“They’re placed in an urn and kept for two years. If a verified relative steps forward and pays $541 to cover transportation costs, they get the urn. If no one claims the urn, the ashes are scattered in a mass grave at the Evergreen Memorial Cemetery in Boyle Heights— that’s East L.A., near the coroner’s office. The graves are marked with numbers. It’s a group scattering, no individual identification is possible. Not all the unclaimed bodies are kept at the main crypt. Some are out in Sylmar, which is a suburb north of L.A., and others are even farther out in Lancaster, which is a city in the Antelope Valley— the high desert, maybe seventy miles east.”

Rattling off the facts in the low, emotionless voice of a reluctant penitent.

Giacomo took it without flinching. Seemed almost to revel in the details. I thought about the cheap plastic urns the county used. Bundles stacked in room after room of the cold-storage basement on Mission Road, bound by sturdy white rope. The inevitable rot that sets in because refrigeration slows decomposition but doesn’t stop it.

During my first visit to the crypt, I hadn’t thought that through and expressed surprise to Milo at the greenish patches mottling a corpse lying on a gurney in the basement hallway.

Middle-aged man with a John Doe designation, awaiting transfer to the crematorium. Paperwork laid across his decaying torso, listing the meager details known.

Milo’s answer had been painfully glib: “What happens to steak when you leave it in the fridge too long, Alex?”

Now he told Lou Giacomo: “I’m really sorry for your situation, sir. If there’s anything else you want to tell us about Tori, I’d like to hear it.”

“Like what?”

“Anything that would help find her.”

“The restaurant she worked, her mother thinks it had something with ‘Lobster’ in it.”

“The Lobster Pot,” said Milo. “Riverside Drive, in Burbank. It went out of business eighteen months ago.”

“You checked it out,” said Giacomo, surprised. “You’re looking for Tori because you do think it had something to do with the other girl.”

“I’m exploring all the possibilities, sir.”

Giacomo stared at him. “You got something you’re not telling me?”

“No, sir. When are you going back home?”

“Who knows?”

“Where are you staying?”

“Same answer,” said Giacomo. “I’ll find something.”

“There’s a Holiday Inn on Pico past Sepulveda,” said Milo. “Not far from here.”

“Why would I wanna be close to here?” said Giacomo.

“No reason.”

“What, you wanna keep tabs on me?”

“No, sir. Got plenty to do.” Milo motioned to me. The two of us headed for the door.

The bespectacled woman said, “Was everything tasty, Lieutenant?”

Milo said, “Great.”

Lou Giacomo said, “Yeah, everything’s fantastic.”

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 13