Real Murder (Lovers in Crime Mystery Book 2) (6 page)

Chapter Six

The official medical examiner’s office was down the river in Weirton. However, Dr. Tad MacMillan usually performed his autopsies in the morgue located in the basement of the hospital in East Liverpool, Ohio, directly across the river from his home, and where he was a doctor on staff.

Not a popular place to visit, the morgue was eerily quiet—silent enough for Tad MacMillan to be catching a nap when Joshua stopped in for a briefing on his findings during Mike Gardner’s autopsy.

Upon stepping through the swinging doors, Joshua discovered his cousin sound asleep on the cold steel examination table with his arms folded across his chest. Unable to resist, Joshua crept forward and bent down to bring his lips to Tad’s ear before shouting in a voice mocking a small child, “Daddy! Wake up!”

With a gasp, Tad jumped so hard and fast that he almost rolled off the table. Seeing Joshua doubled over with laughter, he eased his feet down to the floor. “Very funny,” he said with sarcasm. “I’m glad my sleep deprivation is such a source of enjoyment for you.”

“I told you that you’d get yours,” Joshua said. “I had to wait twenty years, but you know what they say about   revenge—its best served cold.”

“Revenge?”

“Twenty years ago?” Joshua said. “We came back home   to visit. Grandmomma and Valerie had gone to a church meeting and the twins were taking a nap … so was I when a certain little devil came in and drew a mustache and beard on me with permanent marker.”

Recalling the incident, a slow grin came to Tad’s lips.

“I had to go to the doctor to have it removed,” Joshua told him.

“But you looked so cute.” Cocking his head at him, Tad noted, “I thought you had court today.”

“The defense copped a plea,” Joshua said. “Another B and E guy is going behind bars and I got off early to come wake you up from your late morning nap.”

“Why don’t you go home and spend some time with your bride?”

“Because she’s on her way to Cricksters with yours,” Joshua said.

“Oh yeah, today is the hen party.” Stifling a yawn, Tad went over to his desk and picked up a clipboard with a report attached to it. “How well do you think Cameron is going to fit in with the neighborhood hens?”

“As long as they don’t get between her and her ice cream sundae, they’ll be fine.” Joshua turned to follow him. “Is the ID positive?”

“Dental records were a match for Mike Gardner.” After handing the report to him, Tad plopped down into his chair. “C.O.D. is gunshot to the face.”

Joshua cringed. “Was it from his gun? Did they find his service weapon?”

Shaking his head, Tad shrugged. “Last I heard, Sawyer sent a crew back to the park to search the bottom of the lake. It wasn’t in the car. However, they did find a slug inside the car that’s a match for Mike’s gun. It’s a nine millimeter. That matches the size of the hole in his face.”

“Then it appears that the killer disarmed Mike and then shot him in the face with his own gun?”

Tad got up and went to the drawer where Mike’s remains were resting. He pulled out the drawer and lifted the sheet to reveal the skeleton. “I suspect Mike was already down and out when the killer finished him off.” Lifting the skull from the drawer, Tad showed Joshua a crack along the side of what had once been his friend’s head. “There’s a long hairline fracture along the left side of his head. It looks like it could have come from a blunt instrument, like a ball bat or something that could have knocked him down and incapacitated him, maybe even knocked him out so that the killer could disarm him and then shoot him in the face with his own gun.”

“And then put him in the car and dump it in the lake,” Joshua said. “I doubt if they’re going to find any evidence in that car after it’s been sitting in the bottom of the lake for almost two decades.”

“Makes you think that instead of meeting a confidential informant for the case he was working on,” Tad said, “he met the murderer he was looking for.”

“I guess the best place to start now is to find out the identity of that prostitute.”

“Are you really a homicide detective?” The tiny lady’s eyes sparkled like those of a star-struck teenybopper meeting her heartthrob.

With a grin, Cameron glanced across the back seat to the elderly woman who, in the year since she had met Joshua,   she had never formally met.

