said.
Fingerprints. Forensics didn’t much interest Kathryn Dance but you had to treat physical evidence with consummate reverence.
‘Shit. I’ve already picked it up.’
John Lanners, the MCSO deputy: ‘There’ll be plenty of prints on it, I’d imagine, but we’ll sort it out. Take yours for samples. Find the ones that don’t match Billy’s or the other drivers’.’
In gloved hands, Kit Sanchez collected the key fob from the offending truck and put it in an evidence bag. Dance knew in her heart, however, that there was no way there would be any prints from the man who’d intentionally blocked the club’s doors. She knew instinctively he would be meticulous.
Ironically, just after Dance had been shifted from criminal mode to civil, the administrative matter she’d come here about, taxation and insurance certificates, had just turned into a crime. A felony. Murder. Perhaps even a terrorist attack.
She said to Sanchez and Lanners, ‘Can you declare this a homicide? I can’t.’ A wry smile. ‘That’s the long-story part. And secure the scene. The drop-box, the truck, the oil drum, the club. Better go for the parking lot too.’
‘Sure,’ Lanners said. ‘I’ll call Crime Scene. Secure everything.’
With a dribble of a siren, a county ambulance pulled up and parked in front of the office. Two techs, large white men, appeared in the doorway and nodded. They spotted Billy and walked over to him to assess damage and mobility.
‘Is it broke, my jaw?’ Billy asked.
One tech lifted off the icy and bloody towel. ‘Got to take X-rays first and then only a doctor can tell you after he looks over the film. But, yah, it’s broke. Totally fucking broke. You can walk?’
‘I’ll walk. Is anybody out there?’
‘How do you mean?’
Dance glanced out of the window. ‘It’s clear.’
The four of them stepped outside and helped the scrawny driver into the ambulance. He reached out and took Dance’s hand in both of his. His eyes were moist and not, Dance believed, from the pain. ‘You saved my life, Agent Dance. More ways than just one. God bless you.’ Then he frowned. ‘But you be careful. Those people, those animals, they wanted to kill you just as much as me. And you didn’t do a lick wrong.’
‘Feel better, Billy.’
Dance found her shield, dusted it off and slipped it into her pocket. She then returned to the roadhouse. She’d tell Bob Holly what she’d discovered but keep the news from Charles Overby until she’d done some more canvassing.
She needed as much ammunition as she could garner.
As she approached the gathered press and spectators, she glanced toward a pretty woman TV reporter, in a precise suit, interviewing a Monterey County firefighter, a solid, sunburned man with a tight crew-cut and massive arms. She’d seen him at several other fire and mass-disaster scenes over the past year or so.
The reporter said to the camera, ‘I’m talking here with Brad C. Dannon, a Monterey County fireman. Brad, you were the first on the scene last night at Solitude Creek?’
‘Just happened I wasn’t too far away when we got the call, that’s right.’
‘So you saw a scene of panic? Could you describe it?’
‘Panic, yeah. Everybody. Trying to get out, just throwing themselves against the door, like animals. I’ve been a firefighter for five years and I’ve never …’
CHAPTER 11
‘… seen anything like this.’
‘Five years, really, Brad? Now tell me, it looks like the doors, the fire doors, were unlocked but they were all blocked by a truck that had parked there. A tractor-trailer. We can see … there.’
Antioch March lifted his eyes from his present gaze – the pillowcase of fine-weave cotton, six inches from his face – and glanced at the TV screen, across the bedroom in the sumptuous Cedar Hills Inn in Pebble Beach. The camera from the crew outside the Solitude Creek roadhouse panned to Henderson Jobbing and Warehouse, which was all of ten miles from where
Fingerprints. Forensics didn’t much interest Kathryn Dance but you had to treat physical evidence with consummate reverence.
‘Shit. I’ve already picked it up.’
John Lanners, the MCSO deputy: ‘There’ll be plenty of prints on it, I’d imagine, but we’ll sort it out. Take yours for samples. Find the ones that don’t match Billy’s or the other drivers’.’
In gloved hands, Kit Sanchez collected the key fob from the offending truck and put it in an evidence bag. Dance knew in her heart, however, that there was no way there would be any prints from the man who’d intentionally blocked the club’s doors. She knew instinctively he would be meticulous.
Ironically, just after Dance had been shifted from criminal mode to civil, the administrative matter she’d come here about, taxation and insurance certificates, had just turned into a crime. A felony. Murder. Perhaps even a terrorist attack.
She said to Sanchez and Lanners, ‘Can you declare this a homicide? I can’t.’ A wry smile. ‘That’s the long-story part. And secure the scene. The drop-box, the truck, the oil drum, the club. Better go for the parking lot too.’
‘Sure,’ Lanners said. ‘I’ll call Crime Scene. Secure everything.’
With a dribble of a siren, a county ambulance pulled up and parked in front of the office. Two techs, large white men, appeared in the doorway and nodded. They spotted Billy and walked over to him to assess damage and mobility.
‘Is it broke, my jaw?’ Billy asked.
One tech lifted off the icy and bloody towel. ‘Got to take X-rays first and then only a doctor can tell you after he looks over the film. But, yah, it’s broke. Totally fucking broke. You can walk?’
‘I’ll walk. Is anybody out there?’
‘How do you mean?’
Dance glanced out of the window. ‘It’s clear.’
The four of them stepped outside and helped the scrawny driver into the ambulance. He reached out and took Dance’s hand in both of his. His eyes were moist and not, Dance believed, from the pain. ‘You saved my life, Agent Dance. More ways than just one. God bless you.’ Then he frowned. ‘But you be careful. Those people, those animals, they wanted to kill you just as much as me. And you didn’t do a lick wrong.’
‘Feel better, Billy.’
Dance found her shield, dusted it off and slipped it into her pocket. She then returned to the roadhouse. She’d tell Bob Holly what she’d discovered but keep the news from Charles Overby until she’d done some more canvassing.
She needed as much ammunition as she could garner.
As she approached the gathered press and spectators, she glanced toward a pretty woman TV reporter, in a precise suit, interviewing a Monterey County firefighter, a solid, sunburned man with a tight crew-cut and massive arms. She’d seen him at several other fire and mass-disaster scenes over the past year or so.
The reporter said to the camera, ‘I’m talking here with Brad C. Dannon, a Monterey County fireman. Brad, you were the first on the scene last night at Solitude Creek?’
‘Just happened I wasn’t too far away when we got the call, that’s right.’
‘So you saw a scene of panic? Could you describe it?’
‘Panic, yeah. Everybody. Trying to get out, just throwing themselves against the door, like animals. I’ve been a firefighter for five years and I’ve never …’
CHAPTER 11
‘… seen anything like this.’
‘Five years, really, Brad? Now tell me, it looks like the doors, the fire doors, were unlocked but they were all blocked by a truck that had parked there. A tractor-trailer. We can see … there.’
Antioch March lifted his eyes from his present gaze – the pillowcase of fine-weave cotton, six inches from his face – and glanced at the TV screen, across the bedroom in the sumptuous Cedar Hills Inn in Pebble Beach. The camera from the crew outside the Solitude Creek roadhouse panned to Henderson Jobbing and Warehouse, which was all of ten miles from where
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