ToServeAndProtect (3 page)

“Elliot!” she cried, glass penetrating into her hands
and feet. Hot tears streamed down her cheeks. She struggled with the knob to
her father’s bedroom door. Blood from cuts and deep gouges in her palms kept
her from gripping the handle. “Elliot!” she pleaded for him to hear her.
Finally, the door gave way.

Animal-like screams ripped from her soul as she
crawled across the carpet and collapsed near the bed.

“Oh, god, no!” she cried as her mind clouded with
black.
This couldn’t be happening again.

Chapter
Two

Dustin stirred as the tone of his cell phone cut into
his fitful sleep. “Pearce,” he snapped, while combing his hair off his
forehead.

He fell back onto the pillows and closed his eyes. He
listened to Tyson on the other end of the connection. A phone call at three in
the morning meant his restless night was over.

“I’m at the hospital.” Tyson’s voice was tight with
tension. “I’ll fill you in on the details when you get down here. Meet me in
the cafeteria.”

Normally, Dustin preferred wearing a tailored suit to
work, but at three in the morning he tugged on his favorite jeans and a black
T-shirt. He shrugged into his shoulder harness and clipped his badge just above
the front pocket of his jeans before walking out the door.

Long shadows from the streetlights played with his
imagination. Dimly lit areas in the middle of the night still gave his blood a
shot of adrenaline. A cat leapt from a ground floor patio to the balcony above.
Alert attention to his surroundings had made him a good cop and now served him
well as a detective.

He jerked open his truck door, climbed behind the
wheel and turned the key. Tension shifted into relief as his truck roared to
life. Rusted and dented, the Ford exemplified another prize he was awarded as
part of the divorce while his ex retained the Lexus that cost him two years of
401k because she simply had to have it. She’d simply had to have a lot of
things until he’d been injured in the line of duty and then she’d just wanted
out. He absently rubbed his left thigh as he headed to the hospital.

The streets were deserted. Ten minutes later, he
pulled into the parking lot. Entering the hospital, he took a left and followed
the signs to the cafeteria. Tyson was waiting.

“I was at the station, catching up on some paperwork
when the call came in,” Tyson said. They grabbed cups of coffee before heading
over to the emergency wing. The scent of medical disinfectant mingled with the
aroma of the stale, black java.

Dustin swallowed some of the bitter brew. “So what’s
up?”

“Seems a neighbor called 911 when she heard screams
coming from the residence.”

Gray carpet with flecks of blue, orange, and purple led
the way to the emergency room. The corridors were empty with the exception of
hospital personnel wearing sea green scrubs and running shoes.

“Patrol arrived after the fact. Called a bus to bring
in one female.”

“Anyone had a chance to talk with…what did you say her
name was?”

“McKenna Porter. Sound familiar?”

Dustin shook his head. “Someone you dated?” He smiled
while the scalding hot coffee burned past his lips.

“Daughter of Dr. Elliot Porter. He’s been in the
papers lately for some breakthrough research for Ronac Pharmaceuticals. Big
name, big money. I haven’t really been following the story, but he’s making the
news.
Big time
.”

They turned into the sterile area of the emergency
room. White walls, hard tile on the floor, and uncomfortable straight back chairs
left an impersonal touch. In contrast, the floor to ceiling saltwater fish tank
lighting up the corner bubbled and gurgled with bright, beautiful life.

Tyson acknowledged the nurse behind the desk. She
pointed to a sectioned off area where several other officers clustered.

“Jasper’s here. I wonder if he’s had a chance to
question her,” Dustin said to Tyson as he approached the group. “What have you
got?” he asked Jasper.

Richard Jasper pulled out his notebook. “She’s not
making a lot of sense. The doctor gave her a sedative.”

Dustin and Tyson peered through the doorway. The young
woman was still beneath the thin, white hospital blanket.

“Whose blood is she wearing?” Dustin asked.

Ms. Porter’s blood-soaked, blonde hair lay matted to
her head. Sterile gauze wrapped around her hands and her face glistened with
some kind of ointment.

“Who knows?” Richard looked at his notebook again. “We
don’t have a body.”

“Shit.” The night was about to get complicated.

* * * * *

Dustin was silent as Tyson maneuvered his car through
the winding roads above the university campus. Well-lit streets and large homes
with views of the Beaver Valley below, sat on acres of manicured lawns.
Flowerbeds in the shape of kidney beans, with rows of colorful blooms as
diverse as a rainbow, surrounded huge pink and beige boulders pulled from the
side of the Rocky Mountains towering above.

The driveway to the Porter home was as long as a drag
strip at the raceway. An old-fashioned streetlamp at the mailbox had a twin
near the house.

A white Durango, with a Crime Scene decal on the door,
sat in the driveway along with a patrol car. Blue lights flashed, cutting into
the night like a beacon announcing death had come to this doorstep.

Tyson parked alongside the patrol car. Stepping out of
the vehicle, they walked along a wide, curving, brick walkway banked by cannas
blooming bright red matching the bloodstains leading away from the front door.
An officer had circled the drips and footprints with yellow chalk. Yellow tape
wrapped around the front porch.

Dustin led the way up the stone steps. The front door
stood open. Looking inside, the same dark rich wood of the foyer was used to
craft the grand staircase leading to the upper floor. Overhead a chandelier
twinkled with dozens of crystal tear-shaped drops.

“Beats the shit out of your place.” Tyson slapped
Dustin on the back.

Dustin’s critical eye immediately went to work
assimilating the evidence. There were no signs of forced entry through the
front door and no outward signs of any struggle in the foyer. However, one
detail couldn’t be denied. Death hung in the air like an acrid odor stinging
the inside of his nostrils.

