The Perfect Affair

“What does that mean?” Jessie demanded.

But before he could answer they had reached the door. A burly officer named Lester stood just outside the taped off unit. He looked as wary as the cop outside but less nervous. Jessie observed that Ryan didn’t show his badge to this guy.

“This area is off limits,” Officer Lester said brusquely. “Police business. The officer outside should have told you.”

“Oh yeah?” Ryan whispered in a curious, very un-detectivelike tone. “What happened? You can tell me.”

“I’m not at liberty to say,” Lester snapped. “Are you a resident of this building, sir? Because we can’t have civilians just wandering through a crime scene.”

“Oh no, we wouldn’t want that,” Ryan agreed smarmily. “That’d be almost as bad as removing a dead body before the assigned detectives got a chance to evaluate the scene. Am I right?”

The officer narrowed his eyes at the question, now fully aware that something unusual was going on.

“Who are you, sir?” he asked, his brusqueness now laced with a hint of apprehension.

“I’m sure as hell not a Valley Bureau detective,” Ryan said, his voice booming.

“Sir…” the officer began, clearly flummoxed.

“It’s okay, Lester,” said a bald, barrel-chested officer who walked up behind him. “Don’t you know who that is? It’s the famed detective Ryan Hernandez from Central Station. You can let him in. But be sure to get his autograph before he leaves.”

“Sergeant Costabile, I assume?” Ryan asked, his eyebrows raised.

“That’s right,” Costabile said with a sneering grin. “To what do we owe the honor of your presence, Detective? Showing your long-legged, pretty lady friend how the other half lives out here in the Valley?”

“My ‘long-legged, pretty lady friend’ is actually criminal profiler Jessie Hunt. You know, she’s the one who catches serial killers almost as often as you catch venereal diseases.”

There was a long, uncomfortable silence in which Jessie thought Costabile might simply pull out his gun and shoot Ryan. The man’s nasty grin faded so that it was now a nasty scowl. After what felt like an eternity, the sergeant gave a loud, forced guffaw.

“I guess I deserved that,” he said, glancing over at Jessie, not sounding even mildly chastened. “It was rude of me to be so dismissive of you, Ms. Hunt. Your reputation precedes you. I can only imagine what law enforcement lottery allowed us to be graced with your singular genius this evening. Pray tell, what brings you here?”

Jessie wanted desperately to respond to the mockery with some of her own but didn’t want to upset whatever plan Ryan clearly had in mind. So she choked down her disdain.

“I’m afraid I can’t be completely forthcoming,” she said apologetically. “But I’ll let Detective Hernandez share what he’s able to.”

“Thanks, Ms. Hunt,” Ryan said, smoothly taking the baton. “We just happened to be in the area wrapping up an interview when we got the alert about this case. It sounded like it might be part of a pattern we’re investigating and we thought we’d check it out firsthand.”

“You think this is related to a case you’re working?” Costabile asked disbelievingly.

“It’s possible,” Ryan said. “We’d have to look at the body to draw any firm conclusions. Of course, we don’t want to step on the toes of the detectives already assigned. Who might that be?”

Costabile stared at Ryan, taking note of his challenging tone. It was clear that Ryan knew there were no detectives on the scene yet. Costabile appeared to be debating whether to answer the spoken question seriously or address the one below the surface about what exactly was going on here.

“Detective Strode should be here momentarily,” he finally said in a disturbingly polite tone. “But we were prepping the body to be viewed down at the coroner’s. Everything looks pretty open and shut. We didn’t want to waste department resources unnecessarily.”

“Sure, sure. I get it,” Ryan replied, using the same official but not genuine politeness as Costabile. “All the same, maybe we take a look here so as to not compromise the scene. We are talking about a teenage girl stabbed in her own bed…how many times?”

Costabile’s face turned red and it looked like it was taking an enormous effort for him to keep his composure.

“Nine…that we’re aware of.”

“Nine times?” Ryan repeated. “That seems like a lot. Doesn’t that seem like a lot to you, Ms. Hunt?”

“It seems like a lot,” Jessie agreed.

“Yeah, a lot,” Ryan added for emphasis. “So maybe we dot the ‘i’s’ and cross the ‘t’s’ on this one before tossing the girl into a plastic bag and driving her over a bunch of pothole-strewn Valley streets? You know, just to be thorough.”

He smiled sweetly as if he’d merely been discussing the weather. Costabile did not smile back.

“Are you taking over this investigation, Detective?” the sergeant asked flatly, not commenting on the pothole dig.

“Not at this point, Sergeant. Like I said, we just want to see if the killing fits our pattern. You’re not denying us access to the body, are you?”

That question led to another uncomfortable silence. Jessie watched another officer named Webb wander over from inside the apartment and take up a position right behind Costabile. His right hand was resting uncomfortably close to his gun holster. She glanced back and saw that Officer Lester had now stepped inside the police tape and was standing behind them, assuming the same posture with his hand in the same position.

Costabile looked down at his shoes and kept his gaze there for several seconds. Ryan stared at the top of the man’s head, his eyes unblinking. Jessie was afraid to breathe. Finally, Costabile looked up. A vein on his forehead bulged. His eyes were angry slits. Slowly, he opened them and his body seemed to relax slightly.

“Come on in,” he said, waving his hand in an exaggerated welcome.

Ryan stepped forward and Jessie followed. As she moved into the apartment, she reminded herself it was okay to breathe again.

CHAPTER FIVE

It was hard to stay focused.

With so much testosterone bouncing around the apartment, Jessie was still slightly apprehensive that a shootout might break out any moment.

She tried to force the simmering animosity out of her brain as she walked through the place. She needed to have a clear head from this point forward. The coroner might focus on the state of the body and the crime scene folks might look for blood spatter or fingerprints. But she needed to be aware of everything that contributed to the psychological makeup of the victim. Even the smallest detail could lead to the killer.

The apartment was fairly unremarkable. It was clear to her from the décor that both residents were female even though the gender of the victim’s roommate hadn’t been mentioned. One of them was clearly way more personally conservative than the other. The wall art was a confusing amalgam of watercolors and religious iconography next to Gustav Klimt prints and incendiary Mapplethorpe photos.

As she walked down the hall, Jessie got the distinct sense that the more outré roommate was also the one with more money. Her style seemed far more dominant. When they passed the smaller bedroom, she glanced in and saw a cross on the wall above the dresser.

So the one who could afford the bigger bedroom died.

Sure enough, they continued on to the larger bedroom at the end of the hall, from where she could hear voices.

“You up for this, criminal profiler lady?” Costabile asked derisively.

“She’s been…” Ryan started to say but she cut him off.

“I’m good,” she answered.

She didn’t need him standing up for her professional virtue. And she definitely didn’t want another tough guy competition when she was trying to concentrate. Ignoring whatever stare-down was going on behind her, she took a deep breath and stepped into the bedroom.

Before even looking at the body, she allowed her eyes to scan the room. There were more of the bold decorating choices on the walls and a disco ball lamp beside the bed. A chair in the corner was on its side and magazines were scattered on the floor, hinting at a struggle. The desk was mostly empty, though there was a clean, rectangular spot surrounded by a layer of dust, a sure sign that a laptop had recently been there.

“TV is still here,” Ryan noted. “So is the gaming console. Seems like an odd decision for a thief to leave that stuff.”