Bury the Past Read online

  THREE

  With Burger’s corpse loaded in the back of a white van and Karen Baylor directing the broken shell of a Toyota onto a flatbed tow truck, the crime scene looked sterile to John’s eye. A dead car and dead body aside, there was nothing else that marked this bend in the road as a terminal place.

  A few paces down the road, in the direction Burger had last traveled from, John noticed gouge marks in the asphalt where the tips of the spike strip dug into the surface. Designed to rip open the tires of fleeing felons, they’d worked exactly as intended, stopping Burger’s Toyota in its tracks.

  “John, over here,” Paula called. She stood at the edge of the road in a flattened section of weeds. The overgrowth stood as waist-high evidence of budget cuts. The city couldn’t afford the annual weed abatement needed to clear the fire hazard.

  Paula pointed at a trampled patch of weeds next to the pavement. “You think our killer waited here for Burger to drive by?”

  “Could be. It’s hidden by the tall grass. He could watch the headlights as they approached. Kinda begs the question—was Burger the intended target, or was it random?”

  Paula circled around the trodden grass. “Nothing is ever really random. Life finds a way of getting payback.”

  “Karma.”

  “Payback. Karma leaves too much up to mystical shit. Payback is real and direct,” Paula said. A moment later, she stopped pacing and looked at the blades of trampled vegetation. “Blood trail.”

  Smears of red had begun to congeal on the grass. The blood wasn’t cast off into neat droplets; it was smudged, as if wiped off from someone trampling through the grass. The detectives followed the blood trail across a small meadow, and it became more and more faint by the time the path ended at a dirt road. A last smudge of blood on an oak leaf next to fresh tire tracks in soft red dust marked the end of the trail.

  “Know where this road goes?” Paula asked.

  John shook his head. “Could be a fire access road. I’ll check with Cal Fire and see if it’s one of theirs.”

  Paula walked to the far edge of the dirt road, and the dust clung to her black pants. Thick brush and spindly oak trees lined the thoroughfare, but through the natural barrier, a bright patch of blue shown through. Paula pushed her way into the brush, and the dried branches snapped and cracked as she moved them out of her path.

  The vegetation opened into a small clearing, dotted with makeshift shelters. The blue object Paula noticed from the dirt road was a plastic tarp covering a ratty yellowed mattress. There were a dozen tents and cardboard condos set up in the camp.

  “Code Enforcement hasn’t found this place yet. These people have been here for a while,” John said. He pointed out an elaborate table lashed together from mismatched scraps of lumber and discarded nylon rope.

  Two men stretched a black plastic sheet over a pile of small branches and stacked firewood. A woman tended a dented black coffeepot suspended over a small fire. The men straightened when the detectives entered the camp. The closest one wore a sleeveless plaid shirt and jeans and had sun-damaged skin. “We don’t want no trouble.”

  “We didn’t bring any,” John said.

  The other man pursed his toothless mouth and pulled down the sleeves on his sweat-stained thermal. The faded street gang tattoos disappeared under the worn fabric.

  John pulled the badge from his belt and identified himself.

  “That supposed to make me feel better?” the man in the soiled plaid shirt said.

  “We just want to ask you guys some questions,” Paula said.

  “That’s how it always starts,” the man in plaid said.

  A twitch from the toothless man gave him away. He bounced into the brush behind him; the crash of dry twigs marked his path.

  John barreled after the man. The homeless man’s thin build let him dodge in and out of the brush like a rabbit. Jagged wooden spears snagged John’s arms, leaving bright welts. The dense vegetation slowed his pursuit. The homeless man pulled ahead and disappeared in the thicket. Highway noise covered the crash of broken tree limbs and crushed branches in his escape.

  When John returned to the camp, Paula had the man in plaid and the woman sitting on a log. The man saw his friend had evaded them, and he smiled. “Yeah, you go, Bullet.”

  “We just wanna talk,” John said.

  “What if we don’t wanna?” the man asked.

  “Then we bring some of our friends down here and go through everything,” Paula responded.

