Murder on Thanksgiving

by P. Creeden

  “What’s going on? What’s wrong?” the man asked, following Colby toward the driver’s side.

  Colby turned back, uncovering his face and shaking his head again toward the man, but not saying a word as he rushed over and pulled the woman from the vehicle and lay her gently on the ground. Then he began CPR. The man stood there, suddenly breaking into sobs.

  Emma rushed over and was immediately struck by the sudden smell that permeated Colby’s clothing—car exhaust. And she realized that the area surrounding the car reeked of it even though it hadn’t been running for the last several minutes.

  Chapter 4

  The ambulance arrived and the paramedics jumped out of the vehicle, taking over the attempt at resuscitating the woman. Colby stepped back and then went over and set a hand on the man’s shoulder. “I’m sorry for your loss, but I’m going to need to ask you a few questions about your fiancé. It doesn’t seem that she died in this accident.”

  The man lifted his head, removed his glasses and then wiped the tears on his face on the sleeve of his jacket. Replacing the glasses, he asked, “What do you mean?”

  “The accident appears to be a slow-moving one. Airbags tend to engage when the vehicle is going over fifteen miles an hour, but hers did not. Additionally, there appears to be no physical injury to her body - no bruising or blood,” Colby said with a frown.

  “I can confirm it was a slow-moving accident,” Emma said, her voice cracking a bit as she watched the paramedics begin to move the body of the woman onto the stretcher. “I was driving down the road when I went to pass another car. Then I suddenly saw headlights coming my direction. To avoid an accident, I yanked my wheel a bit too hard so that I ended up over there. But yes, the car was moving slowly, or things would have been much worse.”

  “What does this mean?” the man asked again, his face a contortion of confusion.

  “It’s just that I’d like to ask you a few questions,” Colby said, trying to diffuse the man’s overemotional outburst. “Like, for example, what is your name, sir? And what is the full name of the victim of the accident.”

  Relief seemed to come over the man as he answered, “I’m Rick Bushy and my fiancé’s name is... was... Patricia Stone.”

  Colby wrote what the man said down in his notebook. “And you said that you were driving out to meet Patricia somewhere in Ridgeway?”

  “Yes, at the park so that I could take her over to my new place for the holiday. But she was late meeting me, and I couldn’t reach her on the phone so I drove out here to see if I could find her,” he answered, looking over Colby’s shoulder a bit as though trying to see what the deputy was writing down.

  “You’re new to Ridgeway, then?” Colby asked.

  “Yes,” the man said. “I just moved her two months ago but Patricia hadn’t yet seen my place.”

  “So, you were coming from Ridgeway?” Emma asked, with a sudden frown. That didn’t seem right.

  Rick Bushy looked up, raising a brow, and nodded. “Yes.”

  Emma swallowed hard, but blinked and looked away, trying not to make it obvious that she suspected something about the man. Why would he lie? If Emma’s car hadn’t landed on the shoulder facing oncoming traffic, Emma might not have even known, but she’d seen the man and his vehicle making a U-turn. He’d come from outside of Ridgeway for sure. Taking a tighter grip on the leash, she turned toward Colby. “You said that the interior of the car reeked of exhaust? How did that happen and how did the victim not notice?”

  Colby shrugged. “I’m not sure. The only thing that makes any sense is that saying about how if you put a frog in cold water and slowly bring it to a boil, the frog will stay in the pot. But if you throw a frog into boiling water he will jump out. If the exhaust seeped in slowly, it’s possible that the victim ignored the smell until it became nonexistent for her.”

  “Then it’s possible that she died of carbon-monoxide poisoning?” Emma said with a frown.

  Rick’s brow furrowed as he tilted his head. “Excuse me, but who are you? Why are you even having this conversation with the police officer?”

  Heat rushed to Emma’s cheeks.

  Colby cleared his throat and glared at the man. “Actually, she’s a consulting detective with the Ridgeway Sheriff’s office.”

