Fugitive Justice (22 page)

Jake would never be able to catch him.

He stuffed the pistol behind his belt and watched Ace’s back disappear around the corner a couple hundred feet away.

Jake hadn’t seen Ace’s face, but at least he knew the guy was still hanging around, and he was going to track him down. Sooner or later, their paths would cross. And when they did, Jake wasn’t going to be caught by surprise again.

Chapter 35

Thursday, 4:14 p.m.

HANK MANEUVERED his Chevy through the beginnings of rush-hour traffic. It was always busy downtown at this time of the day, and the closer they got to the core of the city, the slower everything moved.

Detective King slouched back in the passenger seat and yawned. “At least the guy had the courtesy to kill someone at a decent hour.”

Hank rolled his eyes and remained silent. But King had a point. Hopefully, they could do a walk-through and then put the case on hold until CSI had a complete report. Or King could take it on his own. Hank was knee-deep in trying to solve the Overstone case, and he didn’t have time to add another murder to his plate at the moment.

But when duty called, he had to respond.

He’d spent the last couple of hours trying to get some information on anyone with a criminal record who went by the name of Ace. He hadn’t had much luck. Of the three he’d found, two were incarcerated, and one was dead.

Hank wasn’t sure where the name Ace had come from, but it looked like a dead end without a last name.

He squeezed the car between a pair of cruisers parked on either side of a narrow lane, pulling to a stop behind the coroner’s van. CSI was there, and investigators were unloading some equipment. Crime scene tape was stretched around. Officers held back curious onlookers.

He and King got out and looked at the abandoned building in front of them.

They were in an older, uncared-for part of town. Graffiti covered the surrounding buildings. Litter lined the fences and grimy walls. The place smelled, the intense odor further fomented by the heat of the glaring afternoon sun.

Hank stepped into the building. The stench inside was even worse. The place had been taken over by vagrants, addicts, and rats. One of the vermin dashed under a pile of garbage. A couple of others were used to human company and paid no attention to the handful of intruders.

The room was lit only by whatever light could work its way through the one grimy window. Someone was in the process of setting up portable lighting, unraveling a long cord that would eventually lead to the closest power source.

CSI was going to have a tough time with this one. Even the best investigator could never separate potential evidence from the piles of trash that filled the room, surrounding the body of the victim who was now lying facedown in the middle of the floor.

Inspectors milled around nonetheless. They would do what they could.

Hank approached Rod Jameson, gave him a curt nod, and got to it. “Any ID?”

Jameson nodded. “Driver’s license in the name of Dewey Hicks.”

Hank shrugged and looked at King.

“Never heard the name,” King said.

The portable lighting came on and the room was filled with dazzling light.

“Shot in the head,” Jameson continued, flicking off his flashlight.

“Any witnesses?”

Jameson pointed vaguely toward the exit. “Someone saw the shooter run from the building. An officer’s taking his statement, and he’s waiting in a cruiser.”

“Thanks, Rod,” Hank said.

He approached the body and stood beside Nancy Pietek. The ME was in the process of examining the back of the victim’s head. Blood and brains were spattered on the floor around the body. The back of his head was a mess.

“Afternoon, Nancy,” Hank said.

Nancy turned her head upwards and gave Hank a cheerful smile. “Afternoon, Hank.” She stood, turned off her flashlight and slipped off her latex gloves. “It appears the cause of death was a GSW to the back of the head by a small-caliber weapon. Gunshot residue on the victim indicates it was fired from a distance of six to twelve inches.”

“Lemme guess,” King said with a wry smile. “The manner of death is homicide.”

“Sure doesn’t look like an accident,” Hank said and glanced around. “I don’t think there’s much else we can do here. Let’s go talk to the witness.”

Jameson followed them to the door and pointed toward a police car. “There’s the guy you want to talk to.”

Hank glanced to where Jameson had indicated. The witness had apparently gotten tired of sitting inside the vehicle and had gotten out. He was leaning against the fender, watching the proceedings.

An officer stood nearby. He nodded and stepped aside as Hank and King approached the vehicle.

