Praise for White Tombs
Named Best Mystery of 2008 By Reader Views
Winner of the Garcia Award for Best Fiction
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“. . . Christopher Valen addresses a very wide range of extremely relevant social issues in White Tombs, and this book goes well beyond being just a detective story. The characters are fantastically well developed . . . the writing is solid an elegant without unnecessary detours. Any lover of solid writing should enjoy it greatly. White Tombs also screams out for a sequel—or better yet sequels.”—READER VIEWS
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“. . . Valen’s debut police procedural provides enough plot twists to keep readers engrossed and paints a clear picture of the Hispanic community in St. Paul.”—LIBRARY JOURNAL
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“John Santana of the St. Paul Police Department is a man you will not forget. . . . The book is a great read, and Santana is destined to become one of my favorite detectives. Truly a five-star read from this author.”—ARMCHAIR INTERVIEWS
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“. . . Santana is an intriguing character. St. Paul readers will enjoy Valen’s sense of place.”—ST. PAUL PIONEER PRESS
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“. . . In this page turner, Christopher Valen presents a clear picture of a modern, urban Hispanic community—plus the horrible Minnesota winter weather.”—THE POISONED PEN
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“. . . White Tombs is a well crafted who dun it I enjoyed immensely. It’s action packed. On a scale of 1-5, I give it a 5.”—FUTURES MYSTERY ANTHOLOGY MAGAZINE
White Tombs
A John Santana Novel
Christopher Valen
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Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2008 By Christopher Valen
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Certain liberties have been taken in portraying St. Paul and its institutions. This is wholly intentional. Any resemblance to actual events, or to actual persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental. For information about special discounts for bulk purchases contact conquillpress@comcast.net.
Dedication
For Martha
Te quiero mucho.
Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank Bill Kraus of the St. Paul Police Department, and the officers and staff of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Citizen’s Academy.
Special thanks also to Abigail Davis, Linda Donaldson, Lorrie Holmgren, Archie Spencer and Peg Wangensteen for your help and support, and to Bart Baker for bringing us together. You are deeply missed. My deepest gratitude to my wife, Martha, whose love, encouragement and stories of Colombia inspired me to write this book.
This book would not exist in its present form without special contributions from Amy, Frank, Diane, Ronda and Michele at 1106 Design.
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“Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For ye are like unto whited sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones and of all uncleanness.”
— Matthew 23:27
~ ~ ~
Chapter 1
DAY ONE
JULIO PÉREZ SAT IN A SWIVEL CHAIR behind the mahogany desk in the study of his house on St. Paul’s West Side. His eyes were closed and his left cheek was resting on the desktop. Were it not for the bullet hole in his head, one could have assumed that he had merely fallen asleep.
“What time did the call come in?” Detective John Santana asked.
He and his partner, Detective Rick Anderson, were talking with the first officer on the crime scene. The nameplate above her breast pocket identified her as Larkin.
“Just after five this afternoon,” she said. Her uniform was pressed and starched and looked like it had just come out of a box.
“Who called it in?”
“Mrs. Pérez. She met me when I arrived. Told me she left her husband alone to do some shopping. When she returned, she found him like this.” Larkin gestured toward Pérez’s body without looking directly at it. “I called dispatch immediately.”
“Shit,” Anderson said. “The news media monitor police radio frequencies. No wonder they’re streaming around this place like squad cars at a Krispy Kreme grand opening.”
Larkin’s face colored with embarrassment. “Sorry. I’ll remember it next time.”
“I know you will,” Santana said. “Did Mrs. Pérez say anything else?”
“Only that she couldn’t believe someone would do this to her husband.”
Santana could hear sobs coming from another room. The warm, stuffy air in the house smelled like garlic, cumin, oregano and chili peppers.
Anderson said, “Anyone with Mrs. Pérez now?”
“Her daughter.”
“Okay, Larkin. Keep your hands in your pockets so you don’t touch anything on the way out. And be careful where you step.”
Despite Anderson’s warning, Santana knew it was impossible for anyone to enter a crime scene without changing it in some way. It was the reason he used gloves at a crime scene only if blood was present and AIDS was a concern, or if he needed to touch something. Gloves led to carelessness, which could destroy fingerprints.
“I don’t see a gun,” Anderson said. “But there’s a shell casing on the floor near the desk.”
He squatted near the shell casing. “Head stamp reads REM. Looks like the bullet came from a twenty-two caliber, Remington. Makes me wonder though.”
“Why leave the shell casing?”
Anderson stood up. “Exactly. It can be traced to the gun.”
Santana drew a rough sketch of the crime scene in his notebook showing the location of Pérez’s body and the shell casing. Next to the drawing of the shell casing he wrote a question mark. Then he examined the gunshot wound in Julio Pérez’s head.
Powder grains expelled from the muzzle of a gun had caused tattooing on one side of the angled wound indicating that it wasn’t a contact shot. The reddish-brown color showed that Pérez was alive when he was shot. The tattooing would have been gray or yellow in appearance had he been dead beforehand.
Santana looked at Pérez’s arms and legs without moving them, then at the hands and fingers. He detected no defensive wounds and nothing was visible under Pérez’s fingernails. He saw no folds or rolls in the clothing that would suggest the body had been moved.
“No sign of a struggle, Rick. No fear in Pérez’s face.”
“I figure he knew the shooter,” Anderson said, reading Santana’s thoughts. “Maybe he was expecting company.”
It was like that with a partner after awhile, at least a good partner. Santana imagined it was like being married for a long time.
“They come into the study together,” Anderson said. “The shooter is behind him. Pérez sits down at his desk and gets capped in the head.”
Santana noted that the powder tattooing was darker and denser behind the right ear, indicating the muzzle was near the ear when the gun was fired.
“I’ll get some uniforms to help me canvas the neighborhood,” Anderson said. “Find out if anyone saw or heard anything.”
“Make sure you run the names of all the neighbors, Rick. See if anyone has a criminal record.”
“Sorry about giving you the hard part, John, but you’re better at dealing with the family.”
