“Bullshit. You always kick ‘em out, so if she hadn’t already left, you had a good reason for her to leave.”
“Whoowee, you boys need some happy powder dumped in your coffee,” Shamika laughed. “Of course, since I work shift work, I always know when I’m going to be working in the middle of the night.”
“Yeah, and you got that husband of yours to keep the bed warm and get up with the kids,” he said.
Throwing her head back, she laughed. “You got that right. What you two need is to find good women to keep your bed warm and give you a reason to want to head back after a brutal case.”
That thought had crossed Sean’s mind a lot lately. At thirty-six, he was ready to find what his parents had but so far had had no luck meeting such a woman with his work schedule… or one who understood his work. Sighing, he simply nodded.
Shamika finished logging the rest of the containers, and he signed the forms before handing them back to her. “I’ll get the results to you just as soon as I can,” she promised.
“Appreciate it.” He turned toward Jonas. “I’m gonna drop this off at fingerprinting and will meet you back at the office.”
He continued down the hall past the lab and went through another door, repeating the process of chin lifts to the lab technicians. “Hey, Jerry, got something for you. I lifted it from the windowsill of the warehouse fire this morning.”
Handing Jerry the bags, he signed the release. Now that he had distributed his collected evidence, he left the lab building and walked the block to another entrance of headquarters. The sun had risen and was just peeking between the alleys of the tall buildings, but with the wind whipping through as well, he hustled inside.
The administration for the Criminal Investigation Division was housed on the third floor, with Homicide, Special Investigations, and Major Crimes taking up most of the floor space. While there were homicide detectives placed in all the district police buildings, the Arson Division detectives were all housed at headquarters.
He walked past the office of Captain Todd Jones, not surprised to see his supervisor already at his desk. Plopping down at his old, green metal desk facing Jonas, his ass had barely hit his chair when the Captain leaned out of his doorway. “McBride. Miller. My office.”
He sighed audibly as he pressed down on the arms of his chair to stand, seeing Jonas do the same. They walked into the office, waited until Todd nodded for them to sit, then filled the two seats in front of his desk. Todd’s demeanor was professional, but Sean knew his Captain was concerned. Todd had seen it all rising through the ranks, starting as a street cop in one of the roughest areas of Hope City. His father had been a firefighter and his brother currently served as a fire chief. As Todd lifted his gaze to Sean’s, he could see worry lines creasing his brow.
“Thanks for giving me a heads up this morning. As you can imagine, Commissioner King has already briefed all of the Chiefs as well as the Division supervisors. I don’t envy the boys in homicide, but then we’ve got our own job to do and have to make sure there are no fuck ups.”
Sean bristled at the idea there would be fuckups, but he kept his mouth shut. Fuckin’ politics of the job. The murder of Samuel Treyson would have the press looking at the arson angle and Todd would have to deal with them.
“What can you tell me so far?” Todd asked. “Does it look like Treyson’s murder is tied to our serial arsonist?”
“We’ll know more when we get the results back from the lab, but the basic site analysis of the fire accelerant used is a mixture of aliphatic hydrocarbons... probably gasoline.”
“And a rock pile?”
“No, Sir. Not at this site.”
Todd let out an audible sigh of relief, his body relaxing back into his chair, causing the wood and fake leather to squeak. Sean had nothing but respect for his Captain but now could see the stress lines had etched themselves deeper into Todd’s face. Of average height, he was a barrel-chested man, but now carried a little bit more weight. He remembered Todd’s father had died of a heart attack a few years ago, and he hoped Todd was not heading for the same.