Free Kiss of Evil by Richard Montanari Page B

being and steps into the building and is immediately solicited by the smell of death, by the damp perfume of neglect. A quick scan of the room: crack vials, spent condoms, broken glass, fast-food trash. The temporary lighting that had been brought in is throwing more light than the interior of this building has seen for years. Cobwebs hang in thick cascades from every corner; the floor is dotted with dead insects, animal feces, tiny bones. Paris notices a pair of small black mice scurrying along one wall, probably wondering why their home has been so loudly and brightly invaded.
    Paris locates Greg Ebersole in this scene. He is standing near the SIU team, talking on his cellphone.
    Sergeant Gregory Ebersole is forty-one, spare, and red-haired: a mongoose in an Alfani suit. Paris had seen him get physical with suspects a few times and remembers being surprised and impressed at Greg’s speed and agility. What was scary about guys like Greg Ebersole, Paris had always thought, was not the cards they showed you, but the ones they didn’t. Behind the cool, jade eyes, beneath the freckles and affable exterior, lurks a man capable of all manner of explosive behavior.
    But as Paris approaches Greg he sees the sallowness of the man’s skin, the weariness in his eyes. Greg’s six-year-old son Max had recently undergone heart surgery, a fairly routine procedure, it was said, but one that thoroughly exhausted the Ebersoles’ insurance, and then some. Greg had once confided that he would owe tens of thousands of dollars before it was all over. Paris knew of two part-time jobs Greg worked. He suspected there were more. This very evening there is a benefit for Max Ebersole at the Caprice Lounge. Looking at Greg now, Paris wonders if the man is going to make it.
    Greg sees Paris, nods in greeting, points toward the body.
    Paris acknowledges him and finds the victim in the back room, near the rusted ovens that once prepared bread pudding and the like for customers of Weeza’s Corner Café. The body is covered with a plastic sheet, and next to it stands a very nervous, bespectacled black officer. Paris approaches, mindful of the small areas of chalk-circled evidence on the floor.
    “How ya doin’?” Paris says, stepping into the room.
    “Just fine, sir,” the officer lies. He is heavyset, clean-shaven, no more than twenty-two years old. Paris locates the man’s name tag: M.C. Johnson.
    “What’s your first name, Patrolman Johnson?”
    “Marcus, sir.”
    “How long have you been on the job, Marcus?” Paris asks, putting on a pair of rubber gloves, recalling that, when he was a young officer, he always appreciated ordinary conversation at moments like these.
    Patrolman Marcus Calvin Johnson looks at his watch. “About six hours, sir.”
    Six hours, Paris thinks. He remembers his own nerve-racking first day in blue. He was absolutely certain that he and his mentor—a highly decorated street cop named Vincent Stella, a lifer well into his forties at that time—would stumble upon a bank robbery in progress and that Patrolman John Salvatore Paris would shoot his own partner. “Tough assignment right out of the box, eh?”
    “ Oh yeah,” Patrolman Johnson answers at the entrance to a deep breath, one that swells his cheeks for a moment, the kind of breath that generally precedes a roll of the eyes and a quick trip to the linoleum.
    “Hang in there, Marcus,” Paris says. “It’s not always this bad.”
    “I’ll try, sir.”
    Paris tucks his tie into his shirt pocket, nods to the officer, then hunkers down next to the body. Patrolman Johnson pulls back the sheet. Immediately, Paris wants to amend his pearl of wisdom for the rookie cop.
    It’s never this bad.
    Because there is something so very wrong about what Paris is looking at. It is the body of a partially clothed young white woman, lying prone, her face turned to the left. She has very pretty legs, is wearing a short white skirt, white high heels. She is wearing no