Deadly Sins

by Stacy M Jones

  Lily was Luke’s only sibling. He still felt like a part of him was missing. His relationship with his parents only got stronger through the years. But because he still hadn’t been able to solve his sister’s murder, Luke felt like he was disappointing them, and himself, if he was being honest. That’s why he worked so hard on murder cases, pushing himself beyond a breaking point at times. He had more to prove than the others. At least, he felt like he did.

  Luke was almost to the crime scene. His stomach knotted and rolled. He released the tight grip on the steering wheel and tried to take a few deep breaths. Showing up to a crime scene tense and already agitated wouldn’t make his job easier. Murray Park was generally safe. It was a family place with eight pavilions, three soccer fields, two playgrounds and the boat dock. Runners, walkers and families with their dogs were a common sight at the park. Not dead bodies.

  Passing the Rebsamen Park Golf Course on the right, Luke noticed the line of cars on the side of the road. He passed slowly, taking in the news vans and onlookers, some standing in groups and others moving slowly down the walking path towards the park entrance. The street was ablaze in light. He didn’t like that such a crowd had already started to gather.

  All Luke knew from the initial call to 911 was that a woman’s body had washed up near the boat ramp at the park. An older man in his sixties coming in from a day on the Arkansas River spotted the body and made the frantic 911 call. There was a woman’s body. She had long blonde hair and was face down in the water. Her body was caught between two rocks just out from the boat ramp.

  The fisherman had left late in the afternoon. The report didn’t specify a time. He told the 911 operator he hadn’t noticed anything when he took his boat out, but when he was coming back in at dusk, he spotted a body in the water. Uniformed officers were holding him at the park for Luke to question.

  Luke approached the entrance to the park and was thankful a police barricade was already in place. He slowed down and navigated his unmarked police car through the crowd. A uniformed officer waved him through. He pulled in, drove past the playgrounds and open field directly to the back parking lot that overlooked the river. Marked and unmarked police cars littered the parking lot. Luke was surprised to see the Pulaski County Medical Examiner had already arrived. Luke had just seen him down the road at the other crime scene. Two dead women pulled from the Arkansas River in one night. Unprecedented in Little Rock.

  Luke steered his SUV in line with the other police vehicles. He stepped out, barely closing the door behind him. He moved quickly, walking ahead of Tyler and Captain Meadows. He wanted to see the body and get the initial shock he always felt first on the scene over and done with so he could get to work. No matter how many times he had rolled up to a scene like this, nothing could prepare him for the sight of the deceased. Luke never understood when he heard other detectives tell him they were numb to it. That wasn’t him. He wished for numbness to wash over him. It never came.

  Luke walked to the top of the boat ramp and looked out at the river. Ed Purvis, the Pulaski County Medical Examiner, was with two of his employees knee deep in the water. They were flanked on each side by members of the Little Rock Dive Team who carefully moved the woman’s body, clad only in her bra and underwear, out of the water onto a dive board. They carefully moved her into a heavy black body bag.

  Luke moved down the ramp towards the water and called out to Purvis, “What do we know so far?”

  Purvis, fifty-five and balding, wore black waterproof rubber overalls and a county issued medical examiner white shirt. He looked up. “Hold on, let me get out of here, and I’ll fill you in.”

  Purvis and his team carried her body past Luke and up the boat ramp.

  Luke felt his impatience rise. He wanted to know right now if it was Maime LaRue Brewer or not. She was the daughter of the most high-profile, richest lobbyist in the south. He knew the whole community would be watching the police department on this case. The pressure he felt was already intense.

  Luke stood halfway down the boat ramp. He turned to see Captain Meadows and Tyler at the top, watching as Purvis moved past them to the medical examiner’s van and placed her on a stretcher. Tyler was clenching and unclenching his fists. Captain Meadows wiped his brow as he asked, “Any chance we can get a photo comparison before you take her, Purvis?”

