Avengers of Blood

by Gae-Lynn Woods

  Joseph leaned back in Moses’ chair, now almost deaf to its squeak. Moses had met Moore five years ago and Joseph didn’t recognize her photo or name. This meant that Moses had kept his relationship with her a secret. And Moses sucked at keeping secrets, so staying quiet about Moore must have been important to him. Maybe their liaison made someone crazy enough to murder them both. A spurned lover? A redneck who had problems with mixed-race couples? A tiny flicker of hope bloomed in his brain. If these murders were about Moses and Moore, Joseph would find their killer. He still hated her, but neither Moses nor this woman deserved to die because they were in love. Joseph nodded; this was a place to start.

  CHAPTER 55

  CASS PULLED INTO EMMET Hedder’s drive and watched as Jerome, a large man in pale blue scrubs, executed a delicate dance with a well-dressed woman who was trying to get past him to the front porch. The house was a neat one-story brick with a two vehicle carport to the side. Mitch was twisted sideways with the passenger seat pushed as far back as it would go to allow his brace encased leg and crutches to fit in the truck’s cab. “Can you get out by yourself?” she asked.

  “I’ll manage,” he huffed, reaching for the door handle but hitting the button to lower the window instead. “Give me a minute.”

  Cass stepped from the cab and adjusted her belt, enjoying its weight against her hip bones. The sun’s heat baked from the driveway and sweat prickled her underarms and between her shoulder blades. “Jerome?” she called. “Ma’am?”

  The woman spun at the sound of Cass’s voice. She took in the Sheriff’s department logo on the side of the pickup, slung a massive purse over her shoulder and marched across the lawn to meet Cass, tucking her dark blue blouse into a pair of dirty beige slacks. Her black hair was loosely styled around a face the color of creamed coffee. “Thank God you’re here. Jerome’s gone mad. He said the cops were coming but won’t let me go in the house or tell me why he called you.”

  “I’m Cass Elliot, ma’am, with the sheriff’s office. And you are?”

  “Celia Hedder. This is my house. What is going on?”

  Mitch hobbled to join them. “Detective Mitch Stone, ma’am. Are you Mrs. Emmet Hedder?”

  “I am.”

  “Would you mind if we had a word with Jerome?”

  “Yes,” she stated, placing one hand on her hip. “I would. He can say whatever he has to say to me.”

  Jerome stood quietly near the porch, waiting. He was a big man, an ex-con who’d spent time in the penitentiary for auto theft and armed robbery and bore a host of prison tattoos as evidence of his time inside. Unlike many of his fellow convicts, Jerome refused to slide back into the dangerous waters of criminal life, and through a quirk of fate found a job working for a rich widow in an exclusive retirement community. He watched them through dark chocolate eyes, his nutmeg-hued skin a bit paler than the last time Cass had seen him.

  “Mrs. Hedder might be able to help, Mitch.” Cass waved Jerome over and asked Celia, “Do you know where your husband is?”

  “That sorry man’s not at work? If he’s not there, he’s probably gone off on one of his little trips.”

  “I don’t think so, Celia,” Jerome said. “The old people worry, so he always calls when he’s gonna miss work.”

  “Ma’am, where have you been today?” Cass asked.

  “I teach preschool for half a day.” Cass figured that explained the green goo mashed into the knees of Celia’s beige slacks. “I had a late lunch with my mother, and just got to the house.”

  “What time did Emmet leave home today?”

  Some of the anger left Celia’s face. She gave Jerome a rueful look. “I wasn’t here.”

  “Where were you?” Cass asked.

  She closed her eyes. “At my mother’s house. I’ve been living there for a while now.”

  “You’re separated?” Mitch asked.

  “Not legally, but yes, we’re living apart.”

  “Why?”

  Her eyes snapped open and she glared at Jerome. “He’s been acting strange for a while now, hasn’t he?”

