by Rusty Ellis
Not knowing how long he’d be away, he grabbed a couple of pills from each bottle and dropped them in his shirt pocket. Maddie had bought him a little pill carrier, with good intentions, but the thought of carrying around a little pill container and using a cane was more than his pride could bear. For now, a couple pills would do and he was going to hold-out against Father Time as long as possible.
Grabbing the pad off the sofa, he clipped the pin inside his pocket and headed out the door. It was time to flush out the killer’s connections.
18
Driving west on Cheyenne Avenue, Ransom could see the American flag waving above the police station. He took a right just after the building and parked on the road next to the small area on the west of the building. Sitting in his truck and waiting for Leesa and the others, Ransom turned on the radio and was met with A-ha hitting a high-note in Take On Me. He quickly turned down the volume and switched back over to 102.7, one of two country radio stations in town. The laid-back voice of Kenny Chesney shared his thoughts on life with The Good Stuff.
Thinking of Teresa tapping on his dash to Prince last night brought a smile to his face. Maddie was at work when he’d gotten home and he was fast asleep by the time she got home, so there was no time to surprise her with the fact her old-man went on a date.
A date. Is that what it really was?
He had enjoyed his time with Teresa. There was no problem with keeping the conversation going or any awkward moments during their time together. Even though she had to be patient due to his cane, she waited for him to come around and open the door to the truck when he dropped her off. His only debacle of the night was sticking out his hand for a handshake at her door. She laughed and kissed him on the cheek then disappeared through her front door. He must have looked like a very old schoolboy, standing on her porch, dazed from the peck on his cheek. More than anything, he liked it.
Leesa pulled past Ransom’s truck and parked just across from the employee entrance. Ransom climbed out of his truck and made his way to her dark sedan. He waited for her to get out of her car before approaching her.
“Morning,” he smiled.
“Morning, Ransom.”
She opened the back driver’s side door and pulled out a leather satchel.
Pointing at the car next to her, she said, “Looks like Gonzalez and Hatch are already here.”
They walked together to the employee entrance and Leesa swiped her badge against the black pad. A buzzing sound signaled the lock release and Ransom opened the door to let Leesa through. He followed her past several dark rooms until they came to a lit room occupied by Gonzalez and Hatch. Reams of printed paper, files, and handwritten notes were littered across the long table.
“Looks like you two have been at it for a while,” Leesa walked to the table and popped open her satchel.
Ransom followed and did a once over on the piles of paper.
Gonzalez smiled and proclaimed, “Briggs said he wanted some answers so I relayed that to the Sergeant. I might have exaggerated how much help Briggs said to give us, but the Sergeant assigned a couple of techs and financial crimes guys to work on this last night.”
Hatch beamed along with his partner. They looked like they had just hit a jackpot at the casino by wrangling the extra help.
“Did they find anything?” Ransom asked and sat down, conserving his leg as much as possible.
“A couple of things,” Hatch searched the table to share what they’d found. “First, Jones and Ford never worked together. They’ve worked the same shift before, but never together.”
Gonzalez took the short route and grabbed his notepad. Flipping a couple of sheets over the top of the pad, he found what he was looking for.
“Also, we have four locations in common between the two families. A bank, grocery store, gym, and school.”
Ransom looked down at his list and was happy to see he had all four listed as potentials.
Gonzalez continued, “We went through receipts, calendars, credit card statements, basically anything we could find on scene.”
“What did the neighbors say? Get anything from them?” Leesa jotted down the four locations on her steno pad.
Hatch paused his document searching to answer, “We talked to the neighbors on either side of the victims’ houses and got the same reply from everyone. The families were great neighbors and the neighbors were aware that they had a Metro officer as a neighbor. The only thing one neighbor brought up was hearing the dog barking inside the Ford’s house for a while, but they said that wasn’t anything out of the ordinary.”
“What do you have on the locations?” Ransom pulled them back to the evidence.
Gonzalez went back to his pad, “Both families banked at Wells Fargo, shopped at Smith’s Grocery, had memberships at Planet Vegas Gym, and their kids attended Merrymont Elementary School. All locations within about a mile or so radius of their houses.”
The number of commonalities upped the difficulty of fishing out the true evidence. They would need to investigate each location. The problem was manpower. Getting enough detectives to thoroughly search through employees and contacts and sift for any inconsistencies or strong hunches. Your gut could drive you in certain directions, but evidence was what the district attorney needed to present to a jury or make an offer to the perpetrator. Time was an uncomfortable variable in this case. The uncertainty of whether the killer was done with his spree or not put a crunch on their chase for evidence and clues.
“Did Briggs notify other agencies about the method of deaths in this case?” Leesa asked.
Hatch responded, “He said they contacted local agencies and were having all Metro officers contacted by shift supervisors.”
“That’s good to hear,” Ransom was happy with the answer. “What do we know about that date? The one in Ford’s wallet at the ice cream shop? May 11, 2010?”
Leesa flipped through her notes on her steno pad and answered, “I looked at Jones’ arrests and nothing stood out. A couple tickets, shoplifting citation, trespassing, and two battery domestic calls. Ford was off that day.”