  Purvis responded as he positioned the body on the stretcher. “Might. She’s bloated but not much else. Don’t want to guess, but if I had to say, she hasn’t been dead more than a few days. Looks like ligature marks are around her wrists, ankles and neck. Petechiae is present and lips, fingers and toes are bluish. Can’t call it now, but my guess would be a homicide. Like the one earlier, no defensive wounds that I can see here. I really can’t imagine she was taking a swim half naked in the river this time of year.”

  “Fits with the timeline,” Tyler reminded them without saying anything else.

  Luke couldn’t wait any longer. He had to know. He walked back up the ramp to the van while pulling on heavy purple medical gloves from his back pocket. He side-stepped around his partner and his captain and unzipped the body bag, partially exposing the deceased woman’s face. He peered down, looked closely, and muttered curses under his breath.

  Luke looked up at Captain Meadows and Tyler and shook his head side to side. He would have to wait for the official identification, but he was pretty sure this was not Maime. Not that he was hoping it was Maime. It’s just that this meant he now had three cases – two deceased, one missing. He certainly wasn’t one to be dramatic, but he felt like Little Rock was under siege.

  CHAPTER 6

  I TOSSED MY NAPKIN DOWN and pushed my empty plate to the side. The dinner’s arrival had delayed the discussion about Luke, thankfully. More than anything, I wanted to learn what Cooper knew about Maime and George. “I’ve read the news reports and only spoke to George briefly. What can you tell me about this case so far?”

  “Before we really get into this, you have to promise me that tomorrow you’ll come with me to meet Luke and his partner Det. Bill Tyler who are in charge of the investigation.”

  I sipped my drink. I hadn’t planned on seeing Luke so soon. Meeting with him and getting things out in the open might prove useful. I couldn’t keep my eye on him if I didn’t get close enough. “All right,” I conceded. “I’ll meet them tomorrow.”

  “You’ll make nice?”

  I held my hands up in surrender. “I promise. Now tell me what you know so far.”

  “I don’t really know a lot either,” Cooper admitted, leaning forward, his elbows on the table, hands folded in front of him. “I guess Maime said she was going to be with friends on Friday night, but she never met up with them. George claims she didn’t go home either. On Saturday morning, after George said he hadn’t heard from her, he called her several times. Then he called friends and family. When no one said they had seen her, he made a police report. She hasn’t been seen or heard from since Friday.”

  “Her friends didn’t bother to call her when she didn’t show up on Friday night?” From what I remember, she had a tight-knit group of girlfriends.

  “No, but I guess they never did. A big group of them met up, and if you showed, you showed. If not, they assumed you had other plans,” Cooper explained.

  I let that sink in for a minute because it meant there was a lot of time for Maime to be missing without anyone realizing it. George thought she was with friends and her friends thought she was at home. I didn’t know if she spoke to her mother or other family every day, but I doubted it. She was a grown woman after all. Then again, if her mother was anything like mine, we might get lucky and find she had tracking chip in her.

  “There haven’t been any other sightings of her since Friday afternoon at work,” Cooper said.

  “Where does she work?”

  “She was doing some pharmaceutical sales from an office out on Chenal in West Little Rock. After she left the office, there were no other sightings of her. No bank transaction
s either from what Luke tells me. It’s like she just vanished,” Cooper explained, gesturing with his hands as if into thin air.

  If it was George, his motivation was anyone’s guess. Husband or boyfriend was the usual prime suspect. And that was the first time it occurred to me that Maime might have a boyfriend on the side, which could also be motive for George. That wouldn’t help.

  We would have to start with George and get him to tell us everything he knows that will help this case. He has to help himself before we start anywhere else. I didn’t even know where else to start other than the girls she was supposed to see on Friday night. Her parents and coworkers might know something as well. They would be my next step.

  “You know if Maime was seeing anyone?” I asked, hoping Cooper might know. While I didn’t think he really knew George well, they did run in some of the same circles. Little Rock was surprisingly small in some regards.

