May 29, 2015

The day after interim Mayor George Pavlou was killed in an explosion, Athena Rex escorted Zenobia King into work at City Hall to take over the position.

The campaign would continue, but Zenobia King had gained fierce public loyalty with her move against George Pavlou. The dead man had been confirmed as a mafia contact by the bloody and explosive nature of his murder, which also ended the lives of so many innocent deli sandwich eaters. Hatred of Pavlou was strong, stronger than love for Zenobia King, but her campaign team could work with that.

There were two or three other contenders for mayor, but no one mentioned their names very often. One of them was even suspected of having mafia ties himself. Brendon Podesta, whose sister Joey Podesta was just wed to a prominent mafia member named Thalia Zane, daughter of Hugo Zane. It was like the shameless crime syndicate had to keep coming, had to keep trying to hold the mayoral office in the face of everything they had done.

With a feigned authority that she didn't actually have, Athena led the way to the mayoral office and opened the door for Zenobia.

"All yours," Athena said and followed the new interim mayor into the office. It was still a mess from Pavlou's disorganized carelessness, a combination of how little Pavlou cared to deal with the city's problems and the severity and multitude of the problems the city faced. "Let me help you clean this up."

In the company of Pavlou's assistant — a well-dressed young man who was too intimidated by the senator and interim mayor to say more than a few words but was very helpful in determining the purpose of documents and the best way to sort them all — they determined the purpose of the documents and sorted them the best way possible.

They were about halfway through organizing the mayor's office when Police Commissioner Eric Calazans came through to congratulate Zenobia King. "The SFPD hopes this is the beginning of a fruitful effort to end the criminal activity in this city."

Athena ignored him and kept placing folders down onto the desk in their proper piles. He was continuing his grand speech when Athena got a text. Everyone in the room paused to check their phones, including the police commissioner, who launched back into his pompous oration as soon as Athena held up her phone and said, "It's me."

Detective Fog had texted her a picture. A young man leaving Daedalus Bar. The text accompanying it included the date of Mayor Banikas's murder — May 17th, 2015 — with a timestamp of 6:01 p.m. Just half an hour before Mayor Banikas was killed. It wasn't evidence, and the real mystery to Athena was how the detective could claim this photograph was taken the day of the murder at all — what had she been doing across the street from Daedalus Bar?

If Fog hadn't known the mayor was about to be killed, why would she have been taking pictures of mobsters at their favorite watering hole right at that moment?

A series of photos followed, and her phone dinged again, and again, and by the third time, she had the phone set to silence, but Calazans kept looking at her every time the cell buzzed. A number of men and women came out of Daedalus Bar, the date remained the same, the time stamp increasing chronologically, some in groups and some single. None of this meant anything but Athena was encouraged at least that the sleuth she'd given Calazans's data to was being so enthusiastic about the case.

Toward the end of the series, the phone buzzed. The most intriguing photo so far. There was the woman who had threatened Athena yesterday. The beauty in the fedora with the red lips.

Hope fluttered in her heart that Detective Fog was on the right track, that this mobster was involved in Banikas's murder, and they were going to get her, but Fog better have a good explanation for how she got these photos on the day of the murder.

Thank you for reading Detective Fog. The mystery continues! Please leave a star if you are enjoying this installment of the Constellations series. Your support means all the stars in the sky.