Detective Wade Jackson Mystery - 05 - Dying for Justice

by L. J. Sellers

  Her mother drew in a startled gasp, but Gina burst out laughing. “I’m okay. Just pull me up please and seat belt me in.”

  Detective Evans opened the opposite door and climbed into the car to help. “Are you sure it’s not too soon? You seem a little floppy.”

  “I feel like a rag doll, but I couldn’t stay in that room for another minute.” Gina wanted to tell Evans what it had been like, the half wakefulness, the dreams, the inability to communicate. Yet she kept it to herself. She hated seeing pity in people’s eyes. It was time to put the coma behind her and reclaim her life. “It may not seem like it, but I’m getting stronger every day.”

  “I’m happy for you.” Evans gave her a tight smile. “I’ll follow in my car.”

  On the ride home, Gina rolled down the window and let the warm air blow on her face. God, it was good to be alive and fully awake.

  The sight of her parents’ house with the ducks waddling in the front yard filled Gina with happy memories. Barbeque dinners on the deck, followed by long Scrabble games. Could she still play? Would her brain ever be that sharp again?

  The van came to a stop in the driveway and Gina unbuckled, pleased by every small thing she could do for herself. She heard Evans pull in behind and shut off her engine. Her father retrieved the wheelchair from the back of the van, while her mother opened the door and helped get her legs out and her feet on the ground. Her mother held out her hands and Gina grabbed them tightly, grateful that her parents were still healthy for people in their seventies. Together, they got her upright on the driveway.

  “Let me take a few steps,” Gina said, feeling confident.

  Her mother looked worried, but she stepped to the side. Gina heard a car pull up on the street behind her. She turned to see who it was. A masked man in a dark vehicle idled near the curb. Terror grabbed Gina’s heart and squeezed hard. The man shoved a gun out the window and fired right at her.

  * * *

  As she climbed from her cruiser, Evans heard a car drive up. She spun toward the street. Her own vehicle blocked most of her view, but she saw the back end of a dark SUV idling at the curb. Panic rising, she ran toward the sidewalk, fumbling under her jacket for her weapon. The driver came into view. A ski mask covered his head and his arm snaked out the window. As she brought up her gun, he fired his. Two quick shots, muffled by a silencer. Evans fired four shots at the driver as he gunned his engine and raced away. The blasts ripped through the quiet trailer park and shattered a side window in the vehicle. Evans started to sprint after him to fire another round, but a small truck was suddenly coming down the street toward her. Shit! She couldn’t endanger the other driver.

  Evans spun back, unsure of what to do next. Every nerve in her body wanted to jump in her vehicle and chase down the shooter. The fucker! Yet Gina’s life had to be her priority.

  Weapon still in hand, she charged up the driveway. Gina was on her back on the ground and blood flowed freely. Sharon kneeled next to her daughter, cradling Gina’s head and making an odd humming sound. George frantically searched his pockets, presumably looking for his cell phone. Evans grabbed hers from her jacket and dialed 911, noting the time was 5:17.

  “Detective Evans here. I have shots fired and a woman down. I need an ambulance at 466 Pondview Park near the corner of Royal and Echo Hollow. The shooter is driving a dark SUV, possibly a Ford Explorer. He was last seen wearing a ski mask and a dark long-sleeved shirt. He’s about six feet tall, armed and dangerous.” She handed the open phone to George because Sharon seemed to be in shock. “Answer any questions they have.”

  Evans examined Gina’s damage. Two bullets had pierced her chest, one directly in the heart, and blood soaked through her pale yellow shirt. A small gurgling sound came from Gina’s mouth and her eyes rolled back in her head. Evans understood that Gina was moments from death and there was nothing she could do. Her experience as a paramedic felt worthless, yet she holstered her weapon, peeled off her jacket, and used it to stem the flow of blood.

  For a long moment, time stood still. The sun beat down, the wind blew, and Gina’s blood flowed. The neighborhood was eerily quiet, except for the sound of Sharon Stahl’s humming. Gina’s father sat nearby, eyes closed and lips moving in prayer.

