Lot’s return to Sodom

by Sandra Brannan

  Before she hung up, I could have sworn Elizabeth said that Ernif was murdered. But that just wasn’t possible. My mind couldn’t wrap around the concept of yet another person killed, much less anyone wanting to see Ernif dead. Everyone loved him—and his wife, Helma, for that matter. And who could kill an old man? Impossible. Elizabeth must have gotten her wires crossed somewhere, was overreacting, overly concerned about her dear friend. The two women had met and befriended each other years ago at a support group meeting for parents who’d lost children. Elizabeth and Helma shared similar stories, losing their babies to SIDS fifty years apart almost to the day. I shook it off and got back to the task at hand.

  Gathering my thoughts, I read through what I had typed so far. From my notes and my memory, I pieced the story together, matching names with faces, explaining the story.

  Monday, Noon: Sherman Street, Sturgis, SD

  Six bikers arrived on Harleys. One biker had a girl riding with him. Girl was wearing red string bikini, black boots with spike heels, matching spiked dog collar, and a leather jacket way too big for her.

  Creed, the enforcer, kept watch.

  Noodles’s semen would be found in the unconscious girl left for dead.

  Girl looks similar to missing girl Charlene Freeburg.

  Cheetah, the prospect, was the one who convinced the girl from Main Street to go with them on their bikes and to pull a train.

  Another prospect whose name I never heard.

  Teddy, the bald guy with the bandana.

  Jimmy Bones, who almost had his penis bitten off and whose spittle could be found on her left shoulder.

  Mully, the outlaw gang’s leader, who succeeded Bomber and Striker, arrived later with Weasel. Best year the chapter ever had. Doing what?

  The girl did seem to be there on her own volition, albeit drunk or stoned. Loopy. The Lucifer’s Lot didn’t seem to have anything to do with that. I could also attest that she did not die of suffocation or pass out based on what I saw of Jimmy Bones’s manhood. Probably couldn’t choke a fly.

  After girl dropped, Mully talked about celebrating business success of rally by earning purple wings (what’s a purple wing????). All men dropped to knees between her splayed legs and went down on the poor girl while she lay unconscious. Not dead? Creed thought dead, had trouble finding pulse because of spiked collar. Not dead. Unconscious. Only fell against the pavement from a kneeling position. Wasn’t hit, struck, or smacked by anyone or anything. Just fell over.

  Bikers left as EMTs arrived. Mully spotted me and probably got the license plate to my brother Jens’s truck, where I witnessed the whole thing.

  I saved my Word document with embedded pictures and toggled back to the Internet, searching for phone numbers and finding only three hospitals where the EMTs may have taken the bikini girl in and around Sturgis, including Rapid City Regional Hospital. I called all three asking for anyone brought in from Sturgis around noon the day before, a Jane Doe or a Charlene Freeburg. I got no help. If the girl was not Char and was awake and aware, she would be registered under her name, which I would never know. But I couldn’t shake the image of Creed being so responsible, too responsible to miss a heartbeat, no matter how much I wished he had.

  I searched for the only other agency that would know about the girl I’d seen with the Lucifer’s Lot and dialed the number.

  “Sturgis Police Department,” a woman announced, unenthusiastically.

  I couldn’t imagine how crazy their jobs must be this time a year. “Hi, I was wondering if I could talk to someone about a woman who may have passed out or been hospitalized yesterday afternoon.”

  “Can you narrow it down? We had dozens of fainters yesterday. It peaked at a hundred and three degrees. A new record.”

  “Well, I just want to know if the woman that was found on Sherman Street is okay or not. Do you know which case I’m talking about?” I continued.

  There was a pause. “Ma’am, what’s your name?”

  I ignored her request. “Who might be able to answer my question?”

  Without covering the receiver, the woman shouted, “Stanley, you need to take this one.”

  I heard a series of clicks, assumed it was the sound of me being transferred, and elevator music started playing. I couldn’t believe my ears. Elevator music on a police department line? I took a breath and jotted some more notes as I waited, organizing the list of girls’ names and addresses I had compiled to find out who might be harboring Char. I refused to believe the red bikini girl and Char were one in the same, even though I was waiting to confirm my beliefs.

