by G. K. Parks
“So much for a morning off.”
“It’s not a morning off. We’re on call. You know that.”
“Up until now, it felt like a break. You don’t mind giving me a ride, do you?” He took off his cap. “I don’t have my car.”
“See, it’s a good thing I showed up today to watch you play.” I gave him a teasing smile, though my insides were currently doing the mambo. I’d been on the force long enough not to have jitters. It must have been the hangover or fear of what this call meant. I hadn’t gotten many details, just that more security guards were dead. I didn’t know if it was connected to our current case, but I had a bad feeling. I just hoped this scene wasn’t gruesome. I didn’t think I could stomach gruesome at the present.
“Okay. Give me a minute. I’ll meet you in the parking lot.” His gaze darted to Carrie.
I took a step back. “Sure, no problem.” I tried to wave goodbye to Emma, but she had lost interest in me the moment I answered the phone. She knew what it meant. Instead, she continued to eyeball the fire department’s third baseman. My mind made several inappropriate hose jokes, which made me snort. At least I amused myself.
I’d just unlocked the car doors when Brad sprinted toward me with his bag thrown over his shoulder. He hadn’t bothered to change, but at least he’d taken off his cleats. He climbed into the passenger seat.
“Two dead. Responding officer said it looks like an armored truck heist gone wrong.” He unzipped his bag and pulled out his holster. “At least that’s what Lt. Winston left on my voicemail. For some reason, he thinks this is related to yesterday’s robbery.”
“I guess he called you too.” I checked the rearview mirror before backing out of the space.
“What did he say when he spoke to you?”
“The same thing. You know the LT. He doesn’t give anything away.” I glanced at my partner from the corner of my eye. “I’m still not sure if that means he doesn’t know, doesn’t care, or just doesn’t want to cloud our judgment.”
“Who knows?” Brad dug through his bag, pulling out his cuffs and badge. He clipped them to his belt and unbuttoned the softball jersey and slipped into a long-sleeved t-shirt and police windbreaker. “Do you think anyone’s going to notice I’m not wearing regulation attire?”
“You mean that isn’t the police department’s official softball uniform?” I gasped in mock horror.
He squinted in my direction. “Has anyone mentioned you’re not that funny?”
“Really? The voices in my head think I’m hilarious.”
He chuckled, a deep velvety sound that eased the unsettled feeling in the pit of my stomach. “I hate to break it to you, but they’re wrong.”
“Pfft.” I slowed as the traffic light turned yellow. “You’re just jealous you don’t have a built-in audience to give you unfettered adulation. But I guess you don’t need it. You had your own cheering section at the game this morning.”
“I can’t believe you invited Emma. See, this is why I didn’t tell you about softball.”
“Seriously?”
He chuckled. “Sure.” Except he knew I didn’t believe him. “You hate watching sports. And you saw what it was like. Aside from the families, everyone else enjoying the game has ulterior motives. You already break my balls enough over my dating life.”
For the first time, the complaint actually sounded sincere. “I’m sorry.”
He shook it off. “How’d last night go with Logan?”
“We’re all set for court. He wanted me to remind you that you have to meet up with him.”
Brad tapped his temple. “Like a steel trap.” He turned sideways to face me. “You didn’t wash your hair.”
“How do you know that?” I felt the top of my head. “Does it look greasy?”
“No, you look fine. But you only wear your hair like that when you don’t have time to shower.”
I cocked an eyebrow at him. “I wear my hair up all the time.”
“I know, but you rarely do the twisty thing.” He leaned closer. “And you smell like cologne. So unless you bought some very manly scented soap, I think you have some explaining to do.”
I couldn’t believe he just said that. Apparently, I’d also underestimated his detecting skills. He might be the greatest sleuth since Sherlock Holmes. At this rate, Emma could be his Watson. “Oh, like you inviting Carrie to watch you pitch? We’ve been partners for nearly two years. You’re the one who has some explaining to do.”
