Sonoma Squares Murder Mystery

by Robert Digitale

  Sandra slammed her door and flew into Copperfield’s. The public space? she thought whirling around, taking in the layout. It’s all public—no, there used to be…. She grabbed Abby and dragged her toward the back stairs, pointing.

  “A public board!”

  The reporters searched the board. A couple of shoppers drifted toward them.

  “Nothing. Events, classes, editing services. What—”

  “—This!” Sandra pointed to a Xeroxed flier.

  Abby read, “‘Learn to play an instrument. Piano. Guitar. Harmonica. Accordion. Classes held in your town: Healdsburg, Sonoma, Sebastopol and more…’ I don’t understand.”

  Sandra ripped the announcement down. “Abby, the tags have my cell number and these are the cities. Could it mean I ‘play’ (sic)?”

  “I’ll take that Ms. Cordero,” an earth-mother in a purple maxi said, flashing a badge. “You’ll have to come with us.”

  The shoppers ushered the stunned friends into the bookstore office.

  “How did you know we’d be here?” Abby asked.

  “We’re staking out the area. Your friend might be watching you,” the matronly cop replied.

  “Why here?” Sandra demanded.

  “You’d better talk to Detective Brown.” The younger plainclothes cop handed her a ringing phone.

  “Brown,” a familiar voice said.

  “Are you bugging my phone?” Sandra’s voice rose to a shrill.

  “You found the clue?”

  “Are you?”

  “No, the warrant’s for transmissions from the second victim’s cell. It’s our duty to monitor every text message our suspect sends.”

  Next Time: “Phone Secret.” Brown thinks he may have found a way to catch the killer.

  Ana Manwaring, www.anamanwaring.com, writes, teaches creative writing through Napa Valley College and privately in Sonoma County, and is a principal in JAM Manuscript Consulting, https://www.jam-editing.com. She’s branded cattle in Hollister, out-run maniacs on Calistoga Road, lived on houseboats, consulted brujos, visited every California mission, worked for a PI, and swum with dolphins, and she writes about it all. She’s finished Book 1 of The Hydra Effect, thrillers set against Mexico’s El Narco, and is writing a memoir of the years she lived in Mexico City.

  Previously: The killer texts Sandra on her personal cell phone and says she must solve his riddle or someone else will die. Sandra and Abby go to a Sebastopol bookstore to retrieve a clue, but detectives quickly take control of it. Investigators are monitoring every text the killer sends from the Sonoma victim’s cell phone.

  Chapter 8 – Phone Secret

  By RANDI ROSSMANN

  Brown was wide awake by 5:30. His brain snapped on and he sighed. The day loomed long and he felt the pressure of the case, excitement for the chase and fear they wouldn’t catch the killer before someone else died. Then there was the pressure from his sergeant and the sheriff. He reached over and ruffled Franny’s fur. Brown might be getting up but old Franny was going to stay put in her favorite place.

  Just a few more minutes in bed. It was the best night sleep he’d had since the report of the Sonoma homicide. Six hours of snooze time, a luxury, and he felt a little guilty.

  After a quick shower Brown put on his Saturday clothes, jeans, a knit shirt and a sport coat would work. No tie today. He drew a towel over his blond buzz cut, ready to roll. Not wanting to take time for real coffee, he drank a few sips of instant just to feel something hot going down, tossed back a few handfuls of dry cereal, strapped on his duty gun and stuck a couple of protein bars in his jacket pocket. As he headed out the door, he checked the water bowl and made sure the dog door was unlocked. “Bye girl, wish me luck,” he yelled. He could hear her tail thumping on the bed as he closed the back door.

  At 32, Brown had been a detective for three years, enough time to have been lead investigator on exactly five other homicides and shotgun on maybe two dozen others. But those had mostly been domestic violence, drunken “friends” in fights and gang slayings. This was one the retired detectives talk about.

  By 6:45 a.m. he was upstairs at the Sheriff’s office, in the violent crimes investigations unit. After starting a pot of real coffee in the closet-sized coffee room and digging out his Chico State mug from the pile in the dish drainer, Brown headed for the interview room where the big dry board was half covered in writing.

  Two columns, one headed “Pismo” and the other “Spittleheim.” Underneath each name were their particulars, age, town of residence, and what they’d been doing when last seen.

