Over Troubled Water: A Hunter Jones Mystery (2 page)

“Yes,” Novena said. “His daddy was just in R&J’s having breakfast and Sasha called him from the hospital. He called his wife right then. Annelle said he was saying Ricky got shot while he was riding his bicycle over the bridge out on Sumter Road. If that isn’t the craziest thing. I wonder if it was some driver who doesn’t like bikes on the road. What they call road rage.”

“It wasn’t just him,” Mallory told Novena. “Three other people were shot and killed.”

Novena looked stunned.

“He was riding his bicycle?” Hunter asked. “I wonder if the others were on bicycles. They must have been. Remember that story we ran a couple of weeks about “Cycling Georgia. That big bunch of people is coming through here on bicycles. They were going to have a local team to lead them to the county line.”

“Let me look at the gym website,” Mallory said, her fingers already on her keyboard.

“Got it!” she said half a minute later. “They were practicing—riding a 14-mile round trip on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday mornings, starting at 6:30 a.m. Ricky Richards and Annie Chapman were the team leaders. It says here for people to call if they wanted to be part of the host team. See, it even gives a map of the route.”

She zoomed in on the map.

“Sumter Road is on the route.”

“And it gives their starting time,” Hunter said, feeling sad and angry. “So somebody who wanted to shoot them could just pick a place and wait for them.”

Mallory’s phone played a few notes of piano music, and she picked it up.

“That’s just insane,” Novena said to Hunter. “Oh, Lord, I hope Annie Chapman wasn’t one of them. That woman rides a bicycle everywhere, and she’s as old as I am. I’ve seen her out in a cotton housedress with one of those plastic helmets on her head. You know that fool son of hers takes her car to work with him every day. That’s how she got started. Of course, she’s real big on staying fit anyway. Won’t touch a piece of meat or even milk and eggs.”

Mallory was off the phone.

“That was Janelle from my dad’s office,” she said. “She says they’re calling for the Emergency Management Agency volunteers for traffic control. Her husband’s one of them. Oh, and they’re about to have helicopters overhead and dogs on the ground out there by the bridge.”

“Bless Janelle,” Hunter said. “I think you should go try to get some pictures. If you can’t get anything else, get the barricades.”

An hour later, the crime techs were everywhere on the bridge, taking notes, photographs, and measurements. Two were under the bridge, and two more were searching the wooded areas on either side of the shallow creek. So far they had come up with two empty black plastic trash bags. The sound of the choppers was steady.

The coroner had come and gone, and a team had arrived with body bags and stretchers. Three hearses were waiting to take the bodies to the Magnolia County Medical Center’s back parking lot long enough for identification and then on to a pathologist in Macon.

Taneesha called Sam to report.

“I just left China Carson’s house,” she said. “Her husband, Russell, is just about crazy with grief. He couldn’t answer questions, and I’m not going to try to ask him any now. He was kicking the furniture and taking swings at the people trying to comfort him when I left. I don’t think we’re going to get anything coherent out of him for a while. We called his sister. She’s a nurse. I’m picking up India Jackson in a minute. She’s China’s sister. She can do the ID.

“The others?” Sam asked.

“Annie Chapman’s pastor at First Baptist said he’ll identify the body. He got some church member to call the son and the daughter both. It’s neighbor, and apparently Mrs. Chapman left both their numbers with her in case there was ever an emergency.

Taneesha continued.

“Shellie called Mayor Washington and he’ll identify Jim Jordan. His family’s from somewhere in North Georgia. The mayor says they’ll have the information in Jordan’s personnel file. He offered to make the call himself since he’s met them once before. That was the easiest one.”

“Good work,” Sam said. “Ricky Richards is in surgery. They expect him to make it. I told them to tell everybody including his family if he so much as opens his eyes, to ask him who shot them, and as soon as he can take being interviewed we need to be there.”

“What about the media?” Taneesha asked. “I’ve seen a Channel 20 van already.”

