I still had friends in the DA’s office, and I found one who was young, persuasive, and not afraid to call a judge after the dinner hour. Forty-five minutes later, I had a search warrant in my hand.

I called Conklin.

“Open up the trunk,” I told him. “I’ll hold while you do it.”

I heard Conklin talking to McNeil in the background, the metallic crack of a crowbar snapping the trunk lock, McNeil barking, “Oh, shit. Goddamn it.”

“Conklin? Conklin?” I was gripping the edge of my desk, white-knuckled by the time Rich got back on the line. He was breathing hard.

“There’s a frickin’ body in the trunk, Lou. Wrapped up in a quilt.”

I stared at Jacobi, not having to say what I was thinking because I knew he was thinking it, too. The missing body had turned up. But whose body was it?

“You checked for a pulse?”

“Yes, Lieutenant. He’s dead. White male. Brown hair. Looks to be in his thirties. He’s covered with blood, Lieutenant. Soaked with it.”

“Lock down the scene. Stay with that car until the ME and CSU arrive,” I said. “I want that car brought back to the lab. And, Richie, make sure it’s handled like a newborn baby.”

Chapter 135

Chapter 135

IT WAS AFTER 11:00 P.M. on what was turning out to be one of the longest days of my life. Jacobi and I were in the box with Garza, the three of us stinking of sweat. The flat overhead light was making shadows dance dizzyingly against the gray tile walls.

I figured that I felt like Garza looked.

And he looked like a gargoyle, a monstrous, murdering gargoyle. And like a gargoyle, he wasn’t talking.

I was this close to squeezing his purpled jaw between my fingers to make him scream. I hated the sight of him so much.

Instead, I gave him a Tylenol, a cup of water, and a bunch of ice cubes in a paper towel for his swollen jaw.

And he’d given me nothing back.

His arrogance was remarkable, stonewalling us even though we’d found a dead man inside his car.

“You should help yourself, you know, Dennis?” I was on a first-name basis with him because I knew he resented it.

“I should have an X ray.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’m pretty sure my jaw is fractured. I might have a concussion, too.”

“How’d that happen?” Jacobi asked, tapping the point of a pencil on the table. It was a faint, brittle sound. Irritating. And menacing. I thought if I left Jacobi alone with Garza he’d bounce him off the walls. Might even kill him. I pulled out a chair and sat down.