December's Secrets (Larry Macklin Mysteries Book 2)

by A. E. Howe

  Cara smiled. “No. I probably should. But I was serious. Life is about living and living is about risk. And this,” she gestured to all the first responders, “was more about my family than your job. If you’re willing to ride things out with me for a while, I’ll give it a go.” I hugged her more tightly.

  “Come on. I should go tell Mom what happened,” she said. We started toward the van, but then she stopped. “It isn’t always like this, is it?” She sounded half serious.

  “Oh, yeah, crazy women with guns and guys in wheelchairs with bombs. A normal week for me,” I said and bumped her jovially.

  I checked in with Chavez and got permission for Cara and me to leave the scene. We spent an hour giving her mother all of the details while she sat staring at us, her mouth hanging open. I couldn’t blame her.

  We took Mauser for a quick walk then left him napping on the Laursens’ couch. Cara and her mom set off for the hospital to check on Henry and I left for the sheriff’s office to hunt up Chavez. I still needed to wrap up my case. It was going to take a lot of team effort to sort it all out, deciding how to share the evidence and who had the primary responsibility for prosecuting the Andrewses.

  I found Chavez at his desk, coat off and leaning back in his chair, reading reports. He stood up when he saw me.

  “Macklin, is your life always this interesting? If so, I think you need to go back up north. Gainesville has enough crazy,” he said with a big smile. “Seriously, it has been an honor. I guess we’re both proof that your father is a very good teacher.”

  “I appreciate all your help, and I know that Cara and her family do too.” I shook his hand. “What are you going to do about Terri Andrews?”

  “I talked to the prosecutor. The most we could charge her with is prior knowledge and there isn’t much cause for that. We agreed that pressing charges would just be cruel.”

  We flipped a coin to see who had to make the depressing phone call. I lost. Terri cried and cried some more. She really was in Italy. She said she hadn’t wanted to leave her parents, but they had insisted. I told her that there was no need to hurry back. Her parents had already retained counsel so there wasn’t much that she could do for them. It would probably be at least a year before they went to trial and bail was unlikely. Judges don’t feel lenient when it comes to bomb-makers.

  I called Dad and told him I’d be home the next day. I needed to get Mauser back to his home, and there was no point in me waiting around Gainesville any longer. It would take months before all the terabytes of forensic data were compiled and the reports written. Now that the killers were off the street, there wasn’t any urgency in processing the evidence. The reports would arrive when they arrived.

  I fetched Mauser from the Laursens’ and went back to the motel. My foot, and most of the rest of me, was aching. I filled the tub with hot water and Epsom salts and soaked for an hour. When I got out there was a message on my phone from Cara: Dinner?

  I answered: Sure. Where?

  Her: There? Comfort food—pizza?

  Me: Perfect.

  Her: I’ll bring it. One hour.

  After dinner, we made love. It was slow and exploratory as we learned each other’s bodies. Working around my injuries, we found our rhythm. Satisfied at last, we lay beside each other and held hands. We didn’t speak much. For my part, I didn’t want to take the chance of spoiling the moment. After a few minutes, Cara rolled over and slept. I fell asleep with the warmth and comfort of her body next to mine.

  At some point during the night Mauser, the lumbering oaf, climbed into bed. I was much relieved in the morning to discover that the horrible snoring I heard coming from the other side of the bed was the dog and not Cara.

  “Are you awake?” Cara asked.

  “How could anyone sleep through that?” I asked, waving a hand in the direction of the canine buzz saw. I looked at my watch.

  “Probably time to get up anyway,” I said. We got the monster out of the bed, walked and fed. We still didn’t talk much about the night before.

  “I need to go to the hospital and see how Dad’s doing,” Cara said after getting cleaned up and dressed. “As long as the doctors say he’ll be okay, I’m going back home today.”

  I held up my phone. “Let me know what you’re doing?”

  “You too,” she said and leaned in for a kiss. She scratched Mauser, who’d gone back to bed. “You take care of him,” she told the dog.

  Mrs. Perkins came out to say goodbye and gave me a huge bag of goodies for Mauser, and then proceeded to scratch, pet and hug the big goofball while telling him what a great dog he was and how much she’d miss him. At last I managed to pry him loose from her clutches and get him situated in the back of the van.

  Soon I was up on I-75 headed back to Adams County. The drive gave me time to think about all the complications with Matt that were waiting for me back home. How was I going to deal with the possibility that he was working for drug dealers? I decided I couldn’t deal with it on my own.

  My first order of business was to take my overgrown traveling companion back to where he belonged. Dad was standing on the porch when we drove up. He spent half an hour greeting Mauser, who seemed equally enthused to see him and to be home. I got a handshake.

  “When you moved to criminal investigations, I didn’t think you’d be putting yourself in harm’s way every chance you got. You know, most deputies consider CID a desk job,” he joked. “You want to come in out of the cold?”

  Sitting across from Dad, I told him about the information I’d received from Eddie, how I’d staked out the industrial park, and the realization that I’d seen Matt’s car. I was surprised when I didn’t get any flack about going out on my own.

  “There could be other explanations for why Matt was there.” Dad slipped into sheriff mode, calm and judicious.

