The Case Ch. 01

The conversation was succinct and the directions decisive. The man hung up the receiver and walked back to his car and took a pistol and a silencer from the glove compartment and tucked them into the inside pocket of his coat.

Sharon Granger looked up when Pete Coombs came through the front door of the station. He had called her on PR and told her he was inbound and she was expecting him.

"What have you got for me Peter?" Sharon Granger stood behind the counter with her arms crossed, tapping her fingers on her biceps.

Sharon Granger commanded the space behind the L-shaped counter which consisted of her desk, the radio set and the locked evidence room. To her right in an open-plan office were six desks used by the uniformed police officers and behind them were the three separate offices used by the two detectives, Sergeant Benstead and the Commander. Off the small entrance foyer was a single interview room.

"Ma'am I have these two bags to be locked in the evidence room until the crime scene guys or the Chief can get them fingerprinted, examine them, and inventory the contents," Pete had difficulty lifting the pelican case onto the counter alongside the soft carry bag.

Pete raised the flip-up countertop and walked through the swinging door and closed the countertop behind him. Sharon was still standing in front of her desk with her arms crossed. She wouldn't even touch the bags until the chain of custody paperwork had been signed.

Pete began to fill in the custody control form whilst trying to surreptitiously eye-off Sharon Granger. She was tall, slim and very attractive with her long brunette hair piled loosely on top of her head held in place with long wooden pins. Her makeup was carefully applied, especially the bright red lipstick she favoured. She was wearing a red pencil skirt with a hem that rested mid-thigh, a white satin blouse, tan hosiery and black high heels. The jacket matching her skirt was draped over the back of her chair.

Pete could smell her perfume from where he was hunched over the paperwork and he found it quite exotic. Sharon Granger was about the same age as his mother but she was far from matronly. The other officers called her a lipstick lesbian, the meaning of which they had yet to explain to him. They made lewd comments about how they would like to see Sharon and her girlfriend Bethany Williams going at it but they made their comments well away from Sharon and the Chief.

Sharon took the paperwork from Pete, countersigned it and completed the chain of custody form then she took a pair of latex gloves from the box on the bench next to the evidence room and put them on. Pete wondered how her long red fingernails didn't pierce the thin latex; years of practice he suspected. He eyed her bottom in the tight red skirt and admired her toned thighs encased in the shiny sheer pantyhose.

"You have somewhere else to be I take it? Shall I get on the PR and tell Sergeant Benstead that you've delivered the evidence and are on the way back to the scene of the MVA?" she gave Pete a wry smile.

Sharon always referred to the senior police officers by their name and rank and she was deliberately formal. She was amused that the officers found her sexy and her partner Bethany William's often berated her for teasing the men but they both got a kick out of it. Bethany was a clotheshorse herself.

"No ma'am I'll check in with Sergeant Benstead myself when I get in my cruiser," Pete baulked.

There was no reason for any of the police officers to call Sharon Granger ma'am, she was a civilian Public Service Officer, but her seniority and professionalism demanded respect. The only person who called Sharon by her first name besides her brother was Beau Benstead. A few years ago she and Beau had a brief torrid affair when Sharon decided to experiment with a man to see what it would be like. She liked it but not as much as she liked being with other women, particularly Bethany Williams who could do things to her with her mouth and hands that no man could.

The breakup had been amicable. Beau was himself married and realised that the affair had no future but they remained good friends and kept their secret.

When Sharon was nineteen she had been abducted and repeatedly raped by two boys who committed the hate crime. They had brazenly told the officers that arrested them that they had decided to 'fuck the lesbian out of her' that 'it was a waste of good pussy for her to be a lap-licker'. She had spent a week in hospital recovering from the ordeal but it hadn't stopped her being curious about what it might be like to be with a man who treated her caringly and Beau had been her sole experiment in heterosexuality.

The man watched Pete Coombs climb back in his cruiser and drive away holding the radio microphone to his face. He checked the street again and then crossed it and parked his car in one of the visitor's parking spots right outside the station. All the other spaces were empty so he presumed that all of the police officers were attending to the two incidents out on SR 590.

