The Night Watchman Read online

  “It's staying right there. Maybe you can find some time between drunkenness and self-pity to read it and help me.”

  “I'm the night watchman!” My voice thundered through the pool area as she scurried around the corner. “I watch everyone else's life go by. I don't catch killers anymore. I'm lucky if I can even catch a cold now.”

  The maintenance man, Hector something-or-other, stood on the other side of the pool, staring at me. “Women troubles, no?” he said with a stupid grin.

  I didn't trust anyone who smiled all the time, and I didn't answer him as I hustled back to my kitchen. I had to walk past the file, which was taking up space on my coffee table.

  I grabbed Jim by the neck and decided to eliminate the middleman, leaving the glass on the counter. Her audacity stunned me. What did she think I would do, jump at the chance to take the case?

  I went over and sat on the couch, stretching out some. Any chance for a John Wayne marathon was now ruined. The whole foray back into the law enforcement world only elicited thoughts and feelings I wanted nothing to do with.

  6

  THE BIGGEST PROBLEM in living with Jim as a roommate was waking up. I didn't do too well after a late night with him.

  I'd had worse hangovers, but at least I got some sleep, so all was not lost. The dreams, though, were another matter—like some psychedelic montage of Jimi Hendrix music, colliding colorful images, and alcohol-induced plot lines that were like watching a foreign film without subtitles. Weird stuff, but it still beat most of the places my brain went at night without booze.

  All too often my dreams, when they weren't of Trisha, would be of me running, kicking, and doing all the things my body used to able to do. Then I'd wake up, still trapped in this altered reality, like some awful prison sentence with no chance of parole.

  I sat at the edge of my bed and massaged the carpet with my toes, debating how long I could reasonably stay here without getting up. Since all day was out of the question, I forced the issue and stood, wobbling more from my hangover than my leg. My bedroom was cave dark so I could sleep during the day. As much as sleep was possible.

  My mouth was dry and nasty. I checked out my frame in the full-length mirror on my closet door. My right leg—wrinkled and emaciated—looked like someone crept in during the night and switched it with an old man's.

  I grabbed my pants off the hook on my closet door and laid them on the floor. I slipped both feet in and sat back on the bed. I used my left foot to hook the waistband and lift up about eight inches so I didn't have to bend more at the hip. My left hand cinched them up and just over my knees. As I stood, I worked them up the rest of the way a technique Helga developed for me. I learned it quickly because she said if I didn't, I'd get more table time to stretch those muscles to make it work. It's amazing what a little negative reinforcement could accomplish.

  After the production, I caned my way down the hall to the kitchen. The angry chick's folder lay where she tossed it earlier. I didn't dare touch it and left it a good twenty feet away from me as I switched on the coffeepot.

  I grabbed cereal with a cheery captain on it—peanut butter crunch, my favorite—off the counter and dug in. Like making Pavlov's dog salivate, the aroma of coffee coaxed me into a semiconscious state, even before I hoisted my first cup. I'm not a coffee connoisseur by any stretch, and I wouldn't be caught dead in one of those expensive java shops, forking out five bucks for a cup. Coffee is merely my caffeine delivery system, and I prefer it hot, black, and strong enough to chip a tooth. If they ever made a caffeine IV drip, I'd be the first in line for it.

  I downed my first cup and hiked out to get the paper—the file maybe ten feet from me as I passed. It looked thick, but since I didn't really care what the stupid thing contained, I picked up the Orlando Sentinel and would peruse the mayhem in Mickey land before I got moving for the day.

  I sat at the kitchen table and turned to the Local section. A young man from the Parramore district was gunned downed in the street around 2:00 a.m. yesterday. No witnesses, or none coming forward. Police think it's drug related, according to Sergeant Yancey I turned to the Sports page. The Magic lost… again. Perusing the Entertainment section, I scanned for any decent movies. Nothing of interest.

