by KJ Dahlen
“About as well as you could expect. Everyone is concerned but it doesn’t seem to be too bad yet. The next few hours will tell us if this is just a single hit or a series of hits on law enforcement in general,” Cooper explained.
“Let’s hope the shooting this morning was a one-time shooting. We don’t need a panic in a nearby town,” Kyle said. “We need to assure the citizens we are protecting them by getting on the case as soon as we can.”
“I’ll spread the word,” Cooper replied.
Kyle nodded. “Oh, by the way, this is FBI agent Sam Reed and SEC agent Molly Bentz. I think you might know reporter Luna Mathias. She works for the Whiskey Bend Happenings newspaper but she does some articles for our own Tribune.”
Cooper leaned forward and grasped Sam’s hand then Molly’s. He nodded at Luna. He turned to Kyle and asked, “Will that be all Captain, or did you want me to stay?”
“That will be all. I need you to find out what the coroner has come up with from the bodies this morning. I need his preliminary report as soon as possible. ”
Cooper nodded and he turned to leave the room
Chapter Four
Sam glanced over at Luna and was surprised to find her staring at Cooper. He frowned when the glance turned into a stare that lasted longer than he expected or felt comfortable with. Had Cooper said something or done something to warrant such intense interest? He didn’t know for sure but he was going to find out.
“Did your early morning caller have anything else to say?” Kyle asked Luna.
Luna nodded. “He also said the only witness would be dead soon.”
Kyle stared at her for a moment before he switched his gaze over to the other two. “Tell me about the case that brought you both here in the first place. That way, I can judge for myself whether or not your scenario fits into your theory.”
“That’s fair enough but you have to listen with an open mind,” Sam said.
Kyle listened as they told him what they knew. He absently glanced at Luna when she got up to wander over to the window. He turned back to Sam and Molly.
~*~
Luna wandered over to the window and looked out over the city. The skin on her upper arms tingled a bit as she remembered her caller in the middle of the night. His voice held no emotion as he told her he would take someone else’s life for a price. It seemed to her that he really didn’t care that in a few hours he would take someone’s life. She shuddered at the thought of how callus he seemed to be. The she wondered again why she had come here. She lived in Whiskey Bend and Charlie Boone was the law enforcement there. But when she told him about the phone call she’d gotten this morning he told her she had to tell his friend and co officer Kyle Matthews about it. He had a bigger police force and could probably do more for her than he could.
She glanced over at Molly to find the other woman staring at her. Luna tried to shrug off Molly’s stare but she couldn’t. The killer knew he had made a mistake and Luna couldn’t help but feel that mistake had put her life in danger. She knew it wouldn’t take him long to find her.
Luna had remembered a conversation she had with Mike Denver, the killer that was dying of cancer in prison. She had asked him if the man he was telling her about was such a bad guy why had he stayed so long with him. Why hadn’t he just disappeared?
Mike told her that he wanted to get the hell out of town but Bruce had told him a story once about how he had reacted to someone who had betrayed him. They had both been drinking that night and Bruce told him about the time his best friend had tried to turn him in. Bruce told him he would never allow that to happen again. What he told her next horrified her and when he was finished, Mike asked her what she would have done if she’d been him. She had shuddered and told him she wouldn’t have tried to run either.
Luna glanced at the display cases on the wall behind the desk. Kyle had shot glasses and police badges from all over the States. Luna frowned when she saw some of the glasses. Some were from bigger cities and some were from smaller cities. Something clicked when she saw a couple of the places Kyle had shot glasses from. A feeling of dread filled her as she searched the rest of the names on the glasses.
She caught her breath as one name stood out. She had visited that particular town in the last few days and what she found there hadn’t been pleasant. It was a suburb of Chicago called Little Creek, Illinois.
Luna caught Molly’s eye again and wanted to warn her but didn’t know what to say. She began wringing her hands as she walked back to the window and stared outside.
Sam finished up with his part of the report. Molly left everything in her briefcase. She just gave him a look and said nothing.
“Maybe I’ll just check with the M.E.’s office about those reports. Cooper seems to have forgotten to get back to us,” Kyle told them. He excused himself to use the phone in another office.
Molly looked at Luna, then looked back at Sam. “I think Luna has information we should know about before we share our whole case with Captain Matthews.”
“Really? What kind of information?” Sam frowned.
“Let’s get out of here and I’ll explain,” Molly advised him. “Don’t say any more about the case until we hear what Luna is thinking about, let’s just go somewhere, and talk about this.”
Sam nodded and began packing up the evidence he’d brought with him.
Kyle returned a few minutes later. “The medical examiner found that both victims were shot but the bullets didn’t match either each other or anything we have on file. It could mean that the killer either used two different guns or that we are looking for two different killers. We have personnel looking into both the Judge’s cases and the D.A.’s cases. Maybe they will come up with some cases that overlap.”
Sam nodded. “My guess is that you’ll never find either weapon. If our case is somehow linked to the murders this morning, we’ll soon find out. I need to talk to my superiors about this and see what they want to do next.”
