by A. E. Howe
I parked a little farther away from his house this time, just in case he mustered enough paranoia to look out the window. The lights were still on in his house. After a few minutes, we saw him stumble past the front windows, probably in the living room. No doubt he was on his way to the bathroom to drain his bladder or to the kitchen to fill it up. His life’s work.
“Why are we watching the house?” Shantel was agitated. She needed a reason to be sitting there staring at a house when she wanted to be out looking for her niece.
“The bartender at the Sweet Spot said that a guy he called ol’ Ray was there Saturday night when Tonya came in.” I left out the details.
“You should have asked him about it.” Shantel was not interested in subtleties right now.
“He barely gave us his name, and he didn’t want to admit that he was at the Sweet Spot. Why not? Because he has something to hide. If I was on duty and could take him down to the office for questioning, maybe.”
Shantel started to speak, but I held up my hand. “And if we don’t find out anything by watching him for a while, we’ll find some way to take him in and put a little pressure on him.”
We killed half an hour with texts. Shantel went back and forth with several of Tonya’s friends, including Jarvis. Everyone had been out looking for her, but no one had found or heard anything. I checked in with Cara, letting her know it was okay to give up on me and go home.
Finally I decided we’d wasted enough time. “I’m going to walk around his house.” I pulled out a small LED flashlight and checked it.
“Not without me,” Shantel insisted.
“Just wait here, I won’t be that long,” I told her.
She wasn’t having any of it. “I’m going.”
“Two of us are more likely to be seen. I just want to check the windows. See if I can tell why he obviously didn’t want us in the house. I might find something that could give us leverage to pull him in,” I tried to reason with her.
“You forget. I’m the crime scene tech. You rely on me to find evidence. I am just as good at seeing things as you are.”
I’d seen her like this before and never once had she backed down when she’d staked out her ground. I sighed. “Fine. But I’m not letting you use my flashlight.”
“Got my own,” she said, pulling a similar flashlight out of her coat pocket.
We got out of the car and snuck across the street. Since the yard hadn’t been maintained, there were plenty of bushes to use to conceal ourselves as we made our way to the house. I was counting on Ray’s lack of sobriety to work in our favor. Once up against the house, the trick was not to stumble over any of the trash strewn about. We had to be careful using our flashlights. We didn’t want one of the neighbors to call 911 thinking we were prowlers just because we were prowling.
The cheap windows were in aluminum frames and most of them didn’t have curtains on the inside. Going around the south side of the house first, we passed a bedroom that did have curtains, but they were parted enough so we could see the filthy conditions of the room. I swear I could smell it from outside. A double bed on a metal frame took up the center of the room, while a couple of cheap dressers were scattered along the walls. The next window was small and made of frosted glass—clearly a bathroom.
The kitchen was in the back of the house. Light from the living room filtered in and, knowing that Ray probably made frequent trips to get beer or wine, I didn’t want to linger at the window.
Things got strange when we came to the next window past the kitchen, which I’d figured was for a small bedroom on the northwest corner of the house.
“Interesting,” I whispered to Shantel.
“What?” she whispered back, coming up alongside me.
“It’s painted—” That’s as far as I got before the old wooden privacy fence running along that side of the property was rammed by something large and aggressive from the other side. The roar of barking exploded in our ears.
“Shit, run!” I hissed to Shantel. She started to go forward. “No, no, back the way we came,” I told her, half pushing her.
We hustled as fast as we could back around the house, then hunkered down in the bushes across the street from my car. We didn’t dare cross the street after all that ruckus. If anyone was watching, they would have easily spotted us.
Apparently the neighborhood was used to the barking dog because no neighbor appeared to look out a window or open a door. Strangely, though, Ray came out and stumbled around his house, paying very special attention to the side next to the privacy fence.
Chapter Seven
Ten minutes later we were back in the car.
“Jesus,” Shantel said, holding her hand over her heart. It wasn’t an exclamation, but a prayer.
“The window of that bedroom was painted over,” I told her.
“Drugs?” she asked. It wasn’t unusual for people growing pot to paint and/or cover their windows with foil so that they could run grow lights without anyone noticing the glow.
“That old man? Pretty unlikely.”
“Person that lived there before him?”
“Believe it or not, he owns the place and has for twenty years. Maybe a family member. But we didn’t see or hear anyone else. No cars in the driveway.”
“Larry, I’ve got to find Tonya. Drugs or whatever he’s doing, I don’t see where that helps us to find her.”
“I don’t know if it does, but there is something weird going on with him.”
“So what?” Shantel asked as I was trying to figure that out.
“I’m going to call Julio. He can come by and talk to Ray. See where that gets us. Maybe Julio can talk himself into the house.”
“Can Julio take him in for questioning?”
“One thing at a time. I know you’re anxious, but we can only go so fast without screwing things up. If you want, I can take you back to your car and Julio and I will deal with Ray the drunk.”
“No, it’s all right. I can’t think of anything else I could be doing right now except driving around looking for her car. And I spent hours doing that already. I’ll see this through.”
