The Cruelest Cut

by Rick Reed

  The creak of the stairs was sharp in the darkness of his room, and he wondered why it was so dark. Is it always this dark? he wondered, but he couldn’t remember.

  There came the sound of metal on metal, something turning, the doorknob, the latch to his door. His heart pounded so hard his chest hurt, and he wanted to scream but he couldn’t.

  “Wake up, bro. Wake up, man,” Bobby said, and Eddie snapped out of the dream. His hands shook. He was embarrassed to find he had an erection, and he wondered what the fuck was wrong with him. He hoped Bobby wouldn’t notice he had a hard-on, and he shoved his hands into his lap.

  “You were dreaming about the preacher again, weren’t you?” Bobby said. “You were dreaming about what he did to you. What he made us do to him.”

  Eddie pounded his fists on his thighs and began to cry.

  The old man and his dog were in the back of a police cruiser. He was petting the dog’s head and muttering soothing things to the little Jack Russell terrier. The dog seemed calmer than the man.

  Jack was surprised to see it was the same old gentleman who’d found the body of Timothy Ryan.

  “This guy should play the lottery,” Liddell said.

  “This would not be an example of good luck,” Jack responded. “If it was the lottery, he’d probably get a ticket that said he owed them money.”

  “Yeah. Guess you’re right. By the way, his name is Duke Gibson,” Liddell said.

  “The dog or the man?” Jack said, and then added, “Never mind. Bad joke.”

  Jack opened the back passenger door of the police car and leaned down to scrub the dog’s head. “Mr. Gibson, I’m Detective Murphy. You remember my partner, Liddell Blanchard?”

  The man nodded his head straight up and down and tried to swallow. “What’s going to happen to me?” he asked nervously.

  Liddell straightened up so the old man wouldn’t see him smiling. Jack looked at the man and said, “Mr. Gibson, this is a very serious police matter, and I expect you to tell us everything you know.”

  “What’ll happen to me then?” he asked.

  “Then the police officer here”—Jack pointed to the uniformed officer whose car they were using—“will take you and your dog home. I don’t want you coming back down here until we catch whoever did this. Do you understand, Mr. Gibson?”

  “Yes, sir. Yes, sir, I understand, and I thank you for not taking me in, Detective Murphy. You’re a good man. Thank you, sir.”

  Jack straightened up and grinned at Liddell. “You want to do the honors again?” he asked.

  Liddell theatrically rubbed his hands together and said in a high-pitched voice, “Oh, I’ll get him, my pretty—and his little dog, too.”

  Jack shook his head and walked off to interview the uniformed officers and anyone else that had information about this, which included two fire paramedic units, an ambulance crew, neighbors living around the area, dispatchers, and the original call taker. It would be a long morning.

  His cell phone rang, and it was Liddell.

  “The old man said his dog was acting funny, then took off running ahead of him. By the time he caught up with the dog on the playground, he said the dog was carrying something around in its mouth.”

  “Let me guess,” Jack said. “A dead cat.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Better tell the crime scene guys that there may be dog hair contaminating the scene,” Jack said.

  “I’ll do it,” Liddell said and hung up.

  What a cluster fuck, Jack thought.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Captain Dewey Duncan was sixty-three years old and had been a policeman for forty-two of those years. He’d never been a detective, or even a good street cop, but he’d been good where it mattered. And that was at taking tests. He could memorize almost anything set in front of him, so testing for promotion had been simple. But by the time he reached the rank of captain, he realized that if he tried to go any further he would have too much responsibility, and that was something he avoided like death itself.

  When he’d come to the attention of Deputy Chief Richard Dick, he was working as the “accreditation commander” for the police department. No one really knew what an accreditation commander did, so he had been able to slip into that netherworld of invisible employees that he had longed for. He drew a captain’s pay and did whatever pleased him. It didn’t get any better than that. Or at least that’s what he thought until he was approached by Richard Dick.

