The Ninth District - A Thriller

by Douglas Dorow

  He was still curious where Sandy was, but was happy to move on with his plan without her. He started the boat and headed for the marina on the other side of the lake.

  “Sure Thing, we’re standing here looking at the lake. Where were they?” Jack asked.

  “Somewhere between you and Big Island.”

  “Come on. It’s dark out here. Where’s that?”

  “Look straight out, perpendicular from the shore.”

  Jack looked out over the dark water. A little to the left and then to the right. “You see anything, Junior?”

  “A few boat lights. That’s it,” Ross said.

  “You know where I am, Sure Thing?” Jack asked.

  “Yeah, I have you pinpointed on the map from your phone signal. Her phone disappeared about five hundred yards out from where you’re standing.”

  “If she was on a boat, it’s not there anymore,” Jack said as he paced along the water’s shore.

  “Jack, the boat still has to be on the water. This is a big lake with lots of bays.” Ross reached for Jack’s phone. “Sure Thing, how many Marinas on this lake?”

  “There are about a dozen.”

  “That’s it, Jack. We need to check them out and see if we can figure out which boat went out earlier or see which comes in,” Ross said.

  “Get us some help and let’s go. We’re so close,” Jack said.

  “This is a bust, Jack. We’ve visited three marinas and no boat.”

  Jack and Ross stood in the gravel parking lot under the humming lights and swatted at mosquitoes. “Let’s get in the car away from the bugs and call the Sheriff, see if they have any better news.”

  Ross yawned while he spoke. “We need to get some sleep, Jack.”

  Jack started the car, checked the air-conditioning was on, and called the Sheriff.

  “Sheriff, this is Miller, we just finished visiting our third marina and we got nothing.”

  “Nobody has anything yet,” Sheriff Looney replied. “Assuming they were on a boat, they either came ashore on private property, docked before we got around and snuck out, or they’re still out on the lake. I’ve got a couple of boats out on the water and we’ll keep patrolling the landings.”

  “Thanks, Sheriff. Agent Fruen and I are going to get some sleep. Give me a call if you find anything,” Jack said and ended the call.

  “Junior, why don’t you just come crash at my place and we can get right back on things in the morning.”

  “Won’t your wife care?” Ross asked.

  “She and the kids are staying with her parents for awhile.” Jack spun the wheels on the gravel and pulled out of the lot. “I’ve got a couple of spare beds right now.”

  “Want to talk about it?” Ross asked.

  “No, I just want to get some sleep and solve this case.”

  The noise jerked Jack from his dream. He grabbed the alarm clock on the bedside table and hit the snooze. The noise didn’t stop. He peeked through his lids at the numbers on the clock. Five twenty-three. What the hell? He grabbed the phone. “Yeah?”

  “Agent Miller?”

  “Yeah.” Jack cleared his throat and tried again. “Yeah. Who’s this?”

  “Agent Miller, this is Deputy Sheriff Looney.”

  “Looney.” It felt like he just went to bed. Jack looked at the clock again to make sure what time it was.

  “I think we got something you’ll want to see.”

  Jack cleared his throat again. “You find the boat?”

  “No. A fisherman found a body out on Lake Minnetonka. Young woman.”

  “I can be there in forty-five, maybe thirty minutes.”

  “Make your way to Deephaven, southeast end of the lake, and call me. I’ll talk you in from there. I’ll text you my number.”

  “Right, I’ll be there soon. Thanks.” Jack hung up the phone and went into his son’s room. “Junior, get up.”

  “Geez, Jack. Do you know what time it is?”

  “Just got a call. They found a body out on Lake Minnetonka. We’re going to check it out. Back where we were last night. Leaving in ten minutes.”

  Chapter 27

  Vince was curled up on the passenger seat, nudging the Governor’s elbow.

  “Shh, Vince.”

  The Governor sat behind the wheel and looked out through the windshield. According to the list, Jack Miller lived in a house on the next block up from where he and Vince were parked. And the info said he was a regular morning runner. From their vantage point, he could see the house and one end of the alley that Jack might come out of when he drove to work. He didn’t know what he looked like, but Sandy had described him so he thought he would be able to pick him out.

