Mind Scrambler

  Detachment.

  This was one of the first tricks Ceepak taught me back when we first started working together. He advised an otherworldly separation between your personal feelings and the demands of the job. A cold, analytical approach to stuff that would otherwise tear your guts out. I guess it’s how he survived over in Iraq. Yes, your buddies are getting blown to bits by improvised explosive devices but if you freak out about it, you won’t be able to save your own ass or help your buddies who are still alive stay that way.

  You forget that the body you’re examining for clues is the same body you used to admire in a tight white one-piece on Oak Beach when you were both fifteen and that body held all the secrets to everything you ever wanted to know.

  “Danny?” says Ceepak. “Is this how you found the crime scene?”

  “Yeah.” I find just enough voice to push out the one syllable.

  “We know the victim,” Ceepak says to Detective Flynn.

  He nods. Gestures toward Katie’s naked, trussed-up body, her grisly S and M death pose. “This sadomasochism situation consistent with what you know of her history?”

  “Negative,” says Ceepak.

  I just shake my head.

  “Hunh.” Flynn squats into a crouch, rubs his chin, stares at Katie.

  So, I look again, too.

  We’re in what I’ll call the sitting room of the two-bedroom suite because there’s a couch, two chairs, a small dining table, and four wooden chairs. Lots of places to sit. One door leads into the master bedroom. Another into a smaller bedroom, which, judging from the trail of toys spilling across its threshold, is where Richie and Britney sleep. A third door is open a crack, revealing a tiled wall and floor. Bathroom.

  In the center of the sitting room, Katie is pinioned in a spread-eagle seated position on a wooden chair situated directly in front of the armoire storing the TV set. Her hands are cuffed behind her back. Her ankles are lashed to the rear legs of the chair.

  “I found a couple pubic hairs, here on the floor,” says Flynn. “Black. A whole clump of them.”

  Katie is—was—a redhead.

  “Running the DNA?” asks Ceepak.

  “We will,” says Flynn. “But the test takes five days. So first, we’ll eyeball ’em under the microscope. Match ’em against samples taken from any potential suspects. Dance belts.”

  “Come again?” says Ceepak.

  “This dancer. Jake Pratt. The one what missed the show tonight. Can’t nobody find him.”

  Yep. Jake is definitely a suspect.

  “We tagged and bagged his dance belt out of the dressing room. It’s like a jockstrap, only for ballerinas. Anyway, we examined this guy Pratt’s dance thong. Harvested a couple short curly ones. Black.”

  Ah, the glamorous life of CSI: Atlantic City. Combing through jockstraps.

  Detective Flynn goes back to staring at Katie, so I do, too.

  I see it all again, in better light this time. The blindfold. The ball gag. The black leather garter belt studded with steel rivets. The silky rope wrapped above and below her breasts.

  The bolo tie cinched tight into her neck.

  Now Flynn stands up. Shakes his head.

  “Not hers,” he says.

  Ceepak nods. “Agreed.”

  “What?” I ask.

  Flynn nods at Ceepak, encourages him to go ahead and field my question. “The S and M costume,” he says. “Ms. Landry did not purchase it.”

  “We don’t know that,” I say. “She might’ve, you know, been into this kind of stuff and kept it secret.”

  “In which case,” says Flynn, his diction crystal clear, the way it must be when he goes to court, “we can safely assume Ms. Landry would have purchased a garter belt that fit. This one is loose—even though the waist strap is buckled through the last slot available. It’s two inches too big. A medium when she needed a small. This here was staged to misguide us.”

  My turn to mumble: “ ’Trust none of what you hear and less of what you see.’ ”

  “Hunh?” This from Flynn.

  “Springsteen,” says Ceepak. “Song lyrics.”

  “Oh. Right. I’m more a Bon Jovi man, myself. Keep the faith.”

  I know it’s a Bon Jovi song title. Might also be good advice because Detective Flynn just confirmed what I hoped was true: Katie Landry was not a skanky sex kitten. True, she may not have been the Saint Katie I imagined her to be, but the loose-fitting garter belt means she wasn’t filling out applications at Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club, either. Somebody was trying to trash her reputation, make us believe a lie.

