ONE TOO MANY - ANGIE BARTONI CASE FILE #9

by Marshall Huffman

  ONE TOO MANY

  Angie Bartoni

  Case File # 9

  By

  MW Huffman

  ONE TOO MANY©2013

  By Marshall Huffman

  All rights reserved

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to anyone living or dead is purely coincidental. Certain facts have been arranged to fit the time line of the story.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

  I would like to thank my wife, Susan, who has taken on the role of editing my books. I appreciate her more than she will ever know.

  OTHER BOOKS BY MW HUFFMAN

  THE END–BOOK I of The Event Series

  THE BEGINNING–BOOK II of The Event Series

  THE REVELATION–BOOK III of The Event Series

  The Second Civil War–BOOK I-A Nation Divided

  The Second Civil War–Book II-A Nation at War

  The Second Civil War–Book III–A Nation Healing

  Project BlueBolt – BOOK I – American Gulags

  Project BlueBolt – BOOK II - The Gulag Journal

  Project BlueBolt – BOOK III – American Uprising

  REVOLUTION

  THE BRINK

  CLOSE PROXIMITY

  BLACKSTAR

  CHIMERA

  WORLDS END

  SUN BURST

  Sins of the Fathers

  The Unfinished

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 1 - The Alphabet Murders

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 2 - Frost Bite

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 3 - Dead Aim

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 4 - What Goes Around

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 5 - Nothing to Lose

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 6 - Shadow Man

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 7 – The Club

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 8 – Shakespeare Murders

  Angie Bartoni Case File # 9 – One Too Many

  Angie Bartoni Case File #10 – Weak Link

  Angie Bartoni Case File #11 – Vanishing Act

  Angie Bartoni Case File #12 – Victim’s Advocate

  Angie Bartoni Case File #13 – Payback

  Angie Bartoni Case File #14 – Dead on Arrival

  The Logan Files - Blond Deception

  The Logan Files - Innocence and Avarice

  The Logan Files - The Deal Breaker

  The Logan Files – Pain Center

  Norris Files – Insurrection

  Norris Files - Silver2

  ONE

  Alyssa Powers had been taking the same short cut home from High School ever since her freshman year. Today was no different other than the small gully that she had to traverse was still slightly muddy from the rain earlier in the day.

  She looked down and then back at her shoes. She had just gotten them a week ago and the last thing she wanted to do was get them all muddy. She was just trying to decide if she would take the longer way around or try tip-toeing through the mud when she was shoved violently from behind.

  She let out a slight yelp before tumbling down the side of the slope. Her backpack went sailing. She tried to regain her balance but it was too late. She landed on her knees first then slipped onto her stomach when her hands shot out from under her on the slimy mud. She slid to the bottom of the gully and before she even had time to recover she felt someone's weight pressing down on her. They had their knee in her back, forcing her face into the mud.

  She tried to buck and roll them off but they were far too strong and she could feel her strength giving out. Whoever it was continued to hold her face in the mud and she could taste it in her mouth. Slowly she began to lose consciousness and then everything went black.

  **

  “Holy smokes, what brings you in so early?” my captain asked. Captain McGregor had been my boss ever since I was transferred to the Twelfth Precinct. All in all he was a pretty good guy to work for. We butted heads occasionally but let’s face it, he had to put up with a lot of crap from me from time to time.

  You've probably figured out that I am a cop. A Detective First Grade if you really want to know. I’m a female, five-five and have brown hair and brown eyes. I wear it sensibly up in a ponytail and out of the way most of the time, my hair not my eyes, and I would tell you my weight but then I would have to shoot you. Let’s just say I’m decent looking. I have started putting a little more effort into my appearance since I have been dating Doctor Ben Warman.

  My partner, Detective Dan Roberts, has been with me for almost three years now and while I have always liked working alone, I must say I have enjoyed having him as a partner. Dan is a hunk. He is a tad over six-one, probably one eighty-five, and looks good from all directions.

  I have two hard and fast rules. I don’t date cops and will never get involved with a married man. Both situations are nothing but disasters waiting to happen.

  “Hey look at you,” Dan said when he came up the stairs and headed straight to the break room as always.

  “What?”

  “Is that eyeliner and girl stuff on your face?”

  “Go get your stupid coffee. I am not talking about my looks to a dweeb like you.”

  “Who would have thought it?” he said as he took off.

  See? This is why I don’t usually wear makeup. I knew it would garner a lot of smart-aleck comments.

  I saw him coming back, stirring his coffee. Why he drank that rotgut was beyond me. I need Diet Cokes to keep me going. Yeah, I know, if you drink a billion of them in forty-eight hours it might kill a laboratory rat but I really didn’t care to heed that dire warning.

  “So, I take it your relationship with Doctor B is flourishing.”

  I just looked at him with that mother is unhappy look. It went right over his head.

  “Makeup. I just never thought I would see the day,” he pressed.

  “Dan. I don’t want to have to shoot you but you know I will. Now give it a rest if you want to live past lunch time,” I warned him.

