The Man Behind The Badge

“Nobody heard anything?” Hank asked.

“Well, our people are questioning the other occupants, but nobody called in a shooting. And in a building like this, if someone heard shots... I’d say the perp used a silencer.”

“I’d say you’re probably right,” Travis agreed. “How about the doors? Any sign of forced entry?”

“Uh-uh.”

“Who discovered the body?”

“The building manager. He had an appointment to see the vic about some repairs. And when Parker didn’t answer his door...”

Travis nodded. “We’ll want to talk to him, but we’ll have a look inside first. The medical examiner arrived yet?”

“Uh-huh. Ten minutes ago.”

When the officer turned to open the door, an all-too-familiar feeling of uneasiness crawled up Travis’s spine. Even after four years in Homicide, walking in on a murder scene hadn’t become routine to him. Each was different, and you never knew just how grisly any particular one would be.

This didn’t seem too bad, he saw, relaxing a little as they stepped into the apartment. Nothing gruesome. Not at first glance, anyway.

A large, expensively furnished living room lay beyond the foyer—the body of a white, middle-aged man sprawled on the floor. Rob Gentry, an M.E. Travis and Hank had crossed paths with several times before, stood over it, making notes. A couple of the tech team members were methodically working away in the room. The others would be scattered throughout the rest of the apartment.

Hank closed the door; Gentry looked over and nodded a greeting.

Travis nodded back, breathing shallowly as he pulled on a pair of latex gloves. At his very first homicide, the coppery smell of drying blood had made him throw up. Since then, he’d been more careful.

“I hear he was a psychiatrist,” he said to Gentry.

“Right. In private practice. His office area is through there,” he added, gesturing in the direction of a hall that ran off the far corner of the living room.

“Forty-five years old, according to his driver’s license.” This time, Gentry gestured toward the coffee table. Its surface was clear except for a drugstore photo envelope sitting at one end and a wallet at the other.

“Wallet was in his bedroom,” he said as Travis focused on it. “One of the techs brought it out.”

The M.E. turned toward the body again and continued giving them details. “Killed last night between about nine and midnight. Four .38-caliber wounds to the chest from close range. Died almost instantly. Nothing indicates he was trying to defend himself.”

“So he probably knew the killer. Had no concern about letting him in, then got taken by surprise.”

“That’s how I read it. Oh, and from the angle of the entry wounds I’d say the perp was quite a bit shorter than Parker. Probably not more than five-seven or -eight.”

“Possibly female, then,” Travis said to Hank. “That could explain why the vic was taken by surprise.”

He nodded. “A .38’s a lady’s gun.”

“By the way,” Gentry said, “there’s a contact-in-emergency card in his wallet.”

Travis picked up the wallet, flipped through it and removed the card.

Originally, “Adele Langley” and “Mother” had been printed on the next-of-kin and relationship lines. That information had been scratched through and replaced with “Celeste Langley” and “Sister.” The phone number had been changed, as well.

Absently, he wondered whether the mother had died or if Parker had just decided the sister would make a better contact.

“Langley, not Parker,” Hank said, peering at the card. “Mother must have remarried before she had the daughter.”

“Hey, you should be a detective,” Travis told him.

He grinned. “Yeah, well, guess we’d better send a uniform to the sister’s and let her know what’s happened. Give me that number and I’ll get an address to go with it.”

As Hank took his cell phone from his pocket, Travis handed him the card. Then he walked over to one of the techs and asked if they’d come across an address book.

“Uh-huh. There’s one in the end table.”

“Good. If it hasn’t already been checked for prints would you mind doing that right away? I’d like to take it with me. And there’s got to be an appointment book in the office. Same thing with it. Oh, and if there’s a Rolodex, it, too.”

“Sure.”

“Thanks.”

He’d have to call Parker’s Monday appointments and cancel them, then get one of the support staff to do the same for the rest of the week.

The apartment would remain a restricted crime scene until they were sure they had everything they needed. And he didn’t want any patients showing up, expecting a session, and finding yellow tape and an officer outside the door.

After glancing around the room and seeing nothing else that grabbed his attention, he headed back across to the coffee table and picked up the photo envelope. The label on it was dated a year ago; the snapshots looked as if they were from a family gathering of some sort.

On the back of each picture, in the same neat printing as on the next-of-kin card, were the names of the people in the shot.

There were three of Parker with the same older woman. Printed on them was “Me and Mom.”

After flipping past a few more pictures, Travis paused at one of “Mom” standing beside a much younger woman—an attractive blonde.

“Not bad,” Hank commented, finishing his call and sticking the phone back in his pocket. “But her hair’s too short.”

Travis turned the photo over. It bore the words “Mom and Celeste.”

“The sister,” he said, just as the officer outside the door opened it and called, “Detectives?”

“Yeah?” Hank said.

“Got a minute?”

Through the doorway, Travis could see a second uniform in the hallway—clearly dying to tell them something.

“There’s a guy who’s been staying with a friend in 501,” he began before they’d even stepped out of the apartment. “He came home around ten last night. And when he got off the elevator a woman was in the hall here, hurrying for the stairs. He’d never seen her before, but like I said, he’s only a visitor.”

Travis glanced toward the staircase at the end of the hallway. Few people on the fifth floor of a building would choose the stairs over an elevator. Not unless they were trying to avoid being seen.

“Did your guy have any idea which apartment she’d come from?” Hank was asking.

“No.”