Once the thought got in her mind, Frankie couldn’t get it out. Dr. Muncie’s fraudulent billing of insurance companies made sense. Well, it didn’t, but it was a so-called non-violent, supposedly victimless crime. Of course, with Denise blackmailing him, she may have pushed him too far. But all the way into murder?
Frankie’s thoughts ran like a gerbil on a treadmill. What about Howie? Would a man like Dr. Muncie go after a semi-alcoholic like Howie just because he happened to live next to Denise? Maybe even run Howie down? Why attack me, when I moved into the place? I never even met Denise.
A sensation of cold shook through her even though the sun beat down on her head. The day promised to be another scorcher in a whole string of scorchers.
“Banner, Shine, come.” Calling the dogs into the house, Frankie poured herself a cup of coffee and stood staring out the kitchen window into the glorious summer day. One thing for sure, whoever shot the doghouse full of holes, it hadn’t been Dr. Muncie.
Was Gabe positive he had the right man? Because Frankie couldn’t get the memory of those size twelve hiking boots prints out of her head. Boots that didn’t fit with Dr. Muncie, neither his size nor his style—just one inconsistency among several. Here was another: how could Dr. Muncie know where she was living now, or even that she had dogs? For that matter, how could his wife? Because it was a lead pipe cinch, he hadn’t been doing any shooting last night.
“Oh, lord,” she told Banner, who pricked his ears and came to stand at her side. “He’s going to hate me for sure.” She sat the coffee cup down with a clink.
Banner cocked his head, his almond-shaped eyes wide with questions. Like maybe, what did she mean. There could be only one.
Picking up the phone, she dialed.
Spoke.
Got hung up on.
Again.
She no more than clicked off from speaking with Gabe when, ears still burning, her phone rang again. It was Maggie.
“Hey, girl!” Maggie burbled. “Was that one heck of a party or what?”
Frankie couldn’t help it. She laughed. Which after Gabe’s cool reception, felt warming. “That may depend on which part you’re talking about.”
Maggie laughed too, not even pretending to misunderstand. “Both. Number one, we raised $1208.00 for our recipient, so as a fundraiser I consider it a rousing success. Then at the end, well, there were some pretty entertaining elements with Alexis Barwick’s meltdown. Poor Gabe, though. Has he recovered?”
Safe where Maggie couldn’t see her, Frankie made a face at the phone. If that wasn’t a leading question, she’d never heard one.
“I don’t know.” She chose her words carefully. “I haven’t seen him since he followed Ms. Barwick out. I think he probably worked through the night.”
Think? She knew he had, and as far as being poor Gabe, when she talked to him a few minutes ago, he appeared to have taken a page out of Barwick’s book. Fact of the matter is, he’d gone off like an IED when she told him about the dog house. And the reminder of those size twelve boots definitely went unappreciated.
“Really?” Maggie said. “I thought when he showed up just before the dance was over that you two, well, maybe you…um—”
“No.”
“No? Well, I guess he has been pretty busy. Now he’s caught Howie and Denise’s killer, maybe he can slow down. You must be relieved, too. It’s hard to believe Dr. Muncie would deliberately kill anyone, isn’t it? I mean, a totally respected, big-wheel physician like him? He’s taken an oath to save lives. And he never came across as a violent person.”
“Do you know him?” Frankie asked.
“Not exactly. Met him, not to say know him. I expect I’m no more than a voice on the phone, not that he thinks of me as a real person. He’s quite the hand with women, though, or so I hear. His preference seems to be the young married ones—or is when he comes to our parties at the community center. I don’t know if you noticed last night, but a bunch of people who live down at the lake attended. They always do.”
“Like hobnobbing with the great unwashed, do they?”
Maggie snorted. “The great unwashed, my foot! What drivel have you been reading?”
In truth, Frankie had noticed the summer people during Alexis’s diatribe against Gabe. She’d heard one women whisper, “Ned seems to have been a bad boy,” to which another replied, “Can you blame him, married to Alexis? Serves her right if he’s in trouble.”
Evidently, the attorney was not a popular figure with anybody. Not even her neighbors. Maybe everybody came in for the edge of her tongue upon occasion.
