Murder Stalks (4 page)

On his way out, Sekorski stopped at the
doorway. “Don’t forget to leave the booties in the box by the front
door. We can’t do our magic if we don’t have all of the
evidence.”

Tony waved him off, moving his focus to the
team of two assembled in front of him. Why hadn’t he sent Janice to
the criminal profiling class in Quantico last year? Rex was a great
detective, despite his immature attitude about some things, but
Janice had a knack for getting inside the criminal’s mind, working
out motive before the rest of the team finished with their first
round of coffee.

Pulling the thick drapes aside, Tony
searched for Michael Rains. The guy was a great crime scene
technician, but damn it, he needed a new watch, one that shouted
‘get your butt in gear’.

“
We have about two minutes
to come up with a suspect before the press starts asking questions,
about four minutes before the chief asks again, and about thirty
minutes before the Mayor sticks his nose up our shorts. Randall has
already called me, and you can probably figure out that we’ll be
living out of headquarters for the next few days. Where the hell is
Rains?”

Rex and Janice grumbled, mirroring Tony’s
feelings, but no one commented on Rains not showing up. Janice went
to work with her camera, getting a few final shots before they
closed the apartment.

The front door banged open and slammed shut.
Tony whirled around, ready to scream at the offender.

“
Hey, I got your call.
Wow, I haven’t seen one this bad in a while. Damn, he did that to
both hands?” Michael Rains said as he slipped booties over his
shoes. “We won’t be getting any trace from under the fingernails.
If she did scratch him, we’ll never know it.”

“
So our suspect may or may
not have scratches.” Rex turned and looked around the room. “This
place is too clean. Did you notice there’s no dust? And where are
her sheets?”

“
Maybe she was doing
laundry,” Michael suggested as he pulled out his high-powered,
multi-colored flash light kit.

“
Hey Janice, you’re a
girl, do you dust often?” Rex quipped.

Janice closed her eyes and Tony could see
her lips move as she counted backwards from ten. Her eyes opened
and the fire of her anger was still there. “Rex, just because
you’re a Neanderthal doesn’t mean the rest of the world isn’t neat.
Of course I dust.”

“
You wanna come to my
place and do the same for me?” Rex chuckled.

“
Tony, I’m going to go
take shots outside,” Janice said as she moved from the
bedroom.

“
That’s fine. We need to
find her car too. See if it’s been cleaned out.”

“
Sure, after I get a few
shots.” Janice smiled at Tony then stuck her tongue out at Rex’s
back. Tony ignored their behavior and let his eyes sweep the room.
What else was missing? The pillows?

“
Michael, you’re late.
Don’t do it again.” Tony’s eyes bore into Michael’s. He couldn’t
afford to coddle one of his key team members. Either Rains got his
act together or Tony would have to request his transfer. “After you
finish up in here, I want you and Rex to go door-to-door. Question
everybody in the apartment complex. Go back as far as last
Saturday. Sekorski thinks she was murdered yesterday, but we don’t
know for sure.” Tony did another quick visual sweep of the
apartment. “How the hell did this guy get out of here without being
noticed?”

“
I’m surprised no one
heard anything,” Rex said.

“
No roommate, and with the
college closed, who would hear anything?” Janice answered, poking
her head around the corner.

“
I need to find the
manager, see if anyone moved out recently.” Tony pulled out his
notebook and made a few markings, mostly detailing the
body.

The blood was minimal, which meant her hands
were cut off post mortem. The bruises on her inner thigh indicated
she had probably been raped. Her shoulders carried bruises, almost
like hands forcing her from above. Forced oral sex? That was a
dangerous position for the suspect to be in. What if she bit? Tony
cringed and resisted the urge to cross his legs. He forced his mind
away from thoughts of pain and turned his attention back to the
apartment. The way too clean apartment.

