Fatal Game

by Linda Ladd

  Junior was as free as a bird for the first time in his life. Lucky knew his secret and hadn’t told a soul about the murder. Now Junior finally had a friend who had helped him do what had been necessary that day, and without blinking an eye or casting a bunch of stupid guilt down on Junior’s head. They would party and travel and do anything and everything they wanted, and they would do it to anybody they wanted. They might even kill again. Junior liked that idea. He liked it a lot.

  Junior had lain in bed almost every night since he committed the murder, reliving the moment when Mom had stopped struggling and finally kicked the bucket. He enjoyed recalling in specific detail the way she released her last breath, the way it had come out of her throat and risen to the surface in that little narrow stream of tiny bubbles. Her last and final breathless goodbye, sonny boy. So long, never to see you again. Lucky had laughed when he’d seen those bubbles. That’s the moment they had bonded and become murderers together. It was a fine moment, in a deadly, evil sort of way. But man, had it ever felt good to Junior. He was going to love being a multimillionaire. Maybe even a billionaire by now. He didn’t know how much his mother had. But it was plenty. And he was going to enjoy having a blood brother who got off on killing people as much as he did. Life was going so well, and it was only going to get better.

  Chapter 6

  As the Canton County homicide team stood together at the scene and contemplated what evil the arrival of Jonesy Jax would bring to their law-abiding lake community, Shaggy was the only one who seemed delighted by the unwelcome new resident. Not surprising, really, with Shaggy being Shaggy. “Man oh man alive, this is so damn cool! I love that dude’s music. He’s awesome, people. More than awesome. He’s spectacular. So’s his band. I’ve got every single CD he ever made. Have you heard his theme song, ‘Kill All the Women’?”

  Claire gave him a look. “Shaggy, that’s about as politically incorrect as you can get. If I were you, I wouldn’t admit to anybody that you like that song. Especially to anyone of the female gender, of which I am, if you’ll recall. What’s more, a song like that sounds like he might be a prime candidate for this first-degree murder. Whoever did this doesn’t have much respect for womanhood, believe you me.”

  “Nah, you’re wrong about him. Listen to the lyrics, Claire. Jonesy doesn’t say ‘kill them all,’ not really kill them, you know, like murder them, or anything. He means he kills them with his charm and sex appeal.”

  Claire could only scoff. “Well, good luck with that. He’s the grossest, most arrogant human being that I’ve ever met. I’m already sick to my stomach just talking about him. Oh, and by the way, Jonesy Jax has a rap sheet three miles long. DUIs, drug busts, and last and most despicable, multiple counts of sex with underage girls. He has exactly zero redeeming qualities. Trust me on that, Shaggy. I had hoped that I’d never have to see him again, but it seems my luck is always bad where obnoxious morons are concerned.”

  “Again? You’ve met this guy?” That was Bud, and he looked shocked.

  “No shit? You’ve actually met Jonesy Jax? In person?” That was Shaggy, all atwitter, with a bit of squeal in his voice.

  “Oh yeah, I had the distinct displeasure of arresting him on Hollywood Boulevard when I was a street cop at LAPD. Long time ago, true, but I’ll never forget that creep. He actually propositioned me for sex while I was frisking him. Tried to grab me, if you know what I mean. Then he had the gall to pull out a bunch of hundred-dollar bills to tempt me to oblige his needs. And yes, I was wearing my uniform. Trust me, guys: Jonesy Jax is a colossal dirtbag.”

  All three men grinned. Claire didn’t particularly appreciate that. “Not funny, guys. I charged him with drug possession, drug paraphernalia, and having sex with the sixteen-year-old girl who was with him and half-dressed in the back seat of his limo. She admitted everything, and none of it was pretty. Last but not least, I added assault on a police officer to the charges.”

  That sobered them all pretty damn fast. “He serve time for that?” Bud asked.

  “What do you think? He’s almost as rich as Black. He assembled his team of fancy L.A. lawyers, who showed up within the hour and got him sprung from detention. They used every dirty, scummy trick in the book to get him off. But I’ll never forget that guy and the way he treated me. And lucky me, now he’s right here on our lake, in our jurisdiction. That means I’ll probably have to deal with him again. The idea actually turns my stomach.”

  “What did you say this guy’s name was?” That was Buckeye. He looked clueless about the rock star. He had finished up at the scene and was prepared to leave. The young woman’s body was in the van, and his techs had already packed up and were waiting outside. Buck was good at his job. In and out, no mistakes, no wasted energy. Claire was not surprised that he was unfamiliar with Jonesy Jax’s disreputable reputation. He listened to Johnny Cash and June Carter on the way to crime scenes, much to the chagrin of Shaggy and the other young CSI technicians.

  “Jonesy Jax, you know, the hard rocker that wears all that black leather with silver chains and has a parrot on stage in a cage that shrieks out curses to the audience,” Bud informed him. Buck frowned at that and still looked blank, and a bit skeptical. “Maybe you’ll remember the time he threw pills out into the audience and then told everybody to take them on the count of three and they’d all trip out together. He got arrested for that, too, didn’t he?”

