Chosen Prey

see?”
    “Well, just the body, like they found it. We’re giving it the full routine, so it’s gonna be here for a while. You could look at the tapes later. Maybe if we get the neighbor down here . . .”
    “Ah . . . Listen, keep working. I’m gonna try to make it over.”
    “You know where it is?”
    “Yeah. And listen, let me give you a number. . . .” He gave the cop Del’s number and said, “He was looking for some other women who worked for Randy, and they might have seen this chick, too, if you can’t find the neighbor.”
    “All right to call him in the middle of the night?”
    “Oh, hell, yes. Del’s an early riser—I wouldn’t be surprised if he was up already,” Lucas said.
     
    H E TOOK THE Tahoe for its cup holders, stopped at a Super America and got two big cups of coffee and a box of powdered doughnuts, and pulled into the Kanpur’s parking lot a half hour after the call from the St. Paul cop. The back of the store was dimly lit by two distant orange sodium-vapor security lights, a variety of lights from the cop cars, and the light from a video camera. Several cops turned to look when Lucas pulled into the lot, and when he got out, a sergeant broke away from the group and walked over.
    “John Davis,” he said, and they shook hands. “She looks pretty bad.” The dumpster was against the back wall of the store, and they walked over together. “She might have gone right into the truck, except that the dumpster was overfilled and the driver got out to toss a couple of bags before he hooked it up.”
    “She was right on top?”
    “She was down a way. The driver threw a couple of bags off and saw her arm.”
    “Pretty dark,” Lucas said.
    “They have lights on the truck so they can see to hook up the dumpster.”
    Lucas looked in. The dead woman was naked, as advertised, her face innocent but gray, her eyes half open. She had deep ligature wounds on her neck, a rime of blood around her mouth. One arm was bent sideways and disappeared under the garbage bags to her right. The other was sitting on top of her chest.
    “She does fit the profile,” Lucas said. “You got a flashlight?”
    Davis handed him a flashlight and he pointed it at the visible hand, and bent farther into the dumpster.
    “What?” David asked.
    “She’s got a broken fingernail . . . two broken fingernails,” Lucas said.
    “Trying to defend herself.”
    “We’ve got a guy with a theory,” Lucas said. “If he’s right, we gotta take a close look at the rug up at Randy’s.”
    As Lucas pushed back from the dumpster and handed the flashlight to Davis, Del pulled into the lot and got out of the car. He didn’t look much like a cop, and he held up a badge to the St. Paul cops who started toward him.
    “Coffee in the truck,” Lucas called.
    Del swerved over to the Tahoe, opened the door, and a moment later continued across the lot to where they were standing and introduced himself to Davis. To Lucas he said, “I was planning to kill you for having them call me, but with the coffee . . .” He slurped at the cup.
    “There’s a possibility that she’s Randy’s girl,” Lucas said.
    “John told me,” Del said. “There’s one chick living with DDT—not Charmin’, but the one named Melissa? She might have seen her last week at a party up on Como.”
    “You called DDT?”
    “Yeah. There was a game last night over at the Target Center, and Melissa was working it. She didn’t expect to get back last night, and she didn’t.”
    “So she’s shacked up somewhere downtown with a fuckin’ basketball player.”
    “Yeah, and I hope one of the Chicago guys,” Del said. “She didn’t look that healthy.”
    “Does he have any idea when she might get back?” Lucas asked.
    “He thought maybe midmorning.”
    “Goddamnit. Be nice if he could have tossed her in the backseat and dragged her ass over here.”
    “Early enough to miss the rush, too,” Del said, taking another hit of the coffee.
    Davis said, “We rousted the guy who talked to Whitcomb’s neighbor, and we got her name and sent a squad over. I haven’t heard back yet.” He turned and looked across the lot at a couple of St. Paul cops who were blocking the parking lot but not doing much else. “Hey, one of you guys call Polaroid and ask him if he’s found that neighbor.”
    One of the cops lifted a hand and fit himself inside a squad. A few seconds later, he slid out of the car and said, “They’re on the way back