by Robin Cain
While walking the property, he did notice that the one a few doors down had a construction sign in the yard. Holmes Homes? Maybe nothing. Maybe a coincidence. Nonetheless, this fact also made it into his little notebook for later examination.
Otherwise, the stop was pretty uneventful. Maybe his next one would turn up something better.
Frost drove down the street in the other direction, in an effort to locate Mr. Holmes. When he located the address, he pulled into the drive and turned off the car engine. He sat a minute and looked around, observing that the property was on a huge wooded lot that seemed to go on forever. There were big shade trees everywhere. Several days’ worth of delivered newspapers lay in the yard, unopened, where they had been originally thrown. The mailbox was stuffed with what looked like multiple days of deliveries. The grass needed cutting, and the drapes were drawn. His instincts hinted something just wasn’t quite right.
He got out of the car and walked up the front steps to the door. After ringing the doorbell several times and getting no answer, he walked down the driveway. A truck was parked there, with no sign of anyone around. Its windows open and doors unlocked, the truck’s interior was wet, like it had been rained on during the storm the other day. A small amount of money on the dashboard lay next to a couple business cards that Frost could see matched the one he had stuffed in his shirt pocket. This was likely Tyler Holmes’ truck.
Without touching anything, Frost peered into the back seat and saw the empty beer cans lying all over the floor. He surmised its owner had come home drunk and left the windows open.
Frost decided to give one last try. He went over and pounded on the back door to see if he could rouse anyone.
No answer.
He walked into the back yard, getting a feel for just how big the lot was. Had to be a couple of acres. He couldn’t imagine what property like this must cost on the lake. Certainly wasn’t anything he’d ever be able to afford on his salary.
Off on the side of the driveway, toward the back, was a guesthouse, tucked back under the limbs of a couple of huge trees. The property was so dense with trees and bushes that Frost realized he would have missed the building had he not walked back around here. He went up to its front door and knocked.
Still nothing.
With drapes pulled on this building as well, he couldn’t see a thing inside. He listened for noise. Nothing stirring.
Well, Frost told himself, being lazy, drunk and not answering the door wasn’t a crime and, besides, he didn’t really have any reason yet to think this guy had anything to do with the Campelletti murder. If Mr. Holmes knew Sadie Campelletti, as Mrs. Summerhill had suggested, that alone didn’t make him a suspect.
With nothing here for him to go on, Frost decided to return to the office, do some research on the guy, ask some new questions of those involved, and see if this guy’s name came up again. In the meantime, this case was getting colder and he had work to do. He headed for the station.
Once back at the station and in The Pit with the other detectives, Frost reviewed the facts he had gathered since the body had been found three days ago.
“Rich guy’s wife. Murdered by a blow to the back of the head by what appears to be a hammer. Dead before she hit the water and then dumped in the lake. Several broken fingernails indicate she fought with her attacker. In the water too long for any trace evidence. Last seen on Friday, and then found on Sunday; no one knows she’s missing until Monday morning. Rental car still missing.” Frost paused and looked up at the group, “No one’s found the car yet, correct?”
The other investigators all shook their heads.
“Okay, Patrol is aware of the missing car. It’ll turn up.” Frost located the place in his notes where he’d left off and continued. “Husband was definitely out of town when it happened and everyone who worked at the house has an ironclad alibi for the evening she disappeared. We have a local who thought she heard a woman’s scream at about seven-thirty Friday night, but that isn’t corroborated by anyone else but her husband. There is a hint of Mrs. Campelletti being involved with some ‘young guy’ who owns a construction business in town, but the husband gave no indication of this during initial questioning. I’m following up...”
“Detective Frost? Sergeant Temple on Line Four,” Darren yelled over from his cubicle, interrupting Frost’s recitation.
Frost excused himself to answer the phone.
Temple started talking the minute Frost got on the line, “Hey, one of my guys found your vic’s rental car awhile ago. Crime and evidence guys are on their way.” Temple’s pride in having one of his guys find the car was detectable.
