12

Davie didn’t awaken until six a.m. the following morning. She bolted out of bed, surprised that she’d slept so long. Maybe focusing on the case had distracted her from her ever-present feelings of guilt. She checked her cell. Vaughn had left three messages. She dressed, grabbed an apple, and darted out the door to her car. When she got to the station, a group of detectives were standing against the wall near the kit room, all wearing blue shirts.

Joss held a camera ready to take the shot. “Davie, hurry. Get in the picture.”

Davie had forgotten it was Blue Shirt Tuesday. She held up her hands, palms up. “Sorry.”

Joss grabbed her elbow and guided her to the group. “Doesn’t matter. Just say cheese.”

The camera flash was still blurring Davie’s vision as she entered the squad room and found Vaughn sitting at his desk.

She threw the apple core into a wastebasket. “What’s up?”

He made a drama of looking at his watch in a faux gesture of disapproval. “I found more information on TidePool Security Consultants. They have an office in Delaware, but it looks like the headquarters is in Fairfax County, Virginia.”

She rolled a chair to her partner’s desk and sat. “Isn’t that where the CIA is?”

“You got it.” He held up a set of car keys. “I put gas in the green Crown Vic and let Giordano know we’d be driving to Santa Barbara this morning. Ready for a road trip?”

Giordano knew they planned to search Zeke Woodrow’s house with the consent of his daughter, but he was still obligated to notify the Detective Bureau at the Police Administration Building downtown that two of his detectives were leaving the county. Giordano was away from his desk. She and Vaughn signed out and left the station.

Davie steered the car toward Santa Barbara along the coast highway, shifting her view from the ocean to her left and the bone-dry mountains to her right.

“We’d get there in half the time if you took the freeway,” Vaughn said.

Driving the 101 was tedious, so she always chose an alternate route if possible. She could have reminded Vaughn about her affinity for sand and sea air, but he already knew that. Instead, she said, “Relax. Enjoy the scenery.”

Santa Barbara hugged the meandering Pacific Ocean coastline with the steep Santa Ynez Mountains as a backdrop. Every neighborhood they passed looked like a vintage postcard—blue skies, white Spanish-style buildings with terra cotta tile roofs, palm trees, and well-kept landscaping despite the drought.

Zeke Woodrow’s cottage was no more than a thousand square feet nestled in a quiet, secluded neighborhood. It was the perfect location for somebody who valued his privacy. Two large windows, covered by shutters, flanked the entrance. A driveway on the left led to a one-car garage. Davie parked on the side of the road. She and Vaughn circled the property and found that the cottage was built on a small embankment just above the beach. To the right was a wooden staircase that descended to the sand below. The place was so close to the water she could smell the aroma of brine and decomposing kelp and hear the waves lashing the shore. Shannon said the property had been in the family for decades. It must be worth a fortune now.

“You think Zeke chose this place because it has an escape route to the water?” Vaughn said.

“Not likely. There’s no place down there to keep a boat.”

“He was a Ranger. You don’t think the Army taught him how to swim?”

He had a point, except the water was cold. Not even a former Ranger could survive for long without a wetsuit.

Davie turned away from the shoreline. “Let’s check out the house.”

They made their way through the gate of a white picket fence. The house had no alarm system. That seemed unusual for a security-minded guy like Zeke, even if he didn’t live in the place full-time. Once inside, she and Vaughn split up and checked each room until they’d cleared the house. Nothing looked disturbed. In any event, whoever had sanitized the Topanga Canyon place had not been here.

The furniture in the living room had clean lines with accent colors that reminded Davie of Shannon’s Santa Monica condo. She figured the same decorator designed both places.

“Let’s split up,” Vaughn said. “You search the house. I’ll take the garage and maybe talk to the neighbors. Somebody must have known Zeke.”

After Vaughn left, Davie searched the living room but found nothing of evidentiary value, so she proceeded down a short hallway to the master bedroom. The bed was made with crisps folds and bed linens stretched taut. A small bookcase was positioned near the bed. Davie opened each volume but found no cryptic notes or telltale receipts. A wicker basket at the foot of the bed held only extra blankets.

