“Tommy, better have some uniforms canvass the neighbors,” Soave ordered him. “Find out what they heard.”
Tommy headed off to take care of it. Up above, the choppers were still circling.
“Anything else I ought to know?” Soave asked her.
“The victim’s father is Wendell Frye, probably the greatest living sculptor in America. Also a major-league recluse.”
Soave considered this, stroking his see-through mustache. “He got deep pockets?”
“I imagine so, yes.”
“Any chance this is a money-related thing? A kidnapping gone bad, say?”
“Nothing should be ruled out at this point.”
“Gee, thanks, I’ll remember that,” Soave said, bristling. Clearly, he felt she was lecturing him.
Des let it slide. “I’ve told the family a DNA test may be necessary to confirm Moose’s identity-that’s what they called her, by the way. If there’s any way I can assist you from the local level, just let me know.”
A photographer was snapping pictures of the remains from as many angles as possible. Until he was done, Moose could not be removed to the medical examiner’s office in Farmington. Des noticed that there was a strange, uncharacteristic hush among the technicians as they worked. It was the smell. It was all of the innocent animals that had died.
Soave was studying her curiously. “You’re not enjoying this, are you?”
“I never enjoy a death, Rico.”
“No, I mean the fact that I’m in charge now.”
She let that slide, too.
“You know what I keep saying to myself?”
“Rico, I honestly can’t imagine.”
“I keep thinking you’re the smartest woman I ever met. But tell me this: If you’re so smart, how come you ended up back in a Smokey hat?”
“Priorities change,” she answered.
He shook his head at her. “I don’t get it.”
“Not many people do.”
“Are you telling me you’re happy here?”
“I am.”
He started flexing his shoulders again. Something was still on his mind. “Look, maybe we better stake out some ground rules-any information you gather on this case I want funneled through me. Are we clear on that?”
“Of course we are, Rico,” responded Des, who knew exactly what was going on. He felt threatened by her presence here. He was, after all, a man. “Whatever you want me to do, I’ll do. You want community liaison help, it’s yours. You want a command center at town hall, it’s yours. Otherwise, I’m in my ride and out of here. It’s your case. I’m not looking to climb you.”
He peered at her doubtfully. “You’re not looking to get back in?”
“Not a chance.”
“You’re being incredibly mature about this whole thing, you know that?”
“Yeah, I’m all grown up.” Des glanced at her watch. She was due at Center School for traffic detail. “I’m going to take off now if you don’t need me.”
“Did you check out her gas tank?” he asked offhandedly, stopping her.
“No, I didn’t.”
“Want to have a look?”
She frowned at him. One minute he was creased, the next he was fishing for help. “Do you want me to?”
“Sure, if you’d like.” Again, very offhanded. “I’m just saying I’ve got no problem with that. Unless you’ve got somewhere else you have to be…”
“Okay, let’s have a look,” she said, because the truth was that she was very interested in the condition of the Porsche’s gas tank.
Lab tests would confirm if there had been a bomb-the device would leave nitrate or chlorate residue behind. But Des could tell it with her own two eyes-by the fracture pattern on the gas tank. A bomb explodes outside the tank, setting off a second explosion inside the tank. If, on the other hand, an explosion has been caused by a bullet piercing the gas tank, then it’s the other way around-the tank explodes from the inside out. Entirely different distortion and bending of the metal.
As Des knelt there, examining the Porsche’s gas tank, she had no doubt about what had happened.
Neither did Soave. “I got me a shooter, Des,” he declared, as Tommy rejoined them.
“That you do, Rico,” she agreed, shoving her hornrimmed glasses back up her nose.
He had Tommy round up a dozen men to undertake a search for the spent bullet by fanning out in five-foot intervals around the wreckage. It was slow, painstaking work, but that was how you did things. And they might find it. Not that they’d be able to match it to a specific weapon-it would be too distorted from the explosion to do them much good in terms of ballistics. But maybe they could determine the class of weapon.
“Could be somebody was tailing her, Des,” Soave said. “Got off a couple of pops when she came to a stop here at the crossroads, then hightailed it out of here. You think?”
Des found herself gazing around at the surrounding countryside in search of a shooter’s blind, Soave’s eyes following hers. From the open field where they stood she could make out a spot of high ground in the woods across the road, in the general direction of Wendell Frye’s farm. There was a natural rise there, with an outcropping of bare rock that was partly shielded from the road by trees. “Unless he was waiting up there for her to come home,” she countered. “Less risk that way. If he tailed her, somebody might spot him.”
“Yo, Tom-meeee!” Rico hollered to his cousin, who was helping the uniforms search for the bullet. “Take a couple of men up to that outcropping across the road! See if you find any fresh shoe prints or anything like that. Be ultra careful, okay? The ground’s damp.”
“You got it!” Tommy obediently grabbed two troopers and started off with them across the road.
“What a big doofus,” Soave grumbled sourly. “I have to tell him everything. And then I have to give him a cookie when he does good. He’s not a man, he’s dog. Was I ever that dumb? Wait, don’t answer that… You don’t mind sticking around for a little while, do you?”
“I don’t mind.” Des radioed the barracks to request an available trooper to handle the school traffic. Then she rejoined Soave, who was watching the medical examiner’s men bag and tag Moose’s remains.
Pictures. I will definitely need pictures of this.
“How’s the jungle, Rico?”
“Same.”
“And your girl-what’s her name, Tammy?”
“Close, it’s Tawny.” She was a manicurist in New Britain. Enjoyed an IQ roughly equal to that of a muskmelon. “What about her?”
“How long have you two been seeing each other now?”
“Uh, since high school.”
“Which makes it how many years?”
“Nine, I guess. So what?”
“Damn, Rico, you belong on ‘Jerry Springer’ or something.” One thing hadn’t changed-with Soave, Des grabbed her pleasure where she could. “What is wrong with that girl? Is she a doormat or is she just plain comatose?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” he said irritably. “What’s the big deal?”
“You ought to be marrying her, that’s what. Settle down and have yourself some little Tedones.”
He made a face. “No offense, Des, but I liked you a whole lot better when you were just trying to stick me with a cat.”
“No offense taken. But, hey, if you’re really in the market for another kitten-”
“I’m not,” he snapped. “Believe me, I’m not.”
“Yo, Swa-vayyyy!” Tommy was calling to him now from the woods across the road, waving both arms
