Full Moon Bloody Moon

by Lee Driver

  Slowly, Sara sank onto the loveseat, their gaze locked. She seemed to mull the question over in her mind and with a subtle shrug admitted, “I don’t know.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Thursday, October 12, 7:30 a.m.

  “No missing persons, no one dancing in the moonlight, no homicides. Very quiet night,” Padre reported. “Couple fights at a local bar, few family disturbances, but that’s it.”

  “Guess that should make us rest easy.” Dagger cradled the phone between his ear and shoulder as he poured water into the coffee maker and pushed the START button.

  “You don’t sound convinced.”

  Dagger told him about some of the reports he had read last night. “Sherlock did some major research.”

  “Might have been a thesis in college he had worked on. Some people latch onto a hobby and don’t let go.”

  “I didn’t notice too in-depth a report on Sherlock’s death.”

  “Other than reporting that he confessed to the slayings prior to taking his own life, I didn’t want to reveal any of his sick theories and I just hope the press doesn’t catch wind of them either.”

  “Luther do an autopsy yet?”

  “Yes. No water in the lungs. Went down just as we witnessed. He’ll place a rush on the toxicology report.”

  “What’s Marty doing today?”

  “Probably still sleeping off a hangover. I told him to give me a call when he wakes up. What about you?”

  Dagger walked out onto the back patio and stretched, inhaled the morning air. The ground was covered in a sheen of dew and a low haze clung to the deep thicket of underbrush in the distance. “I’m just waiting for a little activity on my one bug that followed our thief home and then we can wrap up the Evidence Room case. What about the Caroline Kirby case?”

  “Her parents are going to stop by today to I.D. the body. Such a shame.”

  “Any suspects?”

  “Other than you and Sara?” Padra laughed. “Spagnola is waiting on all the forensics reports to come in. The victim wasn’t raped. Killer had to have a key. Only way to get in the place unless he flew in.”

  Another shudder ran through Dagger’s body. He checked on the coffee. “I don’t want to hear about any killer flying, climbing trees, or doing any other strange things.”

  “Well, be prepared. Spagnola’s got his sights set on you. Just give me a call if he gets overbearing. You have an alibi. We were all with you that night. And we were all with Sara.”

  Dagger hung up and poured himself a cup of coffee. He unfolded the morning paper and sat down at the kitchen table. The front page screamed tabloid headlines. Sheila managed to get her face prominently featured in a distraught yet planned pose. His fingers gripped the cup as he skimmed through her interview which she sprinkled with all kinds of inuendos about the killer being someone who had it out for her, that Caroline was not the target. Even Dagger’s name had been brought up to which Sheila had supported her fiancée one hundred percent. “He is just as distraught as I am,” Sheila was quoted as saying. A couple times Sheila slipped, although he doubted it was a slip up, and referred to the killer as a she.

  For some reason, lately, whenever he thought of Sheila, his thoughts drifted to the movie Play Misty For Me which was about a DJ who was being stalked by a one-night stand.

  Dagger answered the phone on the first ring. He was sorry he did.

  “Dagger, Honey. Did you see the papers?”

  “You practically all but spit out Sara’s name in the article. What do you want, Sheila?”

  A cool breeze drifted in from the jalousie windows behind the sink. Dagger got up to close them and watched a light sprinkle dot the concrete patio.

  “I have to find a new place to live. I just can’t return to my penthouse. As long as I have to do that, I thought maybe we could look for a place together.”

  Dagger laughed. It wasn’t sinister or vicious. He was actually amused. “I don’t know, Sheila. Why don’t you just come here and live with Sara and me until you have a new place built?”

  Silence. Then Sheila blurted, “You’re being funny, right?”

  “Actually, you can live here and take care of Einstein since Sara and I will be in prison.”

  Sara stopped in the doorway, cocked her head as though she didn’t hear correctly. One perfectly formed eyebrow jerked up.

  “You made it perfectly clear in the article, Sheila, that either one of us did it. Matter of fact, it was a conspiracy. We planned it together. How’s that for headlines?” Dagger pushed the END button.