  A siren pierced the stillness and Evans breathed a sigh of relief. More sirens followed. A patrol car raced up the narrow street. Evans spoke sharply to Sharon. “Put your hands here and keep pressure on her wounds.”

  The woman numbly did as instructed. Evans bolted to her feet and ran for the patrol car. She held up her hands, forcing the driver to stop twenty feet away. The officer shut down his engine as Evans ran up to the vehicle. He stepped out and she yelled, “The shooter was parked in front of the driveway. Don’t let anyone near the scene until I’ve searched for casings.”

  “Got it.” He didn’t question her authority and she assumed it was the Sig Saur strapped to her side.

  Evans ran back to where the SUV had been parked and dropped to her hands and knees. She scanned the area as she crawled, ignoring the sting of the rough asphalt. She found a copper casing near the curb. Yes! Evans ran to her car to retrieve her shoulder bag. She dug out latex gloves and pulled them on over her bloody hands, then found two evidence bags and her camera. She hurried back to the casing, took pictures where it lay, then bagged it.

  The patrol officer stood nearby and she heard him warn someone to stay back. Moments later, an ambulance wailed down the street. Evans moved toward the house and took photos of Gina lying on the driveway. She used her zoom lens so she didn’t have to disturb the distressed parents, who still believed their daughter would pull though. Two male paramedics charged up the driveway with a gurney and Evans stepped out of the way.

  While they attended to Gina, Evans paused on the sidewalk and tried to catch her breath. Her heart pounded like a cylinder about to blow and her mind raced with scrambled thoughts. Fuck! Gina had been shot right in front of her and she’d failed to protect her charge. Had Bekker done this? Did he make bail or did he have an accomplice?

  Another patrol car raced up the street and parked near the ambulance. Evans took a deep breath. She needed to take charge of the scene. She jogged out to meet the officer, a thirty-something woman named Connie Perez she’d known from her patrol days. “Officer Perez. Start canvassing the neighbors. See if anybody got a license plate number or a decent description.”

  Perez pointed in the direction of Bertelsen Road. “There’s a dark green Ford Explorer at the end of Mira Court near the bike path. Another officer is with the vehicle and it looks empty.”

  “Shit.” The perp had ditched his vehicle. Evans called dispatch. “The shooter has abandoned the Ford Explorer. He may be on foot, probably on the bike path that runs along Roosevelt.” She visualized the big space in the back of the SUV. Did he bring a bike with him? “He may be on a bicycle and no longer wearing a ski mask.” Oh fuck. He was getting away.

  Evans hurried back to the driveway. The Stahls were on their feet now, hugging each other tightly. Sharon sobbed as a paramedic draped a cloth over Gina’s face. The man looked up at Evans and shook his head. “She’s gone.”

  Chapter 20

  The abandoned SUV sat just off the street in a gravel turnout. Ten feet away, an asphalt feeder path led to the west Eugene bike route. A patrol unit was parked directly behind the vehicle, and an officer stood near the Explorer. Evans stopped in front of a nearby house and hurried over, noticing the SUV had no license plates. The right front fender was dented, rust spots showed through the paint on the hood, and a side window was shattered. She took photos of the vehicle as she approached.

  “I’m Detective Evans,” she said, walking up to the officer. “This is my case.”

  “Richard Anderson. I was a first responder at the Walker murders.”

  Evans nodded but she didn’t remember him. “Have you searched the vehicle?” She caught him staring at her chest and suddenly felt self-conscious without her jacket. Her snug-fitting sleeveless top
left her breasts and weapon on full display.

  “It’s locked,” he said. “I conducted a visual search with a flashlight but the interior looks empty.

  “Locked is not good.” The crime scene technicians would be happy to know the vehicle had not been contaminated, but Evans needed to get inside and search for any kind of identification, including the VIN. What if the killer had dropped something that could lead her to him? She couldn’t wait for the crime scene techs to find it tomorrow. The perp could be long gone by then. She had to do a quick but thorough search and get back to the main crime scene.

