If the text, which brought me to Lightning Self Storage, was spoofed, then Dirk Hildegard, the escaped bank robber, didn't send it. The necessary planning and technical ability were beyond him. But I was sure he was the figure crouched low on the storage unit rooftop taking pot-shots at me with a rifle.
I braked hard and swung the 4Runner to the left, hoping to disrupt the bead Hildegard had on me. Hildegard's second shot went through the passenger seat and blew out the remaining windshield glass. It improved my visibility, and in an instant, I saw that my 4x4 was hurtling toward a concrete wall. I wrenched the wheel to the right.
Nothing.
For the next few seconds, I saw everything in slow motion.
The 4Runner careened forward, taking aim at the wall. I braced for the inevitable impact, knowing the gunman would find me trapped or unconscious in the wreckage and kill me. At the last moment, the wheels gripped, and the back end swung around, scraping the concrete as I went by with a screech of protesting metal. Loose gravel hit the underside of my 4x4 like machine gunfire.
The facility's offices were housed in a one-story to the side of the storage units. If I could make it there, it would offer some protection.
Provided I kept my head down.
Once the 4Runner was lined up with the gravel road running beside it, I gunned the throttle. The would-be assassin's next shot went wide, as the SUV lurched forward and disappeared from his view behind the low building. Once in its shelter, I braked hard. The shattered vehicle slid sideways to a standstill.
Finding the driver's door jammed from the collision, I scooted across the bench seat and rolled out of the passenger side with my Sig Sauer pistol aimed at the roof of the self-storage units.
The locked office door showed signs of being forced before and yielded to my shoulder. I tumbled into a darkened room and took refuge beneath a window facing my assailant's last position. As far as I could see, we were the yard's only inhabitants.
The gravity of my situation became apparent when I pulled out my phone to call for assistance. The screen was displaying only flashes of light—a crack ran right across it. The damage must have happened when I rolled out of the 4Runner.
The room held a single battered desk behind a long counter. Whoever worked there must use a cell phone exclusively, because there wasn't a landline phone in sight. There would be no rescue—no one knew where I was. Whatever direction I tried to escape from the facility, Hildegard could pick me off. I had no choice but to neutralize him myself. Only one of us would be leaving Lightning Self Storage alive.
But how could I get the upper hand? I was pinned down while Hildegard had the height advantage. Plus, he had a rifle with a scope sight, accurate over much greater distances than my pistol.
I tried the door behind the counter. It was unlocked and let me into a small break room. There were a couple of chairs, an aged coffee maker, three stained mugs, and an old-style television with a "rabbit's ears" antenna. To my left was a bathroom with a toilet and sink; in front of me a door to the outside.
Could I sneak through it?
I cursed when I saw that it swung outward. Once opened, it would be as visible from the shooter's vantage point as me waving a flag at him.
I looked up and scanned the acoustic tiles. My eyes stopped at a coffee stain high on the wall behind the toilet, originating from some point above the drop-ceiling. Had someone spilled it while working on the flat roof? I climbed onto a stool perched atop the toilet lid. With a hand on the wall to steady myself, I was able to push one of the tiles up and aside. It revealed an access panel, but it opened upwards onto the flat roof. The office building was lower than the storage units where the gunman crouched.
At least the last time I had seen him.
He'd notice the panel swing up before I could even get my weapon through the opening. Damn! I jumped down, feeling not a little discouraged.
The door I'd come through faced away from the gunman. My only option was to retrace my steps and exit through it. I cursed my lack of forethought in entering the office.
I slipped through the door and kept myself pressed flat against the outside of the building as I moved along the wall. The roof overhang afforded some protection, provided I kept my eyes and weapon trained upward. I'd brought a chrome ashtray from the desk. When I reached the corner, I used it to look beyond. Seeing no threat, I ran to the shelter of a steel dumpster. There, I used the ashtray trick again, and made it to the side of the storage-unit building, flattening myself against the wall. The gunman would have to lean over the edge of the roof to fire at me. It was a gamble as my vest would afford me little or no protection from a shot fired from above, and I hadn't seen him for a few minutes.
I planned to work my way around the building until I found where Hildegard had climbed to the roof. I'd have the choice of clambering up to take him on or ambushing him when he descended.
A loud thud preempted my plans. Looking up, I saw Hildegard had jumped down onto the covered walkway roof bridging the two buildings. He faced away from me with the hood of his blue windbreaker pulled over his head. His rifle was held at waist height. He came fully into my view when he stepped forward onto the office building roof.
I raised my weapon and quickly got a bead on him.
"Police, freeze. Drop the weapon."
Hildegard snapped his head my way and swung his rifle around, taking aim at me.
I put two shots into his chest.
In a reflex reaction, his arm jerked, and his weapon discharged.
His shot struck the stucco wall above my head, showering me with plaster. Hildegard swayed on his feet for an instant. Then his knees buckled, and he fell backward off the roof.
I raced to the front of the building and trained my pistol on the body. Dirk Hildegard was lying on his back, his eyes fixed. Dead. A pool of blood was spreading from where his head hit the paved parking lot.