  “Not that I’m aware of. If anyone was the cheater in that relationship, my best guess would be on George.”

  I nodded in agreement. Unfortunately, I had learned the hard way. I started to ask another question when I overheard the two women behind Cooper talking about a text one of them just received. It was from the one woman’s husband who had come back from a fishing trip and was down at the dock at Murray Park. We heard her screech to her friend that another woman’s body had washed up close to the dock.

  CHAPTER 7

  LUKE LOOKED DOWN AGAIN, closer this time, at the woman’s face and then unzipped the body bag down her torso. She was probably in her thirties, blonde hair and what he assumed was probably a pretty face, now ravaged by death. Her eyes were closed and she was slender. Like the woman earlier in the day, she was found only in her bra and underwear.

  Tell me who did this to you, he mentally asked the deceased, scanning her body for clues or some sign of what might have occurred. Luke was sure it wasn’t Maime, but he’d still need a positive identification from her husband or parents. He didn’t want to make that call.

  Luke slowly looked her over again from the top of her head to her shiny red fingernail polish. He was just about to cover her back up when he noticed the bracelet on her right wrist. It was a silver bracelet, intricate in design with a squared jeweled clasp. He wasn’t sure of the design. Celtic possibly, trinity knots maybe, but either way it looked of quality. Strangely enough, it looked familiar. Luke searched the recesses of his brain for where he might have seen this before. He couldn’t place it. Feeling defeated, he reminded Purvis to bag and tag it. Maybe prints would be present. He hoped.

  “This is crazy, Luke. Two in one day. Any ideas?” Purvis asked, staring at Luke over the dead woman.

  “Unfortunately, not a clue,” Luke let out a long sigh. “Get me what you can on prints and time and manner of death, and it will be a start.”

  Luke stepped back as Purvis and his team zipped up the body bag and began to load the stretcher into the back of the van. Purvis was good. He would get Luke the information he needed and as quickly as he could, given the circumstances.

  Luke looked to the dock area and the witness sitting on a bench with two officers on either side. The witness was an older guy probably mid-sixties with little hair, and what he did have left was gray. He had on glasses, khakis and a white Razorbacks tee-shirt.

  As Luke approached, the older man stood, extended his hand and told Luke his name was Walter Thomas. He spent the next thirty minutes filling Luke in on how he fished the Arkansas River for forty years and nothing like this had ever happened to him. Walter said he didn’t notice anything else unusual and wasn’t certain whether the body was there when he went out earlier in the day. But as he said, “How could I miss a dead body?”

  A uniformed officer standing with them informed Luke that other witnesses in the area confirmed that Walter had started yelling for help as his boat approached the ramp. That’s when a group of them in the park noticed the body. Luke asked the officers to double check witness statements, make sure they had all their names and contact information, and put them on notice that, if needed, the police would be in touch.

  Luke didn’t think there was a suspect among them. They seemed like ordinary folks enjoying what otherwise would have been a pleasant fall day at the park. Same as the first two women who spotted the woman found earlier in the day. Average people on an average day that now would horrifically be remembered forever.

  Luke took in the crowd once more. He knew it wasn’t uncommon for the killer to revisit the scene or be among the spectators when a body was found. Luke looked around at the families and scared confused faces. If the perp was here, it sure didn’t seem like it.

  Luke stood for a moment deciding what to do next. He was overwhelmed. His cellphone buzzed against his hip. He answered, “Not a good time, Coop.”

  “We know. Riley and I are standing on the other side of the barricade with the news media out front. Let us back. We heard you found a woman’s body.”

  “Not now. And definitely not with her.” Luke looked in the direction of the park entrance but couldn’t see them from where he was standing. He wasn’t ready to deal with Riley yet.

  “Is it really a woman?” Cooper asked, and Luke confirmed. Cooper went on, “If it is Maime, Riley has met her. She can help with the identification.”

