Chapter Seven
Eve opened her field kit, crouched beside the body. Like Chu, the victim’s hand lay mangled and broken. She pressed a thumb to her pad.
“Victim is officially identified as Ezra Dent of this address. Victim is a seventy-one-year-old Black male. Six-two, two hundred pounds. His left wrist has been broken, both hands appear to have suffered multiple breaks. There is what appears to be a heel mark across the knuckles of the left hand.”
She got out her microgoggles, leaned down. “Heel mark, the assailant stomped on the hand, but there’s additional bruising, possible defensive wounds.
“I think you got a couple hits in, Ezra. Peabody, run the vic while I’m doing this.”
“Already am. Dr. Ezra Dent worked for Banner-Wyst from 2018, semiretired as a chief lab tech in 2059, and now works part-time for that company as a consultant.”
“And there we are. Keep running him. Victim suffered multiple breaks, left arm, looks like the right knee’s dislocated or broken, ME to confirm. Severe blood loss, facial damage, well, it’s fucking intense. Nose is smashed, both cheekbones, lips, multiple splits.”
With sealed hands she lifted the top lip.
“Visual shows three missing teeth, mangled tongue. Both eyes are swollen closed.” She eased one open a slit. “And the whites of both eyes are bloody. Gashes on forehead and on the back of the skull. I think his neck’s broken.”
She eased back, got her gauges.
“TOD, twenty-two-fourteen. So last night. Let’s roll him.”
As she assisted, Peabody winced. “Jesus, Dallas, he’s like a bag of broken bones.”
“Because he is. Right hip’s displaced or broken. Victim’s wearing what appear to be lounge pants, a long-sleeved tee. He’s barefoot. Left foot’s broken, three toes broken or severely sprained on right foot. From the looks of the bruising, the blows were from fists or open hands, feet.”
She straightened up.
“He was watching screen. It’s busted to shit now, but he was watching screen.
Smashed wineglass over there, bowl of chips busted and scattered over there.
He fought back. Big guy, maybe strong guy, and he fought back, at least initially.
Maybe we’ll get lucky this time and find some of the assailant’s blood. ”
“But you don’t think so.”
“No, he’s careful. Under all that fury, he’s still careful.
Trashed the room, either during the fight or after.
Broken chairs, broken vase of flowers over there, lamp, side table.
That fireplace, like the one in the living area, only the glass front’s shattered.
Art torn off the walls, smashed. But look at those shelves there, Peabody. ”
“Everything’s pulled off, broken or dropped. But there are two frames and they’re turned to face the wall.”
Eve walked over, turned one. “The vic, and most likely the cohab.”
“Verified in the run. They’ve been together for nine years.”
She turned the second. “Vic with an adult male; an adult female; the cohab; a minor female, maybe twelve; a minor male, ten or so; an infant. Since she’s wearing a fancy dress, female. Christmas shot in front of the tree, living area.”
“Vic has a daughter from his first marriage, age forty-one—the boy, the girl, and the infant are her children. The adult male would be the daughter’s spouse. Just FYI, the cohab has no marriage, no offspring.”
“Family. Family matters. He doesn’t damage family. Does he have one? Did he lose one?”
She turned back. “Morgue, sweepers. Flag for the blood samples. Luck happens. Flag the body for Morris.”
She took one last look.
“Let’s go up and talk to the cohab.”
As they walked back toward the stairs, Callendar approached from the opposite direction.
“Still got stuff to look over, but figured you’d want to know what time the security was compromised.
And I wouldn’t have found the how and when so easy if you hadn’t given me the skinny on the first murder.
Damn-sight slick, and even with knowing how on the first, I couldn’t quite finesse so—don’t get twisted—I tagged Roarke. ”
“He’s the one who’d get twisted if he didn’t want to consult, not me.”
“Well, he didn’t twist. I got lucky, and he was just coming out of a meeting.
He gave me a boost on it, and, you know, voilà, the security on the rear glass door—that’s the one right off the lounge—was shut off, remotely, using Ezra Dent’s—also Joleen Everly’s—code at twenty-one-twenty-six.
The security reengaged, remotely, at twenty-two-twenty-two. ”
“Good data. It took him, what’s that? Ah, forty-eight? Forty-eight minutes after shutting it off to turn Dent into a bag of bloody bones. This one fought back some. And, still, he’s out in just under an hour.”
“I got to say,” Callendar put in, “pounding somebody for forty-eight minutes takes a lot of wind, a lot of muscle, and a lot of motivation.”
“Odds are he kept pounding for a time after. The vic’s ’link is smashed to shit in there, but you could bag it up, take it in.”