  Claire nodded. “Yes, sir, he sure did, but it turned out to be a publicity stunt. The pills were Tic Tacs. He got fined and got a ton of bad publicity, but he ended up smelling like a rose to all his fans. They thought it was a cool move. I just find it so distasteful that we are actually going to have to be in the same room with this guy, much less engage him in conversation. Or touch him, heaven forbid.”

  “I like some of his music.” Bud looked sheepish at the admission.

  “Me too. You’re bein’ too hard on old Jonesy,” Shaggy told her. “I got his ‘Hate Everybody’ poster. Think he’ll autograph it for me?”

  They all collectively ignored him.

  Claire turned to Bud. “Any way that you can get him on the phone?”

  “Maybe. It’s late, but I know a TV agent in Los Angeles who can get me to the right people, I think.”

  “Okay, then try to get hold of him ASAP and tell him we need to talk to Jonesy stat. Tell him it’s urgent. You know the drill.”

  Bud moved off again, with his trusty phone in hand. Bud could work magic with that thing and get through to almost anybody, anywhere, Hollywood movers and shakers included. He used his southern charm like a weapon, plus a good bit of pure BS. Claire watched him walk off, and then she sighed, deflated. One of the biggest rock stars who ever lived was the last person on earth she needed to become involved in this girl’s murder. Damn it, the paparazzi were already buzzing around and lying in wait for her and Black. This would jack up their feeding frenzy to bloodbath levels.

  “Claire,” Buckeye said, “I think we can count on blunt force trauma as cause of death. Not much else to go on yet, except for a small puncture wound on her abdomen and the minor burns on her head from the hot light bulbs. The victim bled out for a while before she stopped breathing, might even have regained consciousness for a few seconds, but I really doubt that. I’ll know more and have a definitive cause after the autopsy. So I’m out of here. I’ll do the cut first thing in the morning.”

  “Want us to be there?”

  “Up to you guys. Our workload at the morgue is slow. That’s why I thought I could dash off with the wife and fly down to the Bahamas for Christmas. Looks like that may be out now.”

  “Maybe we’ll solve this case in record time. Bud and I are pretty good at this stuff when we work together, you know. And the sunny Bahamas are only a few hours away by plane.”

  “I suspect Jonesy Jax and all his crap is going to screw things up for our trip, take my word on that. Okay, I’m out of here. See y
ou later, Claire.”

  Claire watched him walk away, but he was right. Jonesy Jax always screwed things up, wherever he was. It was embedded in his genes.

  Within minutes, Bud was back beside Claire.

  “Did you get hold of him?”

  “Not yet. Left my number with the agent and asked him to return my call, told him it was urgent.”

  Claire glanced around. “Okay, there’s not much else we can do out here right now. Let’s shut down all these stupid lights and maybe we’ll get hold of Jax in the morning. I’m fairly certain he’s gonna know this girl, probably intimately.”

  “We do have the lady in charge of the Christmas tour outside. Corrigan’s got her waiting in his patrol car. She’s the one who found the body and showed up here earlier, thinking we might want to interview her.”

  “Well, she’s right. Let’s do it now.”

  By the time they wrapped things up inside and stepped out onto the front porch, the temperature had dropped even lower. It felt like ten degrees below zero, at the very least, and the wind chill even worse than that. Their breaths materialized, smoky in the cold air. Snow was falling again, harder now. It was a beautiful, snowy night on a dark and quiet cliff out in the middle of the deep woods. Peaceful, quiet, or at least, used to be. Too bad some unknown young girl had to die there in the midst of so much natural beauty.

  Corrigan stood out in the driveway, leaning against the fender of his patrol car, stamping his feet and clapping his hands together. He looked pretty damn annoyed about having to stick around and wait for them to interview the witness. They thanked him, and then Bud invited the witness into his truck so Corrigan could go home to his family. Claire climbed into the back seat and sat beside the woman. Bud took the driver’s seat, fired the engine, turned the heater up to full blast, and then swiveled slightly so that he could look back at them. He started the interview without delay.

  “You are Mrs. Barbara Sherman, is that correct, ma’am?”

  The woman nodded. She looked to be around sixty, maybe. Tall woman, five-nine or five-ten, around Claire’s height. She had a pretty face that looked younger than she probably was, and long brown hair with lots of gray strands, which she wore pulled straight back in a tight, low ponytail. She seemed calm and unperturbed by the horrific scene she’d walked into earlier that day. Suspiciously serene, in fact. She didn’t say anything, just waited for them to ask their questions. Claire leaned back, content to let Bud take the lead.

  “Thank you for waiting so long, Mrs. Sherman. My name is Bud Davis. This is my partner, Claire Morgan. We’re both homicide detectives at the Canton County Sheriff’s Office.”

  “How do you do?” she replied. A very polite woman, it seemed. As the truck became warmer, Barbara took a moment to shed her puffy black insulated jacket. She had on a Christmas elf’s costume underneath: red corduroy jumper shorts with a red-and-white-striped, long-sleeved T-shirt, knee-high candy-cane-striped socks, and red ankle boots. This night was so way weird that Claire was getting a little overwhelmed by the sheer absurdity that kept slapping her in the face.