  The big man held up both hands. “Emmet’s had a hard time, Celia. I don’t know why, but something’s upset him. I thought maybe it was trouble with y’all’s marriage.”

  “Don’t you lay this on me, Jerome. Emmet’s the one who’s been sneaking off and won’t say where he’s been.”

  “When was the last time you were here?” Mitch asked.

  “Saturday. I came to check on my plants. Emmet never remembers to water them.” Celia looked down at herself. “I came today to get clothes.”

  Cass exchanged a glance with Mitch. “Ma’am, may I have your permission to look around your yard and the outside of the house?”

  “What for?”

  “Your husband seems to be missing, and we want to make sure nothing’s wrong.”

  Her lips flattened into a thin line. “Fine. Maybe you can figure out where he’s gone this time.”

  Cass followed Jerome across the front lawn and under the carport where a green Camry ticked as it cooled. Jerome stopped her and glanced at the concrete floor. “I don’t know if it means anything, but there’s muddy footprints up the drive, through here, and in the backyard.”

  She squatted. A faint trail of smeared orange-gray footprints ran under the Camry toward the backyard and a similar set, more difficult to see, came back across the open section of the carport. Cass’s senses prickled. This was the second time today she’d come across this type of muddy footprint at a crime scene. “The Hedders have two cars?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Jerome answered. “Emmet drives a little black pickup.”

  Cass stood and headed for the large backyard. She estimated that the Hedders owned about two acres, as did each of their neighbors. There were no fences, and Cass had a clear view across the adjoining yards and down the street. A stream gurgled at the bottom of the properties, and across it a narrow strip of woods separated the residential section from the golf course.

  “The bedroom window is past the porch.” He pointed at the ground. “There’s the footprints in the grass. I tried not to step on them.”

  She squatted again. They were very faint and only visible because the lush St. Augustine was crushed. Cass wondered if the average citizen would have been sharp enough to recognize that the footprints could be evidence, or if it took an ex-con to be so alert. Picking her way across the well-maintained lawn, she used the impressions from Jerome’s shoes to avoid leaving another trail. His steps stopped outside a large, paned window. The curtains were tied back and Cass had a clear view into a bedroom housing functional furniture straight from an Ikea showroom. The pale green bedclothes were mussed and a dark substance was smeared on a pillow and streaked across the wall. A section of the headboard was splintered.

  Cass pulled her vision back to the house’s exterior. She found a single hole through one pane in the middle of the window. Her eyes caught a glint higher up and she spotted a second bullet hole. She wondered why the neighbors hadn’t reported hearing shots as she pulled the cell phone from her pocket and dialed Kado.

  “Where are you?” Cass asked through the static scratching from her phone.

  “Bank vault. Truman finished the warrant for Donna Moore’s safe deposit box and Judge Shackleford signed it. What’s up?”

  “We’ve got another shooting.” Cass gave him the address and snapped the phone closed. She checked the rest of the house, looking for jimmied windows and ensuring the doors were locked, and spotted no signs of disturbance. Jerome had waited by the carport and she joined him there, stopping to check the side door and spotting a dark drop on the carport’s concrete near the step into the house. She squatted. Its directionality indicated that the bleeder had been moving from inside the house across the carport. No other drops were visible.

  Jerome paused beside her. “Is that blood? Do you think Emmet got away?”

  “It’s possible, but I need to get inside.” She crossed the front yard to wh
ere Celia Hedder was grousing at Mitch and interrupted the woman. “Mrs. Hedder, would you unlock the house, please?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “What for?”

  “Someone fired a gun through the bedroom window.”

  She gasped, dropped her purse, and stooped to search through it. “Is it Emmet? Is he hurt? What happened? Who would shoot Emmet?” She dumped the contents of her bag on the ground and pawed through the lipsticks, sunglasses, cash, and crayons. Jerome knelt beside her, plucked a set of keys from the tangle of female paraphernalia, and handed them to Cass. Celia swayed and Jerome caught her. She leaned into him and started to cry.

