Murder Book

by Weber, Frank F. ;

  Attempting to portray an illusion of confidence, I approached him and held out my hand. “Jon Frederick.”

  Tony eyed me with irritation, which I assumed to be frustration over having been assigned a rookie for a partner. He smirked as he registered my new black tennis shoes. In my haste to get to work, I had forgotten to change into my boots. “Brittany Brennan was last seen walking out of a driveway half a mile back,” he said in greeting. “She was headed to her folks’ farm another half mile down the road. She never made it home. We found this on the road, here.” Tony held up a dark-brown leather jacket. “Any idea where it’s from?”

  I shrugged. “No.”

  Tony said, “It’s an Express leather men’s jacket. My guess is it’s about a decade old.”

  That was a lot of information to have on a jacket that was just discovered. I wasn’t sure what to say, other than, “Okay.”

  “Did you ever own one?”

  “I don’t think so.” I couldn’t help wondering where he was going with that question.

  Tony scowled at me and said, “Think hard.”

  “No, I didn’t. I couldn’t afford a leather jacket when I was younger, and I don’t own one now. Is my attire relevant to this case?”

  After glaring at me for a beat, Tony nodded. “Tell me what you were thinking on your way here.”

  “Okay . . . If she was abducted on this dirt road,” I speculated, “she’s probably with someone from around here. This isn’t a road tourists would be traveling. That doesn’t necessarily make her safe, but it may mean she’s still close by. I also thought I want to find her alive, and prove I can do this job. People don’t realize how hard it is to find a child, until it becomes your job to find one.”

  “Ain’t that the truth?” Tony rolled his shoulders. “The only guaranteed way to find her is to bring everyone in the world to Morrison County, and ask the person standing on her to raise his hand.”

  The problem with giving me hypothetical proposals was that they started a series of numbers tumbling through my head. I felt compelled to respond. “Actually, if everyone in the world was in Morrison County, it’s possible that nobody would be standing on her.”

  Annoyed by my response, Tony growled, “What?”

  “There are eleven hundred, twenty-five square miles in Morrison County. There are twenty-seven million square feet in a square mile, and about thirty billion square feet total in Morrison County. Assuming each person took up three square feet while standing, you could fit ten billion people into Morrison County. There are only a little over seven billion people on earth, so it’s possible no one would be standing on Brittany.” I wasn’t sure how Tony was taking my oration, so I added, “But we could ask them to look around.”

  He furrowed his eyebrows and said, “No shit. Everyone in the world could fit in this county, with room to spare?”

  “Yes.”

  “What, are you some sort of savant?”

  “No, I just have a thing with remembering numbers.”

  He gave a couple of quick head-shakes, as if he was trying to clear the conversation out of his mind and, switching gears, pointed toward the ditch. “Brittany’s parents organized a search when she didn’t come home. They feared she was hit by a vehicle and was lying in the ditch somewhere. So, we have a mess. If we have a crime scene, it’s contaminated. This jacket could have come off the man who abducted Brittany, or it could’ve come off one of the searchers.” Tony turned in a slow circle and said, “Walk a little down the road with me, as Brittany did, and tell me what you think.”

  As we strolled, Tony told me, “Brittany Brennan is an eleven-year-old white girl with dark-brown hair. She was wearing a pink jacket and pink sweatpants. The Downings gave Brittany a pair of pink-and-white tennis shoes that no longer fit their niece, and Brittany was excited to show them to her mom. Her parents are Al and Mary Brennan, and she has a brother, Jason.”

  The gravel road was lined by ditches with long strands of dead, brown grass haphazardly twisted at various angles by the winter storms. Beyond the ditches stretched long fields so dark and muddy they looked like could have been composed of finely ground coal. The cold air bit at my ears. The local farmers were waiting for the water from the melted snow to completely run off the fields so they could start planting. About a hundred yards from the road sat a row of poplar trees jutting from the muddy ground like dried sticks. I looked down the gravel road and thought out loud, “That’s a long walk to the next farm for an eleven-year-old girl.”

