Dead or Alive by Michael McGarrity Page A

asked with sarcastic enthusiasm as he caught up with his partner.
    â€œNah,” Olivas grumbled. “Nothing is that easy.”
    Pino flipped open her cell phone, dialed Daniel Peck’s number, and got his answering machine. She left a message, went to her unit, and drove to Peck’s residence, a post-World War Two pueblo-style house in the Casa Solana neighborhood, which had been the site of a Japanese-American internment camp during the war.
    Lights were on inside the house, so Ramona parked and rang the bell. A deeply tanned man in his early fifties with short-cut gray hair answered. He wore a short-sleeved V-neck undershirt that revealed a Marine Corps tattoo on his left forearm. He had pleasant features and crinkly blue eyes.
    Ramona flashed her shield and ID. “Daniel Peck?”
    â€œThat’s right.”
    â€œI’m Lieutenant Pino and I need to ask you some questions about Jeannie Cooper.”
    â€œI haven’t seen her since she quit working for me to start her own business. Did she overdose and get taken to the emergency room again?”
    â€œNo, she’s dead.”
    Peck looked stunned. “She finally went and did it.”
    â€œNo, she was murdered.”
    â€œMurdered?”
    â€œIt appears that way.”
    â€œPoor Jeannie,” Peck said with a sigh. “She was such a gentle, lost soul, except when she got too manic or too down in the dumps. Then you must be looking for Craig Larson, right?”
    â€œWhy do you say that?” Pino asked.
    â€œBecause I’ve been watching the TV news story about his escape today from that prison guard he almost killed. My company did landscape and garden maintenance at the Bedford estate. Jeannie and Larson had a thing going right up to the time he went to trial for embezzling all that money.”
    â€œYou know that for a fact?”
    Peck nodded. “I saw it with my own eyes, and Jeannie told me all about it.”
    â€œWhat reason would he have to kill Jeannie?”
    â€œYou’ve got me,” Peck answered.
    There was no way Peck could know about the murder of Riley Burke at Kevin Kerney’s ranch or the discovery of the abandoned pickup truck Larson had used to abduct Lenny Hampson from his Springer auto body repair shop. Ramona doubted he was deflecting suspicion from himself. Still, she needed to rule him out as a suspect.
    â€œCan you account for your time since about four this afternoon, Mr. Peck?” she asked.
    â€œYou bet I can, Lieutenant. I kept a six-man crew working at a landscaping installation job until six-thirty and then went directly from there to a chapter meeting of Veterans for Peace.”
    â€œI’ll probably want to talk to you again.”
    â€œMaybe we can have that talk over a drink, Lieutenant.” Peck took out his wallet and gave Ramona a business card. “Once you’ve cleared me as a suspect, that is. I’ve been told that I clean up nicely. Best to call me on my cell phone.”
    â€œI’ll do that, Mr. Peck,” Ramona said stiffly.
    She headed back to the Cooper crime scene. If Peck’s hunch about Craig Larson was right, he might still be in the city. By radio, Ramona put the word out to intensify the search for Larson.
    Russell Thorpe immediately responded to her advisory and asked for a back-channel update. Ramona filled him in on the connection between Larson and her murder victim.
    â€œMy, my, he’s been a busy boy today,” Russell said.
    â€œIt’s not confirmed that he’s the perp.”
    â€œDid you find the red Jeep?”
    â€œNegative,” Pino replied.
    â€œIs your victim’s vehicle missing?” Thorpe asked.
    â€œNegative.”
    â€œInteresting,” Thorpe said. “Let’s debrief when you wrap up your preliminary.”
    â€œTen-four, your place or mine?”
    â€œAt Chief Baca’s ten-nineteen.”
    â€œAffirmative.”
    It was going to be a long night, and