Free Quicksand by Carolyn Baugh

you?”
    â€œJust … give me a minute,” she said, getting out of the car. She poked her head through the still-open door. “Thirty seconds. You want something?”
    â€œWere you gonna go into a Dunkin’ Donuts and not get me something?”
    Nora shut her door and ran into the store, returning a long five minutes later with a carrier containing three cappuccinos.
    She handed one to John and kept the other two on her lap.
    He stared at her, then shifted the car into drive. “What kind of fool goes into a Dunkin’ Donuts and comes back with only coffee?”
    She ignored the question, responding simply, “I learned something last time we found ourselves in a situation like this.”
    They emerged from the car on a side street just beyond a battered Ethiopian restaurant. Scarlet and gold leaves dusted the trash-strewn sidewalks and the yards of tightly packed homes. Gang symbols peppered the landscape. The Junior Black Mafia’s upside-down crown with two intersecting pitchforks was spray-painted on the sides of abandoned buildings, on stop signs, and on corner mailboxes. The crime scene lay in a wide alleyway that fell in the center of a block of shabby duplexes marked by their peeling paint and bowed wooden porches. A Philly PD car was parked at an awkward angle. More yellow crime scene tape decorated the area than Nora had seen in recent memory.
    Mike Cook and Pat Crone were two of Nora’s fellow officers. They looked cold and irritable, but they greeted her warmly, and she introduced John.
    â€œHow they treatin’ you, Nora? I need to rough somebody up for you?” Mike asked, looking pointedly at Wansbrough.
    Nora laughed as she handed over the cappuccinos. “It’s pretty posh with the feds, guys. This is just a token of our appreciation. Thanks for all your hard work on this case so far.”
    Mike chuckled, looking Nora over. “Oh, I know exactly what this is. And yeah, it’s probably gonna work, too.”
    â€œNora’s always giving people food or tea or something in order to get them to help her out,” Crone said to John. He sniffed the small opening, then took a tentative sip. “That’s why we miss her,” he added.
    Nora grinned. “So? What do you think? Anything you can tell us about the initial canvassing of the neighborhood?”
    Crone shrugged. “Went to the old lady’s house. She saw the body when she came out to feed the pigeons or some dumb-ass old lady thing. Houses here, here, and here wouldn’t answer.” He pointed at the surrounding homes that backed up to the alley.
    â€œGawkers?” Wansbrough asked.
    â€œPlenty. We started tellin’ ’em that anyone standing around would be questioned by the police. They dispersed pretty quick after that.”
    â€œPress?” Nora asked.
    â€œNah. Must have sounded too much like just another Philly gang killing. Gangs don’t get press anymore unless they’re called al-Qaeda.” Mike Cook said all this through gritted teeth that showed how cold he was. He took a long sip of his cappuccino.
    â€œYou got any sense that the A&As are owning up to this one?” Wansbrough asked them.
    Both shrugged. “Didn’t hear anything about that,” Crone answered.
    Nora let her eyes wander across the landscape. She could feel the questions pouring out of the upstairs windows of the surrounding homes, imagined the fearful curiosity of the neighbors. She slowly took in the entrance to the alleyway, the long, dark passage between two tall row homes.
    What brought you out here? She questioned the woman where she lay, an opaque beige tarp covering all but her toes and some strands of dark hair. It was then that Watt drove up with the van.
    â€œWell, that looks like it for us,” Crone said, pulling out the security log for the crime scene and handing it over to Wansbrough. He glanced over it and signed it.
    The two cops