Bingo!
“Where was it?”
“Off of Water Street, at some new construction site. A neighbor called it in when she read about our hunt for it in the paper today. Guess it had been sitting there all weekend and then some. With the house being vacant, she thought it suspicious.”
Some of the pieces were starting to come together.
“Thanks, sarge. I’ll be down to have a look at it.” Frost made a note of the address and as an afterthought, he added, “Double-check your guy used his tape, huh?” Frost enjoyed taking cheap shots at Temple’s crew. He knew it drove the sergeant crazy.
Frost turned to address the guys in The Pit, “Son of a bitch! Looks like we’re getting a break here. The car’s been found and it was down from that house where the local told us she heard a scream. Gentlemen, we just might have ourselves a crime scene!”
twenty-eight
SERGEANT TEMPLE called Frost again while the detective was making his way over to take a look at Sadie’s rental car. Frost grabbed his cell phone after one ring.
“Hey, buddy, new deal. My guy did a walk-through and sealed up the house. It’s pretty ugly from what I hear. Looks like you’ve got yourself a crime scene.”
Frost thanked him for the heads-up and made it down to the address on Water Street in what he knew was record time. The crime lab guys were already on the scene, and a print technician was already busy pulling prints off the car. A detail guy, Frost wanted to have a look at this thing himself before heading into the house. He grabbed the latex gloves from his pocket and pulled them on.
The car was a bare-bones version of a Hyundai Sonata. Red in color, with cloth seats and manual windows. Unusual for a wealthy woman to rent such a simple car, Frost thought. He walked around the car, looking for anything out of the ordinary. No apparent damage and nothing lying on the seats. The folded-up car rental agreement Sadie had signed was tucked into the passenger-side visor. According to the patrol guy who found the car, the doors were not locked when the car was discovered.
Frost opened the passenger door to have a look inside while trying to stay out of the tech’s way. No one was able to turn on the engine to check the mileage or fuel level without the keys, but it looked like the car had barely been driven. No trash anywhere in the car. No dirt on the floor mats to speak of. If Sadie Campelletti had disappeared sometime over the weekend, she hadn’t driven the car very much.
“Hey, you smell anything?” Frost asked the tech who was taking prints off the driver’s door. Rented cars usually had that sprayed-on, air freshener smell, but there was a hint of something burnt in the car. He didn’t know if Mrs. Campelletti had been a smoker, but there was a pile of ashes in the ashtray and no butts.
“Smell what?”
“Something burnt. Look at the ashtray. Burnt ashes, yet no cigarette smell in the car.”
The tech now understood what Frost was getting at. “That’s not from cigarettes. Looks like paper. I’ll bag it.”
“Thanks. How you doing on prints?”
“Nothing really clear on the exterior. Storm the other night must have washed everything away, but there are multiple partials on the interior. Rental car, you know.”
“Let me know when you run ‘em through the system. I need to see anybody and everybody who turns up as a match.”
“Roger that. Been inside ye
t? Hear it’s pretty ugly.”
“Going in now.” Frost wasn’t looking forward to ugly. He’d seen enough of that.
Frost climbed out of the car and surveyed the area. Lots of tire tracks. Some partials, some obviously from heavy equipment; they wouldn’t get much from any of them. Everything must have been from previous vehicles because the arriving officer had immediately taped off the entire area. Frost chuckled, knowing he wouldn’t mention that fact to Temple next time he saw him.
The structure was definitely months from being completed but looked like it was going to be on the modest size compared to what he’d seen today. The framing, walls and roof boards were all up but none of the windows and doors. Some kind of temporary door had been installed as the front entrance. Large sheets of plywood and plastic covered the other openings to protect them from weather. To Frost’s amateur eye, what had been done looked like good enough work. The large wooden sign in front read “Holmes Homes.”
