Terry Odell - Mapleton 03 - Deadly Puzzles (19 page)

“
Maybe the guy moved them.” Gordon checked under the bed, then the vanity cabinet in the bathroom. He didn’t keep a lot of personal stuff at Angie’s—a few pairs of underwear, socks, three or four shirts, and some jeans. An old pair of sneakers. “That makes no sense. You’re sure nothing of yours is missing?”

Angie
’s brow furrowed as she went through her clothes again. “Nothing I can see.” She popped into the bathroom. Drawers opened and closed. “Your travel kit’s gone, too.”

Gordon sank onto the bed, trying to put these new puzzle pieces together. Angie went into the living room and came back a moment later carrying three CD cases.
“These are yours.”

Gordon pondered that one.
“Okay, there’s nothing obvious about those that says they belong to me. You have anyone who’s been hitting on you? Or someone from your past? Jealousy’s always a prime motive.”

Angie plopped down next to him.
“Well, Kyle Foster didn’t take it well when we broke up.”

“
Kyle Foster?”

“
Yeah. My first true love.” She crossed her palms over her heart. “Third grade.”

Gordon gave her biceps a playful swat.
“A little more recent than that.”

“
There’s the usual casual flirtation sometimes, but it’s all in fun.”

Gordon stiffened.
“Who’s been flirting with you?”

“
I didn’t mean it that way. You know, when you chat with customers, some are friendly, some make comments with little innuendos, but nothing I’d consider anything more than small talk. You know, someone says, ‘I really love your buns’ and he might mean my cinnamon rolls, or he might be teasing. A couple of guys have offered to take me to Finnegan’s for a drink after work, but I’ve never accepted. Sometimes a group of us go out and have some fun, but everyone knows I’m taken.” She cocked her head. “I
am
, aren’t I?”

He ignored the question.
“I want to know who. A list.”

Her eyes popped.
“You’re serious? You can’t be jealous.” She stabbed him with her gaze. “My God, you
are
jealous.”

Gordon couldn
’t respond to that one. Not with the way his gut had clenched when Angie mentioned flirtatious customers or goofing around with friends, some of whom were male.

Angie went on.
“I can’t believe anyone would do this because I was seeing someone else. Especially if they knew that particular someone else was the chief of police.”

“
It could happen. So, if nobody recognized this guy, then maybe he’s a stranger and didn’t know I’m a cop.”

“
But if he’s a stranger, how would he know to come up here, and why would he take your stuff?”

Gordon scratched his jaw.
“I’m working on that one. Maybe Solomon will get some prints and we’ll have a direction to follow.”

“
So, while we wait, how about I give you your Valentine’s Day present? Then I have to get downstairs.”

“
I have one for you, too.” Gordon headed to the coat rack. “Shit.”

“
What now?” Angie asked.

“
My jacket. I know I hung it up here. Did you see it when you put everything away?”

“
No,” Angie said. “I wasn’t even thinking at that point.”

“
Your present was in the pocket,” Gordon said.

She made another quick pass through the living room.
“Yours is gone, too.” She flopped onto the couch, bent over with elbows on her knees, and rested her head in her hands. “Damn.”

“
Okay, because he took stuff, we’ve moved to a class four felony. Prosecutor might decide to go with misdemeanor theft, but I say we go all the way.”

She raised her head.
“Whatever. That kind of stuff is your world, not mine. Right now, I’m mad that he spoiled our Valentine’s Day. I can get you another gift, but it might be a little late.”

“
Same here,” Gordon said. “Are we going to keep them a secret until then?”

She thought for a moment.
“Yeah. Why not? And that gives me the option to change my mind and get you something else. A woman’s prerogative, you know.”

“
Until then, how’s this?” He cradled her face and kissed her. Long and slow.

She sighed, pulled away for a moment, and ran her finger along his jaw. Gave him the impish grin he loved. Then moved in for another kiss, longer and slower. When it ended, she said,
“And that was for being jealous.” She stood and finger-combed her hair. “Although there’s no reason to be. You can let yourself out. But lock up. You never know who might be lurking downstairs waiting for a chance to throw stuff around my apartment.”

Glad she was taking things so well, Gordon sat on the sofa and waited until things settled before calling Solomon.

“Just yours?” Solomon said, when Gordon filled him in. “Now, that’s weird.”

And Solomon had the decency not to mention the fact that Gordon was keeping some of his things at Angie
’s.

“
Not to mention it pisses me off. And he got the gift I was going to give Angie for Valentine’s Day.”

“
Not
the
gift?” Solomon said. “The fourth finger, left hand variety?”

“
Geez, no, nothing like that. Earrings. Not all that expensive.”

Solomon
’s pause was a bit too long. As if he was deciding whether to push the topic.

