Murder, Fish, and Norway

When something big happens in the “V-T” everyone knows it. Vista Tranquila is too small a community for anything to go unnoticed. Husbands don’t cheat on wives, unless they are itching to be caught, Wives don’t flirt with the pool-boy and kids don’t usually step too far out of line. It’s just our thing. Being steady but unspectacular. So, when a young woman’s body was found last week. It was major news and very disruptive. Young woman, in her twenties, sandy blonde hair was found lying in a coastal hillside amongst the tall grass in a meadow area. Local livestock roam and feed in these areas and the staff tending them found her. No signs of injury, she was just lying there dead. We will know more when the autopsy report comes back, but nothing obvious. Consider that we have no real throughfare and usually bodies are dropped off nearer to a major highway so, it’s not clear that this is a “dead drop”. The active theory around here is MAYBE a “Spring Waver” come into town and had an overdose. Dropped here by the others at the “party.” It makes it local foul play but not aggravated assault or murder. When the Spring Wave, as we call it, comes once a year, we get a lot of non-locals come to look at the California Poppies and have some down-time in our beachfront village. It is small but has great food, drinks and wine tasting for a weekend. We ride the Spring Wave as a local commerce boost and welcome it. Usually, the arrests go up some due to DUI’s and public disturbances of the youngsters cutting loose a bit. Regarding the body, I keep telling myself to stop waiting on Raines to weigh in his own theory, but he has not budged much. I just can’t help but to be curious what HE thinks. He is the one I bet will come closest to finding the real story arc. I am trying to develop an active theory, but nothing is coming to me beyond an overdose. We will get the autopsy report any day to provide more detail. While I am musing this over, I randomly begin to wonder if Skarsgard has seen Raines six-pack. She is the one that told me he has one…I think. If she saw it, maybe THEY are secretly seeing one another romantically (even though he could be her father). I stop myself and remind my DETAIL oriented brain to FOCUS. I need to pay attention. Captain is about to grill us about the crime scene and our working theory, which, (by the way) was all chronicled by ME. See, the details are MY thing. I submitted a Pulitzer worthy report just last night. Skarsgard even said so before inhaling the donut. Five pages of just about nothing. Woman. Dead. Blonde. Nonlocal. Fingerprint ID had her living in Northern California nearer to San Francisco. Our captain is named Juniper Bradley. She is an African American woman that is the true class of the department. She is tough, fair and a true salt of the earth person. As she enters our little area, she looks upset. She looks at Raines and says: “Another body. Another young woman. Just found.” She then turns to look our way to make sure we heard and goes back to looking at Raines. “Otter watchers found her in the rocks off the beach about twenty minutes ago. I need you guys to process the scene immediately as this is going to inflame the locals and we obviously may have a bigger problem if these two events are connected.” She pauses before continuing, “We have two detectives, you guys go detect something to help get this thing in order” looking toward Raines and back toward Skarsgard (Who is standing right next to me, HELLO!). I hate that because I am new, I don’t get treated as a serious Detective, more like a clerk or admin. Two detectives my ass. I passed the TEST! Raines, already standing, regards Captain Bradley with a serious face that looks as if it was made of stone. “If the two bodies connect, we are going to get immediately overrun by outside help, likely FBI. That is not to mention the locals going into panic.” Raines grabs his coat and keys and says: “Let’s try and get ahead of it. If we can eliminate any form of continuity here, we can give you something to put in your afternoon statement.” He looks at me and motions me to follow.