Then we’d get all concerned and stop the drugs and really try to learn the stuff, but it was so damn
hard
, and harder still without a pop here and there to cheer you up. It wore Marty down. It wore me down. Marty decided to trash it all, including me, to work on the side of the friggin’ angels. By the time summer came he had enrolled with you guys and I was pregnant.’
‘That was it?’ Angela pressed. ‘No one particular incident that made Marty turn to police work?’
‘He said he figured he could put other people in jail or go himself, and he preferred it to be them.’ His wording still made her laugh. ‘
Preferred
. He’d get flowery once in a while.’
‘Thanks for your time,’ Frank said, and turned to go.
‘Hey.’
‘Yes?’
‘I get all his stuff?’
‘You’re apparently his beneficiary, yes. Once it goes through probate.’
‘Did he have a TV?’
‘I don’t know,’ Frank lied.
Angela, too soft-hearted, said, ‘Yes. A big screen, probably fifty-two inches.’
‘Plasma?’
‘No.’
‘Oh. That’s still cool, though.’ She scratched the dog’s ears. ‘Thanks.’
They left her standing in her damp kitchen and moved carefully down the wooden steps. ‘Nice to brighten someone’s day,’ Frank muttered.
‘It’s not like they were that close,’ Angela pointed out. ‘She was going to say something else, about why Marty became a cop, and then didn’t.’
‘I noticed. But I don’t really care what happened to him twenty-five years ago. I’m more interested in what happened to him two days ago.’
At least, he noticed, their new car appeared unmolested, and he used the remote to unlock the doors. As they pulled away from the curb, a
thump
at the rear made him jump. Braking, he and Angela craned their necks round to see a browned, rotting apple splattered on to the trunk, its mushy guts glistening against the deeply black paint.
And from his sagging roof, his ample butt depressing the shingles underneath him, Lily’s son Brandon grinned until the afternoon sun reflected off his teeth.
SEVEN
Thursday
T he death toll from the explosion had been arrested at seven and the various sets of initialed agencies working the scene seemed fairly certain that all the victims had been found. Theresa had not had the time nor the inclination to revisit the area but would have to, and soon. They needed a plan to excavate their stuff. She wondered if any other crime lab in the country had ever had a similar situation. What did the New Orleans PD do after Katrina? She should make some phone calls …
She’d spent all morning drafting a written plan of attack to excavate, move and store their stuff. Leo had requested the SOP and she had nearly finished expanding ‘dig the stuff out, pack it into boxes, truck them back here and put the boxes into the garage’ to three pages in true civil service tradition. Once she had completed it, Leo glanced over it, told her that the average fourth-grader could have produced a more comprehensive plan, demanded that she start over with a more clear focus on her professional responsibilities. So she changed five or six words and altered the font from Arial to Times New Roman. Leo grumbled while shuffling out of earshot, then went to the second floor and presented it to M.E. Stone as his own work. After fifteen years, Theresa knew the process.
Hence freed to get back to work, she hovered absently around portly Dr Banachek’s autopsy table. He detailed this particular victim’s injuries on a preprinted diagram as Theresa examined the body for any trace evidence left after the clothing had been removed. The dead person, a female in her forties wearing hospital scrubs, had worked in the building’s fitness center. Beams from the collapsing upper floors had crushed part of her skull and compressed her chest into her backbone. She had not been burned, however. The fitness center had been located at the back of the building to the west, and the blast
hard
, and harder still without a pop here and there to cheer you up. It wore Marty down. It wore me down. Marty decided to trash it all, including me, to work on the side of the friggin’ angels. By the time summer came he had enrolled with you guys and I was pregnant.’
‘That was it?’ Angela pressed. ‘No one particular incident that made Marty turn to police work?’
‘He said he figured he could put other people in jail or go himself, and he preferred it to be them.’ His wording still made her laugh. ‘
Preferred
. He’d get flowery once in a while.’
‘Thanks for your time,’ Frank said, and turned to go.
‘Hey.’
‘Yes?’
‘I get all his stuff?’
‘You’re apparently his beneficiary, yes. Once it goes through probate.’
‘Did he have a TV?’
‘I don’t know,’ Frank lied.
Angela, too soft-hearted, said, ‘Yes. A big screen, probably fifty-two inches.’
‘Plasma?’
‘No.’
‘Oh. That’s still cool, though.’ She scratched the dog’s ears. ‘Thanks.’
They left her standing in her damp kitchen and moved carefully down the wooden steps. ‘Nice to brighten someone’s day,’ Frank muttered.
‘It’s not like they were that close,’ Angela pointed out. ‘She was going to say something else, about why Marty became a cop, and then didn’t.’
‘I noticed. But I don’t really care what happened to him twenty-five years ago. I’m more interested in what happened to him two days ago.’
At least, he noticed, their new car appeared unmolested, and he used the remote to unlock the doors. As they pulled away from the curb, a
thump
at the rear made him jump. Braking, he and Angela craned their necks round to see a browned, rotting apple splattered on to the trunk, its mushy guts glistening against the deeply black paint.
And from his sagging roof, his ample butt depressing the shingles underneath him, Lily’s son Brandon grinned until the afternoon sun reflected off his teeth.
SEVEN
Thursday
T he death toll from the explosion had been arrested at seven and the various sets of initialed agencies working the scene seemed fairly certain that all the victims had been found. Theresa had not had the time nor the inclination to revisit the area but would have to, and soon. They needed a plan to excavate their stuff. She wondered if any other crime lab in the country had ever had a similar situation. What did the New Orleans PD do after Katrina? She should make some phone calls …
She’d spent all morning drafting a written plan of attack to excavate, move and store their stuff. Leo had requested the SOP and she had nearly finished expanding ‘dig the stuff out, pack it into boxes, truck them back here and put the boxes into the garage’ to three pages in true civil service tradition. Once she had completed it, Leo glanced over it, told her that the average fourth-grader could have produced a more comprehensive plan, demanded that she start over with a more clear focus on her professional responsibilities. So she changed five or six words and altered the font from Arial to Times New Roman. Leo grumbled while shuffling out of earshot, then went to the second floor and presented it to M.E. Stone as his own work. After fifteen years, Theresa knew the process.
Hence freed to get back to work, she hovered absently around portly Dr Banachek’s autopsy table. He detailed this particular victim’s injuries on a preprinted diagram as Theresa examined the body for any trace evidence left after the clothing had been removed. The dead person, a female in her forties wearing hospital scrubs, had worked in the building’s fitness center. Beams from the collapsing upper floors had crushed part of her skull and compressed her chest into her backbone. She had not been burned, however. The fitness center had been located at the back of the building to the west, and the blast
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