Dolly Houseman lived alone in the red brick house across the street from the Thorntons and the MacMillans. Joshua and the MacMillans made it their duty to look out for the lady who had no family. Joshua would take her garbage out to the curb and take the can back into her garage. Tad would mow her lawn and do yard work for her. If she needed any home repairs, one of them would make sure it was done either by himself or an honest repair person. Sitting with her in the back seat of Jan’s SUV, Cameron was the closest to Dolly that she had ever been.

Not over five feet tall, Dolly didn’t appear to be even an ounce over one hundred pounds. Her hair was blue-gray. Her face was so wrinkled that it resembled a road map. Yet even at her advanced age, she sat with dignity in her blue suit with matching pumps and handbag.

“Do you carry a gun?” Dolly asked Cameron.

“Always,” she replied.

“Have you ever shot anyone?”

Cameron answered, “Yes, I have.”

She was surprised to see the little old lady clap her hands with glee. “Oh, this is so exciting.”

“I think it’s terrible,” Lorraine said from the front   passenger seat. “There’s too much violence in the world. Women strapping on guns and shooting people. If they   outlawed guns, then people wouldn’t be shooting at each other.”

“If they outlawed guns, then only the crooks would have them and innocent, law-abiding people would have no way of defending themselves.” Cameron would have said more but caught a warning look from Jan in the rear view mirror that ordered her to let it go.

Another exceedingly elderly woman, Lorraine Winter lived up the street from Rock Springs Boulevard. Much to Cameron’s displeasure, Jan had stopped to pick up the most unpleasant woman in the neighborhood to give her a ride to the restaurant. Tad Junior was being cared for by a babysitter to allow Jan a break.

Donny joked that even the snakes avoided Lorraine Winter’s house and backyard. Within minutes of Lorraine climbing into the front seat across from Jan, Cameron saw that Donny might not have been joking. Tall and broad   shouldered even without shoulder pads, her appearance was intimidating. With her long gray hair in a bun tightly   secured to the back of her head, she was frightful in presence as well as in attitude. Armed with an opinion about everything, Lorraine Winter was a woman who was itching for a fight.

“Two wrongs don’t make a right,” Lorraine said with a shake of her head.

“How is my defending myself as a police detective wrong?”

Turning in her seat, Lorraine shook her finger at Cameron. “Did you ever think that maybe those suspected criminals who you shoot at have been wrongly accused and that they are defending themselves from unfair prosecution and that is why they are shooting at you?”

“Are you for real, lady?” Cameron managed to get out before Jan announced that the weather was perfect for their luncheon. Once again, she caught Jan’s warning look in the rearview mirror.

Cameron wondered if the ice cream sundae was worth spending a couple of hours with Lorraine, who then launched into a declaration that the last good president the country had had was Dwight D. Eisenhower. Abruptly, Cameron became aware of Dolly’s hand on hers.

The little old woman was smiling at her. “How good of a detective are you?” Dolly asked in a whisper.

“I like to think I’m pretty good.”

“Have you ever caught a killer?”

Cameron pointed to her black eye. “Got this arresting one yesterday.”

Again, Dolly clapped her hands. “Splendid. I’m looking for a detective.”

“Really?” Cameron asked. “For what? Have you got a case?”

“Oh, yes,” Dolly said. “Someone murdered one of my girls. It was a long time ago and no one has ever captured her killer. I’m an old woman and before I die I would so like to see her killer get justice.”

“Your girl?” Cameron cocked her head at her. “I didn’t know you had any children. Why did I think you’ve never been married?”

“Oh, I’ve never been lucky in love,” she said, “but I had eight girls.” She sighed. “They’re all gone now, though. Oh, Ava was the most beautiful one of all. Long hair that was the color of an Irish setter. Sexy green bedroom eyes. Legs up to here and the perkiest breasts you ever laid eyes on.”

