Ray Elkins mystery - 02 - Color Tour

by Aaron Stander

  David Dowd’s shaving kit, a worn brown leather bag, rested atop the toilet tank. Ray unzipped the bag and removed the contents into the sink bowl: toothpaste, brush, comb, a small can of shaving cream, and a disposable razor. At the bottom was a small plastic prescription bottle. Ray studied the label: Dowd’s name, the doctor’s name, University of Michigan Medical Center, and the drug—a highly advertised anti-anxiety medication. Ray checked the two side pockets, one empty, the second pocket contained two prophylactics in sealed wrappers. He carefully returned the contents to the bag. Ray lifted the top off the toilet and peered into the tank. Nothing.

  In the medicine chest, it was unnecessary to remove anything from its carefully ordered interior; everything was clearly visible. His eyes ran along the shelves: a modest collection of cosmetics, dental-care products, and medications—an antibiotic prescribed the previous February, and a wheel of birth control pills, one side of the circle intact.

  He looked through the vanity: cleaning products, toilet paper, and Tampax.

  Ray walked into the bedroom. “Anything interesting?” he asked.

  “Not really. She had a small wardrobe of quality clothing. One very nice suit, a few dresses, blouses, and sweaters, but it looks like she mostly wore jeans and work shirts. And lots of fleece— jackets, vests, pants.”

  “Anything unusual?”

  “She didn’t have… well, I don’t know what she would have worn to a fancy party or wedding. And there is no perfume, not one bottle.”

  “Is that unusual?”

  “A bit, perhaps. But there are no surprises, no stash of drugs or porn, no whips or rubber suits. Well, that’s not quite true. There’s a carefully folded wetsuit on a shelf in the closet. That’s probably kayak gear,” Sue said in a questioning voice as she pointed toward its location in the closet.

  Ray walked over and examined the Farmer Jane suit. “Yes, kayaking.”

  Sue continued her exploration of the dead woman’s belongings. She pulled open the top drawer of a long modern dresser and motioned toward neatly folded stacks of panties. “Same size and brand, Victoria’s Secret, mostly black, a few white.”

  “Why would you bother?” Ray asked.

  “Bother with what?” she responded.

  “Having two colors, if you like black, buy black.”

  “Black shows through, you can’t wear it under some things.”

  “Oh,” he muttered.

  “Martian,” she responded with a tone of playful scorn. Sue checked the other drawers in the dresser, carefully looking through the contents. “You find anything?”

  “No,” he responded. Ray slowly looked around the room, four pieces of furniture: a dresser, bed, and two small night tables, one at each side of the bed. An elegant steel reading light stood on the top of each table. The matching pieces of furniture were modern in design, finished in a matte black, and finely constructed. A thick comforter, dark gray with a soft, glossy texture, covered the bed. He pulled back the comforter, looked under the pillows, and then lifted the top sheet. He straightened the sheet and pulled the comforter back over the bed. Getting down on his knees on the off-white Berber carpet, Ray peered under the bed. He walked around and extracted a book.

  “What did you find?” asked Sue.

  “It’s probably the book Dowd was reading in bed, hard to imagine that Ashleigh would stash one under the bed.”

  “What is it?”

  “Leaves of Grass, Whitman.” He opened the cover and looked through the first few pages. “It’s a new edition.” He stood and looked at Sue. “These were two very interesting young people.” He placed the book on the night table, regretting that he had disturbed the order of the room.

  “Let’s check her office,” he said.

  They moved to the last room in the duplex, a room slightly smaller than the one Ashleigh used as a bedroom. A Macintosh computer stood at the center of a simple pine desk, three manila folders were piled to the right of the computer. Ray opened the top folder and peered at the stack of student papers. He showed the papers to Sue, “She was probably going to read these on Sunday night after Dowd left.” Ray could see the sadness in Sue’s face, an emotion he shared.

  “Unfinished work and wasted lives,” she said, finally.

  “Looks like she was into photography,” said Ray, spying a camera on a shelf behind the desk.