The man's luck was in and when he entered the police station he found it empty except for Sharon who was busy in the evidence room. He flicked the lock on the street entrance door. It was the first time that door had been locked in years. Braidwood might not be a large town but Braidwood County was big enough to require a twenty four hour police presence.

The man took the pistol from inside his overcoat and fitted the silencer, his eyes on the evidence room. An attractive woman in her forties wearing a fitted red skirt suit came out of the evidence room. The evidence room was temperature controlled and Sharon had put on her jacket before taking the soft bag and hard case into the room and completed the formalities required to enter them into evidence.

Sharon was pulling off her latex gloves and at first she didn't notice the man standing at the counter.

He looked to be in his forties with shoulder length salt-and-pepper hair styled similar to Mel Gibson's on whom she had secret crush. The man was handsome and looked like he a hard build under the black suit he was wearing under his overcoat. The silencer-fitted pistol he was holding with practiced ease dictated that he was not to be fooled with.

"Give me the case," the man said with no emotion whatsoever.

The man's icy-blue eyes were a void.

"Or what?" Sharon's first instinct was always defiance.

The man aimed his pistol just to the right of Sharon's face and pulled the trigger. The phut of the pistol was almost inaudible; a wisp of Sharon's hair flew up as the bullet passed close to her left ear.

"There won't be a second warning," the man said aiming the pistol at her chest.

Sharon did a quick calculation and figured that she couldn't reach the panic button under her desk before the man shot her.

"Which case?" Sharon put her hands on her hips belligerently.

"You know which case. Go and get it for me and no one needs to get hurt," the man waved his pistol in the direction of the evidence room.

Sharon did another snap calculation. What were the chances that the man wouldn't shoot her after she handed over case? He could just as easily shoot her now and take the case himself but it would take time for him to find it in the evidence room and then find the keys to the security locker where Sharon had secured the case.

She turned her back to the man, every nerve in her body tingling, and went back into the evidence room. The man leapt the counter and stood at the door and watched her.

"Don't do anything stupid," the man growled.

Sharon went to the drawer in the desk in the evidence room and made a show of ferretting around for the keys to the lockers. She deliberately kept her back to the killer who went quickly to the window to check the street. She seized the moment and took a pair of handcuffs from the drawer and closed the ratchet around her left wrist and concealed the other cuff under her sleeve. She made her way to the steel-mesh locker that held the two bags that she had only just checked into evidence. It was obvious which case the man wanted.

She put her hands inside the evidence locker and let the handcuff fall from her sleeve and quickly closed it around the handle of the pelican case. The killer heard the click when the handcuff snicked closed.

Sharon hefted the case out of the locker and stood there smiling defiantly at the killer.

"That was stupid. I can shoot you right now and cut the chain with the bolt cutters in the other bag," the man kept his pistol trained on her.

"If you were going to shoot me you would have done so," Sharon said trying to keep the fear out of her voice.

"I can get the bolt cutters out of the other bag and hold you down and cut the cuffs off," the man replied.

"I'll fight you tooth and nail," Sharon hissed.

The woman was making him waste precious time. He could try to find the handcuff key but someone might come to the door of the police station and would be suspicious when they found it locked or there could be a radio call that required answering. What the killer should have done was shot this woman in the head and taken the case when he first arrived. He was getting soft.

The radio barked into life.

'One Alpha Mike to base, can you call the coroner and tell him that we have a subject inbound for autopsy,' Sharon recognised the voice of Beau Benstead.

Both Sharon and the man eyed the radio set.

'One Alpha Mike to base over,' the radio barked when there was no reply.

"If I don't answer it soon they'll become suspicious," Sharon said.

"Bullshit. Even a sophisticated woman like you needs to take a piss," the killer grunted.

Sharon just eyed the man coldly.

"Fuck this, I don't have time to fuck around," the killer put the pistol to Sharon's temple and frogmarched her through the break in the counter to the front door.

"We are going outside, down the steps and you are going to get in my car. If you fuck around I'll shoot you in the head and shoot those cuffs off your wrist. If there are any witnesses I'll shoot them too. Just nod once of you get it," the man moved the pistol and jabbed it in the small of her back.