  “Could be fingerprints on that silver tie ornament,” says Flynn, now eyeing the murder weapon.

  “Unless, of course, the perpetrator was wearing gloves,” says Ceepak.

  “Which he probably was,” says Flynn. “He came in here prepared. Had a limited window of opportunity. Time constraints.”

  Ceepak nods his agreement. “He wanted to commit this murder while Rock’s show was still in progress.”

  Now Flynn nods. “While the backstage security camera was disabled.”

  “Do we know that?” asks Ceepak.

  “Had to be.” He does the finger-walking bit again. “Otherwise we would’ve seen her with the kids, seen the kids leaving. Payperviewporno?” Flynn’s mumbling again, nodding toward the master bedroom.

  “Roger that,” says Ceepak. “Mr. Parker has already requested information on when the movie was ordered from the front desk.”

  “Uhm-hmmm. More window dressing. Misdirection. Make us think Ms. Landry was some kind of sex addict. Swiftboat her.”

  “Still,” says Ceepak, “the time of the video activation coupled with your time-of-death analysis should help us pinpoint more precisely when the killer was in these rooms.”

  “Yes, indeed, it should,” says Flynn, with the faint hint of a grin. “Sandy was right. Youse guys are good.”

  Now the two of them shift their attention to a stack of books sitting on the small table. I see a couple marble-covered Mead composition books, Hop on Pop, and a world history textbook. There are also a couple more Meads scattered on the floor—near the table legs.

  Ceepak bends down beside one of the notebooks and extracts a small leather case from his right rear pocket. Unzips it. Removes stainless-steel tweezers.

  Usually, my partner packs all sorts of evidence-gathering gear into the pockets of his cargo pants. When he attends the theater, however, he dresses up. Banana Republic khakis. No spare pants pockets. I figure this little cordovan wallet must be the tool kit he packs for a night out on the town.

  He uses the pincers to open one notebook with a childish scrawl on the front: Math.

  “Multiplication tables.” Ceepak opens a few others. “English compositions. History reports.”

  “Ms. Landry their teacher?”

  “And nanny.”

  “I want to take a sample of the rope,” says Flynn. “Odd color. Silk, you think?”

  “Definite possibility,” says Ceepak. “It looks very similar to the ropes used in Mr. Rock’s magic act.”

  “Okay,” says Flynn. “MCU is on the way. Dr. McD’s people will comb the carpet. Fibers. More hairs. Dust for prints. Call the coroner.”

  My detachment disintegrates.

  The coroner.

  They’re coming to take Katie away. Put her in a body bag, take her to the morgue. Put her in a coffin. Put her in the ground.

  Ceepak places a hand on my shoulder. “Danny?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Perhaps you should reexamine the bathroom for us.”

  “Yeah.”

  In other words, “get outta here, partner.” No need to remain in the living room with the dead body. No need to watch the somber men come in and zip Katie inside a black vinyl bag, tote her out the door looking like lumpy ski luggage.

  “That’s the kids’ bathroom,” says Flynn. “Dora the Explorer toothbrush. Cherry-flavored Crest. Footstool. Tub is full. Up to the drain latch. Must
’ve been bathtime for one of them. Probably the boy.”

  Guess the detective has already checked it out.

  “That would suggest,” says Ceepak, “if she had been drawing a bath for one of the children, Ms. Landry had not been expecting her assailant’s arrival.”

  “That it would,” says Flynn. “That it would.”

  Wow. This guy’s good, too.

  Flynn head-gestures toward Katie. “I still want to . . . before the coroner . . .”

  “I assumed as much,” says Ceepak.

  Why do I think they want to examine Katie for evidence of what they call entry?

  “I’ll be in here.” I head into the bathroom. Seems appropriate: I’m off to the kids’ table so the grown-ups can discuss adult stuff.

  I use a fingertip to close the door, steer clear of the doorknob. Don’t want to contaminate any potential fingerprint fields.

  There’s a brightly colored toy tugboat floating in the placid ocean filling the tub. Guess that’s how Flynn figured it was the boy who was getting ready for a bath when Jake came in and handed the kids fifty bucks to go get lost. I wonder if he even gave Richie time to dry off.