  “They said she did it all the time.” Tony looked at me curiously. “Any visions or premonitions?”

  I finally realized what he was getting at, so I explained, “I’m not psychic. I just have an obsession with numbers. It’s not anything special. Anyone could find out what I know with an iPhone.”

  “The square footage of Morrison County?”

  “I grew up on a farm near here.”

  Tony smirked. “For a moment I thought you were going to make it easy for us. That’s too bad.” He looked out at the muddy fields and said, “I’ve lived here for two decades now, and no one can explain to me why everyone plants corn. So, farm boy, tell me. Why does everyone plant corn?”

  Tony apparently had done his research on me, too. I looked out at the field and with a half-smile, said, “They just do. But it hasn’t been planted yet. It’s too wet.”

  He stared at me for a few seconds, and with histrionics, waved his arms as he said, “Now I get it—they just do! Next time I put a criminal in front of the judge, I’ll tell the judge, ‘He did it.’ When the judge asks how I know, I’ll tell him, ‘I just do.’ That should work.”

  I grew up with a father who would furiously ruminate on issues, so I had little tolerance for this kind of ranting. Determined to end his tantrum quickly, I explained, “Okay, there are more profitable crops that could be planted in this soil. But a farmer in this area plants corn because his dad did and made money, and his dad’s dad planted corn, and he made money, too. Planting corn is profitable, but not the best option.”

  Tony seemed to find perverse pleasure in agitating me, but he quickly acquiesced. “Okay, I get it. So, ‘They just do,’ is simply the best answer.”

  “Yes.”

  As we walked down the road, Tony commented, “Another day standing out on a dirt road. Welcome to rural Minnesota. They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Well, at least it’s paved.” Tony directed me, “You walk the ditch north for a bit, and I’ll head south. Yell if you find anything.”

  Becoming progressively impatient, I half-jogged as I searched. The three-hour mark had passed since Brittany’s disappearance. Three hours after an abduction, the odds of finding the victim alive drop below fifty percent.

  Chapter

  Three

  PANTHERA

  1:38 P.M.

  SATURDAY, MARCH 29

  GRAVEL ROAD

  BE SOBER, BE VIGILANT; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.” Peter 5:8 Panthera is my name for myself, a name I will never hear outside my head. Panthera Atrox was the scientific name of the North American lion. It’s not to be confused with Pantera, although I did like the title of their first CD, Vulgar Display of Power.

  Sharp, frozen clumps of dirt and ice cut into my knees as I kneel in the frozen ditch. Her breathing is shallow, but it’s still there. There’s a rosy redness to her cheeks and nose from the cold. I speak to my silent prey. “The cops are searching just a mile down the road, so it’s time for us to part. If you would have just listened, it wouldn’t have ended like this.”

  I lay a blanket out in the ditch and roll her body into it.

  I can see in their eyes when it’s to the point they think they can defy me. They have all entered my life uninvited, and I was initially polite to every one. It’s ignorant for them to expect there won’t be consequences for intruding in the life of a predator. Eventually, I speak softly into their ears and my words pe
netrate their thoughts as unforgettable. It ends with them, to quote Israel Keys, “Begging to be my Stockholm sweetheart.” Keys thought he learned from studying Ted Bundy, but he obviously didn’t learn enough. Keys cut his wrists and hanged himself in his cell in 2012, when he was caught. Bundy escaped twice before he was finally fried. Still, Bundy spent his last night of life crying and praying. Sigh . . .

  I run my thumb over her forehead and give her one last kiss.

  “I don’t want to kill you, Brittany, but I’m out of options. I could say it’s the crap I went through as a teen, but it’s about survival. Nietsche. Social Darwinism. It’s about the need to either stand for something or simply disappear into nothingness. It’s not about recognition. If you think that, you don’t know me. No one really knows me. But I have done something for you, Brittany. Because I picked you, people will talk about you forever.”

  I cradle her body and begin to carry it down the hill.

  I hate it when the adrenaline wears off. I used to spend days worrying, but now I’m smart enough to clean up the mess instead of relying on blind luck and intimidation. I just need to finish it. My life goes on.

