Outside the Wire

by Patricia Smiley

  Davie put on the jacket and socks and followed him to the porch, where the four teak rocking chairs waited. She again asked him who might have wanted all four former Rangers dead, but he didn’t have a clue. After that they barely spoke—just sat and rocked—until fifteen minutes later when she saw the Crown Vic’s tires throwing gravel and dust as it screeched into the clearing. Vaughn bolted out of the car and sprinted to the porch.

  “You okay, Davie?” His expression changed from concern to disbelief as he paused to study her orange sweatpants. “What the hell are you wearing? You look like a traffic cone.”

  She leaned back in the rocker and looked at the breeze ruffling the treetops. “I was worried about you, too, Jason.”

  For the next fifteen minutes the three of them sat on the porch and debriefed. Vaughn told them he was at the side of the cabin when he heard the shots—at least a half dozen of them. He took cover and inched his way toward the river, but by the time he got there, she and Lunds were already in the water and the shooting had stopped.

  “We need to go across the river,” Davie said, “see if we can find any spent shell casings.”

  “You’re joking, right?” Vaughn said, pointing to the distant hills. “That’s a forest out there. Haven’t you heard the expression ‘finding a needle in a haystack’?”

  “Nobody said it would be easy,” she said, “but we have to try.”

  Lunds rose from the chair and walked around the side of the cabin toward the river. Davie and Vaughn followed and found him at the river’s edge, staring across to the opposite bank.

  “You shouldn’t be standing in the open,” she said. “The shooter might still be out there, watching.”

  Lunds pointed to a place midway up the mountain. “That’s where I’d stand to take the shot. The rocks are jagged, but there’s a narrow path that leads up to a ledge that’s wide enough to lay prone. He could spread his arms to aim and get a clear shot at us. There’s plenty of cover so nobody would spot him.”

  “Can you tell us how to get over there?” she said.

  He turned to study her expression and then nodded. “I’ll take you. I’ve hiked up that way dozens of times. It’s not far from the road. Your partner said he heard at least six shots. If the shooter was a pro, he picked up any spent shell casings, but if he was in a hurry, he may have missed one or two.”

  Davie and Vaughn followed Lunds to the cabin. He disappeared down a hallway toward the back of the house and emerged minutes later carrying Davie’s clothes.

  “At least they’re dry.” He pointed toward the hallway. “You can change in the spare bedroom. It’s the last door on the left. I tried to dry your boots with a pair of shoe warmers but they’re still damp.”

  Davie found the bedroom and put on her black pantsuit. The boots were still oozing water, which made walking annoying but not difficult. She put the sweater and orange sweatpants into the plastic bag. Vaughn was waiting for her in the driver’s seat of the detective car. She transferred the bag of borrowed clothes into the trunk. Lunds fired up the Harley and sped out of the clearing. Vaughn floored the Crown Vic and followed.

  “Why are you keeping those ratty clothes?”

  “I thought we could return them to the convenience store on the way out of town. Somebody else might need them.”

  “Who? A CalTrans flagger?”

  Lunds led them across a bridge to the other side of the river. After about a mile or so, he stopped the motorcycle along a wide section of the shoulder and removed his helmet. Vaughn parked the car behind the Harley.

  Lunds pointed up hill. “We’ll go the rest of the way on foot.”

  Vaughn removed several evidence envelopes, a camera, and three sets of gloves from the Murder Kit in the trunk and brought up the rear as the three of them hiked into the woods.

  They’d been climbing for about fifteen minutes when Lunds stopped abruptly. He pointed to the trail ahead. “The brush is trampled down. Somebody was here recently.”

  Vaughn scanned the area. “Could have been a hiker.”

  Davie turned and whispered, “Or a bear.”

  “Joke all you want,” he whispered back. “I hear they pick off the little ones first. I figure you’d make a tasty hors d’oeurve.”

