Homicide for the Holidays

by Speed City Indiana Sisters in Crime

  His widow’s wails reverberated throughout the couple’s garage.

  “Did you know the guy, Drake?” his partner asked the next morning over coffee at their adjoining desks, one with a nameplate that said Drake Curtis and the other Morgan Barrie.

  “No. Not really,” Drake said, taking a sip of his coffee, then stirring in more sugar from a packet. “I’d say ‘hi’ and give him a wave when I saw him or his wife but I barely knew either of them. I mostly only remember their names because they are the block captains.”

  “Carbon monoxide. Wow. But there are worse ways to commit suicide.” Barrie, like Drake, worked homicides.

  “Yeah, but I can’t wrap my head around this one,” Drake said.

  Barrie shuffled papers around on her desk. “You think too much. Some things are as they appear. The guy was depressed and killed himself. Happens all the time.”

  “Could be, but there was no note, according to the officers on the scene.” Drake scratched his bald head. “And he was generally cheerful when I saw him. Didn’t seemed depressed.”

  “You’d think, but until a month ago he was out of work. Got laid off from a management job back in January. Only found a part-time gig lately. That affects people,” Lt. W. Brockman Boyce, who just walked up, said. He took the seat in the chair next to Drake’s desk.

  “How do you know that? This guy isn’t some sort of criminal. No need for any profiling, though it’s your job,” Drake said.

  “Ahhhh,” Boyce started. He didn’t speak for several beats. “It was in the police report. I only read it because I heard folks saying you were on the scene of a suicide near your house.”

  Because their captain walked hard on her heels, the trio heard her coming seconds before she arrived. She was a very no-nonsense commander and got straight to the point. No unnecessary greetings.

  “They found a body out in Irvington. Ellenberger Park. I want you two on it. Dispatch will give you the exact location,” she said. “And Detective Curtis, you take point.”

  They acknowledged the captain and rose to leave. But she looked at Lt. Boyce. “Don’t you have some cases to profile? Work’s not gonna get done on its own.”

  As was usual when they rode together, Drake drove. He didn’t turn on the lights. There was no need to rush. The victim was already dead.

  “You get the Christmas gear put up on your house last night?” Barrie asked.

  “Didn’t have time. It was too dark by the time I got back home from across the street.”

  “You’d better get it done soon. Snow last Saturday was an aberration for this early in December. But bad weather could come at any time.”

  Drake drove past a car without a visible license plate. Any other time, he would have pulled them over.

  “Tonight or tomorrow I’ll get up on the roof with the Santa, sleigh, and reindeer and set them up. I hate that part, fighting those damned decorations.”

  “You finish Christmas shopping?”

  “Not yet. Shelly’s assigned me to find some fancy doll for Dana. But they’re sold out everywhere. I can’t find it. Tried online and everything,” Drake said as he turned off New York and onto Emerson. “I’ll try to hit a couple of stores this afternoon if I can sneak out a little early. To Shelly, the doll’s the more important thing.”

  “I’ll bet,” Barrie said. “What’s with this doll?”

  “I don’t know. Shelly says it’s a Holiday Elegance Barbie. The dark skin one, of course. Long black hair and dressed in a red velvet coat with white fur trim. Like what a Santa wears.”

  Drake parked a short distance from the park entrance on St. Clair.

  There wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the bright sun warmed the air. Drake unbuttoned his coat as he and his partner made their way over uneven ground to a wooded area where there was a lot of police activity. Patches of snow scattered about were reminders of the previous weekend’s storm.

  Ducking yellow police tape, the pair approached a uniformed officer. “Detectives,” was all the officer said as he walked them down a slight incline to a crop of spruce trees. Resting under a particularly large tree was a man decked out in full Santa Claus regalia—black boots, bright red pants, and a red coat trimmed in white fur and closed with a black, buckled belt. His fake beard was as white as a nearby pile of snow.

  Drake stared down silently at the man, whose legs were positioned in an unnaturally awkward way. There were two nice little bullet holes in his chest, over where his heart would be.

