Blood Silence - Thriller (McRyan Mystery Series)

by Roger Stelljes

  “On that”—Lich pointed emphatically at Mac—“I’m with you, buddy. That conniving bitch doesn’t take a shit without a plan.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  “Acquittals are made of alternate interpretations.”

  Mac and Lich pulled up in front of the Sterling lake house. The crime scene tape flapped in the cold wind of a gray November day. The first little hint of winter was upon the Twin Cities, at 10:07 A.M., with the temperature at a not-so-balmy twenty-four degrees. They each took one last, long drag from their tall coffees, zipped up, and exited. Mac went to the back of the Yukon, opened the tailgate, and took out his black nylon backpack and another small duffel bag. They walked up the front steps to find a waiting Hennepin County sheriff’s deputy, who looked over their identification and then unsealed the front door to the lake house.

  Lyman and Company would be arriving around noon. Mac and Lich wanted some time on their own to work the scene. Inside the front door, the two of them slid on white rubber gloves. Mac then kneeled down and opened the duffel bag and took out a brown expandable folder, handed a copy of the investigative report to Dick, and kept one for his own use.

  It was one thing to read an investigative report and quite another to actually walk the scene. The crime scene photos—the angle they were taken from or perhaps the height of the photographer—made the lake house look large, yet now, standing inside, Mac was struck by its relatively quaint size. Lake Minnetonka was dotted with many a multi-million-dollar lake mansion. However, this lake house was very much a nice cottage—furnished immaculately, but really a normal-sized one-story walkout that had been remodeled in the not-too-distant past.

  They were standing in the living room. To their left was a hallway leading to the guest bedroom and the murder scene. Straight ahead was an area that looked like a recent addition—the modern, open kitchen and den that overlooked Lake Minnetonka. To the immediate right, on the other side of the long wall of the house, was the small hallway to the two-car garage. Part of the den addition was also a master suite that was situated behind the back of the garage.

  Mac and Lich each read from the investigative report and walked the house, going their own individual direction and getting a feel for the flow of the house and scene. There was no talk, no discussion, simply a long half hour of reading the report, mumbling, and walking the scene. They both spent a significant amount of time in the guest bedroom, where the murders happened. Even with the bodies removed, it wasn’t hard to visualize the gruesomeness of it all. There was a large pool of blood on the mattress, with blood spatter all over the headboard and the wall above, as well as the lampshade and window curtains to the right of the bed.

  “It’s like a scene out of Scarface,” Lich muttered. “Blood and bullets everywhere, like a frenzy.”

  Mac wasn’t sure he agreed but was not yet sure why.

  According to the report, Sterling and Gentry left the Hilton together shortly after 11:00 P.M. The security system for the house was disarmed at 11:42 P.M., so it was assumed that was the time of their arrival. That made sense to Mac, given that it would generally take a half hour to get from downtown Minneapolis, drive southwest, and wind their way to the lake house. Sterling’s Jaguar was still parked in the garage.

  They were shot around 1:30 A.M., according to neighbors who stated they heard the shots fired. The two were not in the master suite in the back of the house. Instead, Sterling at least had the decency to take Gentry to the guest room at the front of the house—the bedroom that was likely the master at one time, before the addition.

  Mac flipped through the photos of the murder scene, and Sterling and Gentry’s naked bodies were intertwined with one another in a manner that suggested they were in the act or embracing one another when they were killed. As he analyzed the photos more closely, something about the body positioning looked off to him. The picture was speaking to him, he just didn’t yet understand what it was trying to say to him. He decided he’d let that marinate in his mind and then come back to it.

  The gun was dropped on the floor at the foot of the bed, and then the shooter, whom the police presumed to be Meredith, ran from the house. The neighbors in the two houses to the south heard the shots fired and called 9-1-1. The dispatch logs recorded the first call coming in at 1:33 A.M. and the second a minute later. After they made the call, neighbors in both houses to the south saw a silver Mercedes sedan racing away from the scene. Based on photos, the witnesses identified the car as a two-door, sporty Mercedes S550.

