fire in the furnace,’ Waverly told him. “But close enough. Thanks.”

  Two men arrived with a gurney. “The coroner says he’s done here,” one of them said. “How about you two? You finished?”

  Waverly nodded. “We’ve seen all we need to.”

  Ray looked into the dumpster. Recently emptied, there was little inside.

  From several yards away, the chatty cop said, “The crime scene techs already sorted through the trash. Nothing of interest in there but a used condom, but I don’t suppose that’s related to this.”

  “Right,” Ray said. “Thanks.

  He and Waverly stepped aside letting the men secure the corpse in a body bag. They followed as it was transported on a gurney from the alley out to Sixth Street.

  Back on the sidewalk, Ray collared Fielding again. “Any sign of spent cartridges?”

  “No, sir, not yet. We’re still looking. Our chances will get a lot better once it’s light out.”

  “The shoe found on the sidewalk… Where is it?”

  “Bagged and tagged,” the officer said. “Want to see it?” Without waiting for an answer, he retrieved the stiletto for them. “Here you go.”

  Waverly took a quick look and announced, “Christian Louboutin.”

  “What?” Ray said.

  “The soles... They’re red. It’s a trademark. Unless they’re a knock-off, our Jane Doe’s shoes prob’ly cost a thousand bucks or better.”

  “Since when do you know anything about fashion?” Ray said. “You’re a socks-with-sandals guy.”

  “Phyllis knows all about that fashion crap. I picked up some of that stuff from her.”

  “Who called this in?” Ray asked Fielding.

  “The guy over there,” he said, pointing to his right. “The one in the Walden University T-shirt.”

  The subject looked like he could fit between the bars of a jail cell—a free-standing coat rack wearing faded jeans, a baggy T-shirt, and a Twins baseball cap over shaggy, brown hair.

  The officers were keeping him close at hand, away from the press. Displaying their badges, Ray and Waverly approached him.

  Ray offered his hand. “I’m Detective Schiller. This is Detective Waverly. Your name is?”

  “Darrell Keefer.”

  Waverly shook his hand and indicated the shirt with a nod of his head. “Walden U. You a student?”

  “For one more year. B.S. in business administration.”

  “It’s all B.S., kid.” Waverly said. “We understand you’re the one who discovered the victims. Tell us about that.”

  “I was coming from the Shout House bar,” he told Waverly. “I noticed the woman’s shoe on the sidewalk right about where you’re standing. I walked past it and got to wondering what it was doing there. I mean, what woman walks around in one high heel, you know? I thought maybe it belonged to one of the drag queens from the Gay Nineties joint down the street, you know? Anyway, I saw the red sole. Right off the bat I figured either somebody was totally blitzed or maybe something a lot worse happened, because—woman or drag queen—nobody’s going to leave a shoe like that one lying around. Too expensive.”

  “Yeah, everyone knows that,” Waverly said, grinning in Ray’s direction. “Okay, keep going.”

  “Well, I figured whoever was missing that shoe wouldn’t be too far away. The alley being right here, it seemed like the logical place to look. I figured someone would be passed out or puking their guts up down there. Finding those two people like that… That was the last thing I expected to see.” With that, he stopped talking.

  “Don’t quit now,” Waverly told him. “Give us the details.”

  The kid got flustered. “There’s not much to tell.”

  “What condition were the victims in when you found them?” Ray asked.

  “Dead I figured. No doubt about him. I didn’t touch her… I mean to check her pulse or anything like that. When I saw the blood pooled around her, I just figured she was a goner, too, you know? I called 9-1-1 right away, then I waited for the cops and ambulance to show up.” Keefer stopped to watch the man’s body being loaded into the vehicle, his Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed hard. “Anyway, I was surprised to hear the chick was still alive.”

  “Okay, Mr. Keefer,” Ray said. “What do you remember seeing? What kind of jewelry was she wearing?”

  “Jewelry?” He stared off into space for a moment. “I didn’t notice if she was wearing any.”

  “How about her purse?” Ray asked. “Where was it? Was it lying next to her or closer to the sidewalk maybe?”

  “I didn’t see one.”

  “You sure about that?” Waverly asked.

  Keefer took a step back. “Wait a minute. You don’t think I took that stuff, do you?”

  “Did you?”

  “Hell, no,” he told Waverly. “Hey, I did you guys a favor and called this in, and you go and accuse me of doing something like that? Next time I’ll just keep walking.”

  “Favor my ass,” Waverly said. “Notifying the authorities is what any decent person would do.”

  Ray moved on. “As you were walking down the sidewalk, Mr. Keefer, did you see anyone else in the area?”

  Cooperation evaporating, the kid said, “No one was around.”

  “Let me have your contact information,” Waverly said.

  “I already gave it to one of the cops.”