Davie pulled a chair over to the ceiling fan. She felt along the blades but found nothing taped to the surfaces and surprisingly little dust. Either he had a housekeeper or he was a neatnik. She searched all drawers in the bedroom and attached bathroom, as well as the closet. Zeke’s clothes were mostly jeans and polo shirts, but there were a few ties and a couple of dark suits. The pockets were empty. She also checked the toilet tank and under the mattress.

A second bedroom had been converted into an office. There was a desk that held a laptop computer. She tried to boot it up but was stymied when a login box appeared on the screen, asking for a password. Since she had no idea how to get into Zeke’s files, she would book the laptop as evidence at SID. If Shannon didn’t know the code, the computer specialists would be able to figure it out.

Davie looked through the desk drawers and the closet but found no utility bills or mortgage statements. Zeke might have used online billing, but his cell phone hadn’t been found on his body and the information on the laptop was inaccessible at the moment.

French doors led from the office to a patio, which was blocked off from the neighbor’s yard by a high fence. Someone had added an additional two feet of wood lattice pieces for privacy. There was nothing in the yard except for two empty trash bins so she returned to the office and closed the door. She sat at the desk for a few minutes, wondering where Zeke Woodrow kept his personal information. Most people banked online, so she was unlikely to find cancelled checks or statements. But employment records were different. Those had to be somewhere. It was possible he scanned the paper forms onto a computer file and shredded the paper.

Next she went to the kitchen. The cupboards were old but well preserved. The rest of the room didn’t appear to have been updated since the house was built. The windows were all locked. The lights weren’t turned on. There was no food prepared and waiting on the table that might indicate Zeke had left in a hurry.

She thought of all the hiding places she’d uncovered while serving search warrants. Most people weren’t all that original. She herself had once hidden a stash of emergency earthquake money in a sack of peas in the freezer. Zeke worked for a security contractor, so maybe he’d be cleverer. Just to make sure, she checked the refrigerator. It was mostly empty except for several bottles of cola and enough mustard to throw a hot dog party for the entire city.

It was clear that a man lived here alone. There were no cosmetics in the bathroom, no matching table linens, and no leftover canapés in the refrigerator from last evening’s cocktail party with the neighbors. Other than one placemat left on the kitchen table, the house was organized with military precision. Zeke lived a solitary life but in a peaceful place with a cat he loved. At least he had a daughter and three friends who cared about him. It seemed like a good life until it ended in violence.

She was about to rummage through the pots and pans when she noticed the adjacent laundry room. A cat box and a sack of food confirmed this had been Hootch’s home as well. Hootch’s microchip had led Davie to his daughter. Maybe Zeke had hidden something in the cat food. She found a pot in one of the kitchen cupboards and emptied the kibble into it but was disappointed to find nothing. She stared at the litter box. A moment later, she lifted the lid. It looked clean. There were diagonal slash marks through the surface, somebody’s attempt at a Zen garden.

She pulled a vinyl glove from her pocket and squatted next to the box. The litter was the consistency of sand. Her hand sifted through it until the hash marks were obliterated. There was something small and hard in one corner of the box, maybe a parting gift from Hootch. She removed the object and brushed it off. It was a USB drive.

Her heart hammered with the discovery. She had intended to run outside to look for her partner but as she pivoted, she knocked over a can of cola that sat opened on the counter next to a laundry basket. She flinched at the sound of the metal hitting the tile floor. Zeke had likely set it there and forgot about it.

Davie stared at the brown bubbles, wondering where Zeke kept his paper towels. That’s when she felt a jolt of electricity moving down her spine. Bubbles. She bent over, stripped off the gloves, and touched the liquid. It was cold. Zeke had been murdered yesterday morning. If this had been his cola it would have been flat and warm by now. Somebody else had been in the house. Maybe was still in the house.

She heard the creaking of hinges. It wasn’t her partner making that noise. Vaughn was out interviewing neighbors. She slid the USB drive into her pocket and slowly, silently removed her gun from its holster.

