A Child Shall Lead Them (A Joe Burgess Mystery, Book 6)

by Flora, Kate;

  The three of them watched her body zipped in a body bag, then carried down the trail to the van. Then, like three scavengers, they knelt beside the patch of earth where she had lain, and carefully scrutinized the dirt for anything that might have been left behind.

  Nothing could be discounted at this point. They collected a balled up tissue, a nondescript brown button, the bottle cap from an obscure brand of beer, and several used condoms. All carefully photographed in place, then put in evidence envelopes and labeled.

  “What did you find over there, Stan?” Kyle asked.

  “It’s probably nothing. A pink barrette. Well, a broken pink barrette. But since our girl has no head, and therefore no hair, it’s not likely to be hers.”

  “This is so revolting,” Kyle said. He looked at Burgess. “What now?”

  They’d been at this for hours, and it was starting to get dark. “Back to 109 to start developing a strategy, and to interview the man who found the body, then home to sleep.”

  “Wink, Dani, let’s call it a day,” Burgess said.

  They packed up their stuff, and were heading back toward the trail, when Dani said, “Wait.”

  Everyone stopped, frozen in place. She bent down, crouching low, staring at something. “Take a look at this, Wink,” she said. “This is a really unusual footprint.”

  It was an unusual footprint. Definitely not from any of their shoes, as the sole was almost entirely smooth, like an ancient, well-worn pair of sneakers, except for a strange round spot on the heel.

  “Worn out old sneakers with a thumb tack stuck to the sole,” Burgess said.

  Perry touched his forehead. “The great Carnac has spoken.”

  “I don’t care who has spoken, long as we catch the fucker who did this,” Kyle said.

  Normally, Kyle didn’t swear, but kids brutalized and discarded like trash always pushed his buttons. Burgess was the same. He had sworn he’d never work another kid, and yet they kept showing up, needing him to do something. It wasn’t easy to avoid cases where children were the victims. The problem was, cops usually didn’t know what they had until they answered the call and were at the scene. Then it was too late to say no.

  Vince Melia never appeared.

  Five

  Ignoring the news trucks and the throng of reporters and cameramen who swarmed them as they came out of the woods, the three musketeers headed for Burgess’s truck and climbed in. They watched Aucoin and Simmons clear a path for Wink and Dani and the crime scene van, then followed the lumbering van out of the lot and onto the road.

  “I know it’s unseemly,” Kyle said, “but can we grab some sandwiches on the way in?”

  It amused Burgess that Kyle really did use words like “unseemly.” He also knew that if he didn’t keep Kyle fed, his friend might fall by the wayside before the investigation was even underway. Kyle was whippet thin and ran at such high revs he burned through food before others had even finished eating. Michelle joked that her life’s work had become feeding Kyle, but it wasn’t entirely a joke.

  “Melina’s meatloaf okay?”

  There was a murmur of agreement. Then Perry said, “If they’re open on a holiday.”

  Sometimes having Stan Perry around was like having a teenager in the house.

  “We can hope,” Burgess said.

  Melina and her husband ran a deli where the food was great, and she loved to feed cops, calling them “her boys.” If they were lucky, she’d also have fresh baked chocolate chip cookies.

  They were in luck. The deli was open. Burgess wondered if she and her husband ever took any time off. He’d never seen them anything but cheerful, though. When he’d asked, Melina insisted that they loved the work, loved feeding people, and couldn’t complain. He wished he could bottle that attitude and hand the bottles to some of the more disagreeable people he worked with, in and out of 109.

  Melina smiled when they came through the door. “Joseph!” she said, nodding at the others. “I hope you all are very hungry, because I have had this meatloaf just sitting here, waiting for the right person to come along.”

  “I hope we’re the right people,” Kyle said. “We’re starving and there’s nothing in Portland better than your meatloaf.”

  She made a swatting gesture, but her smile grew.

  Perry, who had hung back, now stepped forward and held up his hands in a pleading gesture. “Melina, do you have cookies for some cold, hungry cops?”

