Dead Lawyers Don't Lie: A Gripping Thriller (Jake Wolfe Book 1)

by Mark Nolan

  “You’ve got a deal. I also need to take a statement from you about what you saw.”

  “No problem. What did your K9 team find over there?”

  “Our dog sniffed out the tree where the shooter fired his weapon.”

  “I have a photo of the shooter up in that very tree and pointing his rifle at me. Check your phone, I sent all of my photos and videos to you.”

  “Thanks, I appreciate it.”

  Terrell looked at his phone and saw the photo of the shooter in the tree. The suspect was wearing a ball cap, and part of his face was hidden behind the rifle scope, but the photo was better than nothing. He sent it to Roxanne, the tech officer.

  “Doesn’t this make you wonder if it is ever morally right to kill some evil dirtbag who totally deserves it?” Jake said.

  “You sound like you might actually agree with what the shooter did.”

  “No, I understand it but that doesn’t mean I agree with it.”

  “Good, because there is this thing called the law,” Terrell said. “You might have heard of it.”

  “It does sound vaguely familiar.”

  “Not that you care too much about laws and regulations.”

  “I used to care, but I take a pill for that now.”

  “How did you get your ass up on top of that gazebo thing, anyway?”

  “Sorry but that’s a trade secret only my ass knows for sure, and it ain’t talking.”

  Terrell took a look back at Jake, and then entered the woods area. He saw Ryan and Hank, and walked in their direction.

  “I’ve got to talk to the K9 officer now,” Terrell said.

  “Okay I’ll let you go, thanks,” Jake said.

  “No problem, thanks for the intel on the crime scene, and for covering me. One last thing. Sergeant Denton showed up here uninvited. If she sees you up on that pavilion, she’ll probably use that as an excuse to arrest you or shoot you. Then if you were locked up or dead I’d have to fill out some more paperwork, and that would be annoying.”

  “Thanks for warning me. That sociopath is the last person I want to see. And I’m touched by your concern about the paperwork and all.”

  “Talk to you later Jukebox.”

  “Alright Grinds, see you later my brother.” Jake ended the call. He looked off into the distance and saw Terrell walking into the woods. It bothered him that he wasn’t by his friend’s side and going into the danger zone.

  Chapter 8

  Jake saw Sergeant Cori Denton and her sidekick Kirby, talking to Beth Cushman. He observed them with the critical eye and the knowledge of human folly you gain while working in the news media.

  In Jake’s opinion, Denton was a scowling nut case who used her badge to bully people in order to prop up her low self-esteem. Her partner Kirby seemed like a by-the-book choir boy virgin. He looked like he’d never had a good meal, a good bottle of wine, or a good woman in his entire life. Maybe they balanced each other out, bad cop – good cop.

  Denton reminded Jake of something he’d read in the novel Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky. In that book, the character named Svidrigailov had spoken about how his wife liked to be offended. “We all like to be offended,” he’d said. “But she, in particular, loved to be offended.” Jake thought that there might be something traumatic in her past that was bothering her.

  Jake focused his camera’s long telephoto lens and zoomed in on Denton’s angry face for a moment. Seeing her made him feel a heavy weight on his heart. Some time ago Denton had shot and killed Jake’s pet dog Gracie—a sweet old black Labrador retriever with gray hair on her muzzle. Jake had rescued Gracie from the pound after someone had abandoned the dog in her old age. She’d been a wonderful friend to him. Sometimes he’d taken her to the children’s cancer floor of the hospital, to cheer up the child patients. Gracie had loved every child and nurse she’d met there, and they’d all loved her too.

  On the Fourth of July Jake’s neighbors had held a block party on their street. Denton and her partner Kirby had driven past, then stopped and yelled at the families to disperse. Gracie was harmless but she had barked at the threatening intruders. Denton had drawn her police pistol and fired three rounds into the dog, right in front of Jake and a group of neighbors and their kids.