  “I thought of that, but all the other explanations seem like a stretch. I think what really makes me wonder is his attitude change over the last month. He used to seem resentful most of the time. Now it’s more like he knows something we don’t, and it’s making him smug.”

  “Regardless, all you have right now is a suspicion. His change in attitude could be related to something in his personal life. Without evidence, the only thing we can do is to keep a closer eye on him. Bring me something more concrete and we’ll have a way forward,” he said somberly.

  “I feel better for having told you,” I said sincerely.

  “I’m not sure that I do. I have to treat him fairly and not hold unsubstantiated claims against him. Pretending like you know something when you don’t is one thing. Acting as though you don’t know something when you do is another. Of course, I don’t know anything and that’s the point. Neither do you.”

  “I get it,” I said. Getting back on my feet took some effort. Mauser didn’t even raise his head from the huge bed that Dad kept for him in the living room. “I don’t get a thank you for your action-packed vacation?” Mauser refused to even open an eye.

  I stopped by the office before heading home. I couldn’t help but look around for Matt’s car. I didn’t see it.

  Pete was eating Christmas cookies at his desk near mine when I walked in. The big guy jumped up and gave me a hug. “Damn, I’m tired of doing your work,” he said, patting my shoulder. “At least you managed to solve a homicide while you were on vacation,” he joked and then pointed to a stack of reports on his desk. “Twenty cases I’ve covered while you were gone. Tomorrow it’s lunch at Winston’s Grill, and you’re buying.”

  “Would it make you feel better if I told you I almost got blown up by a wheelchair bomb?”

  He looked thoughtful for a moment. “No. I’m still ordering something expensive off the menu. And the gimpy leg routine isn’t going to get you any sympathy either.”

  “I was only gone for three working days.”

  “Talk to the hand,” he said as he grabbed another cookie and put on his coat. “Oh, the lieutenant wanted to see you when you got in. I’ve got t
o run out and talk to a witness on an assault charge—actually, multiple assault charges. Another great case that you missed out on. A fight broke out at a neighborhood Christmas party. Five people in the hospital. Two of them knifed. God bless us, everyone,” he said as he went out the door.

  I headed for Lt. Johnson’s office and walked in when he acknowledged my knock. He sat straight-backed in his chair. I always felt like I should salute when I saw him. The man had spent almost twenty years in the Army’s military police and had never really left it. I was sure that without his dark brown skin tone, his face would have spent most of its time glowing an angry red at all the non-military behavior around the station. This afternoon I got a tight-lipped smile from him.

  “Congratulations on solving the Tyler homicide. But I do wish that you and the sheriff would at least acknowledge that I’m in the chain of command.”

  As soon as he said this, my mind went to Matt. What would the lieutenant say if he knew that we were keeping information on a potential bad cop from him? If it came to that, I’d have to let Dad deal with the fallout.

  “From now on, at least copy me on texts and emails. Just in case I’m called on to make a decision involving one of your extracurricular activities,” he said with a considerable amount of sarcasm. “You can count on getting a little extra work thrown your way since some of the other officers have been having to do double-duty while you were off solving Alachua County’s cases.”

  Hey, one of those murders was ours, I thought, but decided it was better to keep that to myself.

  “Go on, get out of here.”

  I had two other tasks on my to-do list before heading home. First I called Tammy Page, David Tyler’s mother. I thought she deserved to hear what had happened from me before news stories and rumors started to circulate.

  After leaving the office, I stopped and bought a six-pack of beer then drove out to Jeremy Wright’s house. The old man wasn’t on the porch, which gave me a bad moment, but a knock on the door brought a shout from inside.

  “You had me worried when I didn’t see you on the porch,” I kidded him when he answered the door.

  “Hell, I gotta pee sometime,” he said with a smile that grew larger when he saw the beer. “Wahoo! Wait, I got something to go with it.” He disappeared back inside the trailer and came out a moment later with a couple bags of boiled peanuts.

  We sat on the porch and I drank a beer, ate peanuts and watched the sun go down as he told me about the jobs he’d had and the women he’d known. It was very relaxing.

  I received a cold shoulder from Ivy when I got home. It took her an hour before she decided to forgive me for leaving her in the care of a neighbor, but finally she crawled into my lap as I talked to Cara on the phone. Henry had been told he’d live, but not to eat any more C-4 fuses. We set a date for dinner the next night.

  I sat on the couch, petting Ivy and listening to the petite tabby purr, glad to be home. But I couldn’t help thinking that, for all the trouble that was in the rearview mirror, there was a whole lot more coming down the road.

  THE END

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  Larry Macklin returns in:

  January’s Betrayal

  A Larry Macklin Mystery–Book 3

  Read it now: AMAZON AMAZON UK

  The specter of corruption has hovered over the Adams County Sheriff’s Office for months. Criminal investigator Larry Macklin is convinced he’s identified a mole for drug dealers within the department, but he doesn’t have enough evidence to prove it.

  Larry’s attention is diverted when a recently released suspect in a series of rapes is shot and killed in the act of raping and murdering a woman… or so it seems. But the more Larry digs into the case, the more it becomes clear that the incident is part of a larger conspiracy—one that could have a devastating effect on his father’s career as sheriff.