  He just laughed. What had happened? There was a time when that would have sent cold chills down his spine. Now he just laughed it off. I need some believable new threats.

  **

  The captain came out of his office and headed my way. Not good.

  “Bartoni, grab Dan and head to Morris Creek Park. We have a body. Officers Dunhill and Forrester will meet you there.”

  “On our way boss,” I said, grabbing my gun and jacket.

  “You drive,” I told Dan.

  I was still cooling my jets after my last round of totaled police cruisers. None were my fault but I was still kind of leery.

  It was a nice spring day. Not too hot, maybe seventy degrees and the sky was that clear Midwest blue that seems to only happen in May. Traffic was a little heavier than normal since we were coming up on the week of the Indianapolis 500 time trials. Cars had been buzzing around the track for the past week and Pole Day was just a few days away.

  Morris Creek Park should be renamed Morris Trickle Park. The creek hardly exists any longer. The lady at the gate directed us where to go and Dan followed her instructions. It was pretty easy to spot. Five cruisers were parked there with lights flashing.

  Yellow and black crime scene tape was already up and fluttering in the breeze. I didn’t see the ME's van or anyone from CSI just yet. Dan lifted the tape and we walked over to a group of officers.

  “I’m looking for Dunhill or Forrester,” I said.

  “Over there,” one of the men said pointing to two guys squatted down by a large oak tree.

  “You guys Dunhill and Forrester?”

  “I’m Bryan Forrester. This is my partner, Bobby Dunhill,” the one said standing up.

  “Show u
s what you have,” I said.

  They lead us down a path about fifty yards until we came to a body that I believed to be a man considering the size. He was face down and it looked like a bullwhip had been taken to his back. It was just raw meat. I looked over at Dan and could see him turning green.

  “Go back and direct the ME down here when he arrives,” I told him so he wouldn’t throw up in front of the other cops.

  He turned and quickly headed back down the path.

  “Ever see anything like this before?" Dunhill asked.

  “Can’t say that I have. I’ve seen some pretty gruesome things but nothing quite like this.”

  “You think this was done to him in front too?”

  “I don’t know yet. I want to wait for CSI and the ME before we turn him.”

  “Man, that is just horrific,” Dunhill replied and started back down the path.

  I stayed there just taking in the crime scene. I saw several broken branches heading off the trail a ways. I also saw a muddy footprint but by itself it didn’t mean much. Any hiker could have made it. It had rained two days ago and I had no way of knowing how fresh it was.

  I carefully made my way back a few feet into the forest. Visible, though half covered with leaves, was a bullwhip. Sure didn’t make much effort to hide it, I thought.

  “What you looking at Bartoni? Flowers?”

  “Yeah, to put on your grave if you sneak up on me like that again,” I told our illustrious Medical Examiner, Doctor Sorenson.

  We always took shots at each other but I loved that old coot and we got along famously. He was as crusty and sarcastic as I was and that seemed to work for us.

  “Boy, someone was pretty upset with this guy,” he said.

  “Ya think?”

  “Just my medical opinion. I’ll have to get him back to the lab to make sure.”

  “Really? What are you going to do, ask him?”

  “None of your business. So what was back there,” he said, pointing where I had been earlier.

  “The murder weapon I believe, or at least what did the external damage to the guy.”

  “Really? Didn’t do a very good of hiding it if even you can find it,” Sorenson said.

  “I see you took your ‘mean pill’ today. They seem to be working really well for you,” I replied.

  “Come on, I have more important things to do than stand around here in this mosquito infested forest.”

  “Let’s get the CSI techs back here and let them get their pictures then we can turn the body,” I offered.

  We had to wait another hour for them to finish taking pictures, gathering samples, and making the foot cast. Sorenson grumbled the entire time. What a curmudgeon.

  TWO

  When we finally got back to the body and the CSI techs had gone, Doc Sorenson and I rolled the victim over.

  “Well would you look at that. Fan mail for you Bartoni,” Sorenson said.

  Crudely carved in the guy’s chest was a note to me.

  IT IS FINISHED BARTONI

  “You know who this is don’t you?” Sorenson asked.

  “Yeah. Tom James, the last member of the Bruno Stillwell gang that was released from prison.”

  “Well whoever the perp was, he finally got them all,” Sorenson said.

  “It’s been a year. I wonder how the killer tracked him down?"

  “Obviously they are a lot better at detecting than you,” Sorenson snipped.

  “Don’t you have to go drink some formaldehyde or something?” I shot back.

  “Don’t get mad at me, I’m just saying, he found the guy. You guys tried to find him for months.”

  “Well in case you didn’t realize it, we have had a few more important cases crop up, you medical school dropout.”

  “You’d better never need stiches, you cheeky wench,” Sorenson.

  “I wouldn’t ask you. I wouldn’t want to end up looking like Frankenstein.”

  He mumbled something that sort of sounded like you already do but I decided to let it go. I didn’t want to have to hide his body back there in the woods as well.

