The Fiercest Enemy

by Rick Reed

  Rosie asked, “Tell me what you are going to do next? I watch CSI and Cold Case Files on television. Does it all get solved in forty-five minutes with commercial breaks?”

  Jack laughed. “Hardly.”

  “Do you get in car chases and shootouts? Do you always get the girl in the end?” Rosie asked Jack in a seductive voice.

  “Put a sock in it, Rosie,” Shaunda said. “Pardon my friend.”

  “I’m just curious,” Rosie said. “Nothing ever happened here in Pleasant Valley until this killer.”

  Jack and Shaunda exchanged a look.

  Shaunda said, “You can trust her.”

  Jack gave Rosie the Reader’s Digest version, leaving out things only the killer might know, hoping Shaunda hadn’t already said too much. Rosie listened without interrupting. When Jack was finished Rosie took a pen and wrote on a drink napkin. She put the napkin in Jack’s hand. “That’s my personal cell phone.”

  Jack put the napkin in his shirt pocket and stood.

  Liddell got up brushing crumbs from his front. He said with a big smile, “Rosie, it’s been a pleasure. Thank you for the food and the rooms and finding the Jeep. You’ve been a big help.”

  Rosie’s face lit up.

  Shaunda said, “Now you’ve done it. She’ll be insufferable for a week.”

  “She did find the Jeep,” Liddell said.

  “Yes. I did,” Rosie said proudly. “You never told me what was in it.”

  “We don’t know yet,” Liddell said.

  “Do you think that campsite belonged to the killer?” Rosie asked.

  “No telling,” Jack answered with a half-truth.

  “You can tell me all about your adventure with Jerrell when we get to Linton,” Shaunda said. “I’m going to cruise by my place and then go check the stripper pit one more time.”

  Rosie said with a pout, “I’ll just stay here with Ditty and the girls twiddling my thumbs and being kept in the dark. Don’t feel bad for me.”

  “We won’t,” Shaunda said.

  Jack and Liddell followed Shaunda out to the parking lot. “I’ll ride with you if you like,” Jack offered Shaunda. He didn’t like the idea of her going to the stripper pit alone. She hadn’t fared well last time.

  Her mouth tightened into a straight line and her eyes into slits. “You don’t have to do that.”

  “I’ll tell you about my playdate with the chief.”

  Her face relaxed a bit. “Okay. Don’t back seat drive. I hate it when a guy does that.”

  “I’ll call Chief Jerrell and see where he is,” Liddell said. “See you at the PD or wherever.” Liddell slid into the Crown Vic and pulled out.

  “Should I ride in the back seat?” Jack asked. He watched her open the door of the Tahoe and climb up on the running board to get in. It reminded him of the Deputy Coroner at home, Lilly Caskins, who had been aptly named Little Casket by the troops because of her diminutive size and evil demeanor. She drove a Suburban and needed a ladder.

  “I didn’t know the FBI approved of a sense of humor,” Shaunda said.

  “I told you. I’m a hybrid. Half Fed, half cop.”

  “Get in and don’t mess with me. Remember I have a headache and a gun.”

  Chapter 23

  Jack got in the passenger side. A shotgun was mounted on the dash. An ancient Motorola radio was mounted on the floor with a yellow happy face sticker on top of it. Someone had written in magic marker on the smiley face, “Make My Day.”

  The Tahoe was at least ten years old. The brown and tan paint gave it the profile of a sheriff’s vehicle but the faded colors said it had spent its life in the sun and harsh weather. The front passenger seat didn’t show much sign of use, but with as small of a department as Shaunda had there wouldn’t be a partner riding shotgun. The driver’s side seat springs were sunken deep from the weight of someone three times the size of the petite Shaunda Lynch. Her predecessor must have been a very large man. Or woman.