“The light’s green.” He shook his head and pointed at the windshield, just as the driver behind me honked his horn. “And we’ve been partners for over two years. You don’t like sports. And I knew if you knew, you’d feel obligated to go. Honestly, Liv, I was saving you from countless hours on the bleachers, lumped in with all the wives, girlfriends, and families.”
“And you were afraid I’d hurt your game.”
“You’re not that much of a distraction.”
“I wasn’t talking about your pitching, Romeo.”
Brad’s cheeks reddened, and he turned his head to stare out the window. “Did you and Emma enjoy yourselves?”
“Emma definitely did. What do you know about the other team’s third baseman?”
“He’s a firefighter. He might have been in the calendar. I heard some guys teasing him about it.”
I realized that’s why he looked familiar. “Mr. August.” That spelled trouble with a capital T, but it was just the kind of trouble Emma would want to get into. At least this guy was a legitimate firefighter and not a killer in disguise.
Brad cocked an eyebrow at me, but I shook off the question. He didn’t need me to connect the dots. He knew my best friend almost as well as I did. “So you didn’t have a good time busting my balls?”
“I didn’t show up to bust your balls. You should know me better than that. For what it’s worth, you looked pretty damn impressive out there. You have a good arm.”
“Thanks.”
At the sight of the parked police cars, I turned and pulled in at the end of the row. Our conversation had been a distraction to ease our nerves, but now we were here. And it was bad. Worse than I thought it would be, and I hadn’t even stepped out of the car yet.
The crime scene techs were already hard at work. Two officers guarded the perimeter of the police tape, so I identified myself and flashed my badge.
“What do we know so far?” Brad asked while I ducked under the tape.
The officer consulted his notepad. “The call came in around 8:30 this morning. Shots fired. When we arrived on scene, we found them.” He gestured to two tarps. One on the sidewalk, the other near the rear of an opened armored truck. “The store’s alarm had been triggered. The door was open, but we didn’t notice any obvious signs of a break-in. No signs of forced entry. Nothing to indicate the killer took anything from inside. We don’t even know if he went inside.”
“He didn’t have to,” I said. “He waited for the guards to wheel it out. The cash they collected and whatever was inside the back of the truck is what he wanted.”
“Has the armored truck company been notified?” Brad asked.
“The sergeant’s handling it.”
“Where’s the shop owner?” I asked.
The officer shook his head. “The EMTs don’t think he’ll make it.” He pointed to a marker on the sidewalk near the front entrance. The stain on the concrete could only be one thing.
“Did anyone see anything?” Brad asked. “Customers? Employees? People on the street?”
“Shop was closed. It doesn’t open until ten. When we arrived, the looky-loos scattered. We have yet to speak to any witnesses.”
“What about the shop owner?” I asked. “Did he say anything before they took him to the hospital?”
The officer shook his head. “He was too busy choking on his own blood.” He sucked in a breath and stared into the distance. “I’m guessing if anyone was around to see what happened, they took off the moment the thief opened fire.”
“Still, someone made the 9-1-1 call. Did dispatch trace the number? We need to ID the caller.” Brad ducked beneath the tape to stand beside me. From here, he turned to look into the rear of the armored truck. It wasn’t supposed to be that easy to get inside one of those. “Two guards. That means there must have been another one or two inside the truck. Did they make the 9-1-1 call?”
The officer shrugged. “Ask the sarge.”
Brad nodded and led the way past the bodies to Sergeant Chambliss, who stood just outside the police tape. He sipped coffee from a paper cup and rubbed his eyes. When he saw us approach, he drained his cup and handed the empty to a nearby rookie.
“Are you sure you’re first responders?” Chambliss glanced at his watch. “You’re a couple hours too late.” He looked down at my partner’s softball pants. “At least tell me we kicked some firefighter ass.”
“I don’t know. We only made it three innings.”