  “Sheila?” Sara asked as she grabbed the carafe.

  “You’re changing from a tea to a coffee drinker.”

  “Thanks to this case, I kept tossing and turning. Not sure if I was relieved no one tried talking to me or nervous that someone would.”

  He held his cup out for her to fill. “Sherlock left us all with frayed nerves. Read any of those reports he had?”

  “Can’t believe what floats around the Internet. I never heard of astral perception or limited, primal, blood shapeshifting. It almost sounds cartoonish.” She curled her jean-clad legs under her and sat across from Dagger. Her hair drifted down her arms, captured in the folds of the oversized pullover. Her eyes caught the headline.

  “What did she want?” Sara asked, referring to the phone call from Sheila.

  “Poor thing can’t ever return to her filthy penthouse so she’s looking for another one and wanted me to find something we can both live in.” He shoved the sleeves up on his black Henley, pulled his hair behind his ears. He glanced at his partner. Sara had been hurt on more than one occasion by Sheila and he wondered how much longer she would put up with it.

  “Why did you say we were both going to be in prison?” She cocked her head to see the paper. Dagger pushed it toward her.

  “She basically insinuated she knew who the killer might be and all but named you.”

  Sara didn’t smile, just nibbled on her bottom lip as she read the interview with Sheila. If she had any opinions, she wasn’t sharing.

  “How about an omelet?” Dagger rose from the table.

  “You’re cooking?”

  “Sure. One vegetable omelet and one with artery clogging sausage coming right up.”

  “You must really feel guilty about Sheila’s article.”

  Dagger shrugged, dragged ingredients from the refrigerator and a fry pan from the cabinet. “I thought I left that baggage at the curb when I moved here. You shouldn’t have to deal with it.”

  “Does that mean you’ll visit me in prison?”

  He wasn’t sure if she was kidding or not. Her face was buried in the papers and he couldn’t see those expressive eyes that revealed her slightest mood.

  Sara kept skimming the papers. But a small obscure headline on the bottom right-hand side of Page 6 escaped her and even Dagger’s attention. It read:

  Farmers Report Numerous Cattle Mutilations

  in Hebron, Indiana

  CHAPTER 26

  October 12, 9:10 a.m.

  “Hello, Mr. Burglar.” Skizzy dragged the pointer on the screen to the control panel and enlarged the image on the monitor. He had moved the Mick last night once he was sure it had freed itself from the hat. Now the thermal sighting lens enabled Skizzy to observe the windowless narrow room.

  Several hand guns rested in a rack hanging on the far wall. Mick slowly panned another wall, vacant, except for a cot, and near the far end, a latch-type opening closer toward the ceiling. Skizzy estimated the room to be about seven feet high, maybe less. Was this some type of delivery door? A full length door was on the opposite wall and Skizzy could only guess this doorway led to the rest of the building. Maybe it was a house, maybe a warehouse or storage unit.

  The Mick was perched on a shelf across from the cot. It had crawled up the wall last night and stayed behind a box. Now that it ventured away from its hiding place, Skizzy could see the object was a box of crackers.

  “Well, I’ve heard of being
in a dog house, mister.” Skizzy set the remote in his lap and grabbed his coffee cup. He sat cross-legged on the chair, like a teenager playing Nintendo. This was actually how he would rather be spending his days. His mind was conjuring up other places to put Micks. Maybe the mayor’s office or the IRS. Or maybe it was time to visit the White House, wear a floral shirt and hang a camera around his neck like any other tourist, leave a few Micks lying around. He would place four in the Oval office alone.

  Chuckling at the thought, Skizzy started rocking, left to right, a slow rock while his fingers toyed with the remote. His body was swaying to some tune only Skizzy could hear. It was the tune from the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.

  His eyes drifted to his surroundings. His makeshift bunker at least had food, water, lights, and computers. And it was larger, much larger than this hideaway the thief had chosen. And Skizzy’s had bathroom facilities, although designed more for a bomb shelter.