Talking to relatives and friends of a murder victim was often the most unpleasant and difficult part of the job. But Santana knew at some point in the investigation he could tell those same relatives and friends that he had caught the perp who had caused them so much pain. It might be a small consolation for the victim’s family, but he derived great satisfaction from knowing it was the murderer’s turn to suffer.
He concentrated on the floor and the ground around the body next, looking for any stains or marks. He took a small flashlight out of his pocket and focused the light toward the ground at an oblique angle, checking for footprints or drag marks in the thin layer of dust on the oak floor. Then he let the beam play across the walls and ceiling as he searched for blood spatter.
When he was satisfied there was nothing of evidentiary value, he put away the flashlight, slipped on a pair of latex gloves and opened the folding door on a large closet that covered one wall. Inside it he found Pérez’s summer clothes, a pair of leather sandals and a pair of Reebok walking shoes. The clothes smelled musty after months on hangers and yielded no clues. Mahogany bookcases lined a second wall to his right. The authors were mostly Latino writers. Gabriel García Márquez, Federico García Lorca and Pablo Neruda, one of Santana’s favorites.
Framed photographs of Pérez with his wife and daughter hung on the wall behind the desk. Organized in clusters according to periods of time, they represented a visual record of a family’s history. The daughter had black hair and looked to be in her early to midtwenties when the most recent photographs were taken. She had piercing ebony eyes and reminded Santana of the Mexican actress, Salma Hayek. Mrs. Pérez appeared to be in her late forties. Her dark hair had begun to gray, and she had put on a few pounds over the years. But she still retained the high cheekbones and luminous dark eyes that were clearly evident in the earlier snapshots of her. Santana wondered how her husband’s death would change the peace and contentment he saw in her face.
Many of the photos of Julio Pérez were taken with local celebrities and politicians. In one he was receiving an award at a Chamber of Commerce dinner. In another he was throwing out the first pitch at a St. Paul Saint’s game. Pérez had been a slender, good-looking man with silver hair, a neatly trimmed silver mustache and eyes the color of dark coffee. His chestnut skin looked firm and his complexion healthy.
A framed copy of El Día, one of the monthly Hispanic newspapers in St. Paul, hung next to the family pictures. A former mayor had signed it. Santana remembered reading the newspaper when he first came to Minnesota. El Día became his main source of information and events, his lifeline to the Hispanic community. Since he spoke and read very little English at the time and preferred solitude to groups, he would often reread the same stories while he anxiously waited for the next issue to appear in the newspaper racks along Grand Avenue.
He moved on to the desk. A humidor filled with cigars sat on one side. A half-smoked cigar rested on the edge of a ceramic ashtray beside a yellow pad of post-it notes and a Rolodex open to the card of a well-known local attorney, Rafael Mendoza. Santana wondered why Pérez had called a lawyer and if the phone call was related in any way to his murder.
He walked into the master bedroom off the study. A thin layer of frost filmed the lower panes of the windows that looked out on the lighted park behind the house. The January sun already lay far below the horizon and a starless darkness covered the landscape. It was nearly mid-winter, yet the hard ground was still brown and free of snow, making it difficult to find any impression evidence.
A small statue of the Virgin Mary stood on the nightstand beside the neatly made double bed. A large crucifix hung on the wall. On the wall opposite the windows was a Holy Card called Estampa de la Santísima Trinidad, the trinity, and one called Estampa de Jesús.
Santana took off his latex gloves and stuffed them in his coat pockets. Then he went into the living room where Mrs. Pérez and her daughter were huddled together on a tweed couch. He sat down in a matching chair across from them.
Serapes draped the backs of the couch and chair. Paintings of Native Americans on horseback hung on the walls. A picture window at one end of the room looked out onto the front porch.
A statue of the Virgen de Guadalupe stood on an end table beside a burning candle that gave off an aroma of cinnamon.
“I know this is a difficult time for you both,” Santana said. “But I need to ask you a few questions.”
“Por que alguien querría matar a mi esposo,” Mrs. Pérez said, wiping her red, swollen eyes with a Kleenex.
“Mamíta,” her daughter said, embarrassment evident in her voice. “Speak English, please.”
“Forgive me, señor,” Mrs. Pérez said with a heavy accent. “When I am upset, I sometimes forget my English. I was asking why someone would kill my husband.”
The words brought tears to her eyes again. She rubbed them with the palms of her hands like she had just awakened from a nightmare and was uncertain if what she had dreamt was actually true.
“It’s okay,” Santana said. “Yo entiendo bien el Español, Señora Pérez.”
The two women looked at Santana as though he had just beamed down from the starship Enterprise.
“You are from Mexico?” the daughter said.
“Colombia. Me llamo, John Santana.”
“You have only a slight accent, señor.”
“It wasn’t always that way.”
Santana could tell by the way the daughter’s body relaxed that she saw him differently, now that she knew he was not a guero; he was not the enemy.
“I am Gabriela,” she said with very little accent as well. “This is my mother, Sandra.”
“Mucho gusto.”
“Te pareces a mi sobrino,” Sandra Pérez said. She put a hand momentarily on her mouth to prevent the words from coming out. “I’m so sorry, Detective Santana. But you do look like my nephew. It is the dark, wavy hair and blue eyes. And you are both handsome young men.”
“Muchas gracias, señora.”
“You must be over six feet.”
“Six feet one inch.”
She confirmed the fact with a nod and cast her eyes downward for a moment, as though she were imagining a happier time, perhaps with her nephew.
Santana said, “You were home all day, señora, except for the two hours when you went shopping?”
“Yes.”
“When was the last time you spoke to your husband?” “When I left the house,” she said. “He was working in his study.”
“Do you recall what time you left?”
“It was just after three o’clock.”
“Was your husband planning on going out later?” “Why?” Gabriela asked.
“Your father was wearing a white shirt and tie.”
“Julio was always a good dresser,” Sandra Pérez said. “It did not matter whether it was a workday or whether we were going out or staying in. He was just that way.” She dabbed her eyes with the Kleenex and sighed deeply.