  Vaughn snapped photos of the broken twigs before continuing up the trail. When they reached the ledge, Davie turned and swept her gaze across the terrain. Lunds was right. From this vantage point the shooter had a clear shot across the river toward the cabin. The type of rifle he’d used was unknown, but the shells would likely be large enough to see. She glanced over her right shoulder and began to search.

  After twenty minutes of beating through the dry brush, the arms of her jacket were filthy and snagged. Nettles had torn the skin on her hands and face. Added to the bruises on her thigh and back, her body felt broken along with her spirits.

  She had found nothing and began to worry that the shooter had picked up the spent shells and taken them out of the area just as Lunds had speculated. Her energy was fading, so she lay on a fallen tree to rest, letting a ray of sun warm her face. She heard Vaughn in the distance, calling her name.

  As she turned her head toward the sound of his voice, the sun bounced off a shiny object in the underbrush. She bolted to a sitting position and fixed her gaze on the spot of light near a hollowed-out log. Lying on the ground was a metal object, a large-caliber spent shell casing.

  “Jason,” she shouted. “Over here.”

  Branches snapped and the brush parted. “Find something?”

  She pointed to the object.

  Vaughn stared in disbelief. “Looks like the guy got careless.” He pulled out an evidence envelope he’d brought from the car, slipped on latex gloves, and slid the casing inside. “When we get back to L.A., the firearms geeks can tell us what kind of gun he used.”

  “Where’s Lunds?”

  “I lost track of him. I guess he went up the trail to see if the shooter left anything up there.”

  Davie glanced uphill. “Let’s go find him. Then we have to call Detective Giordano. Let him know what’s happened.”

  25

  Davie found Lunds higher up on the trail, staring at the river below. She didn’t want to startle him so she cleared her voice before speaking. “We found a shell casing.”

  He nodded as if he’d known she was there all along. “Some sort of military rifle, I’d guess.”

  “Probably, but we won’t know for sure until we have the casing analyzed at the lab.”

  His body was rigid and his muscles taut. She reminded herself somebody had just tried to kill him. That had to be stressful, even for a former Army Ranger and especially for somebody who had once suffered from PTSD and recently lost his three best friends.

  “If you show me the casing, I can probably tell you what caliber it is and maybe what kind of weapon it came from.”

  “Thanks,” she said, “but it’s already sealed in an evidence envelope. I’ll have it analyzed as soon as we get back to L.A.”

  He didn’t pursue the offer any further. In fact, he didn’t speak at all during the hike down the hill. She and Vaughn followed the Harley back to the cabin and waited on the porch while Lunds went inside. A few minutes later, he returned, carrying a small black bag.

  “You travel light,” she said.

  He locked the front door. “It’s the only way.”

  “Where will you go?”

  He strolled down the steps to the Harley and stowed his travel bag on the back. “I’ll let you know when I get there. You have my cell. You can call if you need me.”

  Davie hovered near him as he put on his helmet. “Look, I live in a guesthouse behind a security gate and a seven-foot brick wall. You could camp out there for a night or two until we can arrange for a safe house. I’ll bunk with my dad.”

  He threw his leg over the seat.
Then he smiled, the first she’d seen from him. “Thanks, but I’m better off alone.”

  She understood his point of view. It’s probably what she would have said under the same circumstances. Except, sometimes it was better to accept help and not play the hero. Something to remember, she thought. She stepped away from the bike. “Your call.”

  “Promise you’ll let me be there for the takedown.”

  Under similar circumstances, she’d want to watch the arrest of a man who’d killed her three closest friends, but civilians weren’t invited to the show, not even when they were former military. “I can’t promise that.”

  Without responding, he fired up the motor and roared out of the clearing toward the main road. Once he was out of sight, Vaughn made a U-turn to drop off the clothes at the convenience store, and then headed toward L.A.

  As soon as Davie got a cell signal, she put Giordano on speakerphone. Her boss must have sensed the emotion in her voice because he said, “You okay, kid?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “It’s just cold up here, that’s all. There are some new developments in the case you need to know about.”

