Hunters

by Heather Mace



  Hunters

  By Heather Mace

  Copyright 2016 Heather Mace

  Licensing Notes

  Thank you for downloading this ebook.

  This book remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be redistributed to others for commercial or non-commercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy from their favorite authorized retailer.

  Thank you for your support.

  This is a work of fiction.

  Characters, places, and events in this story are the product of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any similarities to persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you to Jeanette Flores Campbell for constant advice on grammar and apostrophes.

  Any remaining mistakes are entirely my fault.

  Contents

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  About the Author

  Other Titles by Heather Mace

  Connect with Heather Mace

  1

  Every waking moment since the attack, Jen had been jumpy and nervous. And on the rare occasion that she slept, she was plagued by nightmares. Despite advice from her doctors, she refused medication to calm her nerves, or induce sleep. She had to stay sharp. He was still out there, out on bail, and she knew that she couldn’t let her guard down until his trial was over.

  As was now her ritual, she had walked the perimeter of her house, checking the lock on every window and door, and making sure that every room had at least one light burning. Just before retreating to her bedroom, she peered out the front window to verify that a patrol car was parked in front of her house. She locked her bedroom door, verified that her stun gun was fully charged, and then crawled into bed.

  She was somewhere in the midst of those precious moments between drifting off to sleep and sliding into a nightmare when she was startled back to full consciousness by something… A noise! She sat up, listening intently, unable to place it or identify it. She blinked into every corner of the dimly lit room and visually checked the door lock. Everything looked all right. She quietly drew in a breath and tried to calm her nerves. And there it was again.

  This time she was almost certain of what and where it was. It sounded like a floorboard groaning at the end of the hallway. All of her senses were now fully alert. She slid out of bed as she reached for the stun gun, and smacked her forehead on the corner of the nightstand. She winced and stifled a cry as she thumbed the weapon on. She felt a trickle of blood running down the side of her face. She swiped it with her hand and looked at it to verify that she was, in fact, bleeding. She grabbed the edge of her bed sheet and used it to hold pressure on the wound while she listened as hard as she could.

  For a time that seemed to border on eternity, there was not another sound. As she began to mentally relax, she could hear the blood pounding louder and louder in her head. She started to feel dizzy. She reached up behind her to the telephone on the nightstand and pulled it down to the floor. Even if there was no one in the house, she thought she might have to call for help because of her rapidly increasing blood pressure.

  “Deep, calming breaths,” she whispered to herself. She had already involved the police in too many false alarms. She was determined not to have them come charging into the house again to rescue her from yet another creaky floorboard. Jen forced herself to remove her thumb from the nine button on her phone and took another deep breath. She felt her pulse slowing down as she exhaled.

  ***

  “Malcolm Cole, you are under arrest for the murder of Jennifer Golden.”

  “Whaaat?!?” Malcolm spun on Detective Glade, shaking loose from the attempt to handcuff him.

  Detective Sherman slammed Malcolm against the hood of the police cruiser and twisted his right arm upward, behind his back. Detective Glade slapped a cuff onto Malcolm’s wrist just a little tighter than was necessary, while his partner kept pressure against Malcolm’s back.

  Malcolm struggled, shouting over his shoulder, “I didn’t kill that bitch.”

  “Of course not,” Glade said, jerking him away from the hood of the car by his cuffed wrists. “Let’s go.” He pushed the suspect toward the back door of the car.

  “I didn’t kill that bitch,” Malcolm screamed, his face growing a deeper shade of red with each word.

  With his hand on Malcolm’s head, Glade shoved him through the door. “And last time you were arrested you swore you didn’t rape her or cut up her face. But we all know better than that, don’t we?”

  Sherman stepped up to the door and waited for Malcolm’s string of expletives to subside. When the suspect was finally quiet, Sherman read him his rights.

  “I did not kill her,” he articulated every syllable. “And I have not been convicted of anything.”

  “No, Mac, you haven’t been convicted yet, but we have a mountain of forensic evidence that will bury you at your trial.”

  Malcolm snorted, “sounds like your star witness won’t be there to testify against me.”

  Sherman looked up at Glade. “That almost sounded like a confession to me. What do you think, Benjamin?”

  “I didn’t confess,” Malcolm screamed, “because I didn’t kill…”

  Sherman slammed the door in his face.

  ***

  Officer Monica Martinez tugged her gun belt upward as she threw her leg over the stool next to Detectives Glade and Sherman. “You two are such a cliché,” she pulled the box of donuts closer to her and flipped the lid open.

  Glade closed the lid and moved the box away from her. “Don’t insult a man and then reach for his donuts, Officer Martinez.”

  She shrugged. “Alright boys, but I did come here to invite you to a barbecue.”

  Smiling, Sherman slid the box back toward her.

  She chose one of the filled donuts, knowing full well that they were Glade’s favorites. As expected, he glared at her and moved the box back to the other side of the counter. “You can throw a hundred barbecues and it ain’t gonna get you into homicide, Marti.”