  “I’m sorry it took us this long to get done inside the house, ma’am. Officer Corrigan told us that you discovered the body; is that correct?”

  “Yes, sir. I came out here a little early, you know, just to check and make sure everything was in good order before the tour started. But I’m not really in charge of the tour groups or anything. I just enjoy dressing up in these cute costumes and taking folks through these beautiful homes. This holiday house tour is sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce and the Lake of the Ozarks Garden Club. They did a great job this year, you know, despite today’s terrible tragedy. They ordered all those poinsettias you saw inside the house. They got them from Mexico. Had them shipped up.”

  Now there you have some useless home tour trivia, Claire thought. Mexican flowers were the last thing on her crime-scene-things-to-know list.

  Bud continued. “Were you alone when you found the victim?”

  “Yes, but only for a few minutes before the folks began to arrive. A few of them were already standing around on the porch, waiting for somebody to unlock the door and take them through the house. So I hurried so I could check out the house first, like I always do. I was already in costume and expected to stay for the second go-around slated for this evening at eight. It was cancelled, of course. All the tours are by now, I suppose.”

  “Do any of the guides wear angel costumes?” Claire asked.

  “No, that was last year. This year, we can either choose to be an elf like this outfit I’m wearing, or there are flannel nightgowns, and old fashioned caroler outfits reminiscent of Dickens’s London.”

  “We think our victim might be one of your tour guides. They’ll probably have her name and address somewhere, right? Did you happen to know her personally?”

  “No, I’d never seen that poor little thing before.”

  “Okay,” Bud said. “Tell us exactly what happened when you got here. Everything you can remember, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant.”

  “Well, I went ahead and did a walk-through before I took anybody inside the house. I don’t know why, but I like to do that when I have time to. Maybe I had a premonition or something about today. I just felt like I should look around and make sure everything was okay. I have to light the display candles anyway. So I had the visitors come inside out of the cold and wait for me in the kitchen. We had provided hot cocoa and coffee and had some sugar cookies sitting out on the counter for refreshments. But then, when I walked into that library and saw that poor child, oh my goodness, my heart practically stopped. It was just horrible. I just froze in my tracks, because I couldn’t even believe my eyes. Then I saw how her eyes were staring down at me, like she was really perched on top of that tree and looking right at me, and then I realized she was dead, really dead, and I’m afraid I pretty much just lost it. I ran out screaming, and that panicked everyone else, so they all ran out of the house, too. Some man in the group had the wherewithal to call 911.” She stopped talking long enough to inhale a deep breath. Her voice was shaking. “I still have trouble believing this kind of thing could happen right here on our lake. Don’t you?”

  Both of them nodded, but they had been homicide detectives far too long to disbelieve anything they found at a crime scene. Murderers found victims everywhere, even at Lake of the Ozarks. “Did you touch anything when you were in the library? Did you go up on the balcony and touch the body?” Bud asked her.

  “Oh heavens above, no. Why would I want to do that? I could barely even look at her up there, you know, all that blood soaking that white gown. Oh my word, I still cannot believe it. I’ve never seen a dead person like that. Somebody who has just been murdered. Except on TV shows.”

  “And you’re sure you don’t recognize the victim?”

  “Well, no, but I didn’t look at her all that long. I just saw the blood and those eyes. My thought was that she was a guide dressed up like a living angel. One of us. Most of the younger guides are about her age.” She clasped her hands together tightly and kept shaking her head as if completely befuddled. “It looked like one of our costumes from last year, truth be told. They just used long white nightgowns.”

  Claire thought the poor woman might be suffering from shock. She didn’t really act like it, though, which seemed odd. A Chatty Cathy type, but seemed to be telling the truth. Maybe. “Who could we contact that might be able to give us the victim’s name and address? We will need to notify her next of kin as soon as we verify her identity.”

  “I have no idea, unless, of course, she was a guide, but I don’t think she was. But if so, I guess you’ll need to find out who hired her and question them. I’m not sure who’s in charge of that kind of stuff this year. I’ve been leading tours for them going on ten years, but I certainly don’t keep up with the ladies in charge of recruiting the guides. I just try to make sur
e everything in the house looks the way the garden club left it. You know, pulling out dead branches from the fresh arrangements and lighting the candles, things like that. ”

  “Did you see anybody, either inside or outside the house, when you arrived here today?”

  “No, sir.” Mrs. Sherman stared at Bud a moment. “I did happen to notice, however, that the patio door was unlocked. That observation was, of course, before I turned around and saw the dead girl up on the balcony.”

  Claire had already checked out the doors. She had found no footprints inside or outside the patio French door, so the killer must have come in a different way, or broken in and concealed himself in the house before the victim arrived. “And you’re sure you didn’t touch anything? Or see anybody loitering around?”

  “Of course I’m sure. I know better than to do that, even as creeped out as I was. I watch NCIS every week. Well, at least I did until Ziva left the show. Didn’t like it so much after that. She and Tony were so good together, don’t you think? It’s a damn shame that such a good actress had to leave. I heard she only left because she wanted to be with her boyfriend down in South America. Such a shame for Tony. He was never the same without her.”