Read Online The Hundredth Man by J. A. Kerley - Free Book Online Page B

Adam’s apple. “That’s all I know.”
    “You haven’t been inside?”
    “Just ME folk, scene techs, and Hargreaves. She took the call,” Blasingame drawled, spitting onto the lawn. “My guys ain’t supposed to go in till Squill gets here. Neither are you, probably, no matter what Piss-it rules say about you being in charge.”
    “Didn’t hear nothing about that,” Harry said as our footsteps thumped across the porch.
    Words scripted around a logo on the door: Deschamps Design Services. A small sign below the doorbell advised, please ring to enter. A decal on the glass said protected by Jenkins security systems. While the place wasn’t the Bastille, neither was it open-door policy. Directly inside was a small pastel-hued reception area that screamed Designer at Work: Chagall-hued abstracts spotlit by track lighting; a puffy blue-leather couch; a frame-and-fabric chair more like a kite than a sitting device. One wall held framed awards for best this and that in design. The place had a subtle astringent smell, like disinfectant, or strong cleanser.
    “Could chill beer in here,” Harry said, cinching his tie. We walked a short hall. I heard a muffled sob from a room to the left and gently opened the door. A slender woman sat at a small conference table with patrol officer Sally Hargreaves. Sal had been first on the scene. She was talking softly with her hand over the woman’s wrist. Sal saw me and came to the door.
    “Cheryl Knotts, victim’s fiancee,” she whispered. “Flight attendant out for three days. She got here fifty minutes ago to find one Peter Edgar Deschamps dead in his studio.”
    “Impression?” I asked, knowing Sal’s got the magic.
    “She had nothing to do with it, I’d bet the farm on that. She’s devastated.”
    By magic I mean Sal has that rare sense letting her read people fast and dead on. All cops grow the ability to detect bullshit better than your average citizen, but some are prodigies, poly graphic Mozarts. On Sal’s take alone I pretty much X’d out the fiancee as a suspect.
    “Get her to answer some questions in a few?” I asked.
    Sally nodded, touched my arm. “Walk light if you can.”
    Sally’s got a hint of wet in her eyes; the magic has its price. I kissed her lightly on the forehead. “Did I tell you I dreamed about you last week?” I said. “I was a nurse and you were a Viking … “
    Sal smiled for the first time and pushed me down the hall. “Go take care of Harry before he does something weird,” she said.
    The victim was on his back next to a drawing board. Beside the board was a desk with a Mac, and a monitor with a screen larger than the one on my TV. The man’s garb was white-collar casual: blue Oxford-cloth shirt, pressed khakis, webbed belt, brown loafers. The deceased was solidly built not a hardcore gym rat with ham biceps and steroid-worm veins, but a guy with a hard and regular regimen. His shirt was unbuttoned and the slacks unzipped, the pants bunched low around his buttocks. Outside of the scarlet collar there was no sign of blood or other violence on his clothing. Hembree’d caught the case.
    “What’s the word, Bree?” I asked.
    “Looks like you and Harry are going to pull some overtime.”
    “Cause of death?”
    “Just like Nelson. Can’t find anything on the body. But a head wound … “
    “Could be floating past the Dixey Bar lighthouse about now.”
    Hembree nodded. “If the perp’s using a gun, I’d bet a twenty-two. Most of the time the slug goes into the skull and ricochets around inside like a Ping-Pong ball. No exit wound, no splatter. Just brain pudding.”
    I thought about what the mind might make of a pellet bouncing within its confines like a metal wasp. Could a brain comprehend its own destruction? Hear itself scream?
    “What about the blood when the head comes off?” I asked, rubbing my hands together, suddenly cold.
    “Heart’s stopped, blood’s not moving. Less exsanguination than you’d think. Was me