  She peered in the windows, taking pictures of the spotlessly clean interior. The bastard had planned the murder and his escape carefully. He obviously knew where Gina’s parents lived. Had he followed them from the care center or had he been watching their house? Evans dug in her carryall bag and pulled out a slim jim, a thin metal tool used to break into vehicles. A guy she’d dated once had locked his keys in his car repeatedly, and she’d learned to break in as fast as any junkie could.

  “Do you know how to use that?” the officer asked.

  Evans gave him a scorched look and set to work. In less than three minutes she popped the lock. She pulled on latex gloves and yanked open the driver’s door. Squatting in the V, she copied down the vehicle’s identification number. She handed the notepaper to the patrol officer. “Call this in, then start canvassing the neighbors. We need to know if anyone saw his face.” She enjoyed giving him an order, the sexist little shit.

  Her time was limited. She’d called Lammers from the shooting scene, and the sergeant said she would send Jackson out to take charge. He was probably at the Stahls’ house already and needed an update. This was the first time she’d worked an active crime scene without Jackson present from the beginning.

  Evans leaned into the vehicle and ran her gloved hands in the space between the seat cushions. She searched the floor and under the seat and found only a thick owner’s manual. Even the console between the seats was empty. She went around to the other side and opened the glove box. It too was empty. The SUV seemed to have been recently detailed and the back seat had been folded down for carrying a load.

  Frustrated, she stood back from the vehicle and visualized the shooter’s activity. He’d pulled over, then hauled the bicycle out of the back. Next, he’d yanked off the ski mask and probably his dark shirt as well. The clothes weren’t in the SUV, so he’d taken them with him. He’d probably brought a backpack or a bicycle pack with him. The killer had stuffed the mask, the shirt, and the weapon into a backpack, jumped on the bike, and pedaled off.

  Evans stared at the feeder bike path that ran between the houses. She visualized a slightly different scenario. The killer had left the ski mask on while he rode away, not wanting the neighbors—who may have watched him drive up—to see his face. As he cycled into the visual safety zone of the bike corridor, he’d pulled off his mask and stuffed it into his pack. By the time he reached the main bike route, he was just a guy in a t-shirt riding his bike.

  Evans jogged to the feeder path and started down it. She walked briskly, glancing right and left, scanning the grass along the edges as well as the asphalt. She ignored the beer cans and food wrappers, looking for something the shooter may have dropped or discarded. More than anything, she hoped to find wet blood. Even more than she needed the DNA, she wanted to know she had wounded the bastard.

  A young guy on a bike passed and said, “Nice gun.”

  Reflexively, she touched her weapon, now exposed because her jacket was back at the Stahls, soaked with Gina’s blood. She would have to start carrying an extra jacket in her car.

  Near the end of the feeder corridor where it formed a T with the main bike route, Evans spotted something dark in the grass. Her pulse quickened. She ran toward the object and kneeled next to it. Hot damn. A black ski mask. The bastard had dropped it. Adrenaline pumping, she grabbed the mask with a gloved hand. Now if only the killer’s hair was clinging to the inside. Getting DNA from hair was tough but not impossible. An attached follicle would make it easy. Oh shit. She’d forgotten to take photographs. Evans set the mask exactly where it had lain and stepped back to take pictures of its relationship to the bike path.

  She bagged the mask, then looked east and west on the path. Had he gone toward Beltline or Highway 99? Or had he crossed Roosevelt and disappeared into the industrial area? Evans jogged a hundred feet in both directions, looking for a dark shirt or perhaps even a weapon, but saw neither. Those items likely ended up in a trashcan somewhere.

  Evans hustled back to the Explorer and called Lammers. “Sergeant. It’s Evans. I think I found the mask the shooter wore.”

  “Excellent work.”

  “I need more officers here to search along the bike route and to search trashcans for a mile in each direction. The feeder path is off Mira Court, just off Elmira, where the killer abandoned his vehicle.”

