Sin City Homicide Read Free

his head with a napkin. Neither had taken off their suit coats.
    He went back to his office and collapsed into his chair, staring at the ceiling. Glancing to his right, he saw the files for his open cases: fifty-seven in total. His pile was higher than the other detectives’ because he took the cases no one else wanted—the ones with no leads, no motives, and no suspects. The victims disappeared like ghosts but clung to life through him.
    Stanton began going through his emails. The forty-one unread messages were mostly departmental emails about policies, updates on cases, or notices for birthdays, retirements, new babies, and deaths. He scrolled down about halfway to a name he hadn’t heard in a long time: Orson Hall. He opened the email.
     
    Jon, long time, Brother. Please call me. I need your help desperately.
    Assistant Sheriff Orson Hall,
    Las Vegas Metro Police, Homicide Division
     
    The “Las Vegas Metro Police” and “Homicide Division” weren’t a tag on his email. He had typed them in. Orson was telling him something with that, but Stanton wasn’t sure what. He was sure of one thing: the message was important. Stanton hit the speaker on his phone and dialed the number at the bottom of the email tag.
    “This is Hall.”
    “Orson, this is Jon Stanton.”
    “Holy shit, Jon! How you been?”
    “Good. How’s Wendy and the kids?”
    “They’re great. Wendy went back to work ’bout eight months ago. It’s making life a little easier on me.”
    “That’s great. She was a nurse , wasn’t she?”
    “Yeah, ER. Good money in it. She makes more than me. How’s Melissa and the boys?”
    “We divorced a while ago.”
    “Oh, wow . I’m sorry, man. I didn’t know.”
    “It just wasn’t meant to be , I guess. So, what’s up?”
    “Well, I got a little something here that I think I need your help on.”
    “What is it?” Stanton picked up his grip strengthener and began to squeeze in a slow rhythm.
    “Rape-homicide. A couple. The guy’s kind of a big shot in town , and I need some help.”
    “Have you called the feds?”
    “FBI? You shitting me? They’re ninety-nine percent terrorism now. If your perp’s name isn’t Omar or Muhammad , you’re at the bottom of the list. Besides, to be totally honest… how long’s it been since you been up here in Vegas?”
    “At least five or six years.”
    “And you probably remember we were pretty ahead of the curve even then. A lot’s changed, even since then. We got new labs and an expanded CSI unit, thanks to the TV show, I guess. Kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Everyone expected us to have the best, and so the higher-ups just fell in line. Anyway, my point is that I think we even got the labs in Quantico beat.”
    “Really?”
    “Yeah, really. I’m not just blowing smoke, either. So, I don’t need the feds for that. I need something else.”
    “What’s that?”
    “I need you, Jon.”
    “Orson—”
    “I know, I know. You think I’m superstitious, don’t you? But there’s something to the way you think, Jon, that I haven’t seen in other detectives. You know these fuckers inside and out. Call it a sixth sense or imagination or whatever. Harlow knows that. That’s why he recruited you for that bullshit Cold Case Unit of his.”
    Stanton grew uncomfortable and put his feet up on the desk in an attempt to force himself to relax. “I’m pretty swamped with my own cases right now.”
    “I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but I already spoke to the assistant chief over there. What’s his name? Hu?”
    “Chin Ho.”
    “Yeah, I spoke to him, and we worked something out. He’d be willing to bring in another detective to cover for you while you come out here.”
    “And how’d you convince him of that?”
    “We got something over here you guys need—money. Money yells louder than anything else.”
    “You’re going to pay them to have me come out there?”
    “We can talk about the details later, but you wouldn’t just be