  “The house isn’t clear, Cass,” Mitch said, struggling on his crutches to keep up as she hurried across the lawn and unlocked the front door.

  “The shooter’s long gone, Mitch. And,” she added, lowering her voice, “it looks like Emmet shot back and might have made it out of the house. There’s a drop of blood in the carport and Jerome says Emmet’s car is missing.”

  He started to speak but Cass stopped him.

  “If I thought there was a chance that someone was inside, I’d call for backup. But there’s not. I want to make sure Emmet’s not still here and injured, okay?”

  Mitch followed her into the cool, silent house, waiting in the tiled foyer. She moved quietly from room to room, stopping in the master bedroom to examine the splintered headboard and blood on the bedclothes and wall, and to spot a bloody handprint on the carpet near the bed. Another dark smudge marred the hall wall. Four narrow strips of dried blood streaked the wall beneath a key holder near the kitchen door.

  She returned to the foyer and Mitch. “He’s gone.”

  “He can’t be at a hospital. They’d report a gunshot wound.”

  “Given the height of the blood smear in the hall, the injury is probably to his shoulder or upper arm. It’s not bleeding much and he might be able to pass it off as a cut. We’ll call the hospitals, but I think he’s running.”

  “From who?”

  “Whoever killed the Franklins and Donna. For whatever reason, they want Emmet Hedder, too.”

  “That’s a big leap, Cass.”

  “I’ll bet you breakfast from The Golden Gate for a week that the mud from the footprints in the backyard matches that from Donna’s yard, and the slug in Emmet Hedder’s wall is a .308.”

  CHAPTER 56

  THE DRY SMELL OF old paper greeted Munk as he untied the black ribbon snugged around the last of the Franklin files. He’d been through all of Martha’s and Moses’ paperwork, and everything of Joseph’s from the attic. There was nothing unusual in any of the bank statements, tax returns, or other bills he’d examined. He’d found no link to Donna Moore. Not even a business card or notation on a piece of paper. His frustration was building. Munk was methodical, particularly in the examination of paperwork. But all of his effort this afternoon seemed to have been for naught.

  Munk stretched his pudgy arms over his head before checking his watch. Four o’clock. Gabrielle and her family would still be on the beach, handing out flyers and asking, “Have you seen this girl? Her name is Angel.”

  Hand.

  No hand.

  For a moment, the urge to pull on his shorts and t-shirt, jump in the car, and make the long drive to Galveston overwhelmed him. He had washed the clothes in the station’s machines, and just in case, repacked them in the car this afternoon. The tank was full of gas and he was ready to go. But the Franklin’s autopsy photos were still spread across the conference room table. Neither Joseph nor Martha had had a chance against a gunman perched in a tree in Deadwood Hollow. He convinced himself that Gabrielle and her army of familia would be fine on their own. Munk was more use here.

  Settling into the plastic chair, he scanned the documents in the top folder. Two marriage certificates for Martha Franklin. One to a Charles Franklin from Magnolia County, Alabama. The second to a Homer Radcliffe from right here in Forney County, Texas. And two death certificates, one each for Charles and Homer. An oddity was Martha’s petition to the court after Homer Radcliffe’s death, requesting that her name be legally restored to Franklin. Munk was a young patrol officer when Homer Radcliffe died, and he remembered the gossip that erupted when Martha changed her name back to Franklin. Such things rarely happened in small towns like Arcadia.

  There were Alabama birth certificates for Moses and Joseph, and for Martha and their father, Charles. His death certificate, dated May 11, 1967, was also included. Cause of death was listed as ‘asphyxia due to obstructed airway’. He put the certificates aside and smoothed open a copy of Martha Franklin’s will. In it, she left everything in equal proportion to her sons, which was little surprise. The last papers in the file were held together with a paper clip. Munk gently pulled it off and separated the papers – a blank page protected each side of a thick, creamy document. He smiled, shaking his head. Martha Franklin had earned a degree in education from Judson College. Munk knew Moses’ mother from her time as a school lunch lady, when he called her Mrs. Radcliffe and she called him Ernest. With an education like this, her employment in a school cafeteria was a waste. He wondered if she had ever taught school and why she hadn’t started in Arcadia.

