Linda Crowder - Jake and Emma 02 - Main Street Murder (10 page)

12

Sirens screamed
in the quiet summer night, converging on Cheri’s house by the river.  Neighbors peered out curiously as two then three then four police cruisers joined the one that had been sitting in Cheri’s driveway since early evening.  Silence returned as each arriving car cut its siren, the noise replaced by blue and red lights rotating on the top of each vehicle.

First to arrive on the scene, Luis Altrez found Officer Rutledge laying on her side, eyes fixed with the unmistakable look of death.  Blood mixed with brain and bone oozed from a wound in her head.  Officer Altrez withdrew his hand from her neck when he found no pulse and controlled the impulse to wretch.

He reached for the radio on his shoulder.  “Officer down,” he told the dispatcher.  “I repeat, officer down.”  His fellow officers spread out as they moved past the body, each advancing in a semi-crouch, guns drawn, nerves jagged.  Officer Altrez noted the distant siren of the approaching ambulance and joined the line moving cautiously toward the house.

“Police!” shouted the lead officer as he flattened himself against the wall beside the open front door.  He nodded to the officer who was pressed against the wall on the other side of the door. 

“Police, hands up!” shouted the officer as he threw himself around the wall and crouched in the doorway, gun pointed forward ready to shoot if needed.  Methodically, the officers moved through the house, searching every room but finding them empty. 

They gathered in the entry and radioed the results of their search to the dispatcher.  There was no indication that anyone had broken into the house.  There was no sign of either the intruder or the home’s owner.

The ambulance crew had followed protocol for what the dispatcher had designated an active shooter scene and waited for back up before approaching Officer Rutledge.  They hadn’t waited long when Detective Joyner arrived.  He stood guard while they hurried to see if there was anything they could do for the fallen officer.

Joyner had radioed for the coroner as soon as he saw the body.  He’d seen enough death to know the look of it.  He swore under his breath and spared a moment to think how devastated her parents and fiancé would feel when the police chaplain called on them to break the news.

He roused himself from his thoughts when Altrez called to him from the house.  “Where’s the other body?” he asked, resigned to hear the worst.

“The house is empty,” responded Altrez.  “No sign of a struggle that we could find.”

Joyner nodded to Altrez and another officer.  “Check the grounds behind the house.  See if she made it outside.”  They moved to the patio door and Joyner turned to the other officers.  “Check with the neighbors.  See if anybody heard or saw anything.  We can’t have missed them by much.”

Joyner stood alone in the doorway of Cheri’s house, wondering where the killers would have taken her.  He’d given the older woman one of the few panic alert devices the department possessed and told her to keep it with her at all times.  She had sounded the alarm, probably when she saw the attack on Officer Rutledge, alerting the dispatcher at the station who had immediately put out an “all units respond” alert.

They first officer had arrived within five minutes of the alarm, with the others close behind.  He’d hoped the fast response would have been enough to catch the killers before they could strike.  They hadn’t been fast enough to save Ann Rutledge.

“Detective!”  Joyner turned to find a shaken and pale but very much alive Cheri Jackson.  Officer Altrez had one arm around her holding her upright and the other clung tightly to her hand. 

“Bring her in here,” Joyner gestured to Cheri’s armchair.  Ducking out the front door he shouted to the ambulance crew, who grabbed their stretcher and hurried to the house.

They knelt down in front of Cheri, checking her vital signs and looking for injuries.  They radioed the supervising physician in the emergency room, who advised they bring her in for observation.  Reluctantly, Cheri agreed and they helped her from her chair onto the waiting stretcher. 

As they secured the safety straps, Joyner leaned over her.  “Who did this Ms. Jackson?  Who killed Officer Rutledge?”

Cheri looked up at him, a pained expression on her face.  “Ann is dead?  Oh my dear God.”

“Can it wait, detective?” asked the EMT.  “Her vitals are all over the place.  We’ve got to get moving.”

Joyner stepped back and waived them out.  He turned to Altrez.  “Where did you find her?”

“Hiding down by the river,” he answered.  “Shaking and scared to death, poor woman.”

“Did she say anything?  Did she tell you what happened?”

Altrez shook his head.  “She just kept asking where Ann was and was she ok.”  He shuddered, the image of Officer Rutledge’s body when he found her was not going to be easy to get out of his head.

Joyner nodded.  “Good work,” he said.  “Now go home.  Don’t argue with me, you know the protocol.  Go home and in the morning report to the police chaplain.  You,” he turned to the officer who had been searching with Altrez, “can wait for the lab.  When they’re done outside I want them to go over this place with a microscope and see if they can pick up anything to tell me who our killer is.”

The two men headed outside, parting at the end of the drive.  Since Altrez been the first to arrive, his car was blocked in by the coroner’s van.  The coroner was waiting for the crime scene photographer to finish before he could remove the body of the fallen officer.  He got into the van and backed it up and over to the side of the road far enough for Altrez to extract his cruiser.

Before the coroner could reclaim his vacated space, the crime lab vehicle pulled into it.  The coroner sighed and parked his van down the street from the murder scene.  It was going to be a long night.

Detective Joyner left the scene in the capable hands of the coroner and the lab crew and headed to the hospital.  Talking with the neighbors had yielded nothing, which frustrated him.  He’d hoped someone would have noticed a vehicle out of place in the quiet neighborhood, but no one had.  They’d been inside watching television or out on their decks enjoying the cooler evening temperatures.  No one had noticed whether any vehicles came or went from Cheri’s driveway.

