VANISHING ACT - Angie Bartoni Case File # 11: Angie Bartoni Case File # 11 (Angie Bartoni Case Files)

by Marshall Huffman

“No, it’s nothing like that. Make sure any hairs you find are checked for DNA. At least we can find out if the body in the morgue is Kimmi Coleman.”

  “We’ll get on that first thing. I’ll have one of the team start looking for that and get it to the lab immediately. It would help to clear that up at least,” Link said.

  “Thanks, you’re the best.”

  “I know, but I don’t mind hearing it, especially from you,” he said and went off to get started.

  I liked Link a lot. In fact if I was ever going to break my rule, Link would be the likely candidate. I think he felt the same way about me but he was a professional and never stepped over the line. That was one of the things I liked best about him. Sure, he was nice looking, not drop dead gorgeous, but attractive and smart. It was a nice combination.

  Dan came up and stood beside me for a few seconds before speaking.

  “Nice guy.”

  “Link?”

  “No, the elephant you were just talking to.”

  “Don’t be a smart butt.”

  “Well duh, of course I meant Link.”

  “Okay, you’re right. He is a nice guy.”

  “You have the hots for him?” he asked.

  “Don’t you dare start in on me Detective Dan Roberts,” I said tying to sound angry.

  “Now you sound like my mother. She would always use both names when she was really mad.”

  “All mothers do. If they are ready to pop a head gasket, they use your middle name too.”

  “That is scary,” he agreed.

  ***

  On the way back to the station we stopped at another one of Dan’s ‘we just have to try this place’. I was beginning to feel like we were on a greasy-spoon of the week tour. I don’t even know where some of these places even come from.

  I took one look at the eating utensils and decided they have never heard of detergent. There was still crust between the tines of the fork. I decided to just have a Diet Coke and French fries. I figured something boiled in 325 degrees should be safe to eat. I wouldn’t even use the fork.

  “What do you think?” Dan asked between bites.

  There he goes again. That’s how this whole thing started. What do I think? I think he is a dork sometimes; that’s what I think, but being the sensitive person I am, I asked politely.

  “Dan you twit, what the hell are you mumbling about this time? You just say ‘What do you think’ and expect me to somehow know what the heck you are even referring to. I have no clue as to what you mean,” I said.

  “Angie, you need to follow along better. I was asking about the body belonging to Kimmi Coleman.”

  “I see. I was supposed to automatically connect the dots.”

  “I don’t know. I guess I thought you were thinking along the same line that I was.”

  “I was thinking that if you dragged me into one more of these dirty places I was going to go to lunch without you from now on.”

  “Why? What’s wrong with this place?” he asked looking around like he just realized where he was.

  “It’s a pig sty. The dishes are dirty, the floor hasn’t been mopped in who knows how long and I don’t even want to think about how the kitchen looks.”

  “Is that why you are using a straw to drink your Coke?”

  “You bet. My lips were not about to touch that glass. I doubt they even wash them between uses,” I said.

  “Boy, you’re sure a picky eater,” he said taking a huge bite of whatever it was he was eating.

  “Just please, no more dives, okay?”

  “Picky, picky, picky,” was all he said.

  I made him pay for the meal and we headed over to the morgue. I wanted to check in with Doc Sorenson.

  ***

  “Hey doc,” I said as I entered the lab.

  “The good Detective Bartoni. And to what do I owe this pleasant surprise?”

  “I may have a lead on who the headless Jane Doe is.”

  “Pray tell.”

  “Kimmi Coleman,” I told him.

  “And you know this because?”

  “Gut feeling. We will know fairly soon because of DNA, but I’m pretty sure it will be her.”

  “Are you going to tell me all of it or do I need to torture you first?” Sorenson asked.

  “We went to see the special friend of Edward Milliken. We didn’t find her but her place was a total shambles. Didn’t find any blood either, but hair samples were collected and that may give you a match to the body,” I told him.

  “Did you bring a sample?”

  “No. Link is taking care of it,” I told him.

  “Humm.”

  “What does that mean?’

  “It seems there has been a lot of trouble at the lab. Six people have been fired, four put on probation, and Link is under the gun for not keeping tighter reigns on his people.”

  “Wow; he said he had to let a couple of people go.”

  “A lot more than a couple.”

  “That explains why he has been in the field so much,” I replied.

  “They are pretty slim over there,” the doc said.

  “I feel sorry for him. Link is a good guy.”

  “A darned good forensic technician. I trust him totally but apparently some of his staff decided to cut corners. One or two of the workers were actually getting paid for changing the results.”

  “He mentioned that. I sure hope he doesn’t go down for this,” I said.

  “It would be a heck of a loss,” Sorenson agreed.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  When I got in to the station the next morning the report from Link about the DNA was on my desk. He had sent the results to Doctor Sorenson as well. Even before my morning fix of Diet Coke, I called the ME’s office.

  “I thought you would call early,” Sorenson said without any prelude.

  “Kind of curious,” I told him.