Molly stood up. “I think we’ve taken up more time than we thought. We’ll let you get back to your own work now. We need to find a place to stay while we’re here and we can always come back this afternoon.”
Kyle just looked at them. He had a double murder to try and solve before his city panicked. “You will let me know where you’re staying so we can keep in touch won’t you?”
“We’ll call you when we find a place,” Molly assured him.
Sam escorted them out of the office and out to the car. When they were all seated in his car, Sam turned to Molly and Luna. “Okay, spill it. What did you mean by what you said back there?”
“Have either of you heard of a small suburb of Chicago called Little Creek?” Luna asked. When neither of them said anything she went on, “I heard of it for the first time three days ago.”
“What makes Little Creek, Illinois so special?” Molly asked.
“I noticed Matthews had shot glasses and police patches from a lot of different places on the shelves in his office,” Luna told Molly.
“So? What does a collection of shot glasses and police patches have to do with anything?” Sam shrugged. “Maybe some of them were gifts or he’s a well- traveled kind of guy. I don’t know.”
“I just got back from an interview with a man in prison that told me a very interesting story,” Luna spoke quietly. “This story was about a man that scared the hell out of him and when he finished telling me about him I was horrified by what he said. I checked out some of his story and I found exactly what he said I would find. Captain Matthews had a shot glasses and police patch from every city and town I just finished investigating.”
“Were the glasses just from the cities you investigated or were there more than you were told about?” Sam wanted to know.
“There were more than what I was told about but the fact that those cities were there worry me. I mean this could be a coincidence but if it is... it’s a hell of a coincidence.”
“By the way, what was with that look you gave Cooper
Connors?” Molly asked. “I only caught the end of it but it was certainly weird.”
Luna shivered. “I don’t know. I got the weirdest vibe from him. Almost like I knew something about him that I didn’t like. Or maybe it was he knew something about me that I didn’t know about, whatever it was it was very creepy. As far as I know, I’ve never met him. I usually, have a good memory of people I’ve met.”
Sam nodded. “Let’s go find somewhere to stay. I want to make a few phone calls and get some background material on Matthews. I think I need to hear more about what you’ve been digging up in the last few days.” He glanced at Molly, “You do realize that by not telling him about your end of the case that your suspect might just leave town and not be seen again don’t you?”
Molly nodded. “Lester Kratz might possibly leave town. Hell, for all we know he hired the killer to cause this chaos so he could leave town quietly but he isn’t going to get very far. The SEC has frozen his off shore accounts and we’re working with the local banks to freeze his liquid assets here.”
“Was your contact in the judicial department Judge Alec Bennett?” Luna asked.
Molly reached into her briefcase for the documents. She quickly skimmed the document and found the signature at the bottom of the page. “Damn, they both signed it.”
Sam frowned as he took the subpoena from her and looked at it himself. They may have just discovered the one link between the murders this morning and a killer.
~*~
Cooper Connors stood at the window on the second floor of the precinct and stared at the vehicle he’d seen Luna get into. He wondered what was taking them so long to discuss. He would have to find out where they were staying before he could get at Luna. He was a little concerned to see her in Kyle’s office but that could have been explained by her profession. As a reporter, she would be interested in the double murder so soon after his mistake last night.
When they finally did take off, Cooper turned away from the window and found Kyle standing right behind him. He had been so absorbed in watching the car he hadn’t heard the other man walk up behind him.
“I think we need to talk.” Kyle turned and walked back to his office, leaving the door open almost as an invitation to Cooper that he wanted to talk right then.
Cooper raised his eyebrows and slowly followed. He closed the door behind him softly and turned to see Kyle sitting behind his desk with one hand inside a desk drawer. Cooper began to sweat just a little. He knew Kyle kept his police revolver in that drawer.
“What exactly did the Feds have to say this morning?” Cooper asked Kyle as he waited for Kyle to move his hand out of the drawer.
Kyle brought out a small bottle of whiskey from the drawer. He poured a small amount into his coffee cup. He didn’t drink on duty but after this morning, he needed a small shot just to clear his head. “They seem to think the murders this morning might be connected to the case they are working on.”
Cooper suddenly felt weak and he sat down. He watched in silence as Kyle took a sip of his coffee and made a face. “So now what? What are they going to do now?”
Kyle shrugged. “I don’t know. Something happened this morning that spooked them. They clammed up before I could find out any more.”
“Where were they going when they left here?”
“They were going to find a place to stay then come back in this afternoon. I gave them the report from the coroner’s office.”
Cooper nodded just as the phone rang.
Kyle answered it and wrote something down a piece of paper. When he hung up he said, “I need you to check on the status of the investigation into the murders this morning. Check with Dan Miller and George Cable and see what progress they’ve made. Danny was at the Judge’s house and George was at Colleen Markey’s house. See what they’ve got and report back to me.”
Cooper stood and glanced at the information Kyle had written down. It was the name of a local motel and the room number. At least he knew where they were now.