  A shade went up in an upstairs window of the house he was watching, grabbing his attention. Vince noticed the change in his master and sat up in his seat. The Governor scratched Vince’s neck. “Down, boy. Nothing to get excited about yet.” Vince groaned and settled down into the seat.

  The Governor watched the house as he scratched Vince around the ears. The front door opened and a man stepped out wearing khakis and a polo shirt and looked up and down the street. “Doesn’t look like he’s dressed for a run this morning, Vince.” A second man stepped through the door. “Special Agent Fruen.” The Governor reached under the steering column and touched his car keys. He wouldn’t start his car until they had started theirs so as not to draw any attention.

  The two agents walked down the sidewalk and got in the car parked at the curb. They pulled away quickly.

  “Vince, they’re in a hurry to get somewhere.”

  Chapter 28

  Jack pulled to a stop outside of the police tape stretched across the driveway to the boat launch, rolled down his window, and slid his sunglasses down to the tip of his nose so the officer controlling access could see his eyes. He held his credentials out the window, facing away from him.

  “Special Agents Miller and Fruen. They’re expecting us down there.” Jack jabbed his chin towards the lake where the ambulance and a couple of police cars were parked. “Can you let me in?” The officer lifted the tape so Jack could drive under it, onto the driveway, and down to the group of vehicles parked at the water’s edge.

  Jack and Ross walked over to the group standing at the shore. A big bass fishing boat and a Sheriff’s water patrol boat were nosed in resting on the sand. A man of about sixty sat at the wheel of the bass boat. He had a tanned face with white strips extending back to his ear on either side of his head where the sunglass temples had protected his skin. A deputy was questioning him.

  “Hi, Sheriff.” Jack shook his hand. “This is Special Agent Fruen.”

  Ross stuck out his left hand, his right arm in a sling.

  “You the one in the car accident?” the Sheriff asked.

  Ross nodded.

  “We keep meeting over dead bodies, Sheriff,” Jack said.

  The sheriff was in uniform and beads of sweat were forming on his forehead. “It hasn’t been the best of circumstances. I wouldn’t normally have called you. We get a few drownings every summer. But with what happened at the bank I thought we should at least clue you in on anything happening out this way.”

  “What do you have?” Jack asked.

  The sheriff started walking towards the ambulance parked down by the water’s edge. Jack and Ross fell in step next to him. A black body bag lay on the stretcher in the heat of the morning sun.

  “The man in the boat there, talking to my officer, went out to go fishing this morning. Was trolling this bay, casting for bass. Found this girl floating. She was dead. Called us on his cell phone and met us here.” They stopped next to the stretcher.

  “We don’t know who she is. Just had a swimsuit on. Nobody has called to say she fell off a boat during a party last night. We’ll put out a story today on the news and see if anybody comes forward. That’s how it works, once in a while. Somebody wakes up the next morning with a hangover and a guilty conscious and gives us a call.” The sheriff stared at J
ack and glanced at the body bag. “I think we’ve got a drowned party girl, but like I said, I just wanted to make sure you’re in the loop on anything that happens out here for a while.”

  Jack dragged his palm over his forehead, back through his hair to get rid of the sweat that had formed since they got out of the car. “What do you think, Junior?”

  “Let’s see who we’ve got here.”

  Jack looked at Ross. “You don’t sweat, do you?”

  Ross shook his head and stared at the body bag.

  “He’s from the East coast, likes this weather,” Jack said to the Sheriff.

  The Sheriff handed Jack and Ross purple latex gloves and put on a pair himself before grabbing the zipper of the bag in his right hand and the top edge of the bag in his left to allow the zipper to open smoothly. “I really don’t like this,” the Sheriff said.

  Jack nodded and looked at the bag in anticipation. “Nobody does.”

  The Sheriff took a deep breath and slowly zipped open the black body bag about halfway before spreading the bag to reveal the body. Jack stood and looked at the face and hair.