“Oh, yeah, that,” Sam said. “There’ll be a briefing at one in the County Commission chambers. T.J.’s going to handle it, and the District Attorney may show up. I want you to represent our office and make sure they get in all the hotline numbers and safety tips. I’ve got red clay up to my knees and I don’t have time to clean up.”

“Sam, they’ll be expecting you,” Taneesha said.

“You can do it,” he said. “Besides, if you’re going to law school, and you want to be a prosecutor, you need to start warming up to Sanders Beal and T.J. both. Show them how you’d be in the courtroom.”

Hunter and Mallory both went to the briefing early that afternoon. The information, presented in the simplest terms, was stark.

“At some time before seven a.m. today, four cyclists, all from Merchantsville, were shot as they crossed the bridge over Foxtail Creek on Sumter Road. Aaron Twitchell, a local resident, had been first at the scene and called 911 at approximately five minutes after seven.

“Responders found three dead and one wounded.

“Ricky Richards, the owner of the GetFit Gym and Health Club, was in stable condition at the Magnolia County Medical Center following surgery for two gunshot wounds to his right leg.

“Annie King Chapman, 50, a widowed mother of two, Yoga teacher at GetFit Gym and Health Club, was found dead at the scene.

“China Rose Jackson Carson 22, a receptionist at the Magnolia County Board of Education Office, married, was found dead at the scene.

“James Everidge Jordan, 29, the Director of Planning for the City of Merchantsville, a native of Tarryville, Georgia, was found dead at the scene.

“Investigators at the scene concluded that the shooter was on foot. No weapon has been found, but ballistics tests on the ammunition indicate that it was an assault rifle. A search is ongoing…”

After it was over, Hunter talked to T.J. Jackson briefly. He was the chief investigator for the District Attorney’s office and a good friend of Sam’s.

“He’s down there in the woods around the creek,” T. J. told her. “Better him than me. He’s shot one water moccasin already.”

“Thanks for cheering me up,” Hunter said.

After a hectic day of working with Mallory to pull stories together about the shooting victims, Hunter watched the media event again on television at six that evening.

She was collapsed their big comfortable sofa with her 12-year-old stepdaughter, Bethie Bailey, cuddled at her side.

They shared the sofa with two of their cats – Tuxedo and Marmalade—and their big German Shepherd, Flannery. The third cat, Katie Calico, was in her usual place on the back of Sam’s recliner, keeping an eye on all of them.

“Miss Taneesha looked really sad,” Bethie said, scratching Flannery behind her ear. “But she looked pretty, too. I love her hair when she has those curls.”

“You need to do your homework,” Hunter said to Bethie as she turned off the news.

“At school, they were saying it was probably somebody crazy,” Bethie said. “And he might do it again. They said that if he came to our school we’d have to have a lock-down.”

“Well, let’s just hope that he gets caught soon,” Hunter said.

There was a knock on the back door. Flannery leaped off the sofa and ran to the door barking. Bethie ran to open it, and Hunter surprised herself by suddenly yelling, “Don’t you open that door until we know who it is.”

It was Mallory with a backpack.

“I thought you were at the City Council meeting,” Hunter said.

“They adjourned after a half hour,” Mallory said. “They tabled a bunch of stuff because it was from Jim Jordan’s department. I did get some good comments about him, and”, she paused for dramatic effect. “The Sheriff of Magnolia County had his secretary text me and make an official request that I spend the night here in case he can’t make it home or has to leave during the night. Do you want to see what I texted back?”

Hunter smiled and nodded.

“Here it is,” Mallory said, looking at her phone. “Advise Sheriff assignment accepted, have watched ‘Call the Midwife,’ can deliver B.B.”

Hunter and Bethie laughed. B.B. was the short version of Baby Bailey.

“Well, I’m not planning to have the baby tonight, but I’m glad you’re here,” Hunter said. “I hope you don’t mind sleeping in the nursery. We’ve still got the bed in there, but it’s full of baby stuff.”

They went upstairs and Mallory took one look and laughed.

“Has B.B. got enough stuffed animals and mobiles?” she asked, tossing her backpack onto the bed that had been moved to one corner and covered with a bright hand-made quilt.

