“The victim?” Olivia asked, focusing on the words, not the churn.
“Probably Barney Tomlinson, the owner of the company,” Kane said.
“Probably?” The warehouse’s concrete walls still stood. “Was the fire that bad?”
“Pretty bad,” Casey said. “But there’s a good bit left inside. Lots of melted chrome.”
“Tomlinson sold plumbing fixtures,” Barlow explained. “No known connection to KRB Corporation or Rankin and Sons’ construction-not yet anyway.”
“So the fire burned Tomlinson up?” Olivia asked.
Casey shook his head. “No, ma’am. He was shot. He’s still in his office, sitting at his desk. Most of his face is gone. He was shot in the back of the head.”
Her stomach pitched. “Who discovered the body?”
“One of the firefighters out of Company Forty,” Barlow said. “The office was in the center of the warehouse, self-contained with walls and a separate eight-foot ceiling. Inside was the victim, facedown on his desk. The team tried to keep the scene as intact as possible while putting the fire out.”
“When you called, you said they found another glass ball?”
“Covered in gel,” Barlow answered, “like before.”
“When the firefighters saw it, they told their captain, who called me,” Casey said. “They’d all heard about the glass ball Hunter caught yesterday. Nobody plans to talk to the press, although I’d be surprised if we kept it secret for too much longer. When they saw the ball tonight, they called me. I called Barlow.”
“I asked him to bring Hunter over,” Barlow said and Olivia’s gaze shot to his face. “I wanted Hunter to walk through and tell me how the place looked compared to last night’s fire. I needed the info fast, before they’d let me go in. Hunter’s in there now.”
“All right,” Olivia said calmly, although her heart had started to pound with the first mention of David’s name. “What about video surveillance?”
Kane pointed to a man standing next to the uniformed cops on duty. “That’s the warehouse manager. I haven’t talked to him yet. There was also a guard dog.”
Olivia grimaced. “They killed it?”
“No,” Barlow said. “Appears the animal was drugged. The warehouse manager dragged him to the edge of the fenced area, then called 911. The dog was unconscious when the firefighters responded. I called a vet. I think the warehouse manager is more worried about the dog than his boss. Tomlinson didn’t seem very well liked.”
“We’ll want to talk to Hunter and the firefighters who discovered the body,” Kane said. He looked at Olivia. “But first the manager.”
She nodded. “Let’s go.”
“I didn’t know Hunter was here until just now,” Kane murmured as they walked toward the now-pacing warehouse manager. “Did you, um, get my field glasses?”
“No. I… left early. I’ll get your damn glasses later, all right? You want me to lead with the manager?”
“Knock yourself out, kid.”
The warehouse manager stopped his nervous pacing when they approached. “I’m Detective Sutherland. This is my partner, Detective Kane. You are?”
“Lloyd Hart. Is that vet here yet?”
“I don’t think so,” Olivia said. “But I know he’s been called. Is the dog yours?”
“No, but I’m the one who takes care of him. Have for five years. His name is Bruno.”
Olivia wrote it down. “I’ll make sure the vet knows you’re the contact, Mr. Hart. You can tell him Bruno’s medical history and make sure he gets the best care.”
“Thank you.” He swallowed hard. “You probably think I’m a horrible person, being more concerned about the dog than Tomlinson, or this fire.”
“I have a dog, too. So, what can you tell us about this fire and Mr. Tomlinson?”
He rubbed his hands over his face. “I left at my usual time, about six. Barney was still here. He was doing the books. They said he was shot. How?”
“We don’t know yet, and we haven’t been in there. So Mr. Tomlinson was doing the books. Was the business in any trouble?”
Hart rolled his eyes. “Oh, yeah. Tomlinson and the missus were in the middle of a messy divorce. He’d been cheating and she had pictures. She made sure everybody knew she had pictures and who Barney’d been doin’ it with. Young woman he’d hired as a temp. Nobody was surprised because we all knew why he’d hired her. The girl never did a lick of work except on him.” He winced. “Sorry, Detective.”
“It’s okay. Was the divorce the reason the business was in trouble?”
“Not the whole reason. We were hurting before, with construction slowing. Most of our customers buy for commercial building. But Weezie had just ordered an audit of the books, and all of our spending had to be approved. I guess she figured he’d been buying things for the other woman from the business accounts.”
“Was he?” she asked.
“Yeah. I tried to tell him to stop, that he was gonna get fried, but he didn’t listen. He was a fifty-year-old man with a twenty-year-old on the side. They never listen.”
“Mrs. Tomlinson’s first name is Weezie? Short for Louise?”
He nodded. “It’s a real shame. I like her. She didn’t deserve this.”
Olivia met Hart’s eyes. “But Mr. Tomlinson did?”
“No,” he said. “Nobody deserves that. But I won’t lie to you. Barney was a prick. He cheated on Weezie, he was rude to employees. Never made eye contact, always either on his cell phone or using it to surf the Internet. Probably looking at porn. And he hated Bruno,” he finished, as if hating the dog was the most egregious sin of all.
“What about you, Mr. Hart?” she asked. “Did you hate him?”
“Sure. He was racist, sexist, every bad ‘ist’ you can name. But he was my boss, and I said ‘yes, sir’ when he gave an order. The only time I ever held my ground was over Bruno. And before you ask, I was with my wife and some friends playing bridge when the fire started. I can give you their names.”
“That would be great. We can cross you off quickly. Sergeant Barlow said you were the one to call 911. How did you know to come here?”
A sheepish expression stole over Hart’s face. “I installed a smoke detector in Bruno’s run. Just in case. It sends an alert to my cell phone. We were just finishing our last game when my phone went off. I got here, saw the fire, called 911. I dragged Bruno beyond the fence. I didn’t want him to get burned or trampled on by the firemen.”
“Why the dog?” Kane asked. “Did you have a problem with theft?”
“We used to store porcelain fixtures out here and had some vandalism. Kids, with too much free time. They’d break up porcelain, that kind of thing. Barney got the dog, hoping Bruno would bite one of them. The kids went elsewhere and Bruno stayed.”
“Video security?” Olivia asked.
“Cameras outside, none inside. Feed goes straight to a recorder inside. Old-fashioned. Barney didn’t think he needed anything fancy as long as he kept Bruno.”
“We’ll need a list of your clients and employees,” Olivia said.
“Talk to Jake Mabrow. He does our IT. I convinced Barney to set up an outside server about a year ago so that we’d have a backup. Jake will have access to our files. So will Weezie. She came in and made copies of everything on Barney’s computer the day before she filed for divorce. He didn’t know she knew about the temp.”
“What about you?” Kane asked. “What will you do now that this place is gone?”
“Retire. I’d been planning to anyway. Weezie promised me Bruno.” Hart’s head whipped to the side, focusing on a minivan that had just arrived. “Vet’s here.”
Olivia recognized the vet immediately. “Barlow called Brie’s dad,” she told Kane. “He’s a good vet,” she told Hart. “He takes care of my dog. Bruno’s in good hands.”
“I can go?” Hart asked and was gone with Olivia’s first nod.
“We need to get Tomlinson’s customer list,” Kane said. “See if KRB Corp or Rankin bought plumbing supplies from them.”