They moved deeper into the abandoned space. On a wooden sawhorse in front of one of the windows, an amateur gunslinger had shot up old bottles of Mad Dog.

“Uh, Detective,” Yarmark said, pointing at the broken shards and then at the starburst cracks in the glass blocks. “Maybe we should tag this. If the killer’s been practicing his shooting, it might tell us something about him.”

Nodding, Somers dropped into a squat and played his flashlight over the debris. “It’s a good thought. Take another look.”

After a moment, Yarmark nodded. “BBs.”

“Anything else?”

“Oh, shit. The dust. Even the broken pieces have been here for ages.”

“You had the right idea: check everything.” Then he grinned. “You want to see if the killer likes pizza?”

“Christ on the cross, no fucking way. I gotta change drawers when I get home.”

Somers stood and continued deeper into the building. They were reaching the end of the first large room, where an opening in the wall ahead communicated with the next section of the plant. Outside the building, the vegetation must have been thicker, because less light made it through the narrow windows. Somers hadn’t walked around the building; maybe trees had grown up, and that would explain what was blocking the light. The iron rails in the floor guided them deeper into the plant. Somers wondered why the metal had been left. Perhaps it was simply not worth the effort to rip it up from the floor.

“If, uh, you could not tell anybody,” Yarmark said in a quiet voice, his flashlight jiggling on the floor, his gaze fixed somewhere off in the darkness. “About, you know. The pizza box.”

Another grin broke out, and Somers fought to control it. “I had about six weeks on patrol when I got a call for a domestic. We were short that night, and I was working alone. I worked Smithfield, and—”

“Smithfield?” Yarmark’s head swiveled, and he was looking at Somers now. “Alone?”

“Different times,” Somers said with a shrug. “And, like I said, we were short that night. Anyway, I drove out there. Jesus, it was this little shotgun thing, barely bigger than a matchbox, weeds in the yard up to my waist, a chain-link fence someone had knocked down halfway and left sagging out over the sidewalk. Just shitty, you know. And domestics are so nasty, you never know what’s going to happen. One of them might turn on you. Both of them might. You’re getting into the middle of one of the worst moments of someone’s life; nobody can think rationally during that. Anyway, I was really juiced up, you know. I was young. I was hot shit. I knew I was hot shit.” He toed a can of Bush’s pork and beans toward Yarmark and raised an eyebrow.

“Too old,” Yarmark said, “they’ve changed the label on the can.”

“Good call. Can’t smell it, either. And you can see where it’s been on the ground; it left an outline in all the junk that’s come down around it.” They moved forward again. “Anyway, the lights are on. I knock on the door, announce myself, and the door swings open. Silence. I’m on this adrenaline high. I’m not thinking; remember, I’m hot shit. So I announce myself again and what do I do?”