Free House Divided by Mike Lawson

his fingernails, she ignored him and read the printouts. Regarding Russo, the guy sounded like some sort of gay angel: hospice worker, didn’t cheat on his taxes, gave to charity like he was Bill Gates. He’d never had a traffic ticket, much less committed a real crime.
    “Autopsy report,” she said.
    Gilbert handed it to her.
    The first thing she noticed was that the autopsy had begun at five A.M . the day Russo died and had been completed at six A.M . No way. Speedy-friggin’-Gonzales couldn’t have chopped the guy up that fast. But the bell ringer was the cause of death: death by gunshot wound to the head at close range and, based on entry and exit wounds, the weapon had most likely used 9mm ammunition. No bullet had been recovered.
    Bullshit. Double bullshit.
    The report in the Arlington cop’s computer said there had been no exit wound, which there would have been if Russo had been shot at close range with a nine mickey-mike. And she was convinced from the transmission they’d intercepted that Russo had not been shot at close range. He’d been popped from some distance away by a sniper, and if there was no exit wound, the ordnance involved was probably the type the SWAT boys used, the kind of ammo that penetrates the skull and then explodes into a jillion little fragments, instantly shutting off all voluntary motor functions. But a 9mm would fit the story that the nurse had been killed in some drug deal gone bad, such a weapon being gangbanger, drug-dealer, street scum preference.
    Claire sat there looking at Gilbert, but she wasn’t really looking at him. She was staring at his chest, his shirt a narrow blue wall for her to focus on.
    “Uh, you need me for anything else?” he said.
    “Hush,” Claire said.
    Hospice worker. Nurse. Drugs. No. Hospice worker. Dying people. Death-bed secrets.
    “Get me the names of Russo’s last ten patients,” she said. “Leave the file on Hopper with me. Oh, and do a data dump on this doctor who did the autopsy, this Dr. Lee.”
    David Hopper.
    Claire reviewed the file Gilbert had compiled on the FBI agent, noticing that he had served in the army before joining the Bureau. She also noticed he was on the take.
    Hopper was a GS-14 and thus made a decent salary, but he had two ex-wives and four children and had never been in arrears on either alimony or child support. Not only was he father-of-the year, but based on his credit card statements, he dined at some of the best restaurants in town, purchased his clothes from high-end stores, and owned a pricey and relatively new Mercedes. The supposed source of Hopper’s additional income was a trust fund established by a dead uncle, but a little research—the sort of research Claire’s people could do in their sleep—showed that the uncle had been an alcoholic insurance salesman who had three DUIs in an eight-year period. No way had Uncle Boozer left Nephew David any money.
    Turning last to his phone records, she noted no calls to anyone who struck her as unusual. However, at about the same time as Paul Russo’s body was discovered, Hopper had received a call on his cell phone from another cell phone whose owner Gilbert had not identified.
    She marched back out to the technician’s desk.
    “Who made this call to Hopper?” she said, jabbing her finger at the phone record.
    “I don’t know,” he said.
    “Well, find out.”
    “I’ve tried,” Gilbert whined.
    “Try harder. Don’t leave until you get me an answer.”
    “Geez, Claire, I was hoping to get out of here on time for once. Can’t someone else—”
    “Look at me,” she said.
    Gilbert looked at her with the eyes of a martyr. None of her employees knew the demons that drove Claire Whiting. All they knew was that she was fanatical about her job and she would work until she dropped—and she would work you until you dropped. Gilbert also knew of another technician, a man with three kids all younger than eight, who had been transferred to a listening post on