  Jake had screamed at Denton and had run to Gracie’s side. He’d knelt down on the pavement and held his four-legged best friend close while he helplessly watched her die in his arms a minute later. Gracie had used her last ounce of strength to lick the tears from Jake’s face.

  Jake had then stood up and walked directly toward Denton, yelling and cursing and pointing his finger at her. She’d aimed her pistol at him and called for her male partner to back her up. Kirby drew his weapon and the two cops ordered Jake to lie face-down on the ground or be shot. Jake’s fiancée pleaded with him to cooperate. Jake knew he could be killed, just like his dog. He slowly obeyed the police but continued cursing at Denton. The police handcuffed him, placed him under arrest on trumped up charges and put him in a jail cell.

  The neighborhood children had wailed and cried while several of their parents called 911. A television news crew had arrived from Jake’s employer and they’d put Denton’s angry face on the news for all to see. Protests were held by animal rights groups, and the Chief of Police was harassed by news reporters for months afterward. In the police department inquiry that followed, Denton’s official statement had been, “I had no choice other than to shoot the dangerous animal, to defend myself and ensure public safety.”

  Afterwards, the TV station where Jake worked had run a report on how there was an epidemic of family pet dogs being shot all across America by over-reactive rookie law enforcement officers. But Chief Pierce had publicly apologized, and held meetings to make sure it never happened again in San Francisco.

  Jake had tried to forgive and forget, but he’d found that he could not forgive the unforgivable. He’d filed a lawsuit against Denton, but the court had dismissed it. He wished Denton would move away and torment the citizens of some other city. Denton had come here from somewhere far away, and Jake wanted her to go back there.

  The cameraman who was spying on Jake said, “I picked up some patches of audio. He mentioned a rifle.”

  “Record whatever he’s saying, I want to know everything,” Arnold said.

  Arnold secretly hoped his competitor would fall off the pavilion roof and break a leg.

  Chapter 9

  The killer drove several miles away from the golf course and stopped his car at a small store to buy some mini bottles of vodka. He wasn’t taking his bipolar medications as he should. And the doctor had given him strict orders not to drink any alcohol. But he didn’t care about any of that at the moment.

  In the back of his mind the killer was aware that whenever he went off his meds and drank a lot of liquor, all hell might break loose. If he thought too much about the woman he’d loved and lost, he might swing into full-blown mania or depression. He had to avoid dwelling on how she’d died so young, with her whole life ahead of her.

  He told himself to focus on his work. Now that he’d successfully murdered the first lawyer on his kill list, he’d earned a drink. The alcohol would also help to dull the memories and the pain that he lived with every day of his life.

  The killer put his pistol into the back of his pants waistband and covered it with a jacket. He walked toward the door of the store with the feeling that he was still in the mood to rid the Earth of some unnecessary humans. He talked to himself in a low voice as he walked.

  “Every once in a while I lose patience, and I want someone to die. It doesn’t matter who or how. It only matters that some irritating brain and heart stop their worthless, annoying, pestering life so the rest of us can live in a slightly better measure of peace.”

  When the killer opened the door of the market, he briefly entertained the thought that perhaps if the cashier wasn’t properly polite, he would put a bullet in his forehead. In fact if the cashier was even the slighte
st bit annoying, he would shoot him in the throat and then ask him questions while he choked to death. That thought made him smile as he entered the store.

  However once he was inside he noted that the cashier was a cheerful young woman from India. She wore a traditional salwar kameez suit of embroidered blue material printed with a pattern. A child was playing by her side, and the woman was very polite to her new customer.

  The killer was impressed with the attractive woman who demonstrated such grace and poise, but he was also somewhat disappointed because he’d been looking forward to a confrontation and release of adrenalin. He paid cash for a handful of 50ml size mini bottles of vodka and a soda cup filled with ice.