  I slide her body into its final resting place, then return to open the floodgates.

  I did get one piece of useful information from watching ID, the Investigation Discovery channel. Israel Keys buried a murder kit so he would be prepared when he had the need to kill. I’m too smart to get this close to getting caught again.

  I carry the five-gallon bucket containing duct tape, a handgun, needles loaded with an animal tranquilizer, industrial plastic zip ties, and an awl to the black, muddy field. I use my phone to get the GPS coordinates of the bucket and then commit the numbers to memory. I shut my phone off, toss it in the bucket, wipe it all down, seal the cover, and then bury the bucket.

  The murder kit is in place, and now I need to depart.

  Chapter

  Four

  JON FREDERICK

  1:56 P.M.

  SATURDAY, MARCH 29

  210TH STREET (GRAVEL ROAD)

  WE NEEDED TO TALK TO the girl’s mother. I followed Tony’s beat-up, brown Chevy Celebrity down the gravel road. It was the first unmarked car I’d ever seen with rust eating through it. I wasn’t sure how much benefit there was to having an unmarked car in Morrison County—everyone knew everybody. All the local criminals likely knew what Inspector Shileto drove.

  After parking the cars in the Brennans’ dirt driveway, we started the long walk to the farmhouse. Tony glanced at my hand and commented, “You’re not married.”

  “No.” Deciding to take the focus off me, I asked, “Are you?”

  “I was. I married this fantasy of having a fulfilling job and some wonderful time alone with my beautiful wife. Instead, I spent long nights interrogating slimeballs, and she just got tired of being alone. When people tell you ‘we both grew apart’ or ‘it was mutual,’ you know they’re just giving you a line of crap. It’s never mutual. Someone always wants out and the other person can’t stop it.” Tony took a cleansing breath and blew it out in a white vapor. “No one likes spending a lot of time alone. I don’t hate her for leaving.”

  “But you hate her for other reasons?”

  Tony glanced over at me, as if trying to figure me out. “You might have some potential,” he chuckled. “Go through a divorce with a kid involved, Jon. You have reasons to hate that person. I have a boy who worshiped me once, who now can’t stand me for reasons I’m not aware of.” Tony squeezed his shirt pocket and muttered, “And I quit smoking.” He was silent for a moment, likely grieving the loss of his nicotine, then got to the case at hand. “Greg and Denise Downing picked Brittany up to go to church with them at eight o’clock this morning, as they do every Sunday. After returning from church, Brittany stayed to play with their ten-year-old daughter, Kayla, until about ten thirty, and headed home. After Brittany left, Greg Downing bundled his daughter up, and they went outside. He watched Kayla jump on the trampoline for fifteen minutes before he decided it was too chilly, and they headed back in. The Downings are a nice, Christian family. There is no evidence of any kind of a struggle in or around either the Downing home or the Brennan home. We’ve searched the barn and the sheds. To sum it up, we don’t have a hell of a lot.”

  I added, “Except the jacket you found on the road?”

  “We do have that. I do know the jacket was only recently left here. If it had been here overnight, it would have been soaking wet.”

  WE REACHED THE FADED brown door of Al and Mary Brennan’s home.

  Mary Brennan was a big-boned, sturdy woman. She had thinning, reddish-blonde hair, pale, weathered skin, and small eyes set back behind plump cheeks. She was only five years older than I was, but looked a decade beyond her years. She sat at the worn oak kitchen table with several school pictures of a petite, dark-haired girl spread out before her. A stained dish towel was bunched in chapped hands. The linoleum floor had likely started out white, but had yellowed over the years. This helped it blend with the walls, which had started out yellow, and faded closer to a shade of off-white. Gingham-checked curtains gathered to the side of double windows gave view to an expansive mowed lawn, edged by pole sheds. On a happier day, I’d expect to see an apple pie on the table.

  Tony put a finger on one of the pictures and told her, “Thank you for finding the pictures of Brittany.”

