“Pixie—a charming name,” Sherlock said. “And now she’s dead, along with Milo Siles, just because he was visiting her.”
Savich said, “I wonder if Milo’s wife knew about Pixie.”
Cheney said, “Even though his wife was using photos to get more leverage in the divorce settlement, according to Siles’s lawyer, my guess is neither of them cared much about what the other was doing for the past five years or so. That’s from Siles’s divorce lawyer. He said Milo left really mad about his wife’s demands at the mediation session, and that’s the last anyone saw him.”
Sherlock asked, “How did Xu find out about Pixie McCray?”
Cheney cut his eyes to her. “Funny thing is, it wasn’t a big buried secret. The house in Bel Marin Keys is in Milo’s name, and so is the Sea Ray Sundancer, both easy to find out.”
Sherlock said, “I gather this house and boat weren’t part of her demands?”
Harry said matter-of-factly, “Milo Siles’s wife is obviously having an affair, too, maybe even a long-term affair, like her husband, so they seemed to treat it as no harm, no foul.”
Sherlock closed her eyes for a moment. How could anyone live like that? Were Milo Siles and his mistress, Pixie McCray, dead because the Cahills had told him too much about Xu? Had Milo tried to blackmail Xu? Or was it simply because he’d known who Xu was and what he’d done that had signed his death warrant?
She said, “We need to keep checking on whether Siles had any hidden accounts, see if he got himself killed because Xu paid him to keep his mouth shut.”
Savich nodded. “If Milo hid any money in his own name, he was pretty sophisticated about it. It could take some time, but MAX will find it eventually.”
Sherlock said, “I’m hoping we don’t find any accounts. That would mean Milo wasn’t so stupid as to imagine he’d come out of this whole-hide if he was dealing with Xu.”
Cheney kept the lights flashing until they turned east off 101 on the Bel Marin Keys exit. They drove through an industrial area, then wetlands, and finally past some palm trees lining the road on both sides. The closer they moved toward San Pablo Bay and its myriad waterways, the heavier the fog became. The roadways crisscrossed around the lagoons, the fog blending with the water like a surrealist painting. The rain picked up and the gloom deepened. It was nearly dark now.
Cheney said, “On a sunny day, this is a beautiful area, fairly affluent, with hundreds of homes sitting either on a lagoon or on Novato Creek. All the lagoons have access to San Pablo and San Francisco bays, as you can see from all the boats. I have a friend who lives not far from Pixie’s house, on her same street. I wonder if he knew Pixie McCray. Maybe he’s even seen Milo Siles at her house.”
Cheney turned left off Bel Marin Keys Boulevard onto Calypso Shores. The houses were set close together, the landscaping mature and well maintained, a great place for both families with kids and retirees. Cheney pulled Eve’s Suburban up to the curb about a half-block from Pixie’s house, the closest available spot. The houses blocked the view of the lagoons and the boat docks, but they could see the water at the end of the street, and the lock where boats came through. They huddled under umbrellas and walked quickly to the house. There were half a dozen Crown Vics, a couple of them haphazardly parked in the driveway, others against the curb, one up on the lawn. The county coroner’s van and the county’s Crime Analysis Unit van were parked in the middle of the street, blocking traffic.
Neighbors were standing around, staring and talking, looking generally horrified, huddled beneath umbrellas and awnings as the rain beat down.
The white wooden house was a single story with a big solar panel on the roof, built some thirty years ago. It still managed to look stylish, its three palm trees in the front yard adding a bit of tropical charm.
Sheriff Bud Hibbert met them at the front door. “I’d just as soon not have seen you guys until the Christmas party. What this guy did, how fast he moved—it’s frightening. They’re in the bedroom.”
They left their umbrellas on the front porch and walked around two forensic techs and a sheriff’s deputy through the country feminine living room and a small country kitchen with a connected eating area, and down the carpeted hall to the end of the corridor.
Sheriff Hibbert asked for the photographer to stand back for a moment and motioned them around the big king-size bed. It was a god-awful scene, Sherlock thought, so much blood. There was always so much blood. She sometimes wondered how a human body could hold that much blood.
The sheriff said, “I haven’t let them touch the bodies. The crime scene’s just as it was when a deputy arrived after we got a call from a neighbor who heard Pixie’s dog carrying on and came to see what was happening.”
None of them really wanted to, but they looked closely at what had once been two living, breathing people until Xu had slit their throats.
The sheriff said, “All their clothes are in place, so no sexual activity had begun even though they were lying on the bed. Look at the blood splatter, the way their bodies ended up when they died. Siles’s head has nearly fallen off the near side of the bed, and she’s fallen nearly off the other side of the bed. I’ve been trying to figure out exactly what happened.”
Savich pointed at Sherlock. She was standing quietly at the foot of the bed, and he knew she was putting it all together in her mind, using her special gift to picture what few people could see at a crime scene.
“Sherlock?”
She said, “He came in quietly, saw them. He was fast, silent, and smart—even managed to lock Pixie’s terrier outside without alerting them. Milo was first. He grabbed him by his hair, jerked his head back, sliced his throat— again, right to left. Not even a second, that’s all the time it took. He let Milo fall, reached over him, grabbed Pixie by her hair, jerked her head toward him, then back so violently it snapped her neck. When he sliced her throat he must have been staring down at her, watching her eyes as she realized she was dying. The coroner might be able to determine which of those things killed her, not that it makes any difference.
“You can see the dried tears on Milo’s cheeks. He was crying, his head probably against Pixie’s shoulder. She was—comforting him.”
Sheriff Hibbert stared at Sherlock for a moment. He said slowly, “Yes, I can see that now. Thank you.”
Cheney said, “Milo came to her for comfort. And he got her killed.”
Sheriff Hibbert said, “Let’s back out now, let the coroner and the CAU people do their jobs.”
Sherlock paused. “The CAU?”
“Yeah, the Crime Analysis Unit; that’s what we call our forensic section.”
Sherlock said, “Of course. We’re from the CAU in Washington, the Criminal Apprehension Unit.”
Sheriff Hibbert said as he walked them to the back of the house that gave onto the waterway and the boat dock, “The neighbor—Mrs. Dee Kotter—saw Pixie’s terrier, Bob. He was locked out of the house, and that surprised her, since it was raining. She knocked on the door, found it wasn’t locked, and found them. She told us Milo was a twice-a-week fixture at Pixie’s house, her longtime boyfriend. He was always polite, spoke to the neighbors who spoke to him, and made Pixie happy. She said it was sort of a joke with Pixie, always saying why marry a man and put up with the toilet lid being up all the time? Better to have him visit, orderly and planned, and that was the way she liked it. The neighbor didn’t know Milo was married.
“Mrs. Kotter took Bob. Last time I saw her, she was petting him, kissing him over and over, and crying.
“It’s nearly dark, so canvassing the neighborhood is tough. And the damned rain doesn’t help. We don’t believe it was raining when the killer got here, so hopefully someone saw a stranger, a car, something.
“We also have men over on Caribe Isle—that’s the spit of land across the water—interviewing everyone along the street. There’s a small park at the end of the spit, and a narrow beach with a nice view of the back of all the houses along this street, including Pixie’s house.
“Even though there was a break in the rain, I don’t know if anyone was in the park or on that skinny beach. So far, we don’t have anything.”
Savich cursed. Sherlock was so surprised she nearly tripped over a Christmas cactus on the wide back porch.
Savich said, “I just realized, Xu’s got two major loose ends left—the Cahills. You know he’s going after the Cahills. Ramsey, at least, is safe from him for the moment.”
He got Eve on the first ring.
“Barbieri.”