  “My, my, my, what have we got here, Sergeant?” Barrie asked.

  Pointing to a couple of officers talking to a tall, middle-aged female holding a frisky dog on a leash, he said, “A woman walking her dog this morning on the path over there saw the body and contacted the police. We’re still interviewing her.”

  Drake stooped down to the body but was careful not to touch anything. He looked back up to the sergeant. “How long ago was he found?”

  “’Bout sixty minutes.”

  “Anybody touch anything?” Barrie asked.

  “I searched him for ID but other than that, no,” the sergeant said.

  Drake rose again to stand next to his partner, who had a little notebook out. “Who is he?” Drake asked.

  The officer ticked off the information without assistance. “According to his driver’s license, he’s Raphael Hernandez, fifty-seven. Hispanic male. Five-foot-nine, 200 pounds. Lives on Robey Drive in Clermont.”

  “Arrest record?” Barrie asked.

  “Initially, none I have found. I figure you guys’ll dig deeper.”

  “What was he doing here? Any drug activity in this area?” Drake asked.

  “Not here. It’s a quiet neighborhood, with families and kids. The drug problem is back towards town. Around 10th street.”

  “Doesn’t look like a robbery,” Barrie said.

  “Nothing was taken as far as we can see. He’s still wearing a watch, wedding ring, and his wallet was on him. Back pocket.”

  “How’d he get here? You find a car?” Drake asked.

  Barrie pointed to the ground, which indicated tire tracks from near the victim all the way back to the street.

  “Looks like he was dumped here,” Barrie said. Drake and the officer nodded.

  “We haven’t found a car. Only the tire tracks over there,” the officer said, again pointing to the edge of the road.

  “How long’s he been dead?” Drake asked.

  The answer came from behind him.

  “Based on lividity, I’d say twelve hours, more or less,” said an older man in civilian clothes wearing white plastic gloves and pulling a stretcher.

  Drake smiled. “Good to see you, Mac. What do you think happened here?”

  “Clearly, the man was shot,” the coroner said in a cheeky voice. “But can’t say more than that until I have him on my autopsy table. Mind if I take the body now, detective?”

  The police sergeant and Barrie looked directly at Drake.

  “No, go ’head. I think we’re pretty much done here,” Drake said. To Barrie, he said, “Catch a ride back downtown. See if he’s in the system and check out his bank statements. I’m going out to Clermont and see what I can find.”

  “Detective Curtis, a word please,” Mac said to Drake as he turned to leave.

  The detective and the coroner walked a short distance from the others. Much older than Drake, the coroner displayed a paternal attitude toward the detective.

  “You were right this morning. It wasn’t a suicide last night,” Mac said in a low voice. “Haven’t had time for a full autopsy but I looked over the body and observed a small pin prick hole in his neck. Barely visible. I think someone injected your neighbor with a strong sedative. He might have succumbed to carbon monoxide asphyxiation in the car but the sedative would have kept him from moving and seeking help. He was murdered.”

  Drake drove to Clermont to interview the most recent victim’s widow and was grateful the man’s two youngest children, both high school
students, weren’t home yet.

  “Raphie had no enemies,” Maria Hernandez said, her shoulders rising and falling as she wept. She wiped her nose with a tissue. “He was a good man. Everyone loved him.”

  The house was warm and comfortable and there were photos of the couple’s five children scattered about on every flat surface.

  Drake got a clear understanding of the man—husband, father, non-smoker, infrequent drinker. A good provider until he was laid-off last summer as a machinist mate at a welding shop in Speedway.

  “And what is this?” Drake asked as he picked a photo which was different from the rest. It showed perhaps two dozen men, all in varying stages of roundness. White beards hid the lower portion of most of their faces.

  Marie Hernandez walked over, looked at the picture and struggled keeping in control. “It was at Santa Claus School in Kris Kringle, Indiana. Back in October. Raphie went and that’s the graduation picture. He’s on the second row.”

  She lost the battle and started crying again as she replaced the picture on the mantle.