  Rick’s eyes went wide and he suddenly swallowed and nodded, but the confusion didn’t leave his eyes as he mumbled, “Doesn’t she seem a bit young for that?”

  The heat crawled down Emma’s neck. She had always feared that reaction out of people, but she needed to remember that old saying that “people who matter don’t mind, and people who mind don’t matter.” She knew that she’d helped the department on several cases now, earning the respect of her father, the sheriff, as well as the deputies who help run the office in Ridgeway. She let out a slow breath, running her fingers through the fur on the top of Molly’s head and releasing the embarrassment that she felt. Then she lifted a brow and asked, “When was the last time that you saw your fiancé in person?”

  Scratching his chin, Rick answered, “Last weekend. We went out on a date on Friday. We’ve both been busy with work all week and haven’t seen each other. She lives and works in Richmond, so we only ever get to see each other on holidays and on weekends. We just call and text each other otherwise.”

  The paramedics had loaded the body into the back of the ambulance. Then one of them came over to Colby. “We’re going to deliver her directly to the morgue. Do you want anything else from us? Should we wait for CSI to arrive?”

  “No,” Colby answered, shaking his head. “It would be good to hear from the coroner as soon as possible, though, about the cause of death. I hate to bother him on Thanksgiving.”

  The paramedic huffed a laugh. “George said that he had a lot of work to do in the office and since he didn’t have family, he planned on just picking up a turkey sandwich from the cafe.”

  Colby nodded. “All right then. Have him call me as soon as he can with the cause then.”

  “I will,” the paramedic said and tossed a wave toward Emma before heading into the passenger seat of the ambulance. Slowly, the white van-like vehicle pulled out without the siren running. That always made Emma sad to see the ambulance leaving a scene without the siren. It meant that there was no longer any hurry to save a person’s life. It meant that the life was already gone.

  Colby turned back toward Rick. “Did you make plans for Thanksgiving with Patricia over the weekend, then, or over text?”

  He shrugged. “A little of both, I guess.”

  His non-committal answer felt like truth. Usually lies were elaborated upon, like when he’d answered the question about when he’d last seen Patricia. He didn’t have to give all the extra information about their work schedules or when they’d seen each other regularly. But he did. He could have been nervous, but it was just as likely that he was lying. Emma drew her lips thin. Right now, she wasn’t sure which it was.

  Yellow flashing lights let them all know the tow truck and arrived. Jack Spencer got out of the truck—he was a long-time friend of Emma’s father, and a stellar mechanic. Emma was relieved that he came out on the call personally. When he approached, he opened his arms toward her. “Don’t I get a hug? It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you, sweetheart.”

  Emma stepped forward to accept his hug, but the moment she moved, Molly hopped forward and jumped into the man’s arms instead. He laughed and gave Molly a pat on the head. “Not quite the sweetheart I had in mind, but you’ll do.”

  Emma laughed and pulled the leash. “Get down, Molly!”

  Then she stepped into the man’s arms and accepted the hug.

  “I’m glad you’re the one here, Uncle Jack,” Emma said with a smile as she pulled back.

  “It’s the holiday, I’m not going to pull any of my boys away from their family plans for something like this.” His thumbs stuck into his jean pockets as he pushed his shoulders back and surveyed the situation. “Who’s the driver?”

 
“That’s just the thing, Uncle Jack. It was a slow-moving wreck into the ditch, but the driver is dead. We need your help to find out why.”

  His eyes suddenly lost their mirth as wrinkles formed in his forehead. “Tell me what you need me to do.”

  Chapter 5

  Jack had been under the car in the ditch for about five minutes when Rick asked, “Do you think I could go now? Do you still need me here? I have a turkey sitting in the oven, and I need to shut off the heat soon.”

  Colby frowned, meeting eyes with Emma for a moment before nodding. “Yes, I believe we still need you here. Please remain here at the scene for a bit longer. You can text whoever you might need to if the oven needs shutting off.”

