“Thanks for your time, Detective. We’ll be in touch.”
Stanton left and went to the storage room to turn down the heat. He went back to the main floor, where he watched the two IAD officers leave the room, Barkley rubbing furiously at his head with a napkin. Neither had taken off their suit coats.
He went back to his office and collapsed into his chair, staring at the ceiling. Glancing to his right, he saw the files for his open cases: fifty-seven in total. His pile was higher than the other detectives’ because he took the cases no one else wanted-the ones with no leads, no motives, and no suspects. The victims disappeared like ghosts but clung to life through him.
Stanton began going through his emails. The forty-one unread messages were mostly departmental emails about policies, updates on cases, or notices for birthdays, retirements, new babies, and deaths. He scrolled down about halfway to a name he hadn’t heard in a long time: Orson Hall. He opened the email.
Jon, long time, Brother. Please call me. I need your help desperately.
Assistant Sheriff Orson Hall,
Las Vegas Metro Police, Homicide Division
The “Las Vegas Metro Police” and “Homicide Division” weren’t a tag on his email. He had typed them in. Orson was telling him something with that, but Stanton wasn’t sure what. He was sure of one thing: the message was important. Stanton hit the speaker on his phone and dialed the number at the bottom of the email tag.
“This is Hall.”
“Orson, this is Jon Stanton.”
“Holy shit, Jon! How you been?”
“Good. How’s Wendy and the kids?”
“They’re great. Wendy went back to work ’bout eight months ago. It’s making life a little easier on me.”
“That’s great. She was a nurse, wasn’t she?”
“Yeah, ER. Good money in it. She makes more than me. How’s Melissa and the boys?”
“We divorced a while ago.”
“Oh, wow. I’m sorry, man. I didn’t know.”
“It just wasn’t meant to be, I guess. So, what’s up?”
“Well, I got a little something here that I think I need your help on.”
“What is it?” Stanton picked up his grip strengthener and began to squeeze in a slow rhythm.
“Rape-homicide. A couple. The guy’s kind of a big shot in town, and I need some help.”
“Have you called the feds?”
“FBI? You shitting me? They’re ninety-nine percent terrorism now. If your perp’s name isn’t Omar or Muhammad, you’re at the bottom of the list. Besides, to be totally honest… how long’s it been since you been up here in Vegas?”
“At least five or six years.”
“And you probably remember we were pretty ahead of the curve even then. A lot’s changed, even since then. We got new labs and an expanded CSI unit, thanks to the TV show, I guess. Kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Everyone expected us to have the best, and so the higher-ups just fell in line. Anyway, my point is that I think we even got the labs in Quantico beat.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really. I’m not just blowing smoke, either. So, I don’t need the feds for that. I need something else.”
“What’s that?”
“I need you, Jon.”
“Orson-”
“I know, I know. You think I’m superstitious, don’t you? But there’s something to the way you think, Jon, that I haven’t seen in other detectives. You know these fuckers inside and out. Call it a sixth sense or imagination or whatever. Harlow knows that. That’s why he recruited you for that bullshit Cold Case Unit of his.”
Stanton grew uncomfortable and put his feet up on the desk in an attempt to force himself to relax. “I’m pretty swamped with my own cases right now.”
“I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but I already spoke to the assistant chief over there. What’s his name? Hu?”
“Chin Ho.”
“Yeah, I spoke to him, and we worked something out. He’d be willing to bring in another detective to cover for you while you come out here.”
“And how’d you convince him of that?”
“We got something over here you guys need-money. Money yells louder than anything else.”
“You’re going to pay them to have me come out there?”
“We can talk about the details later, but you wouldn’t just be working. I’m going to set you up in one of the nicest hotels out here. Anything you need, you tell us. You wanna fly your boys out on the weekends? It’s done. You wanna drive around in a Ferrari while you’re here? No problem.”
“This guy was that important, huh?”
“More than you know.”
“All right. I’ll come take a look, but I gotta tie up a few loose ends.”
“I’ll book your flight now for Saturday, first-class. I really owe you one, Jon. I’m not kidding. You call in that favor whenever you need.”
“I’m just taking a look at the evidence, Orson. I don’t know if there’s anything I can do.”
“Well, whatever, just get on that plane. I’ll feel better just having you out here.”
Stanton ended the call and noticed Lieutenant Childs standing at the door with his arms crossed. He had built even more muscle over the past few months, and they bulged underneath his smooth, black skin.
“Old friend?” he asked.
“I did some consulting work for him when I was still a grad student. We’ve stayed in touch since then.”
“All expenses-paid trip to Vegas? Sounds good to me.”
“Maybe. If he’s calling me and willing to shell out that kind of cash, it means he doesn’t have any other options. If I can’t help him right away, I’ll be flying coach on the next plane back here.”
3
By Friday, Stanton had passed his cases over to the detective brought in to cover for him. He was tall and lanky, with wrinkled suits and worn-out shoes, but he struck Stanton as honest and hardworking. After he had given him the last case, Stanton was notified that Assistant Chief Ho wanted to see him at the SDPD headquarters uptown before the day’s end.
Stanton left the office around three o’clock to go surfing. He might be in Vegas for a while, and he hoped missing his morning ritual of being out on the waves wouldn’t be too much for him. When he was married, every vacation they went on had to be near a beach, and Stanton hadn’t left San Diego since the divorce. When he’d agreed to help Hall, he hadn’t considered that it would mean taking a break from surfing.
The waves were mediocre, and he sat out on the water for a long time, lying flat with his stomach against the board. Letting his legs dangle in the waves, he let the surf push him back toward shore. The water was murky, but the sun was bright, and there were few clouds. He caught a glimpse of a group of kids getting surfing lessons on the beach, and he smiled as he watched them. He had tried to teach Matt and Jon Junior how to surf several times, but neither had been interested. They were obsessed with football because Melissa’s boyfriend played for the Chargers. She had met him at the gym, where she worked as a personal trainer. He’d heard through mutual friends that the relationship was serious.
Stanton paddled in softly, stood up when he was twenty feet out, and walked back to the beach. He watched the kids for a while and instinctually scanned around for single men watching them as well. His pleasant thoughts were immediately followed by an unpleasant one of what others could be doing or thinking. His mind had few barriers, and thoughts, both pleasant and horrific, flooded his consciousness every second. Orson was right: he did understand the monsters inside and out.
He went to the car and opened the passenger door to prevent prying eyes as he changed into jeans and a button-down shirt, then he hopped onto the interstate. He drove slowly, listening to the jazz station, until he pulled into the new SDPD headquarters’s parking lot. He never ceased to be amazed how clean the grounds were kept, considering his own precinct had recently developed a mouse problem. Several times, he had found droppings in his drawers and filing cabinets. Here, trees were planted in a pleasing arrangement, not too many and not too few. He had to sit in his car for a few minutes and prepare. A lot of his ghosts haunted that building.