“Anything exciting about the battery domestic calls?” Ransom questioned.
Leesa grabbed two stapled packets of paper from her bag, “One was a yelling match, no arrests, no return calls. The other was an arrest.” She flipped further through the second stack, “The female was drunk and arrested for scratching her boyfriend’s face.”
“What about the news on that date, anything there?” Ransom posed to Leesa.
“I didn’t see anything important. No major arrests. Nothing in the obituaries that stood out. Should we be looking at all arrests that day? We averaged over nine-thousand arrests that month. That puts us at around three-hundred arrests that day.”
Gonzalez remarked, “I’ll have the tech guys dig further into the arrests and the families’ financials to see if anything pops. The Sergeant called in two other sets of detectives from the Northeast Area Command. He said something about them having a different view from the outside. They work the robbery detail so at least they should have some good interview skills.”
Gonzalez continued, “Why don’t we have the robbery guys check on the school and grocery store. Me and Hatch can hit the bank. You and Ransom check out the gym.”
Ransom agreed, “Sounds good to me.”
“Call if you find anything specific,” Leesa gathered her notepad and papers back into her satchel. “Ready?”
“Yep,” Ransom pushed up to his feet from the table top and followed Leesa back down the hall and out to her car.
In her car, Ransom asked, “Can I play with the siren?”
“Touch it and I’ll put you in back where you belong.”
“You’re never any fun,” he laughed and shook his head.
Being back in the undercover sedan brought back a flood of memories. Mostly it reminded him about his last physical day on the job. He had failed Leesa, put her in danger. The weight of that day ground into his chest and pres
sed against his lungs. He grimaced a brief smile at Leesa and put on his seatbelt.
She caught his glimpse and reassured his thoughts, “I know partner, I know. Glad to have you back.”
Her comments abated the weight on his chest and they pulled out of the parking lot in route to Planet Vegas Gym.
19
The parking lot at Planet Vegas Gym was packed. From BMWs to work trucks and mid-sized SUVs, the only available parking spaces were a considerable distance from the front entrance. Given his leg, Ransom wished they had a golf cart pickup service for those having to park so far away. The irony of his thoughts made him laugh inside, considering he wanted a shuttle service to the front door of a place where you go to exercise. His cardio, prescribed by his doctor and agreed upon by his daughter, consisted of an exercise bike in the garage. Thirty-minutes at least three times a week kept peace in the house and satisfied the doctor. The bike allowed him to break a sweat without the pressure of his full-weight on his leg.
Leesa had her steno pad in one hand and slowed her pace to walk alongside Ransom. They passed a number of gym-goers in their various forms of fashion and enthusiasm. The large building was colorful, decked out in bright yellows and oranges with images of cheesy-grinning people working out and having the time of their lives at Planet Vegas Gym.
Entering the second set of doors to the lobby, Leesa and Ransom were quickly greeted by a young man wearing a tucked in polo shirt with the gym logo on the upper left side. He was wearing black shorts and a pair of black tennis shoes and socks. Leesa and Ransom, in street clothes and no gym bags, were instant membership targets.
“Hello folks, my name is Damien! What brings you into Planet Vegas today?” he chimed with too much enthusiasm.
Ransom was already exhausted from the chipper young man’s attitude and let Leesa do the talking, “Can we see the manager, please?”
“Is there a problem?” he clasped his hands in front of him and leaned forward.
Leesa produced her badge and asked again, “We just need to talk to a manager.”
Damien’s face dropped when he saw Leesa’s badge, “Our general manager isn’t here, but the sale’s manager is. You want me to get him for you?”
“That would be great, we’ll just wait over here,” Leesa pointed to some chairs to the side of the lobby.
Damien hurried around the corner. Leesa and Ransom stepped over to the chairs and Ransom sat down. As soon as he hit the chair bottom, another young man appeared with Damien. He looked to be in his mid-20s. Not quite as chipper as Damien, but ready to flash a charming smile when needed. He was dressed in the same general outfit, except for long black pants and black dress shoes.
“This is Mr. Talbot,” Damien introduced his boss.
“Thanks Damien,” he nodded to let Damien know he could go. “You can call me Corey. What can I help you with?”
Leesa again spoke up, “Is there somewhere we can go in private. We’re conducting an investigation and need to ask some questions.”
Unshaken, Corey escorted them to a small office. There was one chair behind the desk and two chairs for visitors in front of the desk. It didn’t appear to be Corey’s office there was nothing personal on the desk or wall, just a computer and a stack of sign-up forms. Corey sat behind the desk and invited them to have a seat across from him.
“What can I help you with?” Corey repeated in his upbeat manner.
Leesa pulled out her wallet and flashed her credentials and badge at Corey, “I’m Detective Gardner and this is Ransom Walsh, he’s working as a consultant.”
Leesa looked toward Ransom and he raised an eyebrow at her.
“We’re conducting an investigation and needed to check on a couple of things having to do with a few members of your gym,” Leesa began.
“What type of investigation?”
“We’re not all liberty to discuss that right now, the investigation is ongoing. Can you help us with some basic questions?” Leesa continued.
