Read Online Proof Positive: A Joe Gunther Novel (Joe Gunther Series) by Archer Mayor - Free Book Online Page B

level of decomposition.
    Joe was crouching down, trying to figure out the mechanics of the body’s peculiar positioning, which was suggestive of a burial.
    “Yeah,” he replied. “It also makes this a whole new ball game.” He glanced up at his colleague and added, “Looks like we’re officially on duty.”
    *   *   *
    “Hold it,” Rachel said. “There. Back it up a couple of frames.”
    Lester Spinney gave his computer key a few jabs.
    In silence, they watched Ben Kendall move in reverse, concentrating on the background just under his left arm.
    “There,” Rachel said again.
    Lester froze the screen.
    “See it?” she asked them.
    Joe, Sam, and Willy pressed in to better see the image.
    Joe tapped his finger on what appeared to be a small opening in the stack of boxes beside Ben. “Doesn’t look like much.”
    “Maybe not, but he had at least a couple of them.”
    “How tall was he?” Willy asked, seemingly at random.
    “Ben? Not very,” Rachel said. Despite her youth and the squad room’s austere setting, Joe couldn’t not notice her maturity and poise in their midst.
    “Five-eight,” Sammie said, having recently consulted the autopsy report.
    “Why?” Lester asked without turning around.
    “Small guy—small hole,” Willy replied. “Reminds me of the tunnel rats they had in Nam—crawling through the VC underground systems to see what they could find, like punji stakes, land mines, and grenades on the fly.”
    “Ben Kendall was a photographer,” Joe reminded him.
    “Everybody knew about the tunnels,” Willy shot back. “He would’ve, too.” He tapped Rachel on the shoulder. “Were his little rabbit holes booby-trapped?”
    “I don’t know,” she answered. “He told me to never-ever go into one. I figured it was because they were dangerous.”
    “That’s no lie,” Willy muttered, stepping back, his point made.
    “This new dead guy was small, too,” Sammie said.
    Joe looked at her. “We have anything on him yet?”
    She answered, “The crime lab’ll be running his prints as soon they’re delivered from the ME’s office. Something’s bound to crop up.”
    “Yeah,” Willy threw in, “unless Hillstrom finds nothing, the prints don’t hit, or whatever files there are have been eaten up by some stupid computer.”
    “No, no,” Spinney said, reaching for his smartphone. “I told them to text me as soon as they got something. I bet it’s in already.”
    Joe smiled to himself, seeing both men’s outlooks in a nutshell—Spinney: upbeat, positive, supportive, a happy family man; and Willy: downcast, pessimistic, sarcastic, and the suspicious member of a family he seemed to orbit more than inhabit.
    “Yeah,” Spinney said, having scrolled to the proper screen. “Here it is, fresh off the presses: Tomasz Bajek. At least that’s what his driver’s license says. The ME’s office extracted it from his wallet, which was covered with yuck and shoved into his underpants, for some reason. The lab ran the name through NCIC and got nothing, but the license says he lived in Philadelphia.”
    “That it?” Willy asked.
    “For the moment, yeah, but I’m sure we’ll get more. If nothing else, I bet the Philly PD has a file on him. Stands to reason, given what we think he was up to. There’s a lot of data that hasn’t made it to the national data banks, especially if it’s local, older stuff.”
    Joe kept quiet for the moment, given the presence of their young outsider, but Ben Kendall and this Bajek having both originated from the same city seemed an unlikely coincidence.
    He returned to the earlier topic. “Rachel, before we let you go, tell us more about these tunnels. You must’ve asked him what they were for.”
    As it had been throughout, her response was quick and enthusiastic. “I did, but I never got a straight answer. Also, it’s not like there were a ton of them. I think I saw two or three. I always thought at least one might lead to his version of a