by Cindy Bell
“Kevin, and Vanessa, they were both here.” Brenda gestured to the others clustered together near the entrance of the town square.
“Yes, they were. Along with a few others. But I trust you the most, Brenda. I don’t know them well. I know you will do your best to tell me what happened here.” Detective Crackle tapped the pen lightly on the notepad. “Just tell me what you can remember.”
“But I have no idea what happened here. That’s what you’re supposed to figure out.” The muscles in her shoulders tensed as she tried to gain control of her emotions. “I mean is there really any explanation for something like this?”
“Not one that will ever satisfy the rational mind, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need to figure it out.” Detective Crackle met her eyes again. “Brenda, tell me everything you can remember, it’s very important.”
“Right, sorry.” She wiped at her eyes, then tried to focus. “The thing is I didn’t even see much, Detective. I wish I had seen more, but I really didn’t see anything at all.”
“Just tell me what you can recall.” He shifted from one foot to the other as his lips tensed.
“Okay, yes.” After another breath Brenda launched into a description of what she had seen. “I just remember turning around, and seeing Alexa on the ground.” She stared towards the spot that was now roped off and surrounded by police. “But I only turned because I heard tires squeal. It was such a sudden sound. I turned around, and she was on the ground. The car was already almost out of the parking lot.”
“You’re sure? You didn’t see anyone driving the car, or get into it?” He moved in front of her to regain her attention. “What exactly did you hear?”
“No, I didn’t see the driver. I heard the tires, like I told you.” Brenda frowned as she did her best to recall every bit of information she could.
“What about any passengers in the car? Could you tell if there was more than one person?” Detective Crackle scribbled on the notepad.
“I didn’t notice. I mean, I don’t think there was anyone else. But I can’t be sure of that. I’m sorry.” Brenda rubbed her hand across her forehead as her head started to spin again. “I told you what I saw, that was it. Then I tried to stop the other cars from coming into the lot. I thought maybe you’d be able to trace which tire tracks belonged to the car.”
“That was a very smart move. Now, can you show me where the tire tracks are?” He turned towards the crime scene. “Maybe you could point them out to me?” He gestured to the dirty parking lot.
Brenda tried to look at the ground, but her eyes were drawn to the area where Alexa’s body was. The area was surrounded by police, so she couldn’t see anything, but she knew what was there. For a few seconds she stood in stunned silence.
“Brenda.” His tone became firmer. “Brenda, I need you to try to work out which tire tracks belong to the car you saw.”
“Uh, right.” Brenda looked down at the ground. Her vision blurred as the multitude of tire tracks blurred together. “I think it was here, right here.” She pointed to one deep groove, but there was another one not far from it. “Or maybe that one.”
“Try to think back. You saw the car, Brenda. You saw it pull away, you know which direction it went in. It would be very helpful if you could narrow down which set of tire tracks it might be.” Detective Crackle stepped up beside her and looked down at the ground as well. With the sun out in full force, her line of vision was clear. But she still had no idea which one to point to. At the time that she’d seen the car pull away, she hadn’t really been paying attention to the car, but to the body left behind.
“I don’t know.” Brenda shoved her hands into her pockets. “I’m sorry, I just don’t know.”
“I’m sorry, Brenda, but you are my prime witness. Try and relax and see if you can remember anything. What kind of car was it? What color? What model?” He looked back at his pad. “I don’t have anything here other than car, and squealing tires.”
“I think it was gray, or silver, but it was still dark. I just don’t know. I probably would have noticed if it was a brighter color. And it was a four door. I think. Yes, I’m sure it was a four door.” Brenda’s thoughts raced as she tried to summon back her memories of that moment. When it first happened, it seemed as if she would never be able to un-see it, but suddenly she wasn’t confident in anything she recalled.
“Thanks Brenda. I know you’ve been through a lot, but now is the time when what you remember can make a big difference. What was the make? What was the model?”
“I don’t know.” Brenda shook her head. “I don’t know much about cars. Okay?” She gulped out her words.
