The Beast Page 13

  “Totally,” Marge said. “We’ve got six uniforms with a perimeter around the place. No one’s getting in.”

  “Good.” Decker along with Oliver and Marge walked outside into a commotion of fog and chill and blinking lights. There was a swelling crowd of people. Undertone murmurs had transformed to overt grousing. “I’ll address the residents. They have a right to know everything that I know . . . which isn’t much.”

  Marge said, “What about Paxton?”

  “I’ll talk to him . . . find out why he thought Penny was keeping women.” Decker rotated his shoulders. “You two go back to the station house. Start probing into Casey’s Massage and Escort, Bruce Havert and his cohort, Randi with an i. I’ll call you once the place has been cleared and we’ll check out the apartments together. That may take a while.”

  “We’re not going anywhere.” Oliver grinned. “Hell, the party’s just begun.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  HIGH FIVE.” DECKER slapped hands with Marge. “Poisonous insects and fish!”

  “You’re the man.” Marge flicked her wrist to look at her watch. It was past midnight. She and Oliver had been called back to the apartment house about twenty minutes ago. In the early evening, it was chilly. In the dead of night, it was not only cold but also wet. Fog gave an eerie yellow glow to streetlamps as droplets glistened in the artificial light. Cars were top-coated in mist. She tightened the scarf around her neck. “What was lurking behind the walls?”

  “In the insectarium—better known as the apartment to Penny’s right—Wilner found tarantulas, scorpions, a whole lot of spiders, including the infamous brown recluse and black widow. There were also beetles, two Madagascar hissing cockroaches, and three ant farms with different types of harvester ants, which—according to Wilner—bite as well as sting. No bees. That’s the good news.”

  “Bizarre, but at this point, not surprising,” Marge said.

  Decker said, “I’m still thinking about what Paxton said—that he used the apartments for women. Do you have anything on Bruce Havert and company?”

  “Nothing new, but we haven’t had much chance to investigate,” Marge said.

  “Right. Let’s attend to the immediate problem. Wilner said the smartest thing to do would be to fumigate ASAP, since we don’t know if something bad escaped and nested in the floors and walls.”

  “Charming,” Oliver said. “I feel itchy already.”

  “What does he want to do?” Marge asked. “Like a total tenting?”

  “Yes. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next week.”

  “So the apartment building is going to have to be emptied while it’s being fumigated.”

  “At least thirty-six hours.”

  “Who’s going to tell the masses?” Marge asked.

  Decker regarded the group of tenants who had chosen to stay rather than hunker down somewhere else. There were about twenty of them. “I suppose that would be me. We need to make sure every single tenant is aware of the situation and all the pets and food are out of the building. Also, no one is allowed to sleep here tonight. Paxton’s getting me a list with apartment numbers and phone numbers. We’ll have to go through the contacts one by one by one until we can tick off all the boxes.”

  Oliver took out a notebook. “If the insects were in the apartment to Penny’s right, what’s in the left? The fish?”

  “Actually the fish and the insects shared the same space,” Decker said. “The apartment to the left was a food pantry for all the animals.” He checked his notes. “One refrigerator and three big chest freezers.”

  “What about a tiger cage?”

  “Wilner didn’t say anything about that,” Decker said. “He did a cursory glance at the freezers. There were lots of wrapped butcher paper packages plus plastic bags of frozen rats and mice. Food for the snakes.”

  “I thought snakes only eat live prey,” Marge said.

  “In general that’s true,” Decker said. “But Wilner told me if the prey is flash frozen—essentially fresh—you can thaw it out and warm it, jiggle the mouse on a line and make it look like it’s alive. If the snake is hungry enough, it’ll sometimes take it. If Penny had live rats, I don’t know where he kept them.”

  “This is really more than I need to know,” Oliver told him.

  “There were also bags of fortified insect meal, fruit, and lettuce in the fridge. Cartons of frozen fish food . . . did I tell you about the fish?”

  “Do I want to hear it?” Oliver said.

