Thanks for the welcome, buddy.
He drove another hundred yards. Officers from the county Sheriff’s Department had turned the street into a makeshift parking lot. Trent parked beside the police cruiser closest to the gate and stepped out. The ground was damp, and the air smelled like rain. The news had said to expect storms, but they were holding off so far. Hopefully it’d stay like that for a while.
Trent pivoted in a three–sixty, getting a feel for the layout of the college. The residence halls and fraternities were about two blocks to his southwest, while a dining hall was directly to his east. North and northeast was an open, grass field and what he assumed was a classroom building.
With his bearings straight, Trent walked toward a group of officers outside the building directly in front of him. Before he arrived, one of the members of the group peeled off. He had a willowy frame and arms and legs that were so long that he almost resembled a praying mantis. In contrast to the uniformed officers, he wore a pair of jeans and a white polo shirt with a pen in the front pocket. As far as Trent could tell, he was unarmed.
“I certainly hope you’re Detective Schaefer,” he said, extending his arm toward Trent. “I’m Pete Amerson, Bluffdale’s interim sheriff.”
“Interim?”
He waved off the question as if he got it all the time.
“My predecessor is indisposed,” he said. “He had a weakness for fried okra and an intolerance for exercise. Had a heart attack. The county asked me to fill in until the next election.”
Trent nodded, taking the information in as they walked toward a classroom building that looked distinctively like a Colonial–era courthouse. An enameled metal sign on the front lawn announced it as Bushard Hall. The group of uniformed officers outside showed Sheriff Amerson the same indifference the officer at the barricade had shown Trent earlier. Evidently some people weren’t fond of the new management.
“So what do we have?” asked Trent.
Amerson hemmed and hawed for a second before stopping beside a marble column just outside the building’s front door.
“Honestly?” he said. Trent nodded. “It’s pretty much a disaster. Bluffdale is a small college town. I’ve got good officers, but we bust up frat parties and confiscate fake ID cards. Despite what my men may think, we don’t have the manpower or expertise to solve a murder. We need you, so I’m glad SIU sent you down.”
SIU was the Special Investigations Unit of the Ohio Attorney General’s office. Its detectives assisted Ohio’s small towns when they lacked the resources to conduct an effective investigation. It wasn’t a bad gig for a detective from what Trent had heard. Unfortunately, he hadn’t been able to discover if that were true yet. He was officially SIU’s lead detective for Southwestern Ohio, but he had only been on the job for a few days. Bluffdale was his first solo call.
“I’m here to help,” said Trent. “What have you done so far?”
Amerson rubbed his hands together as if for warmth and then gestured toward the building with his head. Trent took the first step inside. The interior floor was bare concrete and the walls were white and sterile, making the place feel almost like a hospital. The building was obviously being renovated, but it looked like the designer had elected to keep a few things. The crown molding looked original, as did most of the trim around the windows. Trent looked over his shoulder at Amerson, expecting him to keep up.
“Unfortunately, we haven’t done much,” said Amerson, stepping quickly. “The victim’s name is Dr. Mitch Byram. From what we can tell, he got whacked on the head by a baseball bat or something similar. Before you ask, we haven’t found anything yet. We’ve secured the scene, and the coroner is ready to remove the body on your say. We’ve also secured someone who may have seen what happened.”
“A witness?” asked Trent. He stopped walking in the middle of the building’s three–story atrium. Hallways branched in four directions, and Trent could hear the buzz of an active crime scene coming from one on his right.
“We don’t know yet,” said Amerson, taking a spiral–bound notebook from his pocket.
“Her name is Dr. Renee Carter, and she’s a professor here at Bluffdale. She called in the body from the victim’s office. Here’s where it gets interesting, though. She claims somebody attacked her when she went to Dr. Byram’s office to pick up her laptop. Naturally, she didn’t see anything, and her attacker took her laptop.