“Brenda!” Joyce ran the last few steps to her side. She shot Detective Crackle a harsh look. “Can’t you see that she’s in shock?” She wrapped her arms around her.
“I know, but I need whatever information she might have.” His gaze lingered on Joyce, then shifted back to Brenda. “Anything you can remember is helpful.”
“I get that, but you want me to remember things I never saw. I just don’t know what kind of car it was, I didn’t see anyone. I had no idea that I needed to memorize as much as I could in those few seconds. I’m sorry.” Brenda sighed, soothed by Joyce’s presence. “I’m so glad that you’re here.”
“All right, I’ll check in with you a little later.” Detective Crackle adjusted his hat, looked between both women, then turned and walked away.
“He’s such a buffoon.” Joyce waved her hand through the air as she continued to hug her friend. “I don’t know why you put up with him for so long.”
“Joyce, he was just doing his job.” Brenda sighed again, then wiped at her eyes. “It’s not his fault I wasn’t smart enough to remember anything that could help him catch the killer.”
“Hey, none of that.” Joyce frowned as she took a step back from her and met her eyes. “You didn’t do anything wrong here. You did everything you could for Alexa.”
“It all happened so fast.” Brenda pressed her hand against her chest. “I still don’t understand how it happened. How can someone just drive up and dump a body, then take off? All with no one stopping them? All with no one seeing anything of use?”
“No one expects to see something like that. The shock makes it hard for your brain to function as it normally would. It’s too bad that the parking lot doesn’t have any cameras.” Joyce patted her hand. “Please don’t be so hard on yourself.”
“How can I not be?” Brenda frowned. “He’s right. If I could only remember one helpful thing, maybe the killer would be found.”
Joyce started to argue the point, but she was interrupted by a familiar voice.
“Hi Joyce, hi Brenda.” Melissa walked up to them both, with her nose buried in her phone.
“Melissa, maybe you should go home.” Brenda wrapped an arm around her shoulders as she steered her away from the crime scene. The wall of officers nearly blocked the view completely, but Brenda didn’t want to risk her catching a glimpse of it. “Something terrible has happened.”
“I already know.” Melissa shifted out of Brenda’s grasp enough to hold her phone out for both of them to see. “I can’t believe it.”
“You already know?” Joyce frowned as she stepped up closer.
“About Alexa’s latest vlog, yes. Isn’t that what you’re talking about?” Melissa tapped the screen on her phone and a video began to play. “I saw it first thing this morning.”
“She posted a vlog this morning?” Brenda leaned in closer for a clear view of the video.
Joyce stood on her toes and peered over Melissa’s shoulder at the phone.
Alexa’s image appeared on the screen. Instead of a friendly smile, her eyes stared heavily into the camera. As she spoke, her voice sounded breathless, her words fired off in rapid succession.
“I’ve made a terrible mistake. I can’t apologize enough for it. I feel like the only way that I can make things right, is to come clean about this in the most public way I can. So please li
sten, and share this vlog with everyone you know. Authenticity is so important to me, as many of you know. I never would have gotten involved in this if I had known the whole story. But I can’t be responsible for this any longer. I know I may lose a lot of my viewers over this, but I don’t care.” She took a deep breath. “Okay, the truth is—” Her words were cut off as the screen went black.
“Something has happened to her. Someone took her!” Melissa rewound the video a few seconds, then pointed out a shadow on the wall behind Alexa. “Someone came up behind her, see? Everyone is going crazy about it. You should see some of the comments people are making. Everything from it being a ghost, to it being her boyfriend. As far as I know she doesn’t even have a boyfriend.”
“I can see the shadow,” Joyce whispered. “This really might be the moment that she was taken.”
“I can’t quite see it.” Brenda narrowed her eyes as she stared at the frozen image on the screen. “But we should make sure Detective Crackle sees this.”
“I can send him the link.” Melissa looked up from the phone, her brows knitted as she noticed the officers and the police cars. “What’s going on here? Is there something more I should know?”