  “Shoot,” he said.

  The word made her cringe. As they drove back to the station, she told Giordano everything that had happened in the past twenty-four hours, including the attempt on Dag Lunds’s life.

  “Jeez. I let you out of my sight for a few hours and—”

  “We’re fine,” she said. “But we have two open homicide cases in different jurisdictions—Woodrow’s in Pacific, Cormack’s in San Bernardino County, and I believe a third, Juno Karst’s in Nevada. Now there’s a fourth felony, an attempted murder in Kern County. We didn’t notify local law enforcement; it would have taken forever for them to respond to the scene.”

  “Don’t worry,” Giordano said. “I’ll call them.”

  “The point is,” Davie said, “all four of those men worked together for decades. I don’t know if all their deaths are related to TidePool, but I believe all of them are related. When will Homicide Special want the case?”

  “When you’re ready to make an arrest,” he grumbled.

  Vaughn chuckled.

  “You think I’m joking?” he said. “I’ll run it by the Captain. Don’t take it personally, but I’m guessing he’ll be happy to send it downtown. It’ll lower his homicide numbers at COMPSTAT.”

  Giordano was talking about the meetings held by the department’s top brass to discuss crime statistics in each division. From what she’d heard, the recriminations for upticks were brutal.

  “I hope you can talk him into keeping the investigation at Pacific,” she said, “at least for a while. Jason and I have put this case together without any help. We’ve collected forensic evidence and interviewed witnesses. We can write all the search warrants we need and coordinate the service. If we want a surveillance team, we can request help from downtown.”

  “You two did a great job, kid, but RHD has fifteen dicks sitting on their asses doing freakin’ nothing. Let them coordinate with the other cop shops and bring in the experts.”

  “But there are still leads we can—”

  Giordano interrupted her midsentence. “Look, I know how you feel. It’s tough when you’ve given your all on a case and then have to give it up. Like I said, you two have done a great job, but believe me, it’s best for everybody that we do this right. I’ll clear it with Maciver and the Captain and then call the other law enforcement agencies to let them know we’re sending the case downtown. As soon as you get back to the station, write your three-fourteen and make sure all the information is in the Murder Book.”

  “Roger that,” she said without enthusiasm and then ended the call.

  Vaughn turned to look at her, assessing her mood. “Well, that sucks but I did warn you.”

  Davie’s cheeks burned. Not only would Dag Lunds not be there when detectives made an arrest, she wouldn’t be there, either. She felt a bond with Zeke Woodrow, as she did with all of the victims, but now somebody else would follow the case through to the end. Letting go was tough to accept.

  It would take a while to write her final report. Maybe she’d find some overlooked evidence that would break the investigation wide open. If not, she hoped the anger she felt would eventually turn into the final stage of grief—acceptance.

  By the time she and Vaughn got back to the squad room it was after five o’clock. Detective Giordano had already notified San Bernardino’s Homicide detectives and the Goldfield County Sheriff’s office that the Woodrow case was being kicked downtown and that somebody from RHD would contact them. Based on information she and Vaughn had uncovered, Nevada told her boss they were reopening the Juno Karst investigation as a possible homicide.

  Davie spent the next hour at her desk computer, reviewing the forensic evidence and witness statements, writing a summary of the crime and the follow-up investigation, and typing an official request that the case be transferred. The only thing left was for Detective Giordano to sign the report and get the Captain’s approval.

  Giordano wasn’t at his desk when she printed the report, so she left the pages stacked in his in-basket and wandered outside to a median in the parking lot to get some fresh air. She sat at the picnic table and laid her head on her arms. She thought about the uncertainty of the coming days. Her boss might ask her to work a cold case or let her take a couple days off to nurse her physical and emotional wounds.

