‘Over twenty years,’ Hunter said, flipping open the volume in his hand. ‘His days, his thoughts, his doubts. They’re all here on paper. Listen to this,’ he said, turning towards Garcia.
‘With a heavy heart I prayed today. I prayed for a woman – Rosa Perez. For the past five years she’d been coming to this church. She’d been praying for one thing and one thing only. To be able to bear a child. Her womb was severely damaged after she’d been sexually assaulted by four men almost eight years ago. It happened only a block away from here. She was sixteen then. Rosa got married three years after the assault. She and her husband, Antonio, have been trying for a child ever since, and last year her prayers were finally answered. She became pregnant. I’ve never seen anyone so happy in all my life. Two months ago she gave birth to a baby boy, Miguel Perez, but there were complications. The baby wasn’t born healthy. He fought bravely for ten days, but his lungs and heart were too weak. He died eleven days after his birth.
‘Rosa came back to this church only once after she left the hospital. She brought with her a single question – WHY?
‘I saw it in her eyes. There was no belief anymore. Her faith had died with her son.
‘Today – alone – she took her own life inside a small apartment in East Hatchway Street. I now fear for Antonio’s sanity. And though my faith is indisputable, I long to know the answer to Rosa’s question. WHY, Lord? Why do you give only to take away?’
Hunter looked at Garcia.
‘When was that?’
‘There are no dates,’ Hunter confirmed.
Garcia shook his head as he pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘That’s a sad story. It seems that even priests question their faith from time to time.’
Hunter closed the diary and placed it back in the bookcase. ‘If Father Fabian feared for his life, or if anything bothered him lately, it will be in one of these books.’
Garcia slowly blew out a deep breath. ‘We’ll need some extra manpower to read through all of them.’
‘Maybe,’ Hunter said, retrieving the first diary from the right. ‘I’m hoping Father Fabian was an organized man. If that’s the case, the journals should be in order. If anything bothered him “lately”, it’ll be in the most recent one.’
Twelve
The party was already in full swing by the time Hunter arrived. Everyone was there. From the chief of police to the Robbery-Homicide Division’s mail boy. Even the mayor was expected to turn up. That wasn’t surprising given that William Bolter had been the Robbery-Homicide Division’s captain for the past eighteen years. Most of the division’s detectives had never been under a different captain. Everyone owed Captain Bolter a favor or two – everyone including Robert Hunter.
The Redwood Bar & Grill was bustling with law-enforcement officers. The ones on duty had their beepers securely clipped onto their belts. The ones off duty had beer bottles and whiskey glasses in their hands.
Hunter and Garcia had spent the entire day at the Seven Saints Catholic Church and its neighborhood. But the house-to-house turned up nothing but scared and distressed people. Hunter’s mind was overflowing with questions, and he knew the answers would take time.
‘Believe it or not, they have a ten-year-old bottle of Macallan behind the bar,’ Garcia said, coming up to Hunter with two half-full whiskey tumblers.
Single-malt Scotch whiskey was Hunter’s biggest passion. But unlike most people, he knew how to appreciate it instead of simply getting drunk on it.
‘To Captain Bolter.’ He raised his glass. Garcia did the same. ‘Where’s Anna?’ Hunter asked, looking around.
Anna Preston had been Garcia’s high school sweetheart and they’d married straight after graduation.
‘She’s at the bar chatting to some of the other wives.’ Garcia made a silly face. ‘We ain’t staying long.’
‘Me neither,’ Hunter agreed.
‘Are you gonna go back to the church?’
‘Roberrrrrt,’ Detective Kyle Byrne interrupted, grabbing Hunter by the arm and raising the bottle of Bud in his hand. ‘A toassst to Captain Bolterrr.’
Hunter smiled and touched his glass against Kyle’s bottle.
‘Where’re you going?’ Kyle asked as Hunter started towards the bar. ‘’ave a drink wizz us,’ he slurred, pointing towards a table where a handful of detectives sat drinking. They all looked wasted.
Hunter nodded to everyone at the table. ‘I’ll come back in a minute, Kyle. I just gotta say hello to a few people, but Carlos here can hang around with you boys for a while.’ He patted Garcia on the back, who gave him a ‘you didn’t just do that to me?’ look.
‘Carlosss. Come and ’ave a drink.’ Kyle dragged Garcia towards the table.
A firm hand grabbed Hunter by the shoulder before he reached the bar. He turned around ready to raise a new toast.
‘So you finally decided to show up.’
Captain Bolter was an impressive-looking man. Tall and built like a rhinoceros. Despite being in his late sixties, he still had a full head of silvery hair. His thick mustache had been his trademark for the past twenty years. His menacing figure demanded respect.
‘Captain,’ Hunter replied with a pleased smile. ‘Did you actually think I wouldn’t turn up?’
Captain Bolter placed his right arm around Hunter’s shoulders. ‘Let’s step outside, shall we? I can’t bear to raise another toast to myself.’
Thirteen
Clear skies made the night feel even colder. Hunter zipped up his leather jacket while Captain Bolter pulled a Felipe Power cigar from his jacket pocket. ‘Want one?’ he offered.
‘No, thanks.’
‘C’mon, it’s my leaving do. You should try one.’
‘I’ll stick with Scotch.’ Hunter raised his glass. ‘Those things make me dizzy.’
‘You sound like a big girl.’
Hunter laughed. ‘A girl who kicked your ass in the shooting range.’
Captain Bolter’s turn to laugh. ‘You know that I let you win on Friday, don’t you?’
‘Of course you did.’
‘I’ll take one of those.’
Hunter and the captain turned to face the man standing behind them. In his early sixties, Doctor Jonathan Winston, the Los Angeles Chief Medical Examiner, was dressed in an expensive-looking dark Italian suit with a white shirt and a conservative blue tie.
‘Jonathan!’ Captain Bolter said, already retrieving another cigar and handing it to the doctor.
‘You look like you just came from church, doc,’ Hunter said with a smile.
Doctor Winston lit up his cigar, took a long drag and blew the smoke out slowly. ‘From what I’ve heard, so have you.’
Hunter’s smile faded fast.
‘I’ve heard about this morning,’ the captain said in a more ominous tone. ‘By the look on your face, I can tell you don’t think this was a random killing, do you?’
Robert shook his head.
‘Religious hate?’
‘We don’t know yet, captain. There are some clues that point to a religious motive, or a religious psycho, but it’s too early to say.’
‘What do you have?’
‘At this point the only thing we know for sure is that the killer was extremely brutal, probably ritualistic.’
Hunter’s split-second hesitation was quickly picked up by Captain Bolter. ‘C’mon, Robert, I know you. There’s something else bothering you.’
Hunter sipped his Scotch and breathed in sharply. ‘They talked.’
‘Who talked? The priest and the killer?’
Hunter nodded.
‘How do you know that?’ the doctor asked.
‘The body was found a few feet from the confessional. Both doors were open and so was the small window on the partition that separates the two small cubicles.’ He paused for a second. ‘In the Catholic Church when a confessor is done confessing his sins and is given his penance, the priest always closes the partition window. Something about symbolizing that the door has been shut on those sins and the person’s been forgiven.’