  I stare at myself in the bathroom mirror.

  I look worn out. Older than I remember being this morning. Yes, I’m still twenty-five, but I feel like I’m seventy-five or whatever age it is when you start going to more funerals every year than weddings.

  I use one finger to lever open the sink taps and let water rush into the bowl. Hot. Nearly scalding.

  I just let it run.

  The sound is reassuring. A faint mist rises. When I was a kid with a cement head, all stuffy and congested from a cold, my mom would spoon Vicks VapoRub into the little medicine cup that came with our humidifier and make me breathe in big clouds of eucalyptus-scented steam.

  Guess the Xanadu’s hot-water heater works better than my mom and dad’s because the mirror is already starting to fog up. Fast. I adjust the knobs to cool it off. Cup some lukewarm water into my hands. Splash it against my face. Taste the sweat and some of the fear as it washes away. I turn off the hot, put my hands under the spigot, bowl up a load of cold and splash it into my eyes.

  When I blink them open again, I’m staring at the mirror.

  Reading what somebody had finger-written there the last time the mirror fogged up:

  J Luvs U.

  A loopy, Valentine’s Day heart frames the letters.

  J.

  Jake.

  16

  Who needs a pubic-hair match when the killer basically smears his confession on the bathroom mirror?

  Jake.

  He killed Katie in a fit of rage. Maybe because she wouldn’t spice up their sex life and go buy her own S and M outfit. So he bought one for her. Kicked out the kids. Forced Katie to put the stuff on, hoping she’d warm up to the idea of dressing like a bondage freak. Maybe he tried to turn her on to the whole erotic asphyxiation game.

  And when he tugged too hard, he killed the woman he loved.

  Guilt-ridden, he ran in here, took a shower.

  No. Wait. He would’ve had to drain the bathtub first.

  So, maybe he finger-painted the message this afternoon. Maybe they had a quickie on Katie’s lunch break and Jake scribbled his fifth-grade mash note after that shower.

  Whatever. This definitely implicates him. Jake.

  I’m all set to call out to Ceepak and Detective Flynn—show them our newfound evidence—when I hear voices.

  They’re muffled. This bathroom has two doors: one opening up into the room where Ceepak and Flynn are still examining Katie. The other?

  Guess it connects to Mr. and Mrs. Rock’s suite because I recognize his voice.

  “You’re a big stupid fuck!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How could you let this happen?”

  “I don’t know. . . .”

  “What the fuck do you know, you fucking moron?”

  Richard Rock, Mr. Family Values, has quite a temper offstage, not to mention a severely limited vocabulary. Most of his words come out of the F file.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck . . .”

  “Yo, sir—I’m sorry. Chill.”

  Now I recognize the other voice, too. It’s the big Samoan bruiser who told me, “Take the right. AA-four’s the second suite down.” Mr. Event Staff. The invisible man.

  I shove open the door.

  “Hey!” Rock says when he sees me. “You can’t come in here. This is a private room!”

  “Ceepak?” I’m shouting. “Detective Flynn!”

  The Samoan, still in his navy blue windbreaker, takes a step forward.

  “Don’t move,” I shout at him. “I’m with the police.”

  The Hawaiian whale throws up both his hands to let me know he isn’t looking for trouble. “I’m cool, bro. We’re cool.”

  “Get him the fuck out of here!” screams Rock.

  “Freeze!” Ceepak. Behind me.

  “That’s him!” I flail my arm and point. Highly unprofessional, sure, but I’m excited. “That’s the security guy who was backstage when I came down the hall after the show.”

  “What’s the problem?” Detective Flynn squeezes past me.

  “Nothing,” says Rock.

  “Somebody stole Mr. Rock’s secret notebooks!” says the Samoan, pointing at a small trunk tucked underneath the table in Mr. and Mrs. Rock’s sitting room.

  “You were burglarized this evening?” asks Flynn.

  “Maybe,” says Rock. “We don’t know for sure.”

  “It’s nothing,” says Mrs. Rock as she breezes into the living room, trailed by Zuckerman. “No need to involve the police. David can take care of it.”

  “Of course I can, Richard.”