  I glanced behind me toward the living room, the file still resting comfortably on the table. I bet they established a time line from David Hendricks's phone records and other statements. Did Hank Karpinski see anything odd that day during his shift? I shook my head. What did I care? The thing needed to go to the Dumpster.

  I folded the paper and ambled over to the coffee table. I scooped up the file, then started toward the door when a packet of pictures tumbled out onto the floor. As I turned back to pick it up, the entire contents spilled out. A heavy sigh escaped. The day wasn't starting out in my favor.

  I settled onto the arm of the couch and spiked my cane between my feet, resting my hands on the handle. The sum of Pampas's case lay scattered in front of me: police narratives, crime scene logs, inventory sheets, photos, diagrams, witness statements, and the medical examiner's report.

  Once, my life revolved around investigations like this, drawing me deep into the intimate and often chaotic lives of others. Murders were complicated. The acts themselves were explained easily enough—somebody shot someone for some reason. A then B then C. But probing the victims' personal lives and the suspects' motives was where homicide cops really earned their keep. Sifting through the complex, entangled, and often convoluted schemes of intersecting lives proved to be more art than science. I stabbed at the mess with my cane, the metal tip shuffling the papers around.

  Using the arm of the couch, I lowered myself to my good knee, then to a sitting position with my legs outstretched among the clutter. I gathered the papers, photo envelopes, and computer printouts, then returned them to the file. I struggled back up to the couch.

  What would it hurt to just give the material a glance? Better yet, who would know? I checked with the Duke's portrait, and he didn't seem to mind.

  I slipped Pampas's narrative labeled Murder-Suicide from the file. I scanned the eight pages. No immediate surprises. Everything appeared as it should if David Hendricks murdered his girlfriend, but the read whetted my appetite for more. As I pulled the two photo envelopes from the packet, I felt like some hopeless cop junkie. I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed perusing cases.

  The first series of pictures were of the kitchen, living room, and bathroom. Nothing outstanding there. Typical stuff like the thermostat showing the temperature, the windows in the locked position, the medicine cabinet open.

  The next set were of Hendricks's bedroom. One was from the doorway into the room, the same view I had in my brief time at the scene. The next was a closeup of David. I studied the photo and moved on slowly to the others.

  “Why would that be there?” I flipped back through the photos again, just to make sure I wasn't seeing things. “Now that's really odd.”

  7

  CREVIS SKULKED ALONG the condos' exterior rear doors, searching intently for a phantom white male I had convinced him passed by the cameras twice. I even added the detail of a red skullcap for a little creativity in the story That should keep him off my back for a while.

  I pulled the Hendricks file from my satchel and opened it at the desk. I waited until 2:00 a.m. because almost nothing happened at that time, and it would provide me privacy to review the pictures. Thumbing through the photos, I couldn't shake the nagging feeling that something was really wrong. I didn't like or respect Pampas, but I couldn't let that taint my observations.

  I placed the large-scale photo of the entire bedroom on the desk. The female victim, one Jamie DeAngelo, was lying on her back on the bed on top of the covers; the bed was made. She was fully clothed. One gunshot wound to the head. According to the report, the bullet traveled through the mattress and lodged in the wall molding. A pillow with powder burns on it lay on the floor next to the bed, probably used to silence the shots.

  David
's body was on the floor, crumpled in almost a fetal position. Pampas speculated that Hendricks shot himself while standing at the foot of the bed, then fell into that position. Maybe. The gun was next to his hand, and he had a wound on the right side of his head. The wound had a blue hue to it, marked by gunpowder burns and stippling consistent with a contact or near-contact shooting.

  A small white dot appeared on the wound, possibly matter from the pillow Pampas determined that pillow remnants must have hung in the air after Hendricks shot Jamie and then landed in the wound after he died. To be fair, small flecks of down dotted other areas of the crime scene. But the particle on his wound looked embedded. An abrasion or carpet burn covered the top of David's right knee. That injury had bled some, indicating that it occurred pre-mortem.