“Oh Melissa, I know you were a fan of Alexa’s.” Brenda met the young woman’s eyes. As intelligent and resourceful as Melissa could be, she was also still very young. “I’m sorry to tell you this, but Alexa was killed this morning. The police are trying to figure out what happened.”
“What? Are you sure?” Melissa stumbled back a few steps. “But how could that be? This was just posted this morning.”
“I’m sure.” Brenda clasped her hands together and took a slow breath. “I saw her myself, Melissa. I’m very sorry.”
“I knew something terrible had happened, I knew it. But this?” Melissa shook her head as she wrapped her arms around herself. “I never expected this. Who would do this to her?”
“That’s what the police are going to find out.” Brenda patted her shoulder and again steered her away from the crime scene. “And if there’s anything we can do to help, we will. But as of right now, I think it would be best for all of us to just stay out of the way.”
“Oh, there’s Detective Crackle.” Joyce glanced over at Melissa. “Can I borrow your phone, Melissa? I want to show him what you found.”
“Sure, no problem.” Melissa handed over her phone with a soft sniffle. “I hope he can figure out who did this.”
“Me, too.” Joyce accepted the phone, then gave Melissa’s hand a light squeeze.
Chapter 4
As Joyce headed in the direction of Detective Crackle she noticed that he had Kevin cornered near his truck. The closer she came, the clearer the tension in the detective’s muscles became. Kevin’s cheeks flared a darker shade of red as she paused a few steps away from him and the detective.
“It’s a simple question, Kevin, I would like to know where you were before you arrived here this morning.” Detective Crackle squared his shoulders as he stared hard at Kevin.
“It’s a question I don’t have to answer. Unless you’re ready to accuse me of something?” His thick hands balled into hard, red fists at his sides. “I won’t stand here while you imply that I had something to do with Alexa’s murder.”
“I’m not implying anything. I’m simply asking you a question that you should be able to give me an answer to.” Detective Crackle lifted his shoulders some as he leaned a bit closer to Kevin. “Perhaps it’s you that’s implying something by not answering the question.”
“This is ridiculous. I had nothing to do with this. I’m not wasting anymore time here. If you want to ask me more questions, then you’d better go ahead and arrest me.” Kevin’s voice grew louder with every word he spoke, and seemed to punch through the noise of the officers and bystanders that had gathered.
“If that’s what it takes to get some cooperation, then that just might be what I have to do.” Detective Crackle rested one hand on the handcuffs that were attached to his belt. “Does it really need to come to that, Kevin, or do you think you can calm down?”
“I’ll calm down when you leave me alone!” Kevin took a step towards the detective.
“Kevin!” Joyce stepped between them as Detective Crackle’s hand went to the holster on his other hip. “Kevin, take a breath, it’s all right.” She patted the much larger man’s chest and looked up into his eyes. They were spread so wide that she could see the whites of them beyond his dark lashes. “We all want the same thing here, don’t we?”
“Joyce, careful.” Detective Crackle grabbed her by the shoulder and drew her back a few steps.
“Yes, we all want the same thing.” Kevin slid his hands into his pockets and lowered his eyes. “Like I said, Detective Crackle, if you need more information, you know what you have to do.” He turned on his heel and walked away.
“What were you thinking?” Detective Crackle frowned as he released his grasp on Joyce, then stepped in front of her. “Why would you get in the middle of things like that?”
“Kevin just likes to run his mouth. He acts like a tough guy, but he’s harmless.” Joyce shook her head as she swept her gaze over his strained expression. “Why were you about to pull your gun on him?”
“He was threatening me. Someone has been murdered, Joyce. This isn’t a game.” Detective Crackle glanced over at the crowd gathered around the crime scene, then shifted his weighted gaze back to hers. “Please, be more careful.”
“I could ask you to do the same. Picking a fight with someone twice your size isn’t exactly a good idea.” Joyce noticed a hint of concern flash through his eyes. She didn’t see that often in the seasoned detective who always appeared to be in control. “Are you okay, Detective?”