  “Well, be curious no more. The body does indeed belong to Kimmi Coleman. It’s a total match; no doubt about it.”

  “Okay doc. Thanks,” I said and hung up before he could think of an insult.

  Dan came in and stumbled into the break room. I waited until he did his usual plop down in the chair.

  “The DNA matches,” I told him.

  “So now we know who the body belongs to. I don’t see how that helps us all that much. I mean, yeah, we have another homicide, but we don’t know if Milliken was involved.”

  “Oh he was. Of that I am sure. We just need to find a way to prove that he killed his three wives and now his playmate,” I said.

  “This guy is pretty sharp. Come on, has a joint account with his wives so he doesn’t have to wait seven years for them to be declared dead. He just continues to use the money and it’s perfectly legit. What I don’t get is why knock off the girlfriend or whatever you want to call her?” Dan asked.

  “She knew something. He must have told her something that caused him to worry. Maybe she was trying to shake him down,” I told him.

  “Okay, so he does her in too. What does she have that makes him go to her house and rip the place apart?”

  “A diary, recording, video tape, any number of things. She tells him that she has proof of what he did and if he didn’t come up with the money, she would expose him.”

  “Not too bright to say that to a man who has knocked off three wives already,” Dan replied.

  “I didn’t say she was smart. Besides, I don’t think you were looking to see show smart she was when she answered the door.”

  “Stop it. Give me a break. I’m just human, you know?”

  “You’re just a guy,” I replied.

  He had no reply for that.

  “We need to bring the captain up to speed on this,” I told him.

  “Not much to really tell is there? He is going to want to know what proof we have and we have none. There is no way we can get a search warrant for Milliken’s house and we can’t bring him in without being charged for harassment. We will be told to leave him alone unl
ess we have solid evidence that he is involved with Kimmi Coleman’s murder.”

  The conference with the captain went pretty much as Dan had predicted.

  “Do we have any direct evidence?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Do we have any witnesses?” he inquired.

  “No.”

  “Can we link him directly to the break in at Kim Coleman’s house?” McGregor wanted to know

  “Not really.”

  “In other words, you don’t have a thing to go on,” he said

  “Pretty much.”

  “But you want to continue to go after Milliken for this?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Get out,” were his last words.

  Not one of our more productive talks. I wasn’t upset about getting thrown out of his office. That happens about once a week so it is no big deal. What was upsetting is that we had no real direction as to where we should turn next. If we just dropped it, not only would Milliken be almost two million dollars to the good but he would have gotten away with four murders. We were going to nail this bas….guy.

  “S, what do we do?”

  “Go to the lab and see what, if anything they have turned up,” I told Dan.

  “Oh, I see. We can’t just call; we have to go in person.”

  “Don’t start in on me. This is purely professional. He may have something for us to look at.”

  “He. Not they. Interesting.”

  “Give it a rest. Grow up, you moron.”

  “When you resort to name calling I know I have hit on the truth,” he said smirking.

  Sometimes I wish I was a lot bigger than him. This was definitely one of those times.

  The lab was a lot like the morgue. There were not many people around. You could really see the results of the purge that had taken place. We found Link in his office talking on the phone. He held up a finger indicating he would be right with us.

  “Hey Bartoni, Roberts, what brings you to my empty lab?”

  “It is a might sparse of people,” Dan said.

  “It is indeed. Everything is backing up and the Commissioner wants to know what I am going to do about it.”

  “What can you do?”

  “Right now we are going to have to sub some of this basic testing out to other labs. It costs a lot more but I don’t see any other options. Trial dates have been set on three cases and we haven’t even written the reports because we are lacking some test results,” Link said rubbing his eyes.

  “Anything we can do to help?” I asked.

  “Have people stop killing each other. That would be really helpful,” he answered.

  “Probably isn’t going to happen.”

  “I suppose you want to know if we found anything important.”

  “Link, It’s no big deal. I don’t want to be the one to add to your worries.”

  “I have to tell you, we don’t have much so far. I did find this,” he said holding up an evidence bag with a micro cassette recorder inside.

  “Anything on the tape?”

  “No tape at all. None in the house either. If there was a cassette, someone removed it,” Link said.

  “Anything else that you found that struck you?” Dan asked.

  “Nothing so far. We have boxes and boxes full of stuff not to mention that we hauled in her car that was in the garage. Pretty nice ride,” Link replied.

  “If you find a cassette or anything else you think will help, please give me a call,” I said.

  I knew as soon as I said it I would hear it from Dan once we got in the car.

  I have to give him total credit; he waited until we got all the way back to the station before he started in. I guess he wanted witnesses in case I committed a felony.

  ***

  It was getting dark by the time I got home. I was tired and depressed from the total lack of progress we had made. Instead of one unsolved case, now I had two cases on the board under my name. While that is not a first, it was eating at me.

  I had stopped at the store on the way home and bought some real food for a change. Nothing I would really have to cook, frozen pizza, premade lasagna, and cereal. The kind of things you could subside on in a pinch. I even bought a gallon of milk even though I was pretty sure it would be bad long before I ever used it up.