  She looked at Joe. “Has this boy been good? Should we give him cookies?”

  Kyle said, “You should give me and Joe cookies and Stan a lump of coal.”

  The cheerful woman studied Perry. “No, Terry, I think you are being unkind. Anyway, I am saving the coal for Christmas, and you will all get it if you are not nice to each other.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Kyle said. “You can keep the coal. We will be nice.”

  “So, it is a holiday today, yes? Why are you not with your families? Has some poor soul been killed?”

  As she spoke, her hands were moving, cutting and slicing and spreading, and a pile of sandwiches was growing.

  She knew them so well, Burgess thought. “Yes, Melina. A poor little girl.”

  “This is horrible,” she said, “but you will find out who did it, won’t you?”

  “We will try,” Kyle said. “We always try.”

  “I am sad about the girl,” she said. “I think you may need extra cookies today.”

  Which they did.

  They paid for their sandwiches, despite Melina’s protests that they were a gift, and headed back to 109. Burgess’s phone rang as they were turning on Franklin. He expected Vince Melia, looking for an update, or, worse, Captain Cote, who always wanted an update, but it was Chris.

  When he answered, she said, “I don’t care who has been killed or how critical the first twenty-four hours are. You promised to take the kids to fireworks and you are going to keep that promise.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said.

  “Don’t you ‘yes, ma’am’ me,” she said. “Just show up.”

  He suppressed a sigh. “What time to they start?

  “Be home by eight-thirty,” she said. “Or else.”

  He couldn’t resist. “Or else what?”

  “You know what else.”

  “Does it involve the presence or absence of a silky blue nightgown?”

  “Joe Burgess, are you alone?”

  “Nope.”

  “I will see you later.” Chris hung up on him.

  “Uh oh,” Perry said. “She’s going to cut you off.”

  “She won’t,” Burgess said. “Because I am going to be home by eight-thirty to take the kids to fireworks.”

  “Me, too,” Kyle said. “Guess you’ll have to solve this one by yourself, Stan.”

  They had two hours before they had to show up for family obligations, and they all knew that Burgess and Kyle would be back afterwards. As Chris had pointed out, the first twenty-four hours were critical.

  Vince Melia was waiting for them at 109, looking dapper as always, and abashed that he had just learned about the crime. “We all went sailing,” he said. “It was great. The boys loved it. Gina got seasick. And there was no cell phone service.”

  He looked at his shoes, then back at them. “It was deliberate. We needed a nice, normal family day. And it was great.”

  “We were at a picnic at my sister’s,” Burgess said. “Where unfortunately there was cell phone service. Now we’ve got at least three women and a lot of children who are mad at us.”

  “The policeman’s lot is not a happy one,” Melia said. “Speaking of not happy. One of you better get in there and interview the man who found that body. He is seriously unhappy with us for keeping him waiting all this time.”

  “Kyle, he’s yours,” Burgess said. “Stan, you watch, okay?”

  As the two of them turned to go, he said, “Wait,” and held out the bag of sandwiches. “Terry, eat something first. He’s waited this long, he can wait an
other five minutes. Stan can eat while he monitors the interview.”

  Melia was looking longingly at the bag. “From Melina’s?”

  “Of course,” Burgess said.

  “I don’t suppose you have…”

  “Of course,” he said again. “Serve and protect. That’s what we do.”

  He handed Melia a sandwich.

  Kyle had seated himself at the nearest desk and was devouring his sandwich like a hungry wolf. Perry grabbed one for himself and handed another to Burgess. Then they went off to get the story from the man who’d found the body, and Burgess went into Melia’s office to update him on the case. He didn’t like to delegate. He wanted to be the one in that room watching the man’s reactions and listening to his voice. But Kyle was good, Perry would spot anything that needed to be followed up, and Melia needed to be brought into the loop.