Santana gave her a smile to reassure her that he understood. “Was your husband expecting anyone? A visitor, perhaps?” “No. I do not think so.”
“And you, Gabriela? When was the last time you saw your father?”
“Yesterday evening. I came over for dinner. I like to do that at least once a week.”
Santana watched both of them carefully, their mannerisms, how they reacted to his questions. He had no reason to suspect them of committing the murder, but it would be unwise to rule either one of them out this early in the investigation.
“Your husband owned El Día, señora.”
“It was his life.”
“Do you both work there as well?”
“No. Gabriela worked there before she went to college.” “And sometimes in the summer when I was home from school,” Gabriela said.
“You’re not in the newspaper business, then.”
“I manage Casa Blanca, a restaurant in St. Paul.”
Santana was familiar with the movie but not the restaurant.
“Were you working when you got the call about your father?” “Yes,” she said hesitantly, as if he had implied she wasn’t. “Do either of you know a man named Rafael Mendoza?” Both women shook their heads.
“Why?” Gabriela asked.
“Your father’s Rolodex was open to Mendoza’s name and number.”
“My father never spoke of him,” she said with a slight edge in her voice. “I do not know why he would call him.”
Santana wondered if Gabriela Pérez had a reason for reacting angrily when Mendoza’s name was mentioned or if she was just edgy by nature. Either way, he knew he would have to tread softly if he wanted her cooperation. He turned his attention to Sandra Pérez.
“Did your husband have any enemies, señora? Perhaps someone who worked for him at the newspaper?”
She shook her head vigorously. “Julio was a friend to many in this community.”
“Did your husband own a gun?”
“No.”
“Forgive me for asking, señora, but were you and your husband having any marital difficulties?”
“Difficulties? I do not understand?”
“My parents were very happy,” Gabriela said. Her dark eyes burned right through Santana.
Asking personal questions, particularly to a grieving widow, always bothered him. Still, most murders weren’t random acts of violence, but were committed by someone the victim knew. Santana considered explaining this fact to Gabriela Pérez before he concluded that she was not the least bit interested in hearing his reasoning behind the question.
“When you feel up to it, señora,” he said, “I would like you to look carefully around your house to see if anything has been taken.”
“You suspect robbery as a motive?” Gabriela said.
“We can’t rule it out. Señora, we’ll need to see your financial statements, bank accounts, credit cards.”
“I do not know about these things,” she said with a small shrug.
“I can help,” Gabriela said.
“Would you mind if I borrowed a photograph of your husband, señora? I might need it during the course of the investigation.”
“Gabriela will get one from the albums.”
Gabriela put her arms around her mother and stroked the back of her head, as if she were consoling a child.
Santana took a card out of a pocket and placed it on the coffee table. “There’s a name and number of a victim advocate, the medical examiner’s number, and the Ramsey County Attorney’s number on this card. Once we’re finished here, your husband’s body will be taken to the medical examiner’s office at Regions’ Hospital where an autopsy will be performed.”
He stood and closed his notebook. Behind him he heard the front door opening and closing and the sound of footsteps in the hallway. The evidence techs and ME had arrived.
“If you think of anything else or have any questions, please call me.” He gave them both a business card with his direct number at the station. “Is there someplace your mother could stay tonight?”
Gabriela looked at the card in her hand and then at Santana. “She will stay with me.”
“That’s a good idea.”
He started to leave when Gabriela said, “My mother is right, Detective. No one who knew my father would want to kill him.”
Her dark eyes had softened. An indication, perhaps, that she realized she would never see her father again.
“I’m very sorry for your loss,” he said.
“Por favor,” Sandra Pérez said with trembling lips. She pulled away from her daughter and stifled a sob. “Encuentre al asesino de mi esposo.”
The desperation in her voice imploring him to find the person who murdered her husband triggered the sudden rush of adrenaline Santana always felt when he began a homicide investigation. He had no idea yet who had murdered Sandra Pérez’s husband. But he had no problem promising her he would find out who did it.
“Si, se lo prometo, señora,” he said and returned to the study.
*
Tony Novak, the crime scene investigator, and his usual contingent of forensic techs were measuring distances and collecting evidence. A police photographer used a Minolta 35-mm single-lens reflex camera to shoot black and white photos of the crime scene, the physical evidence and the body. Behind him, a sketch artist made detailed drawings. On the ground next to the .22 shell casing stood a small, yellow evidence marker with the number 1.
“Hey, John,” Novak said. “I just got a couple of tickets for the Chandler fight on the twenty-seventh. This kid is the best lightweight I’ve seen in a long time. You interested?”
“I might be.”
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
Santana smiled and said, “What do you have, Reiko?” Reiko Tanabe, the medical examiner, leaned over the body. A strand of her dark hair fell across her face. She brushed it away with a latex gloved hand and touched the birthmark just below her right ear. The café au lait mark was small and light brown in color. Santana figured Tanabe wore her hair long so that it covered the mark when she was off the clock. At crime scenes she wore her hair in a ponytail and had a habit of unconsciously touching the blemish.
“Well, I’d say he’s been shot dead.” Tanabe looked up at Santana with a wry smile.
Santana had worked with her many times before and knew that she was as competent as they come, despite the lame humor. “What about the time of death?”
Tanabe felt Pérez’s jaw and neck and then proceeded down the trunk to his legs and feet. “Rigor’s just beginning in the lower jaw. Have to pop a thermometer in the liver and get the body temperature. But you know that can be unreliable.”
She looked at the body now and not at Santana, as though talking to herself. “It’s warm in the room. He’s wearing clothes. Could keep the body temperature up. I’d say maybe between two-thirty and four-thirty p.m.” She lifted Pérez’s head off the desk. “Right side of the victim’s face doesn’t show any lividity.”
Santana noted it was different on the left side of Pérez’s face. It had turned the familiar maroon color of death. Postmortem lividity only formed on parts of the body exposed to pressure. More evidence that Julio Pérez’s body had not been moved.
“Give me until tomorrow afternoon,” she said. “I got a couple ahead of this one.”