  “Raphie was a proud man and he loved being Santa Claus. For the kids. The school helped him get a steady job at the mall in Greenwood this Christmas.”

  “It’s a long drive from here to work. Any idea why he was in Ellenberger Park last night? It’s not near home or work.”

  She shook her head no.

  After a few more questions, Drake thanked her and left.

  With a few minutes on his hands, Drake stopped at two toy stores in the trip back to the office but didn’t find what he needed.

  Damn. Gotta find that doll. Cuttin’ out early to put up SC, Drake texted Shelly.

  Good. B careful, she replied.

  At his desk, Drake verified Hernandez’s employment—according to the mall manager, he was a model employee—and that Hernandez left alone last night when the mall closed. No criminal record, small banking account, modest credit rating that took a hit in the last six months as he struggled to pay all his bills.

  Because no car was discovered at the scene, they issued an allpoints bulletin for Hernandez’s car—a blue, late-model Ford.

  Drake had just informed his captain he was heading out early when Boyce wandered over to his desk. Drake was collecting his paperwork and tried his best to ignore the smart-dressing lieutenant.

  “Caught another dead one, I hear,” Boyce said, tapping the side of his leg in a nervous gesture. “Santa Claus.”

  “Yes, well, that’s what we do down here in homicide.”

  “I wonder who’d want to kill Father Christmas,” Boyce chortled without displaying any real interest in the question.

  Drake stood and picked up his coat. “I guess we’ll have to find out.”

  Back home, an unseasonably warm December sun welcomed Drake outside as he used a rope to haul a large plastic Santa up to the roof, temporarily anchoring it to the chimney. Then he went back down the ladder and tied a rope around the remaining decorations.

  Back on the roof, he was maneuvering the four-foot Santa when a heavy wind gust caught it, sending the Santa tumbling down the roof where it hit the ladder. The impact tipped the ladder, which seemed to hang in the air for the briefest of moments before falling to the ground. When it hit, the ladder smashed the Santa Claus.

  “Damn. My second dead Santa of the day,” he muttered to himself.

  Drake reached for the cellphone he normally carried on his belt. It wasn’t there. He had left it in its charging stand in the kitchen. He was at home alone and stranded on the roof—without a phone.

  “Damnit,” he said, this time aloud.

  “Howdy, neighbor.” A man with a cheerful disposition and a short, neatly trimmed grayish-white beard called up to him from the yard. He was slightly shorter than Drake—perhaps six-foot—and very soft through the middle. He was pinchable, the type of person people liked to hug.

  “I saw you up there from next door,” he said, surveying the ladder and the destroyed decoration. “Looks like you could use some help.”

  “Well, I guess I do. I’m the only one home and I left my cell phone in the house.”

  The guy picked up the ladder, positioned it against the house and climbed up. “Unfortunate. But I’m always happy to be of service,” he said as he reached the roof. “Let’s see what we got.”

  “Thank you, uh…” Drake started, wishing silently he remembered the correct name. “Jim, isn’t it?”

  “Joel. Joel Kerstman’s the name,” he said with a cheerfulness that spoke of a lifetime of amusement.

  They made quick work of stringing the lights and attaching the reindeer and Santa sleigh, minus the Claus, to the roof, talking as they went along.

  “I’ll take those,” Kerstman said, indicating the wire and clamps used to anchor the decorations. “You’re a policeman, right?”

  “A detective. Homicide,” Drake said, handing over the items before going back to his work.

  “Sounds so exciting. And you’re off today?”

  “No. I left early. Needed to finish this before dark and before it gets too cold again,” Drake said, then added, “Hand me the hammer, please.”

  Kerstman stopped. He stroked his beard briefly, staring at Drake. “You don’t seem to be enjoying this.”

  Drake looked at his neighbor. He hoped he could convey an understanding of the situation. “Look, I have a stressful job and a lot is going on right now. So, I probably appear somewhat distracted. I do this for my daughter and my wife. But especially for Dana. I just don’t know how much longer she’s going to believe in all this. In Santa Claus. In all the wonder.”