  She still had on the same clothes that had survived the river, a hot dryer, and a trek though the underbrush in the mountains above Lunds’s cabin. No one had commented on her appearance, but the snags on her jacket and pants and streaks of dirt imbedded in the polyester made her look like a hostage held by some third-world rebel army. Her body ached and the bruises were already turning vivid shades of purple and yellow.

  She wasn’t sure how long she’d been sitting there contemplating her next move—ten minutes, she guessed—before she saw her partner jogging across the pavement toward her.

  He stopped at the table, only slightly out of breath. “Giordano wants to see us in Maciver’s office.”

  Davie didn’t want to go. “You can answer any questions they have.”

  “He wants to talk to both of us. Maybe he’s going to give us a commendation.”

  Davie braced her hands on the picnic table and rose to her feet. “Lead the way.”

  When she and Vaughn got to Lt. Rich Maciver’s glass office, Giordano was already there, sitting with his fingers laced together on the tabletop. Maciver looked thin-faced and earnest in his neat Class A uniform. Most detectives wore business attire in the squad room—what the department called soft clothes—but lieutenants like Maciver came from patrol and most had never worked as detectives. He looked younger than his actual years, which made him seem more college dormitory proctor than a cop clawing his way up the LAPD’s chain of command.

  Davie’s 3.14 report lay on the table in front of the lieutenant, signed and stamped with rhd handling. She had updated Zeke Woodrow’s Murder Book in preparation for the transfer. It was also on the table.

  “Everything is in order,” she said. “I’ve also prepared a things-to-do list with possible interviews to conduct and search warrants to write—”

  Maciver’s brown eyes conveyed sympathy. “I hear the passion in your voice, Detective. This case means a lot you, doesn’t it?”

  In truth, all her cases meant a lot to her. Despite the grueling hours and the raw emotions, that sacred bond with the victims and their families was what drove all Homicide detectives to seek justice for the dead.

  “Jason and I could have solved the case,” she said, “given a little more time.”

  “We all agree.” As Maciver spoke those words, he swept his gaze around the table to encompass everyone, an inclusive gesture that surprised her. “That’s why you and your partner are going downtown. You’ll be on loan to
RHD for the rest of this DP, or as long as they need you.”

  Davie was stunned. She turned toward Vaughn to judge his reaction. He was grinning. He looked elated.

  Giordano pushed back his chair. His face was flushed. “What the hell? You didn’t tell me that.”

  Maciver’s expression was impassive. “I didn’t know until a few minutes ago, Frank. The Captain just got the request from RHD. They need Richards and Vaughn to help them run the case. Their detectives don’t have time to play catch-up.”

  Giordano’s hands balled into fists. “What about my time? They’re taking half of my workforce.”

  “We have a serial killer on our hands. Your detectives know everything about the investigation. RHD needs that knowledge. I’m sorry, Frank. The case has to go downtown. Richards and Vaughn are going with it.”

  “And what happens if they don’t arrest a suspect within this DP? Who’s going to investigate homicides here?”

  “You’ll just have to manage with two detectives. You can step in and help if necessary. ”

  “Fifteen effing detectives aren’t enough for them?” Giordano said. “I’m trying to run my squad. I can’t afford to lose these two. Maybe one of them but not both.”

  Davie thought of her partner’s excitement when Maciver announced the news. At first that surprised her, until she remembered his comment about transferring to the Mounted Unit. Vaughn was restless and ready for a change now. Homicide Special wasn’t horses, but maybe this was what he needed. Most detectives would die for an opportunity like this, but she liked working at Pacific and she liked working for Frank Giordano.

  “Send my partner,” she said to Maciver. “RHD doesn’t need me. Jason knows as much about the case as I do. I’ll stay here.”

  Maciver pushed the Murder Book toward Davie. “I don’t think you understand, Detective. You’re both going downtown. RHD made the request. There’s nothing any of us can do to change that.”

  Giordano raked his hand through his thinning hair. “Wait and see. They’ll use my peeps for grunt work and then take all the credit. Bunch of lazy prima donnas.”