  The woman looked up through a shock of greasy black-and-gray hair. “Say what you gotta say and leave us be. We ain’t bothering nobody.”

  “What’s your name?” John asked.

  “Dottie.”

  “You hear anything unusual before dawn this morning, Dottie?”

  “What’s unusual?” Dottie said.

  “Like a car parked on the road up here? An accident on the highway maybe?” John offered.

  “Someone parking on the fire road ain’t that different. The first and third Wednesday of the month you can find whores and drug dealers up there looking to take our benefit money.”

  “Today isn’t Wednesday,” Paula said.

  “No, it ain’t,” Dottie said.

  “So what’d you hear?” John asked. He sat on a stump and rubbed his knee. It had been a while since he’d chased someone. He tried to leave that to the younger officers.

  Dottie paused.

  “Don’t say nothing to them,” the man in the plaid shirt said.

  “What’s got your panties in a twist?” Paula said.

  “Bullet didn’t have nothing to do with that.”

  “Bullet, the guy who gave me the slip in the brush? What did he not have something to do with?”

  “Man, just leave him alone.”

  “He kinda ran out of here quick for a guy having nothing to hide,” Paula countered.

  John pulled his cell phone from his pocket. “Do I have to call Code Enforcement to rip down this camp?”

  Dottie smiled. “You gotta know we don’t have cell reception out here.”

  John looked at the display on his cell, and it read “No signal.” “Nice, Dottie.” He pocketed the phone.

  The man dressed in plaid flannel rocked back on the log. “Man. That ain’t right. You don’t gotta hassle Bullet. He didn’t do nothing.”

  “I’d still like to hear it from him,” John said.

  Dottie looked at John. “Bullet was up on the road last night.”

  “Dammit, Dottie,” the plaid man said.

  “He came back early this morning, said he saw somebody on the road. He said it was someone he knew.”

  “Did he say who?” John asked.

  “Naw. But he’s been shook up all morning.”

  “Where would he go?” Paula asked.

  “Food pantry on North C Street,” she said.

  “Shit, Dottie, why you spillin’ on Bullet?”

  “Whatever Bullet got hisself caught up in ain’t no good for the rest of us.”

  “If Bullet turns up, just let him know we want to talk to him—that’s all,” John said.

  John and Paula retraced their steps back out of the encampment to the dirt road. Paula used her cell to take photos of the tire tracks and the smudge of blood.

  “If Karen’s still here, let’s get her to take more photos and samples of the blood before it’s lost to the elements,” Paula said.

  When they returned to the highway where they’d left their car, Karen was taking samples of the blood trail near the road. It seemed she’d found the trail too. Chances were it was the victim’s blood, but if the killer cut themselves on whatever they used to slice open Burger, it could blow the case open. Karen left nothing to chance.

  Traffic now flowed into the city as if nothing had happened out here on this lonely stretch of pavement. Commuters passed the spot without a glance. It wasn’t like Larry Burger mattered to them. But the killer had gone to a lot of trouble for someone who didn’t matter.

  FOUR

  The detective bureau of the Sacramento Police Department on Freeport Boulevard was already humming with activity by the time John and Paula returned from their crime scene. Robbery detectives gathered around a monitor where camera footage of a convenience store holdup played out in grainy gray-and-white tones.

  Detectives Turner and Shippman sat at their desks, tapping out reports from the drive-by shooting in Del Paso Heights. Turner nodded at John as he and Paula reached their desks. “What’d you guys catch?” Turner asked. “Ours was a bust. Gang-on-gang and nobody saw anything other than gang colors.”

  “What flavor?” John asked.

  “Looks like Crip on Blood. One victim. He’s at the med center. Doctor says he’s gonna be fine.”

  Lieutenant Tim Barnes crossed the floor and didn’t break stride when he said, “Penley, we need to talk. You and Newberry in my office.”

  Paula tossed a file on the top of her desk, and it cascaded into a paper avalanche, dropping photos and reports from three cases onto the floor behind her desk. “Shit.” She bent to gather them up.

