Collateral Damage by Austin Camacho

steps leading up to the porch. As she came within sight he slid his glasses back into place.
    â€œDid you catch him?” Joan asked, getting to her feet. She smoothed her skirt as if she were just rising from a board meeting.
    â€œAfraid not,” Hannibal said. “He managed to reach his car and take off. So did you go in?”
    â€œAre you kidding? There might be a dead body in there.” Joan jerked her thumb toward the door and moved out of Hannibal’s path.
    Clearly, bodies were his business. He pushed the door open slowly with a gloved hand and took one step inside. The dining room light played over the stark ghastly scene displayed like a waxwork in the living room. Hannibal stepped carefully around the edge of the room to reach the corner living room torchere.
    â€œYou might want to stay on the porch, Miss.”
    More light didn’t make it any more pleasant. Oscar Peters lay on his back, his head turned to his left. He still wore his glasses but behind them, his eyes were empty. His cheek was stuck to the floor by the large pool of blood. A couple of quarts had leaked out across the hardwood floor there, actually pumped out through his jugular vein. Oscar might have been staring over at Dean’s footprint in the red pool. His face was frozen in shock. Well, yes, getting murdered is often a surprise.
    Hannibal crouched beside the body, trying to hold a mental photograph of this last view of Oscar Peters. His facial expression was the result of the stab wound, one deep thrust to the solar plexus with the flat of the blade held horizontally. Too thick for a kitchen knife. Hannibal could picture the killer putting a hand behind Oscar’s neck, or perhaps an arm around his shoulders, holding him still while he pushed his camp knife or hunting blade up into Oscar’s middle.
    â€œOh dear God.” That meant Joan had decided to come in after all. Well, now she knew why he wanted her to stay on the porch. Hannibal looked toward Oscar’s pale face. The slash wound across his throat was deeper and from the pool of blood, must have been deeper still on Oscar’s left side. Hannibal again saw the killer in his mind, stepping behind Oscar, sinking his blade into the left side of Oscar’s throat through the big vein, then yanking it to the right and dropping him. No, not dropping him. He would have landed face down then. No, the killer stepped back and lowered Oscar to the floor.
    Finally Hannibal lifted Oscar’s cold arm and tried to bend it up a little. Judging by the stiffness, Oscar was at least two hours dead. Then Hannibal stood, recalling his brief tenure as a homicide detective in New York City. He remembered seeing lots more damage done to men. This was, in fact, the kind of neat work so often done by professionals and the mentally unstable.
    â€œNow, Miss Kitteridge,” Hannibal said without looking at her. “Now I think it’s time to call the police.”
    Hannibal was pleased to see he had judged Joan correctly. Most people are frozen into shock by the sight of a dead body but she gritted her teeth, nodded her head, and reached into her purse for her phone. She did turn her back to the death, and step back out to sit on the porch while dialing. That was fine by Hannibal. He intended to stay in the house for a few more minutes.
    Guilt was creeping in around the edges of his heart. While he quickly toured the house’s first floor he was driven by more than a need to avoid Dean being charged with murder. For now he wouldn’t think of that. He would look for some clue to who would want this little man dead.
    Hannibal found nothing of a personal nature on the ground floor, if you discounted the knickknacks and kitchen utensils, so carefully matched and coordinated as to betray an obsessive attention to detail. Even Cindy didn’t have salt and pepper shakers that matched the napkin holder, the toothpick holder, the canister set, even the breadbox,