“Well, I think that’s what comes of not being willing to tell people whether it’s a boy or girl,” Hunter said. “People don’t know whether to get pink or blue, so they go for toys.”

Bethie said, “They won’t even tell me. I’m hoping it’s a girl.”

“No point in hoping,” Hunter said to her. “Baby Bailey’s already one or the other, and you just have to wait and find out. Hey! I hear the timer. Mallory, you’re faster on the steps than I am. Would you go and get the pineapple-upside-down cake out of the oven?”

“I wondered what smelled so good,” Mallory said.

“Did you get photos of China Carson and Jim Jordan?” Hunter asked later as Mallory set up her laptop computer on the coffee table.

“Yep. Like you said, they both had photos in their personnel files – the ones they used on their IDs. Jim Jordan’s is okay, but I’ve got to find something else for China. Her Board of Ed picture was taken back when she first started working there. Since then she’s lost about 50 pounds and gotten really fit. I guess the bike riding was part of that. Anyway, the last time I saw her, she looked beautiful and had her hair cut shorter and streaked. I just don’t think it would be right to use one of her old pictures if we can find a newer one.”

“I agree,” Hunter said, “So where are you looking?”

“On Facebook,” Mallory said. “One of her cousins is on my friends list.”

Two hours later, part of the pineapple-upside-down cake had been devoured, and Bethie was reading herself to sleep. Hunter and Mallory finished up their plans for the next day’s deadline and settled into a rambling conversation.

Mallory told Hunter that her twice-widowed father, Jack Bremmer, was going to marry Sue-Ellen Larson. Hunter ventured that Sue-Ellen was a nice woman and Mallory agreed and said, “She wants him to buy another house.”

Hunter considered the fact that Jack Bremmer’s first two wives had died in the house, and said tactfully, “I can see somebody wanting to start fresh. I really would love to have more room and so would Sam, but he is so picky about the quality he wants and how much land he wants.”

Hunter’s phone rang. Miss Rose Tyndale wanted to know if Mallory was with her, because she hadn’t come home to her apartment, and Hunter winked at Mallory and assured Miss Rose that Mallory was safe.

“Well, I suppose I could have just called her,” Miss Rose said, “But I don’t want to be too grandmotherly, and I did want to ask you about what happened today.”

They talked briefly about the shooting on the bridge.

Then Miss Rose said, “I heard Annie Chapman’s Andy wouldn’t let his sister into the house when she got here, which is ridiculous. It was their mother’s house, and they certainly can’t have read the will yet. The way it happened was that four or five ladies from First Baptist had come with food, and he told them just to put the food in the kitchen, and didn’t say so much as thank you.

“So while they were still putting things into the refrigerator, Sunshine got there from Macon, and he just stood in the door and told her she couldn’t come in. The ladies tried to persuade him to let her in, but Sunshine told them not to worry about it, and she left. Anyway, she’s staying at Hilliard House.”

“Sunshine’s her real name?” Hunter asked.

“Oh, yes,” Miss Rose said. “Sunshine Elizabeth, if I remember correctly. She was in the last class I taught at the high school. Sweet girl. Her brother – well, he’s an odd one. Always has been. Smart as a whip, but odd.”

“Did Miss Rose keep up with you when she was your landlady?” Mallory asked after Hunter got off the phone and relayed the information about Annie Chapman’s son and daughter.

“Not so much as she does with you,” Hunter said. “Once I started going out with Sam I guess she assumed I was being looked after. And then when Taneesha lived there, she had Jeremy around there all the time.”

“So I need to get a boyfriend,” Mallory said, laughing.

“And then she’ll start worrying about when he’s going to propose,” Hunter said.

“All things considered,” Mallory said. “It was sweet of her to call. We do have a crazy shooter out there.”

Flannery’s ears suddenly pricked up. She let out a little whining sound and was up and running toward the back door.

“That’s got to be Sam,” Hunter said, smiling and pushing herself up to a standing position. “Flannery knows the sounds of our cars.”