****

If the killer had taken the time to dust,
what did that say about this crime and the criminal? Was the
suspect so arrogant he believed no one would walk in on him, or had
Angela dusted earlier in the day and the clean apartment had
nothing to do with the killer? Tony mulled over the information,
letting the facts settle into his consciousness and wrap its
tentacles around his brain. “I wonder how many close friends Angela
had in Juniper.”

“
Do you want me to search
for a set of sheets?” Michael asked as he put away his equipment.
“It’s clean here, I’m done.”

“
Sure, this complex has a
laundry room.” Tony pulled off the latex gloves, glad to set his
hands free from the sweat producers. He carefully removed the bags
on his shoes at the front door, slipping them into the box Sekorski
had left.

He hated this part of the investigation.
There was too much information, but it was all uncollected and
unaccounted for. Everything to solve the crime was here, within his
grasp, but nothing stuck out. The killer hadn’t left a sign behind
that said ‘I did it.’ Somewhere in this apartment, or on the ground
in the parking lot, was a telling fiber or strand of hair with the
follicle still attached. Now all Tony and his team had to do was
find it.

Chapter 4

The south Texas heat gripped Tony, forcing
its imprint on his skin, leaving a trail of sweat down his back. At
the pool, that’s where he wanted to be. He wanted to be at the pool
with Marissa, drinking an ice-cold beer while he listened to his
wife talk about her day.

It was the little things he missed the most.
Like the way she would tilt her head and listen to him talk about
his current case. Marissa would’ve hated this case, but she would
have listened quietly as he spoke about the different aspects.

Tony’s mind ticked through the elements they
had discovered so far. This murder was big time. Juniper’s typical
murder case was between friends who had drunk too much, or a
husband tired of his wife’s cheating ways, or the wife sick of the
husband stepping out one too many times. That last thought stuck
with him. Damn, he had been a stupid prick, and he didn’t know how
to make it right.

He needed to stay focused on the case if he
wanted it solved quickly. They needed a list of Angela’s friends
and boyfriends, places where she hung out and the people she hung
with. Moving towards the front of the complex, he rounded the
building and ran into Officer Sally Gerrig. His chest tightened and
his stomach turned over before sinking.

“
Gerrig, don’t let anybody
into the apartment, even other uniforms. The only people authorized
inside this unit are Hague, Rains, Owens and myself. And no rookies
who don’t know what to do with the press,” Tony barked.

He paused. He’d done it again. He turned
back to Sally, ready to apologize and found her standing with her
hand on her hip. An angry smirk masked her face.

“
What about
Sekorski?”

Tony glanced around the area, making sure no
one else was within earshot. “Sally, I’m sorry but you have—”

“
I don't know why you have
it out for me. But I'm not quitting the force. I'm a good cop.”
Sally’s voice rose in pitch.

Tony ground his teeth, holding back the
accusations he wanted to let loose. “I’m not going to place any
blame, but...” Tony stopped, weighing his words before he made
another mistake. She’d sent those damn letters and pictures. He
wanted to point that out to her, but starting the argument wouldn’t
benefit either of them. He hadn’t gone to internal affairs, that
had been his big mistake, and now he would have to handle the
situation carefully.

“
Listen, we have to work
together, and if you want to advance to detective then you’re just
going to—What? Don’t look at me like that.”

He realized too late that he was being
condescending again. Sally brought out the worst in him. The first
note from her should have gone to personnel, but it hadn’t.
Instead, he let his bruised ego play her game. Games sucked. And he
knew it. Now he was paying for his mistake.

“
Excuse me? I’m going to
have to get past it? Past what? You need to stop discriminating
against me. Like I said, I'm here to stay.” Sally’s steady stare
pricked at Tony’s ego.

“
Damn it,
Gerrig—”

She held up her hand. The intense expression
on her face put a halt to his words, “A news van just pulled up. Do
you really want us arguing on tape?”

“
Fine, just keep the
riffraff out.”

“
Got it.”

Tony shook off the uncomfortable feeling
Gerrig left him with and headed over to speak to the manager.