“Bobby,” Santana said to one of the techs. “Hand me a pair of latex.”
The evidence tech gave Santana a fresh pair of latex gloves and he put them on.
Santana hit the redial button on the phone on the desk. He picked up the receiver and held it close to his ear. A message machine answered after the fourth ring. The voice was unfamiliar, but he recognized the name. He hung up, took out his notebook and copied Rafael Mendoza’s phone number and address from the card in Pérez’s Rolodex. Then he began his search of the remainder of the house.
The bathroom towels were free of bloodstains and dampness indicating the perp had not bled at the scene and attempted to clean up. Santana found nothing hidden in or around the toilet tank and no illegal drugs in the medicine cabinet.
He left the bathroom and went to the small kitchen. A backdoor opened into a chain-link fenced yard adjacent to a park and playground. The door was unlocked. Neither the bolt nor the doorjamb showed evidence of forced entry.
Three paper bags full of groceries sat on a kitchen counter. Santana found the sales receipt with a stamped time of 4:42 p.m. in one of the bags. If the ME’s estimate of the time of death was accurate, then Sandra Pérez couldn’t have shot her husband when she returned from the store. It was possible that she murdered him before she left, but Santana didn’t read her as a cold-blooded killer.
He peeled off the latex gloves and pulled the used ones out of his coat pockets and tossed both pairs in a container brought to the scene by the techs.
Gabriela Pérez came up to him as he headed for the front door and gave him a picture of her father. Standing this close to her, Santana realized how petite she was. Even in this time of grief she exuded a sexual quality that clung to her like a tight-fitting dress.
The recent photograph of Julio Pérez looked posed and professionally done. He wore a red tie, blue shirt, and black pinstriped suit. He appeared fit and was smiling broadly.
“I’ll return the photo to you,” Santana said.
Her dark eyes held his for a time. Then her gaze shifted to the long, jagged scar on the back of his right hand and then to the picture of her father. “Make sure that you do.”
She turned and walked back into the living room, her slim hips swaying like a rope in a gentle breeze.
*
The scene outside the house reminded Santana of Lautréamont’s description of surrealism as the chance meeting on a dissecting table of a sewing machine and an umbrella. TV vans from the local NBC, CBS, and ABC news outlets were parked at the curb along with the mobile crime lab van, medical examiner’s van and six white St. Paul squad cars with gold shields on the front doors. Flood lights illuminated reporters who waved microphones in front of anyone who wanted to speak and those who didn’t. Yellow crime scene tape had been strung from oak to oak, cordoning off the house and yard. Neighbors had gathered behind the tape in the cold night air. A uniformed officer stood in the driveway recording the names of anyone who entered the house.
In his teens Santana had been fascinated by the paintings of Salvador Dali and the writings of André Breton. Now, he often filtered the dark and violent world of homicide through a surrealistic lens of both intention and chance. It was a world in which the real and the imaginary became one. A world in which bodies that could not speak were spoken for. Bodies beaten with bats and bricks and tire irons until their skulls looked more like smashed pumpkins than human heads; bodies and parts of bodies carved and sliced and sawed; bodies shot and suffocated and dragged bloated and blue from the Mississippi; bodies in bags and on gurneys and on cold slabs in the morgue with tags attached to their toes.
Only one would forever haunt him.
He gave a quick shake of his head to chase away that memory and focused on the current case. The most important hours in murder investigations were the first forty-eight hours after the discovery of the body. The longer the investigation went on, the less chance he had of finding the murderer.
Santana stood on the front walk and felt the cold, still air against his skin. The sudden absence of wind left him feeling as if the earth, like Julio Pérez, had quit breathing.
Rick Anderson walked across the brown grass toward Santana. “I gotta start hittin’ the gym again,” he said, rubbing his ample belly.
An unmarked car pulled up in front of the house and parked next to the ME’s van. The driver’s side door swung open and James Kehoe, special investigator from the mayor’s office, stepped out. He appeared disoriented for a moment until he spotted Santana and Anderson and headed toward them.
Santana said, “What the hell is Asshoe doing here?”
He used the nickname given to Kehoe by certain detectives within the department.
Anderson leaned closer to Santana and said quietly, “Take it easy, John.”
“Santana ... Anderson,” Kehoe said, acknowledging each of them with a nod.
Tanning beds had leathered Kehoe’s once handsome face, and he wore his blond hair very short and an SPPD baseball cap to hide the fact that he was losing it.
“You got a homicide?” Kehoe said.
“Appears to be,” Santana said, unwilling to give him anything to work with.
“I understand the vic is Julio Pérez?”
Santana said nothing.
Kehoe waited a moment for a response and then looked at Anderson. “How’d he die?”
“Gunshot to the head.”
“Any idea who whacked him?”
“Nothing concrete.”
Kehoe pulled on the brim of his cap and glanced behind him. “You talk to the inkslingers?”
“Not yet,” Santana said. He could hear the reporters in the background yelling at them for a statement.
“What does the mayor’s office have to do with this?”
Anderson asked.
Kehoe shot him a look. “Julio Pérez was known and respected by a lot of people in this city. Including the mayor. Santana should know that since he’s ...”
“Hispanic?” Santana said.
“If the shoe fits. You a friend of Pérez’s?”
“We don’t all know each other.”
“Forget the sarcasm, Santana, and concentrate on results.”
“We will. Soon as you get out of the way and let us do our job.”
“Look,” Kehoe said, stepping close enough to Santana that he could smell the coffee on his breath. “If you want to play hardball, let’s take it downtown.”
“Come on, Jim,” Anderson said, raising his hands in a calming gesture. “Give it a rest.”
Kehoe’s jaw muscles clenched. His eyes flicked back and forth before settling on Anderson. “You got any wits?”
“We’re working on it.”
“So what’s the next step?”
“We start questioning the employees at El Dia,” Santana said.
“All right. But keep me in the loop. The mayor wants to know exactly how this investigation is proceeding.”
“You’ll be the first to know.”
Kehoe stared at Santana for a long moment. Then he turned and headed for his car.
“Christ,” Anderson said. “What’s with him?”