  I drew another photo and laid it next to the first. This one troubled me the most. The CSI documented blood from the exit wound on the floor next to Hendricks. The round that killed him was dug out of the wall about two and a half feet above the floor. A little low for a standing contact shot. The hands naturally tilt the weapon high for a self-inflicted wound, not low or downward. If Hendricks was standing, the trajectory of the shot was off. Even if he was on his knees when he pulled the trigger.

  Two shell casings were found on the floor to the right of both victims. I wished I'd spent a little more time in the scene that night. But my instincts screamed at me to get Pam and me out of there so we didn't destroy any evidence. The horror on Pam's face wasn't a pleasant memory.

  My chair groaned as I worked it back and forth. I glanced at the monitors to make sure the ever-vigilant ghost chaser was waging his war against midnight monotony. Crevis passed by the rear camera for the umpteenth time. He was still good for a while longer.

  If Hendricks killed Jamie and himself, why did he use the pillow to silence the shot? Maybe there was a good reason, but only David, or someone else, would know.

  Why was the round impact so low on the wall? They just didn't seem to fit.

  Why did David have an unaccounted-for abrasion on his right knee? Maybe he and Jamie fought beforehand, but she didn't have any defensive wounds, so it wasn't likely.

  Why in the world was I thinking about this at all? I surveyed the lobby and felt the cheap plastic security badge pinned to my shirt. It was so light I hardly noticed it. Not like the thick tin badge I wore before, with a weight that never let me forget it was there.

  I closed the file. So many months had passed since I considered investigative procedures that my instincts probably suffered from bedsores and atrophy. Yet with every review of the photos and supplements, I felt more and more drawn to the case. But I was a night watchman now. How far would I take this with Pam?

  I checked the monitors again. Crevis hid behind a bush by the back door, scanning the entrance and street for evildoers. I decided to check out David's condo to get a stronger feel for the scene. Maybe I was just being weird about all this; a walk-through would put these nutty notions to rest.

  In short order, I was at his door and used the passkey to let myself in. I flipped on the light switch to a barren room. They hadn't sold this unit yet, but all of David's things had been cleared out. I eased down the hall and turned on the light in the bedroom. My second visit to this room was a bit more pleasant. The carpet had been ripped out, probably to be replaced soon. The bullet holes had been patched but not yet painted over. My cane thumped on the wooden floor as I paced along the room.

  I didn't believe in psychic energy or karma or dead spirits yearning to communicate with our world. But I did believe in going back through a crime scene to get a feel for the crime, to put myself in the killer's mind, and to understand everything that happened. I held up Jamie's picture where the bed used to be and David's photo where he had been. How did this go down? Did David Hendricks murder Jamie DeAngelo here? Or was something else in play?

  The front door jiggled, and I turned off the light and returned the pictures to the file. My heart throbbed, and I reached back and drew my pistol from my waistband. The front door creaked open, and heavy steps approached the room. I stepped back and raised the sights to the middle of the doorway, waiting for whoever was coming my way.

  A man walked into the room, the backlight from the hallway silhouetting him. I wasn't sure if he could see me in the darkened room or not. His hand moved to the side. He flipped on the light.

  “Don't move,” I told him, my sights trained on his mug.

  Crevis's hands rose. “I give up.” His shock quickly transformed into a grin. “I knew you kept a gun on you. Let me hold it.”

  “You might get a better look at it if you sneak up on me like that again.” I slipped the pistol back in my holster and tucked my shirt around it to conceal it. “How did you know I was here?”

  “I looked for you in the lobby, and I saw the elevator just went to the fourth floor. I figured you were coming here to poke around.”

  Not a bad deduction for Crevis. His attention beaded in on the file. “What are you doing with that stuff? Are you like a secret cop plant or something?”

  “Yes, and I flew in on my government helicopter to keep an eye on the Coral Bay Condos.” I started toward the door. “You need to get a life, Crevis.”

  “Really, Ray” He trailed me. “What are you doing here?”

  “Let's go back downstairs. We shouldn't be up here in the first place.” I'd messed up big-time. Crevis would be bouncing around like a carnival monkey until I told him what was going on.