  “Get that later. My office,” the lieutenant barked.

  Paula dropped the paper back to the floor and glanced over at her partner. John shrugged and tipped his head toward the lieutenant’s office.

  The pair hadn’t yet cleared the threshold when Barnes said, “Get the door.”

  Lieutenant Barnes sat heavily in his chair and sighed. “Where do I start? I got a call from the district attorney this morning. Not a deputy DA, but the elected one herself.”

  “I take it the call wasn’t about your parking tickets?” John said.

  “I wish. She’s got an interest in your case.”

  “Which one?”

  “This morning
’s junkie you found out on Garden Highway.”

  “Larry Burger?” Paula said.

  Barnes nodded. “The DA seems to believe that it wasn’t an overdose.”

  “She’d be right. But why the interest?” John said.

  “He was a witness in a case she’s got coming up.”

  “Burger was into painkillers the last time I ran across him. He went to rehab as part of his plea agreement. So I guess he turned into a career snitch or something?” Paula asked.

  Barnes’s eyes flashed when Paula mentioned her last involvement with the dead man. “When was the last time you saw him?”

  “Um, I guess, three—three and a half—years ago.”

  “He was originally out of the Solano County Sheriff’s Office, assigned to SSPNET.” The Solano Sacramento Placer Narcotics Enforcement Team was a joint task force of law enforcement agencies along the Interstate 80 drug corridor from the Bay Area to the Nevada state line.

  “Before he got caught with his hand in the cookie jar,” she said.

  “A cool million in meth and heroin is a tempting cookie jar,” Barnes replied.

  “He wasn’t the only one caught in that honey trap.”

  “That’s what has the DA interested in Burger. Remember Sherman, Charles Sherman?”

  “He got ten years for witness intimidation, assault, and possession,” Paula said.

  “Burger was the primary witness in the case that got him put away,” Barnes replied.

  “Madam DA said Burger was supposed to cooperate with the feds in the federal prosecution of Sherman and the others. They were up on racketeering, corruption, and civil rights violations worth up to fifty years additional prison time.”

  “Good,” John said. “Except, let me guess—without Burger, the case goes away.”

  “And even though the DA wasn’t prosecuting the new federal case, she was supposed to keep all the witnesses lined up—”

  “And alive,” John finished.

  “Yeah, always a plus when it comes to witness testimony. So, Paula, what do you recall about Sherman?”

  Paula leaned against a bookshelf and tipped her head back. “He was a piece of shit. Physically a big guy and used his size to bully his way around. He was a thug—but smart. Burger was our best witness; without him, we’d never have been able to put a case together on Sherman.”

  “What do you mean?” John asked.

  She shuffled a bit. “How do I say this delicately? Sherman was slick. He’d cover his trail and leave someone else to take the fall. But he was an opportunist, and he got greedy. All that money and the illegal drugs were too tempting for him. It was always about what was in it for him.”

  “That’s high-risk behavior,” Barnes said.

  “High risk, high reward. And Burger’s testimony against him, along with my IA investigation, nailed him for it.”

  Barnes stood and rubbed the back of his head to ward off a growing tension headache. “Suffice it to say, there will be all kinds of interest in your homicide. Make sure everything is documented, and chase down every lead.”

  “Boss, we’ve done this a time or two. We have it covered,” John said.

  “I know, I know. There will be Monday morning quarterbacks questioning our every move on this investigation.”

  “Understood. We’ll keep you posted,” John said.

  John and Paula headed back to their desks on the other side of the detective bureau. Paula knelt to collect the files she spilled earlier.

  “I need to get a look at the IA files on Burger and Sherman and get a refresher on their connections. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve even thought about those assholes,” she said.

  “Good idea. I’ll get in touch with SSPNET and see if they can shed any light on Burger and whether he’s been on their radar at all recently.”

  A thick file folder sat in the center of John’s desk. A Post-it note identified it as being from Karen Baylor. John thumbed it open. “Karen left us copies of her photos from the crime scene this morning.”

