4
Her first impression had been the right one.
This was not a crime scene. The alley between Ivar and Cahuenga off Hollywood Boulevard was nothing more than the location for a body dump. A convenient location just three blocks from two separate entrances to the Hollywood Freeway. They could search every inch of the alley and find no evidence. Not a wallet, a purse, or anything that might resemble a murder weapon.
Lena glanced at a criminalist from SID packing up his kit as she thought it over.
There was no linkage. Nothing found here would point to the perpetrator because the victim hadn’t been murdered here. Instead, this was the place where she had been thrown out with the trash.
Lena could feel the anger in her bones.
If the perpetrator had made a mistake, she only counted one. The plastic bag the victim had been placed in didn’t match any other bag found in any Dumpster within five blocks. The plastic was a commercial grade, thicker than any normal trash bag and a good 30 percent larger. Lena’s father had been a welder. The Denver skyline bore its shape and beauty from his work. She knew from experience that bags like this were common on construction sites. The extra-thick plastic held more weight and was less likely to rip open if the bag contained sharp objects like glass and nails, or in this case, a young woman’s jagged bones.
Danny Bartlett, the runaway from Little Rock, had stoked up his crank pipe and just hit liftoff when he fished the five green bags out of the Dumpster. Lena had gone through the four remaining bags with a criminalist, then again with the kitchen manager at Tiny’s. The contents were from the bar and had gone out at 2:00 a.m. last night. According to the employee who tossed the bags, the trash had been picked up the night before, the Dumpster completely empty. None of the tenants sharing the alley had seen anyone drive through since they arrived at work this morning. So, it was a safe bet that the perpetrator got rid of the body between 2:00 a.m. and sunrise, then made the short drive north and vanished into the freeway system.
Lena shook it off, stepping aside when she heard the coroner’s van backing toward the Dumpster. Gainer’s assistants had placed the trash bag inside a blue body bag and were zipping it up. Once the victim was loaded into the van, Gainer handed Lena a receipt for the girl’s corpse. The name of the victim was listed as “Jane Doe No. 99.” Gainer included the date, time, and address, but nothing else to distinguish her identity. Lena was surprised by the high number, but didn’t say anything. Like the murder rate, the number of unidentified victims would reset to zero with the new year. Still, the slate would never be clean.
“You’re in luck,” Gainer said. “I just spoke with Madina. He’s changed his schedule. His plane lands at noon in Burbank. You’re in tomorrow afternoon despite the backup.”
She had been hoping for this. She wanted Art Madina to perform the autopsy, but knew that he was attending a medical conference in New Haven. Because the victim had been dismembered, she was counting on the pathologist’s expertise.
“Did you bring him up to speed?”
Gainer nodded. “I told him that we left her the way we found her. That what’s left of her is still inside the bag.”
Gainer’s voice trailed off. He had been on the job as a coroner’s investigator for at least a decade. Lena figured that in those ten years he had seen all there was to ever see. Yet, she sensed something in his voice as he spoke about Jane Doe No. 99 tonight. Something different in his eyes. Something she respected and admired in the man.
“We have to start at the beginning,” she said.
“Madina knows that she’s a Jane Doe. You’re in good hands. It’s all set.”
“Thanks, Ed. And thanks for hanging in this long.”
“No problem. You know that, Lena. What happened to Sweeney and Banks?”
“They took off with the kid. We’re opening the streets and shutting down.”
They shook hands, then she watched him climb into the van and drive off with the corpse. As she turned back to the alley, she shivered in the cold night air and reached inside her jacket for the chief’s itinerary. This was the first time in the past six hours that she had thought about the chief or his adjutant. For six hours she had been working for the victim, free of the weight of department politics. She unfolded the paper and moved beneath a street light. According to the schedule, Chief Logan was still at Parker Center. The Police Commission was holding another emergency meeting on gang violence. Lena remembered seeing a flyer posted outside the captain’s office. A proposal was on the table that called for the appointment of a gang czar, with $1 billion to be spent on a Marshall-like plan that included gang intervention programs and economic development. Because half the homicides in Los Angeles were now attributable to gang violence, and that violence was spilling into the wealthiest neighborhoods in the city, this was a serious meeting and the chief would be tied up until ten or eleven. If she left now and lucked out with traffic, she might be able to catch him before the meeting ended.
She slung her briefcase over her shoulder and started down the alley. As she stepped around the SID truck, she heard the press shouting questions at her from across the street but ignored them. The air felt raw and she couldn’t wait to get the heat on. When she finally reached her car and lit up the engine, her cell phone started vibrating and she checked the display.
The call was from Denny Ramira, the one and only reporter who knew her cell number. Ramira worked the crime beat for The Times. Even though they shared a certain history, she was reluctant to take the call. She stared at the phone for a while, then changed her mind and flipped it open.
“I know this is out of line,” he said. “But I’m freezing my balls off out here and it looks like you guys are packing up. You’ve got nothing to say, right?”
“You’re a mind reader.”
“But this is your case, right, Lena?”
Something about the question seemed odd. Even out of place. She sat back in the seat, thinking it over.
“It’s your case, right?” he repeated.
“What’s going on, Denny?”
“I’m not sure. I got a heads-up about the murder. My contact wanted to make sure I knew you got the case.”
“Who’s your contact?”
Ramira hesitated. “Just some guy I know. But everybody out here got the same call. The question is why.”
If it had been a multiple-choice question, none of the answers seemed very good. Still, this wasn’t her main concern right now.
“Gotta go, Denny.”
“Yeah, sure. I’m heading downtown to Parker Center. Maybe I can catch the end of that meeting. Maybe the night won’t be a total bust.”
Lena winced. “Maybe you can touch base with that guy you know.”
She closed her phone before he could respond, hoping she wouldn’t run into him at Parker Center. Pulling out of the lot, she made a left to avoid the media, then looped around the block and worked her way down to Gower and Sunset. She had skipped dinner, the view of the victim’s lifeless eyes staring back at her from that trash bag still way too vivid. But she needed something. As she pulled into the lot at Gower Gulch, she didn’t see a line at Starbucks and ran in. Five minutes later, she was back on the road, toggling through recent calls until she found Howard Benson’s number. Benson had been a classmate at the academy and now worked in the Missing Persons Unit. Once they determined that the victim couldn’t be identified, Benson had been her first call. But that was more than three hours ago and she hadn’t heard from him. After six rings, he finally picked up.