Page 81 of Den of Iniquity

I walked over to the quilt and made a show of examining it on both sides, not that I had the foggiest idea of what I was looking for. After what I hoped passed for an acceptable amount of inspection time, I turned to her and nodded.

“This is perfect,” I told her. “My wife is going to love it.” Then I reached for my wallet. “Do I pay now or later?” I asked.

“Now is fine,” she said. “But once we do that, if you don’t mind, I’ll need some help getting it into one of my shipping bags. I can do it myself, but it’s a lot easier with four hands instead of two.”

“Of course,” I told her. “Happy to.”

She ran my credit card past one of those little cell phone readers. Then I watched as she climbed up on a ladder to retrieve the quilt. After she removed the clips that had held it in place, the quilt came loose, and I caught it as it fell. And there, on the now bare wall the quilt had once covered, was a framed photograph. I knew instantly what I was seeing on the yellowing paper. It wasn’t a mug shot at all. Instead, it was a framed, cut-down version of an old-fashioned Wanted poster of William Landon, the kind that would have beendistributed in the aftermath of the armored car robbery back in the fifties. I allowed myself a quick glance, but that was all. I didn’t want to be caught staring.

If Constance had had any idea I was onto her, I’m sure she would have taken pains to get rid of it long before I arrived, but that’s arrogance for you. Serial killers often regard themselves as the smartest people in the room.

I gathered up the quilt, carried it over to the sewing table, and helped fold it. While doing so, we carried on a polite conversation. Constance wanted to know what I did for a living. I told her I was retired from selling real estate. Did my wife still work? No, she’s retired, too. I wanted to keep everything understated and bland, without making her think I was there for anything other than my buying the quilt. What I was really doing was reveling in the idea that every time Constance Herzog touched the quilt, she was leaving behind a trail of epithelial skin cells that would soon turn into damning evidence. Once the quilt was loaded into a clear plastic bag, Constance sealed it shut with strips of packing tape. At that point I wanted to dance a jig. There’s nothing better than tape—duct or packing—as a source of touch DNA and/or fingerprints.

Twenty minutes after my arrival, I wished my hostess a pleasant afternoon and left the studio, lugging the bag by the bottom so as not to disturb the places I knew for sure she had touched. The quilt weighed six pounds or so, but to my way of thinking I was carrying a ton of pure gold. Having already checked to be sure Gretchen Walther would be on duty, I got in my car and drove straight to the crime lab.

“What’s this?” she asked when I placed the bag on the counter in front of her.

“It’s a quilt that just cost me a cool two thousand bucks,” I toldher, “but if you can develop a female DNA profile off this and run it through CODIS, I’m willing to bet you’ll get a match to the ones from the Darius Jackson case here in Seattle and from Jake Spaulding’s over in Liberty Lake.”

Gretchen shot me a scathing look. “Do I need to worry about a chain of evidence here?”

“No, you don’t,” I told her. “I bought the quilt fair and square and have a receipt signed by the lady herself to prove it. Will that work?”

I handed over the receipt. When she saw the amount, Gretchen’s eyes widened. “You paid two thousand bucks for a single quilt?”

“No,” I replied. “I paid two thousand bucks to legally obtain Constance Herzog’s touch DNA. She threw in the quilt for free, and she’s the one who handled all the packing tape. How long do you think this will take?”

“You’re in a hurry then.” It was a statement, not a question.

“Of course,” I replied. “Should I hang around town or go back home to Bellingham?”

“It’ll take however long it takes. Lucky for you, I’m something of a hotshot, so go ahead and hang around.”

I did exactly that. And where did I go? Not to any of my old stomping grounds because they mostly don’t exist anymore. Instead, I headed for the Homicide unit at Seattle PD.

Chapter 38

Seattle, Washington

Monday, March 9, 2020

Naturally, as I waited for the elevator at Seattle PD Headquarters, who should step off but my son, Scott—or Scotty, as he seemed to be known around there. I don’t know which of us was more surprised. While working in the Tech unit, he had worn a regular uniform. Now I tried to get accustomed to him being dressed as a full-scale detective, all decked out in a suit and tie.

“I didn’t know you were back in town,” he said. “What’s up?”

“I’m here to see Detective Sechrest.”

“About that Liberty Lake case?” he asked. “Sandy told me about that.”

“What about you?”

“I’m on my way to touch base with someone over at the courthouse.”

He looked like he was in a hurry, but I held up my hand. “Wait,” I said. “Before you go, have you heard back from your sister?”

Scott sighed and rolled his eyes. “I did,” he responded. “I asked her how things were going.”

“Let me guess. She told you everything was fine.”

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