  By the time the others arrived at 7:30 a.m., he’d made long lists for the day and added “MOTIVE” in big letters and “CELL PHONE” to the board.

  Brown looked at his audience. Sheriff’s detectives Rusty McCaughn and Roberto Nunez along with their sergeant, Robin Maddocks, stood together. Healdsburg Police Officer Desiree Ransom, who’d had to be escorted into the department’s inner sanctum by Nunez, stood by herself, looking a bit uneasy.

  Ransom had started investigating the first death, which by day’s end had become a murder, thanks to the autopsy. The Sonoma death also officially became a slaying when the doc found poor Spittleheim also had a needle puncture to his heart. With two deaths and the prospect of more, the Sheriff’s Office was taking the lead and Healdsburg was loaning Ransom to the effort and hoping to get the promising young officer some experience.

  Nunez helped her find a less-used coffee cup, and the sergeant dumped a bag of whole wheat bagels on a plate, sans cream cheese. They all took a seat at a conference table while Brown stood by the board.

  “Matilda Pismo, 44, Geyserville resident. Injected with something and carried or dragged through the Healdsbug plaza where she was dumped at the memorial statue. The night she died she’d been at a wine bar off the plaza with co-workers. She was a hostess at Fitch Mountain Winery,” recapped Brown.

  “Wally Spittleheim, 59, Lakeport, also injected. A taxidermist. He’d been in Sonoma for business. Last seen that night in the downtown plaza park talking on his cell phone. Found face up in the Sonoma Plaza duck pond.”

  “Two homicides, left in very public places, killed with a syringe of something. Tox not back yet? Did we tell them to hustle on that?” Brown looked to the sergeant.

  “Yes. Repeatedly, should be any time,” she answered.

  “Ok, what do we know now?” asked Brown, holding a red marker and looking at Rusty McCaughn, the senior VCI detective and a mentor to Brown.

  “We know he’s using Spittleheim’s phone. We’ve been monitoring the account and he’s turning it on every day, from various remote locations,” said McCaughn, giving Brown a nod of encouragement.

  “He’s quick,” added Nunez. “It’s only on for about a minute. He rarely texts or calls Cordero. We’re thinking he’s checking each day to see if she’s left him a text or voice message.”

  “OK, why Cordero? Why did he send Pismo’s phone to her? Does he know her somehow, a neighbor, an old teacher? Maybe he likes her sentence structure,” said Brown, getting a short snort from Nunez and an eye roll from the sergeant. “Maybe he’s chosen her as a way to give her something, because he does like her. He gets the publicity and she gets the story?”

  “Well, since he sent a reporter photos of his victims and some clues, the obvious answer is he must want to make sure his moves get publicized,” said Maddocks, reaching for a bagel. “For whatever reason.”

  “He craves attention” added the Healdsburg officer.

  “Attention,” agreed Brown, giving her a smile. “Most murderers want to quietly slink away. This one wants to prove something. That he’s smart, or smarter than us?” To himself, he thought, smarter than me.

  “Ok, so we need Cordero to actually call him, not just text him,” Brown said. “She needs to try and string it out, keep him talking, keep him on long enough so we can get a fix on him and grab him. I’ll work on that, figure out a way to approach her, and see if she would be willing to call
him.”

  “We should have deputies and officers ready to get to strategic places in the county, along 101, and east and west on 12, maybe Old Red, Pet Hill for when we get a location,” offered Nunez.

  “I’ll talk to the captain,” said Maddocks, standing up and brushing bagel crumbs from her slacks as her cell phone rang. She took the call. “Pure adrenaline? Ok, huh. I didn’t expect that.”

  Before she could repeat the lab’s report, Brown’s cell phone rang, emitting Darth Vadar’s theme song. “Dispatch,” he said to the room.

  The smooth, deep voice in his ear said “1055 in Cotati, probable homicide.” Steve, a veteran dispatcher, gave it straight. “A male, appears to be in his early 20s. Reporting party said he recognized the victim as a student at SSU.”

  “Where was he found?” asked Brown. “Ok, tell Cotati PD to set up a perimeter. And tell Cotati to sit on whoever found him. And don’t let them talk to anybody until I get there, especially the press. Thanks man.”