  “What the hell do you do for entertainment, dude?” Skizzy studied the screen, the images glowing amber, until the Mick bumped into something. It looked like a glass container of some sort. Skizzy put the Mick in reverse and brought the container into focus.

  “What the…” He leaned closer to the screen and then jerked back. Inside the glass was a human finger.

  “Of course he would keep the finger in some preservative,” Dagger laughed. He adjusted the brightness on the monitor and studied the image the Mick was seeing. “Now if only you can get Mick to crawl outside and give us an address, you might be worth something, Skizzy.”

  “I can tell you now, I think that hatch thingy on the wall is a chute of some sort. Seeing that the walls are those old time cinderblocks…”

  “Those are coming into vogue again. Sara’s house is cinderblock.”

  “Hers was originally an auto dealership. This dude’s building is old. Could be an old warehouse and deliveries were made through the chute, or a hospital or nursing home and it was a laundry chute.”

  “Or a coal chute. Some older homes had coal bins. Why don’t you check that out, Skizzy.”

  “Sure. Like I got nothing else to do,” Skizzy mumbled.

  “You don’t.” Dagger clicked the END button on the telephone icon and smiled. He knew if it wasn’t for his involving Skizzy in side jobs, the little guy would go crazy, or crazier in Skizzy’s case.

  “AWK, BAD BOYS BAD BOYS.” Einstein lighted on the perch and ruffled his feathers.

  “Who’s bad, Einstein?” He reached up and stroked the macaw’s bill. “Were you watching Cops again last night?” Dagger stood and gently clasped his hands around Einstein’s head, examined his eye coloring. “You still look doped up, you know it?”

  “DOPEY DOPEY, AWRRKK.”

  “It’s a wonder you aren’t falling off the damn perch.” He watched as the macaw flew up to the catwalk and wrapped its claws around the railing. The macaw continued its screeching and drowned out Simon’s appearance at the kitchen door. Several minutes later, the jovial postman was standing at Dagger’s desk.

  “Good aromas in that kitchen,” Simon chuckled.

  “I think Sara’s making banana nut bread.”

  “Oh…” Simon paused, his smile fading. “Sara’s baking?” Simon turned toward the couch, a chuckle catching in his throat.

  Dagger avoided Simon’s bait. He knew all too well how the scent of Sara’s shampoo, bath soap, or a new body lotion, filled the room whether she was in it or not. It wasn’t overpowering. You just knew she had been in the room.

  “Pity about that professor,” Simon said, turning serious and lowering his hefty body onto the couch. “Sara seemed to like him and she’s a pretty good judge of character. You, on the other hand, are suspicious of anyone who looks sideways at that lovely thing.”

  “Including you.” Dagger grabbed the rolled up copies of city maps he had obtained from the Building Department and carried them over to the couch. He no longer needed the isolated structure in the forest preserve for Sherlock’s imaginary beast. But the maps might come in handy for his other case. After removing the centerpiece from the coffee table, Dagger opened the maps. “Where would you say the oldest homes in Cedar Point are?”

  “Putting me to work, huh?” Simon leaned forward and studied the street maps. “Can I mark on it?”

  “Help yourself.”

  Simon pulled a felt tip pen from his pocket and circled an area. “The First Ward is the oldest section in Cedar Point. Got a bunch of row houses along the state line.” His pen circled another area in the middle of town. “Here is where the old city hall was and a lot of the surrounding houses are ancient.” He eyed Dagger curiously. “Whatcha lookin’ for?”

  “Any houses that had utilized coal chutes.”

  “That would be most of them. Although near the old city hall, a lot of those houses were renovated. People dug out those coal rooms, practically chopping them off the building and adding on those fancy enclosures.” Simon jerked a thumb toward the Florida room. “Sorta like that. Some put hot tubs in. Guess the mayor’s project with them Philadelphia-style townhouses forced the residences to spiffy up their own.”

  “Our Evidence Room thief is living in an older house, one that has what looks like an old coal bin.” Dagger slipped the top map off the table and watched as Simon studied the next map.

  “Nope, this here’s all new construction.”

  A bright splash of color swooped down from the catwalk and landed on the perch behind the couch.

