Free Fine Blue Steele (Daggers & Steele Book 4) by Alex P. Berg Page B

force trauma or not. It seems pretty obvious he did, but that’s why we’ve got you around. Now, beyond that, the real question is, was there a murder weapon?”
    Cairny stuck out the index finger of her sandwich-free hand. “Um, Daggers…”
    “Now, now,” I said as I reached the side of the white sheet-draped body. “I know what you’re going to say. You need time to perform your investigation. I get it. But we don’t need a full report. If you could just tell us whether the guy was beaten to death by hand or with a murder weapon, that’ll do. If the latter, then better if you can give us some idea of the weapon, but you know.” I shrugged.
    “No, Daggers,” said Cairny. “That wasn’t what I was going to say. It’s that—”
    I ignored our coroner’s protests and flipped up the sheet. Then I blinked a few times.
     

13
    A guy with a bloated, black and blue face, long sandy blond hair, and a thin moustache stared at the ceiling with dead eyes.
    “Who the hell is this?” I asked.
    Cairny joined me at my side. “A narc. A good one, by all accounts. Morales found him in his apartment yesterday afternoon, along with quite a bit of drug paraphernalia. Looks like he relapsed without anyone knowing. The evidence in his place was pretty damning, but Morales asked me to take a look at him. Make sure his death was an overdose and not something more nefarious disguised to look as such.”
    “Ok…” I said slowly. “That’s a nice story. But what I meant was, where the hell is our stiff? Where’s Lanky?”
    I glanced around the examination room, which stubbornly remained as empty as when I’d first entered it thirty minutes ago.
    Cairny shrugged. “Beats me. As I said, I’ve been out most of the day.”
    I glanced at Quinto, who stood next to Shay with his hands in his pockets and a puzzled expression on his face.
    “Well?” I asked.
    The big guy met my eyes. “You talking to me?”
    “No, I’m talking to the enormous lug behind you who’s also wearing an oversized purple duster,” I said. “Didn’t you help Phillips bring Lanky back to the precinct?”
    “Well, yes and no,” he said.
    I rolled my fingers in the air. “The no part being?”
    “I accompanied Phillips and the stiff back to the station,” said Quinto, “but I didn’t help bring the body to the morgue. I let Phillips and those other beat cops take care of it. I figured they would.” He scratched his head.
    “Really?” I said. “You’re the size of a small barge, and you made other people do the heavy lifting?”
    “Just because I can do something doesn’t mean I relish it,” he said. “Honestly, do you have any idea how often people ask me to help them move?”
    I planted my hands on my hips and shook my head. “I can’t believe that Phillips character…”
    Steele pointed a stern finger in my direction. “You be nice to him, now.”
    “What?” I said. “What did I do?”
    “You were unnecessarily mean to him back at the crime scene,” said Shay. “You know as well as I do there was nothing he could’ve done to prevent that sergeant major from taking charge of the army enlistees. I’m sure whatever happened here, he’s not to blame.”
    I grunted. Steele was far more trusting than I. “Fine. Whatever. I’ll do my best to be nice.” Which was a clever way of hedging my bets in case the eager beaver had done something really stupid. “Now why don’t we find Phillips to see what exactly did happen.”
    Cairny stayed behind, citing the need to get back to work on the ragged narc, but Quinto joined us as we embarked on our second straight tour of the precinct grounds. After not finding Phillips anywhere, I stopped by the Captain’s office and asked the bulldog for his beat. With the information in hand, I grudgingly stepped back outside, mentally preparing my feet for the long journey that was sure to follow. Before I’d even taken three steps up 5 th Street, however, I heard a few chuckles and guffaws,