  Shaunda backed out and instead of heading toward Linton she turned left on the gravel road that ran along the railroad tracks. Her expression was unreadable. She wore no jewelry, earrings, gold chain, rings. A simple leather thong was tied around her left wrist. She tugged on this as she drove in silence. Jack knew she must have a dozen questions about what they found in the Jeep. She was bright enough to know he hadn’t told everything in front of Rosie. He had the impression that she was trying very hard to show him she was tough. Trying too hard. She had a biting way of talking to everyone, even her friend Rosie. He noticed Chief Jerrell had the same habit. He’d seen the way Shaunda and Chief Jerrell snuck peeks at each other when they thought the other wasn’t looking.

  They were headed northwest, with nothing around them but trees, farm fields and railroad tracks. Jack saw combines out working in a few of the fields and asked, “Why aren’t all the fields being tilled?”

  Shaunda pointed to a large tract of land to their left between the road and the railroad tracks. “That’s the Oberman place. They can’t get in their fields for maybe another week if the rain holds off. It’s been cold, but the problem is the moisture. The ditches running along the tracks are steep but not deep enough to keep the ground from being flooded. If the ground is too wet when they plow or till it will just turn to hard mud when it dries. The ideal time to till is when the soil is dry on top and moist an inch or so below.”

  She changed subjects. “I told you something you didn’t know. Now you tell me something I didn’t know. You can start with what it was you weren’t telling me in front of Rosie?”

  “What?”

  “I told you Rosie can be trusted but I can understand you holding back,” Shaunda said.

  “I told you we found a campsite about fifty yards from the Jeep. I didn’t want to get into much with Rosie there. Best not to share too much with civilians.” He couldn’t tell if she was nodding understanding or if her head bobbed from the uneven surface of the road.

  “I trust Rosie,” Shaunda said.

  “I know you do. That’s why I wanted to ride with you and talk in private. We don’t want things to go public that will hurt a confession when we find the killer. The less in the papers or on TV, the better for us. Right?”

  “Everyone is a suspect until they aren’t,” she said glancing at him. “I see what you’re saying. I’ll follow your lead G-man. Now tell me everything.”

  “I’ve told you everything,” he said. “I just want you to understand why I don’t want to discuss this outside of our small group. That means Rosie’s out.”

  “We’ve known each other since grade school,” Shaunda said, taking her eyes off the road to see if he understood. “She keeps my secrets and I keep hers. She’s watching my daughter so I get to decide what she hears and what she doesn’t. She’s not a blabbermouth.”

  Jack gave in. “Okay. Part of the reason I didn’t want to talk in front of her was so she wouldn’t worry. The Jeep got hung up in the ditch and the driver’s door was still open. The K-9 searched on both sides of the track and followed a scent back almost to Rosie’s but lost it. We think they had a car parked back in the trees behind Rosie’s. About the same area where Troy’s truck was found.”

  “You think the killer was going to Rosie’s?” Shaunda asked.

  “There’s no reason to think that. But whoever this is they’re starting to get sloppy. They leave both cars within five hundred yards of Rosie’s place and they must have left something incriminating enough behind this morning that they went back for it.”

  “That was a big risk.”

  “Unless he wasn’t afraid to be seen,” Jack said.

  “What do you mean?”

  Jack said, “I’m just thinking out loud.”

  They came to a road heading north. She bounced over the tracks and up onto the road. She turned west on Main Street at Newkirk’s Funeral
Home and they were suddenly back in civilization. She zigged and zagged through the south end of Dugger, then due north past Casey’s General Store, turned west again onto State Road 54. Jack saw a Country Porch gas station across the road and was tempted to have her pull over so he could put his kidneys back where they belonged from the teeth jarring ride along the tracks.

  “Who’s the killer, Mister FBI man?” Shaunda asked.

  “I have no idea,” Jack said. “If we can match the DNA we found at the campsite to some of the other murders that’ll be our big break. He’ll screw up if he hasn’t already. They always do.”

  “You found DNA at the campsite?” Shaunda said, turning her head and almost going off the road.

  “We think so. Whoever was sleeping there made a pine needle bed under a tree with a campfire. The K-9 officer tracked from the Jeep to the campsite and back, then back towards Rosie’s before the scent disappeared. The person at the camp definitely went to the Jeep. It might not have been the killer, but whoever it was might have seen the killer stash the Jeep.”

