Last Call

He's leaving!

More sirens. Helicopters were closing fast. Daylight was only a few short hours away. If Isaac didn't make this co

"Theo!"

The man stopped and turned.

Isaac rose from his position of safety and concealment in the Dumpster, revealing himself from the chest up. "That you, Theo?"

No answer. The man simply reached inside his pocket and, like before, tossed the roll of bills onto the ground in front of him. Isaac's gaze followed the cash. The diversion was just enough to delay his reaction to the blur of a hand that pulled a pistol and took aim at Isaac's face. The entire motion was completed in a split second, but for Isaac it seemed like an eternity.

He no longer heard the approaching police sirens. The whir of choppers vanished.

He heard only the muffled release of a silenced projectile as his knees buckled and his head jerked back in a crimson explosion – as he left his own body and saw the lifeless shell of Isaac Reems collapse in the Dumpster, trash on top of trash.

Chapter 12

Andie got the phone call as she was preparing for an eight o'clock briefing with her ASAC. She reached the Grove ghetto before 9:00 a.m.

Isaac Reems's body was still in the Dumpster.

It wasn't exactly the answer to her prayers, but it was an answer.

Media helicopters hovered overhead. Television stations from Action News to Telemundo had vans and remote-broadcast crews crammed into the parking lot across the street from Quincy's Restaurant. It seemed strangely Orwellian, this wintry forest of metal towers topped with microwave dishes. Field reporters were vying for the best position to broadcast the "latest developments" back to their respective stations. Many of them had been covering the Reems story from the begi

Uniformed police officers and yellow crime tape closed off the alley that ran alongside the east side of the restaurant. The west entrance to the delivery area behind the building was also cordoned off. Andie showed her credentials and was allowed to pass through the outer perimeter, but she was stopped before she reached the Dumpster. MDPD was in charge of the crime scene, and the perimeter-control officers were determined to make certain that no one, not even the FBI, contaminated it. Andie caught the eye of Lieutenant Dawes, who recognized her from the task-force meeting. He went to her and provided an update, the two of them separated by taut yellow police tape.

"You sure it's Reems?" said Andie.

"Positive" said Dawes.

"How long has he been dead?" said Andie.

"Don't know yet."

Dawes had the look and demeanor of a homicide detective who had seen far too many murders. He was tense and angry, his teeth and right hand stained from chain smoking, a clenched fist of a man. Andie sensed that he knew more than he was willing to share, which wouldn't have been the first time in the history of American law enforcement that a homicide detective chose to be tight-lipped around the FBI. Her questions had to be more pointed to draw anything out of him. "Rigor mortis set in yet?"

"Yeah."

"Beyond the neck and jaw?" she asked.

"It would appear that way."

"Full body?"

"Not yet."

"What about lividity? Any blanching to the touch?"

"I'd say it's fixed."

"So, you can set a preliminary on the time of death at six to eight hours." She checked her watch. "Between one and three a.m., roughly."

"That's a fair guess."

"Can you tell if the body was moved here from somewhere else?"

"Not yet," said Dawes. No elaboration.

"Well, what does your ME say about the bloodstains and lividity patterns?"

"No signs that the body has been moved."

Andie said, "So Reems was shot exactly where he was found, in the Dumpster. Are you thinking suicide?"

"Still under consideration."

"Did you find a weapon nearby?"

"Yeah. But it hadn't been fired."

"Blood spray on his hands?"

"Nope."

"Where's the entry wound?"

"Between the eyes."

"Not your typical self-inflicted gunshot," said Andie. "Any powder burns or starburst at the point of entry to suggest a close-contact wound?"

"No."

"Doesn't sound like suicide to me. Any witnesses to talk with?"

"One possibility."

"Who?"

"Reems stole a car to get here. Owner is a nineteen-year-old woman. She was locked in the trunk, semiconscious when we found her. She's at Jackson now. Maybe she can tell us something."

"Got a name?"

Dawes gave it to her, and Andie wrote it down. Then she glanced toward the Dumpster, where the forensic team was busy searching for fingerprints and collecting other evidence. "Mind if I have a closer look?"

"Sorry. We're doing a footprint and tire-track analysis, and I'd like to keep traffic to a minimum."

"Understood," she said. "Anything of particular interest?"

He seemed to think about it for a minute, as if trying to decide whether her performance thus far had earned an answer to such an open-ended question. Andie hated this game – boy cop tells girl cop absolutely nothing until she dazzles him with her knowledge and lures him into sparring with her. But Dawes was old school, and her persistence seemed to be getting through to him. Whatever worked.

"Hard to say," he said. "There's lots of foot traffic behind a restaurant. But one set of footprints appears to come down the alley, stop about twenty feet away from the Dumpster, and then turn around and head back."

"You're thinking he was shot from twenty feet away?"

"It had to be from some distance. There's no exit wound."

"What kind of ammunition?"

"I can't be sure until the ME extracts the bullet from his head. But the wound looks a little too large for.22-caliber, so I can rule out that much."

"Plus, if it was.22-caliber, the shot probably would have been fired at close range to penetrate the skull. Like the classic Mafia hit, where the.22 is right up against the skull and the bullet rattles around inside the skull, no exit wound, turning the brains to scrambled eggs. That would have left residue."

He seemed surprised that Andie knew that – or at least a little chagrined that he hadn't said it first. "Exactly," he said. "So with a larger wound and no powder burns at the point of entry, I'm saying it's not a.22."

"But if it was a bigger round – say, a.38 or a 9-millimeter – and fired at close range, it probably would have passed right through the skull. You're telling me it didn't do that."

His expression showed less surprise than simple a

"Did you find a shell casing?"

"Not yet. Shooter may have picked it up and taken it with him."

Andie's gaze drifted back toward the crime scene. She was trying to imagine what it would have been like behind the restaurant after dark. "What's the lighting situation like here?"

"Just that one street lamp on the west end of the building."

"Any stray bullets found in the wall or anyplace?"

"No"

Again, Andie turned her attention back to the Dumpster, mentally placing herself at the scene of the crime. "So the killer fires a single round from twenty feet away in bad lighting. Hits Reems right between the eyes. He's so confident that it's a kill shot, he doesn't even approach the Dumpster to inspect his work. He just picks up his spent shell casing, turns around, and leaves the same way he came."