“Anyway,” Maggie said, “I wanted to let you know about the party.” She paused. “Wait a sec.”
Frankie was pretty sure the purpose of this call was to see what she could find out about Gabe and the murders. A report of the dollars donated was an excuse.
Mixed up in the background noise coming over the phone, she listened to Maggie speaking to someone. Soon a siren began wailing, an emergency in progress.
Her phone went dead, although the wail went on. Even from the distance of her post inside the house, Frankie heard the heavy fire truck’s rumble as it gained speed, heading south on the highway.
Banner accompanied the noise by lifting his snout and yodeling along with it. Shine stared at him in wonder, all of which cracked Frankie up. Her laugh of the day.
Gabe drove up shortly before noon, backed his SUV into its accustomed spot in the driveway, and got out, slamming the door. His feet clumped across the porch.
Banner and Shine ran to greet him, but even their cheerful attention couldn’t pierce his gloom.
“Stay down,” he told Shine brusquely when she set a foot on his shin. Tail tucked, she backed away.
Frankie, anxious to learn the latest and following right on the dogs’ heels, winced and retreated right along with the dogs. Gabe’s bad mood meant only one thing. His case was falling apart. And he positively drooped with exhaustion, like guys in the unit used to when they came in off a long, dangerous patrol.
“You look like you could use a beer,” she said. “Or a shot of Maker’s Mark. Unless it’s too early for alcohol.”
“Not as far as I’m concerned. I’ll take a beer if you’re offering. I’m dry.” Unbuckling his gun belt, he placed it, along with his Glock, inside her grandma’s old wooden sewing box and closed the lid. The box, with a rack for spools of thread and cubbies for scissors and the like, had sat beside her grandmother’s TV-watching chair for as long as Frankie could remember. Now it served as an end table to Gabe’s leather recliner and a repository for his weapon. Gran would laugh at the use he made of it.
Seeing Frankie’s amused expression, he huffed. “What? It’s a good spot. Out of sight, but handy. Not too many people expect to find a gun in a sewing basket.”
“True.” Snickering to herself, she went into the kitchen to fetch his beer. When she came out again, he was fussing over the dogs. Apologizing.
“You’re not drinking?” Gabe took the icy bottle and chugged a couple large gulps.
She waved her glass, ice cubes rattling. “Peach ice tea. I’m working tonight.”
Gabe looked at his bottle, magically more than half-gone. “Me too. But not for a while. I’m gonna need another of these.”
Hint, hint. Like a good soldier, she retraced her steps to the kitchen. When she returned, the room was empty. Hearing him stirring around in the bedroom just off the parlor, she disposed of the now-empty beer bottle and sat the fresh one in its place. Then, quietly, she took a seat on the couch and waited. A few seconds later he was back, clad now in Levis and a T-shirt, twin to the one she’d stolen to sleep in a few days earlier.
He sat in the recliner, popped up the footrest, and leaned back. Shine leaped onto his lap and Banner pressed against his knees. All forgiven.
“Is there any point in me going out to look at holes in an old doghouse?” he asked wearily.
“Probably not. The bullets passed through and ended up somewh
ere in the field out back. And I suspect whoever did the shooting was in a car, so there’s no brass left behind.”
Gabe reached for his beer. His mouth opened in a yawn wide enough to break most people’s jaw. “Mind telling me how you deduced this?”
Deduced. He sounded like a minor league Sherlock Holmes.
“I’ve seen bullet holes before. Quite often.” An understatement. Frankie sipped her tea. “Being able to judge the angle of fire helps evade snipers. As for the brass, I looked. Didn’t find anything.”
“Lacking the manpower for a full-out search for bullets, I expect you’ve done as well as any other investigator.” His eyes closed.
He wasn’t going to sleep on her, was he?
“Did you have to turn him loose?” She meant Dr. Muncie, of course.
Gabe’s eyes opened. “Not yet. We’re not charging him with murder, though. So far. You were right about the footprints and the shoes. He wears a size nine. More importantly, he’s got an alibi for two of the charges against him, including one for setting the booby trap at the duplex. The fire marshal figured that must’ve taken place while people were at the field fire.”
