Chapter  1

     Andi Wicksham, owner of Investigatory Services, was taking a two-hour
manager's-lunch with a friend.  Her friend Sonny's yellow head-scarf leaked
casual strands of bleached-white hair that went with her oversized, cut-off
overalls and tastefully paint-spattered tee shirt.  They walked through
Portland's summer warmth to the Underground Cafe--Andi ordered green chili
and shredded chicken soup with a small Caesar salad and Sonny the Garden
Burger ala chef's whim for Tuesday.  
     Her burger came with thick, sweet teriyaki sauce and pickled ginger.  "No
questioning who's in the kitchen..." she quipped.
     They both knew the answer--it could only be Shawn.  Andi rolled her eyes
and spooned a kernel of hominy and a thick shred of chicken from her bowl. 
     Sonny peered under the toasted bun.  "...so Paco told the editor there
were three publishers waiting and the guy caved in."  She bit and dribbled
teriyaki sauce down her chin.
     "Were there?" Andi asked through a mouthful of lettuce.
     "Were there what?" Sonny wiped at the sauce with her napkin and took a
sip of tea.
     "Other editors...?" 
     "Yeah...he's hot property..."  Sonny seemed bored with the subject and
the conversation drifted.
     They split a caramel-fudge mousse desert and downed the last of their
iced teas.  Tingling-warm sun rays pierced the warm breeze blowing from the
Eastern Oregon plateau.  The usual, sporadic packs of traffic coursed SE 50th--at the corner two girls talked animatedly while waiting for a break in the traffic. 
Down a block, in front of the hardware store, there was shouting, the slam of a
car door and the squeal of a drag race start.
     A candy-apple red pickup with a roll bar and fog lights streaked towards
them--gas peddle floored and the engine roaring.  Andi could see the
passenger's face tighten to a grimace as he looked back over his shoulder
toward the hardware store.  The driver's gloved hand tugged the steering
wheel, careening the truck across the center line and around a slow turning
car.  She met his eyes a brief second just before they came abreast, then he too
looked back through the rear window.
     The girls were mid-street when the truck arrived, one child dove from its'
path, the other froze.  The truck jerked as the driver attempted a last minute
swerve--fish-tailing wildly, knocking the girl, like a rag doll, hard against the
curb to Andi's left.  The other screamed "Gina..." and kept screaming as the
truck roared down the street and Andi and Sonny ran to help.
     A crowd gathered, police and ambulance were called, but there was little
to do but comfort the child still screaming.  Sonny and Andi gave statements to
the police and waited as the child's body was bagged.
     Andi had glimpsed the three letters of the license plate--SQT.  She
thought the first number was an 8.
     She was certain there were two people in the cab--both males, both
clean-shaven and pale, in their thirties; probably Euro-American--dark clothes. 
Another witness thought there were three--one man reported only the driver;
but the same man as Andi--medium brown hair, dark eyes and gaunt physique. 
     Sonny had been watching the kids, not the truck.  She gave her brief
statement and was told to go home. 
     Uniformed officers drove Andi to the station to work on computer
sketches.  "Thicker chin?  Longer nose?"  She watched images form and
reform, still in shock over what she'd seen--hardly believing how the truck had
sped away after mowing down the child. 


     Back in her office an hour later, she focused on work.  Early summer had
brought a rash of missing persons, mostly adolescents, running from childhood in
the time-honored human tradition.  Andi usually discouraged distraught parents
from retaining her on their first contact.  Those persisting, she took on, letting them
pay for making the same phone calls and flyer efforts they could do themselves for
free.  Flyers were like milk cartons--almost entirely futile, she told clients that up-front, but it was something everyone of them expected.
     Paying money seemed balm to parental guilt and was probably easier than
taking time out of a busy schedule.
     She and Lena had their usual scattering of summonses to serve--mostly the
ones that the sheriffs gave up on, ones that took more than a simple visit.  There
were three open cases for lawyers trying to track down witnesses, two others were
accident cases.  She'd just closed two for business people looking into business
partners and one rather nasty divorce.
     All their cases passed through her hands, but her hyper-active office manager
Lena, admittedly, did most of the paper work.  They'd turned a tidy profit since
Lena joined--and now she demanded a junior-partner's share.  Andi plodded
through the files stacked on her desk, only occasionally glancing to the window. 
Lena was probably worth a full partner's portion--she'd have to deal with that soon
enough.