Introducing himself, Dustin held his hand out to the
uniformed officer stepping from the shadows at the end of the hall. “I’m Detective
Pearce, and this is my partner, Detective Jones.”

The officer pointed to the kitchen and began walking
them through the house. “Janet’s still upstairs collecting blood samples. Not
much else for forensics. Father and daughter live alone. According to the
neighbor who called us, both are reclusive by nature. Dad’s been widowed for
nearly twenty years.”

“Middle of the night, secluded neighborhood, how’d the
neighbor know to call?” Dustin asked.

“Open windows upstairs. Neighbor said she was letting
her dog out and heard the screams.”

“Lucky break.” Tyson followed Dustin and the uniformed
officer.

Dustin admired the huge painting hanging in the wide
corridor leading to the kitchen. Someone had painted the local mountain scene
with oils and a delicate, featherlike stroke. A spotlight lit the deep color of
the frame blending with the rugged beauty of the mountain.

“Anything missing?” he asked the officer. The Porter’s
had money. Lots of it by the looks of things.

Dustin stretched on a pair of latex gloves and handed
a pair to Tyson.

“Not that we can tell.” The uniformed officer took a
clear plastic envelope and handed it to Dustin. “Found this on the counter.”
Sorry
I was harsh with you, Dad.

Dustin gave the letter to Tyson, who then returned it
to the officer.

 “No blood,” Tyson observed. “Nothing appears out of
place in here.”

“Upstairs is a real mess,” the officer said with a
disgusted sneer on his lips. “It’s been photographed and nothing has been
disturbed. Wanted to maintain the integrity of the scene until you had a chance
to see it.”

“Let’s go.” They headed back in the direction they
came from.

Upstairs, Dustin stopped at the threshold of the door.
Tyson grinned. “Hey, Janet.”

“Detectives.” The lead crime scene investigator smiled
at Dustin but gave Tyson a cold shoulder.

“I guess she’s still mad,” he said to Dustin.

“Don’t get cocky, Detective Jones. You weren’t that
good.” She didn’t look up while she continued to take samples of blood.

Dustin surveyed the interior space of the master
bedroom. Centered against the wall, an unmade king size bed with gray satin
sheets draping to the floor bore witness to an unspeakable crime. Blood pooled
near the edge of the bed and dripped down the side of the mattress. Smudged
footprints intersected on the carpet as if someone had repeatedly entered and
left the room. The phone lay disconnected covered in bloody fingerprints. “Take
the phone and anything else that might have a print,” Dustin told Janet. “Maybe
we’ll get lucky in the database. It has to be the perp or the vic.”

“I want the rug.” Janet referred to the ornate woven
rug reminiscent of something Native American trampled with blood and debris.
“The mattress, too.”

Dustin nodded his agreement.

Tyson wrinkled his nose because of the heavy scent of
death and squatted down on his haunches. The muscles of his thighs strained
against his tan slacks. “Run DNA on the blood samples even though I’m betting
there ain’t a chance in hell this isn’t the good old doctor’s juice.”

“Any sign of the body?” Dustin glanced over his shoulder
at Janet.

“No, but I don’t think we’re going to need one.” She
grabbed the corner of the mattress. “Put those muscles to some use,” she said
to Tyson.

“Fuck!” Tyson lifted the mattress to see the blood had
soaked through to the other side. The mattress slapped down on the box spring
spattering drops of blood onto both of them. “Sorry.”

Janet wiped her latex covered hands on her slacks now
smeared with dark red stains. “Guys, there’s enough blood in here to say for
certain that whatever happened ended with a homicide.”

Chapter
Three

Dustin returned to the hospital while Tyson went to
the station to begin a file of their case. It wouldn’t take long for the news
media to get whiff of the night’s events, releasing predators on the hunt for a
story. Only it was premature to determine any details. Not many facts were
given to the press at this stage. Once they had a suspect, they needed details
to solve the crime.

Once the media was involved, District Attorney Butler
would be giving an Oscar caliber performance. Dustin had seen it before.
Election years could bring out the best and worst in those with civic
ambitions. He’d watched the young District Attorney make the promise of swift
punishment, and then behind closed doors, criticize department detectives when
they didn’t have a suspect for him to denounce.

Small town Olden hadn’t seen a high profile murder in
some time. Butler’s primary aspiration in life was to one day reside in the
governor’s mansion. A conviction of Dr. Elliot Porter’s murderer would fit well
into his résumé.

* * * * *

“Someone beat us to Porter.” A man spoke into his cell
phone as he sat in his car. From a distance, he watched the house. Surrounded
by flashing lights, police, and gawking neighbors, the place pulsed with
activity.

“It’s a friggin’ cop convention over here.” He needed
further instruction. He wouldn’t dare make a move without authorization.

“How?” The clipped tone made his stomach clench. “I
want to know who fucked with me. No one should’ve touched Porter without consulting
me first.”

“Don’t yell at me. I’m just assumin’ it was the doc.
His kid’s in the hospital. She ain’t dead, but the cops are talkin’ like her
old man is. The house is a friggin’ crime scene. Yellow tape and all.”

“I want facts!”

“Don’t jump my shit. This ain’t about you. This
involves all of us. We’re family.”

“We can discuss fault later. Just call me when you
know something.”

He shook his head. “I can’t get in the house, and
there’s cops posted at the hospital. I’ll have to stick around to find out what
she knows.” He ended the call.

“I’m glad you called. Sounds like Robert chewed your
ass.”

“Yeah, too bad you or I wasn’t born first. Robert’s a
dick.” The man turned to his brother in the passenger seat. “No way are we
leaving without our money. Doc Porter had to stash it somewhere. I’ll find it,
no matter what it takes.”

* * * * *