  I stretched my legs and walked across the hall carrying the portable handset to Jens’s bedroom, watching the sun as it began its descent to the west. This late in the summer, sunset wouldn’t be for another two, two and a half hours, or so. I thought about Jens and wondered how he was doing with the FBI this time, glad that Jason was with him and relieved that Elizabeth was on her way. She’d keep Jens’s spirits up if anyone could. And Jens could lift her mood. I was daydreaming about my siblings, listening to a song my dad used to sing to me when I was a toddler. “Would you like to fly in my beautiful balloon? Would you like to glide in—”

  “Detective Stanley Hoyt.” The gruff voice scattered my balloons. “Who am I talking with?”

  “Listen, I just have a quick question,” I said, trying to avoid explaining why the sister of Jens Bergen, a person of interest in Michelle Freeburg’s murder, was calling about a Jane Doe. “The girl on Sherman Street. In the red bikini. Do you know who I’m talking about?”

  Pause. “Yes.”

  “Can you tell me how she’s doing?”

  “Who is this?”

  “I saw what happened. I saw the whole thing. I just need to know if she’s told you her name,” I pushed on, returning to Jens’s desk across the hall.

  “No,” he said, his voice softening. “Do you know her name?”

  “No, I … Well, I was wondering if you could check to see if she’s Charlene Freeburg. Char’s been missing since Sunday night and well, I thought it kinda looked a little like her.”

  No reply.

  “Do you have Internet access, Detective Hoyt?” I volunteered.

  “Yes, of course.”

  “She may not want you to know who she is. She may be a runaway. That’s probably why she’s not telling you her name. But check the Rapid City Journal photo on page D1 of the October twenty-seventh edition last year. See if she’s Char.”

  I waited, my palms sweating.

  Detective Hoyt returned to the line and said, “October twenty-seventh, D1. The girl spiking the ball?”

  “Yep.”

  “I’ll do that. But could you give me the rest of the story, please?”

  “Do you have an e-mail address?” I asked. He gave it to me as I typed, and I promptly sent him all the notes I’d just compiled and photos I had taken from Jens’s cell phone.

  I waited, expecting more music but was rewarded only with silence. I waited so long I was starting to think Detective Hoyt had forgotten about me.

  To ward off the boredom, I replayed my horrible behavior with the FBI agents earlier. I remembered the card in my back pocket and retrieved it, wondering what Agent Adonis’s name was. My fingers started to shake when I read the embossed name on the bright white card.

  Special Agent Streeter Pierce.

  I could not believe my eyes.

  Agent Pierce. The man who killed the De Milo murderer for me. The man who saved my life. Streeter Pierce and Agent Adonis were one in the same! My stomach flipped with excitement and dread. Excitement because I’d finally met Streeter Pierce. The man I owed my life to. Dread because I had just made a complete ass of myself. Instead of showering him with gratitude, I had figuratively kicked him in the balls and out of my brother’s house.

  What in the hell could top this for bad luck!

  “Impressive,” Detective Hoyt eventually said. “Names, photos. Now, what’s the story and how did you get these photos
?”

  I had just started to tell the story and explain what I knew when I heard the distinct sound of Harleys nearby. I ran across the hall, glanced out the master bedroom window, and saw Mully and three other Lucifer’s Lot bikers staring at Jens’s truck in the driveway. And the house. I dropped to the floor behind the bed before they could see me, phone still in my hand. My heart was pounding.

  “Officer?” I croaked.

  “Detective. Detective Stanley Hoyt. Is there something wrong, miss?”

  Barely above a whisper I asked, “Is the girl okay? The girl from Sherman Street?”

  “She’s dead. What’s your name, miss? Miss?”

  I dropped the phone and crawled to Jens’s dresser for his gun.

  “QUIT PICKING AT IT,” Bly scolded.

  “I’m not picking at it. I’m just looking at it,” Streeter harrumphed and walked over to the mirror. He could clearly see the two tattoos on his forearms, “TCB” on his left and “Eat Shit” on his right. But he needed the mirror to spy the tattoo on his upper right arm, a snakelike creature coiled on a pillow of flames with the word “STNEPRES” in black on the arc above the spindly beast and the words “YESREJ WEN” on the rocker below.

