Knobb smirked, crossed his arms under his chest, and leaned his shoulder against the wall. “You know what I think? You’re feeding me a line of bullshit. You’re eager for another murder to solve to capitalize on your moment in the spotlight and this corpse happens to be handy.”

“So you haven’t closed it yet.”

He straightened up, taking a more defensive posture. “Don’t sound so hopeful. You aren’t getting the case. You’ll have to wait for a body to drop in your jurisdiction.”

She resisted the urge to remind him that he was being very protective of a case that he’d pushed into her jurisdiction just a few days ago but she didn’t think that would be a persuasive argument. So she took a different approach.

“The morning after three people were murdered and dismembered with a knife, your victim was found with his throat slit in a truck parked a hundred yards from where our killer lives. I think that’s a mighty big coincidence, don’t you?” Eve said. Knobb pursed his lips, considering the implications. “I don’t want your case, Frank. I just need to know what you’ve got. What’s the harm in telling me? We both want the same thing here, to catch whoever killed him.”

Knobb sighed in resignation and gestured for her to follow him into the detective bureau. The cubicles were large, each with Plexiglas dividers on two sides that created a more open feel around sleek curved desks with flat-screen monitors and stylish ergonomic desk chairs. He sat down at his cubicle, wheeled over a chair for her, and she sat down.

“The victim’s name is Roger Karpis,” Knobb said. “He works at Malibu Creek State Park.”

She was familiar with Malibu Creek State Park. It was eight thousand acres of peaks, canyons, rolling hills, and meadows south of Mulholland Highway and west of Las Virgenes. It was originally owned by 20th Century Fox, which used it as various locations for hundreds of movies and television shows. The studio donated the property in the mid-’70s to the state, which opened it to the public as a park, but there were film crews in there shooting on almost a daily basis. Some deputies, like Garvey, made extra cash off-hours working as set security. The Paramount Ranch bordered the northwest end of the park and also doubled as a shooting location and state recreation area.

“Karpis was a forest ranger?” Eve asked.