Free Dead Is Dead (The Jack Bertolino Series Book 3) by John Lansing

tighties in a wad, it’s not personal anymore. I see you, I know a clear-cut case is going to get complicated. My life’s complicated enough.”
    Jack couldn’t argue the point.
    “It’s a clean shot,” Gallina conceded. “No footprints?”
    “If there were, with the rain and all, there was nothing left.”
    “And you didn’t call me why?”
    “You’re here now. I saved you a few steps.”
    “I don’t even know what that means,” Gallina said as he walked to the chain-link fence that spanned the rear of the property. He checked out the quiet of the suburban street beyond. “Anybody see anything?”
    “Cruz knocked on all the doors . . . nothing unusual. The shooter had perfect cover.”
    “If it was the shooter and not some neighborhood kid gunning for squirrel.”
    Jack handed over the envelope with the shell casing and the photos documenting the exact location and time the evidence was discovered.
    Gallina let out a labored sigh, too frustrated by the potential legal ramifications to go into it. “Prints?”
    “Clean as far as I can tell.”
    “I’ll get Malloy on it.”
    “Can you run the slug through IBIS?” Jack asked, knowing the police were keeping a computer database of bullets used in crimes. The Integrated Ballistic Identification System. Every slug has an identifier, a personal mark created by the spin of the lead as it travels down the gun barrel. If there was a match with a bullet used in another crime, the case could be cracked wide open.
    Gallina didn’t deem the request worthy of a response. An aggravated nod was all he could muster. “And I’ll have some of my men recanvass the block. Sometimes having a badge loosens lips,” he said pointedly.
    “You’d think the mayor’s fifty grand would help.” But both men knew potential retribution from the Lenox Road gang would keep mouths cemented shut. Dead men couldn’t spend reward money, and the dollar amount wasn’t enough to bankroll a new life, in a different town, with a new identity.
    Jack made a mental note to give Malloy a heads-up on the shell casing. “Can we get a black-and-white on the Sanchez house? Juan was pissing himself. Willing to take the fall rather than implicate Vegas. He’s got a plateful of reasons to be concerned.”
    Both men paused as their attention was grabbed by a neighborhood girl struggling to light a votive candle with her mother’s Bic lighter. At last she added it to the growing shrine in front of the Sanchez residence. Mother and daughter genuflected, made the sign of the cross, clasped hands, and continued down the street.
    “I’ll talk to Burns,” Gallina said. “Should be able to get it done.” Burns was the newly elected mayor’s city attorney and main fixer. “The last thing the mayor needs is having to explain to his constituency why he allowed more grief for the Sanchez family that he could’ve prevented.”
    “Thanks.”
    “And you buy Triola’s story about the time line of shots fired?”
    “I walked him through it. It’s solid.”
    “I’ll have Tompkins bring him in and take a statement.”
    “Just a thought,” Jack said, trying to be politic, “but we should keep this on the QT.”
    Gallina bristled at the implied team play. “Am I losing my mind here? There is no we in this equation, Jack. And if we don’t have anything else for the mayor’s press conference this afternoon, this is gonna lead the local news. Not to mention, a thank-you is in order, fuck you very much. I should run you in for evidence tampering in a murder investigation. Or have you forgotten in your retirement how the law operates?”
    “No sense warning the shooter,” Jack said, reiterating this point.
    “Yeah, whatever. Find me something else or all bets are off.”
    Gallina started for his gray unmarked Crown Vic that every punk in the country could make as a police vehicle. He turned after keying the door open. “You know there are 175,000 white and gray late-model Sentras and Toyotas