Davie checked the kitchen. No one there. She peered around the corner to the hallway but saw no movement. The rubber soles of her boots were silent as she inched down the hall, keeping her body close to the wall. When she got to the master bedroom, she stopped. Looked inside. Empty.

She continued down the hall to the office. With her back pressed to the wall she turned her head just enough to look inside the room. The French doors were wide open, not closed as she had left them. She stepped over the threshold and swept the aim of her weapon from wall to wall, looking for an intruder. That’s when she saw the laptop was gone.

Footsteps echoed in the hallway. Her heart pounded as she moved into a shooting position, her gun trained toward the threat. As the footsteps came closer, she slid her finger from the barrel to the trigger, ready to shoot.

“Davie, you in there?”

Her hands trembled as her finger slid back to the barrel. Her breathing was labored. Fear and guilt washed over her. She didn’t want to think about how close she’d come to shooting her partner. Vaughn stepped into the office just as Davie bolted out the French doors.

“What’s going on?” he shouted.

“Somebody was just in the house. Zeke’s computer is gone.”

He broke leather and followed her out the door.

Davie heard a car engine start and tires squeal. She ran toward the sound but by the time she got there, the car had disappeared. She kept running through the streets of the neighborhood, hoping to catch a glimpse of the suspect, while Vaughn jogged back to the house for the car. She was out of breath when her partner finally pulled up next to her.

“Get in,” he yelled. “He may still be in the area.”

She shook her head. “It’s no use. I heard the engine start, but I didn’t see the car. I don’t know the make or model or even the color.”

“You want to call Santa Barbara PD or should I?”

She put her hands on her thighs and dropped her head to catch her breath. Maybe training with Joss Page wasn’t such a bad idea after all. “You call.”

She got in the car and Vaughn drove back to Zeke’s cottage to wait for patrol officers to take the burglary report.

“What did you find in the garage?” she said.

“A bunch of old paint cans and a few tools.”

“What about the neighbors?”

“Only one person answered the door. She didn’t know anything. She and her husband just rented the place for a week on one of those online house-sharing sites.”

Davie made it as far as the entryway of the house before her legs could no longer support her weight. She pressed her back against the wall and slid to the floor. Her body trembled and her breathing became shallow and fast.

Vaughn reached out his hand and pulled her up from the floor. “You okay?”

“Yeah, just out of breath.”

A moment later Davie hauled herself the rest of the way to her feet. She went back to the kitchen to finish the search she’d begun when she’d been distracted by the litter box. Now she found crowbar-like marks on the back door and splintered wood around the lock. There was a bench against the wall on one side of the kitchen table. Davie tugged on the seat cushion and found that it opened for storage.

“Hey, Jason,” she said. “Look at this.”

Vaughn walked over to join her. “Looks sort of cramped in there but I guess there’s enough room to hide as long as the guy wasn’t a linebacker.”

When the officers arrived, Davie directed them to the laundry room to collect the can of soda in case there was enough saliva for DNA testing. When they finished, they dusted for prints on the bench and then moved to the French doors. That’s when she saw a small piece of black cloth caught in the lock’s strike plate. Somebody had snagged his clothing, maybe in a rush to get away. Next to the cloth was what looked like blood splatter.

The officers didn’t have a bloodstain collection kit, so Davie got one from the trunk of the Crown Victoria. At her direction, the officer opened the wrapper on one of the sterile cotton swabs and pulled the attached cap from its protective tube. She directed him to drop a small amount of distilled water on the tip of the swab and use a circular motion to collect the blood. There was enough for a second swab so she had him collect that as well. Then he broke off part of the stick so the swab and the protective cap fit into a coin envelope. When he was finished, he closed it with an official seal and had Davie sign for it. With the chain of evidence clear, he officially turned it over to the LAPD.

The USB drive was useless for the time being. They no longer had a computer to open it, so she slipped it into an evidence bag, too. When she and Vaughn were finished, they locked the house and returned to the station.