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have been any of us who knew and loved him. I’m afraid, Detective Reid, you have your work cut out for you.”

CHAPTER THREE
    T he San Carmelita County Morgue was one of Savannah’s least favorite spots on earth. Her prejudice went beyond the depressing, industrial-gray walls, the grungy old fart at the front desk who always tried to hit on her, or the acrid smell of chemicals—and that was on a good day when they weren’t autopsying a ripe one. On those occasions the atmosphere could definitely be classified as Harmful to Sensitive Persons, or any human being who wore a nose on his or her face.
    The main reason Savannah hated the morgue was far more of an emotional issue than a visual or nasal one. She had lived a multitude of unpleasant, sometimes heart-wrenching experiences here, and when she walked through those spotless, glass-and-chrome front doors, the feelings inevitably came flooding back. Unfortunately they brought back with them accompanying memories of times when she had brought other people here to view their mangled loved ones, and when she, herself, had been asked to identify one of her fellow officers, killed during a drug bust gone bad.
    But, despite Savannah’s distaste for the place, this was an important element of the investigation. Not that they depended upon a positive ID from Mrs. Winston—there were half a dozen other ways to ascertain the identity of the victim. Mostly, Savannah had brought Beverly Winston here so that she could watch and evaluate the woman’s response when she saw her dead husband.
    That fact made Savannah feel a bit like a ghoul, but, hey ... it was all in a day’s work.
    “Well, hi there, good lookin’,” the front-desk clerk said in a voice so cheerful that it seemed incongruent with the dismal surroundings.
    Loud, invasive, cocky, and aggressive, Officer Kenny Bates seemed to possess a much higher opinion of himself than was held by those who knew him. On the first day she had met him, five years earlier, Savannah had decided that someday, when she had an extra five minutes to blow, she would contemplate and evaluate all the convoluted trailways and byways of Ken Bates’s psyche. Perhaps then she would unlock the secret: Was he really an insecure, tortured man trying to overcompensate, or was he just a pompous jerk?
    So far, she hadn’t found the time.
    “This is Councilwoman Beverly Winston,” Savannah said, trying to convey the gravity of the situation in her tone.
    Bates was oblivious.
    “Hi! Nice to meet you,” he said, flashing a toothsome smile that was only somewhat sullied by the hard-boiled egg yoke stuck between an incisor and its neighbor. He leaned both elbows on the waist-high counter and tilted his head to one side while perusing the councilwoman’s features. Fortunately he confined his curiosity to her face, rather than giving her his usual elevator sweep, head to toe and back again, pausing at each floor to savor the view.
    Maybe the recent departmental workshops about sexual harassment had enlightened him. Or maybe Beverly Winston was just a little too mature and sedate for his tastes.
    “We’ve come to make an identification,” Savannah said as she fixed him with her sternest smarten-up-asshole look. Again, Officer Kenny didn’t have a clue.
    “Could I please have the log?” Savannah asked, leaning across the counter and grabbing the clipboard out of his hand. She pulled a pen from her purse and jotted down her name, Beverly’s, and the time.
    “So, when are you and me goin’ out?” he said, lowering his voice to what he probably considered a deep, husky, sexy whisper. But “sexy” wasn’t what came to Savannah’s mind. His tone reminded her of a few obscene phone calls she had received at three o’clock in the morning... and was just about as stimulating.
    With considerably more force than was required, she shoved the clipboard across the counter to Bates. The hard, sharp edge caught him in the diaphragm, momentarily knocking