“Ava?” Certain that her concussion was affecting her hearing, Cameron shook her head to clear her ears.

Dolly continued, “And her tush was nothing to sneeze at either.”

Again, Cameron caught Jan’s eye. She was slowly shaking her head.

Cricksters was a 1950s retro diner almost directly under the Chester Bridge on Carolina Avenue. It was Cameron and Joshua’s favorite place to eat. It served everything from burgers and sandwiches to full dinners. It also had an ice cream bar that served Cameron’s favorite dessert, the C & J Lovers’ Delight—created especially for the newlyweds.

If her silver fox was there, she would order and share it with him. But since he wasn’t, she was forced to settle for a two-scoop hot fudge sundae with everything. But first, down to business, she needed to eat lunch … or did she?

What are they going to do if I skip the meal and head straight for dessert? Shoot me? Lorraine probably would, or worse, she would say something to make me shoot her. Then Josh will have to come visit me in prison and talk to me through bars. If that didn’t put a damper on our marriage …

After they parked, Lorraine jumped out of the SUV and scurried inside, which left Jan and Cameron to help Dolly out of the backseat and across the parking lot to the door.

Jan grasped Cameron’s arm as soon as they were out of the SUV and quickly gave her the lowdown while they went around to Dolly’s side of the car. “You need to be patient with Lorraine.”

“No, I don’t,” Cameron replied.

“She’s had a hard life,” Jan said. “Her husband died suddenly, leaving her with a son to raise by herself, and then he committed suicide.”

“How awful.” Cameron couldn’t imagine if Donny had taken his own life.

“He was only twenty-four.” Jan paused with her hand on the door handle. “They found him hanging from a tree branch out in Raccoon Creek. Obviously, Lorraine never got over it.”

“I can see why.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, Dolly is a little …” Jan cleared her throat. “Senile. She’s never been married.”

“Last I heard, you don’t have to be married to have children.”

“Eight
daughters?”

“So she’s a slut with issues when it comes to birth control.”

Jan squeezed Cameron’s arm. “There are no daughters, and there’s definitely no daughter named Ava who was murdered. Take my advice. Humor her, but don’t waste your time. It’s not a real murder.” She threw open the door and reached in to take the old lady’s arm to help her out.

Inside Cricksters, Cameron ensured that she was sitting next to Dolly and as far away from Lorraine as she could get, which was a difficult maneuver because the diner was busy with the lunch crowd.

Cameron recognized many of the faces of the customers. Most were regulars like her, including one of the men sitting in the booth directly behind the ladies’ table in the center of the restaurant. Sheriff Curt Sawyer was having lunch with two men and a woman.

“Cameron,” Curt rose up in his seat to shake her hand. “That black eye is a real beauty.”

“I’m proud of it.”

Curt went on to introduce his guests. He gestured at the older man sitting next to him. “This is Phillip Lipton. He’s   the head of the state crime scene unit in Weirton.”

Cameron shook hands with the baldheaded man with thick glasses.

Curt moved on to the distinguished looking couple   sitting across from him. The woman looked very familiar to Cameron. An older woman who wore her silver hair in a straight cut down to her shoulders. The silver in her pantsuit matched the tone of her hair, along with her blouse and   silver jewels. Her tall, slender—even regal bearing—made her age difficult to pin, though Cameron estimated that she was in her sixties. She had a tall, slender bearing.

The man sitting next to her wore a dark suit and had black hair with a touch of gray at the temples. His hard-looking face had a square jaw.

Curt introduced the couple. “Congresswoman Hilliard and superintendent of the West Virginia State Police, Colonel Henry MacRae, have flown in from Charleston for a briefing on Deputy Gardner’s murder. I invited Phillip to meet with us to go over what his people have put together from Gardner’s cruiser.”

“Boy, you people sure got here fast,” Cameron said. “All the way from Charleston?”

