Page 27 (1/2)

Part One

Nobody Cares

Chapter 1

IT WAS JUST BEFORE 4:00 a even before Jacobi nosed our car up in front of the Lorenzo, a grungy rent-by-the-hour “tourist hotel” on a block in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District that’s so forbidding even the sun won’t cross the street

Three black-and-whites were at the curb, and Conklin, the first officer at the scene, was taping off the area So was another officer, Les Arou

“What have we got?” I asked Conklin and Arou

“White -eyed and done to a turn,” Conklin told ns of forced entry Vic’s in the bathtub, just like the last one”

The stink of piss and vomit washed over us as Jacobi and I entered the hotel No bellhops in this place No elevators or rooht people faded back into the shadows, except for one gray-skinned young prostitute who pulled Jacobi aside

“Give ot a license plate”

Jacobi peeled off a ten in exchange for a slip of paper, then turned to the desk clerk and asked him about the victim: Did he have a roommate, a credit card, a habit?

I stepped around a junkie in the stairwell and climbed to the second floor The door to roouard at the doorway

“Evening, Lieutenant Boxer”

“It’s , Keresty”

“Yes,his clipboard to collect nature

It was darker inside the twelve-by-twelve-foot room than it was in the hallway The fuse had blown, and thin curtains hung like wraiths in front of the streetlit s I orking the puzzle, trying to figure out as evidence, as not, trying not to step on anything There was too daht

I flicked ht beam over the crack vials on the floor, the e and clothing everywhere There was a kitchenette of sorts in the corner, the hot plate still war paraphernalia in the sink

The air in the bathroo the extension cord that snaked froed toilet bowl to the bathtub

My guts clenched as I caught the dead boy in my beam He was naked, a skinny blond with a hairless chest, half sitting up in the tub, eyes bulging, foam at his lips and nostrils The electric cord ended at an old-fashioned two-slice toaster that glinted up through the bathwater

“Shit,” I said as Jacobi entered the bathrooain”

“He’s toast, all right,” said Jacobi