  “I’m a Serpent from Jersey? That’s almost worse than being tattooed.”

  Bly chuckled. “Better than working the rez during the rally.”

  “Says you,” Streeter sulked. “I’ve had enough of both,” he said somberly.

  “You ever talk about it?”

  Streeter knew “it” would come up eventually. Everyone in the bureau knew about his wife, Paula. But he had never talked about her death and wasn’t about to start now. He had no idea what got into him at Jens Bergen’s house. In the uncomfortable silence that followed, they both scanned Main Street, eyes darting from biker to biker filling the streets.

  Ignoring Bly’s question, Streeter asked, “What do the letters ‘TCB’ stand for?”

  “Taking care of business,” Bly answered. “It’s kind of the Serpents’ motto.”

  Streeter barely recognized himself in the mirror: tattoos, prewashed button-fly jeans, and a black T-shirt. He’d never owned a pair of jeans in his life.

  And he couldn’t seem to focus on the job at hand, worried about what fool’s errand Jens had sent his sister on to find Char. He secretly agreed that her whereabouts were the key to all this, and they, too, would need to find her. Tomorrow, he thought. Tonight he had to find Mully. He had comforted his mind to think that the best way to help Liv stay safe would be to have Mully behind bars. Then he chided himself. “What business is it of yours?”

  As if Bly had been reading Streeter’s mind about her, he said, “Wow, Liv Bergen is smokin’!”

  “You think so?”

  “Know so. Those fiery eyes and luscious lips. Those long legs that last for weeks, that killer body all fit and trim. Not a stitch of makeup, her hair tucked under a baseball cap, and she lit up the room the second she busted through that door. My kinda woman. What I wouldn’t give for an hour alone with that bobcat.”

  Streeter flinched at the thought, resisting the urge to pop his partner in the mouth for some reason.

  “Oh, by the way, your name,” said Bly. “Our motorcycle gang name or nickname. Mine’s ‘Bly’ and yours is ‘Streeter.’ Those are our legal names.”

  “I think I can remember that,” Streeter said, tightening the knot of his black skullcap, which had the initials B.F.F.S. stenciled in white across the front. Brothers Forever, Forever Serpents.

  “I am far too old to be dressing like a grungy teenager,” Streeter mumbled.

  He pointed at the emblem on his T-shirt. “What’s this supposed to be?”

  “The New York office got it for you. It’s a souvenir from a smaller rally they hold up in the northeast every spring. Just so you know, you attended this year.”

  “Maryland’s Mad Dog Rally,” Streeter read upside down. “Sponsored by Harley-Davidson?”

  “You got it. We’re members of the Serpents, which originated in Maryland in 1959. The other clubs will be looking for clues to make sure you’re legit, especially the clubs’ intelligence officers, who will no doubt be trying to pump you for information. You’ll spook them all at first, considering none of them has ever heard of you. You did study everything I gave you in that manila envelope, right?”

  “Committed to memory. Every detail. While you were in the shower.” Streeter wanted Bly to wonder if he was telling the truth or pulling his leg.

  Bly asked, “What are you thinking now that we’ve talked with Vincent?”

  “I’m thinking,” Streeter groaned as he tugged on his boots, “that Vincent having mentioned Michelle was raped at thirteen confirms what Jens said Michelle told him after Roy outted her. I’m thinking that, despite my good friend Bob Shankley’s insistence, that this is an open-and-shut case and Carl Muldando killed Michelle, my gut says we’re looking in all the wrong places. It has since the beginning. Too neat. Shank is deceitful and can’t be trusted. He’s got a vested interest in the outcome of this case, and I don’t know exactly what that is yet, but his motives are not entirely pure. And he’s pushing hard for Mully to be the one we charge with Michelle’s murder, pushing even harder for people to know I’m the one to finger Mully.”

  “You missed that he’ll be quick to steal the credit when you solve this case, my friend,” Bly added with a wink.

  “A picture’s worth a thousand words, and the succession of photos taken of Michelle confirms the story. Look at the way she intentionally uglified herself from the age of fourteen. Also explains why she was so overprotective of Char.”

