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CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

NED

The Prius was parked between a blue van and a red Corvette convertible, reminding Ned of the American flag. The back door was down - Justice Johnson had closed it, he said, after finding the body.

The call had come early: when Justice, Senator Johnson's 13-year-old son, had gone down to his hotel's car garage to fetch a forgotten kindle (Ned was vaguely surprised that the senator even allowed his children to use such devices), he'd instantly smelled something horrid, and when he investigated, he'd discovered a dog's body in the back of the car. Horrified, the teen had immediately detained a passerby, who'd placed the 911 call - without alerting Justice's parents.

"You smell that?" Scarlett whispered, as she and Ned followed Arkady and Nolan towards the car. Carmen was right behind them, toting her forensics bag.

He did; the blood scent was unmistakable.

Arkady lifted gloved paws and pushed the door up.

The dog was a border collie; late twenties, probably. He was wearing ordinary clothes; jeans and a Maroon Five T-shirt. His head was on its side, exposing the large hole in the back of it, the blood partially dried.

"I guess we have our answer about Senator Johnson" Nolan muttered.

"Looks like it" was all Arkady would say. Looking at the corpse, though, Ned couldn't see any way out of this for the senator - it would be bad for anyone to have a bloody body discovered in their car, but even worse when the badger was already suspected of being involved in a string of homicides.

Carmen had slunk up next to the others, peering in. "Bullet to the head" she shrugged. "Not much work for me. Although it's clear he died elsewhere and lay there for a while before being moved here."

"Because the blood is dried" Ned said.

The vixen gave a curt nod. "That, yes, but more importantly, there isn't enough blood. He got shot at pretty much point blank, I'm guessing. That's gonna make a big mess." She waved a paw at the corpse. "Not enough here."

"This doesn't look like the Prophet's work, though." It was Nolan speaking again. "Save for Feeley, who was probably trying to escape, all his other victims have been killed from in front, not behind. Excepting Wilson, but even then, the bomb was in a front pocket. Also, he didn't arrange the paws."

"Probably he was going to move the body somewhere else and set it up there?" Ned suggested, but Scarlett was looking closer at the collie's lower half, and raised a finger to point.

"He's got something in his pocket. A cell-phone, maybe."

As it turned out, the dog's pocket's contained both a cell-phone and a wallet. "Joey Simon Rath" Arkady read, flipping open the wallet. "Twenty-nine years old, and a resident of..." he paused, ears flicking.

"What?" Scarlett asked, then biting her lip. Arkady was wearing the look he did when he was onto something, and it was best not to interrupt him then.

The fox glanced up thoughtfully. "The address. Unless I'm mistaken, this is the same street where yesterday afternoon a house exploded."

Ned remembered the news blurb about it. "Did you hear whether the owners were there?"

"I didn't" Arkady said, "but I'm guessing the owner is this unlucky fellow right here."

"That's not all" Nolan had been looking through the phone, and he motioned for Ned and Scarlett to join him. "What do you make of this?"

The phone was a very simple thing, one of those old AT&T flip-up phones that were several years out of style. Nolan had the screen displaying the call history, which, strangely, listed only one call, the previous morning.

Ned caught it almost the same moment Scarlett did. "The time of the call!"

The grey wolf nodded grimly, handing it to Arkady. "Same exact time that Conner Wilson's phone exploded."

"The detonator!" Arkady's big fox ears flew up. "This is a great find." He looked down at the dead dog with new interest. "Carmen, when's your estimated TOD for this guy?"

During their exchange of evidence, the swift fox had continued picking over the body, and now she stepped back from the car, adjusting her glasses. "Yesterday afternoon, maybe? If not earlier. He's been dead for long over 12 hours. I'm sure of it."

"Wait," Scarlett was looking at the body again, confused. "So this guy is the Prophet?"

"Or worked for him" Arkady shrugged. "Whatever the case, we need to find out more about Joey Rath, but first, we have an arrest to make."

Finally, Ned thought. Perhaps he shouldn't count his blessings too early, but if this theory was found to be correct, then they had just found both the Prophet - the actual killer - and the man who was paying him. Two birds with one stone.

Because the case now involved a murder investigation with a senator as the prime suspect, Lennox had accompanied them to the crime scene. She'd been detained when they'd arrived though by the first responder cops, who'd asked her to watch Justice Johnson, as the senator and his wife had not yet been alerted of their son's discovery.

The young badger was still hyperventilating when Ned, Scarlett, Nolan, and Arkady approached Lennox to explain what they'd found in the car. "Father killed that dog" the boy gasped. "He killed him. He says they all burn in the fires, so why delay what will happen anyway? He killed him."

Noticing the glazed tint to the teen's eyes, Ned asked "Has he been doing this all along?"

"As long as I've been here" Lennox growled grimly. "There's an ambulance on the way."

"Poor kid" Arkady muttered. "Having parents like that is bad enough, but I guess it wouldn't be surprising if something like this could have psychological damage." He continued to reveal what they'd found on Joey Rath's body, including the detonator phone, and the theory that it was Rath's house which had blown up the previous day. Nolan was already on his phone, calling in to confirm the address.

During that, Justice Johnson never stopped repeating "Dad killed him" and similar phrases, only getting more frantic if any of them attempted talking with him. Lennox nodded thoughtfully to herself as Arkady finished. "Well, alright then. I have to admit I never thought I'd end up ordering the arrest of an American Senator, though."

"Would you like me to handle it?" the fox asked.

"Yes, you and Goodwolf, although I think I'll join you. Leave these two to watch the kid until the ambulance arrives." She pointed her muzzle at Ned and Scarlett.

