Murder! Too Close To Home (16 page)

Chapter 38

March 11, 1997

The man had made one last trip to the shed to retrieve a bag from his car. Spreading the contents out on the table, he found an old wash basin and filled it with water. Spending over an hour working on his task, he was nonetheless satisfied when he looked in the broken mirror at his handiwork.

His usually dark brown hair had been transformed to blonde using the hair dye he had purchased weeks ago for just this purpose. Next he picked up a large sewing needle, taking three deep breaths before forcing it through the left side of his lip. A string of cuss words escaped loudly into the room as he forced the steel through flesh, a cold sweat having formed on his face by the time he was finished.

He stared at himself with the needle sticking through his skin as he panted like a sprinter. After calming himself down again, he removed the needle, replacing it quickly with a lip ring he had purchased.

“One more detail to take care of,” he mumbled to himself, returning to the table and grabbing the last item. Heading back to the mirror, he applied a concealing makeup cream to the prevalent birthmark on his face. Standing back, he admired his handiwork with a smile.

“The transformation is complete.”

He now looked more like a seventeen year old skateboarder than a murder suspect, the mark on his face effectively gone, and a lip ring on the opposite side of his face to draw others’ attention there. He could now easily go back into public without immediately arousing suspicion.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he spoke to no one but the spirits that may be living inside the house. Bowing theatrically to his invisible fans while spreading out his arms with much ado, he continued in a circus ringmaster’s booming voice, “I bring you the new and improved, much feared and respected, the bane of all law enforcement’s existence, the
’Ghost’
!”

Imaginary applause streamed into the room as he blew kisses to his adoring fans. He had never felt more loved and accepted in his life.

Chapter 39

March 11, 1997

We found but a couple other clues at the trashy apartment that marked our suspect as the man who had committed three vicious murders in our county, but we already had more than enough for a warrant for the man’s arrest.

One glaring exception was the ring from Harold Longstreet’s fireplace; it was nowhere to be found. The general consensus was that he still had it on his person, so that would be another nail in Wesley’s coffin when we finally found him.

The evidence guys arrived and I remembered to show them the notebook I wanted tested for prints as well as a handwriting analysis. The tech nodded as he put the book in an evidence bag, making notes on the outside with a marker.

Frank and I headed back to the office about 11:00. On the way back Frank wanted to talk about baseball. It seemed he gave the Reds a fighting chance this year of going all of the way.

For my part, I had long ago distanced myself from professional baseball and had no clue what any of the teams looked like, nor did I care. But for Frank to bring it up was the strange part, and I saw it as his first real foray into an interpersonal exchange with me, a form of communication I definitely wasn’t used to with him.

It brought a smile to my face,

This conversation had taken years of working together to achieve and I relished the fact that he reached out with it today.

Back at the office I was going over my notes when I noticed an overnight package on my desk. Opening it up, I was pleasantly surprised to find the map that Boris Yang from the state lab had promised. Unfolding it farther, I discovered that it was a large wall map showing the area of Fincastle Silt Loam overlaid onto a road map. I was very pleased to have something showing the large area of Fincastle, as well as showing the way to get to it.

I took the map into the conference room, tacking it up on the board and hoping it would come in handy soon. Frank entered with a small stack of papers, handing them to me saying, “Your soup information, Gabriel.”

Flipping through the papers, I realized that they were copies of invoices from a wholesaler to various stores, each one listing ‘John Bros Bean’ at various places within a list of other items supplied to that particular store.

“Johnson Brothers is a small company in Indianapolis,” Frank started in explanation, “and their area of distribution is mostly north of us. There are two stores in the north part of the county that carry their products, as well as about twenty in Franklin County.”

Franklin County again, that place just kept popping up, and I was not strong on coincidences.

Asking Frank to give me a hand, I took the invoices over to my newly acquired map, pulling a box of red map pins out of a drawer as I passed. As I read off the addresses, Frank located and marked the location with one of the pins before we moved on to the next address. After ten minutes, we had all of the Franklin County addresses pinned and stood back to see what they revealed.

My heart dropped when I realized that most of the locations were in the northeast part of the neighboring county, while the area of Fincastle was mostly in the southwest.

Mulling this over, I noticed that a small portion of the north end of our county was also shown on the map. I found the invoices for the stores in our county which to this point we had ignored. Reading off these addresses, Frank also placed these pins which revealed both of the stores to be in the northwest part of our county.

Someone leaving our county and traveling north would surely pass one or both of these stores on the way to Franklin, depending on which way they went. I was feeling pretty good about myself when I looked over and noticed Frank frowning at me, a look of dismay plainly showing on his face.

Chapter 40

March 11, 1997

“Come with me,” Frank finally uttered after looking around the room for a few moments as if looking for something.

I followed my partner out of the conference room, and then out of the building.

Heading directly to his car, he entered the driver’s side, reaching over and unlocking the passenger door for me. We drove in silence for a few minutes until we reached our apparent destination…the parking lot at the Legion.

Exiting the car, I again followed him as he led me into the dark paneled bar, both of us waving a greeting to the two men at the bar as we claimed a table in a dark corner. When the bartender came over for our order, Frank ordered a beer and looked expectantly at me. I declined anything, but my partner quickly chimed in with, “He’ll have the same.”

We sat there silently until the bartender brought our order and left. Frank took a big swig before replacing the bottle on the table.