Gordon went on to fill the void.
“It’s—I don’t know what it is. I can get her another pair, but, even if I get her the same ones, it won’t be the same. And the creep took whatever she was going to give me.”

And why was he getting so put out about some clothes, a razor, and a couple of gifts? And why was he babbling all this to Solomon?
“Never mind. I should get to the station and give you a hand with the investigation.”

“
And do what?” Solomon said. “It’s all waiting. And a few computer searches, all of which I’m capable of, and if necessary, there’s the civilian patrol guys who eat this stuff up. You’re off duty until Monday, and as acting Chief of Police, I am ordering you to stay away.”

“
You are, are you?”

“
A little too heavy-handed, you think? Abusing my authority?” Solomon chuckled.

“
No, you’re well within the scope of duty. But you’ll call as soon as you’ve got something.”

“
Of course. It’s your stuff that’s missing and your girlfriend’s apartment that was ransacked, and as the victims of a crime, you have the right to know how the investigation is going.”

“
But—”

“
No buts, Chief. You don’t let victims investigate their own crimes. Police work 101.”

Reluctantly, Gordon hung up. Angie was busy, he had an accumulation of dirty laundry, and—the thought slammed into him like colliding with an elk. Remote a possibility as it seemed, if
he
was a target, then whoever broke into Angie’s place might have done the same at his.

He played with the new puzzle as he
sped home, laying out the pieces in his mind.

Someone was jealous that Angie was seeing him and removed all traces of him from her apartment. As Angie had pointed out, anyone who knew he was a cop wouldn
’t have been that stupid. So, a casual—very casual acquaintance? Someone who didn’t live in Mapleton? Someone out of Angie’s past? That had a few possibilities. He’d come to see her, found out she was unavailable, and trashed it, stealing Gordon’s things? But how would a relative stranger know where Angie lived, or how to get there?

Someone she
’d been a lot closer to, then. Someone who might have left some of
his
things in her apartment once. Gordon’s gut clenched again, despite the fact that the logical side of his brain kept shouting that both he and Angie had past relationships, and they’d already talked about how what happened in the past didn’t matter in the now.

Angie
’s right. You do get all manly-macho
.

He stopped his SUV at the curb of the house next door to his and pulled his Beretta from its holster. Overly cautious, he told himself. He had a damn good security system and hadn
’t had a call from the monitoring company.

The unblemished snow in his yard, the lack of tire tracks in the driveway said nobody had come by since the last snowfall, which was—when? Solomon had said the Mapleton weather was nothing like what he
’d had in Tranquility Valley. Dog footprints patterning his neighbor’s yard said the snow wasn’t recent.

But if someone had parked around the block and come in through the back … Gordon
’s brain churned through all the possibilities. One that refused to go away was that there was someone inside waiting for him. Light peeked from behind the living room curtains. He checked the dash clock. His lamps were on timers, so the glow at the window was normal.

Telling himself he was overreacting, but knowing he had to check, he drove around, to the other side of his block. No unfamiliar vehicles. Most of the people who lived here worked, so dark, empty houses, like the Bakers
’, were the norm. Next door to that, Winston and Salem, the resident German shepherds that Gordon thought of as the “Bark Brothers,” bounded back and forth along the boundaries of the invisible fence, letting the entire block know someone was approaching. No, if his guy had come from the rear, it would have been via the vacant house on other side of the Bakers’. The “For Sale” sign in the yard and the lockbox on the front door made it the logical choice.

Gordon drove beyond the vacant house and parked. He grabbed his Beretta and the flashlight he kept in the glove box and opened the door. The frigid air rolled over him, and he cursed the creep who stole his jacket. From down the block, the Bark Brothers continued to announce Gordon
’s presence as he stepped out of his SUV and played his light over the snow. Plenty of footprints, but none leading to his own house.

As satisfied as he could be that his house wasn
’t a target—yet—Gordon hopped inside the SUV and cranked up the heat for the short return trip home.

He parked in his garage, and telling himself it still made sense to be cautious, he cleared his own house. No signs of anyone. He cranked up the thermostat, took his duffel to the laundry room, and dumped the contents, which was as close as he was getting to doing laundry tonight. Instead, he poured himself a stiff drink and powered up his computer. Because he wasn
’t
supposed
to investigate a crime he was personally involved in didn’t mean he wasn’t going to—as Solomon put it—poke around.

And maybe he
’d see what Kyle Foster was up to now.

Gordon arrived at the station Monday morning, thirty minutes before change of shift. The bouquet he
’d ordered for Laurie was displayed prominently on her desk. No sign of the chocolate, but that wasn’t surprising. She wasn’t stupid enough to leave them out where everyone passing by would take one.

