Free Second Watch by J.A. Jance Page B

to take wing.
    Letting the iPad drop onto my chest, I lay there recalling every detail of that first grueling week, the beginning of my career in Homicide.

 
    CHAPTER 6
    I nitially, Karen had been thrilled when I gave her the news of my unexpected promotion to the rank of detective. Her pleasure quickly dimmed when she learned how much money I had spent in my unauthorized shopping spree at the Bon. And she was even less pleased when she found out that, as a detective, I’d still be pulling hours that weren’t remotely related to bankers’ hours. I’m not sure why, but Karen had somehow assumed that homicides happen and are investigated on a nine-to-five basis, Mondays through Fridays only. Not so.
    “We’ve got a conference on serial killers down in Olympia this weekend,” Detective Powell had told me when he stopped by to see me late Wednesday afternoon. “It’s all hands on deck because they’re bringing in a guy from the FBI to teach the class. We’ve all signed up and paid to attend, so you’re elected to do funeral duty for Monica Wellington.”
    “What does that mean?”
    “It means you show up at the funeral and at any reception following the service. It means you’re polite to the family members. You let them know we’re sorry for their loss and we’re working the case, but while you’re there, you keep an eye out for anything that seems off or anyone who seems off, too. You do not let on that you’re a greenhorn. You wear a suit and tie. Got it?”
    “Got it,” I said, wondering all the while how long it would take for my tiny pay raise to make up for the upgrade to suits and ties required by my new status as a detective.
    There’s a uniform allowance for cops on the street. There’s no such thing when you’re working in plainclothes out of the fifth floor. At that stage in my life, I didn’t actually own a suit, unless you counted the baby blue tux I wore when Karen and I got married. Even if it still fit, the tux wasn’t going to cut it for a funeral. But I also knew that if I was going to get a suit and have it altered in time to wear it to a funeral on Saturday, it had to be purchased that very day—before I went home and gave Karen the news. So that’s what I did. Fortunately, it turned out there was still enough room left in our Bon charge account to make that work.
    By the time I broke the news to Karen that I would be spending all of Saturday driving to and from Leavenworth to attend a funeral followed by a reception, my wife was barely speaking to me. She stuck Scott in my lap, told me she was going to the store, and why didn’t I figure out what we were having for dinner for a change. Cooking has never been my strong suit. I rose to the occasion by opening a can of SpaghettiOs, to which I added some frozen hamburger that I had thawed out and fried. When she came back from the store, Karen ate my slightly burnt offering without comment. I could tell she was neither pleased nor amused, although it was the best I could do with Scott screaming bloody murder the whole time I was trying to cook.
    Believe me, I already suspected Karen’s job of stay-at-home mom wasn’t easy, but that evening’s meal made it blazingly clear to all concerned.
    On Thursday I left the domestic warfare at home and showed up on time and properly dressed, Homicide style, on the fifth floor. Watty directed me to a cubicle near his that gave evidence of having been recently vacated by someone else—clearly someone who smoked, as there was a dusting of cigarette ash everywhere and a faint whiff of smoke still lingering in the air.
    “Don’t get too comfortable,” Watty told me. “Go down to the motor pool and check out a car. I’ll meet you out front on Third.”
    Welcome to the world of being the last guy in. I had already been warned that I was automatically on tap to do the grunt work, and that was fine with me. I knew that was what it would take to learn the ropes. When I showed up in the garage, I