“Here’s the thing, though. One of my deputies knows the college’s head of security, and he says this building has a computer–controlled security system. It locks the place up at night. In order to get in, Dr. Carter had to type in her password at a security terminal outside. The system keeps track of everyone who does that, and according to the logs, Dr. Carter and Dr. Byram were the only two people inside.”
Trent started walking again. That was probative, but not definitive. Computerized logs were too easy to alter. There were probably half a dozen people on the college’s payroll who could do it.
“What’s her relation to Dr. Byram?”
“Rumor among my officers is that the two of them were dating,” said Amerson. “I don’t know if that’s speculation or knowledge, but most of the guys have been around here for a while. They know the local scene.”
“We’ll figure it out,” said Trent. He rubbed his hands together as goose bumps formed on his forearms. It was even colder inside the building than it had been outside, a strange feat in Ohio in mid–September; the school must have been having air–conditioning problems if it were still running that late at night that late in the season.
The hallway he and Amerson entered had two exits: the one he had just come from and a pair of frosted–glass doors at the end of the hall. A photographer took pictures of an office door about five yards from the far exit, while two men wearing navy–blue jackets from the Coroner’s Office stood watch. A woman, presumably she was Renee Carter, sat on a metal bench about thirty feet away from them. She looked as if she were in her early thirties and had an athletic build. If she were a teacher, Trent doubted she had much problem keeping the attention of her male students.
She stood as they walked down the hall and met them halfway, her arms across her chest.
“Can I go yet?” she asked. Her neck was red, and the skin looked chafed as if it had been rubbed hard by something. The abrasion wasn’t tight, so it wasn’t caused by a rope or wire. It could have been hands, or maybe even a forearm. Someone at the state crime lab could probably tell. As if sensing his stare, Dr. Carter turned her gaze from the sheriff to Trent, her head tilted to the side and her eyes penetrating and unwavering. “Didn’t your mother teach you it’s wrong to stare at a woman’s chest?”
Trent’s eyes darted from her neck to her face.
“Forgive me,” he said. “Have the crime scene guys taken pictures of your neck yet?”
“Yes,” she said, rolling her eyes and panning her gaze back to the sheriff. “I’ve been sitting here for the past four hours. Can I go home yet?”
“Not just yet, Miss,” he said. “We still have some things to figure out. It’d be best if you were just a little patient.”
She clenched her jaw hard enough that Trent could see the muscles beneath her cheeks flex.
“Fine. Can we at least go to your station so my students don’t see this?”
Amerson looked at Trent, his eyebrows raised questioningly.
“If you’d like to come in voluntarily for a statement, that would be fine,” said Trent. He turned his attention back to Amerson. “If you stay here, I’ll interview Dr. Carter at your station. We’ll see where we go from there.”
“You’re in charge, so we’ll do whatever you need,” said Amerson. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a key chain. “You’ll need these to get in the front door. Station is on Elm Avenue. Can’t miss it.”
“Sure,” said Trent. He took the keys and hurried to catch up with Dr. Carter, who had already started walking. He reached her as she arrived at
the front door. She looked different out of the artificial glare of the building’s lights. Her facial features were less severe, and her skin had a pale green, almost olive–colored hue. Her eyes, though, were sharp and angry.
“Is this going to take a while?” she asked. “I have things to do tonight.”
“It will take as long as it takes,” said Trent. “That’s all I can say.”
“Whatever.”
There didn’t seem to be much else to say after that. The two arrived at Trent’s unmarked police cruiser without further conversation.
“Do I ride in the front or the back?” asked Dr. Carter.
He probably should have asked her to sit in the back. Chances were high that Dr. Carter wouldn’t do anything stupid, but human beings, even the most intellectually gifted, weren’t always rational creatures. She wouldn’t have been the first witness to lash out at the police. He scoped her out quickly. She couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred and twenty pounds, so he thought he could handle her if she tried anything. Allowing her to sit in the front might also put her at ease some. It was an acceptable risk.