Per crime scene protocol, no one was allowed in after the initial discovery until the scene had been photographed and logged for evidence, so the arriving officer had taped off the door, waiting for the cavalry to arrive. Frost lifted the tape and tried the door and found it unlocked.
He motioned to one of the crime scene photographers to join him and waited for all the technicians to get in place before entering. There was too much publicity on this case to risk sloppy evidence. One of the guys on the scene started putting entries into the crime scene log book before anyone took another step. Once he gave the go-ahead, Frost pushed open the front door.
The interior floors of the home were still bare concrete, covered in construction dust and debris. Frost stood in the entryway and scanned the room divisions he could see from his vantage point as the photographer kept busy working his camera. Saw horses, holding an electric saw and various pieces of wood, stood in what appeared was going to be the living room. Scraps of lumber lay nearby. Cigarette butts lay scattered beside the dark black smudges they’d left in the concrete. The edges of the plastic sheathing covering the window openings were stapled to the wood framing. Pallets of shrink-wrapped floor tiles, on-site now and seeming to be there much too early, sat shoved in a corner of the living room, waiting for installation. Definitely still a work in progress.
One of the crime technicians headed toward the back of the house, telling Frost and the photographer to follow him as he made his way down the biggest hallway. Afternoon sun, flooding in from openings up ahead, lit the way. Frost thought they were heading toward what he suspected would one day be the kitchen, based on the stubbed out electrical fittings he could see. He immediately got his first whiff of what years on the job told him was blood.
Bingo.
The afternoon sun had warmed the closed-up house, making the odor all the more overpowering. The crime technician, rapidly taking notes and leading the group as they approached the kitchen, was the first to see the spatters and smears that seemed to cover the entire kitchen area. Until the technician’s soft whistle, the rapid fire clicking of the camera lens was the only noise in the room.
“Looks like somebody was up to no good in here,” he remarked. “Look at this.”
They all stood still at the entrance to the kitchen, taking in the scene.
Blood on the floor, walls and roughed-out cabinets indicated there had been a serious struggle of some kind. The pool of blood on the floor contained wipe patterns, indicating something had been moved, or as though a body had been dragged after it had fallen. A cast-off pattern on the wall to the left indicated something, most likely the weapon, had splattered blood as it was flung back and forth to repeatedly strike its victim. Spattered blood on the other side of the closed, plastic-protected, glass patio door meant it had to have been open at the time of the murder. There were smeared handprints on the plywood counter surface, as well as bloody footprints on the floor. Whoever had done this hadn’t taken the time to hide anything other than the body. The whole scene screamed crime of passion.
The technician narrated as he made notes in his report while the crime scene photographer moved around the room, getting photos from every conceivable angle.
“Hmm... first glance, point of origin seems to indicate someone got hit here,” the tech pointed. “The void there indicates where the killer stood. He must have been covered in blood. Look at that castoff pattern there. Looks like he swung a few times.”
It must have been one hell of a beating, Frost thought; no doubt this is where she died. Recalling the picture of Sadie Campelletti taken in better days, he hoped she hadn’t suffered long. He knew better, though, by the looks of all the blood surrounding them.
“Any sign of a weapon yet?” he asked.
“Yes. The arriving officer found a big, claw-type hammer lying out back. Smeared remains of what appears to be blood on head and handle. Hair fibers on claw. Blood splatter here seems consistent with medium velocity impact—typical of what a hammer would cause. We shot and bagged it. But outside conditions have likely screwed pretty nicely with trace, I’m guessing.”
“Let me know,” Frost said and excused himself to go make some calls.
There was nothing more he could do here. Years on the job and the sight and smells of a bloody killing still managed to get under his skin.
He yanked off his plastic gloves and exited the house back through the front door. The first of the media was arriving. In an attempt to remain unmolested by the aggressive reporters, he stayed behind the crime-scene tape to make the calls he needed to make. First up was a call to one of his investigators back at the station.
“Hey, find me Tyler Holmes. H-O-L-M-E-S. I want to know anything you can find. Priors, marital status, if he owns property. Find it all,” he told the investigator. “And I need it yesterday.”