“Damn. Nothing good’s gonna come from today.” Chambliss blew out a breath. “All right. So here’s the kicker. The dispensary,” he pointed to the building surrounded by crime scene tape, “is protected by Moonlight Security. The night guard got off duty at eight a.m. The armored truck pickup came a little late today, after the night watchman had already gone home. We don’t know anything yet, but that’s one hell of a coinkydink. It’s a good thing you detectives are here to figure that out, huh?”
I narrowed my eyes at the sarcasm, but Brad let it roll off his back. “What about the armored truck company and the guards inside?” he asked.
“They’re all dead.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” Brad said. “If two of the armored truck guys went in to collect the money, what happened to the guards who remained inside the truck?”
Chambliss swallowed. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
Fourteen
I checked the inside of the shop, but nothing looked like it had been taken or disturbed. The sign on the desk insisted cash-only, and given the nature of the shop, I wasn’t surprised. According to LockBox, the truck company, cash was picked up by armored truck every Saturday before the start of business. They had several other dispensaries on their route, along with other cash-only businesses. By the time they made it here, they should have had close to an entire pallet in the back of the truck, roughly one hundred million dollars, except the original truck had broken down. So LockBox sent an empty truck to make this pickup while they emptied out the other truck and had it towed for repair.
“Our killer has the worst luck ever,” Fennel said, stepping into the main room. “Did you find anything?”
“Nope. Nothing’s been disturbed. Do you think this could be another inside job? I contacted Moonlight Security, and Mr. McFarland told me Jonathan Gardner used to work as a night watchman here before he got transferred to Star Cleaners. That gives us a solid connection.”
Fennel bit his lip and stared into the room he just came from. “The dispensary has a ton of security cameras. They’re all working. Two LockBox guards came in, the owner opened the safe, they unloaded it onto two separate, locked carts, and they wheeled it out of the shop.”
“Okay, so the shooter didn’t enter the store. He’s not an idiot.”
“No, I guess not.” But a question itched at Fennel’s mind.
“You want to know how the alarm got triggered if everything appeared to be on the up and up.”
He pointed at me. “Bingo.”
“What about the owner? Could he have hit the alarm when he saw the shooter?”
“I haven’t found any big red button that says press in case of an emergency, but there might be one.” He got onto his hands and knees and peered underneath the counter. “Anything on the walls?”
“No.” And now I wondered how the alarm had gotten tripped. “Let’s have someone bring Mr. McFarland in for questioning, along with the night watchman. Two businesses protected by Moonlight Security were hit in the last two days. That has to mean something.”
“Besides the fact they have lousy security?” Fennel stood up and wiped his palms on his pants. “Have you checked out the truck yet?”
“Just a brief glance. CSU’s checking for GSR and blood.” I marched out of the fragrant shop and knelt down beside one of the tarps. The medical examiner wasn’t in any hurry to move the bodies. I didn’t know if that was because he slept in on Saturday mornings or if it was because he was short-staffed on account of one of his assistant’s watching the softball game.
Beneath the tarp, blood had congealed around the man’s head and chest. Just like Jonathan Gardner, he’d been shot in the face at close range. But unlike Gardner, this guard had made a move for his gun. The strap was open, and his weapon was missing. According to the crime techs, they’d found it a few inches from his body. It had recently been fired, with two bullets missing from the clip.
“The vest would have saved his life if the asshole hadn’t shot him in the head,” Fennel said from behind me. He pointed to two bullet holes in the guy’s shirt with the silver slugs poking out from beneath the torn material.
“At least he tried to shoot back.”
Fennel studied the ground, careful to maneuver around the markers, but he didn’t find any blood drops. At least none that had been marked. “Looks like he missed.”
He went to the second tarp, this one much closer to the rear of the truck. “Same thing here. Two shots to the chest. One to the head.”
“Nice grouping.”
“You’re thinking our killer’s been trained?”
“Maybe.” I didn’t know what to think, except this had to stop before more people died. I rubbed my mouth, replaced the tarp, and said a silent prayer. Were these two robbery-homicides connected?