  “Hey, how is your Healy doing? You know, I used to have one of those things.”

  “Really?”

  “Yep before they cost a fortune. Had one back in the sixties. It was a pretty wicked car. I wish I had kept it.”

  “Maybe I’ll come by and pick you up and we can go cruising.”

  “I would enjoy that,” he said.

  **

  “Wait. Are you saying it is the same Tom James from the Stillwell gang?” Captain McGregor asked.

  “The very same.”

  “Where has he been all this time?”

  “I don’t know but he should have stayed there. It wasn’t very smart of him to come back.”

  “And I suppose you think it was the work of Kenny Miller.”

  “I’m ninety percent sure of it. The problem is always physical evidence. He got away with killing Stillwell’s other members, he as much as told me so. I need some real solid evidence linking him to this murder or he is going to walk again and I’m pretty sick of it,” I told him.

  Yes Miller was a vigilante murderer of rapists and torturers of young woman but we simply cannot allow vigilante justice in our society. Did I blame him for what he had done to his wife’s killers? Not really, but that is what the law and court system are for. Dan asked me once what I would do in a similar situation. The honest truth is I don’t know. I like to think I would let the police handle it but in reality, I’m not so sure I would if I thought I could cleanly get away with it.

  I knew Miller was responsible. I was actually hoping that the idiot James would just stay away and I would never have to deal with it again but now it was back on my plate.

  I went down to records and pulled everything out of the Cold Case Files and brought it up to my desk. Dan looked at me and shook his head.

  “We have to go after him don’t we?”

  “Unless the law has changed, I’m pretty sure murder is still murder in this state.”

  “Man this is one case I was hoping we would never have to deal with again. James should have stayed away,” Dan said.

  “My sentiments exactly.”

  “You know there isn’t anything in there. We have been through that stuff at least a dozen times,” Dan said.

  “Okay Mr. Know-it-all. Name the seven murder victims.”

  “I remember Stillwell and that other guy.”

  “Wow. That’s really knowing the players. Nice job,” I said sarcastically.

  “What difference does it make? They are dead.”

  “Just read the files wonder boy.”

  **

  “Detective Bartoni,” I said as I answered the phone.

  “Very official sounding.”

  “Hi Ben. I wasn’t expecting you to call me here.”

  “I just decided to see if you wanted to have dinner tonight? I found this really neat little Greek place with fantastic food.”

  “That sounds wonderful. I did just catch a case a little while ago but it shouldn’t interfere with dinner.”

  “Great. You want me to pick you up at your place?”

  “That would be nice. I’ll need to shower and get ready anyway.”

  “7:00 p.m. okay with you?”

  “Perfect. See you then,” I said and hung up before he could say anything further.

  I was totally enjoying my relationship with Ben but he was moving a tad faster than I was ready for. I mean, sure hearing that someone loves you is great but it made me feel...weird. I’m still trying to figure out what love really is. I mean I understand lust and making love but the actual concept of love is elusive to me. I know I’m terribly fond of Ben but I’m struggling with the term love.

  “Was that your sweetie?” Dan asked after I hung up.

  “Dan, don’t even start in on me. If you do I swear I will have you reading through every cold case file since this building was built.”

  “Yikes. A ta
d sensitive aren’t you?”

  “Just give it a rest. Why don’t you do something constructive and drive us over to talk to Miller.”

  “You know darn well he is ready for us. He has his alibi all lined out. He was home with his son or some such thing,” Dan replied.

  “I know but I want him to know we are going to take another very hard look at him. I’m not going to just drop it. We have some physical evidence this time and with any kind of luck we will get something.”

  “Okay boss, if you say so,” Dan replied.

  Geez, he was just like a teenager. All that was missing was the rolling of the eyes.

  **

  Traffic had continued to build and it took us nearly an hour to get to Miller's place. It looked exactly the same as the last time we were there. Miller came out of the house as soon as we pulled into the drive.

  “Looks like he was expecting us,” Dan said.

  “Looks like.”

  “Well, look who is here. Bartoni and Roberts. Long time no see.”

  “Right. You know why we are here.”

  “I guess it is about poor old James. Man, he was the last one of the Stillwell group of murderers. Too bad. I heard it was pretty gruesome.”

  “Really? How do you know that?” I asked.

  “The news said it was pretty horrendous. I wonder how long it took for him to die.”

  “Why don’t you just tell me,” I suggested.

  “Oh Detective Bartoni, I love your sense of humor. Besides how would I know that?”

  “Because you did it?”

  He shook his head.

  “Sorry, I don’t know a thing about it except for what I read in the papers. Whoever finally gave him the justice he deserved, my hat is off to them,” Miller said.

  “Where were you last night?”

  He shrugged. “I was here most of the night. I mean I did go to the store for a six pack of beer but other than that I was home all night.”

  “And I suppose your son was here with you.”

  “Now that you mention it, he was here with me.”

  “Where is Brandon?” Dan asked.

  “At work I would imagine or getting rid of evidence,” he said and laughed.