  Melia was right. A policeman’s lot was often not a happy one. There was nothing pleasant about describing what they’d found out in those woods.

  They both ate as he told the story. He’d barely started describing the scene—the distance from the parking lot and the distance from the trail—when Perry appeared in the doorway. “Joe, you’ve got come see this.”

  He and Melia followed Perry into the room where he was watching the interview on a monitor.

  Detectives get used to working with people who are offended by being asked to cooperate in criminal investigations, even when they are critical witnesses. The overreaching sense of entitlement many people carried around these days made their jobs very difficult. Yes, the man Kyle was interviewing had had a terrible experience, finding that body and then being forced to cool his heels in a police department interview room for several hours. Still, Kyle would have apologized to him and explained the reasons for the delay. He would have acknowledged the traumatic nature of the experience. He would have emphasized the critical importance of his questions and the man’s information. He would have made the man understand that he was an important witness and his information was essential to the investigation.

  None of that seemed to have worked. What they were seeing on the monitor was a large, red-faced adult male behaving like a toddler having a meltdown. He was storming around the room, kicking the walls and furniture, and demanding to have his phone back and to be allowed to leave. Despite the tee shirt, running shorts, and pristine white running shoes, he didn’t look much like a runner. Maybe an athlete once, he now had the look of strength gone to seed. He didn’t look like he spent much time outside, either, despite owning a dog that needed to be walked. One thing Burgess knew right away—those shoes were too new to have made Dani’s print.

  “It’s the goddamned phone,” Burgess said. “Probably wanted to call up all his friends and spew about his terrible adventure and we didn’t let him do that. Kyle did explain why we didn’t want him discussing this with anyone until we’d had a chance to talk with him, didn’t he?”

  “Of course,” Perry said.

  This was Kyle. Of course he had. Burgess should have sent him back hours ago to do this interview. Then maybe this mess could have been avoided.

  In the midst of this over-the-top adult tantrum, Kyle sat still as a sphinx, watching the man like he might have watched a cat chasing a catnip mouse. After the man had raged a few more minutes, Kyle said, “Are you done yet, or do you need a few more minutes?”

  “I want my phone!” the man yelled. “I want my phone.”

  “You’ll get it,” Kyle said soothingly, “Just as soon as we finish this interview.”

  “I want it now!”

  “We need to finish this interview first. It shouldn’t take long,” Kyle said, pushing back his chair. “Why don’t I give you a few minutes to compose yourself.”

  He stood and headed for the door.

  The man threw himself before the door, blocking Kyle’s way. “You have no right…”

  “Sit down, Mr. McCann,” Kyle said in a voice that made it clear it was not a request. “Sit down now.”

  The time for politeness and consideration was over. “You saw that poor girl out there in the woods. Our job is to find the person who did that horrific thing. At this point, every bit of information is critical. You found that body. Now we need to know everything you saw, everyone you saw, everything you did, and everything your dog did. That victim doesn’t need, and we don’t need, your tantrums and acting out. We need your cooperation. When we are done, you’ll get your phone back and someone will drive you back to pick up your car. The longer you rant and rave and refuse to cooperate, the longer this will take.”

  McCann folded his arms and stared stubbornly at the wall.

  Kyle made a show of looking at this watch. “I have an appointment at eight that will take a few hours. It would be nice if we could be done here before that. Otherwise, you’ll have to wait a little longer. That would be unfortunate for both of us. But I have demands on my time. Perhaps you do, too. So…”

  The man threw himself sullenly into a seat, while Kyle remained standing, towering over him like a hungry raptor eyeing a tasty morsel. “Shall we get started?”

  McCann muttered a grudging, “Okay.”

  Kyle looked at the camera and rolled his eyes, then started asking questions.

  McCann’s belligerence had set off alarm bells. Maybe he was just an asshole, one of those people who believed refusing to cooperate with the police was their job. But maybe he was somehow involved and had something to hide. It was unusual that he hadn’t expressed any concern for the girl who was killed, nor any curiosity about her identity or what the police had learned. It didn’t take three detectives to do an interview, and Burgess had things to do, but he really needed to hear this.