I nodded and took out my phone. It was twenty minutes before Julio returned my call.
“Sorry, man, I was on a domestic. Nasty one. Two ladies. A girl-on-girl thing. Had to call in backup. What can I do for you?”
I explained the situation.
“Hey, you’re not an investigator no more. I don’t have to take your orders,” he kidded me. “Let me check in with dispatch. You say this is an open case?”
“I don’t want to get you in trouble. I’ll give Pete a call and clear it with him.”
“I’m not questioning you. Just, you know, Major Parks doesn’t want us doing favors,” he said, referring to the department’s head of human services and resident curmudgeon.
“I understand. Get dispatch to clear you and I’ll call you back.”
I didn’t want to call Pete, but I was also sure that Pete would be glad to okay it. I got him on the first ring.
“It’s after ten. What’s going on?” Pete was a solid guy. He knew that if I called him at home at this hour it had to be important. I explained the situation to him.
“Oh, hell. Okay, listen to me. I’m coming out there. Don’t do anything until I get there. You need to either get on the clock or stand way back,” he told me. Being a reserve officer was not the same thing as being a full-time deputy. If something went wrong, there could be a lot of questions as to why an off-duty reserve officer was on the scene.
“Look, you don’t need to come out here. This is probably nothing. I was planning on letting Julio take the lead.”
“Shantel is my friend too. I feel shitty for not being able to put her niece’s case on the front burner. I’m coming out. Actually…” He paused. “I’m glad you agreed to help her. I’ll be there in thirty.”
I called Julio and told him we were clear, and he confirmed that dispatch had assigned him. My next call was to the dut
y officer. We were short-handed so a sergeant was on duty, which was good. I had a better chance of bluffing a sergeant than one of the lieutenants.
“You’re working a case?” Sergeant Toomey sounded suspicious. “You’re a reserve officer now,” he reminded me.
“I was just checking something out, but now the witness looks like he’s developing into a case himself.”
“Anyone authorize your hours?”
“I’ll cut back somewhere else. Promise. I won’t ruin the department’s budget.”
“Okay, I’ll put you on at ten-thirty. Call me directly when you’re going off the clock.”
“This shouldn’t take long. I’ll call you when it’s over,” I said, thinking that had gone smoother than I expected.
Julio and Pete showed up together. Pete had parked down the street to avoid having too many cars show up in front of Ray’s house.
“You want me to try and get in the house and check out the room on the northwest corner. Got it,” Julio said.
“And if he won’t cooperate, tell him we need to question him on the disappearance of Tonya Williams. If he’s unwilling to talk voluntarily, then go ahead and take him as a material witness,” I told Julio.
“You know, if you hadn’t resigned you could be working this case,” Pete said. To Julio, he said, “Do what he says.”
“Anything else we can do for you?” Pete asked me. Could his voice have gotten any more sarcastic? I cut him some slack since I had dragged him out of his house after ten at night.
“You could call me and put your phone on speaker so I can hear what’s going on,” I said, smiling. Pete just frowned back at me.
“You two are fighting like an old married couple. I don’t think the separation is working,” Julio said, getting out of his cruiser.
Shantel and I sat in my car across the street and watched Pete and Julio walk up to the house. My phone rang.
“I hope you enjoy the show,” Pete said. I put my phone on speaker so Shantel could listen.
“You really think this has something to do with Tonya?” Shantel asked me.
“I think we need to follow this lead as far as it will go. If it doesn’t pan out, we’ll move on,” I told her. She frowned, but settled back in her seat to watch and listen.
Julio walked up to the front door with Pete in tow. We heard the knock on the door and Julio shout, “Sheriff, open up!” More knocking. “I know you’re on the other side of the door. Open the door so we can talk.”
The door opened. “What?” slurred Ray. We could see how unsteady he was from our vantage point across the street. He was even more drunk than when we had talked to him.
“I need to check out your house,” Julio bluffed. Ray was within his legal rights to refuse, but a surprising number of people, even ones with something to hide, can be bluffed out of their rights.
“No!” Ray said.
“Then we’ll need you to come down to the office to answer a few questions,” Julio told him.
“What for?”
“Sir, if we could just take a look around.” We could see Julio step forward. I was surprised that he was able to withstand the odor enveloping ol’ Ray. It was an excellent tactic. A lot of folks will involuntarily step back, giving you access. But not Ray. He stood his ground.
“Youdon’tneedtogointhere,” he slurred, and that was when Ray made a mistake. He put his hand on Julio. Julio grabbed Ray’s hand, but Ray was quicker than I would have thought possible and managed to evade Julio’s grasp. That’s when he made his second mistake. He turned to go back into the house. If he had been arrested out on the lawn, Julio would still not have had a right to enter his house. But since Ray “assaulted” the deputy and then fled into the house, Julio had every right under the law to pursue him.
I got out of the car and jogged across the street. The reason for me to hang back was so that we wouldn’t confuse Ray any worse than he was already confused, assuming he remembered me from my earlier visit. None of that mattered now. I sprinted across the lawn and realized that Shantel was right behind me. I turned and told her to wait outside before following Pete through the door.
