I hear some rustling and then my father is suddenly on the line.
“That woman is out to ruin your brother’s career,” he barks.
“Looks like he’s doing a pretty good job of that himself,” I counter, but it meets with deaf ears.
Not that I expected anything else.
“He’s running for mayor and had to clean house before putting his name on the ballot. That woman took it to the press and now we have a mess on our hands.”
Only my father would compare putting your child and his mother on the street to cleaning house. As pissed as I am at Tamara for trying to pull a fast one over on me, I’m disgusted at the depths my family is willing to go to preserve the VanDyken name.
“That mess is your grandson.”
My father snorts. “We only have her word for it, and now we have that reporter sniffing around.”
I drop my head. No concern for the welfare of a two-and-a-half-year-old child, but I’m sure he’s having sleepless nights about any scandal touching him.
“Alex will have to step up financially. Take responsibility. It will blow over, but at least he won’t be known as a callous bastard. Maybe he can try running again in a few years.”
“You never understood!” he barks. My turn to snort, because my father’s right, I never did. “This can all be resolved if you claim the boy as yours. Not like you have anything worthwhile to lose.”
He has no idea.
“That’s a hell no. I can’t even wrap my head around the fact you’d ask me.”
“Then why the hell’d you call?” he snarls.
“Fuck if I know. Maybe I thought—”
I don’t get to finish my sentence because a sharp click announces the conversation is over.
Blackfoot is just getting out of his vehicle when I walk up to the station.
“You okay?”
It’s on my lips to blow him off, but then I remember the talk we had about trust between partners not that long ago.
“No.” Keith seems taken aback by my honesty. “My family is fucked up beyond belief.”
It’s funny, I’ve been with the department for several years now and no one has ever connected me to my somewhat prominent family. That had been a daily occurrence while I was still in Boston.
“That who the call was from? Your family?”
“Of sorts. That was my ex-fiancée, reputedly now my brother’s disgruntled ex-mistress as well, and she’s looking for some restitution. Willing to use her child for leverage.”
His face registers surprise.
“Child? Sounds messy.”
“You have no idea. I’m happy to elaborate, but that’s gonna require alcohol and more time than we have right now.”
Blackfoot pulls the door open for me.
“Holding you to that,” he grunts when I pass.
Ramirez is waving a piece of paper when we walk into the bullpen.
“Fax came in from the lab. Bones belong to the same vic. Dennis Heath,” he says triumphantly. “Except for one…” He lets it drag out for effect before clarifying, “A single finger bone that belonged to Margaret McClintock.”
“The prostitute?” Joe heard the last bit when walking into the office.
“One and the same,” he confirms. “Also, I just got off the phone with Agent Roosberg, who received confirmation from the field office in Farmington the van was parked in the crematorium staff lot. It’s been loaded on a flatbed truck and is on its way. She also sent me the last-known address for the suspect, which doesn’t match his DMV registration. Looks like Billy McCarty is going down.”
“Anything new from Ward?” Keith asks.
“Luna said Gomez waited around for this information before heading out there. He’s on his way now.”
Feels good when the pieces start to fit into place. Even though it looks like McCarty is our man, I hold no illusions the investigation ends there. For one thing, I don’t think the man was working alone, and there’s no way Ward was an innocent bystander in all this. Then there’s young Dunwoody, what was his role? Victim of circumstance or active participant? Still a ton of loose ends that need to be tied off, not the least of which is what the motive was in all this.
The most obvious guess would be greed. Hard as it is to believe, there’s an actual black market for body parts, and as I understand it, there’s quite a bit of money to be made. McCarty certainly had means and opportunity, although we’ve yet to find where he would’ve dismembered and kept the bodies, or who he would’ve been selling to.
“We need to find McCarty,” Joe urges. “I have a feeling he’s hiding out and I need everyone on this before he disappears altogether.”
Sounds like it’s going to be a long night.
Meredith
“Bastard.”
I catch Paul mumbling under his breath as he removes the elderly woman’s clothing.
Both he and Lauren had come running upstairs at the ruckus Dunwoody was causing. After police carted him off, I asked Paul to take Janey home, even though she insisted she was fine, and installed Lauren at the front desk. Then I’d gone into my office and closed the door.
The next half hour I spent trying to figure what the hell just happened. Not with Dunwoody—Keith explained he must’ve come from the police station straight here—but with Jay.
I heard him say her name and I could see the impact it had on him. He disappeared outside and I’d watched him through the door, standing with his feet planted wide—as if to brace himself—and his head sinking lower between his shoulders. When he finally came back inside, his face was set in a grim expression, and he barely even looked at me as he blew me off.
The worst part of not knowing is the length your imagination will go to in an attempt to fill in the blanks.
By the time Paul knocked on my door to announce he was back and heading downstairs, I was glad for the distraction.
I step closer to the autopsy table to see what he’s looking at and notice the bruising on the woman’s frail body.
“I want shots of every single one of those,” I grind out between clenched teeth.
Some cases get under your skin and I already know this one will remain with me for a long time, as Paul starts snapping pictures. Maybe it’s because I’m still a bit shaken with what happened earlier, but I have to fight the urge to wrap that poor, frail body in my arms. To have something other than angry hands be the last thing she knows.
Of course it’s too late; whoever was once Dorothy Zalinski is long gone and just her battered shell remains. Still, Paul and I both handle her body as gently and respectful as we can, each of us silent. We make sure we meticulously gather every little shred of evidence to take down her grandson for what he did to her.
It’s already close to six when Paul covers her body and wheels the gurney into the cooler, where it’ll stay until the funeral home comes to collect her in the morning.
Officer Collier is still standing guard in the lobby when I go to send Lauren home.
“You should go too,” I tell him. “I have a report to finish but can lock up behind you. I’ll call VanDyken when I’m done.”
“Actually, he called. Asked me to take you home. He’s working late.”