  Dick had offered him a position as “administrative assistant,” not if, but when, Dick became the chief of police. He’d been assured that his job would be simple and that he would act as personal driver for the chief. Dewey Duncan knew how treacherous Double Dick could be, but he believed an old saying of Winston Churchill’s that went “Keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer.” He’d made a habit of placating everyone inside his sphere of influence and especially those who had influence over him. With Dick’s offer he knew he’d hit the mother lode.

  Now he was wearing his dress blues with all his meritorious decorations and driving the new chief, Richard Dick, to the scene of a homicide. The only thought that troubled him was that he’d never actually seen a homicide, or a dead person for that matter, if you didn’t count his Aunt Lucy, whom he’d accidentally found after she died in her sleep. He’d been living in her attic for his first few years on the force and had gone down for breakfast and couldn’t wake her. From that point on, he knew he wanted nothing to do with real police work. He’d come a long way.

  He stopped the unmarked sedan outside the yellow caution tape and hurried out to open the door for the chief. He fervently hoped he would not be required to go any farther.

  “Uh oh,” Liddell said, causing Jack and the captain to look up from the body.

  “Let me take care of this, gentlemen,” Franklin said and walked toward the approaching figure of the newly appointed chief of police, Richard Dick.

  Jack watched as Double Dick strutted toward them and was once again reminded of how much Dick resembled a flamingo, or perhaps Don Quixote, with his tall and gangly body, protruding Adam’s apple, beak nose, and skinny legs. As Double Dick stooped to go under the yellow caution tape, Jack decided he looked more like a flamingo dipping for a tasty fish.

  “We just got Dick’d,” Liddell said with not quite a smirk.

  “This isn’t going to be pretty,” Jack said, seeing Chief Dick walk right past the captain, making a beeline for the two detectives.

  “Just what part of ‘orders’ do you not understand, Detective Murphy?” Dick said, drawing himself up to his full height. He didn’t let Jack answer. “I specifically told you that you were not to have any more contact with the media without my presence, did I not?”

  Jack wondered which contact with the media he was referring to. The botched interview at Channel Six, or the abuse of Maddy Brooks here? He said nothing because he knew that Dick didn’t really want an answer. Dick wanted his head.

  “I was told by my driver that Maddy Brooks called, almost hysterical, complaining about your behavior here,” Dick said.

  “I can explain that, Chief,” Liddell said, but Dick gave him a cautioning look.

  Captain Franklin caught up with them, but Dick directed his question at Murphy. “Were you not aware that I was in charge of this case, Detective Murphy?”

  “Yes sir, I am aware of that,” Jack said, looking him directly in the eye.

  “Then why did you go to this crime scene without contacting me first? Or without contacting me at all, for that matter?” Dick asked, and when Jack didn’t respond immediately, he added, “Well, Detective Murphy, I’m waiting for an answer.”

  “Chief, it’s partly my fault,” Franklin said, trying to intercede.

  “Captain, if that is true, then you will suffer the same fate as your stooge here,” Dick said, almost spitting the words out.

  Franklin started to interrupt, but Jack spoke up. “It’s not anyone’s fault, Captain. I was
just doing my job. It’s what we do.”

  Chief Dick’s eyes seemed to bulge in their sockets. His mouth drew into a tight line. “It may be what you ‘did,’ but it is not what you will do as long as I’m chief.”

  Jack clenched his jaw, trying to keep his mouth shut, and Dick saw it. Couldn’t let it go. “Do you have something else to say, Detective Murphy?”

  Oh well, Jack thought. In for a penny, in for a pound.

  “Well, Chief,” Jack said, and Franklin rubbed a hand down his face, knowing he couldn’t stop him, “I came here because I was dispatched to the scene of a murder. You asked why I came here without calling you. The truth is that if I called you, we would all be standing around with our dicks in our hands waiting for you to arrive with the news media, and then we’d waste more valuable time while you got your fucking Kodak moment and tramped through the evidence. So what am I doing, you ask? I’m standing here talking to an asshole while my murder case gets cold. Sir.”

  “Captain,” Dick said, still looking directly at Jack, “take possession of Detective Murphy’s weapon and credentials. He won’t need them for a very long while.”

