9 More Killer Thrillers

by Russell Blake

  Weber glared at the older woman, who was the wife of his predecessor in the Sheriff’s Office, and had been almost a surrogate mother to him and his younger sister after their parents were killed in a traffic accident when Debbie was just twelve. Their relationship was based on mutual respect and affection and was usually expressed in good natured bantering, although Weber always claimed it was more nagging on Mary’s part.

  “You are a hard taskmaster with a cold, cold heart, Mary Caitlin!”

  “Yeah, and I’m not above grabbing a nightstick and busting your melon with it, you lunkhead. So get to work or get out of here! Which is it going to be?”

  “I’m going,” Weber told her, raising his hands, palm up, in surrender.

  “Good, and take your nasty cigar with you!”

  Weber blew Mary a kiss as he went out the door, and she gave him the finger in reply.

  Chapter 4

  Weber was in his boat on Big Lake, casting a red and white Mepps spinner. He allowed it to sink deep, then began to retrieve it with a series of short jerks, followed by three or four cranks on the reel. Then he paused to allow the lure to sink a little and repeated the process. It was his tried and true method for luring the lake’s big trout from the depths, but this day he had been casting for over an hour with not one strike.

  “One more time,” he said to himself. “Then I’m going to be reduced to drowning a night crawler.”

  As if to save him from that ignoble fate, his rod tip suddenly dipped sharply and Weber jerked upward, setting the hook. He cranked the reel’s handle and was amazed at the weight he could feel on the other end. “Oh, it’s gonna be a big one!” he said. “Old Pete is going to be sorry he was too lazy to get out of bed this morning! Serves him right.”

  The fish didn’t fight at all, which was a disappointment because the battle was the most enjoyable part of the whole process for Weber. “Maybe he’ll start to fight when he breaks the surface and sees me waiting for him,” he said. “Come on, big boy.”

  Still there was no fight, and Weber was beginning to think he had snagged an old tire or a sunken log, and he was glad Pete Caitlin wasn’t there to witness that! He could just imagine the ribbing he’d get from the guys at breakfast the next day at the ButterCup Café.

  A moment later the water parted at the side of his boat, and Weber’s heart stopped when he saw Steve Rafferty’s pale face floating up before him, the lure’s treble hook embedded deeply into his lower lip. When the young man opened his eyes, the sheriff’s scream split the morning’s silence, reaching all the way to Cat Mountain and echoing back across the water.

  ***

  Weber bolted upright in bed, drenched in cold sweat, the scream caught in the back of his throat. His heart was pounding in his chest and it took him a moment or two to drive the terror back down inside. He looked at the digital clock on his nightstand. 4:12 a.m. He sat staring into the dark, then swung his legs over the side of the bed, knowing that sleep would not come back anytime soon and was just as glad it wouldn’t. For him, sleep was not always restful, or a refuge from the day’s hard work. Too often it was a descent into terror.

  He walked into the kitchen, drew a glass of water, then stood at the sink and drank it. He went back into his bedroom, pulled on sweat pants and a T-shirt and dragged the blanket off the bed. Weber walked through the dark cabin and pulled the front door open.

  Some small animal, maybe a raccoon or skunk, scampered off the porch at the sound of the door. Weber sat down in an old wooden rocking chair and pulled the blanket around his shoulders against the night’s chill. Somewhere off in the distance an owl hooted, and eventually the sounds of the night animals resumed.

  Weber sat there a long time, trying to erase the dream from his mind. He really wanted a drink, and thought of the unopened bottle of whiskey in the back corner of a kitchen cabinet. He knew he would not touch it, knew he couldn’t allow himself to do so. He asked himself why he kept it, but the answer was just as elusive as a good night’s sleep. He wondered what Robyn was doing. He longed for the comfort of her lying warm and soft beside him, longed to spoon against her and hear her sigh in her sleep as he wrapped his arms around her. When he woke up, the sunlight was dappling through the trees and his back was stiff from sitting in the hard wooden chair.

