STATE OF BETRAYAL: A Virgil Jones Mystery (Detective Virgil Jones Mystery Series Book 2) (5 page)

When Virgil didn’t answer she let
the door of the truck hang open and walked away. Virgil knew there were about a
hundred different things he should have done right then, but he did none of
them. Instead, he dropped the truck into gear and drove away, the door slamming
shut against the frame, gravel pinging at the underside of the wheel wells.

__________

Sandy’s words and the
manner
in which she spoke left little
doubt in Virgil’s mind about the state of their relationship and what he needed
to do. His addiction to the pills was driving a wedge between them, a situation
that was unacceptable, especially after what they’d been through together.
Sandy was not only his girlfriend and lover, she was Virgil’s entire life. Their
future had been sealed by fate long ago when her father died while saving
Virgil’s life. His name was Andrew Small and he was the Station Chief for the
fire department that served the neighborhood where Virgil lived when he was
just a young boy. When the house caught fire and burned he was trapped inside,
buried beneath a pile of rubble that collapsed over his head as he tried to escape.
Chief Small and another fireman went in to rescue him, but Sandy’s dad perished
in a secondary explosion before he made it out of the house. So Virgil grew up happy
and healthy, but it came at the expense of Sandy’s lifelong sorrow. Yet fate
had intertwined their lives, now at once beautifully connected with a level of
expectation that amazed and often frightened Virgil.

He made it about halfway to the bar
before he turned the truck around and drove back to their house. He hadn’t been
gone very long, but by the time he returned, Sandy’s car was not in the drive
or the garage and when Virgil went inside he discovered she was no longer home.

6

__________

N
ichole
Pope had her arms crossed, the look on her face a mixture of disbelief, anger
and fear. Mostly anger. She jabbed her finger at Miles. “What do you mean
there’s no body? Let me tell you something, that’s wrong on about ten different
levels, but the main thing is, when you use the word ‘body’ it implies that my
brother is dead. Are you saying my brother is dead, Detective?”

“Ms. Pope, we don’t really know
what’s going on just yet, other than the blood in your brother’s apartment and
the apparent lack of a victim.”

“So in other words you don’t know
anything, do you,
Detective
?”

Miles was still more than a little
hot himself about the side of his new car and he wasn’t about to be pushed
around, grieving sibling or not. “I’ll tell you what we know for sure. We know
you’re a lousy driver and you just wrecked my new car.” Jabbing his finger
right back now. “That’s what we know for sure.”

“
Your car?
You’re dancing
around the fact that you’ve got blood all over my brother’s apartment, buckets
of blood in fact, no witnesses, no body—your words, not mine—and
you’re worried about your car? Let me tell you something, Detective, and hear
me when I say this:
Fuck your car
.”

__________

Mimi walked over,
introduced herself to
Nichole and said, “Ms. Pope, if you’d be willing to let us take a sample of
your blood we’d be able to get a definitive answer as to whom the blood
belonged to much faster than we normally could. It will still have to be processed
through the lab and all that, but they could begin with random samples and we’d
have a conclusive answer much quicker.”

Nichole gave Miles a parting glare
before she turned her attention to Mimi. “How much faster?”

“We’d be looking at hours instead
of days.”

“Then, yes, of course. Let’s do
that. What do I have to do?”

Mimi took her by the arm. “Just
come with me. We’ll get you all set up. It should only take a few minutes.”

“If that’s my brother’s blood in
there, is there any chance that he’d still be alive?”

Mimi shook her head. “I’m not going
to dance around it, sweetie. With that amount of blood…”

__________

Rosencrantz introduced
Miles to Lola Ibarra,
the tenant who lived in the apartment directly below Nicholas Pope. She was on
the far side of middle-aged, but not too far, Ron thought. She wore a flowered housedress
that matched the flowered scarf in her hair, the flowered sandals on her feet
and the flowered bracelets on her wrists. The apartment was, Ron discovered,
surprisingly well kept and clean. It smelled of pine scented cleaner, incense
and coffee. But it was the artwork and absurdity of Lola Ibarra’s decorative
choices that caused Ron to bite the inside of his cheek.

