by Terri Reid
She laughed out loud. “I’ll try to remember that, Dad,” she said, “In my line of work, that’ll be helpful.”
“Are you sassing me, little lady?” he asked. Mary could picture his bushy eyebrows lifting.
She laughed again. “Oh, no, Dad,” she said, “You’d never hear a word of disrespect from these lips. That would be Sean or Patrick, not your sweet Mary.”
* * * * *
Chapter Thirty-three
Bradley stood quietly in the doorway, listening to Mary’s side of the conversation. He didn’t want to interrupt her time with her dad. But as he listened to her side of the phone call, he couldn’t help but smile.
“No, Dad, everything’s fine,” she said, “I’m working on a great case. I’ll tell you about it next time we’re together.”
“Yes, I know, Thanksgiving’s just around the corner. I can’t wait.”
She paused and Bradley heard the soft sigh.
“I just wanted you to know that I love you,” she said softly. “You’ve always been the best Dad a girl could have.
“Okay, I will. Tell Ma that I love her too. I’ll try and call when she has a day off.
“Bye, Dad.”
She slipped her feet off the desk, carefully replaced the handset and rested her head in her hands.
She was worried, Bradley thought, disappointed in himself that he hadn’t noticed it before. That was a good-bye call.
“You are not going to die...again,” Bradley said.
Mary jumped. “Damn it, Bradley, would you please stop doing that to me. If I don’t get shot, I’m going to die of a heart attack.”
“You are not going to get shot,” he said, “You’re too smart for that.”
He motioned toward the door. “And since I’ve got a little extra time,” he said, “How about I turn your nice quiet door into an annoyingly squeaky one?”
“That would be great,” she said.
“It won’t be as much fun as scaring you,” he said, “But for you, anything.”
She smiled. “Thanks a lot.”
He walked over, sat in the chair on the other side of the desk and put the bag on the floor. “Your dad?” he asked.
She smiled. “Yes, my dad,” she said, “Monday is his day off.”
“So, what’s got you spooked?”
“Well, other than being shot at twice and having someone break into my house?” she asked.
He nodded.
“I went to the Coroner’s Office this morning,” she said, “The original report from Renee Peterson’s autopsy was taken from the original file.”
“What?” Bradley sat forward. “Who took it?”
Mary shrugged. “No one knows, but obviously someone who has more access than the average citizen,” she replied. “I was lucky that Linda Lincoln, who is amazing by the way, knew where a copy of the report was stored. I just faxed it to an old friend at the Cook County Coroner’s Office for a review and he’ll be calling me back soon with his take on it.”
“And you’re spooked because...” he prompted.
“Because this guy seems to be either just on our heels or one step ahead of us,” she said.
“When did the file go missing?” Bradley asked.
“Linda noticed it last week,” she said.
“Well, then we are the ones doing the chasing,” he said, “Shoe’s on the other foot.”
“What do you mean?”
“The perp finds out that you are accessing the files about either Renee or Jessica and gets spooked, right?”
Mary nodded.
“So, he starts cleaning things up. He gets the old file out of the county building, he goes back to the fort, he goes back to the paper the night you’re visiting with Anna,” Bradley said, “But you are always there – either before he gets there or soon after. You’re the one with the upper hand, not him. You have him spooked.”
Mary thought about it for a moment and then grinned. “I really like your perspective much better,” she said.
“Well, okay, better perspective, but actually a more risky one,” he said, “He’s the hunter being hunted.”
“Which makes him more dangerous,” Mary agreed.
“Yes, if he feels we’re getting closer, he might do something desperate. So, we just have to be on our toes all the time.”
The ringing phone interrupted their conversation. From the caller i.d., Mary saw that it was Bernie. She clicked on the speaker phone.
“Hi, Bernie, thanks for getting back to me so quickly,” she said, “I’ve put you on speaker phone so my partner on this case, Police Chief Bradley Alden, can hear the information too.”
“Okay, Mary, that’s fine with me,” he said, “So, the tox report is pretty normal, she had a little champagne that night and a couple of Tylenols. But I was a little surprised when I saw that they found traces of cyclohexanone hydrochloride in her system.”
“What’s that?”
“Well, its compound name is Ketamine,” Bernie said, “It’s a drug primarily used for general anesthesia, usually combined with some other drug. But in the 1980s it was the precursor of Rohypnol.”
“You mean like roofies – the date rape drug?” Mary asked.
“Yes, perps liked using it because it reacted quickly, especially when it was injected. The results were a lack of inhibition and relaxation of voluntary muscles.”
“So the victims seemed willing, even if they weren’t,” Mary said.
“Yes, it also caused the lasting anterograde amnesia,” Bernie said, “The vics can’t remember anything that happened while under the influence of the drug.”
