“And you got this from…?”
I clear my throat. “An unsavory character named Giovanni Ochoa. He’s a morgue attendant at the city medical examiner’s office. He reached out to me a couple weeks ago on Signal and said he’d had something come through his office that triggered a lot of alarm bells in his head. But…”
“Don’t ‘but’ me, Pierce,” scowls Doug. “I hate ‘buts.’”
I refrain from the obvious joke. “But… he wants cash.”
Doug rubs the bridge of his nose. “How solid is this guy? Is he worth it?”
I nod affirmatively. “I think so. He seemed solid. Nervous, sketchy, but solid in the ways that matter. I haven’t been able to verify everything he said yet, but what I have been able to check so far tracks. Lazarev Elder—that’s Lukas—was married up until eighteen years ago. His wife died. They kep