  “Do you know who the owner is yet?”

  “The plates are stripped off, but we called in the VIN and should have it soon.”

  “It’s probably stolen, but even knowing the location of where he picked up the vehicle could help.”

  “I’ll call dispatch and see if they have an ID yet.”

  “Keep me posted.” The sergeant hung up.

  While Evans waited to speak to a patrol officer who had just driven up, dispatch called her. “The VIN belongs to a 1996 Ford Explorer registered to Joel Greer at 324 Clark Street.”

  Evans wrote it down, feeling disappointed. She hadn’t expected the vehicle to be registered to Bekker, but somehow she knew Joel would be a dead end. “Put out an attempt-to-locate on Greer and send an officer to his house. When he’s detained, call me.”

  Another patrol unit raced into the short street. Evans gave search directions and her business card to the officers, with instructions to call her if they found anything. When a third arrived, she instructed him to guard the Explorer until the crime technicians came to tow it away. They would haul it to the big bay at the crime lab and dust every surface for prints.

  Feeling she’d done everything she could at the secondary scene, Evans climbed in the Geezer, preparing to drive back to the Stahls’ house. But first she had know: Was Gary Bekker still in custody?

  Evans called the jail and identified herself. “Is Gary Bekker still an inmate? It’s spelled with two Ks.”

  “Let me check.” After a moment, the deputy said. “No, he’s not.”

  “When was he released?”

  “At 4:50 this afternoon.”

  Chapter 21

  Wednesday, September 8, 4:38 p.m.

  With a signed subpoena, Jackson was eager to drive back up to Durkin’s property and bring him in for a DNA cheek swab. Yet instinct told him to stop at home first and check in with his daughter.

  When he reached his house, a silver Toyota and a red minivan were parked in his driveway. Jackson recognized the little car that belonged to his real estate agent. He hoped the minivan represented a buyer. The thought also filled him with dread. He parked on the street and climbed out.

  Katie rushed down the walkway, wearing a short denim skirt and a tight pink blouse he’d never seen before. She seemed taller and thinner than he remembered. What had happened to his pudgy little girl in the last year?

  “Hey, Dad. I think we have a buyer.” Katie was surprisingly excited.

  “Are they talking about an offer?”

  “Not yet, but this lady really loves the location. I think she has a job at the university.”

  “We should stay out here and let them have some privacy while they look.” Jackson leaned against his vehicle, enjoying the sun on his face.

  Katie leaned against the car too, her shoulder touching his. Together, they stared at the house they loved.

  “How was school?”

  “Now that I know my way around, I’m starting to like high school. The teachers seem both smarter and friendlier than those in middle school.”

&nb
sp; “What’s your favorite class?”

  “Algebra.”

  Jackson raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. “Since when?”

  “Since Mr. Ferguson started teaching it.”

  “He must be cute.”

  “Oh yeah.”

  “In that case, I expect to you to get an A.”

  “He’s not that cute.” After a minute, Katie said, “It’ll be strange not living here, but I think I’m ready for a change.” She looked at him with wounded eyes. “I still associate this house with Mom.”

  “Me too.” Jackson put his arm around her shoulder and gave a quick squeeze. “It’s good we’re getting out of here.”

  Katie suddenly gave him a puzzled look. “Why are you home so early?”

  “I just stopped in to see you. I have to go back to work for another couple of hours.”

  “I knew it.” She have him a friendly shove. “You’d better get going. I’ll go do my homework.” She started up the sidewalk, then turned back. “And if you believe that…”

  The sound of her laugh filled his heart with joy. Jackson watched her until she disappeared into the house.

  Twenty minutes later, he was driving up Fox Hollow for the second time that day. Just before he reached the Murdock turnoff, his cell phone rang. He checked the ID: Sergeant Lammers. His gut told him it would not be good.

  “We’ve had a shooting. Gina Stahl is dead in her driveway. Evans was with her at the time and she’s handling the case until you get there.”

  “The shooter got away?”