He got on the radio as our flashlights continued to lick over trash and leaves and potholes filled with muddy water.
Then Marino said to me, "I'm going to keep a few guys out here poking around for a while. Unless the perp collected his cartridge case, it's got to be out here somewhere." He looked up the hill. "Problem is, some of those mothers can eject a long way and that goddamn chopper blew stuff all the hell over the place."
Within minutes, paramedics were coming down with a stretcher, feet crunching broken glass, metal clanging, We waited until they had lifted the body, and I probed the ground where it had been. I stared into the black opening of a tunnel that long ago had been dug into a Mountainside too soft to support it, and I moved closer until I was just inside its mouth. A wall scaled it deep inside, and whitewash on bricks glinted in my light. Rusting railroad spikes protruded from rotting ties covered with mud, and scattered about were old tires and bottles.
"Doc, there's nothing in there." Marino was picking his way right behind me. "Shit." He almost slipped. "We've already looked."
"Well, obviously, he couldn't have escaped through here," I said as my light discovered cobblestones and dead weeds. "And no one could hide in here. And your average person shouldn't have known about this place, either."
"Come on." Marino's voice was gentle but firm as he touched my arm.
"This wasn't picked randomly. Not many people around here even know where this is." My light moved more.
"This was someone who knew exactly what he was doing."
"Doc," he said as water dripped, "this ain't safe."
"I doubt Danny knew about this place. This was premeditated and cold-blooded." My voice echoed off old, dark walls.
Marino held my arm this time, and I did not resist him.
"You've done all you can do here. Let's go."
Mud sucked at my boots and oozed over his black military shoes as we followed the rotting railroad bed back out into the night. Together, we climbed up the littered hillside, carefully stepping around blood spilled when Danny's body had been rolled down the steep slope like garbage. Much of it had been displaced by the helicopter's violent wind, and that would one day matter if a defense attorney thought it did. I averted my face from the glare of cameras and flashing strobes. Marino and I got out of the way, and we did not talk to anyone.
"I want to see my car," I said to him as his unit number blared.
"One hundred," he answered, holding the radio close to his mouth.
"Go ahead, one-seventeen, II the dispatcher said to some body else.
"I checked the lot front and back, Captain," Unit 117 said to Marino. "No sign of the vehicle you described."
"Ten-four." Marino lowered the radio and looked very annoyed. "Lucy's Suburban ain't at your office. I don't get it," he said to me. "None of this is making sense."
We began walking back to Libby Hill Park because it really wasn't far, and we wanted to talk.
"What it's looking like to me is Danny might have picked somebody up," Marino said as he lit a cigarette.
"Sure sounds like it could be drugs."
"He wouldn't do that when he was delivering my car," I said, and I knew I sounded naive. "He wouldn't pick anybody up."
Marino turned to me. "Come on," he said. "You don't know that."
"I've never had any reason to think he was irresponsible or into drugs or anything else."
"Well, I think it's obvious he was into an alternative life, as they say."
"I don't know that at all." I was tired of that talk.
"You better find out because you got a lot of blood on YOU."
"These days I worry about that no matter who it is."
"Look, what I'm saying is people you know do disappointing things," he went on as the lights of the city spread below us. "And sometimes people you don't know very well are worse than ones you don't know at all. You trusted I Danny because you liked him and thought he did a good job. But he could have been into anything behind the scenes, and you weren't going to know."
I did not reply. What he said was true.
"He's a nice-looking kid, a pretty boy. And now He's driving this unbelievable ride. The best could have been tempted to maybe do a little trolling before turning in the boss's ride. Or maybe he just wanted to score a little dope." I was more concerned that Danny had fallen prey to an attempted carjacking, and I pointed out that there had been a rash of them downtown and in this area.
"Maybe," Marino said as my car came into view. "But your ride's still here. Why do you walk someone down the street and shoot them, and leave the car right where it is?
Why not steal it? Maybe we should be worried about a gay bashing. You thought about that?" I We had arrived at my Mercedes, and reporters took more photographs and asked more questions as if this were the crime of all time. We ignored them as we moved around to the open driver's door and looked inside my S-320. I scanned armrests, ashtrays, dashboard and saddle leather upholstery, and saw nothing out of place. I saw no sign of a struggle, but the floor mat on the passenger's side was dirty. I noted the faint impressions left by shoes.
"This was the way it was found?" I asked. "What about the door being opened?"
"We opened the door. It was unlocked," Marino said.
"Nobody got inside?"
"No."
"This wasn't there before." I pointed to the floor mat.
"What?" Marino asked.
"See those shoe impressions and the dirt?" I spoke quietly so reporters could not hear. "There shouldn't have seat. Not while Danny was been anybody in the passenger's driving, and not earlier when it was being repaired at Virginia Beach." -What about Lucy?"
"No. She hasn't ridden with me recently. I can't think of anybody who has since it was cleaned last."
"Don't worry, we're going to vacuum everything." He looked away from me and reluctantly added, "You know we're going to have to impound it, Doc." -I understand." I said, and we started walking back to the street near the tunnel, where we had parked.
"I'm wondering if Danny was familiar with Richmond," Marino said.
"He's been to my office before," I replied, and my soul felt heavy. "In fact, when he was first hired, he did a week's internship with us. I don't remember where he stayed, but I think it was the Comfort Inn on Broad Street."
We walked in silence for a moment, and I added, "Obviously, he knew the area around my office."
"Yeah, and that includes here since your office is only about fifteen blocks from here."
Something occurred to me. "We don't know that he didn't just come up here tonight to get something to eat before the bus ride home. How do we know he wasn't just doing something mundane like that?"
Our cars were near several cruisers and a crime scene van, and the reporters had gone. I unlocked the station wagon door and got in. Marino stood with his hands in his pockets, a suspicious expression on his face because he knew me so well.
"You aren't posting him tonight, are you," he said.
"No." It wasn't necessary and I wouldn't put myself through it.
"And you don't want to go home. I can tell."
"There are things to do," I said. "The longer we wait, the more we might lose."
"Which places do you want to try?" he asked, because he knew what it was like to have someone you worked With killed. - Well, there's a number of places to eat right around here. Millie's, for example."
"Nope. Too high-dollar. Same with Patrick Henry's and Most of the joints in the Slip and Shockoe Bottom. Remember, Danny's not going to have a lot of money unless he's getting it from places we don't know about."
"Let's assume he's getting nothing from anywhere," I said. "Let's assume he wanted something that was a straight shot from my office, so he stayed on Broad Street."