  The detectives had already been moving out the office and down the hall as he hung up.

  “It wasn’t Sebastopol,” said Brown, to the five faces turned his way. “It was Cotati. The killer left him at the base of the accordion festival statue.”

  Next Time: “Unwanted Eyes.” The killer invades Sandra’s space.

  Randi Rossmann is a 30-year Press Democrat news reporter. For most of those years she has covered the police beat and breaking news, including the Ramon Salcido slayings and the Polly Klaas kidnapping, two of the counties most infamous crimes. The married mother of two is a life-long Sonoma County resident and Piner High School grad. To read her stories, go to https://www.pressdemocrat.com/personalia/RRossman.

  Previously: Detectives confer on how they might benefit from reporter Sandra Cordero contacting the killer. Another body is discovered – this time at the Cotati Plaza.

  Chapter 9 – Unwanted Eyes

  By CHARLES MARKEE

  Sandra ducked out of the newspaper building and drove down Mendocino Avenue to the Ridgway Swim Center, just minutes away. A lunch swim was the best way to handle the tension in her shoulders, as well as to ponder the killer’s riddles. The story deadlines hadn’t bothered her, but the three killings had, particularly the last one, a young Sonoma State student. As a reporter, she was normally an observer, but this time, trapped in the loop of communication between Detective Brown and the killer, she felt vulnerable and at the same time, responsible. Her last published piece saved a life. Now she had to unravel the ‘I pray sic’ riddle or he’d kill again.

  She slowed at the huge landmark oak tree next to the Swim Center. Luckily, she was early enough to find a parking place right in front of the squat little blue building. With her sport bag and towel, Sandra hurried up the walkway. Every time she came, she was struck by its blueness. The painting contractor must have found a blue paint sale, she thought. She swiped her card at the front counter and turned down the hall to the change room. More blue here, and the wall trim tiles were the same color as her cobalt blue bathing suit.

  Outside, three of the nine lap lanes were open. She sat on the pool edge at the end of a lane marked “medium” speed with her feet in the water. She pulled her swim cap on, tucking her hair in, then reached down and rinsed her goggles. The clear sky was marred only by a single vapor trail, like a white scratch in the pristine blue. The blue water, blue sky, blue buildings, blue everywhere, calmed her. The clock above the office window behind her read 11:50. Her goal was 30 laps in 30 minutes. Goggles on, she took a breath and slid into the water, enjoying the momentary pleasure of the cool immersion before she kicked off into her first lap.

  By the time she reached the other side, she was in her zone, steady regular strokes and kick turns at each end. But her mind wouldn’t stop running through all the questions about the case. What does this guy want from me? Notoriety? And why me? He said I saved a life, so now I have to decode his impossible riddle or he’ll kill again. And why did he torch Brown’s car? That just seems arbitrarily malicious, unlike his calculated murders. Another kick turn. She counted fifteen, half way through.

  She tried to clear her mind by focusing on the wobbly light patterns on the pool bottom, but thoughts, like an invasion, commandeered her head. No matter how bizarre it is, someone will die if I don’t figure out the riddle. Maybe ‘pray’ is the error and it should be ‘prey.’ No, that’s too simple and there’s no message. I just don’t get it. Maybe Abby can help me sort this out.

  At the end of the lane, she stopped to look at the clock. 12:30. “Sh--,” she muttered. “I lost count of my laps.”

  A middle-aged woman, brunette, looking fit in a two-piece suit walked up. “Share the lane?”

  “It’s all yours. I’m out of here.” Sandra hoisted herself onto the pool edge and headed for the change room.

  Ten minutes later, she was out the front door and half way to her car, when she pulled out her iPhone to call Abby. What she found was another text from the killer.

  “You look good in your blue suit.”

  Sandra froze, mid stride, and looked slowly around. He knew what she looked like, was stalking her. A wave of fear spread over her, leaving an icy lump in the pit of her stomach. She thought, He was—is—watching me. Where was he? He could have been in the lane next to me. Her panic changed to a flush of anger and she texted back.

  “Why Me?”

  “Solve I pray sic or more die.”

  Her heart pounded in her ears. “I can’t.”

  “Use the bookstore clue.”

  “Cops were there. No clue.”