“Deputy Michael Gardner was a police officer,” the congresswoman said in a firm tone. “That gives this case the highest priority in my book. We need to send a firm message to the public that people don’t go taking out law enforcement officers, even if they are from the smallest of small towns. No matter how long ago the crime occurred, we will hunt down the perpetrators of these crimes—”

“I’m not a resident of West Virginia,” Cameron cut her off. “So you can save your campaign speech for someone else. I’m still voting in Pennsylvania.”

For the first time, the congresswoman turned to meet Cameron’s gaze. The smirk on the homicide detective’s lips served to set fire to the politician’s cold, pale blue eyes.

Sitting on the outside of the booth, Colonel Henry MacRae, who was between Cameron and the congresswoman, broke off the stare down. “Actually, we came up here because this case is personal to me. I taught Mike Gardner at the police academy. I was sort of his mentor. I’m very interested in finding his killer.”

“So is my husband,” Cameron said, “which makes me want to find him.”

“Cameron is a homicide detective with the Pennsylvania state police,” Curt said.

“Hey,” Phillip said, “I’m from Pennsylvania.” He told Cameron, “I started out with the state police.”

“How did you end up in West Virginia?” Cameron asked.

“I was offered the position of
heading
the crime lab,” he said. “Granted, we aren’t as big as the Pennsylvania crime lab, but there’s something to be said about being in charge.” The geeky-looking man grinned. “I guess I’m just a power hungry kind of guy.”

“Well, Mr. Crime Lab, have your people found anything to tell us who killed Mike Gardner?”

“We can’t find Gardner’s gun,” Curt said. “He was shot in the head, and they recovered the slug, which is a match with his weapon, but the gun itself is missing.”

“I think we need to find out what case Gardner was working on,” Cameron said.

“Good luck with that,” Curt said.

Congresswoman Hilliard said, “I suggest that you not go jumping to conclusions. This deputy was only on the force for six months. He was a patrolman. Have you ever given any consideration to the possibility that it was a random hit by someone who had a thing against police officers, or maybe someone who had a personal grudge against him?”

Cameron felt like reaching across the table to slap the congresswoman.
What is she doing coming all the way up from Charleston to stick her nose into our murder case? Why doesn’t she go to Washington with the rest of the troublemakers and screw things up there?
As much as Cameron wanted to announce that Mike was on his way to the park to meet with a confidential informant, she held her tongue. That information wasn’t for public knowledge. If the sheriff chose to share it with the congresswoman, he could, but Cameron wasn’t going to do it.

“Hey, Cameron, are you with us or not?” Lorraine called out in a harsh voice.

“I believe the congresswoman has a good point,” the police superintendent said. “I took the liberty of looking into cases in the Ohio Valley similar to Deputy Gardner’s murder. I found one in two thousand and two where a Pennsylvania State Trooper was run down right outside Pittsburgh while giving a ticket to someone he had pulled over for a broken taillight. A suspect was never arrested, but there has been speculation that the hit was deliberate. Now maybe—”

Cameron didn’t hear the rest. It was drowned out by the roar in her ears from the blood rushing to her head due to the rapid beating of her heart brought on by fury.

Sheriff Curt Sawyer slid out of his seat to step between Cameron and MacRae. “That case is in no way connected to Deputy Gardner’s disappearance,” he insisted.

“How can you be so certain?” MacRae asked.

“Trooper Gates was killed in a hit and run by a drunk driver,” the sheriff said.

“You’re just assuming he was drunk,” MacRae said. “No suspects were ever apprehended. The case was never closed. As long as it is open, an argument could be made that—”

“That was my husband, you idiot,” Cameron sputtered out while Sheriff Sawyer ushered her back.

“I think you should go sit down, Cameron,” Curt Sawyer said in a low soothing voice. “I’ll handle this.”

“But—”

“This isn’t your case,” Curt said in a low voice. “Go order a sundae for yourself. Make it a double. I’ll handle these morons.”