“Se cree la vaca que mas caga. He thinks he’s the cow that shits the most.”
“Maybe. But you better not rub his nose in it, John. Especially if he’s in the mayor’s pocket.”
“I’ll keep that in mind. Let’s talk with the reporters, and then we’ll go see Rafael Mendoza.”
“Who?”
“The last call Julio Pérez made on the phone in his study was to Rafael Mendoza.”
“But that’s not what you told Kehoe.”
“I lied.”
Santana could tell by Anderson’s wary expression that he felt uncomfortable with the lie.
“You know anything about Mendoza?” Santana said, quickly changing the subject.
“No. You?”
“I met him a couple of times when I was in uniform and worked off-duty security at parties for the mayor.”
“He a criminal attorney?”
“Immigration, mostly. Green Cards, visas.”
“Think he’s capable of murder?”
“I haven’t met many who aren’t.”
~ ~ ~
Chapter 2
SANTANA CHECKED HIS REARVIEW MIRROR and saw Anderson cruising in the lane behind him as they drove over the Wabasha Bridge into downtown St. Paul. Mendoza lived in the Lowertown District, a block from the Farmer’s Market in the Riverview Lofts, an eight-story Romanesque building overlooking the Mississippi River. Lofts were the latest marketing tool designed to lure upscale singles and couples into the city. They were being built as fast as developers could acquire enough capital and historic, abandoned buildings could be gutted.
Ice crystals pinged off his car as Santana parked the Crown Vic in a NO PARKING zone along Kellogg Boulevard across the street from the lofts. Anderson parked behind him. He got out of his Crown Vic and into the passenger side of Santana’s car. Even in the dim light Santana could see his partner’s pockmarked complexion.
The digital clock on the dashboard changed to 7:15 as Santana listened to the bursts of chatter from the police radio. The Crown Vic’s heater was pushing out as much heat as a candle.
Cold weather had its advantages. Most gangbangers never ventured outside after dark when below zero wind chills could freeze bare flesh in minutes and hypothermia could mean a slow, silent death. Rape, robbery, burglary, arson, assault, theft and motor vehicle theft, seven of the eight crimes the SPPD classified as Part I crimes according to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting guidelines, all fell with frigid temperatures. Only homicide was unaffected.
“I’m freezing my ass off,” Anderson said.
Santana detected a hint of alcohol in the tiny clouds of carbon dioxide vapor forming as Anderson exhaled.
“Get yourself some breath mints,” he said.
Anderson looked quickly at Santana and then out the passenger side window.
Santana said, “Have you been going to your AA meetings?” “Don’t worry. I’m fine.”
Santana hadn’t detected any alcohol on Anderson’s breath at Pérez’s house. He considered pressing Anderson but decided now wasn’t the time. Instead, he recounted his conversation with Sandra Pérez and her daughter, Gabriela.
“You think either of them are good for it?” Anderson said.
“Not the wife. We’ll have to check out the Casa Blanca restaurant. Make sure the daughter was there all afternoon.”
Anderson looked out the windshield at the city and the lights in the buildings that were burning like embers in the charcoal sky. “How long have we been together, John?”
“Nearly three years.”
“How many murder investigations?”
“I’m not keeping count.”
Anderson sat quietly, staring out the windshield.
“Something on your mind, partner?”
Anderson waited a couple of beats. Then he said, “Kehoe wasn’t a bad guy when I partnered with him in the Narcotic’s Division.”
“He ever work homicide?”
“No. But we were pretty close once. I remember he took the great divide pretty hard.”
“Maybe if he had spent more time pumping his wife rather than iron,” Santana said, “he would still be married to her.”
A large orange snowplow rumbled by with its plow up. The ground underneath the Crown Vic shook from the plow’s weight as the spinning rotor attached to the rear end spread a special mixture of salt and sand over the ice that coated the street. A sign across the back of the cab read: STAY BACK, STAY ALIVE.
Santana checked his watch. It was 7:29. He turned off the car, got out and headed toward the Riverview Lofts. The cold night air smelled of diesel from a Metro Transit bus stopped at a corner. A slippery film underneath his feet slowed him down, made him feel like a child just learning to walk. Behind him, he could hear Anderson cursing the treacherous footing.
Santana had nearly reached the main entrance when he felt a sudden rush of air a moment before the body falling out of the dark January sky crunched like a bag of ice against the pavement.
Instinctively, he looked up. Saw a figure move in the dim light on a balcony above him—then it was gone.
The broken body lay face up. The impact had fractured the femur bone in one leg. Pushed it through the skin like a spike through paper.
“It’s Rafael Mendoza,” Santana yelled to his partner. “Call for back up and then watch the main entrance.”
Santana ran into the building and up a set of stairs to the first floor where he waved his badge at a man in a security guard uniform.
“St. Paul P.D. What’s Rafael Mendoza’s number?”
The security guard pointed in the direction of the occupant names and numbers on the wall.
“Officers will be here soon,” Santana said. “Don’t let anyone leave.”
As he rode the elevator to the eighth floor, Santana pulled his .40 caliber Glock out of the holster attached to his belt. A sound like wind rushing through an open door filled his ears, and his mouth felt as dry as sand. He removed his wool overcoat and dropped it on the floor. Inhaled a deep breath and let it out slowly.
When the elevator door slid open, he flicked on the emergency stop switch and peered out. Quiet. At the far end, the cement hallway turned ninety degrees to the left. He estimated Mendoza’s loft would be halfway between the elevator and the angled turn.
He moved quickly across the hallway and flattened his back against the wall. Held the Glock at an upward angle and slid along the wall until he came to Mendoza’s door. It was ajar. He pushed the door fully open with the gun barrel. Stepped inside.
The loft had brick walls and a high timbered ceiling. Light from a table lamp pooled on the hardwood floor. Drapes concealing the balcony and iron railing fluttered like angel’s wings in the icy air blowing through an open sliding glass door.
Santana crossed the room in a crouch and went out the slider onto the balcony. He stood for a moment in the sleet that pinged off the railing and concrete. In the wind he heard the cry of distant sirens.