Hank gave the witness a quick once-over. Probably in his late sixties, the man had probably lived on the streets for a long time. His weather-beaten face, pitted and furrowed by tough times, was proof of a hard life. Oversized clothes hung on his thin frame, a pair of sturdy shoes on his feet.

“I’m Detective Corning,” Hank said and motioned toward King. “This is Detective King. Can I get your name?”

The man looked at Hank through deep-set bloodshot eyes. He’d likely imbibed too much whiskey or cheap wine to be reliable, but he was all they had.

He brushed back his matted gray hair with a veined hand and spoke in a faintly slurred voice. “Everybody calls me Slowpoke.”

Hank held back a smile. “What’s your last name, Slowpoke?”

“Don’t remember. Don’t know as I ever had one.”

“Fair enough,” Hank said. “Now, can you tell me what you saw?”

Slowpoke pointed a bony finger toward the building. “I was havin’ a wee nap and two guys burst in on me. Snapped me right out of it.” He shrugged and pointed to his ear. “Most times, noise don’t bother me, but these guys were shouting to wake the dead.”

Hank pulled a notepad and pen from his inner pocket and scribbled something down, then looked back at Slowpoke. “What were they shouting about?”

“Couldn’t tell. Some kinda argument.”

“Then what happened?”

“Then one guy pulled a gun. Couldn’t understand what he said, but he was waving it around. I guess he told the other guy to turn around and get on his knees, because he did. Then he shot him and just sauntered out like nothin’ happened.” Slowpoke shrugged. “Then I skedaddled out of there and got a nice lady to call the police.”

“Did the shooter see you?”

“Don’t think so. Leastways, he didn’t look at me. I was lying down in the corner on a pile of newspaper. Probably didn’t see me there, else I’d be shot too. Maybe thought I was a pile of garbage. I was scared to move, I’ll tell you that.”

“Could you identify the shooter if you saw him again?”

Slowpoke cocked his head to one side. “Can’t say as I could. It’s kinda dark in there, and these old eyes ain’t what they used to be.”

“Do your best,” Hank said.

Slowpoke looked over Hank’s shoulder, his furrowed brow taking on deeper lines of thought. “He was big. I’ll say that much. And tall. Had on a red baseball cap.”

Hank wrote the information down in his pad.

“Was he muscular?” King asked.

“Yeah, think so. He was big but not fat. Yeah, lots of muscles.”

Hank pulled out his cell phone and brought up a photo. He held it up for Slowpoke to see. “Is that him?”

Slowpoke squinted at the phone, then nodded slowly. “Can’t be sure, but I think so.” He pointed at the photo. “I remember now. Like I said, he had a cap on, but pretty sure his hair was short like that, too. It was pretty dark.”

Hank glanced at the photo of Jake on his cell phone, then looked at his partner. King crossed his arms and frowned at the phone.

Hank turned back to Slowpoke. “Is there anything else you can tell us?”

The old man shook his head. “That’s all I saw.”

Hank turned to the officer, who’d been lounging nearby listening to the conversation. “Did you get his statement?”

The officer nodded, opened the door of the cruiser, and returned with a clipboard. He handed Hank a sheet of paper. “I wrote down what he said, and he signed it.”

Hank looked at the scrawl at the bottom of the page, then rolled it up and tucked it into his pocket. He spoke to Slowpoke. “You’ve been a big help. Thanks for your time.”

Slowpoke smiled for the first time. “Just doin’ my part. Hope you catch him. God knows it ain’t safe enough for folks like me on the streets anymore.”

The detectives went back to Hank’s car and got in. Hank started the car thoughtfully. Things weren’t looking good for Jake.

“What do you think?” King asked. “I know Slowpoke couldn’t give a positive ID, but he was pretty sure it was Jake.”

Hank’s lips formed a grim line. “We know Jake’s down here somewhere, according to two separate police reports. But I can’t see it. Jake’s not a killer.”

“I’m starting to wonder,” King said.

Hank pulled from the lane and turned onto the side street. He didn’t want to admit it, but he was having second thoughts as well, and he wanted to find out more about Dewey Hicks. He needed to find out if Hicks’s murder was related to the Overstone case, where he fit in, and why he’d ended up dead.