  “Damn it,” Ross said. “It’s her.” He turned and walked to the lake.

  “Who?” Jack asked.

  Jack looked back at the girl and a sense of recognition came over him.

  “He knows her?” The Sheriff’s voice drifted quietly past him. “People don’t exactly look the same dead as they did alive. The life force is gone. No muscle tone and the skin looks grey. Plus, she’s been in the water.”

  Jack closed his eyes. “No other clothes, jewelry?”

  “No.”

  “Tattoos, piercings?”

  “Nothing obvious, but we didn’t look too closely, yet.” The Sheriff’s voice got a little tighter. “You know who she is? Think she’s linked to the bank murder?”

  Jack stood up and closed the body bag until just her face showed. “We know her. She worked at the bank.”

  “Ross, you OK?” Jack joined Ross and they both stood at the shore, looking out over the lake.

  “I’m OK.”

  “This is where we were last night,” Jack said.

  “It’s not a coincidence that she’s here, is it?” Ross asked.

  “I don’t think so. I don’t believe in this kind of coincidence. She works at the bank. You work out with her and get attacked, and now she’s found here. I think the Governor has another victim.”

  A jet ski came roaring towards them, slowed as it got closer to the scene, and paralleled the shore about fifty yards out. The teen boy driving looked over the scene.

  “Those look fun to ride,” Ross said.

  Jack watched the kid as he answered. “My father-in-law hates them. He’s got a cabin up north. They’re loud and create havoc in his sanctuary.”

  Jack took a step towards the lake and started waving the kid in. “He’s out here this early, he probably lives on the lake; let’s see if he knows anything.”

  The kid got a look of panic on this face, turned the Jet Ski out to the open water of the lake, and accelerated away.

  Jack yelled to the men behind him, “Sheriff, we got a runner!”

  “God damn it. Stevie, go get him!” the Sheriff yelled out to the officer in the water patrol boat. The deputy accelerated away from the group in pursuit of the Jet Ski.

  Jack pushed the bass boat off the shore and high-stepped through the water out to it, yelling over his shoulder, “Junior, let’s go!” Jack grabbed onto the side of the bass boat so it wouldn’t drift away. The water was up to his crotch. He looked at the 225 hp motor mounted on the back of the boat. Ross splashed through the water behind him, wading out to the boat. “Hi,” Jack said to the man behind the wheel. “We’re with the FBI. What’s your name?”

  “Bert.”

  “Bert, you can catch that kid with this, right?”

  Bert smiled and said, “Not a problem,” and turned the key. The motor started with a throaty roar.

  “How am I supposed to get in?” Ross asked, waving his right arm in the sling like a broken wing.

  Jack crouched and intertwined his fingers under the water. “Step here, like you’re getting on a horse.”

  Ross held the boat with his left hand, stepped into the stirrup Jack had created, and swung his other leg into the boat without kicking Jack in the head. He climbed into the seat to the left of the driver.

  Jack grabbed the side of the boat, pushed himself up and in as it rocked down, scrambled up to the front deck, and sat on the floor. “Let’s go!”

  “Hang on,” Bert said. The nose of the boat rose into the air as the motor thrust drove the back end forward and the nose up.

  Jack was thrown onto his back and struggled against gravity and momentum to right himself until the boat planed out. He scrambled to his knees and grabbed onto a rope as they raced across the smooth surface of the lake, following the wake of the Sheriff’s patrol boat in pursuit of the teen on the jet ski.

  “Are you OK, Jack?” Ross asked.

  “I’m fine. Can we catch him?” Jack yelled back.

  Bert inched the throttle further ahead and the boat accelerated. “His top speed, if he’s gutsy enough to push it, is fifty or sixty. We’re faster. We’ll catch him.”

  The teen was out in the middle of the lake with nowhere to hide, making a beeline for the other side of the lake. He was about three hundred yards ahead of the Sheriff. Bert steered to the left out of the Sheriff’s wake and passed him.