He went back inside and moved slowly down a narrow hallway until he came to a closed door on his left. He reached for the doorknob and then stopped, trusting his instincts. He waited.
Warm air poured through the heat vent on the floor. The sirens grew louder.
Then he heard someone running down the hallway outside the loft, the click of a crash bar.
He turned and sprinted out of the loft to the emergency exit door near the elevator and shoved it open. Fleeing footsteps reverberated off the concrete walls and metal handrails below him.
Santana raced down the stairs two at a time. When he reached the third level, he heard a heavy door slam shut beneath him.
“Rick!” he said, calling on his two-way. “I’m in pursuit of a possible suspect coming your way.”
Santana wasn’t certain what he would encounter when he pushed open the emergency exit door on the main floor, but he didn’t hesitate. Still, the scene surprised him.
A crowd had gathered around a temporary stage in the center of a large atrium where an Irish band was preparing to play. A red and white St. Paul Winter Carnival banner hung from steel beams in the ceiling. Beyond the stage a boutique and gift shop flanked a market. Couples sat at tables behind a wrought iron railing of the Italian restaurant to his right.
Santana held his gun inside his sport coat pocket as he worked his way through knots of people. Their attention was focused on the stage and the upcoming performance, and they paid little attention to him.
At the edge of the crowd, he spotted a man in a brown bomber jacket. Their eyes met and the man suddenly turned and hurried away.
A moment later Anderson emerged from the throng and lumbered after him.
“POLICE!” he called.
The man froze for an instant. Then broke into a run.
Santana pulled his badge wallet out of his back pocket, held it open in front of him as he made his way through the crowd, urging people to move out of his way.
Anderson drew his weapon and yelled, “FREEZE!”
The man stopped and spun back toward the crowd, his face frozen with fear, his eyes skittering frantically.
Santana lost sight of him for an instant in a crush of people.
Anderson’s Glock roared and a window imploded. Screams wailed through the atrium. All hell broke loose as people dropped to the ground and others scattered in panic.
Everything suddenly decelerated in front of Santana, as though he were watching a slow motion replay. He saw the man in the bomber jacket stumbling backward as glass rained down on him like ice cascading off a roof. Saw Anderson squeeze the trigger and the spent brass ejected from the Glock as it roared two more times.
The second round tore through the man’s jacket. His chest erupted in a gush of red as he jerked backward and went down.
It was over in seconds.
Anderson remained in a combat stance, gripping the butt of the gun with both hands, rigidly pointing it where the man had fallen. The air smelled like exploding firecrackers.
Santana let out a long breath as he listened to the dying echo of the last gunshot bounce off the concrete walls, felt his heart beating once again. Then he moved cautiously forward.
Glass crunched under his shoes as he knelt down beside the man who lay sprawled on his back, his arms splayed over his head. His jacket was unzipped, revealing a .22 caliber Smith and Wesson semi-automatic tucked in his waistband.
Santana checked the carotid artery for a pulse. Holstered his Glock.
Anderson squatted down beside Santana and wiped his mouth with the back of a shaking hand. His complexion was the color of white-hot coals, his breathing quick and shallow.
“He dead?”
Santana gave a nod. He could smell the sour odor of fear mingling with Anderson’s sweat.
“You okay?” he asked, keeping his eyes on his partner.
Anderson stared for a moment at the Smith and Wesson in the man’s waistband before his eyes shifted to the Glock in his own hand and then to Santana. “He went for the gun, John.”
Santana looked down at the dead man. His gaze never wavered as he peered intently into the dead man’s eyes, eyes that were as empty as his own.
~ ~ ~
Chapter 3
THE CITY OF ST. PAUL AVERAGED TWENTY or so homicides a year, unlike LA or New York where they averaged that many in a week. Fewer homicides meant more media coverage and more pressure to solve them. And pressure was already being applied by the presence of James Kehoe, Rita Gamboni, commander of the Homicide Unit, and Assistant Deputy Chief of Operations, Carl Ashford. They had gathered around Santana in the living room of Rafael Mendoza’s loft.
“Tell me what’s going on, John,” Ashford said, in a deep baritone voice.
Through the arched windows above the assistant chief’s black, shaven head, Santana could see the muted glow of the streetlights near the riverbank, and the Mississippi flowing like a dark stream of blood in an open wound.
Santana told Ashford that Pérez had called Mendoza just prior to his death; how Mendoza’s falling body had nearly hit him; and how he had gone to Mendoza’s loft and then chased someone down the stairwell.
“You didn’t tell me about the phone call to Mendoza,” Kehoe said, giving Santana his best hardass expression. “You said you were going directly from Pérez’s house to El Dia.”
“I changed my mind.”
“Sure you did.”
“I’ll handle this,” Ashford said with authority.
He was the kind of man who was used to giving orders, whether it was to men in green or blue uniforms, the kind of man who still carried his considerable width like an athlete rather than a couch potato. Santana figured it was a matter of time before Ashford became just the second African-American appointed chief.
“We got a name on the perp Anderson shot?”
“We’ve identified him as Rubén Córdova,” Rita Gamboni said. “A reporter for El Dia.”
Santana and the others turned to look at her, which was always a pleasant thing to do.
Her white blond hair reminded Santana of the monas de ojos claros he used to see in Riosucio, Colombia. No one seemed to know where the families of the blue-eyed blondes had come from in that town in the Caldas region of the country, whether they were perhaps German or Basques from Northern Spain. Like most American women, Rita had worn her blond hair long until the age of thirty. Santana remembered that it had always smelled of strawberries.
“Who’s the officer in charge?”
“Bill Kraus is the OIC. He’s notified the chief and shift commander, IA, the union rep and the public information officer about the shooting. He’ll make sure Anderson’s name isn’t released to the press.”
“Good,” Ashford said. “We don’t want anything getting out to the media until IA and the county attorney conclude the preliminary investigation.”