  Franklin hesitated, but Chief Dick spoke again. “I’ve given you an order, Captain. You will carry it out, or you will surrender your weapon and identification to me.”

  Franklin still hesitated, and Jack stepped up and handed the captain his police ID, then pulled his Glock .45 out of the holster, dropped the ammunition clip, ejected the live round out of the receiver into his hand, and surrendered these to the captain.

  “Jack,” Franklin called out to Murphy’s retreating figure.

  “Let him go, Captain Franklin. The man’s a disgrace,” Dick said, and Liddell felt his face get hot.

  Captain Franklin must have read his mind, because he put a hand on Liddell’s arm and squeezed. “What are your orders, Chief?” Franklin asked.

  “That’s more like it,” Dick said smugly.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  When Eddie had gone to Kids’ Kingdom he hadn’t planned on leaving a human body, just the cats. The note he’d made out was another clue for Jack, and he didn’t need a body for that. But the kid had changed those plans, and so, he’d had to improvise. He cut a message into the boy’s hide for Jack. After what Murphy said about him on television, that was as good a message as anything. But Maddy Brooks had proven she couldn’t be trusted. He’d deal with that.

  He’d played with the idea of running by Channel Six and leaving Maddy Brooks a note so she could find the body, but she had seriously pissed him off. And so, there had been nothing all night about Kids’ Kingdom on Channel Six or any of the other channels. Just went to show that Maddy wasn’t shit without him giving her the notes. She was as stupid as the police.

  He was sure he hadn’t missed any of the news. The Mt. Vernon Inn, where Eddie had stayed overnight, was just thirty minutes from Evansville and got all the Evansville television stations. The rooms were cleaner than the strip motels in Evansville, but they were still used mostly by long-haul truckers looking for a little slap and tickle with the ladies of the night. Or, as Bobby put it, “a little Pokey and Gumby.”

  The motel had been Bobby’s idea. It was outside the jurisdiction of the Evansville cops, and one thing Eddie and Bobby had learned through their many contacts with the law was that law dogs didn’t cooperate with each other very good. It was a weakness the cops were probably aware of, but never seemed to correct.

  The sun was just cracking the horizon when Eddie walked a mile down the road to the Whistle Stop restaurant. He had reclaimed the van from the North Park Shopping Center in Evansville and had it safely tucked away behind the motel, where a lot of the clientele seemed to prefer to park.

  They would have to move again tonight, keep moving until this was over. It would make them harder to track that way, but it was a pain in the ass. That fucking Murphy, Eddie thought.

  Bobby had disappeared sometime during the night, and when Eddie woke up hungry, he had hoped to at least eat with his brother before he delivered the next message. But he found the van, parked behind the motel still, and no sign of Bobby.

  Fuck him, Eddie thought as he entered the restaurant. The Whistle Stop sat at a crossroads on Highway 69 next to railroad tracks. When Eddie was a kid, the preacher had taken him and Bobby to a tent revival in a cornfield near there, and on their way home he had treated them to a caboose burger at the Whistle Stop. That was when his mom was still around and the preacher was different. Everything was different.

  Back then there had been nothing around but farm fields and a rundown gas station. Now there was a Huck’s Convenience Store, an Ace Hardware Store, and dozens of other businesses lining both sides of the highway.

  Inside he looked around and was glad to see that nothing in there had changed. One entire wall was a chipped and faded mural of an old steam engine. The model train tracks still crisscrossed overhead and along the walls. The only things missing were the little toy trains that used to run around the tracks, and every now and then, one of them would let out a whistle and smoke would come from the train smokestack. It was the most interesting thing Eddie had ever seen, but they had never gone there again.

  Eddie sat at the counter and a rabbit-faced woman with stiff graying hair banged a chipped porcelain mug down in front of him. “Coffee’s over there,” she said. “Help yourself.” Then she turned away and began yelling at the cook in the back. “Ernie, put some more bacon down.”

