Copp On Ice, A Joe Copp Thriller (Joe Copp Private Eye Series) by Don Pendleton

was one of the small ones, convertible, sort of sporty, a bit out of character for a public official. So maybe it was brand new, bought from the proceeds of public service after the service had ended.
    The door opened to my touch. Keys were in the ignition. I just had a feeling, took the keys and went to the trunk, opened it.
    I don't know, maybe I smelled it.
    But I knew what I would find in that trunk.
    He'd been dead long enough to go stiff.
    I closed the trunk, returned the keys to the ignition, and went quietly away from there.
    This murder would make the headlines, sure. But for all the wrong reasons. And business in Helltown would go on as usual, that much you could bank. Tomorrow's headlines would be concerned with the budget crisis in Washington, or maybe what one gubernatorial candidate said about another. People in this country are no longer outraged by the truly outrageous.
     

CHAPTER THIRTEEN  
     
    I called in my crisly find via police radio enroute to the victim's home. It would be an item for the sheriffs, and I was glad for that. I didn't know how many more of these my department could handle without zonking out. Things were already bad enough.
    Murray's widow was sprawled beside the pool in a teeny bikini when I got there, and she looked marvelous, which is an understatement. She was smooth as velvet all over, soft but not too, curvaceous but not exaggerated. It seemed even more certain, with the truth in full display, that she was too young a woman for Tim Murray.
    I'd rung the doorbell several rimes and got no response, so I'd let myself in through the side gate, suspecting that I might find her back there. She rose to an elbow and twisted to one side at my approach, repositioned her legs and gave me a long, silent look.
    "You're bringing bad news," she decided.
    I hadn't thought it showed, but it probably did. I'd always hated a task like this one.
    I pulled up a chair and sat down beside her, said, "Yes, I'm afraid so. Is anyone here with you?"
    "My daughter is on her way over from Chaffey College, but don't keep me waiting. How bad is it?"
    I took her hand and said, "Can't get any worse, Mrs. Murray."
    "Please. Call me Patricia." She was cool as ice, which is often very misleading. "Tim always called me Pat and I never liked it. He knew I didn't like it, but he always called me Pat." I noted the past tense and wondered how long she'd been preparing herself for this moment. "Except when he was making love to me. Then he called me Patty, and he knew I hated that too. No, that's wrong, Tim never made love to me. Tim fucked me. He fucked me like I was a common whore. I never saw his penis soft. He always came in hard and ready, he fucked me in the dark, and then he left me. That is what life with Tim Murray has been. So don't take it easy with me, Mr. Copp. Exactly what has happened to him?"
    "He was shot. Death was instant, I'm sure."
    "I always took such good care of myself, exercised faithfully, played tennis and hated it twice a week, kept myself looking pretty for him. He liked to show me off, like one of his trophies. Do you know I haven't the faintest idea how much money we have? He never told me what his salary was. Gave me an allowance for the routine expenses, never quite enough to stretch from one payday to the next so I never had any just for myself. I was his housekeeper, Mr. Copp, and he condescended to fuck me once or twice a month when I behaved myself."
    "Well, I—"
    "I'm not shocking you, am I? That's okay, I shocked
    myself awhile ago. Didn't realize I had sunk so low until I saw it in your eyes. I mean when I asked you about Lydia Whiteside. I don't know why I did that. It couldn't possibly matter. It has been one woman after another for the past twenty years, so how could it matter? But I always wondered . . . was he making love to any of them?—or did he treat them the same way he treated me? Was he shot in the head?"
    "Yes."
    "Odd how it comes out that way, isn't it? That was what