He hung up and called the crime lab to give them a heads-up on what they had found.
“Prints, fiber, blood work, possible weapon. We’ll have it to you in the next couple hours. Set aside everything you’re doing when it comes in and get on this as soon as you can.”
“Yeah, yeah. Isn’t everything urgent?”
Frost heard the sarcasm in the guy’s voice and chose to ignore it. He thanked him and quickly hung up. Patience was not one of his finer virtues.
Frank Campelletti was next on Frost’s list. He had to ask him if he had heard of this Tyler Holmes guy and if he knew of any association his wife may have had with him. The call went to voice mail before it even rang. Frost hung up and tried again, hoping someone would pick up. Frank answered on the first ring this time.
“Mr. Campelletti, Detective Frost here. Hope I’m not intruding on anything.”
“No, I was just on the other line. Anything new yet?”
“Not quite yet, but I was wondering if you could tell me if you’ve ever heard of a man by the name of Tyler Holmes. We think he might have known your wife.”
“No, detective, I’ve never heard of him, but that doesn’t mean anything. She spent much of the summer here and likely met lots of people I didn’t know. Why? Who is he?”
“Just somebody we’re looking into. You folks have any construction done to your house up here lately?”
“Uh, yes. That’s why Sadie was up there this summer. Most of it was minor.”
“Do you know who did the work?”
“I don’t. Sadie handled all of that. I can have someone look around here and see if we can find any paperwork or anything, though, if that would help.”
“Okay, Mr. Campelletti. Thanks. That would be great. Let me know if you find anything or think of anything else, okay? I’ll be in touch.” Frost hung up, wishing he could get back the results of the prints and evidence ASAP. A murderer out there somewhere was just not acceptable to him.
He looked at his watch. It had only been a half an hour since he’d called his guy at the station. Not enough time. He decided to go knock on some neighboring doors.
Neighbors on both sides of the construction site happened t
o be home and both sets told him the same thing. The house had been under construction for a couple months. Normally a daily flurry of activity, the site had been pretty quiet for the last week, with no one having been there for days. No, no one had seen or heard anything last Friday evening because, as chance would have it, neither household was home; they had all been at Jed McKinney’s party. No one in either house had ever met Tyler Holmes, nor had they had any problems with any of the workers or the work being done on site. The neighbor who had called in about the car being in the yard had no information to offer other than having spotted the car parked there for so long, which she said she first noticed sitting there later Friday evening when she and her husband had left for the McKinney party. She never saw who drove it or who had left it. When it was still sitting there Wednesday, she’d become concerned.
Frost thanked her, as he had the others, and made his way back to the crime scene.
Getting antsy, he redialed the number for the investigator back at the station.
“Whatcha got?”
“Tyler Holmes. Twenty-nine years old; lives at 465 Park Street, according to his driver’s license, but he doesn’t show up as the owner of record. Blonde hair, six-foot, three inches and two hundred and twenty-five pounds. His sheet shows an assault back in ’95, a drunk and disorderly in ‘97 and a DUI from ‘98. Shows he’s principal owner of a construction company called ‘Holmes Homes,’ which he licensed late August.” Scanning his notes, he added, “No complaints filed against the business... and uh... no marriage on record.”
Frost thanked him and hung up. Holmes wasn’t exactly an upstanding citizen and the assault mixed with a booze problem was too much coincidence. He had to be part of the puzzle. It was time to see if he could finally track down this Mr. Holmes.
twenty-nine
FROST MANAGED to successfully avoid the crowd of reporters that now flooded the street. He got into his car and drove back down Water Street. He was heading back to Mr. Holmes’ house but, as he neared the driveway to the Campelletti house, he decided to turn off to see if he could look through Mrs. Campelletti’s personal effects one more time to see if there was anything about Tyler Holmes. The lights were on in the house, so it was likely Mr. Campelletti was still up.