  “There were tanks of stonefish, lionfish, scorpion fish, toadfish, puffers—”

  “Don’t know a thing about fish.” Marge started jotting things down on her pad. “I take it they’re all poisonous.”

  “Venomous. Although the toadfish is probably poisonous.”

  “Thank you for the correction,” Marge said. “What’s the difference?”

  “Via Wilner, venom is injected into the prey; poisonous refers to plants and animals that can make you sick when ingested or touched. Although I don’t know what would happen if you drank venom.”

  “Details not required,” Oliver said.

  Marge said, “Where do we go from here?”

  “As soon as all the bugs and swimming creatures are removed, we can start escorting people to their apartments to pack up their belongings before the tenting. After the fumigation, they’ll need to stay out until the place is cleared and aerated. They have to throw out the food inside except maybe what’s in cans. The extermination company is printing out instructional handouts. It’s going to be a logistical nightmare.”

  “Who’s taking responsibility for the cost and the inconvenience?”

  Decker said, “There are thirty-eight units. Penny had four units, and three units are vacant according to Paxton. That means we have to account for thirty-one tenants. Hopefully, they’ll have family and friends who will put them up for a few days. If they don’t, the city will provide for anyone who needs temporary housing. It ain’t gonna be fancy, but they’ll have a roof over their head. We can start with the few hearty souls that are still out. Be smart and be sensitive.”

  Marge asked, “Are we going to have a chance to look at Penny’s apartments before we deal with the tenants?”

  “Not the insectariums,” Decker said. “There’s too big a chance for a catastrophe if something escapes. We have to wait until after the tenting before we can go in there.”

  “What about the food pantry? Can we check that out?”

  “Margie, why would you want to check out plastic bags of frozen rats and mice?” Oliver asked. “It sounds positively disgusting.”

  “I’m sure it is disgusting. This whole case has been one of the most itchy, yucky, ghastly, repellent crimes that I have ever worked on. I usually don’t put my hands in tiger shit.”

  “So why make it worse?” Oliver said.

  Marge shrugged. “I know you said no bodies, Pete. But you just never know what you’re going to find in a deep freeze.”

  THE DIVISION OF labor was thus: Decker remained outside, answering questions, while Marge and Oliver checked out the pantry apartment. It wasn’t a perfumery, but the smell wasn’t as funky as they had feared. It was a mixture of butcher shop, pet store, and musty old basement. The heat had been turned off, but it wasn’t as cold as it was outside, although it retained the dankness of a basement.

  Marge gloved up. “Want to take a look in the bedroom and bathroom?”

  Oliver frowned. “If I get bit, you’d better know CPR.”

  “No joke.” Marge started opening the kitchen cabinets. She found dried fish and reptile food as well as dozens of bottles of animal supplements. There were also pet antibiotics, analgesics, and ten bottles of animal narcotics. Pet meds were much easier to buy than human meds. Often there was little difference.

  Marge took out a camera and began to click photos. About twenty minutes later, Oliver called out from the bedroom, “C’mere. You’ll want to see this.”

  When she walked inside the bedroom, she
was surprised that it was devoid of furniture. There were some old blankets and tarps stacked on the floor along with piles of newspapers. Oliver was in the closet. It was empty.

  “Steel reinforced.” Oliver opened and closed the closet door. “Listen to the sound when I slam it shut.” It made a distinct ping of metal. He pounded on the wall. “The whole thing is one big cage. Here’s where he hid the tiger whenever he had company.”

  “This backs up onto Penny’s closet, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “So there should be a panel somewhere connecting the two spaces.”

  “I’m trying to find it, but the light is so poor. I’m looking for a seam. He wouldn’t walk the tiger down the hallway from one apartment to another.”

  Marge agreed, “No, he wouldn’t.”

  “Can I borrow the camera? I want to take some pictures.”

  “Sure.”

  “Find anything out there?”

  “Just a lot of veterinarian products in the cupboards. I’m about to check the freezers.”

  “Have fun.”