  “Let’s swing out and cut him off. Show him he can’t outrun us.” Smiling, Jack turned and looked at Ross. “You OK, Junior?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Bert ran parallel to the teen. “Hey, kid!” Jack yelled. “Stop! We just want to talk to you!”

  The kid veered to the right.

  “He’s more maneuverable than we are,” Bert said.

  Ross chimed in. “Let’s cut him off and make some waves. He has to slow down for the waves.”

  Bert circled the boat to the right. Jack rocked left and grabbed onto the side.

  “Hang on, Jack,” Ross yelled.

  The bass boat was on the tail of the jet ski; it passed it on the right side and then turned left, making waves in front of the jet skier, forcing him back in the direction they had come from. The kid hit the waves, jumping the machine into the air. The jet ski motor groaned and screamed as it left the water and reentered.

  Jack was on his knees on the front of the boat. “Come on, kid. We’re with the FBI and just want to talk. You aren’t going to lose us!”

  The boy sat atop the idling machine as it bobbed in the water and looked at Jack, then over his shoulder at the Sheriff’s boat that was approaching.

  “Turn it off and we’ll come over and talk,” Jack added.

  The boy turned off the jet ski and the sound of the idling motor stopped. “Is she dead?” he asked.

  “Let’s go talk to him,” said Jack.

  Chapter 29

  Jack spoke slowly and quietly to control the emotion and to keep Junior focused on procedures and the job ahead of them.

  “I think somebody killed her. You heard what the kid told us. She was on a big boat partying the last they saw her. We’ll know more by the end of day after the ME makes a ruling. If this was related, we need to keep doing our jobs and find the Governor.”

  Jack opened and closed cupboard doors in the kitchen. “Where are your glasses, Junior? I need a drink of water.”

  Ross walked into the kitchen, grabbed a glass out of the cupboard and handed it to Jack. “We don’t know shit, do we?”

  “Not yet, Junior, but we will.” Jack drank his glass of water, thinking about how to calm Ross down. “Junior, you get changed and then you and I are going to Mrs. Humphrey’s funeral to see if anybody shows up there that shouldn’t be there, besides us. Then we’re going to see what else we can find out about Sandy. The Sheriff will keep looking for the boat.”

  In the kitchen, Jack pulled his mobile phone from his pocket a
nd called the Sheriff. While the phone rang, he refilled his water glass, walked into the living room, and sat on the couch. Ross had an apartment typical of a new agent; small, sparsely decorated, used furniture, his road bike parked in the living room, and boxes lined up against the wall, still not unpacked.

  “Chief, it’s agent Jack Miller. Find that boat yet or learn anything else new from the boys?”

  “We’ve been checking landings, assuming he docked it. We’re moving out into the lake now to see if it’s anchored. Got a better description of the boat from the boys. That’s about it.”

  “You’ll call me if you find something?” Jack asked.

  “I got your number,” the Sheriff answered.

  Ross walked into the living room.

  “That was quick,” Jack said.

  “We aren’t going to solve this case sitting here in my apartment. Let’s go.”

  “I see you haven’t unpacked yet,” Jack said pointing to the boxes against the wall. “Have a good camera or binoculars in any of these?”

  “No. Those just have crap in them I don’t need; winter clothes, books I don’t have time to read. Stuff like that.”

  “OK, we’ll swing by my place. I’ll change clothes and grab some equipment we’ll need.” Jack stood up and put his water glass in the kitchen sink. “Let’s go, Junior. You’re right. We aren’t solving this case sitting here.”

  Chapter 30

  Cars, vans, and pickups lined the edge of the narrow road that snaked through the cemetery. Each parked vehicle had two tires in the grass and two on the pavement. Jack drove slowly along the line while Ross pointed the video camera through the passenger window to capture the license plates of each of the cars. An analyst would review the tape later and identify the owner of each of the cars for them. At the end of the row of cars, Jack pulled onto the grass, angling the car so Ross would have a good view of the area around the funeral party and a good vantage point for capturing faces on film when they returned to their cars after the burial ceremony.