  She fidgeted. No answer. She tossed her sport bag in the back seat and started to put her cell away when another text came.

  “Clue Healdsburg, Sonoma, Sebastopol,?,?,?,?,?”

  She texted back, “What?”

  “Add Cotati. H,S,S,C,?,?,?,? Decoder mailed to you. You touched it.”

  It didn’t make any sense. She texted again, “What?”

  “Do your job. Save a life.”

  As she got in her Focus, she decided not to swim there again until they caught the bastard. It gave her the creeps to think of him watching her in her bathing suit.

  *

  “Here’s the printout of Cordero’s text messages,” the sergeant said as he walked into Detective Brown’s office. “He seems to like your cop reporter friend.”

  “Yeah. She called it in. He stalked her at the Ridgway Swim Center.”

  On his way out the sergeant said, “Too bad we didn’t have surveillance on her.”

  Staring out the window, Brown narrowed his eyes and thought, He does seem obsessed with her. That just may be the way to get him.

  Next Time: “The Riddle.” Abby and Sandra try to decode the mysterious “I Pray Sic.”

  Charles Markee is the author of “Otherworld Tales: Irish the Demon Slayer, a novel for pre-teens. Formerly a technical manager in Silicon Valley, he is a member of Redwood Writers, a branch of the California Writers Club, and he facilitates meetings for the North Bay chapter of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. Find more on his book at charlesmarkee.com.

  Previously: Sandra swims laps at Santa Rosa’s Ridgway Swim Center. As she leaves, the killer sends her a text message to reveal he was watching her. He gives her the clues she was unable to retrieve at the Sebastopol bookstore and warns her that someone else will die if she doesn’t solve the code.

  Chapter 10 – The Riddle

  By CRISSI DILLON

  Abby opened the door to find her friend breathless on the doorstep, the blood drained from her face and beads of sweat forming on her brow.

  “What’s wrong Sandra? Are you sick? Can I get you anything?” she moved aside as Sandra swept past her, tossing her bag on the couch in the center of the living room. She spun around and faced Abby, her mouth opening, then closing, as she furrowed her brows deep in concentration. “Sandra, seriously. What’s wrong?”

  “He’s watching me,” Sandra blurted as she paced t
he floor.

  “What?” Abby shut the door quickly and rushed to her friend. Sandra didn’t have to elaborate on who “he” was. Abby knew full well it was the killer that had been invading her friend’s phone with cryptic text messages. “What do you mean, watching you? Where? When?” She tried to keep fear from dripping into her words. But what if this creep was watching Sandra now? What if he could somehow see right into her apartment?

  “At Ridgway,” Sandra said, sinking into a chair and putting her head in her hands. “I was swimming laps there, and just as I was leaving I got a text from him describing what I was wearing.” She ran her hand through her brown hair, letting it fall in waves around her face. “Why haven’t they caught that bastard yet? I just want this to be over! And ‘I pray sic?’ What the hell does it mean? He keeps insisting on it, texting it over and over again. And today’s texts were just as cryptic.”

  “What did they say?” Abby asked, leaning on the arm of the couch across from her friend. “Can I read them?”

  Sandra pulled the iPhone out and handed it over to Abby, who lit up the screen. She pursed her lips as she reread the clues the killer had sent. “Healdsburg, Sonoma, Sebastopol. Add Cotati. H, S, S, C, and four question marks. Those towns are where the murders happened or at least the towns the killer targeted. Nobody died in Sebastopol, thanks to you.”

  “But the question marks, what do they stand for? And what about ‘I pray sic’? How does that fit in?”

  A trill ring sounded from the countertop in the kitchen. Abby handed the phone back to Sandra and crossed the room to gather her own phone by the sink, opening it before answering. “Hello? Oh, hi, Mom. No, it’s not really a good time right now. Sandra’s over. Yes, I’ll tell her. I’ll call you tomorrow, OK? I love you, too.” She closed it back up and came back over to the couch. “My mom insisted I tell you hello, and that you really need to come visit her with me sometime.” She tossed her phone on the couch, only to have it bounce off and hit the floor.

  “Jeez, Abby,” said Sandra, picking up the phone and eyeing the chipped paint on the side. “This thing has seen better days. You know, they sell phones nowadays that double as computers.”