  As I hurried from the room, my foot caught the lip of the carpet in the hallway, and I crashed my crippled carcass against the wall, face first, and then fell to the floor. I rolled onto my back, and Crevis hovered over me.

  “Are you okay?” He grabbed my arm and attempted to slip his hands under my armpits.

  “Don't touch me!” I slapped his hands away. “Don't ever put your hands on me again.”

  Crevis stepped back. “Sorry, Ray. I was just trying to help.”

  “If you really want to help, stay away from me. Now get going. Move!”

  Crevis's shoulders lowered, and he walked around me and hustled out of the condo, slamming the door behind him.

  Horizontal in the hallway, I stared at an uncovered light bulb. The sum of my life had come to this—flopping on the floor like a wounded turtle on its back, waiting for someone to right him again.

  I hated my life. And I loathed the fact that I secretly hoped Crevis would return and insist on helping me off the floor because I wasn't sure if I could do it myself. But I'd rather have a second set of crime scene tape put up on this condo to mark my death than to pull out my radio and call Crevis back.

  My cane was next to me, so I clutched it in my hand. I drew my left leg up and planted it on the ground. I stabbed my cane onto the carpet on my left side and braced my right hand on the wall. With an awkward and ugly push, I twisted myself off the floor.

  I paused to catch my breath. How in the world would I chase down leads in this case, and maybe pursue a killer, when a stiff breeze could put me on my keister for the count?

  8

  AS USUAL, I WAS about fifteen minutes early to the Clubhouse on Pine Street downtown. In the old days whenever I was meeting an informant, I'd always set the time and place and would arrive early—to scout it out beforehand. I wanted to see if anyone wanted to see me. It's a cop thing. The marm was unlikely to ambush me, but some habits were harder to break than others. Another casualty of the job.

  I sat in the outdoor pavilion and ordered iced tea. The patio didn't have the closed-in feel the inside did. The Clubhouse had a decent sports bar inside with several televisions playing various games. I gave half attention through the glass to a soccer match. I've never been a team-sports guy and much preferred individual competition: boxing, kickboxing, wrestling (Greco-Roman, not the cheesy television stuff), and mixed martial arts. You had to rely only on yourself, and you had no one else to blame if something went wrong. Now the only sport I'd be competing in was s
huffleboard.

  Pam Winters scurried up the sidewalk and rushed through the door without seeing me in the patio area. It seemed she liked to be early too, or was just overly curious as to why I called her. She talked with the hostess. I held up my hand when she turned in my direction. She serpentined her way through the patrons and tables and emerged into the patio area.

  Her face revealed the conflicting emotions she must be experiencing—apprehension at seeing me again after our last meeting, and nagging curiosity about my phone call. After a pregnant pause long enough to give birth to triplets, I pointed to the chair next to me.

  She sat with her purse clutched on her lap. Pam was an attractive woman. She wore blue jeans and a red button-up shirt; her blond hair was tied back in a ponytail. We didn't exchange pleasantries, only awkward stares until she broke the silence.

  “I'm glad you called. I've wanted to talk with you since… the other day.”

  “Yeah, I wanted to talk too, but I thought we should meet in a public place, just in case you were going to beat me up again.” I twisted the handle of my cane, digging the tip into a crack in the concrete.

  Her shoulders lowered. “I'm so sorry. I've never hit anyone before in my life.”

  “Well, you're pretty good at it.” The nicest part about religious people is you can use guilt against them like a carefully crafted blade, slicing at will with surgical precision. She'd be easier than expected. “If you kick like you punch, you could make a good bantamweight kickboxer. You'd probably rule the division, maybe even be a world champion.”

  She didn't look at me, her eyes fixed on the pavement. I detest any man who would strike a woman, but I had no problem with a little psychological payback for her smacking me.

  “Well, you'll be happy to know I've decided not to have you arrested. But I think you loosened a crown.” I rubbed my jaw. “We'll have to work out the dental bills later.”