  Mac left the bedroom and walked back to the living room, once again feeling like something was amiss, but he wasn’t sure what it was. He was seeing something.

  Lich was sitting in a chair, flipping through photos. “What do you think?” he asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “Yeah, I don’t know,” Mac answered as he flipped through the photos himself. “We’ve both walked the house and reviewed the report. Let’s play it out.”

  “Okay.”

  They headed to the garage.

  Mac went to the car, Sterling’s Jag, which was still parked in the garage. He looked inside the car and saw Sterling’s briefcase still in it—or at least he assumed it was Sterling’s. It was behind the driver’s seat. Mac opened it and found it empty. “Odd.”

  “What?” Dick asked.

  “His briefcase is here in back, but it’s empty.”

  “So?”

  “You only bring a briefcase home if you have something you need to bring home. You don’t bring home a briefcase just for the sake of bringing it home.”

  Lich shrugged. “Something to ask about, I guess.”

  “I suppose,” Mac answered as he closed the car door. “So Sterling and Gentry arrive out here at 11:40 or so. He pulls into the garage, and they proceed into the house.”

  “He opens the door, they step inside the hallway here, and he …”

  “Turns off the alarm,” Mac said, “and they start getting into it.”

  “Right here?” Lich asked skeptically.

  Mac pulled out a crime scene photo and set it on the floor. The photo showed Gentry’s coat on the floor near the back door. “There is no hook on the wall, and the coat closet is on the other wall. They embrace one another, start kissing, and the undressing starts here.”

  “Did they get fired up on the way out here?”

  “Maybe,” Mac replied, “or in the garage before they got out of the car, or it just happened organically. This is an affair Sterling is having. It’s new. It’s forbidden and dangerous. For a guy like him, the affair is exciting, and that raises in you—”

  “A certain passion, heat, whatever,” Lich finished. “I get it.”

  “However it happened,” Mac said, “once they were inside, they started getting into it.”

  “Okay, on second thought, I think you’re right,” Lich answered, walking out of the short hallway and into the living room area, flipping through the photos. “Clothes started getting shed here, right behind the couch.” The photos showed Sterling’s tuxedo coat and Gentry’s high heels on the floor. From the couch, they turned right toward the hallway. Lich set down two more photos where Sterling’s black bow tie and shirt were dropped halfway to the hall.

  Mac walked past Lich toward the hallway to the guest bedroom, stopped at the hallway entrance, and dropped two more photos on the floor. “His undershirt is here at the entry, and then her dress is down the hall. They were building up.”

  “Yes, they were,” Lich uttered as he walked into the bedroom. “They finish undressing here. His shoes and socks and—”

  “Her nylons, panties, and bra at the head of the bed here, and then they fall onto the bed.”

  “And they get after it.”

  “Or so it would seem. Forensics report found evidence of fresh semen in the bed. They definitely had sex, no question.”

  They both took in the scene for a moment. “Next, a little less than two hours later, they’
re dead,” Lich stated as he lay photos of Sterling and Gentry on the bed—naked, bodies tangled, shot multiple times, with the fatal wounds, one to the back of Sterling’s head and one to Gentry’s forehead.

  “You know, Mac,” Lich suggested, “this could be what it seems. Meredith knows he’s having an affair, and she suspects he’s bringing her out here. After all, he did it with Meredith. She sees the pictures Biggs had, she knows his history, and she follows him out here to see. She sees all the clothes lying in the hallway, hears the two of them having sex, and she—”

  “Snaps.”

  “Yeah,” Dick replied. “She came out here to confront them, but then she sees them in the act, at the height of passion. She stands there, and maybe she watches a little as the anger rises inside her. Even the calmest and most levelheaded of people would be hard-pressed to not get … pissed. The bastard doesn’t even have the decency to go to a hotel—no, he brings her here. The son of a bitch brought her out here to their house—their house.”