  “Holy cow!”

  “Yeah. Crime Scene thinks they’ll find blood in the Jeep. They’re taking it to their garage to process with luminol. There were still some embers in the campfire. I think the guy must have made the fire late last night or early this morning to keep warm.”

  “You don’t seem too happy. Come on. Give.”

  Jack was quiet

  “You’ve got doubts,” she said.

  “Yep.”

  “Listen, if Jerrell thinks that’s the weapon—and I was hit with it remember—and then you find it in a campfire near the victim’s stolen Jeep, that’s case closed.”

  “Yeah.”

  “But?”

  “But there are a lot of unanswered questions,” Jack said.

  Shaunda exhaled loudly. “You know, my mama always said, “If it looks like a dog and bites like a dog, it’s a dog.”

  Instead of answering, Jack took out his cell phone, pulled up a picture of the drill bit and handed his phone to her.

  She glanced at the picture and handed the phone back. “The tip will be carbide. I’ve never handled one but I’ve seen something just like it in the Mining Museum in town. Rosie’s the expert on this stuff. Did you see all the mining paraphernalia on the walls at Rosie’s?”

  “Yeah.”

  Shaunda thought for a bit and said, “If that was in the fire any DNA would be destroyed.”

  “We’re sending it to the FBI lab anyway,” Jack said. “They work miracles sometimes.”

  Shaunda gave him a questioning look and then focused on the road again. “You think?”

  “Who knows,” Jack said and shrugged.

  “If I was hit with that, maybe I should get an X-ray,” she reached back and gingerly touched the spot behind her ear. “I’d hate Jerrell to think he’d won. He’s an ass sometimes.”

  Jack said, “My partner thinks you two have history.”

  “Mind you own business.”

  “Sorry,” Jack said and changed the subject. “We need to narrow down when your daughter had the visitor. She said she gave him a drink and a sandwich. Is there any chance the can or bottle he drank from is still around?”

  “Why would I keep something I didn’t even know about? By the way, do I look like a complete slob? I’ll have you know I keep a very clean house. Take the trash out and everything.”

  “I meant we need to ask Penelope if the guy took the drink and food with him. When is trash pickup?”

  “Boy, you don’t quit, do you? If he left it behind it would have been picked up by now and thrown away. I keep a neat yard too. The trash was picked up two days ago. Once a week. Just like in the big cities.”

  “Okay. That’s off the table.”

  “Do they teach you that in the FBI Academy?” Shaunda asked.

  “What? To be thorough?”

  “To be annoying,” she said, and grinned. “Loosen up. I’m enjoying our chat.”

  “Me too,” Jack said, and thought, she’s bipolar.

  He’d made a mistake telling Jerrell they should wait to have the composite drawing made. He would have to interview Pen and Cretin again and have composite drawings made. He hadn’t asked if Cretin or Penelope—or Patty—knew each other. He’d been so caught up in the chaos this morning that he hadn’t had time to think this through. That was true of a lot of his cases. Sometimes stumbling through worked best.

  “I wish to God she’d told me about this guy back then,” Shaunda said. “I could have tracked him down and at least have a name. I don’t know what that girl was thinking. I told her about Troy Junior when it happened. She didn’t say a word about any hitchhiker. It pisses me off.”

  “She’s a teenager,” Jack said. “She came clean with us today.”

  “I’m not pissed at her. I’m angry with myself for being the kind of mother that she didn’t feel like she could talk to. She was right about how I would have handled it though. I would have picked him up and dropped him off in Sullivan.”

  She laughed. “Don’t give me attitude. I know you guys do it too. You stick them in the car and take them out of town to be someone else’s problem. Hitchhikers are nothing but trouble.”

  “I’ll bet Sullivan loves you,” Jack said.

  Shaunda turned south and drove down a graveled one lane road that turned into a hard packed dirt lane and led between freshly tilled fields. Jack could smell the fresh soil. Down the road he could make out a small wood sided farmhouse painted white with the red asphalt tile favored by farmhomes in the early 30s and 40s.

