“Are we set?” Kerney asked from the side of the door, glancing from Armijo to Clayton. Both had flashlights at the ready.
Armijo nodded. “I’m first in.”
“Cover left,” Kerney said to Clayton. “I’ll take right.”
“Roger that.”
The trio went in fast and cleared the apartment quickly. There was no one there. Armijo found the electrical panel and turned on the lights. Except for the telescope on the tripod, some painting supplies, drop cloths, and a chalky residue from the drywall patching on the plywood subflooring, the place was empty.
“Nobody moves out of an apartment without leaving something behind,” Armijo said as he opened a kitchen cabinet drawer and dumped the contents. Several grocery store coupons floated to the floor along with a box of toothpicks and a plastic bottle of over-the-counter medicine. The rest of the drawers and cabinets were empty.
“I’m calling for forensics,” Armijo said.
“First,” Clayton replied, “I want that telescope and tripod dusted for prints. It looks brand-new and it’s not very high quality or expensive. I’ll bet it was bought at either a toy store or at one of those big-box discount retailers. Ask the manager when the last trash pickup was made. We may want somebody to go dumpster diving. It would be great if we can find a sales receipt.”
“I’m on it,” Armijo said as he left the apartment.
Clayton studied the exposed subflooring. A wide swath of the powdery dust from the drywall repairs had been wiped with a rag. He followed the cleanup attempt from the telescope in the bedroom all the way to the front door. Any evidence of footprints in the dust had also been wiped clean around the tripod and on the balcony.
A slight chill went up Clayton’s spine. Had Tim Riley’s killer watched him locate and document the partial footprints left on the cabin porch in Capitan? Is that why the footprints in the apartment had been obliterated? Was the killer watching him now, or was he just being paranoid?
Clayton looked out the open balcony door to the street below. The attention of the crowd was focused on the crime scene across the way, and nobody was looking up in his direction.
“What is it?” Kerney asked as he approached.
“Nothing?”
“It’s something.”
“I can’t be certain,” Clayton replied, “but what if we’re being watched by the killer?”
Kerney stepped onto the balcony and looked over the railing. “If, as you say, we’re dealing with a professional, that would be totally out of character unless it serves some larger purpose. But let’s have officers get names and addresses of the people on the sidewalk just in case.”
Clayton punched numbers on his cell phone and asked Lee Armijo to have APD detectives follow up with the crowd. “What larger purpose?” he asked after disconnecting.
Kerney returned to the bedroom. “Assuming Brian Riley has been the target all along, the murder of Robocker and the officer could be nothing more than some tidying up.”
“How so?” Clayton asked.
“Robocker may have known absolutely nothing, and was killed simply because the police had shown an interest in her.”
“So the perp has been watching her apartment,” Clayton said, “hoping Riley would come around, and instead the cops show up with Robocker in tow under their protection.”
“Which might have been enough to convince the perp it was time to cancel Robocker just in case she had been talking.”
“That can’t be the larger purpose,” Clayton said wearily.
Kerney patted Clayton on the arm. “I didn’t say I knew what it was; just that there might be one. Let’s go with the thought that we’ve got four homicides, five including the unborn fetus, and Brian Riley is the key to what ties them together. Let’s find him before the killer does.”
“So far that’s been easier said than done.”
Lee Armijo returned with news that the trash had been hauled away yesterday afternoon, the tenant who’d moved out of the apartment was being interviewed by detectives, officers were tracking down the workmen who’d been in the apartment since it had become vacant, and a fresh team of detectives were about to start a new canvass at their present location.
“I put a uniform to work going through the trash bin anyway and told him to look for the packing box and assembly instructions for the telescope,” Armijo said. “If he comes up empty, I told him to get a list together of any and all businesses in the city that sold that particular make and model so we could start making the rounds.”
“Good deal,” Clayton said.
“The forensic techs will be here in a few,” Armijo added, “and they ask that you not touch anything, as you might contaminate evidence and thus prevent them from solving the crimes.”
“They truly said that?” Kerney asked.
Armijo nodded. “Apparently they consider you and Sergeant Istee country cousins who have little appreciation for or knowledge of their considerable skills, or they’ve been watching too many crime scene investigation television shows.”
“Tell them I want comparison fingerprints from the previous tenant and everyone who’s been in this apartment since it was vacated,” Kerney said.
“Consider it done,” Armijo said as the first crime scene tech entered the apartment. He repeated Kerney’s request, pointed at the bedroom door, and told the tech to start in there. “Now, if you guys have a few minutes to spare, my chief, several of his deputy chiefs, and every officer at the crime scene above the rank of sergeant are waiting for you in the mobile command center. They very much would like to know—as my chief put it—‘what the fuck is going on. ’”
“Whatever,” Clayton said, stifling a yawn as he headed for the door.
As the men left the apartment, Kerney noticed dark circles under Clayton’s eyes. He looked totally worn out and in need of sleep. Kerney knew Clayton had been working full throttle for over twenty-four hours and was about to run out of steam.
At the mobile command center, Scott Kruger, the APD chief of police, a man Kerney knew and considered to be more of a politician than a cop, greeted him at the door, pulled him aside, and waited until Armijo and Clayton entered the vehicle before speaking.
A chunky man with a thin face, Kruger looked decidedly uptight. “Tell me this Indian cop knows what he’s talking about.”
“What do you mean?”
“My homicide captain tells me that this Sergeant Istee from Lincoln County says the murder of my officer and the cocktail waitress is directly related to the killings of the deputy sheriff in Capitan and his wife up in Santa Fe.”
“There’s good reason to believe that.”
Kruger grunted. “You mean it’s just a hypothesis?”
“And a very good one,” Kerney noted, already tiring of Kruger’s blustery style. It was a poor substitute for command presence, which the man totally lacked. “It’s one that I agree with, based on Sergeant Istee’s analysis.”
“And this Sergeant Istee, will he walk us through how he arrived at all of his insights?” Kruger asked without trying to mask his sarcasm.
“I’m sure if you ask nicely, he will,” Kerney replied.
“The dead deputy’s son, this Brian Riley, he’s a suspect?”
“Perhaps,” Kerney replied. “We won’t know until we find him.”
Kruger grimaced. “So I got nothing to tell the media, right?”
“After the briefing, I’d like us to make a full-bore effort to find Brian Riley, including asking the media for their assistance. That should make for a juicy breaking-news story.”
Kruger’s expression brightened as he stepped toward the mobile command center’s door. “Okay, Kerney, I’ll stay on the same page with you for a while.”
“That’s great,” Kerney replied, straight-faced.