  “Digital photography,” said Sue examining the camera. “This Sony is a very new model. She couldn’t have had it more than a few months. We’ll take the CD with us and see if there are any pictures of interest on it.” She slipped the disk into an evidence bag.

  They looked through the desk drawers and the file. Most of the papers seemed school related. A few files contained bank statements, income tax returns, insurance records, and monthly reports from Ashleigh’s financial advisor. Ray looked through reports. “Well,” he said after reviewing a few pages, “Ashleigh was a very wealthy young woman.”

  “How wealthy?” Sue asked.

  Ray showed her the report, pointing out values of the portfolio at the bottom of the sheet.

  “Impressive,” said Sue. “But you don’t see any evidence of it here. She had nice things, but there’s no excess. She had enough of everything, but nothing extra. It looks like she was living on her teacher’s salary. Probably even putting money into savings.”

  Ray pulled a heavy plastic envelope from the rear of the bottom drawer and poured the contents onto the desk. Sue picked up a passport and opened it. “Nice picture,” she said, holding it so Ray could see it. “Wish mine looked this good.”

  Next Sue unfolded an official-looking document.

  “What’s that?” Ray inquired, looking through Ashleigh’s undergraduate transcript.

  “Her birth certificate. It has her mother’s name, but no father is listed,” she paused and carefully studied the document. “Pretty name,” she observed as she started to refold the document.

  “What’s that?”

  “Allison. If I ever had a daughter, that would be high on the list of possible names. Allison, it sort of rolls off your tongue.”

  “Can I see that?” Ray asked. He opened the document, scanned it, his eyes resting on Allison’s name. Then he handed it back to Sue. She set it to one side as she looked through the rest of the items. She held out a small, faded color photo to Ray. “That’s probably Ashleigh and her mother, there’s such a strong resemblance, same facial structure, same hair color.”

  Ray took the photo from her hand and looked at it closely. The colors were faded and the print had a grainy quality. A gangly girl and a woman stood side by side with a flower-covered hillside as a backdrop. Their similarity was striking, clearly a mother and daughter. Ray turned the photograph over, looking for a date or any other information on the back; there was none. He returned to the picture. A wave of recognition ran through him as he studied the photo again. “How old do you think they are?” he asked in a low voice, trying to control his emotions.

  “Hard to tell,” she replied, looking at the photo again. “The daughter might be about eleven or twelve; the mother is no teenager. I’d say somewhere in her mid to late thirties.” She gazed at Ray. “You okay? You look sort of strange.”

  Ray was slow to respond. “Yes,” he said and then remained silent.

  “I guess I’ve allowed the enormity of this crime to come through,” he said, finally. “Once you get a sense of the people, you can’t escape the magnitude of tragedy.” They were both still and then Ray, his tone subdued, said, “We’ll take the computer. I’d like you to search the hard drive. Also, I’d like you to access her e-mail and voicemail.” Ray looked thoughtful. “I’m surprised we didn’t find any correspondence. No love letters or cards, not even letters from women friends.”

  “People do e-mail now. I don’t get letters anymore,” said Sue.

  “But don’t you have some… some from the past?” he said, thinking about the memento-filled boxes in his spare room. He needed to sort throu
gh them.

  “No, last time I moved I got rid of that stuff. Bad karma. Do you have any?”

  “Well, not for the last few years, but… ”

  “Well, there’s your answer,” commented Sue.

  “Right,” Ray said, changing the subject. “So, what did we learn here?”

  Sue didn’t hesitate. “I think that Ashleigh was exactly the kind of person people have been telling us she was. So far, no surprises.”

  “That’s my take, too,” Ray said.

  It took two trips to get the computer, files, camera, and other evidence into Sue’s Jeep. Ray came back alone, walked through the apartment one more time, slowly, thinking about the faded photo, the girl and her mother, Ashleigh and Allison, ghosts, both of whom were now his ghosts.