  “Do not call me Marti, Benji!”

  “Hey,” Sherman snapped at her, “that’s Detective Benji to you, Officer.” Sherman nudged his partner, “She isn’t inviting us to her house to get into homicide. I think it’s because she’s sweet on me.”

  “Keep dreaming, dumb ass, Marti, here, doesn’t like boys,” Glade said almost under his breath

  “Luckily, I’m a man and not a boy. And a rather handsome one at that.”

  Monica slid an invitation, containing a map to her house, across the counter to Detective Sherman. “You can bring him if you want to,” she nodded toward Glade.

  Sherman watched Martinez leave the donut shop, and then turned to his partner. “Why are you always such a jerk to her? She’s young, ambitious, always eager to help, and damn nice to look at.”

  “Yeah, Doug, she’s a little too gung-ho for my taste. Gonna get herself dead if she doesn’t learn some patience. And for the record, you really aren’t her type, so give it up.”

  “I don’t care if she’s a dyke, Detective Benji, I can still appreciate the view.”

  “You ever call me Benji again, I’m gonna bust your nuts.”

  “An honorable man would not do that to another man,” Sherman grinned, “Benji.”

  Glade brought his fist down on the box in front of him, flatte
ning almost half of it. “Your do-nuts, that is.” He smirked and left the counter.

  “That ain’t right Benjamin,” Sherman shook his head, picturing the mess inside the box.

  ***

  Detective Glade pulled off his gun belt, re-fastened the buckle and hung it on a coat hook behind the bedroom door. He sat on the edge of his bed, kicked off his shoes and ran his hands through his thinning hair.

  “I take it this wasn’t one of the better days?” His wife asked.

  “I’m not sure there’s enough water to wash this one off of me.”

  She pushed up her sleeves. “I can scrub something.”

  Benjamin almost smiled. “My eyes? My heart? The part of my brain that can’t stop seeing…”

  “Oh? What did you see?” She sat next to him.

  He was silent for a while, considering his answer. “I don’t know that you need to hear this.”

  “Probably not, but I think you need to say it.”

  “Remember that piece of shit who stalked, battered, and raped his ex-girlfriend and then sliced her face up with a kitchen knife?”

  “Don’t tell me he walked?”

  “No, Sherry, but she has disappeared. There was blood on her sheets and her telephone. Even had a thumb print in her blood on the nine, like she was dialing nine-one-one and never got that far. Patrolman sitting right in front of her house the whole time. We picked Cole up for murder today. But without a body…”

  “Isn’t his trial about to start? That sounds like motive to me.”

  He clenched his teeth. “Yeah, the bastard mentioned that. And he cried all the way to, and through, his booking about how he was innocent. He’s probably still whining about it. He said the same thing about the assault. He was framed. We got the wrong guy. He keeps saying her brother hated her and we should be looking at him. But we got a ton of evidence on the assault and absolutely nothing on the abduction and/or murder. So if he walks on the assault due to her not being there to testify, then he could walk on the murder for lack of evidence.” He shook his head and clenched his fists. “Someone needs to kill that son of a bitch.”

  After digesting the horror, Sherry squeezed his hand. “You’re right. I don’t think you can wash this one off. But be patient, let it play out. I’m sure justice will be served one way or the other.”

  “She was such a pretty girl, so sweet, so scared.” He cleared his throat. “I think I’ll do my crying in the shower, if you don’t mind.”

  “I’ll get dinner.”

  He turned back when he reached the bathroom door. “By the way, we’ve been invited to a barbecue.”

  She smiled and turned to look at him.

  He cocked his head and raised an eyebrow. You look disproportionately happy about it.

  “Well,” she laughed, “when you were a handsome, young soldier that was one of the things on your list of reasons why I should marry you and move to Texas. Sherry,” she said, doing her best impression of her husband, “somebody down there is having a barbecue every weekend.”

  He laughed, shaking off just a little bit of his dark mood. “And I was right,” he muttered as he headed for the shower.

  2

  “John Adam Derrick?”

  John Derrick had been sitting on the hard plastic chair for so long that he almost didn’t recognize his own name being called. His subconscious had him jumping to his feet before his conscious mind had even made the connection. His iphone slid from his right hand. He fumbled around and caught it with his left. He smiled, pleased at his quick reflexes. Catlike reflexes? Whoever came up with that crap, he wondered. Cats sucked. He was nothing like a cat. He was more like a wolf than a stupid cat, of that he was certain.

  “Last call for John Adam Derrick.”

  “I’m here.” He waved and stepped quickly up to the line. He placed all of his paperwork on the counter and snickered. “I didn’t recognize my name. I never use my middle name. The only people who use all three names are serial killers. Have you ever noticed that?”

  “I haven’t really given much thought to serial killers. All I think about all day is driver licenses.”

  “Well, that sounds like fun,” John rolled his eyes.

  “It pays the bills.”