Santana had already completed a brief interview with Internal Affairs. They had also checked his Glock to make certain it had not been fired. Later, a private, more detailed tape recorded interview would be conducted. Santana felt the brief interview had gone poorly. He had been unable to corroborate Rick Anderson’s account of the shooting because he had not seen what led Anderson to draw his weapon.
“We know anything about this Córdova?” Ashford asked.
“He was arrested for trespassing at a meat packing plant in Worthington,” Gamboni said. “Apparently, he was investigating the company’s hiring practices and the non-union wages they were paying illegals.”
“Not exactly the profile of a stone cold killer,” Santana said.
“You figure someone else killed Mendoza?”
“I think someone else was here besides Córdova. Someone in Mendoza’s bedroom. And until I find out who it was, we can’t close the book on this.”
“What makes you think that?”
“Call it a feeling.”
“That’s real thin,” Kehoe said.
Santana considered dragging Kehoe out the sliding glass door and throwing his sorry ass off the balcony. That might erase the permanent smirk on his face.
“If you’ll shut the hell up, Kehoe,” he said, “maybe I’ll have some time to prove it.”
“Detective,” Ashford said. “We’re all trying to make some sense out of this. Is that clear?”
Santana gave a reluctant nod.
“Good. We know the last phone call Pérez made was to Mendoza. And we know Córdova worked for Pérez’s newspaper. Anyone have any theories?”
Kehoe said, “I’m guessing when ballistics runs tests on the .22 Smith and Wesson we found on Córdova, it’ll match the bullet in Pérez’s head. I’d say Córdova killed Pérez. Then he came here and threw Mendoza off his balcony. Maybe trying to make it look like a murder, suicide. He might’ve gotten away with it if Anderson hadn’t sent him to the bone orchard.”
Ashford looked at Santana and then Gamboni. When neither of them offered another theory he said, “So, it looks like we’ve got a double homicide and Córdova’s our prime suspect.”
Santana was thinking along the same lines. Still, he thought “looks like” was a good, if unintentional, choice of words.
He said, “We still need a motive.”
“How many investigators can you spare, Rita?” Ashford asked.
“Well, with Anderson pulling desk duty until IA finishes its investigation, I suppose I could have Kacie Hawkins and Nick Baker work with Detective Santana. Their book is clear.”
For a moment, Gamboni’s eyes locked on Santana’s.
He wondered if she ever thought of him in the way she once had.
“Then do it, Rita,” Ashford said.
*
The forensic crew crowded the living room, so Santana slipped on a pair of latex gloves and walked into the master bedroom and looked around.
Mendoza’s king-size bed was neatly made. A recent issue of Twin Cities Magazine headlined “Minnesota’s Most Eligible Bachelors” rested on the nightstand next to an answering machine. Mendoza’s picture was on the cover of the magazine. It came as no surprise then that Santana saw no photos of family in the room.
Santana checked the answering machine for messages. Then he went into a large walk-in closet. All the built-in drawers, shelves and clothes racks were carefully designed to maximize space. Mendoza’s dry-cleaned shirts were arranged by color, light to dark, as were his Armani suits. Each drawer was slightly open. Santana could see that the underwear and T-shirts inside the top drawer were no longer arranged in tidy piles.
“Need a pair of these?”
Santana turned and saw Rita Gamboni leaning against the doorjamb holding up a pair of latex gloves. He considered telling her that it was always important to use latex in the bedroom but decided against it. Since becoming commander of the Homicide Unit, she had apparently lost her sense of humor. He understood. Some of the good-old-boy cops still resented taking orders from a woman.
Santana held up his hands. “Already protected.”
“Find anything?”
“No. But this closet has been searched. You look around; you see Mendoza was a neat freak. Organized. But the drawers are all slightly open and the clothes messed up. Someone was looking for something.”
“You thinking burglary?”
Santana shook his head. “A pro would start from the bottom, pull the drawer open and work his way up. No need to close each drawer. It’s a waste of time. Plus, if robbery’s the motive, why worry about covering your tracks?”
“Or if he wants to make it look like a robbery, he leaves a deliberate mess.”
“Exactly.”
“So, what do you think the perp was looking for?”
“Why don’t you take this bedroom, and I’ll check out the other? See if we can find out.”
She slipped on the pair of latex. As he stepped past her, she touched his arm and he turned to look at her.
“There’s a lot riding on this one, John.”
She stood close enough to him that he caught the scent of strawberries.
“El color de la sangre siempre es el mismo. The color of blood is all the same, Rita.”
“Meaning?”
“This investigation is no more and no less important than any other.”
She let out a breath and peered down at her shiny black western boots with the squared toes.
Then she looked at him again. Given her height and twoinch heels, she was nearly as tall as him.
“You’ll never change.”
Santana knew that he, in fact, had changed. But it had happened in another time and in a place that was now just a distant memory, long before he met her.
“People should change only if it’s for the better, Rita. But it doesn’t always work out that way.”
She frowned and he could tell that she had been stung by his comment, though he was speaking about himself rather than her.
“I haven’t changed, John. I know there are other things, important things, that shouldn’t have to be ...” she paused as if searching for the word.
“Sacrificed?” he said.
“Yes,” she said after a time.
Santana knew that she wanted children. She had told him how she had tried with her ex-husband, Tom, for two years until they finally discovered that he was shooting blanks. It had driven a wedge between the two of them that could not be overcome. Once, after making love, when she had asked Santana to share his thoughts about having children, he had been clear. He would not bring a child into the darkness of this world.
“You all right?” he asked.
“The clock keeps ticking.”
“On this investigation, too.”
She gave him a thin smile. “Let me know if you find anything.”
*
The second bedroom had a cherry wood desk, PC, printer, fax machine, four-drawer file, and built-in shelves filled with thick law books. Santana started with the files hanging on rods in the four-drawer cabinet. Each file had a neatly typed name inside a plastic tab attached to the top of the file. The files were arranged alphabetically by last name. All the names were Hispanic. The files contained a snapshot of each person and applications for visas. There were applications for the J1 and J2 visas, which restricted students to one year in the states, and the F1 and F2 student visas, those without restrictions.