Sharon nodded.

She didn't know why she had cuffed herself to the case. It was in her nature to be defiant but this was just stupid. Her carefree attitude to life had changed after she was raped and she was naturally defiant and often aggressive.

The man opened the door to the police station and checked the street. A young woman was pushing a stroller across the street talking animatedly to the toddler who sat in it. An elderly woman was walking down the street towards the police station, about thirty yards away. She was using a cane to support her weight.

"Let's go," the man hissed in Sharon's ear.

He guided her down the steps holding her close, the pistol jammed in the small of her back. He only let go of her to open the driver's side door of the car.

"Get in and scoot over. Don't fuck around," he pushed her into the open door of car.

Sharon had no choice but to comply, the man blocked any chance she had of escaping and is she tried she would put the lives of the mother and child and the little old lady at risk.

There was no way to climb into the car with any modicum of decorum. She pushed the pelican case in ahead of her and hefted it over the centre console onto the passenger seat and climbed in behind it, spreading her legs wide to straddle the console. The man couldn't help but notice that Sharon was wearing red satin panties to match her suit. She lifted the heavy case and fell into the seat and put it on her lap to cover her thighs which were openly on display because her short skirt had hitched all the way up her legs.

The man only had a split second to admire the view before he dropped into the driver's seat and started the car, keeping his pistol aimed at Sharon. He backed out onto the road and drove away from the police station keeping to the speed limit so as not to draw attention.

Both the stranger and Sharon were both thinking the same thing but for different reasons: what was he going to do with her?

*****

Elliot pulled up at the scene of the homicide. The area had been secured by police tape to keep the scene uncontaminated and keep away the looky-loos. A pretty local TV reporter was standing just outside the police cordon holding a microphone being filmed by a camera operator. She thrust the microphone into Elliot's face but he brushed it aside with a curt "no comment".

Elliot's two-man crime scene crew were working the scene dressed in Tyvek coveralls and bootees. Elliot pulled on a set of bootees and approached the vehicle.

"Looks like a single gunshot wound to the head at close range," Steve Monahan, one of Braidwood PD two detectives said.

Steve had undertaken crime scene investigation training to the extent that he could lift prints, photograph and collect forensic evidence and make informed assumptions based on his observations. The forensic evidence he collected would be transferred to the Scranton PD Crime Scene Investigation unit for analysis. Steve had already collected blood samples, fingerprints, fibres and had found the slug that killed the victim lodged in the passenger door trim. He held up the baggie containing the slug.

"It's pretty distorted but I'd bet my left nut that it's a nine millimetre," Steve passed the bag to Elliot.

Elliot looked at the slug and immediately thought of the nine millimetre semi-automatic pistol he had seen secreted in the carry bag at the MVA scene.

"Any chance of matching the slug to the weapon," he held the distended bullet up to the light.

"Scranton should be able to match the striations to the rifling on the weapon if we recover it. I have the casing too so they can match the tool marks. Do we have a suspect weapon Chief, you're looking pretty pensive," Steve commented.

"We have that MVA fatality further up Route 590. He had a nine inside a carry bag. I don't like coincidences," Elliot sighed.

"Well take a look at this Chief? This case just gets curiouser and curiouser," Steve led Elliot round to the passenger side of the vehicle.

"Check that out," Steve pointed through the window.

The corpse was lying half across the passenger seat his right arm extended. A handcuff was attached to his right wrist. The links had been cut by some sort of crimping device, most likely a bolt cutter.

Elliot immediately made the connection between the single handcuff on the homicide's victim's wrist and the handle of the silver pelican case, the nine millimetre bullet and the nine millimetre pistol found at the MVA, and the severed handcuff link and the bolt cutter.

"I want a tight lid on this. So far only you and I know the incidents are related. It's to remain close hold between the detectives, Beau and myself," Elliot glared at the pretty reporter yammering into the microphone just outside the crime scene tape.

"When you guys have this scene wrapped get over to the MVA and process that. I'm heading back to the station to get a better look at that pelican case and the carry bag," Elliot patted Steve on the shoulder and moved quickly back to his cruiser, pointedly avoiding the television reporter.