     It was about four-thirty that afternoon that she got the call from Ramirez, her
old friend turned police detective.
     "Wicksham...you witnessed the hit and run this afternoon..."
     Andi shut her eyes.  "On 50th? ...get the guy?"
     "I need to talk...I'm down the street from there...you know the convenience
store at Division?"
     "Now?" Andi complained.
     "I'm waiting." he abruptly hung up, leaving her with the phone at her ear and
questions at the tip of her tongue. 
     She growled a curse, smiled to Lena, said "See you tomorrow...lock up..."
grabbed her coat and stalked down the stairs to her car.  She'd go on home after
Ramirez.  There wasn't much she could tell beyond what she'd given in her
statement. 
     She pulled to curb across from the convenience store.  Half a block up, beside
the hardware store, a convention of police cars flashed white, blue and red, crime-scene barrier-streamers were already strung. 
     Ramirez stepped from a unmarked car as she pulled up.  Andi sauntered up
but looked beyond him, watching the activity behind the tape.
     Andi asked dryly "What's the big deal, Ramirez?"  No candy apple red pickup
was parked on the street.
     Ramirez tucked papers back into a folder.  "I've read your statement.  You
saw the guys in the truck?"
     Andi nodded.
     "There's a body inside...office next to the Hardware store.  Coroner's first
guess is mid-afternoon, but it could have been morning.  It's messy.  How's your
stomach?  Want to go inside?" Ramirez turned his head to three-quarters and gazed
evenly into Andi's eyes.
     "Messy?" she asked, in a moment of apprehension, but met his eyes.
     "A knife...victim's tied...tortured.  Forensics hasn't been in yet
Wicksham...touch nothing..."  He held up a finger in warning.
     Andi steeled herself as they ducked under the barricade.  Ramirez escorted
her past the officer at the door.  FAMILY INVESTMENTS said a sign.  The tiny first
room held a chair and desk and a low table with magazines.  The back room held a
desk and table with two big computers--one of the keyboards dangled to the floor at
the end of its' cord.  
     The body lay half naked in a pool of blood, shirtless, trouser legs slit and
laying askew to expose the legs, one of which bent unnaturally up at the knee.  A
young Asian man, his arms were bound behind him with electrical cord tied twice
around each wrist and knotted securely, his mouth taped shut, his eyes were open
as if reading something leaned against the wall.
     There were gashes across his chest and wounds where knives had been
driven deeply into his ankles and shoulders, part of the scalp had been slit and
pulled away from the skull and the abdomen was slit wide enough to emit a loop of
intestine.  Andi stepped closer, caught by a strange fascination, fought the urgency
to gag from the odor of bile, and urine and excrement.  His hands had been
mangled, fingernails torn, a finger broken, the ankles red-brown with blood from
being pounded upon.
     "He was tortured, but his mouth was taped so he couldn't tell anything..."
Andi noted flatly.
     Ramirez looked down at the body.  "Funny, huh?" he snorted tiredly.
     Another officer called Ramirez back to the front room leaving Andi there
alone.  A hush seemed to shake the room.  She felt an inner coldness at the sweet
smell of death; there was no spirit within the flesh, she could feel void--before her
was an empty shell.  She made her way out a minute later.
     The usual police and coroner personnel swarmed about, videos and photos
and a portable table with evidence bags and fingerprint kits readied for use after the
first wave ebbed.  Once photographed, the body was inspected and removed, and
the site left to forensic technicians. 
     Andi felt weak, her skin was clammy despite the obvious warmth.  Was it the
red pickup driver's work?
     Ramirez turned to her.  "...recognize him?"  He glanced back toward the
room with the body.
     "Not driver or passenger..." Andi stated flatly.  "I'm sure..."
     "Shit..." Ramirez stomped and shook his head.  He took her by the arm and
led her back out to the street.
     Andi knew better than to ask questions--crime scenes were officious turf. 
She could wait--he'd tell what he could out of earshot.
     "...coffee later?" she asked hopefully.
     "Not a chance...this'll take until late."  He made a face.  "I do the work, but it's
Max's case."  He shook his head to heaven.  "...I'm a team player..." He caught Andi's
eye and looked away.  "Coroner's report tomorrow and lab work then and two days
from now.  Maybe after...tomorrow or the next day."  His shoulders bowed and his
eyes stared steely from wrinkled sockets.
     "The hit and run connected?"
     "No comment..." he pursed his lips and gave her a hopeless look.  "The partial
license number you got still's being traced..."
     Andi was on the verge of another question when he reached a restraining
hand and said, "Later..."
     She nodded, returned to her car and drove slowly home.
     The afternoon had gotten worse when she thought it couldn't have.  She
couldn't face food--it would be enough to sleep without nightmares.  It was time for
a walk--if she was lucky she'd pass no friends and strangers would ignore her.


     Eight-thirty the next morning, Lena was already at her telephone when Andi
came in with a newspaper.  She'd been unable to shake the image of the tortured
body from its ledge at the edge of her consciousness.
     "Morning..." Lena mouthed silently, nodding, phone to ear, taking notes; she
returned her attention to her call.
     Andi crossed to her desk.  Outside, landscapers were getting an early start, a
flat bed with four large, root-bundled trees reclining on each other--creeping up the
street followed by a smaller truck with a extendable crane and a fifth arboreal
bundle.  The trees were in full, grey-green leaf and billowed high and wide despite
their greater limbs being tied.  There was a disorienting incongruity to trees flowing
up the street.  Andi smiled, swung back to her desk and looked through the paper
for the murder.
     "So, what did Ramirez want?" Lena spun around and hung up the phone in a
single movement.
     Andi stared across her desk blankly.  "It was gross...a body a block down from
the accident... blood, tortured--bound and sliced up.  Ramirez thought it might have
been one of the guys in the truck, but this guy was Asian with longer, black hair." 
She let out a deep breath and held out her hands, "It was real bad." she said quietly,
"...bad."
     There was a small box below the fold on the front page.  A little headline
saying "MYSTERIOUS DEATH," there were two paragraphs and a invitation to turn
to page thirteen.  Andi flipped through to the rest of the article.
     "Poor baby..." Lena consoled.
     Andi looked up dismally.  "I can't get rid of the image of this guy screaming
though his mouth was taped...they'd cut his Achilles tendon, dug knives into
shoulder joints...it made me sick."
     The article didn't