  “She’s angry.”

  “Who wouldn’t be? Who wouldn’t be absolutely beside themselves in rage? And what is there, thirty feet away? A loaded Smith-9 back in the master bedroom. The rage she has, well, that turns the brain off—it’s all emotion and anger driving the bus now. She goes and gets that gun and says, ‘I’m going to smoke the no-good, cheating son of a bitch.’ Meredith comes in here and just unloads, letting out all of the anger, the frustration, and bitterness. She empties the damn gun and then runs.”

  Mac nodded. It was exactly what the scene looked like. “I hear you.”

  “But you don’t buy it.”

  Mac shook his head while staring at the photos. “Hmmm.”

  Lich saw the change in his partner’s expression. “I know that look. What is it?”

  Mac stood up and pursed his lips. “I’m not sure. I see something in this picture of Sterling and Gentry on the bed … but I can’t quite figure out what it is.”

  “Which picture are you looking at?”

  Mac held up the photo. “Sterling is lying on top of her, and their bodies are kind of laced together.”

  “Yeah, so?” Lich answered, not following. “Coroner thought they were having sex. Like you said, they found fresh semen. Sterling at least went out with a smile.”

  “Sure, they get here, they get all fired up and do the deed, but does that take two hours? I like foreplay as much as the next guy, but when it starts how this starts, which is all hot and heavy, ripping each other’s clothes off as they make their way to this bedroom, to then downshift into a long session of foreplay before actually … you know … having sex. That doesn’t make sense. This has all the earmarks of a rush to the bed to get it on.”

  Lich shook his head, not bothered. “Yeah, and then maybe they lie in bed for a while, talk, and then there’s … I don’t know, a round two.”

  “Don’t take this wrong, but Sterling is nearly fifty years old, and Gentry is in her forties,” Mac replied skeptically. “I mean, are you and Dot getting your swerve on twice a night?”

  “It’s not unheard of, Mac. Us men in our midfifties have not lost the desire for sex, especially with the little blue pill being so easy to get.”

  “You need help to stand at attention?” Mac snickered.

  Lich’s expression said it all.

  “It’s okay, buddy, that’s what it’s for.”

  “Fuck you. Wait until you’re my age, Superstar. The pharmacy will be your friend too.”

  Mac laughed hard.

  “Just you wait, you cocky little prick,” Dick retorted but with a knowing smile. “Just you wait. You’ll be sneaking Viagra to keep that fiery redhead of yours happy.”

  After a minute of joint laughter, Mac turned back to business. “I’m still skeptical of round two, but we can ask Meredith when she gets here.”

  “Oh yeah, I’m sure she’ll want to comment on J. Fred’s sexual stamina.”

  “She liked round two back in the day,” Mac retorted. “Responding to questions regarding her husband’s sexual stamina and proclivities goes with her current predicament.”

  “I get the sense that she and her husband had stopped getting it on for some time.”

  “Probably true,” Mac answered. “But still, Dicky Boy, I swear to you, I’m seeing something here.”

  “If they’re not having sex, then what are they doing?”

  “Well, that’s the question, now isn’t it?” Mac replied, still boring in on the photos of Sterling and Gentry lying dead in bed.

  Just then, the front door opened, and Mac heard Lyman, Plantagenate, and Meredith enter the house. Mac and Lich went to the front.

  “How’s it going?” Lyman asked, taking off his leather gloves.

  “Working the scene, trying to get a feel for it,” Lich said as he handed out rubber gloves to everyone.

  Mac looked to Meredith, who was nervously looking around like a stranger in what was now her lake home, assuming she didn’t spend the rest of her life in prison. “Are you sure you can handle this?” he asked her quietly. “It’s”—he hesitated—“gruesome in there. I’m just telling you, it’s not going to be easy for you to look at.”

  She nodded. “I’ll be fine … I think.”

  “She almost wasn’t, an hour ago,” Lyman stated with a smile. “Media sneak-attacked her at her parents’ place when we came out the door. I had to throw myself in front of her.”