  The cashier woman never looked askance at him. She always kept a polite, neutral smile on her face and talked about the weather during the entire transaction. The killer was highly observant and he noticed that she didn’t touch the cash register. She only named a round figure. Her right hand remained by her side below the counter most of the time. Was something down there, perhaps a weapon? The killer also noticed a TV monitor showing four square images of video being recorded inside the store. And his face appeared in one of the squares.

  The woman was observing her customer too, and being careful about it, so as not to upset him. She smiled at the stranger and tried not to let him see that she was feeling sick with fear. When she’d first watched him enter the store and walk past her, she’d felt a sense of danger. His troubled face indicated he had some kind of problem on his mind and he might be looking for someone to take out his anger upon. She’d also noted the shape of what might be a pistol in the back of his pants waistband behind his coat. That was something she’d learned to look for because working at a mini market could be a dangerous job.

  The man picked up his items and walked out the door. Now that he was gone, the woman removed her hand from the sawed-off shotgun under the counter. It was lying on a piece of canvas that hung from the underside of the counter, like a hammock. The shotgun was shortened at both ends, turning it into a nightmare of a pistol. If and when she ever fired it with one hand, it would jump up in recoil and slam into the underside of the counter, keeping it pointed straight at the crotch of the target. Her hand would hurt afterward, as would her thigh from when the butt of the shotgun slammed into it. But those bruises would heal, and they’d be a small price to pay to stay alive.

  The woman relaxed her shoulders and took several deep breaths. She was thankful that she’d avoided blasting the man with a load of buckshot. The weapon could create a deadly cloud of double-ought pellets that would easily burst through the thin wooden front paneling of the counter, and turn a criminal’s groin into bloody hamburger. She shuddered at the thought and hoped it would never be necessary. She closed the metal door that protected the gun cabinet from her child, and she entered the four digit code on the touchpad to lock it down.

  Outside the market, the killer got into his car and drove away. He opened one of the mini bottles of vodka, drank it down in one gulp and tossed it out of the window.

  “Can’t have an open container in the vehicle—that’s the law.”

  The alcohol hit his bloodstream, and he began to plan out the murder of the second victim on his kill list. This next murder would be more of a thrill kill, and he would record it on video and put it on the internet for the entire world to see.

  Chapter 10

  Jake put his camera equipment into his backpack, put the pack on his back, and walked to the edge of the roof.

  Dick Arnold waved to one of the uniformed police officers nearby and pointed at Jake. The officer saw Jake on top of the pavilion, frowned and marched over to him. Jake observed what was happening and he sighed. He understood why cops didn’t like photographers taking pictures and video of them while they were doing their jobs—but he was just doing his job too, as a photojournalist.

  “Hey, you can’t be up there,” the policeman said. “Get down, now.”

  Jake knew there probably wasn’t any law against being on a roof. However, he also knew that he was definitely on the wrong side of the police “do not cross” tape. He’d climbed up on the roof before the cops had put the tape in place, but there was no point in trying to explain that.

  “Yes sir officer, sorry to be up here but my good friend Police Lieutenant Terrell Hayes asked me to do it,” Jake said.

  Jake gave the officer a cheerful smile and then hung by his arms off the edge of the roof and dropped to the picnic table he’d dragged over there when he’d climbed up. He got down off of the table and stood on the grass, not sure if he should move the table back, offer further apologies or just walk away.

  The officer was a big guy with buzz-cut short hair and the muscular build of a weight lifter. He looked dubious about Jake’s story, but the mention of his fellow cop Terrell Hayes caused him to hesitate for just a moment. That was one moment long enough to prevent him from going into automatic robot cop arrest mode.

  Jake slowly held up his phone and turned his body so he was facing away to the side. He did not want his phone to be mistaken for a weapon pointed at the officer. His phone displayed a photo of Terrell Hayes wearing a 49ers football team t-shirt and holding a beer while standing next to Jake, who had the same shirt and beer. In the photo, they appeared to be having a good time at a Niners game at the football stadium.

  “Lieutenant Hayes gave me permission to be on the roof and take photos, but he also said to get down immediately if an officer told me to,” Jake said.