Inside I heard Ray screaming at the top of his lungs in drunken English. “No!” was the only understandable sound coming from him.
Julio was firmly telling him to stop resisting arrest. As I crossed the living room, heading for the hallway where the struggle was taking place, Ray’s screaming stopped. I came up behind Pete, who couldn’t get in close enough to help Julio.
The hallway was dark, so dark that I could only just make out Julio kneeling over a shape on the floor. I knew from experience that Julio was snapping a set of cuffs on Ray. Julio recited Ray’s rights and then tried to get him to stand up so he could lead him back out to the cruiser. But Ray wouldn’t stand and Julio half dragged him back. Pete reached down and, as best he could in the cramped hall, grabbed one of Ray’s shoulders and helped Julio drag him out into the living room. I backed up out of their way.
Once we had him in the light, I saw that there was blood on Ray’s shirt, but it was Julio’s nose that was bleeding.
“His elbow got me in the face.”
Ray was struggling a bit. “Is he okay?” Pete asked.
“What?” Julio was trying to get his bleeding nose under control.
I looked down at Ray. “There’s something wrong with him.” I turned him over. His face was contorted and it had a blue tinge to it. “Uncuff him!” I yelled to Julio.
Julio dropped to the ground and took off the cuffs. We flipped Ray onto his back and I cleared his air passage, thinking he might be choking on his own vomit. But it was clear. Pete called for an ambulance over the radio.
We figured that Ray must have been having a heart attack. We had EMS on the radio giving us instructions. One of the worst aspects of living in a small town in a rural county is that the ambulance can be a long way off. Fifteen minutes was the estimated time of arrival. Julio had the most medical experience, so he began working on Ray while I went out to fetch his medical kit from the trunk of his cruiser.
I passed Shantel on my way to retrieve the medical bag. She was restraining herself from entering what was now a crime scene. Or, at the very least, an officer-involved incident scene.
Julio had been a corpsman in the military, so he was able to understand and follow the instructions that emergency services were giving to us over the radio. He’d also augmented his medical kit with more extensive supplies than most deputies carried. I was very glad that he was there to take the lead. As soon as a scene went medical, I turned a pale color of green. Not my thing.
By the time the ambulance arrived, Julio had a pulse, but little else. The EMS guys rushed Ray out of the house with Julio not far behind, leaving Pete and me inside the house staring at each other.
“What now?” Shantel asked from the front door.
“We need to get crime scene techs over here. If the suspect dies, there will have to be an investigation,” Pete said. “Is Marcus on call?”
“I’ll call him,” Shantel said. It would still have to go through the proper channels, but Shantel could get Marcus headed to the office to pick up the crime scene van.
At that moment, a thought struck me.
“Hey, let’s check out the room in the back,” I said to Pete, who was busy texting his wife that she should not wait up for him.
I found the switch for the light in the hall, but nothing happened. I turned on my flashlight and used it to navigate around some dirty laundry. The door to the bedroom was actually of a better quality than the one to the house. I tried the knob. The door was locked.
Damn it, the key could have been in Ray’s pocket, I thought. “Pete, give me a hand.”
Awkwardly crammed into the small hallway, we managed to get both of our shoulders against the door. I put my left foot against the far wall for leverage, then we did the count-of-three thing and pushed together. With a loud crack, the wood around the lock splintered and we stumbled in
to the dark room. The stench of human waste assaulted our noses. Pete found the light switch and turned it on.
My stomach dropped. Tonya was lying on a dirty old mattress, covered by a nasty-looking blanket. I rushed over and dropped down beside her. Relief flooded through me when I felt her warm face. I pulled the blanket back and saw that she was naked beneath it. I couldn’t think about that right now.
I tried to wake her, but she didn’t respond. “Call another ambulance!” I shouted to Pete, who was already on his radio and asking for assistance. I wanted to pick Tonya up and rush her to the hospital myself, but it would have been too risky to move her, not knowing what was wrong with her.
Pete was told it would be half an hour this time. Once we ascertained that her vital signs were steady, if weak, EMS advised us just to keep her warm and wait for the professionals.
“I need to get Shantel,” I told Pete, who nodded solemnly.
Shantel was leaning against the door frame, talking on her phone. She hung up as soon as she saw me.
“We found her. She’s stable, but I need you to remain as calm as you can. Tonya—” Shantel ran past me, not listening. I followed her and found her clutching Tonya, begging her to be all right.
It was well past one in the morning by the time we were all at the hospital and waiting for word from the doctors. Shantel was constantly on the phone with friends and relatives. I was glad she had something to do.
Julio had met us when we arrived and told us that the doctors didn’t know whether Ray was going to survive or not. He’d had a series of heart attacks. They were running tests to determine how much damage had been done to his heart.
“He’s a suspect in an abduction and kidnapping now. Possibly a sexual assault,” Pete told Julio. We’d asked the doctors to perform a sexual assault exam once Tonya was stabilized. They assured us that they’d do what they could to preserve evidence, but their first priority was to save her life.