Elliot pulled out onto Route 590 and lit up the flashers. He wanted to get back to the station asap, he was contemplating the links between the occupants of the two vehicles and the way he saw it, it all came down to the contents of the pelican case. He figured whatever was in the case was valuable or at least coveted by someone who was willing to go to extreme lengths to get it, another reason to get back to the police station which was currently manned only by his sister.

The radio suddenly barked snapping him out of his reverie.

'One Alpha Mike to base over,' there was no reply.

'Alpha Mike to One Alpha Mike, are you up?' Sergeant Beau Benstead's voice boomed over the PR.

Alpha Mike was the Commander's callsign and One Alpha Mike was the Sergeant's.

'Go ahead One Alpha Mike,' Elliot said into the microphone.

'Chief I'm getting a 10-7 from base; any reason you can think of?' Beau's voice exhibited concern.

'Negative Beau; standby. Alpha Mike to base over,' Elliot tried calling the station.

The airwaves remained quiet.

'All units this is Alpha Mike, I'm responding 10-39 to base, I'm declaring a 10-33 and 10-78,' Elliot yelled into the microphone and hit his siren.

He had declared an emergency situation at the police station and called for all available units to respond with lights and sirens.

*****

"What's your name?" the driver asked Sharon Granger.

The man had put the pistol in his lap where he could snatch it up if necessary.

"I'm Sharon Granger, what's yours," Sharon quipped.

"So you're not just a pretty face; you're also a comedienne," the man emphasised the feminine tense.

Sharon just glared at him.

"Ok, for convenience, you can call me Jake, how's that?" the man smiled to himself.

"Can't say I'm pleased to meet you Jake," Sharon grumbled.

"Can't say that I'm that pleased to meet you either. That was some trick, handcuffing your wrist to the case. What the hell did you hope to accomplish?" Jake asked, genuinely intrigued.

"Call it an act of defiance. It was intuitive, spontaneous, impulsive... pick an adjective," she jibed.

"You don't seem particularly scared," Jake commented.

"This isn't the first time I've been abducted," Sharon said levelly.

"Really? I can see why you piss people off and I can't think for the life of me why anyone would want to willingly spend any more time with you than is absolutely necessary and I've known you for less than a half hour," Jake commented.

Two police cruisers travelling at high speed crested a ridge ahead of them and sped past with lights flashing and sirens blaring. Jake put his hand on the pistol but left it in his lap.

"I wonder where they're going?" Sharon said sarcastically.

"They responded a lot quicker than I expected for small town Barneys," Jake replied.

"Turn that on," Jake pointed to a scanner fitted under the glove compartment.

Sharon just stared at the device but made no move to switch it on.

"Don't make me make you," Jake tapped the pistol in his lap.

Sharon doubted that Jake would shoot her for such an insignificant infringement but she saw no value in antagonising him further... for now anyway. She leaned down and switched on the scanner.

The air was suddenly filled with static that hurt their ears. Sharon turned down the volume and adjusted the squelch. She knew that she was aiding her captor but it was something he would have done himself anyway.

"Tune it to the State Police frequency," Jake concentrated on the road ahead, looking for more police cars or possibly a road block.

"Not Braidwood PD?" Sharon asked.

"They're going to call the Staties and ask them to put up road blocks and start an expanded search when they find you missing. That old biddy or the woman pushing the kid will have seen you getting in the car, even those county Mounties will join the dots," Jake sighed resignedly.

Sharon worked the dial to 154.83 MHz, the State Police band. As Jake had predicted there was chatter about Braidwood police station with reports of a code 207, meaning kidnap, and shots fired in the course of the abduction.

They both knew the police radio codes and their significance.

"We gotta get off the 590 and hunker down awhile, they're going to put up roadblocks to stop me getting on the I-84," Jake said more to himself than to Sharon.

Jake turned south at the first exit he came to.

"What's down here?" Jake pointed down the secondary road they had turned onto.

"If you keep going we're going to hit Lake Wallenpaupack. There's a resort of sorts, scattered residences and a few fishing shacks," Sharon hugged the case against her body; it had slid down her thighs during the turn.