  The officer squinted at Jake’s phone, and recognized the image of Hayes. He glanced at the media I.D. card Jake wore on a lanyard around his neck. The cop frowned and said, “Time to move along. Get back behind that police tape. It says ‘do not cross’ for a reason.”

  “Yes sir, sorry for any inconvenience.”

  Jake walked away, and the police officer stared at Jake’s back for a few seconds until he seemed satisfied that the man wasn’t going to cause any further trouble. He then turned his attention back to the crime scene. As Jake walked he appeared to be checking his phone, but he was actually using its front facing video camera to look behind him without turning around. Once he saw that the cop was no longer watching him, he turned off the video camera and put his phone in his pocket.

  Jake walked on past the media crowd and went over to where he’d parked his car. He was currently driving a used Jeep Grand Cherokee. It was a black SRT8 model that was several years old and had plenty of miles on it but still ran like a champ. Under the hood, it had a HEMI V8 engine that was built in Detroit and could go from zero to sixty in under six seconds. Jake loved “The Tank” as he liked to call his Jeep. It was more than just a car. It was like a friend with a personality, one that had stuck by him through the ups and downs of life. No matter what else happened, he still had his vehicle buddy he could rely on.

  Jake got into the Jeep and drove out of the golf course. He made his way through neighboring streets until he found the one he’d seen when he’d checked a map on his phone. He drove down to the end of that street and parked near a bike trail that went through the woods to the golf course. He grabbed his camera backpack, poured some coffee from his thermos into an empty Starbucks to-go cup, and walked down the trail while sending a text to Terrell’s phone.

  I’m in the woods, walking toward you. Tell the dog handler I’m a friend and to please keep his dog under control, thanks.

  Chapter 11

  Terrell Hayes was standing in front of a tree, next to Ryan and his dog Hank.

  Ryan said, “This is the tree the shooter used as a deer stand.”

  “I don’t suppose Hank found a spent shell casing from that round that was fired?” Terrell said.

  “No, the shooter either picked up his brass, or he used a bolt action rifle.”

  “Right, most dedicated sniper rifles are bolt action. Nice work finding this tree, we’ll check it for DNA evidence.”

  “Hank found a note too, check it out.”

  Ry
an held up a plastic evidence bag containing a piece of paper the size of a business card. Four words were printed on it in a block letter style of writing done with a felt pen and a ruler.

  Terrell read the words and he shook his head. “I’ve seen some clever criminals in our line of work, but this guy thinks he’s special.”

  A policeman from the Crime Scene Investigations Unit walked past. The CSI guy was wearing headphones, and he waved a metal detector over the ground, searching for any brass shell casings that the dog might have missed.

  Terrell’s phone vibrated. He read a text message that said Jake was walking toward him. “A good friend of mine is approaching our position on foot. I need you to keep Hank on a tight leash so he doesn’t react.”

  “Sure, no problem. Who is this guy and why is he here?”

  “He’s a photographer who helped us get some evidence on the crime scene. I’m going to let him take a picture of the tree and maybe of Hank too if you are okay with that. The Chief likes it when Jake runs positive news photos of cops.”

  Ryan gave some commands to Hank and tightened his grip on the lead. Hank was already sniffing the air and listening intently. His ears twitched and he let out a low growl. Ryan repeated the commands as Jake walked up slowly and politely.

  Jake handed the cup of coffee to Terrell, along with a travel-size packet of two ibuprofen tablets. Terrell took the pills and drank some of the coffee.

  Terrell said, “Ryan this is Jake, we served together in the Marine Corps infantry. You two have something in common. Jake was a dog handler.”

  “I worked with a war dog named Duke who was a Belgian Malinois just like your dog,” Jake said.

  Jake and Ryan shook hands, and Hank sniffed Jake in curiosity. Jake noticed it and he slowly held out his hand in a fist and let Hank sniff him, in a kind of a dog handshake.