“I truly believe some of the most important conversations in history have been had over a bottle of beer,” he stated matter-of-factly, looking down at the table and playing with his bottle cap. Looking up seriously, he blurted out, “What the hell is going on with you?”

“Where is this soup thing going? For that matter, where did it come from? I don’t remember any evidence coming up involving soup. And what about the mark on the neck of Mrs. Letterman, how did you know to look there when no one else had caught it. You had never even seen the body? Still haven’t as far as I know.”

“I thought we were partners, Gabriel. I don’t warm up to people quickly, you know that. But I thought we had built up a pretty good partnership over these last few years.”

“Now you are apparently getting info from another party and you don’t think it’s important to let me in on it. I gotta tell you Gabe, I don’t appreciate it.”

I sat there quietly for a few moments, my emotions flipping between being ashamed in not trusting Frank and being apprehensive to admitting the truth. After all, he may try to have me committed when he found out the truth. Taking a deep breath, I prepared myself for the big reveal.

“I’m sorry, Frank, I
have
been holding out on you just a little, but it’s not what you think. You’re probably going to have a hard time believing me when I tell you.”

“Try me,” was all he said, but he said it hopefully. I had seen the beginnings of real friendship from him lately, and knowing how hard that was for him I know he wanted this to work, as did I.

“Just keep an open mind as I explain, that’s all I ask.”

He nodded his assent and leaned up in his chair to listen. I knew that meant that I now had his undivided attention.

“For a long while now, I occasionally have these dreams. Really strange ones, more like visions really. Most of the time, in these visions, I visit a very comfortable room. I play chess with some unseen opponent, drink the best coffee I’ve ever had, and enjoy the fire in the fireplace. It’s a wonderfully relaxing place and I really enjoy myself when I go there.”

“Periodically though,” I continued, committed now, “I will be suddenly transported to a crime scene, or some other setting and I will be pointed somehow to notice a clue. Those are the clues that you were talking about. I can’t explain why or how it happens, it just happens.”

“I saw the guy get out of the car right after he shot the first victims. While I was trying to get in the car, a flash of lightning revealed to me a mark on the woman’s neck. I had no idea what it meant; I never know what it means.”

Frank leaned back in his chair, deep in thought. Reaching up, he grabbed his beer and took another big swig before setting it down again. Leaning forward once more, he asked if anything happened about the Longstreet murder.

“I was on the road in front of the house, although this was before we knew about it and I had no idea where I was, or what was going on. I saw someone sitting on the porch across the road, smoking a cigar. And I saw someone, the killer, leave from the back door of the Longstreet house and walk to a car parked down the road.”

“So that’s why you went over to Zeke’s house, you knew he had probably witnessed something?”

“I didn’t know for sure, but I was hopeful.”

“Ok, then what about the soup?” he asked expectantly. I guess crazy explanations were better than no explanation at all.

“Last night I was in the room drinking coffee, and then I was in an old house, a very old house, looked abandoned to me. But Wesley was there, at least I think it was him, he was wearing a hood and I didn’t see his face.”

“Anyway, he was busy organizing stuff in this old house. I’m pretty certain after today it was the location he is hiding out in. One of the things he did while I was watching was stack can after can of this soup on a shelf, like he had a whole case of it. I noticed the brand name, so I asked you to look it up. I wasn’t familiar with the brand; in fact I wasn’t sure it even existed.”

“I have to tell you I was pretty excited when we found a possible link between my mysterious soup and the area where our soil came from in the first crime scene.”

Frank again sat back and grabbed his beer, taking a long draw before staring down the neck of the bottle for a few minutes. I had been in front of a judge before, and this felt much like that.

“Ok, it’s a stretch, but however weird it appears, the information is spot on. We can’t argue with that.”

To say I was relieved was an understatement. Up to this point, only Betty knew of my visions and their resultant clues. She had been disbelieving at first also, but had been swayed by the evidence. Keeping things from people you care about, even crazy sounding things, is not something I like to do. Having both of these guys in on the story was definitely liberating.

“But how do we get evidence entered into the case if it doesn’t exist?” Frank asked with a look of concern on his face.

“We can’t really,” I replied, having given this a lot of thought. “It is more or less a hunch, and we usually have to do some footwork to prove or disprove a hunch. I have been thinking of driving around the Franklin County area in question after work, but looking at the area in question on the map, it’s huge. I was also planning on running by the stores that sell the soup and see if they have sold any cases of the bean soup lately.”

“Ok, let’s do that then,” Frank said decidedly as he rose from his chair, pulling out some bills to pay for our drinks.

“I can’t ask you to do that Frank, I can handle it. You’ve surely got better things to do than ride around with me all night.”

“We’re partners, we work it together,” he came back matter-of-factly. “Two heads are better than one. Besides, there’s nothing on TV this time of year anyway,” he finished with a smile and a wink.

For the second time that day I followed Frank out of a building and got into his car. This time, however, we stood on a more solid footing. I was getting excited to investigate my hunch with Frank. With him solidly in my camp, the odds had definitely improved.

Chapter 41

March 11, 1997

Having arrived back at the office in good spirits, Ellen handed me a note as I walked in the door.
Reading it quickly, I was surprised by what it told me. Reading it again to make sure I was right, I tugged Frank’s sleeve and relayed that they had some info for us at the lab.