  Eddie looked at her piteous figure. Her frame was so frail that her faded tan waitress outfit hung on her like a skeleton. Her name tag read BERNICE. For some reason, maybe because he hadn’t been here since he was very little, she reminded him of his mother. She had been a waitress, too. But the preacher had killed anything good he remembered about his mother. All that was left was pity, and he didn’t even know why he felt that.

  “Hey, Bernice, how ’bout some of that apple pie,” Eddie said, nodding toward a pastry case that had two pieces of pie and something else he didn’t recognize.

  Bernice was at least sixty years old, but she strutted to the counter where Eddie was sitting like she had a million-dollar figure.

  “You sure that’s all you want, sugar?” she asked.

  “Bernice, I like my women like I like my coffee,” Eddie said with a grin. “Hot and black.”

  Bernice chortled and slapped a piece down in front of him.

  A trucker came in and sat two seats down, while the efficient Bernice banged an empty mug down on the counter and said, “You know where it’s at, Herb.” The driver chuckled and blew a kiss at her and made grinding motions at her with his hips like a dog humping a leg.

  “Herb, someday I’m gonna spray you with pesticide,” Bernice said, her face drawn into a serious expression. To Eddie she said, “Let me warm that pie up for you, hon.” She grabbed Eddie’s plate before he could protest and headed to the kitchen, saying over her shoulder, “Some people get treated better cause they got manners, Herb.”

  Eddie shuddered at the thought of Bernice and the driver doing the nasty. But then, truck drivers weren’t known for having the best taste in women. His mind slowly returned to the problem at hand. Jack Murphy. And he was just getting an idea when the truck driver began making loud slurping noises with his coffee. Eddie looked at him and shook his head and thought, Fuckin’ asshole truckers. Cowboy boots, the fuckin’ hat, and no fuckin’ manners.

  Bernice returned with the warmed apple pie and set it in front of Eddie. She scooped up the newspaper that someone had left behind and was about to put it behind the counter when Eddie spied the headlines.

  “Gimme that!” he said, and grabbed the paper from her.

  “Well, hon, you just had to ask,” Bernice said in a hurt tone.

  Eddie stared at her for just a second and said, “Shut the fuck up, you wrinkled old bitch,” and before she could react he shoved the pie and coffee over the counter onto her feet.

  The dishes smashed, and hot coffe
e and apple pie exploded onto her legs and dirty sneakers. When she looked up, Eddie was gone. The trucker who sat two seats down just shook his head and continued slurping his coffee.

  Sleep hadn’t come easily to Jack, and he didn’t so much “wake up” as just “get up” the morning after his suspension from duty. He didn’t mind being suspended, but it killed him to be taken off the case and he regretted going so quietly. But what good would making a big scene do? Nothing, he decided. But it sure would have felt good.

  The Evansville morning paper lay on his kitchen table. The headline read: DECORATED COP DUMPED FROM INVESTIGATION.

  The article didn’t really say much, but Double Dick was quoted at least twice in the first paragraph stating that Murphy was suspended indefinitely pending an internal investigation. The rest of the story recounted some of his past cases and talked about how many bad guys he had killed during his career and posed the old question of whether he was maybe a little gun happy. Then, way down in the last paragraph, they mentioned that Richard Dick had replaced Marlin Pope, suggesting that Marlin Pope was incompetent and that Double Dick was now “cleaning house,” so to speak. Jack wondered who the mayor owned at the newspaper to be able to get away with saying that shit.

  He was about to make coffee when he heard tires crunching on the gravel parking area behind his cabin. Before he could put the coffee in the filter, Susan was on the porch, tapping lightly on his front door.

  “It’s unlocked,” he called, and she came in with a sack that said DONUT BANK BAKERY on it.

  “I come bearing gifts,” she said and placed the sack on his kitchen table and sat down. She saw the newspaper and looked at him.

  “Don’t want to talk about it,” he said, and he noticed she was wearing warm-ups and running shoes. “You run this morning?” he asked and peeked in the top of the donut sack. Susan pushed his hands away.