  “Good. Then we’ll have it in duplicate.” Keefer relented, and Waverly jotted down the information in his notepad. “You’re free to go, but you’re gonna have to come by the station to give us an official statement.”

  “Here.” Ray handed the kid his card before he had a chance to argue. “If you think of anything that might help, we’d appreciate it if you’d call us.”

  Seconds later, Waverly nudged Ray and pointed at the card lying on the sidewalk as Keefer walked away.

  “Hey!” Ray yelled. “Pick that up or I’ll fine your ass for littering.”

  The kid backtracked and snatched Ray’s card off the ground. Small
satisfaction.

  With the body gone and the police clamming up, the few media people who’d shown up at that hour took off. Chances were they’d gone after the scrawny Keefer kid the second he’d been sent on his way. Fair game.

  “One of us ought to get to the hospital to see if we can talk to the woman,” Ray said.

  “You go ahead, buddy. I’ll stick around and see what I can do here. Someone has to have seen something.” He pulled an officer aside. “I want a couple officers stationed here. The rest of us are going to check the area for witnesses.” He looked at his watch. “The bars and clubs are already closed, but somebody might still be hanging around. I’m gonna head west down Hennepin. Have everyone spread out.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Ray pulled his car keys out of his pocket. “You’ve got things under control here. Wish me luck at HCMC.”

  “You know I do,” Waverly said.

  3

  An hour and a half later, Waverly walked into the department and stopped at the coffeemaker.

  From his desk, Ray said, “I wouldn’t drink that, Dick. It’s battery acid in disguise.”

  Setting the coffee pot back on the burner, Waverly walked over and dropped into the chair on the other side of Ray’s desk. “Get anything?”

  “Once they got her to the hospital, our Jane Doe went straight into surgery.”

  “What’s her condition?” Waverly asked.

  “You know the privacy laws these days. They wouldn’t tell me anything, but I overheard a couple of nurses discussing a new female patient. It sounded like they expected her to make it. I can only hope they were referring to our victim. They let me get a good look at her and I took a photo for us to work with, but she’s on a ventilator, so it’s not a great shot.”

  “Is that it?”

  “There is one more thing,” Ray said. “She’s got an old scar across her throat.”

  “A surgical scar or something else?” Waverly asked.

  Ray shrugged. “Could be surgical, maybe not. I’ve started going through old case files, looking for assaults that might tie into that kind of injury. Nothing so far, though.” He stretched and yawned. “How about you—anything?”

  “We managed to scrounge up a couple of homeless guys and one drunk passed out outside of Sneaky Pete’s. Got zilch.”

  Groaning, Ray let his head drop back as he ran his hands over his face. “If I don’t get some sleep pretty soon, I won’t be able to come up with my own name let alone our victims’.”

  “You wanna pack it in and get a fresh start in the morning?” Waverly asked.

  “It’s already morning.”

  “Don’t go getting cranky on me, buddy. I could use about twelve hours of sleep myself. Whatd’ya say we meet back here when knowing our own names isn’t an issue anymore?”

  “Sounds good to me. I think I’ll eliminate the drive time and crash in one of the interview rooms.”

  “Whatever works for you,” Waverly said. “I’ve got a date with a soft mattress.”

  Within ten minutes, Ray knew Waverly had made the better choice. With the “Interview In Progress” sign on the outside of the door, there were no interruptions—no sleep either. Looking for a more comfortable spot, he went to his car, reclined the seat, and settled in. With his mind in overdrive, sleep still refused to come. He checked his watch at 4:16 AM.

  Sitting in the car wasn’t accomplishing anything, so he decided to put his time to better use. Ray drove out of the parking lot behind the station and headed toward the crime scene two blocks away. The shooting, having taken place practically on the station’s doorstep, made it all the more disturbing.

  The streets were dead. Outside the alley at the scene of the shooting, two officers kept the area secured. Ray began driving up and down the streets in a five-block radius of the crime scene. It stood to reason that somewhere in that vicinity, there was a car waiting for a driver who would never return. At that hour of the morning, the few vehicles he saw probably belonged to security or janitorial personnel. He took down the license numbers anyway.

  Within the final quadrant of the five-block circle, Ray reached the Brave New Workshop Comedy Theatre on Hennepin Avenue. Behind the building, Ray took note of three cars left in an otherwise vacant parking lot.

  He pulled in to take a closer look at the vehicles. The car nearest the lot entrance was an old beater largely devoured by rust. The next was an innocuous 2010 Chevy Cruz. At the back edge of the lot, looking like it had just come off a showroom floor, there was a single vehicle that sparked his interest more than any other he’d seen on his sweep of the area. The metallic-blue, Buick LaCrosse had probably been parked at the back to avoid dings. It looked as out of place in the nearly abandoned parking lot as the “John Doe” in that dingy alley.