  18

  Sue stood at the threshold of Ray’s office and peered in; the early morning sun streamed through the thin rectangular windows that ran across the top of the south wall, bringing a bit of warmth into an otherwise drab interior—off-white walls and tan steel furniture. Ray, his back to her, was busily making lists and adding to a complicated diagram with dry-erase markers on a large whiteboard mounted below the windows. He was using a variety of colors, and she could see that he had created a key for the colors on the right-hand side of the board. She cleared her throat to announce her presence. “Morning,” said Ray turning in her direction. “I’ve been listing the people we need to interview and other tasks. Can you get the crime scene finished up today?”

  “That shouldn’t be a problem. I’d like to pull Evans from the day shift to help me.”

  “That’s okay,” Ray said. “Do you need anyone else?”

  “Just people to continue to secure the scene until we’re done. I’d like to get the tarps off and go over the area again. We should vacate the area by this afternoon.”

  “Good,” said Ray. Pointing to a list he said, “You can see the people I’m planning to talk to today. I’ve keyed my interview notes from yesterday. You need to read them. I talked to Jack Grochoski at the Last Chance and Sarah James—she seems to handle the day-to-day administration at Leiston School. They both identified Jason Zelke as someone who dated Ashleigh in the not-too-distant past. So I visited with him. Do you know him?”

  “No,” responded Sue. “Anything?” Ray summarized his conversation with Zelke, concluding with, “Jason is a nice kid with a good reputation, hard to see him as the killer.” He paused and looked at Sue, “It would be interesting to talk to other women he’s dated. I wonder if there’s a violent streak there that we don’t know about.”

  “I’ll ask around. Anything else?” “Warrington, you’ll see it in my note. It looks like he might have had a fling with Ashleigh.”

  “When?” Sue asked.

  “It would have been her first year. I wonder if there were things that might have motivated him to commit… ”

  “If there are,” interrupted Sue, “he wins the prize for best performance on a beach. He was pretty convincing.”

  “Yes,” Ray agreed. “Before you leave, promise me one thing?”

  “What’s that?”

  “You’ll come back with the weapon and a good set of prints.”

  “That would be nice,” she agreed.

  The chirping sound from Ray’s cell phone interrupted their parting. “Elkins here,” he said. He nodded as he listened several minutes. “How’s his mother doing?” He listened some more and said, “Thank you for the call, doctor.” He slowly closed the phone and set it on the table.

  “Bad news?” Sue asked.

  “That was one of the ICU doctors,” he responded, his eyes filled with sadness. “Arnie coded early this morning. They were able to resuscitate him, but he’s in very critical condition.”

  “What happened? Why did he code?”

  “They think it was a pulmonary embolism.”

  “What are his chances?”

  “Gonzales said fewer than 10 percent of those who code in the hospital and are resuscitated survive.” He paused, “Kim, that poor woman. She collapsed while they were trying to resuscitate Arnie. So they’ve admitted her. The doctor says she’ll probably be okay by tomorrow.”

  “Yeah,” responded Sue, “the medical definition of okay. Your heart is beating and you’re still sucking air.”

  19

  The two-lane drive entering Leiston was divided by a small gatehouse sitting in the middle with wooden barriers on each lane. As Ray entered the drive, he slowed near the building. The man inside, Gary Zatanski, the head of the school’s security detail, waved him through. Ray parked his Jeep nearby and walked back to the building. “Good morning, sheriff,” offered Gary, holding the door. As they shook hands, Ray noted that Gary was about his height, average for their generation. A ring of short gray hair surrounded his round shiny head. Gary’s thick neck and heavily muscled chest and arms gave him the appearance of a weightlifter or Greco-Roman wrestler, but an expansive waistline suggested that culinary joys had replaced a passion for fitness.

  “Want some coffee?” He pulled a clean cup from under a counter that ran across the front of the building. “It’s fresh.”

  “Sure. Thanks,” said Ray.

  “Any developments?” Zatanski asked as he poured the coffee, his voice grave.

