“It’s a lead,” he said. “And it makes me want to talk to his trainer even more. Go ahead and bag it.”
I did, my mind spinning ahead to the implications. Underground betting meant underground events. Organizers. Money changing hands. People with a vested interest in who won and who lost.
“Let’s check the closet,” Jack said.
The clothes hung in neat rows, work gear on one side, casual on the other. Nothing expensive, but everything clean and well maintained. Shoes arranged by type—work boots, sneakers, one pair of dress shoes still in the box.
Jack ran his hands along the back wall, slow and methodical. Halfway across, he stopped.
“Got something.” He pressed against the drywall, and it shifted. “False panel.”
He worked it free, revealing a cavity about a foot deep. Inside sat a duffle bag, olive green, worn soft from use.
Jack pulled it out and unzipped it.
For a moment, neither of us spoke.
Cash. Stacks of it, bound with rubber bands. Twenties and fifties, the kind of bills that came from hand-to-hand transactions. No crisp hundreds fresh from a bank. This was street money. Fight money.
“That’s at least thirty thousand,” Jack said. “Maybe more.”
“Construction doesn’t pay like this.”
“No.” His jaw was tight. “And people earning this kind of cash off the books don’t usually end up dead unless the people running the operation put them there.” He zipped the bag back up. “We’re not looking for a killer. We’re looking for an organization.”
I stared at the money, thinking about the betting slip, the athlete’s diet, the military discipline. About a mother who thought her son was just staying in shape, keeping busy, saving for a house.
“He was fighting,” I said. “Not just training.”
“Nobody talks about fight club,” he said wryly.
“Good one,” I said. “You don’t hide this behind a wall if you’re earning it legally. You put it in a bank. You invest it. You don’t stack it in a duffle bag like you might need to grab it and run.”
“If he was fighting underground, someone was running the operation. Taking a cut.”
“And making a lot more than he was.” I thought about what his mother had said. The celebration. The surprise he wouldn’t tell her about. “What if he was trying to get out?”
“And someone didn’t want to let him go.”
It was still theory, built on circumstantial evidence and gut instinct. But it was something.
A laptop sat on the small desk by the window. That would go to Derby once it was logged into evidence. But when I searched for a cell phone—drawers, bathroom, under the mattress—I came up empty.
“No phone,” I told Jack.
“And none of the victim’s personal belongings were found in the dumpster either. Killer probably found a different dump site.” His expression was grim. “It just slows us down. We’ll get a warrant for the phone company. We can still get access to his texts and contacts. And maybe get a cell tower ping for his last location.”
“Gotta love technology,” I said.
“That’s not what you said the other day when you were trying to update your computer and everything shut down.”
“It’s a love-hate relationship. I’m just waiting for the robots to take over and kill us all, and then we won’t have to worry about it anymore.”
“Cole’s right,” Jack said. “You are always looking on the bright side.”
“And there’s more sunshine where that came from.”
“I’ve always loved that smart mouth.”