“Will do. There’s an office over that side, with a D and C unit. Do you want me to check that out?”
“Check it out. We’re heading up to talk to the cohab. Morgue and sweepers are coming in.”
Eve went up the curving stairs, noted the holographic art decorating the walls on the second-floor loft. The fact that the images seemed to move struck her as just a little unnerving.
“These are excellent, really exceptional, if you go for it,” Peabody commented. “This artist?” She gestured to a painting of lines, angles, symbols in shades of red and gray, a few hints of blue. “She’s one of the top holographists in the world.”
“I like my inanimate objects to stay inanimate.”
They passed guest rooms, another sort of lounge, guest baths, and found both uniforms and the cohab in a sitting room with dark blue walls and a pair of bright white sofas, two chairs of small dark blue crescents and spheres over a bright white field.
Tables, clear cubes, held skinny lamps. Photos, dust catchers, and whatnots sat on clear shelves so they seemed to float on the air.
Another unnerving choice, in Eve’s opinion.
Joleen Everly sat in the corner of a sofa.
A whippet-thin woman, she wore slouchy black pants, an untucked white shirt, and low-topped black kicks.
She had poreless and perfect skin the color of polished oak, a full mouth, heavy on the bottom lip.
A kind of crown of hair topped her narrow face, the black base layered with a froth of muted gold.
Her eyes, red-rimmed, clouded, were dark as midnight.
“Ms. Everly, I’m Lieutenant Dallas. This is Detective Peabody. We’re very sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you.” Her voice, contralto, rich, held steady, but Eve noticed the tremor in her hands.
“We understand this is a difficult time, but we need to ask you some questions.”
“I want to know who did this. I want to know who could have done this to Ezra. I need to know who. I need to know why.”
That rich voice broke on the last word. Joleen squeezed her eyes shut, gripped her hands together. Eve watched her bear down for control, then open her eyes.
“I’m ready to answer questions.”
“One moment. Officers?”
Eve took them aside. “The morgue and the sweepers are on the way. Detective Callendar’s working on the e’s. Go on down, keep the scene secure until they arrive.”
“Yes, sir. This one’s got some moxie.”
As Eve stepped back over, Peabody asked, “Ms. Everly, can I get you some more tea?”
“No. No, this is fine. I started to get a soother, but I don’t want to be soothed.
I loved Ezra very much. I know some people, because of the age difference, think I’m with him for the money, the status.
Hell, I’d have married him if that’s what I wanted.
I didn’t want marriage, never have, and we were fine this way. We were happy. I loved him.”
“You’ve been out of town?”
“Yes, the last two days. I’m a stylist, and I have a client who had an important event in Memphis. She wanted me with her. I travel for work fairly often. You need to check all that, I suppose. I can give you my flight information, the hotel information, my client’s contact.”
“Yes, that would be helpful. You arrived home about noon.”
“Yes. The car service picked me up at the shuttle station—the flight landed at about eleven-twenty, I think. I only had a carry-on.”
“And when you got home?”
“I came in, dropped my bags by the stairs. I called out. We’d texted yesterday so he knew when I’d get home. He said he’d make a welcome home lunch.”
Her eyes glistened with tears she blinked back. “He liked me to eat healthy. He actually liked to cook, make healthy meals that didn’t taste healthy.”
Smiling, she flicked a tear away. “Cooking was, he said, just another science. So I called out, and I started back, as I expected to find him in the kitchen. And I saw him. I saw him, and I stumbled back. I—I fell, and I couldn’t get up for a minute. Longer? I’m not sure.
“I got my ’link, and I called for the police. I didn’t call for an ambulance. I knew he was dead, so I called for the police. The nine-one-one operator was very kind because I couldn’t get my breath at first.”
She picked up tea that had to be cold. “I sat there with him. I didn’t want him to be alone. I know that’s foolish, but I didn’t want to leave him alone like that. Then the police came.”
“I don’t think it’s foolish,” Peabody told her. “Doing a loving thing is never foolish.”
“It was all I could do for him because I wasn’t here. It was all I could do.”
“Ms. Everly, was Dr. Dent worried about anything or anyone? Had there been any threats, confrontations, conflicts?”
“Ezra always worried about something.”
She let out a long sigh, worked to steady again.
“Was his daughter—three kids—getting enough rest? Did I eat properly when traveling? Then the state of the world—politics, society, the environment, of course. But no, nothing more than that.
“As far as conflicts or confrontations, none I know of. He’s been semiretired for a while now. He enjoyed having more time for his hobbies. Art collecting, tennis, sports in general. He kept very fit.”