  She came back inside and opened the refrigerator. As Decker said, it was stocked with rotting produce. It didn’t smell horrible, but the shelves could definitely do with a good cleaning. She poked around the bins and shelves, and finding nothing hidden, she closed the door.

  On to the freezers.

  As predicted, the first freezer contained all things gross—plastic bags of frozen mice, rats, goldfish, grasshoppers, crickets, shrimp, algae green plankton, and other things unfit for human consumption. She sorted through them and, finding nothing, shut the lid down with a thump.

  The second freezer was a mass of butcher-wrapped packages. Marge put on a face mask and started pulling out the white bundles and tearing off the paper. Inside were pounds upon pounds of cattle and hog by-products. The heaviest packages included leg bones chopped in half, but there were also dozens of hooves, ears with the fur still on, eyeballs, skulls, and ribs. When she had gone through all the packages, she tried to fit them back into the freezer. Since they were frozen solid, it took several attempts before she could shut the lid and get a tight fit with the rubber seal.

  Oliver walked in. “I think I found a seam, but I can’t figure out how to open it. Want to see it?”

  “Can I take a look after I’m done with the freezers?”

  “Sure. Find anything.”

  “Just a fucking house of horrors.”

  Oliver looked at his partner. She rarely swore. He put on a face mask. “I’ll help you, Dunn.”

  “Nah, you don’t want to.”

  “Come on, baby, we swore for better or worse.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” Marge opened the lid to the third freezer. “I’ve already found a lot of unsavory animal parts—eyeballs, ears, bones—”

  “Did you find any balls and dicks?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “Then I’m good to go.” Oliver unwrapped the first package. It contained bones that still had some meat on them. The next two packages were identical to the first. “This isn’t so bad.”

  “No, this freezer is better than the first two.” She rewrapped a package of stew meat. After a few minutes, she said, “Bones and bones and more bones.”

  “Do you really think it’s necessary to go through all of this?”

  “We’re almost done.” Another package. “Chicken bones. We’re into poultry now.”

  Oliver took out another three packages, all of them containing beef chunks. “You’d think someone would have labeled these. Not for taste preference. Just to know what you’re feeding it.”

  Marge nodded. “Dealing with chicken legs are better than eyeballs, I can tell you that much. We’ve got a lot of chicken legs . . . legs, legs, and more legs.”

  Oliver started singing ZZ Top. “Someone could make a fine stock with the parts.”

  “This guy was rich beyond belief. He could have collected Renoirs. Instead he has a tiger and hoards venomous snakes and insects.” Marge thought about that. “Probably that was the thrill. Cheating death.”

  “Who needs the shrink when you’ve got Marge Dunn? Do you know what I would collect if I had money?”

  “Yes, I do know. Motorcycles. Don’t you have a couple?”

  “I’ve got one Harley and two Ducati racing bikes and a want list about a mile long. What about you, Margie? What’s your secret passion?”

  “I’m not much of a collector.”

  “C’mon. Everyone has a weakness. What’s yours? Jewelry? Shoes? Romance novels?”

  She grinned. “Oliver, you dog. You found my secret passion. But only those that have the covers with those shirtless, long-haired guys.”

  Oliver smiled. “You could always buy a wig for Will, and I’m sure we could find him a shirt with billowing sleeves, what do you think?” When he got no response, he looked up. Marge was white. “What’s wrong?”

  Marge cleared her throat, attempting to find her voice. She gave up and just showed the package to her partner.

  “Oh God!” He looked away. “What the hell!” Oliver’s breathing was shallow. “How many are there?”

  “I don’t know, Scott! They’re all frozen together!”

  “Put it down, Margie. We both need some air. Let’s go outside, okay.”

  She placed the package aside, and the two of them stepped into the hallway. Marge bit her lip and raised her eyebrows. “You tell Decker and I’ll call the coroner’s office.” A pause. “This is no longer our problem.”

  Oliver cleared his throat. “Well, it kinda is our problem.”

