“Working a job early this morning, then breakfast. So why the hell you here? And for that matter, why the two chiefs outside just for a burglary?”

My stash wall.

“Can we talk in your living room?”

That was a question.

“Yeah.”

They follow me into the living room.

Wires are hanging out of a hole in the wall where the flat-screen once was. Worst of all, the stereo equipment, including the old turntable and vinyl collection, most of which belonged to my mother, gone, along with my CD collection. Who’d steal vinyl? The laptop’s also missing from the coffee table.

“Shit,” I say.

Lot of activity in the kitchen. I try to get a glimpse. I got a strong feeling about what’s in there. The air has a nauseating sweet odor to it. I’m all too familiar with that smell.

Hurley lifts a couple of the cushions off the floor and places them back on the sofa. I sit on the edge so I can look toward the kitchen. Millhoff takes the armchair.

I light a smoke, offer one to Millhoff and Hurley.

Shake their heads.

“You have a roommate, Frankie?”

What kinda question is that?

“No, of course not. I live alone. You got a body in my kitchen,” I say, not ask.

“Yes, we do.”

“Police-involved shooting? The burglar?” I ask, assuming it was a burglary in progress that went bad.

“Not police-involved,” Millhoff says.

What the hell, then?

I feel uncomfortable as shit sitting there, high as I am. Racing heart and negative adrenalin is making it worse. My head like a hare trying to outrace a pack of wolves.

“You were working these last couple of hours?” Millhoff asks again.

“What?”

“What the fuck, Frank? I gotta ask. You know that.”

“What you gotta do is tell me what happened in my house.”

“All right. Was going to have to do this part anyway. May as well now.” He stands. “I’m going to need to see if you can identify the body.”

“Fuck,” I say more like an exhale of air.

Please, not my stash wall.

I need to know.

I snuff out my smoke and follow Millhoff through the dining room and into the kitchen. Another detective is there, but I don’t know him.

A body on the floor.

My back door busted inward, splintered frame.

A white male.

On his back.

It’s Jeffrey. My cousin. My legs buckle a bit, feeling like I’m about to fall out.

“Frank?” Millhoff sounds concerned.

Holy fuck!

His shirt’s rich with blood. A fresh color at the chest with an area near his waist that has pooled. Looks like strawberry Jell-O without the film coating. And this was the smell in my home—a lingering, disagreeably sweet odor. My cousin’s.

I drop to my knee.

“You okay, Frank?” Millhoff asks.

I don’t respond.