“I can’t talk for long. But I thought you should know there’s been a hit on Michaela Penn’s stolen laptop. It was just pawned at a shop on Victory Boulevard in North Hollywood.”
“Is the seller still there?”
“No,” Burnside said. “But the shop owner knows him—a guy named Pete Vasquez. Says he pawns stuff in there all the time. He also said Vasquez took the cash and immediately walked into the bar next door.”
“Are your people en route?” Jessie asked anxiously.
“Not yet,” Burnside said. “The owner called me directly because I helped him set up a security system after a robbery. I’m about to report it up the chain. But I decided to call you first. I’m not sure how it will go down when my station finds the guy. They’re hyped to nail down a suspect so they can put this thing to bed.”
“You think they might take him out and pin the murder on him?”
“I didn’t say that,” Burnside said emphatically. “I never said that.”
“Okay,” Jessie soothed. “I’m sorry.”
“What I can say is that I looked at Vasquez’s record. He’s done some time but it’s all for stuff like petty theft; never used a weapon, no violent crime. It’s hard to see him as right for a stabbing murder.”
“Okay, thanks, Burnside. How much of a head start can you give me? I’m downtown right now.”
“Not too long. I’m going to the restroom because I think I’m suddenly developing some ‘digestive issues.’ I may be able to dawdle a little after that. But then it’s going to look suspicious. Maybe twenty minutes?”
“I’ll take it.”
“I’ll text you the address now,” Burnside said. “And Ms. Hunt?”
“Yes?”
“Try to bring the detective from last night if you can. I don’t know how this will go down and you may want some backup.” Then he hung up.
With that warning still ringing in her ears, Jessie began scrambling around the apartment, grabbing essentials as she gave Hannah the basics.
“Do you know when you’ll be back?” the girl asked.
“I don’t,” Jessie said as she threw on her jacket. “Your best bet is to finish any homework and expect to crash for the night while I’m still out. Sorry to bail but…”
“It’s okay,” Hannah said. “I understand.”
Jessie gave her a quick smile before bolting out the door.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
At times like this, Jessie wished she had a siren for her car.
Instead she had to rely on that old standby: speeding recklessly and hoping she didn’t get pulled over. She was pulling onto the 110 freeway when she tried Ryan again. He picked up on the first ring.
“Sorry I haven’t gotten back to you,” he said before she could speak. “My phone died. I was testifying all day. I was meeting with prosecutors until just a few minutes ago.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Jessie said. “Can you meet me in the Valley? There have been a few developments.”
She explained the situation as she transferred onto the 101 freeway which cut through the Hollywood Hills along the Cahuenga Pass. She did her best to ignore the potholes on the decrepit stretch of road.
It was a lot for Ryan to take in but he seemed to process it all. When she was done, he offered what he admitted was limited insight.
“I don’t know Detective Strode, never heard of him actually. That’s not a great sign,” he said. “Normally a murder like this gets assigned to the most experienced detectives in the Bureau. It’s weird.”
“It’s more than just weird, Ryan,” Jessie insisted. “It stinks. A police sergeant overtly threatens me. A murder victim is cremated before she can be autopsied. A rookie detective gets assigned to the case. Frankly, the question isn’t if someone is being protected but how high up is that person? This can’t all be Costabile, can it? He doesn’t have that much pull.”
“You’re right, it does stink,” Ryan agreed. “And this does seem to go higher than Costabile. But suspecting that doesn’t change how we approach the case. We still have to grind out the work if we’re going to unpeel what’s really going on here. But there is one upside to having a rookie detective assigned to the case. Because I’m representing HSS on this, I may be able to bigfoot him once I get there. Until then, you’ll have to hold down the fort. How far out are you?”
“I’m probably still ten minutes away,” she said.
“Okay. I’m about five behind you. Try not to get yourself shot before I catch up.”
“Aw, so romantic,” she replied before hanging up and immediately calling Garland Moses.
The elder profiler didn’t pick up until the fourth ring and he sounded drowsy when he did.
“Ms. Hunt, have you ever heard the term ‘elder abuse’? It’s after ten p.m.”
“I’m sorry, Garland. You know I wouldn’t call at this hour unless it was pressing. Besides, I never heard back from you. I was a little worried.”
“That’s a lie,” he said flatly, his drowsiness slipping away fast. “I’ll let it go this time. But please, don’t try to play me. I had every intention of getting back to you tomorrow. What is so pressing that it couldn’t wait?”
Jessie decided not to linger on his accurate assertion that she was a liar and moved on to the issue at hand.
“I may be about to enter a hornet’s nest in a few minutes and I really need your guidance. What can you tell me about Detective Wiley Strode and Sergeant Hank Costabile?”
She heard a bed creak and papers being shuffled and imagined him sitting up and putting on his glasses.
“I don’t have much on Strode,” he said, now sounding fully alert. “He was based out of Thousand Oaks until recently. He only just passed the detective exam last year and was reassigned to Valley Bureau. Until now, he’s mostly been a robbery guy, a few home invasion cases. This is his first murder.”
“That seems odd,” Jessie said. “Wouldn’t he normally get paired with someone more experienced, especially for a murder?”
“Normally? Yes. Of course, if there was a backload or major cases in the division, he might not.”
“Do you know if there’s a backload?” Jessie asked.
“I checked their case board earlier this evening. It’s nothing out of the ordinary. In fact, there are two homicide detectives not currently assigned to any priority cases. And yet, Strode was put on this.”
“What does that mean to you?” Jessie pressed.
Garland paused briefly before responding and she knew he was entering sensitive territory.
“There could be completely innocuous reasons for it that we’re just not aware of,” he began. “Or it could be an indication that someone with the power to influence case assignments wanted a less experienced detective on it or at least one with less pull in the Bureau. I tried to go through the paperwork to see who that might be. But the chain of command on this thing has been cleverly disguised. Your good friend Costabile’s fingerprints are all over the place. But he couldn’t authorize this kind of assignment shifting on his own. He’d have to be doing it on someone else’s authority. And I can’t discern who that might be.”