  “Not in the immediate.” Marge exhaled. “Let’s get a CI over here. It’s time to let someone else experience the gross-out factor!”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  A PACKAGE OF FROZEN fingers: probably female, judging by the size, but Decker wasn’t sure of anything. With that discovery, the case had progressed from disgusting to grisly. Now SID had to go through each packet of meat with a critical eye, because who knew what could be mixed with the stew meat? Or what kind of meat had been cubed? The possibilities were endless and nauseating.

  Decker’s main concern was keeping the evidence intact. When protein defrosted, it leaked water, making the skin loose and soggy, so that any prints taken were distorted. It was imperative that the whorls remain as true as possible. Once the fingers were inked, there was no guarantee that the prints would be in the AFIS. But if they had been attached to prostitutes, there was a good chance someone was in the system.

  It was one in the morning. The crowd of onlookers had thinned, and most of the people on the street were associated either with the LAPD, the lab, or with the coroner’s office. Lights blinked and whirled in shades of reds and blues, casting a ghastly shadow on whatever was in the line of fire.

  Marge walked up to Decker. “Go home, Rabbi. We’ll keep you updated.”

  Oliver said, “When are you meeting with Paxton?”

  “Tomorrow . . .” Decker blinked several times. “Actually, it’s today . . . at eight. I put Donaldson on surveillance just in case, so he’s not going anywhere.”

  “Then go home, Pete. You got six hours to sleep. We’ll take care of whatever comes up.”

  “I’m okay.” He turned to Marge. “Are you okay?”

  “Depends on the definition of okayness.” She rubbed her arms. “Did SID give you an idea on how many fingers were involved?”

  “No. How many did it look like to you?”

  “This is just a guess . . . maybe two dozen.”

  “And you?” He turned to Oliver.

  “Same.”

  Decker said, “I don’t want to be morbid, but at a glance”—a very quick glance—“it looked like all different kinds of fingers. I saw some pinkies, some middle fingers, some index fingers.”

  “I noticed that,” Marge said.

  Decker took a quick breath and let it out. “I’m hoping that maybe it’s a few people who had all their digits cut off, rather than tw
enty-four different people each with one missing digit.”

  Oliver said, “So . . . what are we thinking. That Penny was a serial killer who fed body parts to his tiger?”

  “I don’t know and I don’t feel like making a guess,” Decker said. “You have the list of all the tenants?”

  Marge patted her bag. “We’ll deal with them in the sunlight.”

  “You should go home, Margie. You need some sleep.”

  “What I need is to forget that precise moment of opening the package.” Marge swallowed. “It’s not that dead people don’t bother me. Of course, they do. But there is something particularly horrible about seeing human remains when you’ve been looking at chicken. It’s just . . . ungodly.”

  She was shivering. Decker said, “We’ll need to interview the neighbors again. Let’s all go home and regroup in the morning.”

  “Won’t argue with that,” Oliver said. “I told the coroner’s office to call me if someone finds more body parts. I live the closest.”

  “If you go in, I’ll go in,” Marge said. “Call me, okay?”

  “Fine,” Oliver said.

  “Then let’s pack it in.” With that, Decker walked away, his stomach in a knot as his brain sparked horrific visuals. It was going to take awhile before he indulged in meat.

  RINA WAS CURLED up on the couch, a blanket over her legs, reading a book. Gabe was in pajamas, lying over the love seat, his long legs dangling over the arm of the settee. They both looked up when Decker came through the door. “I can’t believe you’re both still up.”

  “Waiting for my own tiger.” Rina put the book down and stood up. “Hungry?”

  “I’ll take a yogurt. Sit. I’ll get it myself.”

  He disappeared into the kitchen. Gabe said, “Is he okay?”

  “Probably not.” Rina sighed. “He eats dairy whenever his stomach acts up. He must have found a body. I’ll be right back.”

  “You know, it’s after one. I think I’ll go to bed.” He stood and stretched. “Give you guys a little privacy. Good luck and good night.” Gabe went into his makeshift room and carefully closed the door.