While my partner spoke to the officers and crime techs, I walked around the area. The responding officers had done a good job containing the scene. Too bad they hadn’t arrived sooner to stop the killer. But why hadn’t LockBox sent more than two guards to make the pickup? Armored trucks had three, sometimes four, men inside when it came to large pickups and deliveries like this. One always stayed inside the truck to call for help.
I peered into a nearby dumpster, unsure what I expected to find, but all I saw was trash. So I moved on, farther from the dispensary and the crime scene. How far could the killer have gotten? Even though he didn’t score hundreds of millions or even millions, he probably picked up several thousand dollars, maybe more. That would be heavy, especially in those sealed cash boxes the guards had wheeled out.
The killer must have had a getaway vehicle waiting. He must have parked close to the dispensary. Dialing LockBox, I waited for someone to answer. Before the call was transferred to someone in charge, an armored SUV pulled up beside my car. The LockBox insignia had been stenciled on the doors, and two men who looked like they should have been extras in a spy thriller stepped out of the vehicle.
Two officers stopped them at the police tape, and I came up behind them. “I’m Detective DeMarco. Who are you, gentlemen?”
“Leslie Tatem and Nicholas Pandori,” one of the men said. He didn’t offer his hand. Instead, he stared at the tarp over my shoulder. “Have you IDed them yet?”
I nodded. “Case Jeffers and Alan Croft.”
“Damn.”
Pandori swallowed and removed his sunglasses. Tears were in his eyes. “Do you know what happened?”
“We’re working on it. Why did LockBox send a truck with only two guards?”
“Two?” Tatem shook his head. “No way.” He held up his fingers. “Three.”
Pandori studied the scene but made no attempt to cross the tape. “You didn’t find Lindsey?”
“Lindsey?” I asked.
“Lindsey Rook.” Pandori bit his upper lip. “That means he might still be alive, right?”
“Who’s Lindsey Rook?” I repeated, not wanting to give him false hope.
“He works with us,” Tatem said. “He liked to drive. Used to be a school bus driver but said
this was better. He always joked if he’d had the gun back then, the brats on the bus might have behaved themselves.”
“Does Lindsey have any outstanding debts? Personal issues?” I asked.
Pandori scowled at me. “You think someone from LockBox is involved?”
“I’m just trying to find out what happened. Right now, my priority is locating your friend. He could be hurt or worse. Anything you say can only help the situation.”
Pandori didn’t look convinced, and he eyed Tatem. Tatem blew out a breath. “Of course, Detective DeMarco. We’d be happy to answer any questions you have, but Lindsey’s an upstanding guy. One of the best guys I know. He’s the guy you’d want watching your back if you were pinned down in a firefight.”
“So you think he got out of the truck to help Jeffers and Croft?”
“You bet your ass,” Tatem said. “LockBox received a garbled radio transmission hours ago, but we couldn’t make heads or tails out of it. Less than an hour later, the police contacted us with the news. I’m guessing Lindsey called it in, but it didn’t go through.”
“They probably used jammers,” Fennel said, stepping up beside me. He introduced himself to the two men. “Excuse us, gentlemen.” Fennel grabbed my elbow and steered me away from them. “9-1-1 just received a call about a body fifteen blocks from here. According to the caller, two security guards stripped the man down to his skivvies, shot him in the chest, and headed down to the train station. Dispatch has already advised the metro cops to be aware of active shooters in the area. We need to move. Now.”
Fifteen
“Shit.” Carter sucked down a few breaths. The world had dimmed around him.
“Stop being such a pussy.” Diego tossed the man’s shirt to him. “Put that on.”
Carter shoved one arm through the sleeve and then the other. With trembling hands, he tucked the too large shirt into the too short pants and went to work on the buttons.
“Hurry it up,” the third man hissed. He had already opened the first lockbox and emptied the cash into a duffel bag. Now, he filled the second bag with the cash from the second lockbox. “It’s taking you longer to dress than it took me to get the boxes open.”