“Front seat’s fine.”
She nodded and walked to the passenger’s side of the car. Trent followed on the other side and sat down. In the enclosed space, he could smell her flowery perfume.
“I should have asked earlier, but what’s your full name, Dr. Carter?”
Trent knew the answer to the question before he asked, but he wanted her to become accustomed to answering his questions.
“My friends call me Renee. You can call me Dr. Carter.”
Trent pulled up to the sawhorse barricade that separated the crime scene from the rest of the campus. The same officer who had let him through earlier opened the roadblock, but this time he gave a cursory nod. Trent returned the gesture but kept his attention on his passenger.
“I’m Detective Schaefer. You met Sheriff Amerson inside, I believe.”
“You mean Barney Fife?”
“That’s the one,” said Trent.
Dr. Carter hugged herself tightly and rubbed her arms. Obviously, she was cold. Had she been a suspect, he would have considered letting her tough it out. Since he didn’t know what role she played in his case, though, he leaned forward and twisted a plastic knob on his dash to turn on the heat. The engine hadn’t warmed up completely, so the air spewing from the car’s vents was lukewarm at best. At least it kept him from having to smell her perfume.
He shifted in his seat. There were two empty twenty–ounce cups in the cup holder on his dash. An hour and a half earlier they had held double–caffeinated coffee from the gas station down the street from his townhouse. In retrospect, he probably should have settled for one.
“From what I can tell, Sheriff Amerson is a nice man. Bluffdale could have done a lot worse.”
“You don’t work for him?”
“No. I work for the Attorney General’s Office in Cincinnati. The county doesn’t get many murders, so I’m assisting. You lived here long?”
Dr. Carter paused.
“Is that a real question, or are you just trying to make small talk to pass the time?”
Trent exhaled heavily.
“I was just trying to be polite,” he said. “Forgive me.”
“I understand what you’re doing, but, please, just cut the shit, okay? I’m tired, my friend is dead, and I’m not interested in making a new one. Ask your questions so I can go home.”
Lovely people here in Bluffdale.
Trent turned out of the College’s main entrance. The grocery store beside campus was closed, and its windows were dark. An old Ford Crown Victoria drove past, its windows blacked out with tint and its twenty–inch chrome wheels gleaming. The car’s sound system pulsed. Even from a couple of yards away, he could feel the rhythmic pounding of bass through his seat like a massaging chair. Combined with his need for a restroom, it was not comfortable.
“Fair enough,” said Trent. “I’ve heard that the victim was your boyfriend. That right?”
Dr. Carter rolled her eyes.
“I can see why they sent you, Poirot. Mitch wasn’t my boyfriend. I’m not his type.”
Trent turned down a residential street. The houses were old and brick but well kept, probably owned by faculty members from the school. There were few lights on, but he caught the flicker of a television set from some of the windows. He wondered when Dr. Byram’s murder would make the news.
“What was Mitch’s type?”
“Broad shoulders, big arms, hairy chests.”
“So he was gay?” asked Trent.
“No, he was into circus people,” said Dr. Carter, looking out her window. “What do you think?”
Trent squeezed the steering wheel hard. He shifted again. Definitely should have settled for a single cup of coffee.
“What actually happened?”
“Like I already told the sheriff and his buddies, I walked into Mitch’s office and saw his body. Before I could do anything, somebody grabbed me. He put a cloth to my face and I passed out. When I woke up, I was alone, so I called 911 from the phone in Mitch’s office.”
“Since you know the college, how do you think your attacker got into the building? Amerson said all the windows and doors were computerized.”
“How’d the place feel to you, Detective? Temperature, I mean.”
Trent looked over. Dr. Carter looked like she expected an answer.
“Cold.”
“Bluffdale gave its heating and air contract to the lowest bidder they could find. Guess what heating and air company also happened to have a security systems division?”