  ***

  Weber wasted most of the morning in a meeting with the school board to discuss the need for traffic control when classes started in two weeks. The winter before, two high school students had lost their lives in an accident near the campus, a loss that had deeply affected the closely knit community.

  Installation of a traffic light in front of the school had been suggested, but progress was stalled until an environmental impact statement was finalized. Weber missed the good old days when you could see a problem and fix it without the need for focus groups and committees.

  He had a headache from lack of sleep. As the meeting droned on, he had allowed his mind to wander when he realized somebody was calling his name. “Sheriff Weber? Are you still with us?”

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Bigelow. Can you repeat the question?” He felt like a schoolboy again, caught daydreaming when the teacher called on him.

  “Sheriff, you said that a lack of manpower made it difficult for you to have an officer in the area during school commute times and at lunch. We certainly understand that, we’re shorthanded, too. But what about Mr. Gilcrest’s suggestion about equipping crosswalk volunteers with safety vests and portable stop signs? Could your department help us with the cost of the equipment and some basic training? I think we can supply the volunteers.”

  “We can do that,” Weber told her.

  “I’ve got a concern with that,” said Ira Hartinger, an older man who had retired from a law firm in San Diego and moved to Big Lake three years earlier to enjoy a simpler lifestyle. In that time he had become involved with the school board, the Friends of the Library, the animal shelter, and half a dozen other community activities. From what Weber had seen of the man, his biggest contribution to all of these was to point out potential problems and liabilities and urge that no action be taken until a case study had been completed.

  “What’s your concern this time, Ira?” asked Nan Bigelow, chairman of the school board.

  “What happens if one of these volunteers is injured on the job? What’s our liability there? Or what if a child is injured by a car that doesn’t stop for one of them? Or if….”

  “Oh, give me a break,” interrupted Rick Gilchrest irritably, “What happens if a meteor falls on one of them, Ira? Or they get hit by lighting. At every meeting you pull this and nothing ever gets accomplished.”

  “It’s my job to look for liability,” Ira said. “You have to understand that each and every one of us on this Board could be personally liable if something were to…”

  “If you’re worried about your personal liability, I’ve got an idea. Resign! Then maybe the rest of us can get something done.”

  “I’ve got just as much right as anybody else on this Board to share my input,” Ira said.

  “And here we go again,” Lorraine Metcalf said, throwing her hands in the air in frustration.

  The meeting immediately descended into bickering, and Weber stood up and said, “I’ll leave you to debate this. Let me know what you decide.”

  Nan Bigelow followed him out into the hallway, closing the door behind her. “Are you okay, Jimmy?” she asked, her face showing concern.

  “Yeah, just a rough night. I guess I’m just not up to listening to old Ira prattle on and on.”

  Nan was a stout woman with graying, curly hair and intelligent grey eyes that studied the sheriff with concern. As a young nurse in Vietnam, she had seen more carnage than most people could imagine in three lifetimes, and knew all too well the effects of post traumatic stress on a person.

  “Are you still seeing Molly?”

  “Yeah. It helps. But I’m not over it yet.”

  Nan squeezed Weber’s arm and said, “Jimmy
, it never goes away. You learn to deal with it, and you push it out of your daily consciousness. But it’s still there. It always will be. It’s all about how you cope with it.”

  “You sound like Molly,” Weber told her. “I don’t know why you sent me all the way over to Springerville to see her, when all I need to do is talk to you.”

  “Oh hell, Jimmy, you haven’t figured that out yet? I just referred you to Molly so you wouldn’t be around to give me a ticket when I run the stop sign at the end of my street every day.”

  She turned her head at the sound of upraised voices coming from the meeting room. “I’d better get back in there before Ira and Rick come to blows.”

  Weber nodded, and she squeezed his arm again before removing her hand. “One day at a time, my friend.”

  “I know.”

  “Call me if you need to talk, Jimmy. Anytime, day or night.”

  He nodded again, and she turned away to go mediate the latest argument among the board members.

  ***

  “Did you see them?” asked Susie Odell, the waitress at the Wagon Wheel Restaurant, as she set Weber’s plate down in front of him.

  “See who, Susie?”