  It seemed strange to Emma that the man wanted to leave so badly. Also, that the man hadn’t wanted to go in the ambulance with his fiancé, even if she had passed away, but he was worried about a turkey? A frown continued to tug at her lip. After another moment, the gravel scraped from under the vehicle, and Jack pulled himself out and stood. The wrinkles over his brows had deepened. “The tailpipe is blocked. That would mean that the car would be dumping exhaust into the trunk area as well as the passenger area through any holes or weak spots that would break free in the exhaust system.”

  “Wouldn’t the driver smell it, though?” Emma asked again. “Doesn’t it seem unlikely that she wouldn’t notice the smell of the extra exhaust coming into the vehicle?”

  “Was the blockage accidental or intentional?” Colby asked, too.

  “Could be either,” Jack said. “The tailpipe is blocked with sod. It’s possible that the driver had backed the car against a hill and tore out a bunch of dirt and grass. It’s also just as likely that the sod got there by someone strategically placing it there. Also, I’m with Emma, the smell from the exhaust would have been enough to make the person pull over, I believe. Not to mention that it would have caused nausea.”

  Nothing was making any sense. Was it possible that the driver didn’t even die from exhaust poisoning? Maybe she’d been poisoned in a different way before she’d gotten behind the wheel of her car. There was no way to tell until they got the report back from the coroner. “Uncle Jack. Is there anything else you can tell us about the car?”

  The toe of Jack’s boot hit the baseball bat that was sitting just to the side of the vehicle. He frowned down at it. “Who broke the windshield? I imagine they did it with this thing?”

  Rick, who’d been chewing his fingernail and texting on his phone the whole time peered up. “I did that. I was panicking. Patricia wasn’t answering, and I just wanted to get her out of the car.”

  “You could have hit the rear window or even the passenger side window, but you chose to do the windshield? Seems like the glass could have cut the driver, even if it is tempered safety glass. Doesn’t seem the safest way to do things,” Jack said with a frown.

  Rick’s eyes went wide and he shook his head. “Like I said, I was panicking.”

  Jack nodded and let the matter go, but still gave the man a disapproving sideways glance. Emma’s mind was reeling. Was it even necessary to break the window or any window in the car at all? The man didn’t even wait for the police to arrive before he’d taken action. If he’d known about the exhaust in the car, was it possible that he’d broken the window and opened the passenger door to let some of the exhaust out and perhaps the smell? Was it all because he wanted to shut off the car and stop the exhaust from dumping in? Emma frowned again. Why hadn’t he even mentioned the smell at all when he’d been the first one to enter the vehicle, albeit momentarily?

  Emma stepped past Jack, who was talking to Colby and walked over to the driver’s side of the vehicle to peer in. The woman was somewhat typical of a single female, it seemed. There was a collection of trash on the floorboard directly behind the driver’s seat of the car. Additionally, Patricia’s purse and a shopping bag from a music store sat in the back seat. They both sat against a pie carrier. Emma peered down at the trash and saw the wrap that had belonged to the CD of the album that she’d purchased at the music store. Once Emma started to put things together a bit, she backed away and started toward Colby just as his phone rang.

  He pulled it out of its holster and pressed a button before putting it to his ear. “Deputy Davidson.”

  After a few minutes of minimal conversation, Colby’s eyes trained on the man who’d been standing there at the car the whole time with suspicion as he asked the same question they’d been asking the whole time, “Why didn’t she smell the exhaust?”

  Emma knew that Colby was thinking the same things that she was. This whole accident didn’t seem entirely accidental. But if it was murder, they’d need more evidence to the fact. Emma gripped Molly’s leash tighter as Colby hung up his phone and met eyes with Jack. “I’m not sure when we’re going to need this towed yet, Jack. I want it to remain here while the Crime Scene Unit takes a first look and pictures. They’ll be here any minute.”

  “Crime scene?” Jack asked, both his eyebrows raising.

  “Yes, it seems that the victim did, in fact die of carbon monoxide poisoning. The driver couldn’t smell the exhaust because she’d likely lost her sense of smell. She was on a medication called phenothiazine that often causes loss of smell as well as suppressing the feeling of nausea.”