  Einstein let out a diatribe of screeches and squawks. Simon winced but it didn’t phase Dagger. The detective was like a father used to the screamings of a house full of kids, immune to the sounds around him.

  Sara appeared in the doorway to the aviary holding up a braid of interlocking blocks. Brazil nuts were wedged between the knotted rope and Sara dangled the braid until she caught Einstein’s attention. She carried it into the aviary and hooked it onto one of the tree branches.

  The curious macaw flew onto the tree branch and hung upside down.

  “Play time, buddy. That should keep you quiet for a while.” She closed the doors to the aviary and returned to the kitchen.

  “Certainly takes care of her men, don’t she?” Simon winked at Dagger.

  “This is the last map,” Dagger pointed out.

  “Yeah, yeah.” Simon studied the streets, reared back as if to get his bearings. “Nothing too old there unless you want to count the farmhouses in the unincorporated areas.”

  Farmhouses. Dagger wondered where he had heard reference to those before.

  Simon unfolded his body from the couch and hobbled toward the kitchen. “Gotta see if that bread is cool enough to cut.” He turned back and set something on top of the filing cabinet.

  Dagger rolled the maps up and walked over to the desk. “What is it?” He eyed the three-inch-tall hourglass.

  Simon grinned and elbowed his friend. “It’s an egg timer.” He was still chuckling as he lumbered off to the kitchen.

  CHAPTER 27

  October 12, 1:45 p.m.

  “You look like hell.” Padre studied Marty’s pallid face as the Indianapolis cop lowered his tired body onto a chair.

  “Could use a little more sleep, like about a week.” He looked around the chaotic office. “Any coffee and can they keep the noise down?”

  The poor man was suffering more from guilt than a hangover, Padre determined. He set the cup in front of the cop and watched him lift the shaking cup to his mouth. “You may not remember, but when you were drunk you offered to escort Sherlock’s body back to Indianapolis. Now that you are somewhat sober…”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Marty took a swallow of the hot liquid and winced. “When will the body be ready?”

  “Can’t release it til tomorrow, maybe.”

  “Maybe?”

  “They are backed up in the M.E.’s office.”

  Marty seemed to digest the information, nodded grimly.

  “Your guy made it easy for you.” Spagnola’s dark
eyes danced as he stood in front of Padre’s desk.

  Padre glared at the smug detective with the gold pinkie ring and thick gold link bracelet. “Well, as you know, when you sit at the right hand of God, things just go your way.” He forced a smile in return. Several years ago he had been partnered with Spagnola briefly but Padre learned quickly there were things Spagnola did that went against all rules. Like stealing money off dead bodies, jewelry from victim’s homes. And once he had witnessed Spagnola planting a gun on a suspect. That had been the final straw. He told his partner under no uncertain terms would he keep quiet after the third such incident. Spagnola immediately asked for a new partner citing irreconcilable differences. That was fine with Padre. He didn’t think Spagnola changed his ways, though. Just became more discreet.

  “I kind of like the easy ones, too. My suspect hasn’t committed suicide, but the case against him is unshakable.” Spagnola left Padre with that little tidbit of information before strolling back to his desk.

  “What was that all about?” Marty slouched in the chair, elbow on the desk, fist propping up his aching head.

  “He thinks he has a pat case against Dagger. But you and I were with him the night Sheila’s employee was murdered. Spagnola is spitting in the wind.”

  There were times Padre wished Dagger were a cop. He always thought he’d make a good one. He studied Marty’s face, the crease above the bridge of his nose that seemed to have deepened since yesterday afternoon, the weariness in his eyes. All signs of burn out. Padre said, “You ever trust someone so much that it didn’t matter to you that you didn’t know everything about him? You respect him for who he is, no questions asked? And he trusts you, too, not to pry, to respect his privacy, and being a cop, that’s hard to do, to not want to delve into his background. Ever know anyone like that?”

  Marty’s heavy lids blinked, and he nodded slowly, as if the sheer effort were painful. “Yeah,” he replied. “I’m escorting him home tomorrow.”