Chapter 11
Chapter
Martha Matthias’s house remained an active crime scene, the front door sealed by yellow tape. But a whole new mood had set in.
None of that first-call tension, no flashing lights, no flotilla of black-and-whites.
No uniformed presence at all.
Parked directly in front of the house and spanning its width was a massive, unmarked white van roomy enough to transport the contents of a McMansion.
Rear doors propped open above a sloping metal ramp offered a view of a long, dim space.
Nothing inside but flat-packs of unassembled cardboard boxes. Piles of them.
A couple of burly guys in blue coveralls stood on the sidewalk near the van’s cab, smoking and pretending to ignore us.
Milo said, “Hey, guys.”
Dual nods. Bored. The badge flash didn’t change that.
He said, “You from the crime lab?”
The older man said, “Nah, we got a contract to bring stuff they can’t. This time they said we’d be taking boxes back but they didn’t say boxes of what.”
His partner looked at him. “It’s a crime scene, dude, what do you think, floral arrangements?”
He took a deep drag on a non-filter cigarette. “We been here three hours forty-two minutes. County wants to pay us to wait, bring it on.”
Milo turned away and glanced across the street where three minivans were lined up. Like the rental behemoth, white. But not anonymous. Blue letters proclaiming Police ran along the bottom. In case you missed that, up above near the roofline, Crime Scene Unit was painted in black.
Behind all that were two sedans with fat black-wall tires, both maligned by paint hues guaranteed to gag a private buyer. Wet Cement Gray, Swamp Mud Brown. Behind the brown car, a dented blue late-model Mustang.
Milo said, “Wonder who scored the cool wheels,” and donned his forensic suit. I did the same and just like the first time, we headed to the back of the murder house.
—
Alicia stood midway between the rear door and the garage, talking to a woman.
Both of their suits were dust-streaked. Alicia’s mask was down but the other woman’s wasn’t.
Above the seam, her eyes were chocolate brown, her complexion coppery gold.
A few feet away on the lawn was a four-wide, four-high stack of assembled boxes, each sealed with crime scene tape.
Alicia said, “Hey, L.T. This is Cheryl Najarian, supervisor at Hertzberg. Lieutenant Sturgis and Dr. Delaware, our psych consultant.”
Cheryl Najarian said, “Assistant supervisor. Nice to meet you, Lieutenant.” The mask canted toward me. “Psych? Makes sense, from what I’ve been hearing the whole case is kind of crazy.”
Milo turned to Alicia. “How’d you find the money?”
“Wish I could say it was a brilliant deduction, L.T. I’m rifling through piles and piles of old magazines, had been doing it for an hour-plus and boom, this bag just falls into my hot little hands. When I saw what was inside, I brought it out here and Cheryl phone-filmed as I counted.”
Najarian walked behind the stack of boxes and brought over a sealed, padded envelope that she tapped.
“Ten thousand. It’s not a record, not even close with the dope money we get. But hiding behind junk? That’s a first.”
She turned to me, eyebrows arching.
Even without seeing the bottom of her face, I knew the look.
Give me a diagnosis.
Time to disappoint someone I’d never met. I said, “Different.”
The eyebrows dropped. “Ya think?” Who needs this guy?
Alicia said, “That kind of money sure firms up a motive. Martha kept serious cash around and someone was aware of it. Maybe at the time of the murder they found some dough but didn’t realize there was more.”
Milo said, “Someone who knew her well enough to find it.”
“That’s what I’m thinking, L.T. As in crazy daughter. Who I still can’t find any info on.”
“Moe and Sean are inside searching?”
“Along with two of Cheryl’s techs. We were all doing it, stepped out to get some fresh air.”
Najarian said, “Emphasis on fresh.” She lowered her mask on a pleasant oval face.
Milo said, “Who scored the Mustang?”
Alicia grinned. “Only thing that was available in the impound lot today. Poor, poor pitiful me.”
Najarian said, “Great song.”
Milo turned to her and smiled. “You didn’t want to drive the moving van?”
Cheryl Najarian said, “When we heard about the situation from the team who got here the first day, we figured we might have to bring the house’s total contents for analysis.
The only vehicles we have with that capacity are the big motor vehicle transports and they’re all tied up.
So I authorized a company we sometimes use.
I’ll personally follow them back to make sure the evidence chain stays intact. ”
“Appreciate it, thanks,” said Milo. “Not sure you’ll need to analyze every scrap, though.”
“Fine with me, Lieutenant. What criteria should we use?”
“The likelihood of something evidentiary coming up. What do you have so far, Alicia?”
“Like I said before, the bathroom was the crime scene for sure and it’s been gone over thoroughly.
Techs found additional serious blood in the tub plus more blood and tissue in the drain all the way down to the trap.
That’s what’s over there in those boxes.
The other place they swabbed thoroughly was the space Martha used for a kitchen, but that produced nothing.
Now they’re working on the one bedroom set aside for sleeping.
The rest of the house is unbelievably filled with crap. ”
Milo said, “Cheryl, if we did bring everything back, how long would it take to go through it?”
Najarian frowned. “If I’ve got ample staff—which is a big if—two weeks minimum. You want us to get all OCD? Months.”
“Okay, how about this. Take random swabs throughout the house and if nothing shows up, I can’t see trucking tons of old paper over.”
“Not going to argue with that, Lieutenant. We’ve got serious storage issues.”
“Ever been in a situation like this?”
“I haven’t but one of my instructors worked the Oklahoma federal bombing. Total nightmare.”
“I’ll bet,” he said. “Now that I think about it, maybe the swabbing shouldn’t be random. First off let’s see if any more money shows up. Is most of the hoard paper?”
“All of it is,” said Alicia. “Newspapers, magazines, random receipts—I found some going back twenty-plus years.”
“Crazy,” said Najarian.
Milo said, “How about this: If we find money, we sample paper close to the stash—say, a three-foot radius. The same goes for personal documents—letters, wills, insurance policies, photos. And obviously anything with blood or body fluids.”
“If I was smart, I wouldn’t bring this up,” said Cheryl Najarian, “but fluids aren’t always visible early on. So how’re we going to be sure we’re not missing something? I mean I’m not thrilled about schlepping tons of garbage, but…”
Milo closed his eyes, opened them, tapped his foot. “Let’s take a look inside and see what makes sense.”