Unless CSI got lucky and turned up something useful, all he had to go on was a contaminated crime scene and the word of a drunk.

Chapter 36

Thursday, 6:12 p.m.

LISA KRUNK HAD been following Niles Overstone around for most of the day. As far as she knew, he was the only person who might have any knowledge of what the murders were all about.

After she’d gotten wind of the attempt on Overstone’s life through her source in the police department, she and Don had raced to the scene. But she hadn’t been able to obtain any information that was going to do her any good. The police had been as tight-lipped as usual, and the few shots Don had gotten were practically useless.

The cops had sealed off the home again, and she’d been unable to get a lead on Overstone’s current whereabouts. She only knew that, though several shots had been fired, no one had been injured, and the gunman had escaped.

But with Overstone having no access to his house, Lisa had been sure he’d eventually return to the very spot where he’d spent his nights after his wife’s shooting.

If someone was going to shoot at him again, she wanted to be there.

Leaving Don with the van, she’d taken her seldom-used silver Corolla and headed to Richmond Inn. She’d recognized the white Lexus parked in front of cabin seven, the same unit Overstone had occupied before.

After taking a subtle peek through the window and confirming Overstone was inside, she had returned to her car and waited.

In the hours following, she’d tailed him to a restaurant for lunch, then to Richmond Funeral Home. He’d met an overweight middle-aged woman outside, and after the woman had butted out a smoke, the two had gone inside the building. They’d spent a couple of hours inside, then Overstone had returned to his room.

While Lisa had watched outside his unit, she’d placed a phone call. She’d found out a wake for Merrilla Overstone would take place that evening, with the funeral to be held early the next afternoon.

That was when she’d made plans to attend both events. Discreetly, of course.

While waiting, she’d kept one ear tuned to the police radio tucked under her dash. There’d been a shooting in an abandoned building downtown, and after giving the information some serious thought, she had decided not to go. Not only was news of a shooting in that neighborhood not in the least unusual, but gang wars and punks killing other punks weren’t the kind of stories most people cared about. Besides, by the time Don got there, and they waded their way through rush-hour traffic, everything would be wrapped up and sealed off.

She had decided she might as well wait it out and waste her time here rather than there.

Then, after a boring time of it, at five-thirty, she’d followed Overstone back to the funeral home. He’d met the same chubby woman, and the two of them had gone directly inside. Other than them, she hadn’t seen anyone else enter or leave the building.

Maybe the Overstones didn’t have a lot of friends.

And now, as she sat in her car across the street from the funeral home, she kept an eagle eye on the building. A couple of cops were lounging around outside the entranceway. Perhaps the police had assumed, as she did, that Overstone might be the target of a killer at his own wife’s wake.

She had half a mind to take her camera, slip inside, and take a few shots. But for some reason her viewers didn’t take kindly to that sort of thing. Though it would be nice to be on the scene if something went down, she decided not to. The cops would likely bar her from entering, anyway.

A car pulled into the lot, and she grabbed her binoculars, zooming in on the face of a man as he stepped from the vehicle. It was some old guy, and he didn’t look like he meant any harm. It was probably someone Overstone worked with. The cops waved him into the building, and he disappeared from view.

A handful of people came and went, and Lisa snapped their pictures out of boredom. She was starting to think she’d wasted her time.

She listened to the police radio. Nothing of interest appeared to be happening elsewhere in the city. It was a slow news day, and she might as well hang around.

When a bright red Mustang pulled into the lot, Lisa barely paid it any attention. Then her eyes widened when a man got out, adjusted his tie, and strode toward the building.

It was Jake.

What was he doing here? Had something happened she wasn’t aware of? Had Jake been cleared?

She swung her binoculars into action. He was walking too fast for her to focus on him, and by the time she could, she only caught a quick glimpse of his side view as he climbed the steps and entered the building.

Though it wasn’t something she often concerned herself with, she couldn’t help but notice how handsome he looked. All dressed up in a sharp black suit, close-cropped hair, tall and clean-shaven with chiseled features. She’d never seen him look so good before.