The man behind the desk was short and dumpy,
dressed in a pair of wrinkled khaki shorts and a grease-stained
undershirt that did little to hide his rounded beer belly. Ms.
Lucy, the manager from when Tony lived here, was gone and it looked
like she’d taken all the class she’d brought with her.

The apartment office was small and dirty,
much worse than the last time he’d been here. The scent of soured
food in desperate need of a trash dump assaulted his senses. Stacks
of paperwork were strewn around the room, giving it a just exploded
look. Heat filled the small space, leaving Tony wishing he were
still outside. This guy, although sleazy looking, couldn’t have
pulled off the murder in the apartment down the breezeway. His
trash would have followed him there, and the stench would have
settled in Angela’s apartment, making it smell worse than it
already did.

“
Excuse me,” Tony said as
he stepped up to the desk. “Are you the manager?”

“
Sure, I’m the manager.
Jack’s my name. You a cop?” Jack’s gap toothed grin covered the
lower third of his face, making him appear clownish instead of
friendly. A waft of whisky drifted off of Jack as he
spoke.

“
I’m Detective Tony
Santos. Were you here, in the office last night?”

“
Is that when you think he
killed her? I mean, you think she died? You know, her apartment was
cold. It was like an arctic blast when I cracked the door open to
have a look see. Didn’t like the smell so I didn’t go in. I heard
once that a body can last really long in the cold. You sure she
wasn’t done in last week? There was a real shady character here on
Thursday—or was it Wednesday?” Jack squeezed his eyes almost closed
as he picked at his front tooth with a black-rimmed
fingernail.

Tony inspected the man. Was he letting his
prejudice rule this guy out, or were the key indicators of a rapist
and murder present in this man? Violence could be brought out in
the best of people, but it took a special type of killer to do what
had been done to Angela Longfellow.

How many slack-jawed yokels knew that
epithelial cells hid under fingernails? Even when the suspect used
a pick to pull out most of the tissue, the victim usually dug down
so hard that the suspect’s skin cells pushed way back to where the
finger met the nail. No, Tony was sure of it, their suspect was
educated, not a half drunk, disorganized shell of a man, but a
person who dealt in power.

“
Jack, can you give a
description of the shady character?”

“
Uh, I don’t recall what
he looked like. Could have been the mail delivery guy. He’s a
strange one, always curls his nose up when he comes in here, like
this place ain’t good ‘nuf for him.”

“
If you remember anything
about the person who was here last week please call the station and
they’ll draw up a profile. You didn’t answer my question,” Tony
said tolerantly, not believing Jack had seen a mysterious person.
He didn’t want to be patient with this guy. Anger still slid
through his veins. His run-in with Sally affected him more than he
wanted to admit.

“
What question was
that?”

“
Were you here yesterday?”
Tony asked again, purposely keeping his voice low and
even.

“
Hmmm, no I was at my lady
friend’s house. She kept me a’busy all weekend long, know what I
mean?” The manager laughed a bawdy cackle. His mouth hung open,
revealing his half rotten teeth. Tony’s stomach turned at the
mental images of Jack the manager with his lady friend.

“
Thank you, Jack.” Tony
stared at the mess surrounding him. He hated asking but there was
no way he could get around it, procedure called for him to
investigate this man because he had access to the victim’s
apartment. “Could you supply me with her name and number? I need to
confirm your story.”

“
Cool, I’m a suspected
person in a murder case. Do ya need to take me downtown for
questioning? Cause it will only take a minute to tidy up here ‘fore
I lock up.”

“
No, that’s not
necessary.” Tony wanted to groan out loud. There was no way this
knuckle dragger could be the killer. He didn’t have the discipline
needed for such a clean operation.

A knock sounded on the door behind Tony. He
turned and saw Michael Rains peeking through the opening.

“
Detective Santos, I found
the laundry room. I thought you might want to see.”

“
Thank you, Officer
Rains.” Tony turned back to the manager, glad to have an excuse to
leave, “I’ll be in contact with you if I have more
questions.”