Keeping It in the Family (Linstead)

Chapter 110

It wasn't a crime scene for the faint of heart, Halstead soon discovered. The young man's body lay on the ground on its back. His head had been destroyed to the extent that it was barely recognisable.

"What the hell happened to him?" Ruzek asked the coroner who was crouched down, working on the body.

"He's had his head crushed," came the reply.

"I can see that. Any idea how?"

"No, I mean literally crushed. Not beaten, not bashed in, these are crush injuries."

"So you're saying someone ran over his head with a car?" Burgess asked.

"Some kind of vehicle, yes, that would be my guess," the coroner said.

"Any idea who this guy is?" Ruzek asked.

"There was a wallet in his pocket. Haven't looked at it yet. Only just got here myself." The coroner held the wallet out to Purrazzo, who was standing closest to him. She quickly took a glove out of her pocket and put it on before taking the wallet.

"Adam Russell," she announced, followed by an address.

"You and Kim get over there, and have Z run him through the database," Ruzek ordered. He seemed to have slipped into the position of authority quite easily, Halstead noticed. "If you get any known associates, let me know. Also find out next of kin if possible. Kev and I will go speak to them if we can find out who they are."

"On it," Burgess said, leading Purrazzo away from the scene back to their car after the wallet was returned to the coroner.

"Guy's been dead a few hours at least. This happened last night," the coroner offered.

Ruzek pointed to the large Wallmart store. It was their parking lot that they were standing in. There were other stores around, but none close to where the victim had died. Their parking lots were pretty full, with the Wallmart customers having use them and walk to the store they wanted to visit. "Jay, Raquel, this store is open 24 hours. Go get a list of names and numbers for everyone who worked the night shift last night. Someone might have seen something and not reported it. And get their CCTV footage for Z to go through."

"You got it," Halstead said.

"Well, that felt weird," Gonzalez said once they had walked a short distance away.

Halstead looked at her. "What's that?"

"An hour ago, Ruze was my partner. Now he's the one giving the orders. Just a strange situation."

"I feel like you've been in stranger situations," Halstead said. It was an opening for her to tell a story or share an anecdote, a way to start building some kind of partnership between them. But she didn't offer anything.

"I sure have," was all she said in reply.

He left it at that, figuring she wouldn't respond well to him pushing her. In any case, they entered the Wallmart, making their way through people who were mostly gossiping about what all the cops were doing outside.

"I heard someone got murdered. Happens all the time these days," an old woman was saying to a friend of hers.

Paying no attention to anything but the job at hand, Gonzalez marched up an employee who was stacking a shelf and showed him her badge. "Chicago PD. Where is your manager?"

Halstead kept a good poker face, but it amused him to see the short man, maybe five feet six, look up at her. For a moment there was a 'Shit, look at this woman' expression on her face. It was the way she carried herself as much as her physical appearance that had that effect on people.