  Larry is desperate to find the real killer and to protect the reputation of the sheriff’s office, but it just might lead him to make the biggest mistake of his career.

  Here’s a preview:

  Chapter One

  It was after midnight and cold. The first thing I saw when I pulled up behind the shopping center didn’t make me feel better. Held back by crime scene tape were two news vans and my dad’s pickup truck. As an investigator, the last things you want at your crime scene are reporters and the sheriff. And when the sheriff is also your father, you’re doubly screwed.

  On the other side of the tape, two of our patrol cars were parked at odd angles, all their lights on and illuminating the bodies of a man and a woman. As I parked my unmarked car, the crime scene van pulled up next to me. Shantel Williams and Marcus Brown, two of our best techs, got out and greeted me.

  “None of this is good,” Shantel said, carrying her box of equipment.

  “I was told Nichols shot a suspect?”

  “Not the half of it. He shot Ayers.”

  “Jeffrey Ayers, the suspect in the rapes?”

  “That’s what Marti in dispatch said,” Marcus responded.

  As we approached the scene, I could see my father staring at the bodies from a distance. He heard us coming and held up the crime scene tape so that Marcus and Shantel could go under. They set their boxes down and started removing their cameras.

  Dad pulled me aside. Behind him, the news crews were already testing their lights and microphones.

  “This is going to go political fast,” he said, his voice low and ominous.

  “What the hell happened?”

  “That’s what we’re going to have to figure out. Look, I know you’re on call tonight, but I’m going to need to assign another investigator as the lead.”

  “Because of Ayers?”

  Jeffrey Ayers had been our chief suspect in a series of rapes. But as we dug deeper, the evidence pointed away from him and two days ago Dad had announced that Ayers was no longer considered a suspect.

  Dad nodded to the news vans. “Press is already on top of the story. I have to be above this. If Ayers raped and killed this woman then I’m in big trouble. It’s not going to help if it looks like I put my son in charge of the investigation. Perception is going to be almost as important as the reality.”

  “I understand.”

  “That doesn’t mean I don’t want you involved. This coming on the heels of what you told me about Matt…” He shrugged. “I’m not feeling very comfortable. You know Matt would have been my second choice.”

  Dad seemed to have aged ten years in the last month. Before Christmas I’d stumbled upon a situation suggesting that Matt Greene, one of the best investigators in our department and a horse’s ass, was also a dirty cop.

  A gust of wind from the north sent a chill through me. “What do you want me to do?” I asked quietly.

  “I called Pete in. I’m going to give him the lead. He works well with Sam in internal. Sam’s going to be handling the use-of-force report on Nichols.”

  “And since Pete and I work as partners most of the time…”

  “It will seem natural that you’re close to the case. Of course, Matt will still have to be involved a bit since he took the lead in the second rape.”

  “What a mess,” I said, shaking my head.

  Another car pulled up next to the crime scene van and Pete Henley’s large bulk emerged. He looked around for a minute before he spotted us and came over. In his mid-forties and a little over three hundred pounds, with a wife and two teenage daughters that were the center of his world, Pete’s easygoing nature fooled a lot of people. But he was a natural investigator and the best shot in the department.

  In Adams County, Pete was the man with his ear to the ground. He knew everybody in our small, rural north Florida county. For most families, he could tell you their history going back for as many generations as they’d lived here. He was also well tuned into local politics, so he didn’t need to have the pitfalls of the current
situation spelled out for him.

  Dad told Pete he was the lead investigator and filled him in on what little information he had.

  “I’m on it,” Pete said with reluctance. He turned and walked over to the crime scene tape, lifting it up, and awkwardly slipped under it.

  “Go on,” Dad said to me, looking over at the news crews who were done shooting background footage of the scene and were heading toward us. I avoided making eye contact with the reporters as I hurried under the tape.

  The bodies were located at the back of a small shopping center. The woman’s body was half hidden behind a dumpster near a loading dock. Five feet away was the man’s body, curled up and face down on the pavement. I never would have recognized him as Ayers. Marcus and Shantel were methodically taking pictures from different angles.

  “Do we know her name?” Pete asked Deputy Julio Ortiz, who was standing well back from the bodies.

  “She is… was Angie Maitland. I went to school with her.”

  Julio was about five years younger than me, twenty-five maybe. Around the sheriff’s office he was always hanging out with the clowns, the guys that razzed each other, came up with silly practical jokes and challenged each other to weightlifting or running contests. There were no jokes tonight, though, his voice sad and dismayed. In a small county like ours, you realized pretty early that the car wreck you responded to or the domestic disturbance call you answered might involve someone you knew. It made a hard job harder. And was one of the reasons I’d rather have been doing something else.

  “Has her family been informed?” Pete asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  Pete pulled out his radio and checked with dispatch. No one had contacted the family. “Would you to do it?” Pete asked Julio.

  “Sure,” Julio nodded, turning away to get the address from dispatch.

  “What about Ayers?” I asked Pete.

  “We’d better do it. We’ll go over after we talk with Nichols.”