  Mac froze, “Lyman, what did just you say?”

  Lyman turned to Mac and could see the expression on his face. “I … had … to throw myself in front of her.”

  “That’s it! I knew I was seeing something in that damn picture,” Mac exclaimed and rushed back to the bedroom while everyone followed, confused. He stood at the left side of the bed and leaned his head over the bed where a pillow would normally be and looked back toward the hallway. Then he looked down at the photos again. Then he walked around to the right side of the bed and did the same thing, lingering over one photo of Sterling lying on top of Gentry, his back riddled with bullet holes, and then the kill shot to Gentry’s forehead. “Excuse me.” He pushed through everyone to get back to the front of the house, where he opened his backpack and took out a large sheet of plastic, about the size of a painting drop cloth. He quickly raced back to the bedroom. “Dick, take the photos off the bed.”

  “Okay, but what do you see?” Lich asked urgently, knowing his partner was on to something.

  “An alternate explanation,” Mac answered. Once Dick swept the pictures off the bed, Mac threw the plastic sheet over the mattress, covering the large blood spot on the right side of the bed. “Summer, lie on the right side of the bed, on your back, like you’re sleeping.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay,” she answered, taking off her long winter coat and handing it to Meredith. She did as instructed and lay down on the right side of the bed.

  Mac walked back around to the left side and lay down as though he was sleeping, except he had the picture of Sterling lying on top of Gentry, all shot up.

  “Mac?” Lyman asked, confused. “What is it?”

  Lich was taking another look at the photos as well. He looked up and met Mac’s eyes.

  “You see it?” Mac asked.

  “Yeah, I think I do.”

  “What? See what?” Lyman asked impatiently.

  “Meredith, are you up for some play acting?” Mac asked.

  “Uh … sure.”

  “Okay,” Mac started, “let’s say you come down that hallway, you have a gun in your hand, and you see your husband in bed with another woman. What do you do?”

  “I want … to … shoot him—kill him?”

  “Perhaps,” Mac answered, “but let me ask you—would you say anything first?”

  “Oh, yeah,” she replied, nodding, animated. “I’d been working through my mind what I was going to say to him when I confronted him with the pictures of him and that … woman. I’d have had plenty to sa
y.”

  “Exactly,” Mac exclaimed, pointing at her. “And if I’m your husband in that case, and I see that gun in your hand, what do I do?”

  “You …” Lyman saw it now. “You jump out of bed. You … try to—”

  “Talk me down. He says, ‘Oh, baby, I’m sorry. This isn’t what it seems. Don’t overreact, I can explain, blah, blah, blah,”’ Meredith finished, and then there was a gleam in her eye. “But you don’t think that’s what happened?”

  “No, I don’t,” Mac answered, shaking his head. “I’ve been looking at these photos again and again, both last night and this morning, and something gnawed at me, and now I know in part what it was. It’s the way the bodies are positioned. They’re not tangled up like your husband and Gentry were embracing or having sex. They’d had sex, but that was some time before. The way his body is lying on top of her at an angle—I think he jumped on top of her to try and protect her. The killer didn’t come down the hallway and confront your husband and his mistress.”

  “No,” Lich stated. “He came down the hallway and started firing.”

  “And Meredith,” Mac continued, “your husband probably heard something and woke up, saw the killer in the doorway, probably saw the gun raised, and just … reacted and …” Mac dove on top of Summer at a forty-five degree angle.

  “And shielded me from the shots,” Summer finished.

  “Or at least some of them,” Lich noted. “She was hit six times anyway.”

  Mac pushed himself up from Summer and kept going. “All of which explains the way his body is positioned on top of her,” he proffered, once again lying on his back, looking toward the hallway. “He sees the killer, the gun, and he rolls on top of her. It explains his body position. He was shielding her—that’s why he’s lying on her at an angle and not, for example, in missionary between her legs. They weren’t having sex, at least not then.”