  Six

  “Vince, what do we know about Cary McCann?” he asked.

  “Not a lot, Joe. I had Prentiss pull together what he could. It’s on your desk. Guy’s married, no kids. Works at an insurance company. Has a condo out in North Deering. One speeding ticket. Got caught up once in a prostitution sweep. Judge dismissed it. That’s about all.”

  Prostitution sweep? That was interesting. He’d have to look at the date. Have a chat with Vice. See what other info might be in the file—like whether when he was caught the guy had been with a younger girl. He wanted someone to take a look at McCann’s car before they drove the man back to it. They couldn’t search it without a warrant, and they didn’t have the grounds for that. He just wanted it eyeballed to see what might be in plain sight.

  They hadn’t released the scene yet, thinking maybe they’d need to go back again in the morning, so he was sure patrol was securing it. Remy was likely long gone. He could ask any officer to take a look at the car, but Remy was already in this and Burgess trusted him. When he called, he got Remy right away.

  “Aucoin.”

  “It’s Burgess. Any chance you’re still at the scene?”

  “No sir. Sorry. I’m on my way back to 109. What can I do for you?”

  Because Burgess didn’t call to chat, or check in, Remy knew that when he called it was because he needed something and could be pretty fierce about what he wanted. Behavior that had gotten Burgess labeled as the meanest cop in Portland. It was an old label. By now, he was sure, another stickler for the rules had taken his place. But his reputation persisted.

  “I was hoping you could take a look at McCann’s vehicle. He’s the guy who found the body.”

  “I’m only five minutes away, sir. I’ll just turn around. Anything particular you wanted me to look for?”

  If he’d been there, this would have been a teaching moment. But time was short. Remy would be tired and even if he might want to act tough, he was still getting back on his feet after being shot. Feet he’d now been on for hours. “Just what’s in plain sight. Anything you notice about the inside—spare clothes, shoes, just note whatever you see. And check the area around the car.”

  “I got you,” Aucoin said, and Burgess was pretty sure he did.

  The many ot
her people who’d been in the lot had probably wiped out any footprints that might have been there. But Aucoin had been at the scene when Dani found that footprint. It was distinctive enough for Aucoin to know what to look for.

  He left that in Aucoin’s capable hands and shifted his attention back to the monitor. Kyle was leading McCann through his timeline, and McCann was as vague as it was possible to be. He wasn’t sure when he’d arrived at the lot. He wasn’t actually a jogger, though he was planning to change that, thus the new shoes. He was really out there to take his dog for a long walk. It was a high energy animal and needed a lot of exercise.

  Stan Perry, who couldn’t stay still for long, and who liked to be doing something, said, “Joe, if you’ve got this, I think I’ll check with missing persons, see if the girl’s been reported, then get on to Vice and get them working on what they might have for us.”

  Burgess nodded. Stan left, and he pulled his attention back to the monitor.

  Kyle picked up that thread and went with it. What kind of a dog was it? A mostly lab mix. How long had they had the animal? A year. Where had they gotten it? At a shelter. His wife had wanted a dog, something to make her feel safer when he traveled for work. To the best of his knowledge, had the dog had any search and rescue training? None that he knew of. All he knew was it was very stubborn about following its nose, practically pulling him off his feet when it wanted to follow a scent. Was that what had happened this morning?

  McCann went silent.

  “Let’s back up,” Kyle said. “Take me through things, step by step, after you arrived at the parking lot.”

  “I parked the car, got Fideau out…”

  “F. I. D. O.?” Kyle asked.

  “No. It’s Fideau, like French or something. Pretty dumb, you ask me, but that’s what he was called by his prior owner. He came with the name and Annie, my wife, didn’t want to change it. She figured it was bad enough that he’d ended up in a shelter.”

  “Ok, let’s move on. You got your dog out of the car and then?”