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"I’m fine"
"You don’t look fine," Hernandez said "Do you want some water?"
"Nothank you"
In Ana DeLeon’s office, the big Anglo detective was still sitting behind the desk, poring through paperwork He had a buzz of rust brown hair, a rumpled dress shirt, a brutish face Queasily, Maia tried to remember where she’d met him before
"Kelsey," Hernandez offered "Lead investigator on the shooting"
Maia willed herself to stay upright "Ana’s old partner"
"Yes" Hernandez said it without enthusiasood cop"
"He hates Tres"
Hernandez held her eyes, trying to send a e she couldn’t decipher "As I said, Miss Lee, the help I can offer in this situation is limited"
"You run the department"
"For three more weeks I retire at the end of December In the meantime, the brass want this case resolved decisively An officer has been shot It’s a ht and not at all certain she’ll survive Ralph Arguello is our prime suspect Your friend Mr Navarre just threw hiyou nothing of the sort, Miss Lee Just listen to Kelsey Take his warning seriously And realize that whatever breathing rooive you, I already have"
Hernandez turned and h the rows of cubicles
The rabid elf, now on the ground with a cop foot against his neck, spat at the lieutenant’s polished black shoes as he passed
EXCEPT FOR THE MAJOR EYESORE NAMED Detective Kelsey, Sergeant Ana DeLeon’s office was a nice workspace Mahogany desk Two cushy chairs Walls painted a cool shade of avocado Her corkboard was pleasantly cluttered with faro prayer charms
Definitely a woman’s office
Maia was i the ah here every day
Kelsey sat behind DeLeon’s desk with his feet propped up He had files stacked high all around him, desk drawers overturned on the carpet nearby He was reading through a hoers on both his hands were laced with faded white scars, as if he’d long ago lost a fight with a wildcat "Sit down, Miss Lee"
"Making yourself at ho my job"
Maia nodded toward the stacks of files "What were you searching for?"
"Just being thorough"
"Very thorough, it looks like"
Kelsey flipped a page in the homicide book He chose a photo and slid it across the desk "Franklin Muriel White Nineteen eighty-seven Twenty-one years old when he got turned into that"
The photo was a black-and-white autopsy head shot The face, badly lo Beyond that, Maia couldn’t tell e blows had destroyed the features Maia had seen worse, but not many times
"A tire iron," Kelsey told her "First hit laid him out cold Back of the head, just above the left ear Probably would’ve been enough to kill him The other six to the face--those were just dessert"
Kelsey watched her for a reaction His eyes reminded Maia of a rich man’s son she’d once defended in court--a boy who liked to set sleeping derelicts on fire
"Eighteen years ago," she said "What were the leads?"
"Forensics got a DNA saernails Probably the killer’s Unfortunately all they had in ’87 was RFLP testing You needed a big sah blood"
"And now you’ve got PCR," Maia said "So as tih the cold case squad looking for old evidence in storage that you can retest"
"Hernandez tell you that?"
"It’s standard practice, Detective Every depart Why this case, and why did it get DeLeon shot?"
Kelsey studied her impassively, then tossed her another piece of paper from the murder book--an old-fashioned carbon copy of a patrol officer’s report
A brief handwritten paragraph described the first response to a motorist’s 911 about a body on the side of a rural South Side road, just after 10:00 PM, July 14, 1987
At the bottonatures of the first two officers at the scene: Herberto Hernandez, Lucia DeLeon
Maia looked up "Ana’s mother?"
"First female class of cadets," Kelsey said "Twenty-seven years on the force There’s a plaque with her name in the main hallway"
"Hernandez was her partner That’s why he’s distancing himself from the case?"
Kelsey seemed to think about that He looked like he was about to say soo," he told her, "Ana was rotated to cold case duty She could’ve picked any file she wanted, but she saw her mom’s name on that reportsentimental bullshit She decided to poke around in it Hernandez and I both warned her she’d get ?"
Kelsey creaked back in the chair "Ana started asking around, found out Franklin White had been arguing with a youngah, business associate right before he got whacked Wasn’t couys had acquired soether This friend was the front ain if he could get Franklin out of the picture Franklin got whacked Within six months, his former business associate was the number one owner of pawnshops in San Antonio"
"Ralph Arguello"