  “We’re collecting evidence, doing interviews, but no, we don’t have a suspect.”

  “I’m still in shock. You know bad stuff happens every day, but,” he motioned with his two hands, “why here? And why Ashleigh?”

  “Wish I had an answer.” Ray sipped his coffee. There was a long pause where both men were lost in thought. Then, Ray surveyed the array of monitors suspended from the ceiling. “Looks like you have a very sophisticated security system,” he said.

  “I’ve pushed them hard to keep things modern. But in a place like this there is never enough money. That said, we’ve got better stuff than most places, especially schools.”

  “And this setup, it’s your baby?”

  “Yes,” Zatanski answered with obvious satisfaction.

  “Dr. Warrington mentioned that you have a police background.”

  “ATF, actually. And after I got tired of busting down crackhouse doors in Baltimore, I did corporate security around D.C.”

  “How did you end up here?”

  “My wife, she was a middle school science teacher in Silver Springs. A couple of years ago she took an early out. Man, I don’t know how she lasted that long. Anyway, she had inherited this little family farm up here. Me, I’d rather have gone to Florida, but you know how it goes.” He lifted both hands, showing his powerful arms, and made a submissive gesture. “And she’s pleased as punch. She has started an apple orchard and is growing grapes. And she’s doing watercolors, even had a little show at the Wayside Tap last summer. She’s got a million activities going in the winter, and in the summer we’re carting visiting grandkids all over hell’s half-acre. But me, well, how much can you fish and golf? So, when Warrington contacted me to do some consulting on security, I was glad to have the work, but I wasn’t looking for a full-time gig. We finally worked out a deal that I’d take over the management of campus security as long as it would only be part-time.”

  “How many hours do you work?”

  “I try to keep it under thirty hours.”

  “And there’s always someone on duty?”

  “Yeah, 24/7.”

  “I imagine most days things are fairly routine.”

  “Yeah, and we’re trying to make sure it stays that way. That’s why we got all this.” He gestured toward the monitors and other electronic devices. “The year before I was here they had a student abducted by a parent. You know, it was one of those custody things.”

  “I remember that,” said Ray. “We heard about it after the fact, long after the fact.”

  Zatanski continued on, not responding to Ray’s comment. “So, after that incident there was finally an understanding of how easy it was to forcibly pick up a kid without being notice
d.”

  “Yes, incidents like that tend to… ”

  “Well, you don’t know the half of it. Warrington wanted a plan to prevent something like that from happening again. So, I drew up a plan for a centralized security system. It was the whole nine yards: improved campus lighting, video cameras at strategic places. When Warrington saw it and the price tag, I thought he was going to shit. He wanted to know why we needed all that stuff, so I walked him about and showed him. Like they thought they were doing good by putting new batteries in the smoke detectors in the dorms every year.”

  “But I take it, you did get the funds?”

  “It wasn’t easy. I had to tell him some war stories. You know, it’s not like talking to business people. Educators are used to working with such little money.”

  “How were you able to prevail?”

  “Warrington had me speak to the school’s governing board. I told them there wasn’t even a rudimentary security system. I took them on a tour. I started a fire in a wastebasket right under one of those old smoke detectors. And we waited and waited and waited.

  “Hey,” he said with a laugh, “there’s no business like show business. And after it was clear the device didn’t work, I asked them how they’d sleep knowing their kids had this kind of protection. Then I laid on what it would take to bring this place up to industry standards. That’s just the way I said it, industry standards. The board is made up mostly of corporate types; they respond more to fear than reason, so I played to their fears.” Zatanski chuckled to himself.

  “So, you pretty much got what you asked for?”

  “Yeah, I did. Several board members have kids here. One has two grandkids enrolled. I didn’t have to do much convincing. The former board president came up with the cash, so it didn’t have to come out of the current budget. But there was hell to pay.”

  “How so?” Ray asked.

  “The system was installed in the summer when the students and most of the faculty were gone. And I don’t think anyone would have noticed, or even objected much if it hadn’t been for the lights.”