  “The hippies.”

  “What hippies?” Weber asked as he salted his hamburger and slapped away the hand of his best friend, FBI Special Agent Larry Parks, as he reached for a french fry.

  “A whole bunch of ’em in an old school bus all painted with flowers and peace signs and such. They was at the Fast Stop this morning getting fuel. Must have been a dozen or more. Smelled like none of them had a bath in years.”

  Weber shook his head and said, “First I’ve heard of them, Susie.”

  As she moved away to refill someone’s coffee, Parks reached for another French fry and Weber stabbed at him with his fork. “Damn, Larry, get your own if you want some!”

  “Can’t,” said the sandy-haired federal agent as he sneaked a fry out from under Weber’s guard. “Marsha’s on a diet, which apparently means I’m on a diet, too. She’s got me eating this rabbit food, says I need to keep in shape.”

  “That woman’s got you henpecked already,” Weber said. “Why don’t you just accept it and marry her and get it over with?”

  “Naaa, we’re just good friends,” Parks replied, as he reached for yet another french fry, then pulled his hand back when the sheriff menaced him with his fork.

  “Uh huh, just good friends? Eat your salad and behave or I’ll tell her you’re cheating on your diet.”

  Parks started to protest, when Weber’s handheld radio crackled to life. “Dispatch, to all units available.”

  Weber keyed the transmit button on the side of the radio and said, “I’m at the Wagon Wheel. What do you need, Kate?”

  “We have a report of shots fired at the Weston place on Zuni Lane. Mr. Weston said he shot an intruder.”

  “I’m on my way,” Weber said, pushing his plate away with a longing look at his cheeseburger. “See Parks, I don’t need a diet. I never get a chance to eat a full meal anyway.”

  Parks dropped his paper napkin over his untouched chicken Caesar salad, stuffed three french fries in his mouth, and followed him out the door.

  Chapter 5

  Zuni Lane was a meandering street that began at the post office and wound its way up the side of Alchesay Mountain for a mile before tapering off into a rough fire trail that continued to the Forest Service fire lookout tower atop the mountain. Unlike the newer summer cabins that had sprouted up all around Big Lake, Zuni Lane was lined with older, well-maintained homes occupied by longtime residents. Deputy Tommy Frost’s Sheriff’s office pickup turned the corner just ahead of Weber and Chad Summers was right behind as the three vehicles made their way uphill.

  Carl and Abby Weston’s split-level house was located halfway up the mountain and was set back from the street. Tall pine trees sheltered the house and well groomed lawn, and a detached two car garage stood off to one side.

  Abby Weston, a round little woman of 65, whose famous apple pies were in high demand at every church potluck dinner and the annual town picnic, was standing in the open doorway wringing her hands when the lawmen arrived.

  “Abby, are you alright?” Weber asked her as he walked toward the house, his hand on his holstered pistol.

  She nodded her head, tears welling up in her eyes.

  “Where’s Carl?”

  “He’s inside. I think he’s dead.”

  “Carl’s dead, Abby?”

  She shook her head and said, “No, this man..., I don’t know who he is. He broke in and Carl shot him. He had to do it, Sheriff!”

  “Where are they?”

  She looked back toward the house, then shuddered. “In there. In the living room.”

  “Stay here with her, Parks,” Weber said, as he put a gentle hand on Abby’s shoulder and moved her out of the doorway. He drew his pistol and went inside, with Tommy and Chad close behind him.

  Carl Weston looked like anybody’s favorite uncle, a husky, balding man with white hair, big bushy eyebrows, and a ruddy face that usually wore a friendly smile. When he and Abby weren’t off on their frequent extended trips, he spent his time fishing, often in the company of retired Sheriff Pete Caitlin.

  But Carl was not smiling this day. His face was strained as he stood over a body lying facedown in front of the large stone fireplace. He held a semi-automatic pistol in his hand, aimed at the man on the floor, and seemed unaware that Weber and his deputies had entered the room.

  “Carl?”

  There was no response, the old man’s attention fixated on the body in front of him.

