The main point of interest, of course, was the dead body lying facedown on the floor between the seating area and the desk. The male figure was clad in a white terry-cloth robe. Even from across the room, the pool of dark crimson blood around the man’s head was jolting.
A CSU tech was dusting for prints. The medical examiner, a woman named Erica Thompson, crouched by the body. She looked up and nodded toward Gabriel, and he returned the gesture.
“Why don’t you look at the body and talk to the medical examiner to find out what she knows so far,” Gabriel said to Asra. “I’m going to look around the place a little.”
Gabriel began his investigation in the kitchen. Despite its small size, it was obviously high end. The cabinetry looked custom-made, the appliances were Sub-Zero stainless steel, and the countertop was granite.
The counter was barren, aside from an older-model microwave and a state-of-the-art coffee/cappuccino machine like Gabriel had seen in high-end restaurants. He opened the fridge. It was mostly empty. Four bottles of champagne and a bottle of white wine were lying on their sides, with a few cans of Diet Dr. Pepper beside them. No perishables other than a container of half-and-half. The butter compartment and the crispers were empty. The only item that appeared to have been put there in the last few days was a container of Chinese food. General Tso’s chicken, if Gabriel had to guess from the orangey color.
The silverware drawer likewise revealed that the apartment’s occupant didn’t have people over for meals. There was a hodgepodge of utensils made out of cheap metal. The kind of spoons that would bend if you stuck them in frozen ice cream. That thought prompted Gabriel to open the freezer, which was even more barren than the refrigerator. A pint of Häagen-Dazs vanilla, a bottle of vodka, and nothing else but ice cubes.
On his way to the second room, Gabriel stopped in front of a credenza against the wall. It was wood but sleek, undoubtedly purchased more for aesthetics than security. He pulled on the door. Locked. It would have been the first place a burglar would have tried, and the lock was flimsy enough that anyone who was there to steal would have been able to pry off the door easily.
That meant that whoever did this wasn’t trying to get rich. Their one and only objective had seemingly been accomplished when the dead man hit the floor.
Despite the fact that the living space was set up like an office, the second room had a king bed against the main wall. Apart from that, however, it was empty, giving off the vibe of a hotel room.
Gabriel’s first thought was that their vic was a bachelor. A man who literally lived at his office.
The bed was disheveled. Gabriel leaned over to examine the sheets. You didn’t have to have a degree in forensics to know that a woman had been in them since they’d last been laundered. A high-end man’s timepiece sat on the night table.
The bathroom reminded Gabriel of the kitchen—small but with high-end finishes. The medicine cabinet housed the essentials: toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, a bottle of aspirin, and dental floss. A single white towel hung on one of the two hooks. The white robe on their vic had most likely resided on the other.
One dark suit hung in the closet. Gabriel checked the label. Tom Ford. Gabriel wasn’t much of a fashionista, but he knew that Daniel Craig had worn Tom Ford in the last few Bond films, which meant this suit didn’t come cheap. A tie and a white shirt were on a separate hanger, and a pair of black high-shine oxfords and dark socks were on the floor beneath them. Apart from that, the only other garment was a pair of boxer shorts that were on the floor beside the bed.
The lack of clothing caused Gabriel to rethink his initial bachelor-pad assumption. No one lived here full time. The term love nest came to mind, though the space could have been used for anything from an Airbnb rental to a commuter’s pied-à-terre.
Whatever the apartment’s purpose, the dead man had apparently come from a business meeting. Maybe he was on his way home before fate—or, more accurately, an attacker—intervened. On the other hand, perhaps he was planning to stay the night and wear the same suit, shirt, tie, and socks the next day.
When Gabriel reentered the main room, Asra and the medical examiner were crouching beside the body. Asra stood as Gabriel approached, but the ME continued her closer examination of the corpse.
“It looks as if the murder weapon is likely going to be the corner of the table here,” Asra said.
Gabriel nodded, looking at the relative positions of the body and table. “You said murder weapon. So not an accident?”
“He wasn’t alone. See here?” Asra was pointing at the streaked blood. “Someone moved him a bit. I’m hard-pressed to think of a scenario where he accidentally falls and there’s this kind of blood, and whoever is with him moves the body but doesn’t call the police.”
“You have a preliminary TOD?” Gabriel asked.
Asra looked to the crouching ME. This was her bailiwick, after all.
“Right now, my best guess is sometime between three p.m. to maybe eight p.m. yesterday,” Erica said while coming to her feet.
Gabriel considered the fact that the sheets had been used in the middle of the day. That said affair. Married people wait until bedtime, at least in his experience.
“The bed was used recently. For sex, not just sleeping,” Gabriel said. “Maybe that’s our vic’s less-than-helpful friend.”
“We’ll do a full workup of the sheets,” Erica said.
“Which likely means it’s a she we’re looking for,” Gabriel said.
“Not very PC of you,” Asra said, teasing him.
Gabriel considered the point. She was right. No reason the vic’s lover had to be a woman.
“You have anything we can work with, Erica?” Gabriel said with a smile, the one that usually got him what he wanted.
“Well,