  Emma blinked. “That’s a bit...”

  Colby nodded once toward her and then peered back at Rick who’d been standing there with his arms down by his sides. “Did you know that Miss Stone was on this medication?”

  Rick’s lips grew thin. “Yes, I’m the one who prescribed it to her.”

  Chapter 6

  ”You did what?” Colby asked, his face growing even more serious.

  The man sighed. “I was her psychiatrist a little more than a year and a half ago. I found that I had an attraction to her and needed to distance myself, as doctors are not allowed to date their patients. At that time, I referred her to a colleague who I knew could help her. After the appropriate amount of time, I reached out to her again and asked her on a date. We’d been seeing each other for eight months now, and I asked her to marry me two months ago. Phenothiazine is used for treating schizophrenia, of which Patricia has a mild case of. It is completely held at bay by the medication.”

  Emma swallowed hard. “Did you know that losing the sense of smell was a side-effect of the drug?”

  Rick lifted a brow. “Doctors know the side-effects of the medications they prescribe.”

  “Emma,” Colby suddenly said. “Would you mind giving me a hand with Gabby?”

  The breeze picked up once more, sending a chill down Emma’s spine as she followed Colby to the back of the K-9 unit’s SUV. Once there, he turned around, a frown on his face. “He’s done this, Emma. You know it... I know it. Even Jack knows it. But we don’t have any evidence. Keep your eyes open, ask any questions you can think of. We need to find something to make this stick or we won’t even be able to arrest him.”

  The intensity in his eyes made Emma’s heart flutter in her chest. She nodded. No matter how smart the culprit was in a situation, they all make mistakes. There had to be something that he missed when he was cleaning up after himself and covering evidence. They just needed to find it. It wasn’t just about being smart or having good planning—it was about how the universe didn’t want for people to get away with murder. At least, that’s what Emma believed.

  Colby opened the back hatch and let Gabby, the German Shepherd, down with her harness on and leash in his hand. He offered Emma the leash. “She’s been sitting in the back of the car for the last hour. Since this is going to be a little while, do you mind holding onto her, too? She needs to spend a bit of time outside the vehicle.”

  “Of course I don’t mind,” Emma said as she took Gabby’s leash.

  Molly wagged her tail in excitement, nudging Gabby with her nose, but Gabby was sitting at full attention, her mind focused on her job. Emma held a leash in each hand and followed Colby back toward the vehicle in
the ditch just as a van pulled up at the scene with the letters CSI painted on the side door. For the next half hour, Emma watched as the team of workers dusted the vehicle for fingerprints and sorted through the trash on the back seat of the vehicle. Emma peered over their shoulder at the package to the new CD the victim had opened. Just before one of the workers bagged it, Emma asked, “Wait. Could you please let me look at that for a second? Hold it in your hand and turn it slowly, please.”

  The worker nodded and did as she was asked. Emma nodded when she was finished and stepped over toward Colby who was standing with Jack and Rick. She leaned in toward him and whispered, “Do you think it’s possible for you to get his fingerprints?”

  Colby nodded once and then looked up toward Rick and Jack. “Could I ask you two gentlemen to give us your fingerprints. The CSI team can take them. You both touched the interior of the car, and we’d like to rule out both of your prints while searching for a possible perpetrator in this situation.”

  “Are you saying that this isn’t an accident, then?” Rick asked.

  Colby raised his hands and shook his head. “Still no evidence to say either way. We just want to rule things out. Jack, you’re okay with giving us your fingerprints, too?”

  Jack nodded and shrugged. “I’m pretty sure my prints are already in your system. Do you need them again?”

  “If we have them on hand, it actually helps because we can compare them immediately rather than waiting for the system to sort through all the fingerprints on file before coming across yours,” Colby said in a voice that had a slightly pleading tone to it.

  Jack nodded again. “Then I don’t mind.”

  Rick’s lips drew thin. “Of course my fingerprints are all over everything in the car. I’ve been in it several times as both a passenger and a driver. I don’t see how having my prints will help in this situation.”