25

Lazarus dropped Piper off and waited until she was in the home before leaving.

He played music loudly on the way back to the trailer but turned it down as he got near. He parked closer to the trailer than he had with Piper.

He’d lived in a trailer when he was younger, after his mother ran out on his father.

He remembered little of that night other than his mother telling him it was time to go. A single backpack was filled with whatever clothes she had hastily grabbed, and they left the house at three in the morning. He didn’t get to say goodbye to his father, who was asleep upstairs.

Time passed slowly in front of the trailer park. He didn’t mind. A lot of problems in the world could be solved if people could do what he had taught himself to do: sit still and do nothing. Sometimes, doing nothing solved problems in a way concerted effort couldn’t.

Lazarus spotted the first sign of movement behind Grimes’s windows. A silhouette of someone with a man bun and a large belly appeared. The door creaked open, and the man emerged, holding a garbage bag. He tossed it into a nearby bin. Lazarus ducked lower in the seat.

Grimes lingered near the trailer’s lights, inspecting something on the ground in a neighbor’s yard. Lazarus couldn’t make out his face.

Grimes answered a call, prompting Lazarus to check the dashboard clock, which showed it was almost one in the morning.

Now who’d be callin’ you at one in the morning, partner?

Grimes went back into the trailer. A few moments later all the lights turned off. Lazarus waited. No lights were on anywhere else in the trailer park.

He popped the trunk and got out of the car. Tucked underneath the spare tire, completely hidden except for a single screw that had to be lifted, was another compartment. Inside, he had stashed a handgun, some lockpicks, two military utility knives, a forensics kit, and some gloves and other tools. He took out a pair of gloves and a flashlight and tucked them into his knapsack that he slung over one shoulder. He scanned the area, making sure no one was out, and then ran across the street to the fence of the trailer park.

Lazarus stealthily entered the park, guided only by the pale glow of the moon. The dim light cast eerie shadows, turning the trailer park into what looked like an aluminum graveyard.

Lazarus stayed low and moved swiftly, the gravel crunching beneath his feet. His heart raced and he slowed down, cautious not to alert anyone.

Grimes’s trailer was the second down the row, easily visible from the street but offering multiple blind spots for anyone inside. Lazarus guessed Grimes had firearms; many residents in this area were hunters and had rifles and shotguns.

The garbage bin was about ten feet away. He stayed close to the trailer and hurried over to it.

He slowly lifted the lid and folded it back. The garbage was full, and the stench of rot hit his nostrils. He opened his knapsack, put on the gloves, and tucked the flashlight under his arm. Then he began sifting through the layers of discarded waste.

Each rustle of a plastic bag or rattle of a can made him stop and listen for any movement from the trailer. He had no reason to be sifting through this man’s trash at one in the morning. A first-year law student could get anything he found thrown out of court. If he was caught, his best bet was to run. He wished he’d thought to bring a mask.

The bag Grimes had thrown away was filled with refuse. Lazarus took it out and put it on the ground and dug deeper into the can.

Underneath were layers of beer cans and pizza boxes, bags of fast food with dark grease stains soaking the bottoms. He stuck his hand in something that felt like warm pudding against his gloved fingers and he grimaced.

The door to the trailer opened.

Lazarus flicked off the light and swung behind the garbage can. He held his breath.

Grimes came out barefoot and looked up at the moon as he tapped a package of cigarettes upside down on his palm. Then he took one out and lit it with a lighter. The ember tip glowed in the darkness as Lazarus watched the man smoke. His hands were shaking, and he was pacing and mumbling. Lazarus wondered if he was on some type of stimulant. Meth use had begun dwindling in the drug communities and was being taken over by synthetic cathinones and Adderall. Grimes was acting too peculiar to not have something coursing through him.

Grimes smoked the entire cigarette and then tossed the butt on the ground and went back inside. Lazarus didn’t move for a while, then came out and grabbed the bag Grimes had thrown away and hurried back to his car.

Lazarus parked his car at his apartment complex, grabbed the bag, and entered his apartment.

His living space was sparsely furnished, mainly because he preferred to keep the lights off at night and wanted to avoid bumping into objects. But he turned them on now and proceeded to his balcony. Carefully, he emptied the contents of the garbage bag onto the floor, revealing a substantial collection of used sandwich bags.

Lazarus ran his pinkie over the inside of a bag and then smelled and tasted it before spitting it out. A strong, bitter, chemical taste. Unpleasant. Crushed Adderall. Crushed because dealers liked cutting it with filler to squeeze every penny out of their buyers.

He gathered the garbage up again and then went inside and washed his hands before going to his home office.

The large room, which was the master bedroom, was painted a dark navy, and against the wall was a desk with only a laptop on it. Rows of bookshelves took up the other walls. The room held a single decoration: a replica of the painting Gaze into the Abyss , by Natalia Petrovna. A lone wanderer standing at the edge of a chasm that looked like it went down forever. The wanderer was staring into it.

He opened a form on his laptop and filled it out:

AFFIDAVIT FOR SEARCH WARRANT

STATE OF NEVADA COUNTY OF CLARK

I , Detective Lazarus Holloway, swear under oath:

I am a duly appointed detective with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department and have been so employed for the last 15 years.

I am investigating the unlawful possession and sale of Adderall, a controlled substance under Nevada law.

I respectfully submit this affidavit to request a search warrant for the premises at 487 Desert Bloom Lane, Rattlesnake Ridge, Nevada, a single-family dwelling, owned and occupied by Robert Darrell Grimes.

On May 27 of this year, while conducting a routine follow-up patrol near Mr. Grimes’s residence, I noticed a small sandwich baggie in plain view, protruding from the publicly accessible trash can outside his trailer home.

Upon closer examination, the baggie appeared to contain a crushed powder, which I suspected to be Adderall, based on my training and experience.

An initial field test of the powder tested positive for amphetamine, the active ingredient in Adderall.

I believe the substance was discarded by Mr. Grimes and that further evidence of the possession, use, or sale of illegally obtained Adderall may be found within his home.

Based on the foregoing, I respectfully request that this court issue a search warrant authorizing the search.

Lazarus Holloway, Detective, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department

He printed out the document and then called Piper.

“Hello?” she said groggily.

“I’m insulted you don’t have my number programmed into your phone.”

“Do you know what time it is?”

“No. I need a warrant to search Grimes’s trailer.”

“Why? What happened?”

“I’ll send you over the affidavit, it’s all in there. Can you get it in front of Judge Dawson right now?”

“You’re really going to make me wake her up now?”

“I need that warrant. I think she’d be more likely to sign it without too many questions if you take it to her. Please and thank you.”

He hung up before she could object and realized he smelled like spoiled milk and rotting meat. He stripped and threw his clothes away in his garbage can before getting into the shower.