Name Withheld : A J.p. Beaumont Mystery (9780061760907) by Judith A. Jance

sell.”
    â€œSo maybe some of your guesswork isn’t so far off the mark after all,” Kramer said. “And maybe it’s still murder and/or suicide. Supposing the wife found out her husband was up here screwing around. She probably came looking for him with blood in her eye and then did herself in afterward. Closing these two cases should be duck soup.”
    â€œNobody’s closing anything until I know for sure who she is,” Audrey Cummings snapped. “I want positive I.D. Comparison with a picture isn’t good enough. I’ll want fingerprints and dental records or both.”
    â€œThis must be the place,” Janice Morraine said from the doorway, announcing the arrival of the crime scene investigators. “It’s hot as blue blazes in here. You don’t expect us to work in this much heat, do you?”
    Janice, a criminalist by trade, is the lead crime scene investigator for the Washington State Patrol Crime Lab. Those who make the mistake of calling her a criminologist do so at their own risk.Smart ones never make the same mistake twice.
    â€œIt’s hot all right,” Audrey replied, “but don’t touch that thermostat until one of your guys dusts it for prints.”
    Behind me, Kramer heaved an impatient sigh. “Dust it for prints? How come? The woman blew her brains out. Don’t tell me we’re going to squander the next three days jumping through hoops and treating the scene like it’s from a multiple—”
    â€œThere’s a weapon here on the bed. Looks like a three fifty-seven. That may be what killed her. For right now, I’m calling it homicidal violence. It was obviously close range. It may turn out to be suicide, but I doubt it.”
    Kramer groaned. When you’re on a fast track, cases cleared in a hurry look better than those that take longer. A call of homicidal violence meant our job was just starting.
    â€œWhat makes you say that?” he asked.
    â€œThe wall,” Audrey Cummings answered confidently. “Women don’t usually go out in ways that leave that kind of mess for somebody else to clean up.”
    â€œMess?” Kramer echoed.
    â€œMess,” Audrey Cummings repeated firmly.
    â€œOkay,” Janice Morraine said, taking charge. “You’d best move out of the way and let us get started.”
    While Janice Morraine and Audrey Cummings conferred near the bed, Kramer led the way out of the room. “I’ve never heard anything sodumb,” he grumbled under his breath.
    â€œI think I’d shut up about that if I were you, Detective Kramer,” I told him. “At least as long as Audrey Cummings is within earshot.”
    â€œBut the mess ? What kind of fruitcake reason is that?”
    I shrugged, enjoying Detective Kramer’s annoyance. “When it comes to women,” I told him, “like it or not, there are some things you just have to accept on faith.”

Seven
    I followed Kramer out of Don Wolf’s apartment, directly into the arms of Captain Lawrence Powell, who saw me and did a double take. “Watty said Detectives Kramer and Arnold were here. I thought you were supposed to be working on the floater?” he said.
    It seemed to me I’d already been down that path. “I am working the floater,” I said. “This is his apartment. Our initial and still tentative I.D. would indicate that the dead woman found here is his wife.”
    Larry sniffed the air. “She’s been dead for a while.”
    â€œA day or two,” I agreed. “With the thermostat turned up to eighty degrees, it doesn’t take long for a body to go bad.”
    â€œYou’re thinking it’s maybe a double, then?” he asked.
    Kramer shook his head and horned his way into the conversation. “For my money, I’m thinking it’s maybe a homicide and/or suicide.”
    â€œAudrey Cummings from the M.E.’s office doesn’t