  Weber held his .45 in two hands, aimed downward, and raised his voice, “Carl? Carl, look at me, Carl.”

  Weber’s voice finally seemed to break through the fog that surrounded him. Carl turned his head toward the sheriff, but kept the gun trained on the man on the floor.

  “Carl? It’s Jim Weber. I need you to put the gun down, okay Carl? Just set it there on the couch and step away.”

  Carl looked back at the man on the floor, then at Weber again.

  “He tried to hurt my Abby.”

  “It’s okay, Carl. We’re here now. He can’t hurt anybody any more.”

  Carl looked back at the silent form in front of him, then pushed up the safety and set the pistol on the comfortable looking blue couch beside him.

  “Okay, Carl. That’s good. Now come over here.”

  When Carl walked to him, Weber nodded his head at Chad, who knelt by the man on the floor and put his hand against his neck, then looked at the sheriff and shook his head.

  Weber nodded, then said, “You guys clear the house, I’ll stay here with Carl.”

  The sound of an approaching siren, and then the crunching of tires on gravel out front told him that the ambulance had arrived, but the sheriff knew there was nothing they could do for the victim.

  ***

  Usually quiet, Zuni Lane was suddenly very busy as other deputies and ambulance attendants arrived at the crime scene. Using standard investigative procedures, Chad and Tommy interviewed Abby Weston while sitting at the picnic table in the back yard, while Dolan Reed talked to her husband in the kitchen.

  Weber, Parks, and Buz Carelton examined the crime scene. When they rolled the body over, it was a man who looked to be about 40, with rough features, a shaved head, and crude tattoos on his arms. Two bullet holes, less than three inches apart, were centered on his chest. There were no exit wounds.

  “Damn good shooting,” Buz Carelton observed. “I don’t see any powder burns on his shirt, so the gun was a few feet away.”

  The man wore cheap, black cotton trousers and a light blue t-shirt. A large carving knife with an eight inch blade lay near him.

  Parks, wearing latex gloves, removed the pistol’s magazine and released the safety, then pulled back the slide to eject the round in the chamber. Once the gun was safely unloaded, he handed it to Buz, who slipped it into an evidence bag. The magazine and ejec
ted round went into another bag. Two empty cartridge cases lay on the floor to the right of the couch. Once they were photographed, both close up and from a distance, they were put into a third bag.

  Wearing jeans and a long sleeved Big Lake Sheriff’s Department t-shirt, Robyn Fuchette arrived to help in the investigation. Weber left them to it and walked into the kitchen. Abby’s love of the culinary arts showed in the large, stainless steel, double door refrigerator/freezer, a stainless Wolf range with double ovens, and a large bookshelf filled with a library of cookbooks. A butcher-block island counter held an assortment of cooking utensils whose purposes eluded the sheriff.

  Carl Weston still seemed in a fog when Weber sat down at the table, but he turned to Weber and said,“I didn’t want to do it, Sheriff. But he tried to take Abby.”

  “Okay, Carl. Let’s start at the beginning, alright? Do you know who he is?”

  Carl shook his head. “I’ve never seen him before. We were still in bed this morning when we heard a noise in the living room. I got up and went to see what it was and he was waiting for me. He was hiding around the corner and the next thing I knew he was behind me, with the knife against my throat.”

  As he spoke, Carl seemed to become a little more animated.

  “He forced me back to the bedroom and told us to get dressed. His eyes were all over Abby, the filthy… She tried to turn her back as she got dressed but he made her face him all the while.”

  “Then what happened?” Weber asked.

  “He took us into the kitchen and made her cook him breakfast. All the while he stood there next to her, with that knife right at her neck. He made me lay facedown on the floor where he could keep an eye on me. Then he ate, and told us all he wanted was money and our car. I told him we only had about fifty dollars on us but he wanted more. He asked how much we had in our checking account. I told him a few hundred and he asked if we had a debit card. I gave it to him and told him the PIN and gave him the keys to my Forester. But he wasn’t ready to leave yet. He said maybe I hadn’t given him the right PIN and that he had to decide what to do about that.”