“So, why isn’t it used anymore?” Bradley asked.
“Mostly because the newer drugs have a higher metabolization rate,” Bernie explained. “By the time we get to the victim the drug has already left their body or can give us false positives when we test. So, you got no evidence.”
“So, how easy was it to get Ketamine?” Mary asked. “Would you need a prescription?”
“Depends, mostly on where you live,” Bernie replied. “It’s used widely for veterinary use; a farmer might be able to get his hands on it, especially back then.”
“If you used it on children, weighing fifty to sixty pounds, how long would it take for them to react?” Mary asked.
“Well, depends on where you injected it,” Bernie replied, “But, it could take effect in a matter of minutes. For sure they would be groggy pretty quickly. Easy to manipulate.”
“Makes sense,” Bradley said, “One of the reports said that the victim would have never left the backyard. If she was disoriented, it would have been easy.”
“How much Ketamine do you need to feel the effects?” Bradley asked.
“Well, for an adult a dose of 100 mg is usually enough to get them under the influence,” Bernie said, “And for the size of child you’re talking about, I’d say half of that.”
“I’m trying to visualize what 100 mg is,” Mary said.
“Well, 100 mg is about 1/50th of a teaspoon, and you’d need half of that,” Bernie said, “It’d be like a TB test injection.”
“So a pin prick covered with Ketamine could do it?” Bradley asked.
“Yes, it could,” Bernie said.
“What if you use the same amount on an adult,” Mary asked.
“You get someone acting a little tipsy, slightly disoriented,” Bernie said, “If they already had some alcohol in their system, like the victim in the tox report, it would be enough to be able to hold her under the water and drown her without too much trouble.”
“Damn,” Bradley said.
“Yeah, I agree with you Chief,” Bernie added.
“Bernie, thank you so much, you’ve really helped us,” Mary said.
“Hope you get the creep,” Bernie said.
“We will,” Bradley responded immediately.
“So, Mary, about me setting you up with my nephew,” Bernie began.
Bradley looked across at Mary, raised an e
yebrow and grinned.
“Bernie, Bernie, what’s that?” Mary asked, grabbing a piece of note paper and crunching it in front of the microphone. “That’s what happens in small towns, can’t count on the reception. Bernie? Bernie?”
“I ain’t giving up, Mary,” he yelled. “Not ‘til you’re married.”
“Love you, Bernie,” she called, just before disconnecting him.
“So, you want to get married?” she asked Bradley flippantly.
“Sorry, I already am.”
* * * * *
Chapter Thirty-four
Mary sat in her living room staring at the flames flickering in the fireplace. She knew outside the house, in the driveway, was a marked police car and a uniformed officer. Inside all of the windows had been checked and double checked. She felt secure. Well, she reasoned, as secure as one can feel after being shot and stalked for several days in a row. But she felt unsettled.
She placed her laptop on the couch next to her and lifted a large mug of spiced tea to her lips, then put it down. She pulled her stocking feet up so they were snugly tucked beneath her soft, fluffy robe and sighed deeply.
Bradley’s comment about being married had left her feeling a little unsettled. He was married, she thought, he didn’t look married. She grinned. Okay Mary, what does married look like?
She threaded her fingers through her hair. Face it, she thought, I’m feeling guilty because I had lustful thoughts about a married man.
But, really, she argued with herself, he could have told me from the beginning that he was married, so I could have taken him off the radar. What kind of married guy goes jogging around the park early in the morning looking like... She tried to come up with the correct descriptor, picturing his unshaven face, his teasing eyes, his toned muscles, his... Okay, stop Mary, he’s married, you don’t think about a married man’s buns. But he really had a nice... Body. Yes, a nice body. He was a good specimen of manhood.
Damn.
She picked up her tea and took a sip. She really needed to get back to the case. That was much more productive. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. That’s when she heard it. Sobbing. Insistent sobbing.
She placed her mug down and walked toward the sound. It was a little louder in the kitchen. She walked to the basement door, yes; it was coming from the basement. “Crap,” she muttered. “If my basement has one of those portals to hell, I’m going after my real estate agent. That should have been disclosed.”
She opened the door and paused. She wasn’t working alone anymore. She had a partner. Besides, she’d seen all of those movies when the girl goes down the stairs because she hears a noise. She always ended up getting killed. Mary had been disgusted at the stupidity of the actress on the television screen, so she certainly wasn’t going to take any extra risks in real life.
She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and called Bradley. He answered on the first ring.
“What’s wrong?”
She could hear panic in his voice and decided it was nice to have a partner that worried about you.
“I’m hearing some sounds coming from my basement. Someone is crying down there,” she said, “But I decided to call you before I investigate.”
“I’ll be there in five minutes,” he said, “Don’t go down there alone.”
