names and other pertinent information, Darla saw the crime scene van pull up. Two technicians—both blond, female, middle-aged, and wearing dark blue medical scrubs—fastened official yellow “Do Not Cross” tape along the perimeter of the narrow property. Then, reaching into the back of their van to don gloves and what resembled shower caps, each picked up what appeared to be a metal tackle box and marched over to where Officer Hallonquist stood.
“Body?” the shorter of the pair barked, not bothering with a greeting.
Hallonquist thrust a thumb in the direction of the front door, from which Reese was now emerging. “Basement,” was his equally succinct reply.
She nodded. “Gimme the Cliff Notes,” she commanded in a strong Brooklyn accent overlaid with the characteristic rasp of a two-pack-a-day smoker.
Hallonquist gave the woman a terse recitation of what was obvious from the scene: middle-aged male, dead several hours, apparent cause a blow to the head, possibly from a fall down the steps, but a crowbar had been found near the body.
“Anyone touch anything?” Shorty asked when he’d finished, her pointed look encompassing Darla and Barry. The latter nodded.
“I, er, moved the crowbar off him,” he admitted, earning a snort of disgust from the tech.
“Civilians! They’ll screw up a scene every time. We’ll need his prints, and hers, too,” she added with a meaningful glare at Darla before she headed up the steps.
Her partner, meanwhile, shot the rest of them a baleful look. “No one comes back inside until we give the okay.”
“All right, folks, statement time,” Reese said, all business now as he gestured Barry to join him. “Darla, why don’t you hang with Officer Hallonquist for a minute while I talk to your friend?”
The officer appeared just about as thrilled as Darla felt at the prospect. To her relief, however, Hallonquist’s definition of “hang” turned out to be “stand around silently and shoot dirty looks at the passersby who were gaping at the police vehicles and yellow tape.” Since the strip of trampled grass in front of the brownstone hardly qualified as a lawn, that meant Darla was close enough to Reese and Barry to catch bits of their conversation. She noted that when the latter got to the part about how they had located Curt by means of the dead man’s ringing cell phone, Reese quickly confiscated the phone in question still in Barry’s pocket. No doubt some official police hacker would be able to get all of Curt’s saved messages even without the benefit of the man’s password. Knowing Curt, she hoped for his sake that he had deleted any suggestive voice mails from Tera or any of his other conquests.
When it was Darla’s turn to talk, Reese went through the timetable of the morning’s events with her, up to and including their discovery of Curt. She included how they’d followed the ring of the cell phone, earning an approving nod from the cop at the unconventional tactic. When she mentioned how Curt had warned her about the scrap thieves last time he stopped in at the bookstore, Reese prodded her for everything she could recall about that conversation.
“Curt seemed pretty upset about having that copper tubing stolen,” she explained. “I’m sure he thought they were some street punks who’d run off at the first sign of trouble, but he warned me that they were hitting occupied buildings, too, and that I’d better keep a close eye on my place.”
“No mention of anyone else he was having trouble with? Creditors, ex-wives?”
“Actually, there is someone,” Darla replied, abruptly recalling the recent confrontation in her store. “You heard about my new employee, Robert? Last week, his old boss stopped by the store basically to harass him. Curt happened to come in at the same time, and it turned out the two of them knew each other. They got into a pretty nasty argument before I kicked Bill out, and he said something about unfinished business between them.”
“I don’t suppose you know Bill’s last name, do you?” Reese asked, looking up from his notes to give her a keen look.
Darla shook her head. “I can find out from Robert if you need me to. All I know is that he owns an adult bookstore a few blocks away called Bill’s Books and Stuff.”
“Short, ugly guy, looks like he escaped from the monkey house?”
At Darla’s nod, Reese gave a cold, satisfied smile, though his look for her was one of approval. “That would be Bill Ferguson. Let’s just say he’s not a stranger to the