“I will be.” He sighed, reached up and pulled his hat from his head. “Once this murder is solved. Have you even considered that Alexa was here yesterday, as were you, as was Brenda, and myself?” Detective Crackle shoved his hat back on the top of his head. “It could have been either of you, but it just happened to be Alexa. My best guess is that whoever took her, spotted her here, yesterday, and enacted their plan sometime after that.”
“I’m not so sure it was random.” Joyce held out the cell phone to him. “I came to find you because Melissa, the new employee on the truck, saw this on Alexa’s website this morning. I thought you should see it as soon as possible.” She pressed play as he took the phone out of her hand. As he watched the video, she noticed the muscles in his face tighten as each moment passed. When he lowered the phone, his gaze was heavy.
“This may have been when she was abducted.”
“Yes, I thought that, too.” Joyce accepted the phone back from him. “Melissa and others who viewed the video spotted the shadow that came up behind Alexa just before the camera cut off.”
“All right, I’m going to have the techs at the station dig into this. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.” Detective Crackle pulled out his phone. His fingers moved swiftly across the keypad. Once he finished, he looked up at her again. “However, it doesn’t excuse the risk you just took. Kevin could have hurt you. In future, please don’t interrupt me when I’m questioning a suspect.”
“I don’t intend to. But I want you to answer one question.” Joyce narrowed her eyes, studying every subtle nuance of his face as he nodded. “What if Kevin had taken a swing at you? What would you have done?”
The tension returned to his face. He cleared his throat, glanced over his shoulder, then looked back at her.
“Thanks again for your help with this. If you or Brenda hear anything more about it please let me know.”
As Detective Crackle walked away, Joyce understood that his choice not to answer spoke volumes. She and her late husband Davey had discussions throughout his career in law enforcement, about when and why it was right to draw a gun on a suspect. They had rarely agreed on the topic. She guessed that if she and Detective Crackle had the same discussion, they wouldn’t agree either.
Bren
da watched Joyce hurry away, then turned her attention back to Melissa.
“How are you holding up? I know that you are a fan of Alexa’s work.” She slipped her hand into hers. “This must be quite a shock for you.”
“Yes, it is.” Melissa sighed and wiped at her eyes. “I am a big fan. Lots of people are. I like that she’s so honest. But I didn’t like the review she did of the truck.” She frowned as she glanced down at the ground. “I thought she would be more fair than that. It made me wonder if she’s really so honest, or if she’s just going for shock value most of the time.”
“The vlog was bad, huh?” Brenda bit into the inside of her cheek to hide her gut reaction. Her cheeks still flushed with heat.
“There were some positive parts to it, but overall I thought she could have been a lot kinder.” Melissa shook her head, her eyes narrowed. “I’m sorry, Brenda, I never should have encouraged you to do the vlog with her.”
“It’s all right. It’s probably not that bad. Let’s take a look.” She pulled out her phone and pulled up Alexa’s website.
“Oh no, don’t.” Melissa tried to grab the phone from her hands. “Trust me, after what’s happened today, it’s nothing you need to see.”
“It’s all right. I want to see it. It’s one of the last vlogs she recorded. Trust me, I won’t get my feelings hurt.” Brenda cleared her throat. She did tend to take things to heart. She’d give herself pep talks before walking into stressful situations, but the pep talks didn’t always work. Still, she couldn’t ignore the drive within her to see what Alexa had to say about her and the truck. It wasn’t so much that she was curious about her opinion, it was more that she wanted to hear her voice again. She’d only met her briefly, and now faced with her death, she wanted to know everything she could about her.
“All right, but don’t say that I didn’t warn you.”
“Warn you about what?” Joyce walked over to them, her hair out of place, and her eyes a bit wide.
“Joyce, are you okay?” Brenda looked up from her phone long enough to meet her friend’s eyes. “Did something happen?”