He found a neatly typed schedule on his desk, along with a hand-written thank you note for his gifts. Before he started his day, he checked Paula
’s blog, wondering if she’d posted anything about the Yardumians’ yet. No, today was Bowling Green, Kentucky and Mammoth Cave National Park. He hoped the Yardumians hadn’t given Paula a free ride expecting publicity. Then again, he remembered that
Paula’s Places
didn’t follow a logical sequence. She might have a post about Tranquility Valley scheduled for next week, next month, or months down the line. He skimmed the post. Vague and generic like the others. Nothing to indicate the date of her visit. Okay, time to get to work.

He went through the weekend reports, setting aside his curiosity about the break-in at Angie
’s and skimming the routine ones first. Solomon hadn’t called him with any progress reports Saturday or Sunday, so Gordon had managed to busy himself with catching up on household chores and buying a new jacket for himself and another pair of earrings for Angie. Which he’d give her tonight over dinner.

Feeling up to speed on the normal operations of Mapleton, Gordon turned to the reports on the break-in. As expected, given Solomon
’s silence, they hadn’t found much. Prints galore on the chair backs. No hits on any of them, though. Gordon didn’t think it would be feasible—or appropriate—to suggest the Daily Bread staff polish the chairs between each set of customers. Plenty of prints in the restroom as well, although only a few high on the wall where someone might have braced himself while holding a cigarette—or cigarettes—up near the smoke detector. No hits on those yet, either, although Solomon’s notes said they were trying to see if those prints matched any of the ones on the chair.