  Mary nodded, fighting back tears. “On Sunday mornings, we all just kind of do our own thing. I was going through our mail. Al went and checked out the south field, and came back a muddy mess. There’s just too much water in the fields to plant.”

  “Where is Al now?”

  “He changed his clothes, and is tryin’ to get some chores done so he can assist with the search.”

  Tony thought for a moment before continuing, “Mary, do you have any proof that Al and Jason were in the yard after ten thirty?”

  “Yeah, I heard Al returnin’ in the truck, a little after ten. The muffler’s got a big hole in it. It’s pretty bad when you can’t watch TV in the house because the truck’s runnin’ outside.”

  Tony frowned. “That doesn’t really tell us much, because that’s before Brittany left the Downing’s home.”

  “But it shut off and never started up again. You can’t ignore the thunderin’ sound of that thing startin’ up. The van isn’t runnin’, so the truck’s the only workin’ vehicle we have.”

  I asked, “Were you messaging with anyone on the Internet this morning?” Communicating online could open up a home to a variety of predators.

  The question took Mary by surprise. She glanced at Tony and then back at me before responding. “What’s that got to do with Brittany? I didn’t talk about Brittany.”

  Tony asked her, “Who were you talking to?”

  Mary busied herself wiping the table and avoided eye contact when she answered. “I was just checking my emails.”

  She was obviously lying. Tony callously said, “I don’t care about your online boyfriends. We can’t afford to be wasting time right now. You need to be honest with us, Mary, for your daughter’s sake.” I held my breath as I considered telling Tony to show some compassion.

  Mary’s cheeks reddened, and she responded, “He’s just a friend, from another state. It has nothin’ to do with this. I don’t want to be blamed for distractin’ you guys, when Brittany might still be saved.” Mary’s flushed face became a portrait of guilt. She took a shuddering breath, and tears began to trickle down her round cheeks.

  I softly asked, “Where was Jason at ten thirty?”

  Mary sternly answered, “Jason was in the shed tinkerin’ with the van. It’s not runnin’ because Jason’s a teenage boy, and he’s hard on things.” She softened her tone. “But he’s a good kid, and he was out there tryin’ to fix it. He came in about eleven thirty. When I told him Brittany wasn’t home, he was frantic. I think he was afraid she got hit by a car. So I called Al and told him to come in.”

  Tony asked, “What time did
you call Al?”

  “A little after eleven thirty, and he came right away. We called the neighbors. They put off their Sunday dinners and everybody went out searchin’. Al led them and they walked the ditches the whole way, both sides, lookin’ for her.” Mary’s voice became gritty. “Please, just go find her.” Drowning in genuine grief, she put her head down.

  Tony cocked an eyebrow. “You called the police before you searched? You knew something bad had happened?”

  Mary was losing patience. “Brittany’s never this late.”

  Tony thought out loud. “Is there an officer with Al right now?”

  “Al’s doin’ chores with Jason. They’ll be in as soon as they’re done. We still need to feed our animals.”

  Tony’s frustration was mounting; he slapped the table, and I jerked back in surprise.

  Mary looked at him like he was crazy and implored, “Please, just go find her!”

  I was in a dilemma. I wanted to tell Tony to simmer down, but as a rookie, I didn’t feel it was my role. At the same time, I didn’t want to be part of a duo of investigators who would be emotionally abusive to a woman who just lost a child. I stood up and put my hand on Mary’s shoulder in an effort to console her. In my gentlest tone, I told her, “If anything occurs to you that you think might be helpful, call. I know this is hard. We want to help any way we can.” I set a card on the table with my number on it. “Where can we find Al and Jason?”

  She studied my card for a second and sarcastically replied, “I said they’re doin’ chores, Jon Frederick.”

  I found her contempt toward me gratifying, as it was evidence of resilience.

  Tony sat motionless. It was his way of telling me he’d decide when the interview was over. He studied Mary in silence as she wiped away tears with the back of her hand. Without another word, Tony turned and left the home.

  When I stepped outside, I expected him to yell at me for ending the interview.