  John Derrick strolled out of the DPS office as calmly as he could. A look at his cell phone told him that he’d been inside for just over three hours. He crossed the street and kept walking, making his way into the surrounding neighborhood. Three hours was a long time to leave someone waiting in the car. He pulled the rolled up baseball cap out of his back pocket and put it on his head, pulling the bill down over his eyes. He took the shades from his shirt collar and popped them on as well. No need to show his pretty face to all of the neighbors.

  Two streets down and three streets over, he found the car right where he had left it. Nothing looked out of place. He approached casually, slowing as he neared the vehicle. He stopped and popped his foot onto the front bumper to re-tie his shoelace. He checked his surroundings as he cinched up the right boot. The only soul in sight was a man several houses down the block, walking his dog. Everything seemed just fine.

  John unlocked the door, slid in behind the wheel and pulled away from the curb carefully. He would never break a traffic law again. This was now a sacred and unbreakable rule to live by. And today would test his resolve. He wanted desperately to step on the gas and haul ass to his favorite secluded spot. More than anything, he wanted to know if the owner of the car was still alive. She’d been in the trunk for a long time.

  John Adam Derrick had so much in store for her. And it would be more enjoyable if she were still alive to experience it with him.

  ***

  Detective Sherman folded his hands together and looked with feigned kindness across the table at Malcolm Cole. “I am certain that the DA would toss out all the other charges and give you some consideration for telling us what you did with Jennifer’s body.”

  “That sounds great, but I didn’t kill the…”

  “We’ve already heard this song,” Glade cut him off. “You didn’t kill the bitch. Got it.” He turned to Sherman and huffed in disgust. “Quit trying to help this piece of garbage and let him fry for the whole thing.”

  “Glade, I’m just trying to do what’s best for everyone,” he said calmly. “If we can make a deal, it saves the taxpayers a few bucks, you and I don’t have to go through a long drawn out trial and Cole gets out of this alive.”

  Glade slammed his hand down on the table so hard that both his partner and the suspect flinched. “He doesn’t deserve to get out of this alive. Don’t you see that?”

  Cole leaned back in his chair and studied the two of them for a moment. “I see what’s going on here. I’m not an idiot. You’re playing stupid cop and stupider cop.”

  “Is stupider a word?” Sherman asked seemingly unfazed by his comment.

  “I used to be a cop.” Cole said. “I know how this bullshit works.

  “A cop?” Glade was incensed. “You were a jail guard in some little podunk town. No real police department would take you.”

  “I was just about to get on with SAPD when that lying bitch started making false accusations and ruined my life,” he spat back. “But I didn’t kill the bitch.”

  Sherman sighed. “I guess I can’t help you.”

  Glade stood up and leaned down over him. “Even after charges were filed for your previous assault on her, and a restraining order was in place, you were still stalking her. You were picked up in her neighborhood the day after she went missing.”

  “And what the fuck would I be doing stalking her if I had already killed her?”

  Glade continued undeterred. “And you practically confessed to killing her right after we read you your rights. Truthfully, I don’t want you to make a deal. I want you to go to prison and find out what happens to pathetic little cowards like you inside those walls.”
He slammed his hand on the table once more and said, “Let’s get out of here.”

  Officer Martinez stood waiting outside of the interrogation room. She pushed herself off the wall she had been leaning on and hooked her thumbs on her gun belt. She nodded at Glade. He glared in return.

  “Were you listening in?” Sherman asked her.

  “Yep.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I think he is a waste of oxygen- an abusive, violent piece of shit.”

  “Amazing powers of observation,” Glade grumbled.

  “But,” she held up her hand, “he did pose one very good question right there at the end.”

  Glade stopped short and looked up sharply. He stared at Martinez for a long time and then looked back at the closed door of the interrogation room. “Why was he still stalking her if her if he already killed her?” He balled up his fists. “Shit!”

  Sherman folded his arms. “What are you thinking, Benjamin? He’s not good for the murder?”

  “I don’t know what I’m thinking. He doesn’t seem that smart. But maybe he’s playing us.” He punched the door. “Without Jennifer here to testify he might walk on the rape charge. And without a body the D. A. won’t want to touch a murder charge.”

  “Has he asked for a lawyer?” Martinez asked.

  Sherman shook his head. “He says he’s innocent and doesn’t need some shark, bitch in his business.”

  Shark, bitch?” She raised an eyebrow.

  “Yeah, his lawyer is a woman. Leslie Hunter, Shark, Bitch, Attorney at Law.” He laughed.

  Martinez laughed along with him. “I bet she’d love that printed on her business cards.” She noticed that Glade, as usual, was not amused. “Okay, so he’s gonna walk on all of this? What if they drop the pending murder charge in exchange for a confession on the rape?”

  Glade considered the possibility. “Number one, if he takes that deal he’ll get a reduced sentence. And number two, that murder charge is going away no matter what we do.”

  “Number one,” Martinez held up her index finger, “some time is better than no time. And number two,” she held up her middle finger and smiled at Glade, “without his shark, bitch here, he might not know that the murder charge is going to drop.”