St Kilda Consulting 04 - Blue Smoke and Murder

photos of her paintings,” Grace said. “Any idea how much paper we’re talking about for the warrant?”
    “I’ll tell you as soon as we know.” At the other end of the line, Zach heard a very young baby’s fretful cry. “Feeding time at the zoo?”
    “She’ll last another few seconds. When do you want the records picked up?”
    “Yesterday. Too many things have burned, if you know what I mean.”
    “Just make sure Jill isn’t one of them.”
    “She’s within reach at all times,” Zach assured her.
    Grace smiled. “ All times?”
    He cleared his throat. “I’ll call when we need something else.”
    “How’s the new sat/cell working?”
    “So far so good.”
    Faroe hung up just as Grace did.
    “Anything wrong?” Faroe asked.
    “Not with the new phone. So far.”
    “That man has a weird electrical field. Goes through batteries—even the rechargeable kind—like grass through a goose. What did he want?”
    “A warrant for public records.”
    Faroe’s eyebrows lifted. “If they’re public, why bother?”
    “Zach says too many things have burned so far.”
    “He has a point.”
    The fretful cries became more urgent.
    Faroe said, “Give her to me. I’ll change her while you do the legal stuff.”
    “You can change her after she eats.” Grace opened her blouseand began nursing the baby. “I can write one-handed. Has anybody heard from Ambassador Steele on the Brazilian money-laundering payoff?”
    “Accounting is depositing our percentage of the finder’s fee as we speak.”
    “Good. At the rate Zach’s spending money, we’ll need an infusion of cash. Where is our closest fingerprint expert?”
    Faroe bent over his computer, punched keys, waited. “She’s in L.A.”
    “Put her on standby notice as of now.”

60
    HOLLYWOOD
SEPTEMBER 16
2:31 P.M.
    S core picked up the phone with a snarled “Yeah?”
    “It’s Amy. You better get over here quick. They’re talking paintings and fingerprints and—”
    Score hung up and headed for the basement cubbyhole that was Amy’s office.
    As he closed his office door behind him, his phone rang.
    He didn’t even hesitate.
    “It’s—” began his receptionist.
    “Take a message,” he interrupted curtly.
    He shut the outer door, leaving the receptionist to handle an unhappy client.
    Score didn’t care. He had his own problems.
    The paintings are safe. Mother of all screw-ups.
    Damage control would be a bitch.

61
    BLESSING, ARIZONA
SEPTEMBER 16
2:33 P.M.
    T he boxes were coated with a red-brown dust that came from decades in the desert. Despite the looks of the boxes, the contents were mostly in order, filed by date and name. Sometimes the files were done by department, then date, then name. Sometimes by category of crime. Sometimes by a personal filing system that made little sense to someone else.
    After a series of trials and errors based on various combinations of name, date, and department, Jill came up with police reports and trial exhibits of all ten criminal proceedings that had taken place the year Justine Breck decided to shoot Thomas Dunstan.
    “Got it,” Jill said, then sneezed.
    “Bless you,” Zach said. “What do you have?”
    “ State v. Justine Breck .” She waved an oak-tag accordion file and fought back another sneeze. “This place has less ventilation than a cellar.” She reached into her belly bag and scrounged around until she found a tissue that was almost as old as she was.
    Zach took the files while she wiped her nose. He walked away, smacked the file against his thigh to get rid of some dust, and handed the whole thing back to her.
    “Your family, your file,” he said.
    Jill untied the bow knot in the cord that held the file closed. As the cord came undone, she spread the file wide and went through it quickly, looking for the kind of cards that held fingerprints.
    It didn’t take long.
    “Well, bless the sheriff’s upright old heart,” she said, pulling out two half-sheets of thick paper.
    Zach managed not to grab them from her.
    “Justine Meredith Breck and Thomas Langley Dunstan,” she said. “Arrested for D&D, ADW, and other bad choices. And yes, we have thumbprints!”
    She held the papers out to Zach. The top of each half sheet was a form detailing name, age, date of birth, booking date, and all the other minutiae required for proper jail records. The bottom of each sheet was divided into a grid, five squares across and two down.
    Each square of the grid was marked with a smudge of black