  With the makes, models and plate numbers of six diverse vehicles recorded in his notepad, Ray returned to his abandoned parking spot behind the station. Exhausted, he decided running the plates would have to wait. Reclining his car seat once more, he finally surrendered to overdue sleep.

  4

  Ray heard three taps on the driver’s side window. “Hey, Sleeping Beauty, wake up.”

  It took a second for him to get his bearings. “Oh… Dick. What time is it?”

  “Seven, forty-eight,” Waverly said. “I thought you’d be inside.”

  Through a three-inch gap in his window Ray said, “I migrated. You want to grab breakfast at Key’s before we get to work?”

  “Nah, I’m not hungry,” Waverly said.

  The man outside the car had to be an imposter. Ray had never heard Waverly utter those words before… not strung together in that particular order, anyway. But for the past month or better, Waverly hadn’t just cut back on his meals, he’d begun cutting some of them out entirely, and that worried Ray.

  “Your belly probably hasn’t gotten the message you’re awake yet,” he said. “Give it another minute.”

  “I’d just as soon skip breakfast unless you’re hungry,” Waverly said.

  Ray wasn’t above using a little subterfuge to wheedle him into a face-to-face stand-off with a plate of food. “Sorry. I’ve got to get something to eat; I’m starving.” He ramped up the temptation factor another notch. “I could use a stack of buckwheat pancakes with banana this morning, or maybe some corned beef hash with toast and homemade strawberry jam. How about it?”

  “Fine. If you’re that hungry, let’s go.” Waverly got in the passenger’s seat and buckled up. “We can discuss our game plan while you eat and I get my caffeine fix.”

  Ray put the car in gear. “Did you have one of Phyllis’s poached egg and dry toast breakfasts before you left home?”

  “I managed to avoid that. I told her you were waiting for me.”

  “So, you lied.”

  “Not really. Awake or asleep you were still waiting for me, weren’t you?” He frowned as Ray turned right down Hennepin Avenue. “Where are you going? South Second Street is quicker.”

  “I know,” Ray said, “but there’s something I want to check first.” He drove to the comedy club as he’d done hours earlier. The Buick remained exactly where it had been.

  “That car…” Ray said, pointing at the LaCrosse. “It’s been there since at least four this morning—probably a lot longer. It could be our John Doe’s. ”

  Waverly nodded. “We can bat that around over breakfast, too.”

  At Key’s, they’d been lucky and got a table before they were all filled. “So that car…” Waverly said, pulling his chair in. “Wanna tackle that issue first?”

  Before Ray could answer, a pretty brunette waitress asked, “Can I start you off with some coffee?”

  “You better believe it,” Waverly told her, “and keep it coming. Oh, and a small orange juice. That’s it for me.”

  She started to hand a menu to Ray.

  “I know what I want.” Still hoping to tempt Waverly into eating something, he ordered Waverly’s favorite breakfast.

  The
waitress filled their cups and moved on with a chipper, “I’ll get that for you right away.”

  Waverly raised the cup to his lips. “Now about that car in the comedy club’s lot… What are you thinking?”

  “I told you. I’ve got a hunch it could belong to our John Doe. We know why he wouldn’t have gone back for it.”

  “Or it could belong to a sloshed customer who had sense enough to take a cab home.” Waverly blew on his coffee, his eyes on Ray. “The victim’s pricey suit and car match up, but the shooting happened blocks away.”

  “Some people actually like to walk. It’s not unheard of, Dick.”

  “Yeah, so I’ve heard.”

  “Maybe walking is something he liked to do. We agreed he looked to be in good shape.”

  “Right,” Waverly said, “for a dead man.”

  “Okay,” Ray said, “for the sake of argument, let’s suppose he was at the comedy club. It closes around ten or eleven… something like that, right? That’s pretty early. Maybe he wasn’t ready to call it a night yet. He could’ve walked down Hennepin to have another drink somewhere else before he headed home.” Like a chipmunk with a prized acorn, Ray tucked a mouthful of raspberry-topped Belgian waffle into a cheek. “Mmmm, that’s good. Want some?”

  “No thanks. You’re forgetting something, Ray. If he and that woman left the comedy club together, there’s no way she’d be up for a three-block hike in those stilettos she was wearing.”

  Ray stalled over another bite of waffle, then countered with, “Maybe he met her at his next stop.”

  “A pick up?”

  “Why not?” Ray asked.

  Waverly shrugged. “Can’t rule it out, I guess. We’re gonna be doing some bar hopping ourselves to track his movements… hers, too. At least we can skip the gay bars for starters.”

  Ray forced another mouthful of Belgian waffle into his mouth. “Mmm mmm. I can see why you love these artery cloggers.” He didn’t, but he tried to sound convincing.

  Waverly drank his coffee and followed it with an orange juice chaser. “So, what do you want to do until last night’s bartenders and wait staff show up for work again?”