That explained a few things. Trent nodded. Dr. Carter’s story was smooth, but it didn’t seem practiced. Of course, she was also a college professor, which meant she was probably smart enough to think of a story on the fly and remember most of its details.
“Did you get a look at the guy who attacked you?”
“He was always behind me. I only saw his hand.”
“What’d his hand look like? Did he have any tattoos? Or rings? Anything distinctive?”
“He was white. That’s it. No rings, no tattoos.”
White guy. That narrows it down to roughly seventy–five million people in the U.S.
Trent pulled to a stop in front of Bluffdale’s station house, a small, red brick building with a metal awning in front. A pair of floodlights illuminated dilapidated, wooden houses nearby.
“We’ll fill out a formal statement inside,” said Trent. “We’ll see where we go from there.”
Dr. Carter ignored him, but that was okay. They had plenty of time to talk. He unlocked the front door with the keys Amerson had given him and waited, holding it open for Dr. Carter. She stopped before entering.
“Is there a restroom inside, or do I get to pee in the bushes?”
Trent gritted his teeth and shifted his weight.
“I’m sure there’s a restroom. I’ll wait for you in the lobby.”
Dr. Carter walked through the door without looking at him. He let it slam behind her.
Saturday, September 14. 2:14 a.m
Bluffdale, OH.
Renee walked through the lobby in front of Detective Schaefer. The room was barely large enough to hold a row of padded chairs and a simple wooden desk. Even without the detective’s direction, she found a small restroom near the corner furthest from the door. The lighting was better inside, but the bathroom still looked like something she would have found behind a gas station. At least it was clean.
She breathed deeply and twisted the pitted metal knob on the faucet. Cold water splashed into the porcelain basin. It was her first moment alone since finding Mitch’s body. Her face was flushed, and her stomach felt heavy. She wanted to be curled up on the couch at home or even slumped over her desk in the tiny study carrel that served as her office. Hell, at that moment, she probably would have taken the gutter in downtown Baghdad over Bluffdale’s police station.
Mitch had
been a colleague, but he had also been her friend. She celebrated Thanksgiving with him, and he came to her New Year’s parties. A lump grew in her throat, and she struggled to swallow it back. She didn’t want Detective Schaefer to see her cry. He was a jerk; he didn’t even seem to care that someone was dead, let alone that it was a friend of hers.Her lower lip trembled of its own volition, and her stomach twisted into knots. She tried to hold it in, but a tear fell anyway, leaving a mascara–tinged streak down the side of her cheek and a dark smudge on the porcelain sink. She clenched her jaw and closed her eyes, forcing the second tear back.
Hold on until you can get home.
She inhaled again and threw cold water on her face. The chill calmed her. The bathroom had a toilet, a sink and a mirror; that was it. Someone had placed a small vase with dried wildflowers on the vanity, a bit of dried, dead cheer in an otherwise bleak space, but they didn’t improve the room’s atmosphere one iota. She crossed her arms and hugged her sides.
She probably wasn’t the first person to seek solitude in that room, and, almost certainly, she wouldn’t be the last. She looked at herself in the mirror. Her eyes were puffy and her cheeks were red. She tried not to break down, but she couldn’t help but remember what had nearly happened to her. Her friend was dead, and she had been attacked. The police didn’t seem to care. They didn’t even believe her. She wiped another tear off her cheek and promised herself that it would be the last until she got home.
True to his word, Detective Schaefer was waiting for her outside. He leaned against the wooden desk in front of the room, his face unreadable. She watched him for a moment. The movement was slight, but he shifted his weight left and right every few seconds. Her students occasionally made similar moves at the end of class, especially when they came in with a mug of coffee.
“I heard we’re going to get rain tonight,” she said. “Lots of it. Might have some flooding.”
“Is that right?” asked Detective Schaefer, leaning forward to stand up. He started to head toward the restroom, but she blocked his path.
Just Run Page 2