Great. So the experienced detectives got to arrest a senator while Ned and Scarlett were left to babysit a crazy kid? Not that he didn't feel sorry for Justice, but, even with his limited experience in the world of crime, Ned had already come to believe that sometimes, kids who were messed up too early would never be able to live normal lives, and with a father like Adam Johnson, who'd probably been filling Justice's head with nonsense about original sin and the wickedness of people from birth, he doubted the young badger had much chance of ever being able to function normally in society.

Nevertheless, one doesn't gain respect and approval by arguing with a lieutenant, so Ned nodded meekly and agreed that yes, he and Scarlett would be happy to watch the kid until someone else could take over.

"We'll bring him down here for questioning" Lennox said. "The kid said something a few minutes ago about his dad lying about being gone yesterday. I don't know how reliable he is when like this, but nevertheless, I'd like to ask him about it when they're both in the same place."

As soon as the three senior officers had departed, Nolan still on his cell, Scarlett turned to Ned, her tail going like crazy. "Can you believe it? The Prophet IS the fucking Prophet..."

"Well, it isn't like we didn't already suspect it" Ned said. He wondered whether they should try talking to Justice, although the teen seemed oblivious. "The question is, since Johnson couldn't possibly have killed them all himself, how many guys did he have working for him? Was this dog Joey Rath the only one, or are there others?"

"Also, why did he kill Rath?" the coyote asked. "Tying up a loose end, maybe."

Down the garage, the collie's body was being removed from the Prius, which Carmen was still picking over, in search of other evidence, presumably. "Or could be just that Rath was getting uppity" he flicked an ear disconcertingly. "Just have to see how Johnson acts. He doesn't strike me as the kind of person who'd be good at hiding things."

And he wasn't. When Lennox, Arkady, and Nolan reappeared with the badger, he was loudly protesting and demanding his release. "I won't hear any of this nonsense until I have an attorney!" he was bellowing as the elevator door opened. "I am a member of the American Senate! I have rights!"

"Gay people have rights too, sir" Arkady remarked, leading the badger, who had already been handcuffed, towards the Prius. "Including those who are murdered."

The sound of the senator's voice seemed to wake his son from his spell, or momentarily, at least. The young badger's head whipped around, and before Ned could grab him, he ran straight for his father, halting only inches away. "You killed them!" he accused, point a finger incriminatingly. "The Lord told Moses: you shalt not kill. You broke the commandment."

To his credit, Johnson did seem mortified at this accusation. "Son," he growled, trying to lean closer to the kid. "Do not listen to these people! They are delusional, and-"

Johnson drew up short as two guys with a stretcher walked by, carrying Rath's bloody body. "Mother of God" he gasped. "What in the name of heaven is that?"

"That, Senator, is Joey Rath, the dog you are accused of killing" Lennox told him.

Nolan waved a paw for Ned and Scarlett to listen in. "Headquarters confirmed that it was Rath's house that blew yesterday" the wolf explained. "And this is the interesting part: Rath had called in a VIN inspection on a white Prius day before yesterday. The house was already burnt to the ground when the inspector got there; no sign of Rath."

That could mean that Rath had been trying to make a run for it, Ned supposed; perhaps he and the senator had had a disagreement. "I had nothing to do with this" Johnson protested. "I have never seen that dog before in my life."

His defence was better than Ned had expected; he seemed genuinely surprised, anyway. But perhaps after all his years in the senate he had learned to be a good actor. "How then do you explain the presence of the body in your car?" Lennox questioned, perfectly calm. "Would you like to know what we found in his pocket?"

"What?" Johnson's eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"The phone used to trigger the bomb which killed a man yesterday at Rep. Van Holling's speech" Lennox said. The wolf was studying the badger intently, ears alert, watching for any sign of guilt or acknowledgement.

There. The flicker of fear across the greying face, a slightly trembling of the little ears. It could just be that Johnson was just now beginning to realise that he really could be arrested for this murder, and others, but the fear could just as easily be a sign of guilt.

Ned glanced at Lennox, Arkady, Nolan. They'd all seen it too. "Senator, you will be accompanying us to the station" Lennox said. "If I were you, I'd call your lawyer."

Ned called Garrett briefly en route to SF Metro headquarters, gleefully detailing the arrest of the bigoted senator, but the call was a short one, because with the senator's arrest, the situation at SF Metro had become insane.

The clues just continued to pour in. Carmen examined Joey Rath's body in her forensics lab, and found evidence suggesting that Rath had been killed with the same calibre bullets as Conrad Fincher and Marvin Feeley, which implied that he was either the Prophet, or part of him, or otherwise linked in some way with the serial killer. Joey Rath, they'd learned, was a surgical intern at St Anne's Memorial Hospital, so someone who would know about how the body works and therefore, how to put it down.

Everyone was on the case, from the lowest rookie to Captain Williston. "So your theory is that this dawg did the first killin' for the senator; who then took over once he arrived in Cali?" the Doberman asked as Ned and Scarlett prepared for their next mission. The question was addressed at Lennox - Senator Johnson had been taken to one of the interview rooms, escorted by Arkady and Nolan.

"That's our theory" Lennox glanced towards Diego. "Redfield and Montoya are going down to St Anne's to speak with the people there. Rath's superiors should be able to confirm whether his off-hours coincide with the times in which the murders were committed."

"Was the badger's family able to confirm his whereabouts last night?"

"Nope. Said he was out for the evening."

Williston whistled. "Lieutenant, you just booked yourself a fuckin' senator. Well done."

Lennox had given Ned and Scarlett leave to accompany Diego and Montoya to the hospital, so they all climbed into the wolfdog's Mercedes. Just a short trip down to confirm Rath's hours; then, with luck, the hard work would be over.

But it wasn't.