“That depends on what you’re looking for. I can help you with some things, but if it’s too deep or has to do with our gym being at fault then I’ll need to have you talk with our General Manager, Mr. Lambert.”
Ransom watched Corey’s responses to the questions. Given Corey’s job running a sales team, the over-exuberance in his voice and actions were notably status quo.
“It’s more to do with a couple of members here and not specifically your gym,” Leesa assured him. “We need you to verify the memberships of Lee and Tisha Jones and Joshua and Holly Ford.”
“Sure, give me just a minute,” Corey grabbed an application and flipped it over to the blank side and wrote their names.
Turning to the computer to the left of the desk, Corey bumped the mouse to bring the screen to life and typed in a password to bypass the security screen. Logging into the membership database, he pulled up the Jones’ membership screen.
“Do you want me to print it?” Corey turned his head toward Leesa to ask.
“Yes, please.”
Corey clicked the mouse button and the printer on the back wall started to come to life as it pulled the paper through its inner workings. He then went to the Ford’s membership and did the same thing.
Ransom leaned forward to look at the screen, “What about the times that they come and go? Can you give us a printout, of say, for the past month?”
“That’s not a problem. When they check in with their membership card, it’s recorded in the system. It only tells us when they get here, not when they leave though. If they forget their card one day, we would probably just let them in after checking their membership on the screen,” Corey explained. “But we don’t check them in if they forget their card.”
“That should do for now, thanks.”
Corey spent a few more minutes tapping on the keyboard and switching screens. He printed several more sheets of paper. Rifling through the printed pages, he sorted the sheets of paper and stapled each families’ pages together.
Smiling, Corey reached across the desk and handed them to Leesa, “Here you go. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
“No. That should do for now, though we may be back in touch.”
Corey reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a business card, “If you need anything else, feel free to contact me. My personal cell and email are on there.”
“Thanks, Corey,” Leesa began to stand. “We appreciate your help.”
Ransom nodded, using his right hand on the table to help push himself up.
Corey, looked directly into Ransom’s eyes and smiled, “Nice to meet you, Mr. Walsh.” He then turned to Leesa, “You too, Detective Gardner.”
Leesa and Ransom both thanked him and made their way out of the gym.
Walking back to the car, Leesa spoke first, “What do you think?”
“About Corey?” Ransom asked and saw Leesa nod. “Those sales guys always seem a little squirrelly, they always have too much energy. It’s unnatural.”
“Yeah, it’s weird how people can be so cheerful all the time,” she tried to keep a straight face, but finally gave in and started to laugh. Sarcasm was no stranger in their partnership.
“What now Oh Happy One?” Ransom ribbed back.
“Wanna’ grab an early lunch and then check in and see how the other guys are faring?”
“That works. You’re buying, since I’m just a lowly consultant.”
Leesa laughed again, “I had to come up with something! Okay, okay, pizza it is.”
20
Ransom and Leesa finished lunch and made their way back to the room at the Northwest Area Command. Flipping on the light, they waited for Gonzalez and Hatch to arrive.
About ten minutes later, Gonzalez and Hatch turned the corner into the room and sat opposite Leesa and Ransom at the table.
Gonzalez and Hatch reported meeting with the robbery detectives in the field about the school and the grocery store. They flashed pictures of each family to the cashiers, baggers and
managers, and spoke with the Jones’ and Ford’s children’s teachers and the principal. Nothing seemed to stand out. No one at the grocery store knew both families, though a couple people thought they recognized at least one of the adults in the pictures. As for the school, one child from each family was in the school and they were in different grades. Having not found anything of substance, the robbery detectives returned to their active robbery cases and told Gonzalez to call if they needed anything else.
Ransom stretched out his leg and spoke to Gonzalez, “Find anything at the bank?”
“Only that they banked there. Direct deposits. Most of their banking they did through the drive-thru. So they had no real contact with anyone specific on a regular basis.”
Leesa jumped in, “Any odd accounts that stuck out? Business accounts? Savings?”
Hatch responded, “The Jones’ had a savings account in each kid’s name, an education fund. There’s a couple thousand in each. Other than that, the standard checking and savings. No business accounts for either of them.”
“What about you two and the gym?” Gonzalez asked.
Leesa answered, “We had them print out their memberships and each time they checked in. We went over their activity and it looks like they were pretty regular and used the childcare at the gym once in a awhile.”
“Did anyone recognize them,” Hatch pushed further.
Ransom took a turn at the questions, “We didn’t get that far.”
Leesa continued, “I know at my gym I see the same couple of people at the front counter each time I go in. There aren’t that many that work the front desk.” She added, “The times they went were a little sporadic and didn’t specifically match up to each other, so I would think that they’d just blend in with the influx of other gym goers.”
Ransom took the two stapled packs of paper from in front of Leesa and set them side-by-side on the table. He scanned the membership information, looking through each section and checked/unchecked boxes. The costs were a little higher for the Jones’ overall, but they had two children to the Ford’s one. Ransom slid a finger back up to the basic costs and discount sections. The box for “Military Discount” was checked by Lee Jones and Holly Ford. Ransom knew Lee had served four years in the United States Marine Corp prior to getting hired with Metro.