  John snatched up a few phone messages and handed most of them to Paula. No one dared to leave a message on the toxic waste storage pond that was her desktop. One misplaced message slip could trigger a FEMA-worthy disaster.

  His single message slip was from his wife. He looked at it with a bit of trepidation because Melissa didn’t usually call him at work.

  He dialed Melissa’s cell, and she picked up immediately—never a good sign.

  “We have to do something about Kari,” Melissa said.

  “What’s up?”

  “The school called and said Kari and another girl got into it in between classes.”

  “Got into it?”

  “A fight, John. They’re suspending Kari for three days.”

  “What was the fight about?”

  “I don’t know. She wouldn’t talk about it.”

  “She okay?”

  “Yeah, they’re both fine—it was a girl fight,” Melissa sighed.

  John didn’t respond with some of the gory details of “girl fights” he’d seen over the years that included bloody razorblade-slashing attacks, disfigured faces, and bitten-off earlobes. Girls didn’t always fight fair, and grudges sometimes collected compound interest that would make a Wall Street banker jealous.

  “What did the school say?” John said.

  “They have a zero-tolerance policy for on-campus violence, and if it happens again, Kari will have to go to another school. First the smoking, now this.”

  “Who was the fight with?”

  “Lanette.”

  “Isn’t that one of her friends?”

  “Yes.” A tired sigh came from Melissa’s end of the connection. “We need to figure out a way to get through to her . . .”

  John thumbed through the photos Karen left for him as he listened. “Uh-huh.”

  “She’s disrespectful, and she’s setting herself up for failure.”

  “She’s sixteen, Mel. It’s kinda what they do.”

  He shuffled to another crime scene photo.

  “You aren’t taking this seriously, John, and I can’t be the bad guy all the time.”

  “What do you expect me to do?”

  “I expect you to give a shit and be a parent.” The connection went dead.

  The words sounded venomous over the phone. John felt the strain in Melissa’s voice. It wasn’t anger, exactly—it was a burden borne from guilt. And it had nothing to do with Kari.

  Melissa was still regretting a desperate deal she’d made a year ago with a black-market organ dealer for their son, Tommy. He’d been passed up so many times on the transplant list that she’d lost hope. She couldn’t have known that a killer had manipulated the wait list and delivered a diseased and decaying kidney for the boy. Tommy nearly died from a botched procedure, and she had never forgiven herself. That guilt bubbled up whenever Melissa felt stressed—and John was more often on the receiving end.

  John looked at his phone. “Woah.”

  “Trouble on the home front?” Paula asked.

  “Kari’s been pulling the whole-rebel-without-a-clue thing since Tommy got his kidney transplant. Apparently, she came to blows with a girl at school.”

  “Girl probably had it coming. Besides, Kari’s a good kid. She’s just jealous of all the attention her brother got after his ordeal,” Paula said.

  Ordeal was an understatement. Tommy was still a fragile kid after the killer had kidnapped him. John unconsciously rubbed the surgical scar from his kidney donation. That was another bone of contention with Melissa—that John was able to save his son, whereas she had nearly killed him.

  Paula held a photo of the spike strip that had disabled Burger’s car. “I was able to run this down from our property tag.”

  “Great. Someone’s got some explaining to do.”

  Paula looked sour, and her jaw clenched.

  “Who signed for it?”

  “I did.”

  FIVE

  Within an hour of accessing the department’s property records and finding her name on the log, Paula sat across from Sergeant Larry Lassiter of internal affairs. John asked to accompany Paula as her representative—officers were entitled to representation under the Peace Officer’s Bill of Rights. Paula waved him off.

  Larry Lassiter—or “LL,” as Paula called him—was an investigator who set a torch to all the tired internal affairs television stereotypes. Lassiter wasn’t hated among the rank and file, he wasn’t a hard-ass, and he hadn’t taken the IA assignment to collect scalps—he took it to accommodate his childcare schedule.