All the coroner had been able to tell him from an initial inspection of Officer Rutledge’s body was that she’d been struck with considerable force by a blunt object.  The rest would have to wait for autopsy, which would require the body to be sent out of state since Wyoming didn’t have a forensic specialist. 

One of the benefits of the low population, thought Joyner as he pulled up at the hospital and parked in the space reserved for law enforcement.  Low murder rates meant low demand for forensic examinations.  If they weren’t too back logged in Colorado, he’d have the results within 48 hours.

Joyner stopped at the desk to inquire about Cheri’s location and was directed to an examining room in the emergency department.  Entering the room, he was surprised to see Jake and Emma Rand.  Emma was standing by the bed, her hands wrapped around one of Cheri’s.  Jake was sitting uncomfortably in one of the chairs that wasn’t built for a man his height.

Emma turned and Jake stood when Joyner walked into the room.  Jake shook the detective’s hand and offered to leave the room if Joyner wanted to speak with Cheri more privately.

“No, you’re fine,” answered Joyner and Jake reclaimed his uncomfortable chair.  Joyner moved to the side of the bed opposite Emma and was relieved to see Cheri had lost the ashen look she’d had when he last saw her.

“How are you feeling, Ms. Jackson?” he asked.  “Do you think you’re up to speaking with me about what happened tonight?”

“It’s so late, Detective,” said Emma softly. 

“It’s all right Emma,” Cheri assured her friend and counselor.  “They’ve got to find the person who killed Ann.”

She turned her head to face Joyner.  “Ask me anything, Detective,” she told him.  “But I’ll warn you right now, I didn’t see the person who did this.”

Joyner sighed, “I’m real sorry to hear that, Ms. Jackson, but I’m just thankful you’re safe.  Why don’t we start with what Officer Rutledge was doing outside of your house.”

“She was walking Kristy to her car,” explained Cheri. 

“Kristy?” asked Emma in surprise.  “What was Kristy doing there?”

Cheri turned her head to look at Emma.  “She stopped by to tell me about that dinner date you tried to set her up with tonight.”

Emma reddened.  “I meant well,” she said sheepishly.

“Ms. Castle was there about what time?” asked Joyner.

Cheri thought for a moment.  “She called just as Ann and I were coming inside from the patio,” she mused.  “Mosquitoes were thick as fleas.  I guess that would have been about 10:30pm because the sun was already down.”

Emma nodded.  “She left our house just after 10 so that would have been about right.”

“Anyway, I told her to come on over.  She didn’t stay long, maybe half an hour or so.”

“And Officer Rutledge walked her out?” prompted Joyner when Cheri failed to continue.

“Yes,” she answered.  “There was a noise outside.”  She turned to Emma.  “Jonas,” she told her and Emma nodded.

“Jonas?” asked Joyner.

“My cat, Detective.  He’s always getting into fights with the neighbor’s tom cat.  Jonas is little but he’s scrappy and that cat just gets on his last nerve.”  She launched into a story about Jonas and his propensity to argue with the tom, but Joyner reeled her back in.

“And Officer Rutledge went out to check on Jonas?” he asked.

“Kristy was scared,” explained Cheri.  “She about jumped out of her skin hearing that cat and it’s so dark in the drive.  I really have to get some of those low voltage walkway lights.”  Joyner sighed. 

“So of course, Ann got her flashlight and offered to walk Kristy to her car.”

“Did you watch them go?” asked Joyner.

“No, Ann told me to shut the door and lock it until she came back so I did.”

“What happened to make you hit the panic alarm?” Joyner asked.

“Well, they must have spooked the cats because not long after I shut the door I heard Jonas howling on the stoop like a banshee.  I opened the door and he practically ran me over getting inside.”

“When you opened the door, did you see anything other than the cat?” asked Joyner.

“No,” said Cheri, tilting her head and casting her eyes up and to the side in thought.  She looked at Joyner, “But I wasn’t looking down the drive.”

“Did you hear Ms. Castle’s car or see her headlights backing out of the drive?” asked Joyner.

“No, not that I remember,” she said uncertainly.  “But again, I wasn’t thinking about that, I was thinking about Jonas.”

“So you let the cat in and then what?” asked Joyner patiently.  “What frightened you into calling for help?”

“I was in the kitchen, trying to coax Jonas down from the top of the cabinets,” she looked at Emma again.  “He always hides on top of the cabinets when he’s had a bad scare.”  Emma nodded and Cheri continued.

“I heard the door bell.  I guess I must have locked the door again after I let Jonas in.  I started to go open it but then I remembered I had to wait for Ann to give me the code word.”

Cheri looked frightened and Emma squeezed her hand encouragingly.  “Only she didn’t.  I called out to her but she didn’t answer.  It just got quiet.  I saw a shadow through the window and heard someone rattle the door handle.  My blood just ran cold.”

Cheri looked up at Joyner.  “I grabbed that panic button you gave me and ran.  I went out the back door and down to the river as fast and as quiet as I could.”

She closed her eyes, reliving the terror she’d felt.  “I must have pushed that button a hundred times before I heard the sirens off in the distance.”

She opened her eyes again and looked at Emma.  “I was never so thankful in my life as when I heard those sirens.”

“Did you see anyone in the house?” asked Joyner.  “Or maybe they came around the house to the back when the front door was locked?”