Santana remembered how he had come on an F1 visa twenty years ago, how lost and alone he had felt. He wondered how many of these names in the files had come alone without their families, and how many were still here legally.
Some, he noted, had the B1 or B2 tourist visas, which prior to the 9/11 terrorist attack granted individuals a three-month stay but now were limited to one month; others had H1B, the temporary worker visas for professionals. But by Santana’s count, there were nearly one hundred files of immigrants who had applied for the H2B visa for nonprofessional workers. The files contained labor certifications from the state and federal government. But as he looked more closely, he realized that many of the workers had applied for the same job at the same business within weeks of one another.
Santana jotted down ten random names and the places they worked in his notebook. He found nothing he deemed important when he searched the rest of the office. As he headed toward the hallway and the master bedroom room again, Rita Gamboni walked in.
“Anything?” she asked.
“An awful lot of applications for H2B worker visas. I’m going to check out a few of them. It’s just a hunch, but I’m wondering if Mendoza was doing a little more than his share when it comes to diversifying the country.”
“You think he was dealing in illegal documents?”
“We’ll see.” Santana pointed to the computer. “We should get one of the techs in here to take a look. We also need to check out Mendoza’s office downtown.”
“I’ll give Nick Baker a heads up. Kacie Hawkins can take a look at Mendoza’s financial and phone records.”
“You find anything in the other room?”
“This.” She handed Santana a 4 x 8 color print. “Found it taped to the wall behind the toilet tank in the master bath. A tech took a picture of it before I removed it. I wrote my initials and today’s date on the back and logged it on the inventory.”
Santana could see two naked men in the color photo. The man standing was photographed only from his chest down. The second man knelt before him. His face was partly covered by the other man’s hand, but the photo left nothing to the imagination.
“The guy standing could be Mendoza,” Gamboni said.
“If this gets out, female subscriptions for Twin Cities Magazine could plummet.”
Gamboni tilted her head. Clearly, she had no idea what he was talking about.
“Mendoza was on a recent cover as one of Minnesota’s most eligible bachelors.”
“I didn’t know you read the magazine, John.”
“Every night just before bed with my milk and cookies.” “Think the guy on his knees is Córdova?”
“Maybe.”
“You see any tats?”
Santana looked more closely at the photo. “No, but it looks like the guy standing has an appendix scar on his lower abdomen. Given the redness, I’d say the scar was recent. I’ll have to check the autopsy report. See if Mendoza has a scar.” Santana looked at the back of the photo. “It was taken in October of last year. You find any other sexually explicit photos?”
“Why?”
“Well, you figure if Mendoza was into this sort of thing, there would be more photos around.”
“Spoken like a man who would know.” Gamboni cracked a smile.
“Right. But ask yourself this, Rita. If Mendoza really didn’t want this photo found, why wouldn’t he put it where only he had access to it?”
“Well, if he wanted someone to find it, why not just leave it out in the open instead of behind the toilet tank?”
“Maybe for protection. It could be that someone didn’t want this information to go public. People have murdered for less. If Mendoza gets killed, he knows someone doing a thorough search is going to find the photo.”
“Like the police,” she said.
“Exactly. But someone in a hurry might not.”
“Like Córdova.”
“Córdova or whoever else was going through the dresser drawers.”
“You really thinking that someone killed Pérez and Mendoza and had Córdova take the fall?”
“Leaving the .22 shell casing at Pérez’s house was real convenient.”
“Could be Córdova was just careless.”
“All I know is that we’ve got three dead Hispanics, two of them prominent community members. The mayor is going to want a quick resolution. Especially if the other dead Hispanic is the prime suspect.”
“Come on, John. Give me some credit.”
“It’s not you I’m worried about, Rita. Just keep Kehoe and the mayor’s office off my back until I’ve had time to look at all the evidence.”
She thought about his request for a moment. “I’ll do what I can.”
*
It was midnight when Santana arrived home. Ice crystals had turned into large flakes of snow. The twenty-minute drive east on Interstate 94 from downtown to his house at the end of a narrow blacktop road in St. Croix Beach took him forty.
The renovated brick house he owned sat on two heavily wooded acres of birch and pine on a secluded bluff overlooking the St. Croix River, which formed a natural boundary between Minnesota and Wisconsin. The previous owner had been a wellknown chef in town before an ugly paternity suit took most of his money and all of his house. Santana knew some members of the department wondered how he could afford the place on a detective’s salary, but he couldn’t care less.
He unlocked the front door and turned off the security system, tossed his wool overcoat and sport coat on the couch and unclipped his Kydex belt holster. He preferred the Kydex because it could be molded to fit the Glock 23 he carried and had a permanent memory of the gun’s shape.
Santana lit the logs in the grate, undressed and took a long, hot shower. After he toweled off, he slipped on a robe and poured a couple of shots of aguardiente Cristal. Then he put an Armando Manzanero CD in the compact Bose system, turned the rheostat light switch down low, and sat down on the soft leather couch in front of the fieldstone fireplace. His body ached with exhaustion, but his mind still raced with the day’s events.
Aguardiente helped him relax. Imported from the Caldas region of Colombia, the smooth mixture of sugar cane and anisette created a comfortable burn as it settled in his stomach. Only a few liquor stores around town stocked it.
He checked for messages on his answering machine. Then he picked up the phone and called Rick Anderson. He knew his partner and figured he would still be awake. Santana wanted to hear how Anderson’s interview had gone. They had met separately at the station with IA after leaving the Riverview Lofts.
Anderson’s phone rang six times before Santana broke off the connection. Anderson had probably unplugged his phone, something Santana had done on numerous occasions, and especially when he wanted to avoid the media. He considered calling Anderson’s cell phone, but decided to let it go. He would talk to his partner in the morning.
Instead, he dialed a familiar number in Santa Fe, New Mexico. While he listened to the phone ringing on the other end of the line, he looked at the framed photograph on the mantle over the fireplace of the older couple. Phil O’Toole with his bulldog expression and the crewcut he had worn nearly all of his sixty-five years. And Dorothy with her sweet smile, untouched by deceit.