“Yeah, I’ve seen the movies too,” she said.
He chuckled. “Exactly. Five minutes.”
She hung up the phone and headed upstairs to her room, deciding that five minutes would give her enough time to change into some ghost-following clothes.
He made it in less than four minutes and Mary had already changed into jeans and a sweatshirt. Bradley was dressed similarly.
“Let’s go,” she said simply and led him to the basement door.
“We don’t have to keep the lights off?” he asked.
At her puzzled glance he added, “You know, when you think there are ghosts in your room you turn on the light because it chases them away.”
She nodded in understanding. “No, the lights being off only make it easier to see them,” she said, “But the lights in my basement are dim enough that I should be able to see the ghost, if he wants to be seen.”
She flipped on the lights and walked slowly down the stairs. The few scattered bare bulbs hanging from the ceiling threw shadows all around the room, making it difficult for Mary to discern anything out of the ordinary.
Mary stopped at the bottom stair and looked to her left. Tall shelves stood against unfinished concrete walls. There was nothing out of the ordinary there.
Then she peeked around at the underside of the staircase. In her childhood she had always been sure that something was lurking under the basement stairs, it just made sense to check there, just in case.
“Anything?” Bradley whispered.
Mary shook her head.
Her old furnace was in the center of the room, its stainless steel ducts branching out across the space, neatly blocking her view to the back of the basement. They passed the furnace. She glanced around the rest of the space. There was a hot water heater in one corner and some boxes filled with Christmas decorations and some unused furniture in the other corner. The only place she couldn’t see was the workroom.
The pegboard covered door stood open. The space inside was dark, but Mary could picture it in her mind. A homemade workbench with a pegboard above it filled with tools. Next to the workbench were several tall shelving units filled with paint cans and other miscellaneous supplies. And spiders.
Mary really hated spiders. What self-respecting ghost would hide in a work room filled with spiders?
Then she heard it again, quiet sobbing coming from the corner with the workbench. Crap! She turned to let Bradley know. He was still looking around the room.
“You can’t hear it, can you?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No, nothing,” he said.
She sighed and patted him on the arm, “It’s okay.”
Bradley grabbed her hand and placed it back on his arm. “Wait.”
He stopped and turned in the direction of the workroom too. He looked at her in amazement.
“I can hear it,” he said.
“So when you touch me, you can hear it?” Mary asked.
He nodded and put his hand on her shoulder. “Lead on Macduff.”
They followed the noise and found their ghost. He was sitting on a stool next to the bench, his body bent, his head resting on his hands, crying. He was a tall man; slim, athletic, with blonde hair and casual attire. Mary thought she might know him.
“Excuse me,” she whispered.
He looked up. She had missed the rope strung around his neck, but it was quite apparent now. And, from the dark marks around his neck, it had been the cause of death. His face was pallid, contorted in a grisly mask of pain and angled to one side.
That had to have hurt.
“I’m dead, aren’t I?” he asked sadly.
Mary nodded. She glanced over at Bradley who was staring at the apparition in shock. “You okay, Bradley?”
He nodded slowly.
She turned back to the ghost. “Yes, as far as I can see, you are dead.” she answered. “Did you commit suicide?”
“No!” the ghost shouted, rising from the stool. “I did not commit suicide, but he...he made it look like I did.”
“Who did it?” Mary asked.
The ghost paused, searching for the memory. “I don’t know,” he whispered, his anguish etched on his tortured face. “I can’t remember.”
“Can you remember your name?” Bradley asked, his law enforcement training overcoming his initial shock.
The ghost nodded. “Yes, but aren’t you the Chief of Police?” he asked nervously. “I don’t want the police involved in this. I can’t have things get messy.”
“Begging your pardon,” Mary said, “But if it looks like you committed suicide, it’s going to get messy.”
The ghost sighed. “You’re right, of course, I’m j
ust not thinking straight. My name is Michael Strong,” he said, “I’m President of the Freeport State Bank.”
“Well, this is a first for me,” Bradley said, running his hand through his hair as he leaned against Mary’s kitchen counter. “How do you report a murder without knowing where the body is and having no report of a missing person?”
They had interviewed Mike for an hour and got nowhere. Finally they decided to take a break and come upstairs.
Mary brought Bradley a mug of tea, then sat at the kitchen table and sipped at her own. “So, what should we do next?” she asked.
He brought his tea to the table and sat across from her. “We try to get him to tell us where he was last night and see if anyone remembers anything,” he said, “And we keep questioning him to see if he can remember anything about his death.
“This is so weird,” he sighed.
“Welcome to my world,” Mary said.
He looked over the table at her and smiled. “More like, welcome to the Twilight Zone.”
“Like I said, welcome to my world.”
“Why did he come here?” Bradley asked.