  Luke was torn. For as much as he didn’t want to see Riley, he really wanted a positive identification out of the way. It would save him a call to George and to Maime’s parents. He kicked the dirt in front of his foot. “All right,” he said hesitantly, “I’ll be right there.”

  CHAPTER 8

  I COULDN’T BELIEVE that Luke was actually going to let us back. After leaving the pub, we drove straight to the park. It was only a few miles but seemed to take forever with each second painfully ticking by. When we arrived, we were both surprised the media was already stationed around the scene. Cooper had to park far down Rebsamen Road. We walked to the park entrance, and on the way, Cooper called Luke.

  Cooper ended the call, looked down at me and asked, “You okay with taking a look and helping with a positive identification? Sorry I spoke for you, but I didn’t know how else to get us back there.”

  “I’m okay with it. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve seen Maime in person. I’m pretty sure I’ll know if it’s her or not.” Of all the times I’d wished she’d disappear from my life, I never wished her dead. If it was her, I wasn’t sure how I’d feel.

  We waited at the barricade for Luke. The uniformed cop nodded to Cooper but didn’t make a move to let us back. The crowd seemed to grow with each passing minute. I always found it strange how many people seem to flock around tragedy.

  “Excuse me,” a male voice called from the right of me. “Did I overhear you say you know Maime? I assume you’re talking about the missing woman Maime LaRue Brewer?”

  Cooper and I both turned to look at who was speaking to us. Neither of us said anything at first. It was obvious the guy was media. They used to be my kind of people. The guy was a little shorter than Cooper. He was about five eleven with sandy brown hair that hung over his forehead almost covering his right eye. I guessed he was right around forty years old, with light-colored baggy jeans, sneakers and a long-sleeve black tee-shirt. He carried a camera, a digital Nikon D4. I knew Cooper would be jealous. He just said at dinner he’d been saving for that very camera for surveillance.

  “I’m sorry. We can’t really answer any of your questions.” I turned back around. Hoped he went away. The last thing I needed was Luke thinking I was passing information on to reporters. Unfortunately, the guy didn’t take the hint. Instead, he moved even closer next to me, stuck out his hand and introduced himself.

  “I’m Ben Prosser with the Little Rock Times. What about you?”

  I shook his extended hand. “Waiting.”

  Cooper smirked, but he didn’t say a word either. The Little Rock Times was the only other paper in Little Rock covering local news. It was a direct competitor to the Little Rock
Record where I had worked.

  Ben went on undeterred, “I’ve been covering the missing person’s case since it was reported. I work the crime beat a lot. I was there for an interview of the husband and her parents over the weekend. Real nice people. Maime’s family thinks the husband did something to her. I think we all suspect that.”

  I took a deep breath so loud that I’m sure Cooper heard it above the noise of the crowd. I turned and said slightly exasperated, “Good for you, Ben. I’m sorry, but I really don’t want to talk. We have work to do. Now just isn’t a good time.”

  Before Ben could respond, Luke walked up to the barricade. He stopped in front of us, but he didn’t even look at me. He turned to Cooper and spoke directly to him like I wasn’t even there.

  “Cooper, you ready to come back?” Then he turned and said to Ben, “You’re out here fast, Ben. You got any ideas who called the media?”

  I was a little surprised Luke was so familiar with Ben, but then again, that is how I met both Cooper and Luke. Different cases, different scenes but still the same way. I raised my eyebrows and shot Cooper a look. He shrugged.

  Ben said he didn’t know who made the call. His editor Cathy called and sent him out. Luke must have caught my look. At least he finally looked at me. Ben, Luke explained, had been known to look through Little Rock’s cold cases for new leads. He was a bit of an amateur sleuth. Luke told us Ben had actually found new leads on two homicides from the seventies, and the cases were later solved. Most of the cops knew Ben pretty well.

  “Ben, I’ll give you a call with our statement as soon as we have one. Right now, I can’t confirm anything,” Luke explained as he moved the barricade aside and let Cooper and me through. Ben smiled and then shot me a nasty look. It seemed I was making friends already.