Solomon had pulled security footage from the parking lot at Finnegan
’s and had assigned Nathan Romash of the civilian patrol the task of identifying the vehicles parked there the night of the break-in. Nathan’s list was attached. Almost all Mapleton residents, which Gordon set aside as being highly unlikely suspects. Three vehicles—a dark-colored Dodge Ram pickup, an equally unremarkable Subaru SUV, and a light-colored Ford Focus—were unidentified and their plates weren’t visible on the camera, although Nathan’s report gave a couple of partials. Solomon hadn’t run them yet. Gordon made a note of them and put that on his own to-do list. But first, he captured the frames from the video and printed a dozen copies of each. Too bad the new CCTV technology that could capture license plates wasn’t in Mapleton’s budget.

~~~

When it was time for roll call, Gordon stood at the rear of the briefing room. He didn’t come in often, leaving the routine to the officer-in-charge, so there was an undercurrent of anticipation in the room. When Sergeant Gaubatz turned things over to him, Gordon strode to the front of the room, shoving down his own unease at speaking in front of a routine change of shift. You’d think he’d be over it by now, but he still fought sweaty palms and a dry mouth whenever he had to stand in front of a group and talk. Didn’t matter if he knew them or not.

“
First, thanks to everyone for their excellent service while I was away. I’m proud to know that the Mapleton PD runs smoothly in my absence.” He paused. Smiled. “Or maybe that means I’m not needed.”

A hesitant ripple of laughter followed his remark. So much for his feeble attempt at levity.
“As Sergeant Gaubatz has reiterated, we still don’t have a suspect in the false alarm set at Daily Bread, nor the break-in and burglary at Angie Mead’s apartment. However, these three vehicles were parked at Finnegan’s on the day in question.” He paused and handed the printouts to one of the officers in the front row, who began distributing them.

“
We don’t have enough information—yet—to identify them or their owners. If you see any of these vehicles while you’re patrolling, get the full plate and call it in. And it goes without saying that any leads to our suspect—at the moment all we can say is he’s a white male—should be called in immediately as well. Be safe.”

With that, he threw the session to Gaubatz, who added the usual alerts. Lost dog, trampled flower bed, noisy neighbors. Diligence about expired parking meters and watching for people ignoring the flashing red lights on stopped school busses. Which reminded Gordon that it was time to head to the elementary school for his crossing guard duty. One of his favorite tasks.

As always after his stint at the school, Gordon’s spirits lifted. Something about the way the kids—mainly the little ones—smiled, waved, and said, “Hi, Mr. Chief,” gave him hope for the future. Maybe his presence might inspire one or two of them to a life of service. And maybe, just maybe, keep one or two of them from turning into someone like whoever had burglarized Angie’s apartment.

At the very least, it got him out from behind his desk and away from the endless spreadsheets.

When he got back, Laurie handed him a pink message slip. “Only one?” Gordon said. “Slow morning.”

“
The others are on your desk,” she said. “This one came in a minute ago. From a Trooper Kennedy out of Section Five.”

Gordon
’s pulse skipped. “Thanks. He say what it was about?”

Laurie shook her head.
“Nothing specific. A case they were working. Said you could call him. He didn’t say it was urgent.”

Gordon thanked Laurie and kept his pace sedate as he went to his office, although inside, he was skipping. A break in the case? Which case? Pickup crash or the Wardell accident? Or had someone turned in a cell phone memory card. Ha!

He parked himself behind his desk and picked up the phone.

When Kennedy answered, Gordon skipped the niceties.
“Hepler, returning your call. You have something new?”

“
Something interesting. The Wardell accident. Missing wife case?”

“
Yeah. Did you find her? She all right?”

“
Nope to the first. But you remember the uncle from Telluride? The one we couldn’t reach? We found him.”

“
Great. What did he say?”

“
Nothing.”

Gordon sensed Kennedy was dragging this out, enjoying a moment of drama.
“You didn’t call to tell me the man didn’t say anything. What’s the deal?”

Gordon could almost hear the drum roll. Stifling his impatience, he let Kennedy play it his way. Tucking the handset between ear and shoulder, Gordon went to his coffee pot for a refill.

“The Telluride cops got a Check on Well-Being call from a neighbor who hadn’t seen the uncle. Newspapers crammed into the delivery box, and the neighbor said the uncle would tell him if he was out of town.”

Another pause. Gordon waited again.

“Cops checked. The uncle was dead.”

Gordon stopped mid-sip and went to his desk.
“I’m assuming there’s a reason to believe it wasn’t natural causes or you wouldn’t have called me.”

“
Strangulation. Hardly natural.” Kennedy’s tone shifted to all business. “All I know is they found the guy in his bedroom, in bed. You’ll have to connect with the locals in Telluride and see what they’ll share after they do the autopsy.”

“
I’ll do that,” Gordon said. “And still no leads on the wife?”

“
Nope. And Wardell’s quit nagging us. Guess dealing with his uncle being murdered has shifted his whining to the Telluride cops. Don’t get me wrong—we’re still looking. But it’s in the hands of the CBI.”

Colorado Bureau of Investigation. They had all the toys. But they also had a lot on their plates.

Stop. You’ve got enough to do. It’s their puzzle now.

“
Thanks for the call,” Gordon said. “What about the pickup truck homicide?”

“
Based on how hard it would be to make those two shots, the investigative team is looking at snipers, but without any trace from the scene, in my opinion, it’s going to end up in the cold case file. On the bright side, though—the driver’s ex-wives aren’t calling us three times a day asking why we haven’t found the killer yet, the way Wardell is.”

Cop humor. Gordon thanked Kennedy and returned to his coffee. After making sure his door was closed, he tilted back his chair, folded his hands behind his head, and crossed his feet on the desk. More puzzle pieces, but how many puzzles was he looking at? He ticked them off in his head. On the home front, which should be his priority, was Angie
’s case. It was the one in his jurisdiction, but he could stretch the missing memory card from his phone in there as well. Then, the fire at the Yardumians’, with its unidentified victim. Wardell’s missing wife, and what sent his car down the ravine. The pickup truck driver’s homicide.

Whoever said life in small towns was boring ought to check out rural Colorado.

Since Solomon had done an excellent job making sure everything was ready for Gordon’s first day back, Gordon called the San Miguel County Sheriff’s Office.

He introduced himself and was transferred around until he was connected with someone who would, in the interest of interdepartmental cooperation, answer Gordon
’s questions.

“
Still early days,” the deputy said. “Lab results aren’t in. I can tell you there didn’t seem to be signs of a struggle.”

“
He was strangled, according to what I was told. So if there was no struggle, he might have known his attacker.”

“
That’s one theory. Another is he was drugged first. Or, he was killed somewhere else and the body positioned on the bed. Lividity suggests if that was the case, he was moved shortly after death. They’re waiting for tox screen results. That, and the autopsy will help. No motives we can find. Neighbor said everyone liked him. Active in his church, paid his bills. Run of the mill good citizen. Modest bank account.”

“
What about his nephew? Orrin Wardell. I had a run-in with him at the Tranquility Valley B and B—”

The deputy cut him off.
“He’s a royal pain in the ass. Thinks the real world works like television and we should have this wrapped up in forty-five minutes.”

“
You looking at him as a possible?” Gordon asked.

“
He’s on our list,” the deputy said. “So far, he’s clean. We’re keeping him as a person of interest.”

“
Where did he say he’s from? When he showed up at the B and B, he claimed to be from New Mexico, but his car came back to a Colorado address.”

“
Huh? Hang on.”

Gordon went through his email while he waited for the deputy. An estimate for a security system for Angie
’s place. He knew staying all the way out at his place wouldn’t work for her, but she’d finally agreed to having a system installed for Daily Bread. Gordon had taken the liberty of tacking her apartment to it as well. Even though she’d give him that manly-macho stuff again, he’d feel better knowing she was safer. He replied to the email and authorized the add-on.

The deputy came back on line.
“Got an address in New Mexico on Wardell. I guess since he said his car was totaled, nobody bothered to look beyond his address.”

“
Can I have it?” Gordon asked. He jotted down what the deputy dictated. He’d started punching the address into his search engine when Solomon came in.

“
Those prints from Daily Bread, Chief. Good news and not-so-good news,” his officer said.