  I had just loaded my arms with the groceries when something hit me in the kidney area and then I was spun around and hit upside the jaw. I started to stager and raise my hands but a hard blow to my stomach caused me to double over.

  The last thing I remember was a knee coming up and glancing off my chest and into my face. I knew I was in serious trouble and then everything went totally dark.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  I have no idea how long I was out. When I woke up I hurt everywhere. I felt like my jaw was broken and I couldn’t see out of one eye. I tried to move but of course I knew that wasn’t really going to happen.

  My feet and hands were bound to a chair and I had duct tape across my mouth. Good ol’ duct tape; it comes in handy for a thousand reasons. Hopefully this isn’t one of them that the inventors had envisioned it being used for.

  It was cold but at least I was dressed. I wouldn’t have been all that surprised to find myself with nothing on. So what was this all about? I didn’t think Milliken would be involved. He didn’t have the guts to do something like this.

  “I see you’re awake Bartoni,” a voice said behind me.

  I mumbled. Kind of hard to talk with your lips taped shut.

  “Oh sorry,” he said and stepped around and yanked the tape off my mouth.

  Doggone, that hurt like heck. I looked up and saw Detective Donner looking down at me with a big grin on his face.

  “Donner, are you out of your mind? What do you think you are doing?” I said.

  I didn’t see the blow coming but I felt the burning where his hand raked across my face. The chair almost tipped over but he grabbed it and kept it from going all the way.

  “What do I think I am doing? You want to know what I think I am doing?” he said stooping down to eye level.

  “Donner you need to think this through.”

  “Oh I have. Time and time again. Ever since you tried to ruin my career and send me to jail. Did you think I was going to let you get away with that?”

  “Look, you won. Okay. Doing something like this makes no sense,” I tried to plead.

  “You need to look at it from my perspective. You stuck your nose in my business. One day everything is just fine and the next I’m suspended and looking at jail time. I guess you think I should just roll over and play dead. I should have admitted taking the money and gone to jail. Is that what you think Bartoni?”

  “Donner, we are the police. People have to trust us. We can’t help criminals get off the hook. If we do that we are no better than they are.”

  “Did I ask?”

  “Listen to me. I know you were a good cop. An exceptional one at one time. I don’t know what happened along the way but don’t step over this line. Once you take that step there is nothing you can ever do to make it right,” I reasoned.

  “Bartoni, you think you are so much better than the rest of us. Hell, we aren’t even good enough to date you. You are so high and mighty. You have a chest full of decorations so you think you know it all. Well you don’t. You don’t know squat.”

  “Donner, you will not get away with this. You can’t kill a cop and get away with it. You know how it works. You know my captain, my partner, and others. They will dig and dig and dig until they figure it out,” I said, hoping to get a reasonable response from him.

  The slap to the back of my head about jarred my brains out of my skull.

  “You see Bartoni, the thing is, they are never going to find you. You are going to vanish like the others.”

  “What others?”

  “Some detective you are Bartoni.”

  “Wait. What others? Are you talking about Milliken’s wives?”

  He just
laughed.

  “Did you help him get rid of them?”

  Nothing.

  “Donner, what difference does it make now? You are going to kill me so why not tell me?”

  “Why should I tell you anything? How is that going to change one little thing?”

  “I guess I just want to know. I don’t exactly know why but I do,” do I replied.

  “You know what, Bartoni, I don’t really care what you want. I don’t care about anything you have said. You tried to wreck my life and you lost.”

  “Listen to me Donner. Right now you still have a chance. You can plea bargain and get off with a light sentence, maybe none at all. If you kill me, you will get the death sentence and that’s a fact. You know it and I know it,” I said.

  “But you won’t be around to see it,” he replied.

  He walked around and stood in front of me. He still didn’t have a gun in his hand and I took that to be a good sign. Of course right now I was hanging on to every thread of hope that I could.

  “I think….” his cell phone went off.

  He looked down and read the number. He frowned and walked over to the far side of the room. I could only catch part of the conversation. I could hear him arguing with someone about ‘right this minute?’ and ‘what? At my house?’ Finally he finished and hung up. He stood there for several seconds before walking back over to where I sat.

  “You bought some time, Bartoni, but not much. I have to go. They sent a car to get me. It’s outside so I guess I’ll have to come back and finish this when I get off. Enjoy,” he said and slapped the duct tape back over my mouth.

  It was the first time I really got a chance to look around. I was obviously in a basement and from the conversation I decided it was Donner’s house. See, I really am a detective. Not that any of that information was particularly helpful at the moment. I had no idea what time it was. The duct tape across my wrist was covering my watch.

  I looked around and saw little that was of help to me. If I was going to get out of this I was going to have to be pretty ingenious. Right now I seemed to be about a quart low on genius. The only way I was going to get even close to anything that would help was to tip the chair over. I wasn’t too keen on that since the floor was concrete and my hands and feet were bound. I was pretty sure I would knock myself silly. That of course wouldn’t be a first.