The walls were covered with
paintings of Jesus Christ, all on black velvet. They were markedly similar to
the Elvis on velvet series, or the dogs playing poker on velvet series, except
of course, these all pictured Jesus. Elvis had apparently left the building, took
the dogs with him and left Jesus behind to fend for Himself.

There were paintings of Jesus at
the last supper, Jesus carrying the cross, Jesus hanging on the cross, Jesus walking
on water, Jesus praying in the garden of Gethsemane and everyone’s favorite, Jesus
wearing a crown of thorns with blood dripping down His forehead, the latter sort
of a headshot for holy rollers. The only thing missing, Ron thought, was a
painting of Jesus Christ in a chicken basket.

“Mrs. Ibarra, I’d like to walk
through the sequence of events with you. Would you tell me what happened,
please?”

“I have already talked with the
other man. I cannot remember his name. Detective, um, Happenstance?”

“That would be Rosencrantz.”

“Yes, of course. Rosencrantz.” Ibarra
tugged at her scarf until it was arranged just so, then pointed to the coffee
table in the center of the small living room. “I woke up and sat down on the
sofa to wait for the coffee. I boil it on the stove instead of using one of the
drippy machines, so it takes a little longer. That is when I saw my statue of
the Holy Mother. It had blood on it. I thought it was a miracle.” She crossed
herself when she said miracle and it gave Miles the impression that it was a
‘just-in-case’ crossing, like just in case it really was divine intervention
and not something quite so simple as evidence from a crime scene.

“I see. And how long did it take you
to figure out that it wasn’t a miracle?”

“Hmm. I am not sure. I began to
pray right away of course. I got down on my knees and prayed like I have never
prayed before, I can tell you that. But then I could smell my coffee starting
to burn—I had prayed so long that the pot boiled dry—so I had to
clean that up. When I came back I was going to pray some more—which I
did—and then I went in the bathroom to shower and get cleaned up. I
wanted to look nice for Father Peralta, my priest.”

“And did Father Peralta come by?”

“Yes. He was the one who told me it
was not a miracle after all and that we needed to call the authorities.”

“And how did he determine that,
Mrs. Ibarra?”

She pointed at her ceiling directly
above the statue. A dark stain covered the thin plaster. “He looked at the
ceiling.”

“So…no miracle I guess.”

Ibarra shrugged her shoulders and
then crossed herself again. “Who is to say?”

Well, I am
, Ron thought.
“I’m afraid we’re going to have to confiscate your statue as evidence in an ongoing
investigation. It will be returned but we’re going to have to take it for now.”

Ibarra waved her hand in the air.
“This is not a problem for me. I have a whole box full of them in storage. I
sell them on the E-bay.”

“I’ll have one of our crime scene
technicians come over and get it then. In the meantime, please don’t touch it.”

“Yes, yes.”

“Just a couple more questions then,
Mrs. Ibarra. Did you hear anything last night or yesterday either outside or in
the apartment above you that seemed out of the ordinary?”

“No, I hear nothing. Nothing at
all.”

“No loud bangs, or thumps, or
shouting? Nothing like that?”

“Si. Nothing.”

“Huh.”

“What is this, huh?”

“Well, I don’t mean to alarm you
Mrs. Ibarra, but whatever happened up there, it had to have been violent. I’m
just surprised you didn’t hear anything.”

“I did not hear anything because I
was not at home.”

Miles audibly exhaled and then scratched
the back of his head. “I see. And what time did you get home?”

“Hmm, I would say it was well after
midnight.”

“Sort of late, then.”

“Si, very late for me. It was Bingo
night at the church. It was my turn to be caller.”

“What do you know about Mr. Pope?
Did you ever speak with him? Was he friendly to you?

“Oh yes. My little Nicky, he was very
friendly. A very nice man. Most of the people around here do not like to give
you the time of day and to tell you the truth, you would not want it if they
did, comprende?”

“Yes, I comprende. But you and Mr.
Pope were friendly?”

“Yes. He always fixed my computer
for me whenever I had a problem. I think the E-bay messes it up somehow.”

“When was the last time you saw
him?”