The rifle by his side was a .308 bolt-action Winchester with a scope sight. After moving it away, and ejecting the rounds, the tension inside me unwound like a clock spring. I threw up in some bushes away from the body.
How had my phone been spoofed? Who had given him the rifle? Like his brother Kidd, Dirk Hildegard was as dumb as a rock. He'd never risen above the rank of private when serving in Afghanistan, but he'd clearly gained some shooting proficiency there. No way could he have sent the bogus text which lured me to the storage facility. Someone had to have helped him.
The murderers I was pursuing.
A warm sensation ran down my left arm and I saw blood trickling from an ugly gash. Hildegard's final shot must have ricocheted and grazed me. Adrenaline had kept me pain-free in the heat of the battle, but now the injury was starting to throb.
The sound of gunfire brought a man out of a store across the street. His hand held a silver snub-nosed revolver. I walked calmly toward him with my shield high and told him to drop the weapon. I hoped for his sake, he didn't go and point it at me.
Once I'd convinced him I was a detective, he let me use his phone to call for assistance.
Ten minutes later, the cavalry arrived in the form of a patrol SUV followed by two sedans, and the crime scene van. I would have my work cut out not to get suspended pending an investigation.
Lieutenant Townsend was the first to reach me, and he surveyed the scene with a look of distaste. "What the hell do you think you're doing, Riley? How do you justify hunting down and killing an escaped prisoner? All because he sent you a threatening message? This is a paperwork nightmare."
"Hildegard lured me here to kill me," I replied testily.
"Lured you here? How exactly did you fall for that? The guy doesn't have two brain cells to rub together—"
Townsend hesitated, as Chief Kane joined us and said, "One fewer escaped prisoners for you to worry about, Detective."
Crime scene techs Chris Andrews and Tom Mason went to work on Hildegard's body and his discarded rifle. Officer Smith flashed me a reassuring look.
Town
send continued to look at me as if he'd smelled something unpleasant. "You need to leave the scene, Detective. I'll get a statement from you later. Rest assured, I'll get to the bottom of your actions here," he sneered.
Chief Kane eyed my ruined 4Runner and said to Smith, "Take her home, Officer."
WE RODE IN SILENCE, and I reflected on the speed with which the day had turned to shit. I was angry at a system which persecuted its own when they acted in self-defense; when they ridded society of a menace. No way was I going to sit at home waiting another month or more to return to duty. In aiding and abetting Hildegard's attack on me, Beth and Ashley's killers had thrown down a gauntlet. I was more than ready to take it up, even if I wasn't a serving police officer.
CHAPTER 41
REPORTER KAYLA ELLIS STEPPED through the open French doors onto the paved patio and scanned Angie Bennett's garden. Sunshine had replaced the recent rain, the clouds had blown off, and the ground was drying fast. Camellias and Rhododendrons filled the terraced beds either side of the stone steps leading down to a seating area carved out of a well-kept lawn. A dense stand of trees surrounded the house and garden on all sides, save for a long gravel driveway leading to the road. Kayla took deep breaths of the damp air, feeling a new lease on life. The seclusion was perfect for her purposes.
She had phoned Angie Bennett right after getting home from the hospital, hoping for an interview. After her husband Jack's death, the press had hounded Angie ceaselessly. She had become adept at fending off insistent reporters who just wanted to sensationalize his death by connecting it to anything from adultery to bribes. They wanted a sound-bite to fit their sordid narrative and were not interested in Angie's insistence that a miscarriage of justice had occurred; that Jack's death was a murder, wrongly treated as a suicide by the police.
Angie read Kayla's column faithfully and felt vindicated when the latest article criticized the investigation and made the same points as she had tried unsuccessfully to raise. Moreover, Angie remembered Kayla fondly as an exemplary student in the high school English class she used to teach.
So, when Kayla called and requested an interview, she had listened patiently. Angie had read of the reporter's ordeal in the morning paper and asked how she was feeling. When Kayla broke down in tears, saying she feared for her life, Angie invited her to look at her basement apartment to see if it would work. It had been unoccupied since the death of Jack's elderly mother, several months previously.
At the front of the house, the apartment was hidden below ground level, due to the slope of the land, while at the rear, it opened onto Angie's well-maintained garden. Kayla's new living space couldn't be seen from the driveway, and she could enter and leave through her own back door.
The only catch Kayla could see was the danger of Angie's daughter Emily revealing her whereabouts. The daughter's friend Sophia seemed to hang out at the house, and Kayla wasn't yet ready to trust either of them. They had sworn to keep her presence a secret, but Kayla remembered well how teenagers could be. She also remembered telling Matt it was inappropriate for him to fool around with someone as young as Emily. Kayla didn't know if the girl bore a grudge.
Kayla had no sooner settled at her laptop to work on her column when the girls knocked on the connecting door. She agreed to talk to them later in the day. Since she'd been interrupted, she followed them upstairs to see if Angie was free.
Angie poured two cups of coffee and asked if they could talk while she folded laundry, as she was behind with her housework. Glad of someone to whom she could speak openly, Kayla told Angie everything that had happened in the last week. She only omitted what was on Matt's USB flash drive, and the scene she'd witnessed in his hospital room. Kayla revealed she'd seen the police report on Jack's death but said she couldn't disclose how.