She already knew that. “Was the fire deliberately set?”
“Yes. The sabotaged combine started it going. The whole scenario was probably caused, so somebody could wire the duplex to blow. Good thinking, since the fire drew almost everybody out to the field to watch. But Muncie was in the operating room at the time of the fire and had been for three hours. Plus, on the night the station was shot up, he was at a Rotary Club meeting giving a speech. He went on late, and he stayed the night in Spokane. Lots of witnesses.”
“I’m not surprised. Anyway, what happened at the station or at the duplex doesn’t strike me as being his kind of thing.”
His lips twitched. “But murder does?”
“Oh, yes. Could be.” Frankie twirled her glass, condensation making it slippery. “Doctors see a lot of death and dying. After a while, it doesn’t scare them much.”
Gabe’s dark eyes bored into hers. “Does it scare you, Frankie?”
“Some. Probably not like it does Jesselyn or Maggie—or even you.” She didn’t look away. “But murder does. The cruelty of it. The waste.”
He nodded.
“So—” She sat up very straight. “—you’re letting the doctor go?”
“Not a chance. He may not be a murderer, but he’s sure in hell guilty of insurance fraud.”
“Have you told him you’re dropping the murder charge?”
He shook his head. “We’re keeping the news quiet as long as we can. Gives us time to look into other possibilities. Makes it a little easier for people to talk if they think the case is wrapped up.”
“Easier?”
“Careless might be a better word. Makes them careless. Anyway, we’re holding him for arraignment on multiple charges. They just don’t include murder.”
“Won’t Ms. Barwick post bail? I’m surprised she hasn’t managed to have him released before now, what with all the judges and important people she keeps telling us about. You know, the ones standing in line to do her bidding?” Frankie failed to hide her dislike of the attorney. “I don’t think it would matter to her if her husband had murdered two people. She’d be right in there, covering up for him. And meanwhile, who did murder them?”
Gabe’s grin faded. He sat, as if frozen, his hand buried in Shine’s soft, curly hair. A minute ticked past. Suddenly, he released the recliner’s footrest handle and stood up, barely saving the bichon from being dumped on the floor. Sweeping his half-empty beer aside, he opened the sewing box, rooted out his holstered Glock and buckled it on.
Frankie set her glass on the table with a snap. “Was it something I said?”
“It does make you wonder, doesn’t it?” Bending over, he kissed her hard on the lips.
She spared a moment to savor his kiss. Regaining her senses, though still bewildered, she asked, “What does?”
Already halfway to the front door, he paused, looking at her over his shoulder. “If Alexis is willing to overlook her husband’s affairs with other women, it makes me, for one, wonder what else she’ll overlook.” His eyes narrowed. “And what she won’t.”
Chapter 24
If someone—anyone—had called and volunteered to pay her a dollar to stay home from work, Frankie would’ve taken it and flopped right down on her bed. Tired to the bone, she’d been in Hawkesford only a little over two weeks and already endured more excitement than her poor wounded brain cared to process. Murder, explosions, ambushes. War on the home front. Who’d ever think of this kind of crap going on in a little burg like her own hometown? And now, here they were back to square one, or so it appeared.
But of course, nobody volunteered the dollar, so Frankie parked her Ranger in back of the station, at exactly five-forty-five p.m., ready for work. Her blue uniform shirt was crisply ironed, her britches smartly creased, her shoes, one hiding the prosthesis, clean and polished.
Ditto the Smith and Wesson Airweight revolver hidden beneath her pant leg. Clean and polished, that is. Also loaded. Given Gabe’s reaction, he must be on to something new. He hadn’t told her, but she wasn’t about to go unarmed. Not with shots wantonly fired into the station. Not to mention the doghouse at home.
Maggie, on duty for another fifteen minutes, greeted her cheerfully. Karl, sitting in his office, looked up from the stack of paperwork spread on his desk and waved. Darryl and another volunteer fireman who sat hunched over a hand of cards in the corner nodded. Lew, busy washing dust and wheat chaff from the ambulance headlights, saluted a greeting, and Chris, knowing quitting time was nigh, headed for his locker.