Ibarra looked up at the ceiling,
either trying to remember, or looking for a sign from Jesus, Ron couldn’t tell
for sure. “Three days ago. He carried my garbage to the container for me.”

“Is there anything you could tell
me about Mr. Pope that would help me find his killer, Mrs. Ibarra? Anything at
all?”

Ibarra waved her hands in front of
herself. “No, there is nothing. Nicky, he is a nice young man who helped me out
sometimes. He said I reminded him of his mother. He had a good job and he
worked for the lottery people. He used to tease me and say he knew the secret
to winning and that one day he would tell me how to pick the numbers and I
would become wealthy.”

Miles handed her his business card.
“If there’s anything else you can think of, call me right away. Keep your doors
locked. We don’t know why Mr. Pope was killed, only that he was.”

“Yes. I will lock my door. There is
only the one.”

“Windows too, Mrs. Ibarra.”

“Yes. Just the one window too, but
I will lock it.”

Miles thanked her and began to
leave, but Ibarra had one more thing. “Señor Detective?”

“Yes?”

“Nicky, he such a nice boy like I
said…”

“But?”

“He had some bad friends, I think.”

“Bad how?”

“They like their checkers. I smell
the stink right through the window.”

“Checkers?”

Ibarra laughed. “It is a Mexican term
for low-grade marijuana. What you would call ditch weed.”

“Checkers?”

“Si, Checkers.”

“Huh. I’ve never heard of that. What
do you call high-grade marijuana?”

“Chess.” Then she lowered her voice
and leaned in closer to Miles. “Is also sometimes just called ‘good shit.’” Crossed
herself again when she said it.

__________

Miles walked outside
and found Mimi and
Rosencrantz standing together next to the stairs that led to Pope’s apartment.
He nodded at Mimi and then looked at Rosencrantz. “What do you know about
Checkers and Chess?”

Rosie didn’t hesitate. “Always go
with Chess. Checkers will destroy your lungs. Taste like shit too. Now Chess,
true Chess if you can find it, that’s some really good shit. Why do you ask?”

“Never mind,” Miles said. “I think I’m
just getting old.”

__________

“Might want to take a
look at this picture
,”
Mimi said, and at the sound of her
voice, Miles forgot all about his age. “It’s just a Polaroid. We’ll have other
pictures with better resolution later today when we get the digital prints, but
you should see this.” She handed the photo to Miles.

Ron looked at the photo but he
couldn’t tell what it was. “I don’t get it. What am I looking at here?”

Mimi positioned herself next to
Miles and that gave him a little thrum. “It’s what we in the business of crime
scene investigations often refer to as a
clue
.” She made little air
quotes with her fingers when she said ‘clue.’ “Specifically, it’s the floor
underneath the front of Pope’s sofa, just behind the dust ruffle. Is that what
they’re called? Dust ruffles? You know, the flap part that hangs down at the
bottom? If you lift it up you can see under the couch? Anyway, my guys found
this when they moved the sofa. It’s some sort of code.”

Once Mimi explained it, Miles could
see it right away. It was a long series of numbers. The sequence read: 102120103157123
“Is it written in blood?”

“It sure is,” Mimi said. “Looks
like your victim was trying to tell you something.”

Rosencrantz stepped closer and took
another look at the photo. “Trying to tell us what?”

Mimi let her eyes do a little half
roll before they landed on Rosencrantz. “Me and my crew? We just process the
scene. You guys are supposed to be the crack investigators. My guess is your
victim was trying to tell you who let him bleed out all over the floor. It’d
take some balls to write a message in your own blood.”

When Mimi said the word ‘balls’
Rosencrantz and Miles made a point not to look at each other. “I’ll want a copy
of that as soon as you can get it to me,” Miles said.

Mimi handed him the photo. “You can
have this one now. I’ll email the digital ones to you when they’re ready.”

Miles took the Polaroid from Mimi.
“Do that,” he said. “I’ve got to figure out what to do about my car.” He stuck
the photo in his pocket and walked away.

Rosencrantz and Mimi stood there
and watched him go. “What was that bit about Checkers and Chess?”

“Apparently, it’s Mexican slang for
pot.” Rosie said. “I’d never heard of it until I spoke with Mrs. Ibarra.”