Angie said, "a week before he died, Jack suddenly turned secretive and began locking the door to his home office, to prevent me from seeing the papers on his desk. He said it was for my protection, which never made any sense to me."
"What happened to the papers he didn't want you to see?" Kayla asked.
"The police came and took everything. When they left, his desk was empty. I hear they cleaned out the office in town he shared with Joey Sands. After finding him there, shot in the head, I never wanted to go near the place again."
"Have you discovered what Jack was hiding?" Kayla asked.
"He was suddenly racked with guilt and told me his only option was to come clean to the police. I still don't know what he'd discovered. All he said was that if a situation from many years ago became known, it would reflect poorly on him. But he insisted he'd done nothing wrong. "
"Do you think it could have led him to kill himself?"
"Absolutely not. Jack loved Emily and me dearly, and always said suicide was a coward's way out. He kept a revolver in his desk at the offices he shared with Joey but only for protection. I still have it as it's not the one that killed him."
"I must have missed that in the report."
"In the days before Jack died, I saw a strange man hanging around outside his offices in town, but the police took no notice of such inconvenient facts. They never tried to find the man. Nor were they concerned that Jack didn't kill himself with his own gun. The investigation by that Townsend asshole was a farce. As if Jack's death wasn't enough, I've been receiving threatening letters and emails ever since."
"What do they say?"
"They try to frighten me with all manner of horrible things, like rape and mutilation if I don't keep quiet about Jack's death."
"Did you take them to the police?"
"In the beginning, for all the good it did. I don't bother anymore. Some days I'm afraid to go out of the house. Whenever Jack is in the news, I get new threatening messages."
"I'm sorry if I set the trolls off with my latest article."
"Don't be. The truth of what happened needs to come out. If you find anything new, you should print it. I won't be scared into submission by the cowards."
"I'd like a piece of them myself," Kayla said as she hugged Angie tightly.
Later in the afternoon, Kayla was in her apartment and reread the article she'd written:
MURDERS AND MAYHEM—POLICE INCOMPETENCE OR CORRUPTION?
Exclusive by The Examiner's Investigative Reporter Kayla Ellis
This columnist will never shy away from her duty to keep you, our readers, informed, even when her safety is threatened. Two days ago, the evildoers who murdered three of my friends, viciously assaulted me in a failed attempt to keep their dirty secrets hidden. They know my investigations are getting too close to the truth behind the murders and fear I will reveal their names and crimes here in my column. After trying for a week to find the perpetrators, our crack police investigators have little to show for their efforts, beyond a suspicion the crimes are connected, sources say. I must ask you how hard are they looking?
After the daring prison escape of Dirk Hildegard, it's not only the press that has the lead detective on the case, Megan Riley, ducking for cover. The soon to be tried bank robber has vowed to avenge his brother's death at her hands, and fears for her safety have hampered investigations. Now, there is late news that Detective Riley will be sidelined while her involvement in the shooting death of Hildegard at a local self-storage facility is thoroughly probed. Lieutenant Townsend has refused to comment on rumors that poor performance was the real reason for her removal from the case. Let's hope her replacement is more effective.
In the short time that this investigative journalist has been on the triple murder case, she has unearthed secrets and motives missed by investigators. Thanks to my sources, I now know about local goings-on like theft, corruption, and bribes, to name a few of the problems plaguing our city. Problems that may have resulted in the untimely deaths of three young people.
Criminal dishonesty is rampant among our community leaders, while the city hands out parking tickets to financially strapped citizens like confetti. Is there one law for the rich and one for
the poor, I ask you?
But you know what the response from the police will be if I present detectives with my findings. The same as happened when we called on them to investigate reports that Mayor Whitehead was receiving bribes in return for letting her bigwig developer friends build what they want, where they want. A big fat nothingburger!
A case in point is the variance she awarded local developer Joey Sands when he wanted to build apartments on land zoned commercial and owned by contractor Buddy Olsen. We know both developers were major contributors to the Mayor's re-election fund. For those who may have missed the news, the city recently awarded Olsen a $50M no-bid contract to put up a new building to house the Department of Motor Vehicles. But I have new evidence suggesting the election funds may not be all they gave the Mayor in return for her consideration in the rezoning matter.
I have been beaten, put in the hospital, and threatened because of what I know. But the thugs who jumped me will not silence me. I'm writing this report at a secret location out of their reach. My readers who are concerned about the accusations I make in this column should note that it is not libelous to report facts.
Next time, I will tell you how a major computer security breach at our local Abbey Mount Hospital has put your personal medical information at risk, even if you were never treated there.
Kayla stood and stretched. She was still bruised and sore where the punches had landed and found it uncomfortable to sit for very long. The article would be fodder for the anonymous haters who attacked her on social media. But Max, her editor, would approve. He liked stoking controversy.
Hiding in Angie Bennett's basement was fine for now, Kayla thought, but what if the police never caught the man who'd tried to kidnap her? She hadn't testified against anyone, so she wasn't eligible for witness protection.
There was no alternative—she had to solve the murders herself, using Matt's hacked information.
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