GETTING A WARRANT to search Debra Lusky’s storage unit proved easy enough. Now that she was a murder victim as well as a suspect, protecting her privacy took a backseat to finding her killer.
“Here we go,” Nick said to Greg as he opened the unit. A pair of industrial-strength bolt cutters took care of the padlock keeping them out. A corrugated steel door rattled up and out of the way, exposing a rectangular vault roughly the size of Nick’s laundry room. Cardboard boxes and sealed plastic bins were piled neatly atop each other in order to take full advantage of the available space, alongside a set of dusty exercise equipment, a ten-speed bike, an artificial Christmas tree, and a peeling wooden rocking chair. No dead bodies, though, which put it up on some of the storage units Nick had probed over the years. The air inside the vault, although stale and stuffy, lacked the sour aroma of decomp.
The beams of their flashlights explored the unlit interior of the unit as they stepped inside. Nick was relieved to see that the vault was only about five by ten. In theory, it wouldn’t take too long to search. Even better, the boxes and bins appeared to be clearly labeled.
“A lot more organized than her office,” Greg observed. “Sure we got the right unit?”
Nick double-checked the number on the invoice. “This is the place. Guess she just wanted to be able to find all of this stuff again, without having to search through every box.”
“Too bad we can’t say the same,” Greg said. “Unless there’s a box conveniently labeled ‘Material Evidence’?”
Nick chuckled. “You wish.”
In truth, the space was small enough that they didn’t really need two CSIs to conduct a thorough search, but it was always better to have a second person to verify any significant discoveries. An investigator operating alone could be too easily accused of planting evidence by an eager-beaver defense attorney. Two CSIs, on the other hand, meant implying a conspiracy, which was a bit harder for juries to swallow.
Nick swept his flashlight beam over the handwritten labels, scanning them along the way:
“High School.”
“College.”
“Vacation.”
“Author Copies.”
“Quilts.”
“Xmas Ornaments.”
Whoa there, he thought. His beam came to a halt on that last label. “Z.H.” he read aloud. “Think that could be short for Zombie Heat?”
“More likely than ‘Zygotic Helixes,’” replied Greg. He turned his own beam on the container in question, which was a brown cardboard box sealed with masking tape. It rested near the front of the storage space, on top of several flat plastic bins labeled “Tax Receipts/Returns.” He walked over and squinted at the carton. “Is it just me, or does this package look newer than some of these other boxes?”
Nick was inclined to agree. The cartons nearer the rear of the unit looked scuffed and battered to various degrees, as though they had been shoved around more than once. There were even traces of dust and cobwebs on the older-looking containers. By contrast, the “Z.H.” box appeared freshly packed. “Wonder how long it’s been sitting here?”
“Not very long,” Greg guessed. “Looks like a recent addition.”
Camera flashes lit up the murky vault as they recorded the box’s location for posterity, before proceeding to investigate its contents. Greg kept his flashlight on the box while Nick sliced open the masking tape with an Exacto knife. He tugged open the top flaps.
Inside was at least a dozen copies of Zombie Heat, “a novelization by Lucia Duske, based on the original screenplay by Roger Park.” The lurid cover was basically just the movie poster, shrunk down to size.
Nick eyed the paperbacks dubiously. “There was a book?”
“Adapted from the original movie, apparently.” Greg helped himself to the top copy. He peered at the byline. “‘Lucia Duske.’ Maybe another pseudonym?”
“Probably,” Nick said. “But why are these tucked away here, and not on display in her office along with her other books?”
“To hide her prior association with Roger Park, just in case we came knocking on her door?” Greg stepped back toward the sunlight outside, the better to peruse the novelization. “Remember that empty gap on her bookshelf? Maybe she got spooked after Catherine and Brass grilled her and decided to bury the evidence?”
Nick nodded. “Makes sense. Guess she was hoping we’d never make the connection between Debra Lusky and ‘Lucia Duske.’”
“And that’s not all,” Greg said. “Look what I just found pressed between the pages of this copy.”
He handed a color photo to Nick, who examined it under the glare of his flashlight. The snapshot showed a smiling Debra, braces and all, posing in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood. A lighted marquee advertised the world premiere of Zombie Heat. Debra proudly held up a copy of the novelization for all the world to see.
“Okay, I can see why she’d want to hide this,” Nick said. “Even if she couldn’t bring herself to destroy it.”
“The book is autographed, too,” Greg said. “Want to take a wild guess by whom?”
“Roger Park?”
Greg handed the book over to Nick, who checked out the title page for himself. Great job! was scribbled across the page, above Park’s flamboyant signature.
Nick grinned. The circumstantial evidence was piling up faster than Zombie Heat’s box office returns. He inspected the copyright date, which was over three months ago.
“So much for Debra and Roger not meeting until recently,” he concluded. “It’s pretty clear they’ve known each other, and then some, long before they hatched that Shock Treatment stunt together.”
Greg completed the thought for him. “Which means Debra could have told Park all about Jill’s creepy stalker boyfriend . . . and the gun she’d bought to defend herself.”
“Giving them a convenient way to dispose of Matt Novak and his blackmail threats,” Nick said. The pieces were definitely coming together. “Now all we need to do is find that zombie mask.”
Greg stepped back to contemplate the daunting accumulation of junk before them.