  “Don’t you fucking fucks tell me—”

  “Mr. Rock?” Ceepak’s booming voice. The one he probably used to clear traffic jams when he was an MP. Tank traffic jams.

  “What?” Rock’s frat-boy face is burning red with rage.

  Ceepak remains calm. “Please sit down, sir.” He indicates that the nearby couch would be a good place for him to do that.

  “Who the hell are you again?”

  “John Ceepak. Atlantic City PD.”

  “What?”

  Detective Flynn nods. “He’s one of my new deputies.” It’s his turn to point at the couch. “Sit. Stay. All of youse.”

  It’s a good thing we’re in a hotel.

  Lots of rooms to send people to while we try to sort a few things out.

  The message scrawled on the bathroom mirror.

  The miraculous reappearance of Mr. Event Staff.

  The possible theft of Mr. Rock’s secret notebooks.

  We’ll talk to Richard and Jessica Rock first. One of the uniformed cops escorts the ponytailed security dude to a small room up the hall where he’ll wait to be questioned. Meanwhile, the state’s major crimes unit has arrived—a trio of highly skilled crime-scene investigators dressed in sterile white Tyvek coveralls so they look like a walking subdivision before the vinyl siding goes up. They just added the bathroom mirror to their to-do list.

  Detective Flynn is with the CSI crew in AA-4, helping them comb the carpet. This leaves the interrogation duties in AA-6 to his two newest deputies: Ceepak and me.

  The Rocks sit side by side on the couch. David Zuckerman, their manager, sits in one of the cushioned chairs with matching fabric. Gray with color sprinkles. Mr. Rock sips a warm glass of milk. His wife nuked it for him.

  “Reckon I owe you boys an apology,” he says, giving us his best head bob and aw-shucks grin. “Didn’t mean to bust loose like that.”

  “Richard is usually very calm,” says his wife. “And he would never, ever use that kind of language onstage, not in front of children.”

  “’Course not. Feel bad enough I used it in front of you folks.”

  “Understandable reaction,” adds Zuckerman. “There’s been a murder here tonight. The children went missing. And now, this?” He flaps a hand
at the footlocker. Snicks his tongue.

  I check out my partner’s reaction. Ceepak’s jaw is set. Eyes locked. None of the apologizing means diddly-squat to him right now. He’s in the Zone.

  “What was stolen?” he asks.

  “Couple notebooks,” says Rock.

  “That’s all?”

  Rock nods.

  “Estimated value?” asks Ceepak.

  I’m guessing $3.50 at Staples.

  “Priceless,” says Zuckerman.

  “I take it these notebooks contain the secrets to your illusions?”

  “That’s right,” says Rock. “See, I do me up one notebook per trick. Helps me keep organized. If I get a new idea, I open a new notebook. Mix ’n match ’em when puttin’ together a new show. I never let nobody else look at ’em. Top secret.”

  “They took Lucky Numbers,” says Zuckerman. “No wonder the sneaky bitch was so late!”

  “Lady Jasmine?” says Ceepak.

  Zuckerman nods. “She took her seat two seconds before Lucky Numbers went up because she was back here burgling us. The goddamn slant-eyed—”

  I think Ceepak’s heard enough family-unfriendly tirades for one night. He cuts Zuckerman off. “Where was your security man stationed?”

  “Tupula?”

  So. Event Staff has a name.

  “Where was he during tonight’s performance?”

  “Outside the stage door,” says Zuckerman. “Same place he’s always positioned.”

  And yet he never appears on camera? Interesting.

  “Did Tupula see Lady Jasmine or any member of her entourage in the backstage area?”

  “If he did, he ain’t telling us about it,” says Rock. “But, come to think of it, ol’ two-ton Tupula could be on the take, you know? Workin’ both sides against the middle. You’re either workin’ for me, or against me. Tupula Tuiasopo? Boy’s slicker than fried lard.” Mr. Rock appears to be winding himself up again. F-bomb alert now in effect for the entire tristate region.

  “Why is he unseen on the surveillance tapes?” asks Ceepak.

  “Confidential,” says Zuckerman.

  “Come again?”

  “That information is classified.”

  Ceepak’s eyebrows rise in what I’d call extreme puzzlement. These guys run a magic show, not the CIA.