FIRST THING IN THE morning, I went to meet John Guerin outside the East Precinct on Capitol Hill. There was a group of bike cops at the curb preparing to set out on neighborhood patrol, in black helmets and black rain jackets and pants. I was dressed similarly, in midnight black running gear and my worn-in Asics. Give me a pair of big-ass mirrored sunglasses, and I’d blend right in.
Guerin came out of the tall lobby. The detective was in his late forties with wire-rimmed glasses and prematurely white hair. He’d grown a mustache since I’d last seen him, and it was white, too. He wore a camel’s-hair overcoat and a sharp blue suit. Guerin looked more like a successful stockbroker than a cop.
“Coffee?” I said.
“Always,” said Guerin. We turned and walked down 12th. “How’s civilian life treating you?”
“More downtime. Fewer options.”
“What kind of work are you looking for?”
“Until recently, I thought I would teach cops.”
Guerin made a whisper of a chuckle. “Interesting.”
“Not exactly the family business.”
Guerin nodded. His posture was so vertical that he hardly seemed to lean at all as we walked. I knew he’d been in the Marines once, but my guess was that he was born like that.
“What would you teach? Combatives?” he said.
“Urban tactics, probably.” We rounded the corner onto Pike toward Caffe Vita. “But it’s moot. No openings. Maybe I can learn bicycle maintenance.”
“How’s that?”
“Private joke.”
We went in and ordered and waited for the coffee. The machine took a long time, and a lot of coaxing and prodding from the barista. We took the cups and sat in a two-top on the upper floor, by the window.
“I want to tell you some things about Kendrick Haymes,” I said.
“Maurice Haymes’s dead son,” said Guerin.
“I have some facts and some guesses. They might help. They might not. Either way, I can’t tell you how I came by the knowledge.”
“Can’t, or won’t?”
“Won’t, then.”
“Haymes was found with William Willard’s niece,” Guerin said. “Found by you, I heard.”
“Word travels.”
“The Jefferson County sheriff called me three days ago, checking on your bona fides. Have you been looking into Haymes?”
I sipped my coffee. It had been worth the barista’s trouble.
“Never mind,” Guerin said. “It’s obvious. If what you know gives a motive for Haymes killing himself, then going on the record is better. It might give their families closure.”
“If he killed himself.”
“You think it was homicide?”
I shrugged.
“Okay,” said Guerin, “off the record.”
“Haymes was a gambler. Sports junkie, mostly. There was a ghost book in Burien where he lost a whole lot of money.”
“Was.”
“It—ah—might have had some trouble lately. Packed up and moved.”
“Which does me no good whatsoever.”
“Haymes was also broke, or as broke as it’s possible for a guy with guaranteed dividends to get.”
“Did his friends tell you this?”
“No. You heard of a guy named T. X. Broch?”
Guerin had been leaning forward to take a drink. He looked up at me over his glasses. “Broch.”
“Kend Haymes signed his Panamera over to Broch. A Porsche. That’s worth at least—”
“I know what it is. Is this a guess, or are you sure?”
“I’m sure Kend forked over the car. I’m guessing he was in up to his eyeballs, or worse, with Broch and maybe others.”
“T. X. Broch,” said Guerin.
“A guy I talked to described him as an animal.”
“Any animal you could name would be better. Broch beat a felony rap a while ago, I recall. Assault with intent, on a woman. I don’t know if it was personal or business.”
“Personal to her.”
Guerin grunted. “Nothing has stuck to him yet. He’s not flashy, but his lawyers are.”
“Kend was a loan shark’s dream,” I said. “Broch must have had a very compelling reason, if he killed him.”
Guerin seemed to think about it. I looked out the window. These few blocks of Pike Street were the part of the Hill that always came to mind when I was far from home. I wasn’t sure why. Broadway was busier, and 15th Ave was closer to the house where I’d grown up.
Maybe it was because Pike was a little off the main thoroughfares, and yet always active, pedestrians outnumbering the cars most any time of day or night. All of the schools and parks and hospitals were just around one corner or another, but not in sight. Pike was the narrow stream flowing between the boulders.
“All right,” said Guerin. “Kend’s death gives us some justification to look into his accounts, if I can get backing.”
“Backing?”
“This is a Jefferson County case, not SPD. And officially it’s still murder-suicide, last I knew.”
“Do they really believe that? Or is it just the theory of the moment until they dig up something better?”
Guerin moved one side of his mouth, making about five percent of what might be called a smile. “The sheriff’s no rube. My guess is that he’s cross-checking every piece of evidence, hoping to find something that will move the needle toward it being a homicide. He might formally request that SPD assist, if I ask him to do so. But I heard that the residue test came up positive on Kend’s hand.”
“Just in casual conversation, huh?”
“I took an interest in the case after your name came up. One of the deputies in Jefferson was with our precinct years back, when he started out.”
“Spies everywhere.”
“Friends. Not spies.”
“The residue test doesn’t mean much, you know. If it was murder, someone could put the Glock in Kend’s hand, fire one off into the high trees, take the brass and replace the round to make the count right.”
“Simpler is better. The murder-suicide tag will remain for now. No point in getting the press and the family all riled up without cause.”
I drank my coffee. It didn’t taste as good now.
“Which brings up another point,” Guerin said. “SPD will need the family’s permission to look into Kend’s finances. A court order is out of the question. This isn’t a homicide case.”
Even if it was, I doubted the SPD could get a judge to sign off on poking into Haymes family business. Hollis’s contacts had found no police records of a break-in at HDC, which could mean it was never reported. Or that the report was quashed. Haymes probably had that kind of political muscle.
And there had been no photograph of Haymes senior anywhere in his beloved son’s apartment, among all the dozens of snapshots. Somehow I knew there weren’t any pictures of Kend in Maurice’s home, either.
“You won’t get permission,” I said.
“Then that road is closed,” said Guerin. “I can question Broch, but we know he won’t melt under a little heat. Broch deals in used cars. He could just claim that the Porsche was intended as a trade-in that Haymes hadn’t claimed yet.”
“Shit.”
Guerin tapped the edge of his empty cup with the wooden stirrer. “This is what off the record earns you. A bunch of knowledge without a lot of results.”
“Thanks a lot.”
“This wouldn’t be the first time a killer skated for lack of evidence. You know that. Better than most, I’d say.”
We looked at each other.
“I’m just hunting down clues, Detective. Junior Crimestopper,” I said.
“Spare me. You’re not a cop. I don’t think you’re a crook, although some of my fellow officers have different opinions. I’m not sure what you are. And not knowing worries me.”
“I’m not going to kill Broch for Kendrick Haymes,” I said.
“Would you kill him for Elana Coll?”
“No.”
“Would you feed him to that monster Willard?”
I didn’t answer.
“You see where this goes,” Guerin said. “I won’t have you or Willard making this city into a hunting preserve. You’ve given me a lead. Thanks.” He stood up. “Now call it a day before I jail you on suspicion of whatever-the-hell-I-choose, just to keep you safe from Broch.”
He walked down the stairs and out of the cafe. Leaving his coffee cup for me to clear. Subtle.