  “Why not?”

  “I stopped believing around her age when I didn’t get the carpentry set I badly wanted. I wrote Santa and even visited him at a department store. I said all I wanted was that carpentry set,” Drake said. “And then I didn’t get it.”

  The watch on Joel’s arm beeped and he checked it. Then he started for the ladder. “I’ve got homemade chocolate chip cookies in the oven. Time for them to come out. You’re mostly done up here.”

  “Go ahead. And thanks for the help,” Drake said.

  Once Kerstman was on the ladder and about to go down, he looked back at Drake. “I hope your daughter gets her toy. It’s sad when a child loses that Christmas wonder.”

  Drake had everything put away by the time his wife and seven-year-old daughter got home. Dana was thrilled with the outdoor decorations on the house.

  “I love the lights, Daddy. What happened to Santa? I thought you were gonna put up Santa,” Dana said, nearly in a single breath.

  “I had a little trouble with Santa but everything else looks good, right?” he asked, while giving his wife a glance that said, ‘Don’t ask.’

  “My friend Stacey said I’m a big baby for still believing in Santa Claus. She said Santa’s not gonna bring me my doll,” she whimpered.

  “He’s going to bring your doll, baby, I promise,” Shelly said, giving a questioning stare to Drake, who backed away without saying a word. “Don’t you worry, baby. You’ve been good this year and Santa knows it.”

  As a career law enforcement officer, Drake had faced many dangers on the job. Some scared him and some did not. But the look on Shelly’s face was dangerous and scary. It said, “You’ll do this or there will be hell to pay.”

  Drake had trouble sleeping that night.

  By the week before Christmas, Drake was no closer to finding who killed Hernandez than he was to finding Dana’s doll. When he arrived at his office on the morning just three days before Christmas, he sat at his desk, reached into a drawer, retrieved a bottle of antacid and took a swig. It was a new ritual.

  “Heartburn?” Barrie asked.

  “Like you wouldn’t believe,” Drake said.

  “Maybe it’s not just work. You should go see a doctor. You know, this is the time of year for heart attacks,” Barrie said.

  Drake ignored her. On his computer was the previous night’s police reports and two item
s had Drake’s attention. A non-fatal shooting and a deadly hit-and-run.

  “It says here a man dressed as Santa was ringing a bell and collecting donations for the Salvation Army outside a grocery store on the eastside when shots rang out,” Drake said.

  Barrie picked up a cup of coffee, took a sip, then said, “Yeah, I read that just before you got in. Dark-colored car drove up, someone inside, thought to be a man…our victim wasn’t sure…fired several rounds. Car drove off. All the shots missed. But they recovered a couple of the bullets and ballistics is running tests.”

  “And the car?” Drake asked.

  “The victim ducked and couldn’t give a description. No one else got a good look,” Barrie said. “What are you thinking?”

  “More than two hours later, a dark-colored car, thought to be a Ford, runs a guy over across from the Castleton Mall on 82nd street. Kills him.” Drake leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. “Something doesn’t seem right.”

  Boyce walked up, looking as dapper as ever. “Murder or attempted murder is always a bit odd, I think. But it’s what keeps us in business. If you ask me, it’s the season. Psychos come out at Christmastime. It’s all that holiday stress. They have to relieve it.”

  Boyce briefly paused as if in wonder. “I enjoy a psychopath’s mind.”

  “What happened to you growing up?” Barrie said dismissively.

  “Is that the sort of in-depth professional judgment we are paying you for?” the captain asked Boyce as she strolled in.

  Before Boyce could answer, Drake sat up and asked, “Who’d you assign this to?”

  “The hit-and-run?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Peterson. He’s out interviewing people now. You got something?”

  Drake grabbed his phone and called Detective Peterson’s cell. “A hunch,” he said as he waited for the call to connect.

  The conversation was short and the others waited as Drake confirmed mostly what was already in the report. The victim was black, mid-40s, lived on the northside. Married, no kids. He was alone at the time heading for a bus stop. It was shortly after 10 p.m.