The Death File: A gripping serial killer thriller with a shocking twist. J. Kerley A.

      “Opportunistic,” I said. “It’s a perfect ambush point.”

      “No call, no reports of anyone in the area?” Harry asked Vince. “Creepers, peepers, people out of place?”

      “Not that I’ve heard so far.”

      Harry got to his hands and knees and leaned his nose over Warbley’s open mouth, sniffing delicately, his bulldozer-blade mustache almost brushing the victim’s lips. “Scotch,” Harry said, standing and dusting his hands. “And he’s wearing a pair of Rockport walkers.”

      I caught the glint of an object on Warbley’s belt and leaned down to inspect it. “A pedometer,” I said. “Combine that with the walking kicks and whisky breath …”

      “There’s a neighborhood-type bar about four blocks over,” Vince said. “The Lucent. It’s the kind of place you find academic sorts: craft beers and single malts, a couple bookshelves with everything from Aristotle to Zen koans. A jukebox that plays the latest from Mozart.”

      “You keep a catalog of all the bars, Vince?” Harry asked.

      “I live about a mile north of here,” Vince said. “It’s on my radar.”

      Vince put his uniforms and pair of detectives on interviewing the onlookers while Harry and I booked to the bar. Vince and his folks would take Warbley’s house.

      We rounded the corner to The Lucent two minutes later, a corner bar with a side courtyard. The hardwood sign over the door was handcrafted artistic, the smooth name in scarlet in reverse-relief.

      “Damn,” Harry muttered, trying the door and finding it locked. “Closed.”

      Closing time was likely two a.m., ten minutes ago, but a light was on and tapping the window with badges brought a face to the embossed and decorative door, one Larry Milsapp. Milsapp was pudgy, in his sixties and sported a waxed and pointed mustache that would have sparked envy in Salvador Dali. Milsapp wore khakis and threadbare blue dress shirt under a white and damp-spotted apron. In the corner of the bar I saw a mop bucket; cleaning up.

      “John Warbley?” Milsapp said in response to my question, his eyes sighting between the twin antennae. “John was in here earlier. I guess from maybe nine until eleven or thereabouts.” He frowned. “What’s this about, if I may ask?”

      It was technically Harry’s case, which meant he pulled the ugly duty. He leveled his eyes into Milsapp’s eyes. “Mr Milsapp, I’m sorry to say Professor Warbley was killed earlier this evening, likely on his return home.”

      If the bar hadn’t been in front of him, Milsapp would have gone down. He grabbed it for support, wavered, but Harry had an arm under Milsapp’s shoulder and guided the man to a chair, where he buried his face in his hands.

      “Oh …” he said, trying to find a place to put his hands so they’d stop shaking. “Oh, oh, oh …”

      Harry pulled two tumblers from the glassware rack, poured a treble shot of Pappy Van Winkle in one, spritzed soda water in the other and handed them to Milsapp.

      “I, I, I …” Milsapp said. His wiring was shorting from sudden overload.

      “First a deep breath,” Harry said.

      Milsapp sucked in air.

      “Now the booze.”

      Milsapp downed half the bourbon, then half the soda. He closed his eyes and waited until the blast hit, then nodded thanks.

      “Take your time, sir,” Harry said. “Then we need to ask about Professor Warbley.”

      Milsapp polished off the bourbon. “John was part of the soul of this place,” Milsapp said, shaking his head. “The conscience, maybe. John never knew an enemy, only friends. This place will never be the same.”

      “Was he married?”

      “Married to his classes, his studies, his books. Married to the concept that reason, correctly constructed and passionately argued, would always win out.”

      “Anyone in here earlier seem especially interested in Professor Warbley?” I asked.

      A sad head-shake. “It was a small crowd, the usual regulars, most have been coming here for years. People came and went, maybe forty over the course of the eveni …” He paused and narrowed an eye.

      “What is it, Mr Milsapp?” Harry asked.

      “There was someone else. A man came in, looked the place over for a few seconds, then turned and left. I got the impression he was looking for someone who wasn’t here. Or maybe he saw that it wasn’t his kind of place.”

      “How’s that, sir?”

      Milsapp studied a memory and frowned as it gained focus. “He was hardlooking, dangerous looking. Latin, I’m sure. Big shoulders, small waisted. Wore one of those knit caps. Though he had a jacket with the collar popped up, I saw tattoos on his neck. He looked like one of those guys in prison documentaries who lift weights all day. You don’t think—?”

      “We don’t think anything yet, sir. We’re just gathering data.” Harry scanned the ceiling, the rafters. “Speaking of that, do you have any security cameras?”

      “Never had any need.”

      We asked a few more questions and went to Warbley’s house to find Vince sitting on the couch and making notes as techs worked beneath porta-lamps out front. He gave us what’d you find? eyes.

      “He’d been at The Lucent,” Harry said. “Left around eleven. Fits the timeline for an ambush.”

      “He have much to drink?” Vince asked.

      Harry nodded. “The owner said Warbley liked single malt. Had four in two hours. Not smashed but happy.”

      “Not much to go on here,” Vince said, grunting up from the couch. His eyes looked tired, but then it was past two in the morning. “It’s like the standard-issue intellectual’s digs: Lots of books, an office where he graded papers, a stack of student essays on John Stuart Mill, a briefcase with more papers. Nothing out of place, tossed … I doubt the perp was ever inside.”

      “Find a wallet?” Harry asked. “Phone?”

      “Nada. There’s a bowl in a drawer by the door, got loose bills, coins, keys, an old uncharged flip phone, but a new charger hooked in a plug. I’ll bet it’s where Warbley tossed the wallet when he came in and charged his phone.”

      “You’re thinking robbery?” I asked.

      Vince nodded toward the outside. “You’ve seen the street. Dark. Some broke junkie’s driving around and coming down hard, maybe looking for houses to creep until he sees an older guy trotting in the shadows. Or maybe he saw Warbley exit the bar a little wobbly and thinks he’ll be an easy target. The junkie pulls over, grabs the steel pipe or cut-down ball bat beneath the seat and tiptoes down the lawns while Warbley trots the sidewalk. As he walks by the darkest yard bang … he gets pulled into the shadows and stripped of anything worth a nickel.” He looked at us expectantly. “You guys get anything besides Warbley sipping at The Lucent tonight? Something we can follow?”

      “Maybe,” Harry said. “If I understand how things work, Vince, you can do a few things for us, the FCLE, while we lead?”

      Vince nodded. “I’ve got more manpower, you’ve got more specialists.”

      “I’d be wondering if there are any security cameras in the area that might have caught shots of a tattooed mutha in a dark skullcap, bodybuilder type, Latin maybe …”

      Harry finished the brief description and Vince went to put people on it ASAP. Harry and I waited until the big white box took Professor John Warbley on the grim ride to the morgue. When there was nothing to do but watch techs pick through the grass, we headed toward the car.

      “Carson, Harry!”