“Another farm accident?” Frankie asked Lew, gesturing to the dirty rag he used to scrub the bug-splattered headlights. Chaff glued to the dead bodies made the insects look like they’d sprouted hair.
He shook out his cloth. “Not an accident. Just a case of heat exhaustion, dehydration. The victim is a fellow the unemployment office sent over to drive a truck for Herb Maher. The idiot forgot to bring water out to the field. Somebody should’ve told him farmers don’t stop for regular breaks, no matter if it is nearly a hundred degrees in the shade. His own damn fault.”
Frankie remembered being a newbie in the desert. “The boss should’ve told him. That’s part of a leader’s responsibility.”
“This ain’t the frickin’ army.”
Obviously, Lew wasn’t in the best of moods. Made her glad Marc was her partner now.
Mouth compressed to silence a sharp reply, Frankie headed toward the lockers to stow her purse. Chris chose that moment to slam his locker door shut, giving it one last metal-bending blow with his fist. He turned his back on her, a sure sign of his state of mind.
“Damn Lew,” he muttered under his breath, but loud enough for her to hear. He shook his hand out.
“What did Lew do?”
“Chewed my ass ’cause I missed inserting an IV port. Twice. Not my fault the guy’s vein collapsed.”
“Awkward,” she muttered back.
She beat a hasty retreat, having no desire to mix in a quarrel between Lew and Chris, especially one in which she’d no doubt end up siding with Lew. Not that he’d care, one way or another.
Besides, going by the vigorous head motions and screwy faces Maggie was making she had news, and from the way she acted, it was for Frankie’s ears alone. Trying to be inconspicuous, Frankie ambled over to Maggie’s desk.
“Did you know Gabe is calling in everyone who might’ve had a reason to kill Denise? You know, the guys she dumped?” Her whisper would’ve penetrated a steel bank vault. “He wants to question them all again.”
Frankie shook her head. “News to me,” she lied. “Does this mean Dr. Muncie didn’t murder Denise or Howie?” She was interested to hear what the others thought about this development.
Maggie’s whisper dropped lower. “I think it might. Dr. Muncie is still in jail, though. Ms. Barwick has called here fi
ve times this afternoon, and if I weren’t so tactful, my butt would be gnawed plumb off by now.”
“Ouch.”
“You can say that again. But Gabe is in Coeur d’Alene, and he’s got Rudy Swallowtail gathering our local guys. Russ Pettigrew, Matt Chavez, even Marc and Chris have summons.”
Frankie shook her head. “I guess that explains why Chris is so surly.” She’d be willing to bet Jesselyn was fit to be tied, too. Brother and boyfriend. Double whammy. As for Marc, well, the new call explained why it was six o’clock, and he hadn’t shown up for work.
“Dang.” Her heart sank. “So the investigation is right back where it started.”
“Looks like.”
Ashley Harcourt arrived just then to take over dispatch duty from Maggie. Frankie hadn’t met her before and wasn’t impressed. Maggie informed her, sotto voce, the girl was putting in time before her sophomore year at the University of Idaho, earning brownie points for some sorority she wanted to join. Ashley sat in Maggie’s chair and, pulling a bottle of sparkly green Kermit the Frog nail polish from her bag, began painting her fingernails, basically ignoring everyone but Karl.
Maybe, Frankie decided, the girl was shy. But she doubted it.
The question of overtime came up as day shift ended, two EMTs being required on duty at a time. Chris slumped out the door to his meeting with Gabe like a revolutionary to the guillotine, still muttering about Lew. Darryl gave him a ‘thumbs up’ as he, too, left.
Maggie called, “Don’t worry, Chris. It’ll be okay.”
Chris didn’t reply.
“Sour grapes,” Maggie said knowingly. “He doesn’t like being chewed out. He’d better put on a cheerier face for the detectives, or they’ll throw him in the slammer just because.”
“I’ll stay until Marc shows up.” Lew lounged in his chair and fiddled with a pen. “Looks like it’s a good thing I never dated this Denise character. Looks like everybody else in town has.”
Hometown Homicide Page 23