Chapter Five
"Cooper! Genov! My office, now!"
Lamar held in a sigh as he shoved his chair back from the desk, grabbing his coffee cup as he rose. "You know what this is about?" he asked, raising a brow at Genov, who shook his head.
Lamar huffed and twitched his brows, heading to the Chief 's office by way of the coffee pot. By the time he got to the door, Genov was already standing there, his jaw dropping at the sight of Ms. Clauneot in a pale green t-shirt and black jeans that looked like they could have been painted on.
Shouldering past his partner, Lamar took the chair next to the young woman, leaving Genov to the ancient wooden chair that was barely standing in the corner. "Good morning, Ma'am. Chief."
The head of detectives nodded. "Ms. Clauneot tells me that you visited her club last night."
"We did," Lamar agreed, noting with amusement that Genov was still in the doorway, looking shell-shocked. "Parker -the victim of that suspicious death in the alley over the weekend - had a receipt in his pocket showing he'd been there the night that he died."
"She wasn't complaining." The Chief nodded toward an envelope on the desk. "She brought a copy of the relevant security footage for you to review."
"Great!" Genov finallyspoke. "We can watch it with you now."
"That won't be necessary," Mandy interjected with a polite smile. "You can keep that copy. We have the original in the safe at the club." She stood, brushing invisible lint off the seat of her pants. "It's been a busy night, so if you'll excuse me?"
"Of course," the Chief agreed promptly. "I'll have an officer escort you out."
"I'll do it," Genov nearly shouted, a blush coloring his cheeks when three sets of amused eyes turned to him. "I, ah, just meant that I was going to the parking lot anyway," he shrugged. "I can walk her out."
When the office door closed behind Genov and Mandy, Lamar met the Chief's eyes and they both laughed.
"That boy has it bad," the Chief chuckled.
"Looks like," Lamar snickered. "You wouldn't have known it last night, though." He shook his head. "He was cucumber cool then." Lamar drained his coffee cup. "You need me for anything else?"
The Chief shook his head. "Not at the moment. The warrant for the security footage from the motel should be here by noon." He sounded more resigned than optimistic.
Lamar didn't need to ask why. Security footage from theTramp On Inmotel had been collected three times in recent months. Each time, the tapes were blank. It seemed the cameras had a unique glitch that kept them from recording when a crime was taking place.
Lamar shrugged. "I'll hit up the owner of the ATM across the back way. Not sure how much of the alley his cameras get, but it's worth a try."
The Chief nodded and reached for a folder at the bottom of the stack on his desk, dismissing the detective. "Let me know."
"Sure." Lamar rose to his feet. "Door open?"
The Chief nodded without looking up, and Lamar headed back to the duo of desks he shared with his partner, surprised to find Genov hadn't beaten him back. Tearing open the envelope, he dumped a thumb drive onto the desk, then flipped open the laptop computer on the desk in front of him and searched through the address book in his email for the ex-con who owned the ATM machine in the pay-to-park lot across the alley fromTramp On Inn.
Hearing steps behind him, Lamar turned his head slowly, taking in his partner's flustered face. His cheeks were flushed. His eyes were a little glassy. When Lamar's eyes drifted down, he saw darkening bruises on the other detective's neck and noticed that Genov's shirt was partially untucked.
"Seriously? On the clock?" Lamar groaned, shaking his head. "You know she's a siren, right?"
Genov had enough grace to look embarrassed as he shrugged. "Um, yeah. I, ah, took an early break."
Lamar snorted and turned back to the computer. "I was just about to start checking out security footage. You need a minute?"
"I'm good," Genov said, dragging his chair over next to Lamar's and sinking into it with a lazy smile. "Let's do it."
The footage fromAfter Nineended up being as boring as Mandy had promised.
The twenty split screens showed various guests and employees coming and going from private rooms but little else.
When they finally found the victim on the screen, it was little more than a fleeting glance as he entered the building and was escorted to a room shortly before the employee they assumed was Ren joined him. Less than ten minutes later, a much more relaxed man left the room and headed straight for the building's exit. Ren left the room shortly after and started down a different hall, apparently off to meet his next client.
"Well, that was pointless," Genov huffed, his head flopping back. "Let's check the motel footage next."
Lamar shrugged. "Don't have it yet. Looks like we have a few minutes to work on our other cases.”