  In a second file, Munk found paperwork related to several car loans, all of them repaid. The folder also contained the original mortgage for the Franklin house, which was in Homer Radcliffe’s name alone. That document was marked paid-in-full back in 1988. A second mortgage was dated 2008, and Munk remembered Moses’ frustration that Martha took out the loan after Joseph was arrested in New York. Moses also moved back to his mother’s home not long after Joseph’s arrest, and from the look of Moses’ bank statements, he was helping his mother repay the mortgage. Joseph was looking for a job, but with a record, it would take time to find one. His ability to contribute to the household expenses, much less repay his mother and Moses, was limited.

  A nasty little thought landed in Munk’s brain: What if Moses was tired of cleaning up after Joseph? Munk balanced his elbows on the conference room table and rested his head in his hands. Sometimes, he hated this job and the wicked things that went on in his brain, but he let the idea play out.

  From riding patrol with Moses on a few occasions, Munk knew that he was ashamed of his brother’s arrest, and was anxious when the time grew near for Joseph’s release. Could Moses be embarrassed or angry enough to murder his own brother and mother? But if he killed Joseph and Martha, Moses was also Moore’s murderer. Munk had heard that Moses spent last night at Porky River’s apartment, but Stella was away, and Porky went into the ME’s office to help with the Franklin murders and Calvin Whitehead. Moses had the opportunity to kill Moore.

  But did he have means? Munk wasn’t sure, but he didn’t think that Moses owned a gun other than his service issue weapon and a 12-gauge shotgun for killing the armadillos that occasionally ravaged his mother’s yard. He’d never heard Moses talk about owning, or even firing, a rifle. Kado said that the Franklin shooter was in a tree roughly one hundred yards from Martha Franklin’s house. Moses was a dreadful shot, and there was simply no way he could have hit the side of a barn at that distance, much less one human being. The chances that he could’ve hit two people were nonexistent. Apparently the killer was standing close to Moore’s bedroom window when he fired the single shot that ended her life. Was it possible that Moses could have killed her? Physically, he might have been able to make that shot. He also could have hired someone to do the killing, but from the look of his bank account, Moses had little money to pay for such a service.

  Motive. Munk could just about understand how a brother could be driven to kill his twin over embarrassment and financial strain. But what motive did Moses have to kill Moore? None, from the looks of his family’s paperwork. There was simply no connection between the two in these files. The chances that Moses had murdered, or paid someone to murder, his family and Moore were slim to none.

  With relief, Munk pushed the nasty thoughts away and picked up the last f
ile from Martha Franklin’s desk. Several yellowed newspaper clippings fell out. The first was half of an advertisement from a furniture store Munk had never heard of. It had been neatly snipped and no date or paper name was visible. He turned the slip over and his breath caught in his throat.

  “Men Found Hanging in Grove”, the headline read. A brief story followed, providing scant details of how Charles Franklin, Robert Hedder, and Ben Silverman were hanged and burned to death the night of May 11 in a town called Thayerville. No year was provided; probably because the full date was included at the top of the page. A single photograph accompanied the story. A flash-lit scene showed charred bodies hanging from the branches of three trees. Five men clad in white sheets and hoods stood between the corpses. Two of the men cradled shotguns while the others held flaming torches.

  “Good Lord,” Munk breathed. He reached for Charles Franklin’s death certificate; cause of death was listed as asphyxia. But ‘lynching’ was Charles’ true cause of death. Most of the officers on the force knew that Moses and Joseph’s father had died when they were young. But no one thought to question how the man had died. Moses rarely spoke of his natural father, and Munk wondered if he and Joseph knew about this horrific event.