1
It was 0900 hours by the time Cotton arrived at the crime scene. The 26-mile drive behind him had taken him across western Manhattan, the industrial region of New Jersey, and then up to North Caldwell, a town he knew only from the TV showThe Sopranos.
He turned a corner onto a picturesque tree-lined street and slowly drove on. The colonial-style houses gleamed in the bright whiteness of the morning sun. Everything in this neighborhood looked well taken care of, very clean. Cotton had seen shootings in worse areas than this; actually, he was used to downright ugly areas, where shootings are the norm.
Cotton parked his car behind a collection of other FBI vehicles and police cars. He got out and followed a gravel pathway leading past rows of flowerbeds. At the front door, which was framed by grapevines, he pulled out his FBI ID card and showed it to the police officer standing there. Having passed muster, he entered the foyer of the house.
The floor was made of marble, and a pompous-looking chandelier hung from the high ceiling. The walls featured a collection of heavy-framed, professionally taken photos that displayed an upper-class white family. The way the family was posed, their hairstyles and clothing, the lighting — no details had been neglected. The photos showed an attractive couple in their forties. The man looked like someone who had spent his life signing documents. Except for a few tiny wrinkles, it appeared that his wife hadn’t aged a day since her thirtieth birthday. The daughter, who looked to be about eight years old, had straw-blond hair and a charming smile. Her teenaged brother had a face covered with acne.
Cotton followed the muffled voices and other noises coming from somewhere ahead of him. He entered the kitchen, which was about half the size of his entire apartment. Almost a dozen uniformed and plain-clothes police officers stood behind a cordon of yellow tape that had been strung straight across the room.
He saw his partner standing among the law enforcement officers: Philippa “Phil” Decker. She seemed rather absent-minded at the moment. Her arms were crossed close to her chest, as if she were freezing cold despite the dark pantsuit she was wearing. Her face was as white as a sheet, perhaps due to the depressing sight before her: 9-millimeter shells strewn across the floor in puddles of blood.
Cotton looked over to Sarah Hunter. The G-team’s forensic expert was crouched on the floor, searching for tiny traces of evidence. She wore a one-piece protective suit, which prevented her from contaminating the crime scene. With an experienced hand, she directed the beam of a powerful flashlight to illuminate one small section of the floor after another, while she carefully studied everything she saw. Once in a while, she would pick up something tiny off the floor with a fine-toothed set of forceps and put it into a small plastic bag.
Joe Brandenburg, Cotton’s former partner in the NYPD, stood a few steps away. He watched Hunter at work with an expressionless face, his hands buried deep in his pockets. His grim appearance was reminiscent of the old-time cops who had solved crimes with brawn rather than brains. The black leather jacket he was sporting fit this image well.
“Hey, Joe,” Cotton said as he walked over to him, thinking fleetingly of the Jimmy Hendrix song.
“Why are you guys getting involved with this case?” Brandenburg asked Cotton sullenly. Tact was not one of Joe’s strong points. “Do those jerks at City Hall think that we can’t even solve a simple murder case?”
“I’m pleased to see you, too,” Cotton said dryly. “What are you doing here?”
Brandenburg knew what Cotton meant. “The town asked for an experienced homicide detective to assist with this case,” he said, just as dryly. He added with a smirk, “Just goes to show you the level of my skills!”
Cotton shrugged his shoulders and turned around, alm