“Cameron, do you want some lunch or not?” Lorraine raised her voice a notch louder to catch everyone’s attention.

Curt grinned at the glare that crossed her face at Lorraine’s chastising tone. “Go join the hen party.”

Set off by one of the women suggesting that they make sure to say grace before eating, Lorraine was ranting about how God was no more than a myth and she refused to be a part of an ancient ritual when Cameron sat down next to Dolly.

“If you don’t want to say grace, Lorraine,” Dolly replied, “then no one is making you.” Her lips curled up into a smile. Her wrinkled little face was almost childlike when she continued in a sickeningly sweet tone. “While we’re giving thanks to God for our blessings, you can go home and pack for warm weather. Believe me, you’re going to be needing it where you’re going after you bite the big one.”

“Dolly!” Jan gasped.

“You’ll get there before me.” Lorraine’s eyes were blazing.

“Lorraine!” Jan turned to gasp at the old woman on the other side of the table.

The expressions on the faces of the other women around the table were a mixture of shock and amusement.

“I’m sorry,” Dolly asked, “did I say something wrong? I must have had another one of those mini-strokes that I’ve been known to have on occasion.”

“Funny how you only seem to have them when Lorraine is around,” one of the women noted with a smile.

With a wicked giggle, Dolly grasped Cameron’s hand, leaned over, and whispered into her ear, “Growing old does have its advantages.”

“What’s that?” she asked to take her mind off of the conversation at the other end of the table. Lorraine was still sputtering about Dolly’s low blow.

“Everyone thinks old people have bad memories,” Dolly’s voice rose. “In some ways, they are right. Sometimes I do forget what I had for breakfast, but things that happened years ago—people I have met, things that were said, plans that were made, treacherous things that people did, especially horrific things to good people, the evil that some people will do to others and get away with, I remember those things with the clarity of an engraving on my brain.”

A hush had fallen around them while Dolly spoke. The little old lady’s eyes bore into Cameron’s face. The corners of her lips curled into what resembled a devilish smile.

“Do you know who did it?” Cameron asked. “Do you know who the killer is?”

“Oh, yes,” Dolly said with a grin. “I know who and I know why.”

Cameron glanced across the table at Jan, whose face was white.
She’s got quite a lot of details for someone who supposedly imagined this.
“When did this happen? How long ago?”

“Friday the thirteenth,” Dolly said.

Cameron was still staring at Dolly in shock when there was a commotion behind them.

Sheriff Curt Sawyer jumped out of his seat when a full glass of water landed in his lap.

“Oh, I am so sorry.” Phillip Lipton grabbed a handful of paper napkins and tried to mop up the spill as best he could. But the glass of water had been full and had gotten all over. “The glass just slipped out of my hand.”

Meanwhile, the front of Curt’s uniform looked like he had peed his pants. Cursing, the sheriff stomped off to the men’s restroom. The congresswoman and the detective moved out of the booth to allow room for the server, armed with napkins and paper towels, to clean up.

As humiliating as it was, Cameron couldn’t help but smile at the crime lab chief’s embarrassment. Lipton glanced up in their direction while helping the server mop. Dolly giggled out loud at the scene. Lipton turned red all the way across his face and up across his bald scalp.

Meanwhile, Lorraine shook her head while making “tsk-tsk” noises with her tongue. “Idiot.”

“I wouldn’t be so quick to judge about who’s the idiot,” Cameron muttered. “I’ll bet he knows how long an eternity in hell is.”

Hearing her, Dolly burst into another round of giggles while clapping her hands with delight. “You are such a clever girl.” Grasping her hand in her wrinkled paw, she said, “I like you. I have a feeling you’re going to be the one to find Ava’s killer.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re such a pretty girl.”

Cameron blushed.

“Such a shame about your breasts,” the old woman said with a shake of her head.

Cameron glanced down at her chest. “What’s wrong with them?”

“They aren’t perky enough.”