  “You think Vincent knows more about this, stayed close with the family all these years because he was the one who raped Michelle?” Bly suggested.

  “Maybe. But then why did he tell us he thought Michelle was raped and got pregnant when she was thirteen? If he were the rapist, why would he be so willing to redirect the investigation toward something he didn’t know we already knew? He wouldn’t know that Jens Bergen and Roy Barker had already told us about Michelle having been sexually abused. Why not just let us investigate her recent murder rather than distort it with her tainted past? No one else seems to know or believe anything was ever wrong in Michelle’s life. What would Vincent have to gain by telling us that, if he was Michelle’s killer?”

  “I’m no psychologist, but if I had been raped when I was only thirteen, I would be damn sure not to let something bad like that happen to someone I love, like a wild, know-it-all little sister. Michelle playing mother hen makes sense. But she moved in with her parents to keep an eye on who? Just her baby sister, or dear old daddy, too?”

  Streeter shook his head. “I don’t think so. I think Frank and Arlene were and continue to be oblivious to any of this.”

  “Older brothers?”

  “Maybe. Haven’t met them yet. Could explain why Michelle got so mad about Frankie Jr. giving Charlene a beer and a toke on his weed. Who knows?”

  “What does Michelle having been raped have to do with her being murdered?”

  The cell phone buzzed and Bly flipped it open on speaker.

  “What’s up, boss?”

  “The autopsy is done on Michelle Freeburg. Time of death was sometime between ten forty and eleven yesterday morning,” Shank said.

  “About the time Tommy found her,” Streeter said.

  “And the autopsy suggested she died of blunt-force trauma to the back of her skull, the murder weapon likely an industrial flashlight, based on the field work.”

  “When was she struck?”

  “Between midnight and one o’clock Sunday night. Well, actually Monday morning. Casts taken of boot prints leading away from the murder scene toward Lazy S Campground indicate men’s size ten and a half. The print is being run through the database now and we’ll get a brand. But I already know it will match with whatever Mully’s wearing.”

  Streeter still hadn’t told Shank that Jack Linwood and his Investigati
ve Control Operations team had confirmed the FTW pin found in Michelle’s palm had the same striations as the pin seen in Mully’s lapel.

  “Thanks,” Bly said, about to snap the phone shut.

  “By the way,” Shank added. “The Jane Doe in Sturgis is not Charlene Freeburg.”

  “When did we think it was?” Streeter looked at Bly. Both men shrugged.

  “When the Sturgis PD got an anonymous call from someone who suggested it might be.”

  “When was this?”

  “About an hour ago. The caller sent photos. We now have proof Mully and several more of the Lucifer’s Lot were involved in Jane Doe’s death. We’ve got the pictures to prove it. Bring him in.”

  Streeter was dumbfounded. Photos and proof of Mully having been involved in this girl’s death on Monday afternoon, too. “Do we have any idea who called?”

  “You’re going to love this,” Shank said. “E-mail of the photos, names, gang ranks, and field notes came from an e-mail address associated with an L. Bergen at Bergen Construction Materials.”

  Streeter stood at the kitchen table, staring at the picture of Michelle’s naked body along the creek’s bank. He couldn’t help comparing this image to the one of Liv on the highwall just a month earlier and shivered at how close she’d come to dying. And how Michelle wasn’t so lucky. And incredibly, somehow Liv seemed to be tangled up with the Lucifer’s Lot, with Mully.

  The phone call to Jens Bergen about Roy Barker leaving Michelle’s book and key on Jens’s nightstand had been helpful. It was also helpful, of course, that Jens had provided them with so much information about Michelle and her pregnancy. But knowing that much of the information somehow came from Liv made Streeter wonder how involved she was in this investigation. And whether she might be putting herself in harm’s way again, which disturbed him to think about. Streeter had asked Bly to get someone over to Jens’s house immediately to retrieve the book, the key, and Liv, but Liv was nowhere to be found. Neither was Jens’s truck. Jens recognized the key and explained that it opened Michelle’s locker at work. Streeter told them to bag everything in Michelle’s locker into evidence and call him with the results. The fact that Jens didn’t know where Liv had gone after she phoned him was unsettling.