  “Is that your place?” he asked and she nodded. It was at least a quarter of a mile from the main road. The hitchhiker couldn’t have been after directions.

  “You have a lot of privacy out here,” Jack said.

  “It’s a dead-end road. You don’t get surprise visitors. Or at least that’s what I thought.”

  “Does your daughter complain about being out in the sticks?”

  “Pen likes it out here,” Shaunda said defensively. “She’s got friends. Patty comes over and spends the night all the time.”

  “Rosie said you were homeschooling her.”

  “Yeah. Hey, if you’re saying I don’t take care of my kid just spit it out.”

  “Whoa. I merely brought it up because my wife is a teacher.”

  “Rosie told me you weren’t married.”

  “Shaunda, there’s no reason for us to fight. I shouldn’t have said anything. I’m sorry.”

  “Forget it,” Shaunda said. “I’m just sore. Not at you.” She drove over the dead grass beside the house, shut the engine off and got out. Jack got out too.

  “I’ll check the house for you,” Jack said. “Anyone else live here?”

  “I’m quite capable of checking my own house, thank you.”

  “You’re right. You stay here and keep an eye out. If I need help, I’ll yell. Now give me your key.” Jack held his hand out.

  Shaunda shoved her keys in his hand. “I’m in no mood to argue with you. If the kitchen’s messy someone planted that stuff to set me up.”

  Jack smiled. He had no doubt she could hold her own if she was attacked, but she hadn’t done too well at the lake. He put the key in the front door lock but it was already unlocked. He unholstered his .45 and tensed with his hand on the doorknob.

  “That idiot forgot to lock the door,” Shaunda said.

  Jack hadn’t noticed her come up behind him. She took the keys, pushed the door open, stepped around him and went inside. “Come on in.”

  Jack stepped inside and scanned the room. Shaunda seemed amused as Jack moved from room to room clearing them. He came back into what served as a front room/office. The room was divided in half by a leather sofa. To the right of this was a loveseat with a fold-up table tray in front, a rocker, and a s
mall ancient television.

  To the left of the sofa the walls were covered with bookshelves full of books and file boxes. An olive green metal desk—the kind favored by the Army in the 70s—was pushed against the back of the sofa facing toward the front door. The top of the desk was piled high with file folders and office supplies.

  Shaunda squeezed past Jack to shut the door.

  “You can put that away,” Shaunda said. “Sergeant Ditterline just forgot to lock the door. If someone wanted to break in they wouldn’t pick the lock. This isn’t the big city. Our burglars and miscreants just kick doors open. Unless you think our killer is a considerate person. Besides, if someone broke in here they’d probably leave money so I could buy a decent television.”

  Jack holstered the .45 and examined the locks and frame on the door. They didn’t show signs of being tampered with. The lock was cheap. “You really should have better locks installed.”

  “I’m a girl. Don’t you know girls are helpless? Besides, I’ve never needed more than a deadbolt.”

  “You don’t seem helpless to me.”

  “Well, don’t tell Jerrell that,” she said. “He still calls me Little Shauny behind my back. You heard the cracks he made about my size.”

  “He’s protective of you,” Jack suggested. “Is that a bad thing?”

  “Yes. If I made those kinds of jokes about him he’d get his nuts in a toaster and file a lawsuit.”

  Jack had to laugh. He’d never heard that expression before.

  “Have a seat. I’m going to put on a uniform. It might be the last time I wear one after the town board meets this week.” She went to her bedroom and shut the door.

  Jack had noticed the bathroom was outfitted with handicap necessities. He’d also noticed that everything in the larger bedroom that must be Penelope’s were handicap equipped with even a hospital type bed and better furniture. Shaunda had spared no expense when it came to her daughter, while her own bedroom seemed a little shabby.

  She came out of the bedroom wearing a freshly starched uniform, sans badge. She’d put a light coat of makeup over the bruises. It didn’t help. Her brunette hair was brushed to a high shine and worn in a ponytail.