~*~
Sam was talking to his coworkers in Quantico a little while later. They had discussed the possibility that the man they were after was a cop. “I need you to run the fingerprint we found at the crime scene in Milwaukee through the police files and see if you come up with a match,” he told Benny Sawyer.
“Do you really think your assassin is a cop?” Benny asked as he typed the necessary information into his computer.
“It’s something we didn’t consider before,” Sam admitted.
“Any particular name I should be looking for?” he asked Sam.
“I’m not going to say. I want this scan to stand on its own. If there’s no match then nothing more will need to be done.”
“Okay I’m waiting for the scan now. It will be a minute.
Sam waited as he tapped his fingers on the nightstand.
Benny finally spoke again, “I have a couple of possible matches.”
“Is one of them Kyle Matthews?”
“Those aren’t the names I came up with.”
Sam frowned and asked, “Then whose print matches the fingerprint we found in Milwaukee?” A few minutes later, he hung up the phone and looked at Molly and Luna. “I have good news and bad news. The good news is that it’s not Kyle Matthews. His fingerprint doesn’t match the print we found in Milwaukee.”
“Who are our suspects?” Molly asked. “Are they anyone we know?”
“Benny came up with a couple possibilities. No one we know except for one and we met him this morning. His name is Cooper Connors. But it’s only a two point match. I don’t think it’s enough for court.” Sam frowned. “I asked Benny to run a complete background check on Connors and get back to me as soon as possible.”
“Who were the other names?” Luna asked.
“Dan Kelly, Seth Brown, Maxwell Sebastian, Nick Bromer and Orin Lawrence. None of the names are a perfect match, they all had only 1-3 points in common.”
Something clicked in Luna’s mind but the thought was interrupted when her cell phone began to ring. When she answered it, she found her boss on the other end.
“Where are you and why aren’t you at your desk?” Nathan asked her.
“I got caught up in something and I don’t think I can get away right now.” Luna told him. “I know I’m usually there on Wednesdays but I can’t make it today.”
“Is it worth your job?” Nathan asked. “I let you have three days to run down a story on a tip, and now I need to know what you found out.”
“This story might be worth my life. Does that count?” Luna informed him more upset than she realized.
Nathan had a way of not showing concern for his reporters, he only wanted the story.
Sam gave her a look and she covered the mouthpiece. “It’s my boss at the paper. He’s wondering where I am.”
Sam held out his hand and waited for Luna to hand him the phone. When he got it, he informed the man on the other end, “This is FBI agent Sam Reed. Miss Mathias is cooperating as a material witness in an investigation we are conducting and she won’t be available for a while.”
“What is this all about?” Nathan asked. “What do you mean she’s a material witness? A witness to what?”
“I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to talk about the investigation at this point but Luna will get back to you and her job as soon as possible,” Sam informed him.
“How do I know this call is for real and that she really is with an FBI agent?” Nathan asked.
“You can call my office in Quantico and find out if I am a real agent or not. Or you can trust her work record and know she wouldn’t just not show up for work unless there was a very good reason. The choice is up to you.” Sam reasoned with him. He listened for a moment and then handed the phone back to Luna.
Luna listened for a minute then hung up the phone. She rolled her eyes. “He wants an exclusive interview about the case when it’s over. Or I can forget my job.”
Sam nodded. “That’s the problem with newspa
pers. They figure it’s within their rights to publish the results of an investigation to the public.”
“This would be a good story,” Luna reminded him. “But I have a feeling this is only the tip of what’s really going on here.”
“Why do you say that?” Molly wanted to know.
Luna shrugged. “This just doesn’t add up yet. This story feels personal not political. And the only thing going on in my life is the sentencing of my ex- boyfriend.” She touched the wicked looking scar on her chest as well as the one on her face. Both had been a memento of her ex, Joel.
She looked around the room and shook her head. Reaching inside her purse, she took out the copy of the flash drive she had for Kyle Matthews. Instead, she held it out to Sam. “Before this goes any further, I want to you know what I know. This is the story I wanted to share with Captain Matthews this morning. I need to get back to my work in Whiskey Bend. I can put Nathan off for a few more days. Let’s hope you guys can solve this before another person loses their lives.”
“We’ll be touch as soon as we know anything,” Sam assured her.
Luna nodded and gathered her things to leave. It was now midmorning and she had an hour drive to get home and touch base with her boss. Nathan wasn’t a bad man he was just impatient when it came to reporting the news. And she knew sitting on this story wouldn’t be his priority.
When she left for La Donna this morning the whole town was talking about the two deaths. People were running scared and scared people tend to panic. The last thing Whiskey Bend needed was a citywide panic.
An hour later after parking in her driveway, she could feel her neighbors’ eyes watching her. Gathering her things, she unlocked her back door and went inside her small house. As in every small town, everyone knew or thought they knew everyone else’s business.
The biggest gossip in this small town had been almost a year ago when Joel Grant got caught trying to kill her. Shaking her head, she had to admit having nosy neighbors had saved her life that time. Having Markus Bishop busting in her door had distracted Joel just long enough for Markus to swing his bat at the other man.