The Three Way Murder

When I walked into the bedroom of the house, it didn't look like anything had happened except the guy went to sleep and didn't wake up. He was in bed on his back and covered up from the chest down. The EMT's were packing up to leave and there were three techs from the Crime Lab looking around for whatever evidence might be there, but it didn't look like they were finding anything. I didn't see any of the little angled rulers or plastic numbered tents they put beside something they think might be evidence of a crime.

What it looked like to me was this guy had just kicked off sometime during the night. I couldn't figure out why they'd called me, a homicide detective, to look at the case. Phil Rogers answered that question for me five minutes after he started his investigation. Phil's the coroner for Monroe County and he's not what we used to think of as a coroner.

A lot of coroners used to be elected or appointed, so what you got was usually a funeral home director who'd run for election to a job nobody else wanted. A funeral home director had the means to transport a body, and he was competent enough to tell me if the victim had been shot, stabbed, or beaten to death. Anything beyond that was pretty much guessing, so if he thought there were suspicious circumstances, he'd take the body to a local hospital for a "coroner's inquest" which meant an actual doctor did an autopsy to determine cause of death. If everything appeared to be natural, the body would usually end up on the funeral home director's embalming table. The job was a convenient way to get paid by the community and also increase his personal business.

Phil is a licensed forensic pathologist and he's damned good at his job. He's been in the job for ten years now, and I've worked with him a lot. He's helped me solve some murder cases I'm sure would have been declared natural deaths thirty or so years ago. He's a little odd sometimes, but there's no way I could do his job, so maybe that's understandable.

Phil pushed his thermometer into the stiff's liver and while he waited for it to register, he checked the guy's eyes. A couple of minutes later, he read the temperature on the thermometer and then walked over to me.

"Mark, you got yourself either a suicide or a homicide. I don't know which yet, but it wasn't natural. His eyes look like a roadmap because of all the petechial hemorrhages and he's blue as a Smurf. Something caused him to run out of air, and it was fast. I'm suspecting drugs because there isn't any bruising on his throat or face and there's no evidence of a struggle. He'd have fought back and torn the bed up if he'd been choked or smothered but it looks like he just went to sleep and didn't wake up. I'll know more when I get him back to the lab."

Phil looked at the thermometer sticking out of the guy's belly.

"Looks like he died late last night, like between eleven and one."

Well, unfortunately, suicides from drug overdoses are becoming more prevalent nowadays. I like to believe they are just drug use gone wrong, but I'm sure some of those OD's are because the user said "Fuck it all", and shot him or herself full of dope. On the other hand, there have been more than a few cases where the OD wasn't caused by the user. It was someone else who pushed the shit into the victim's vein and then watched them die. Between Phil and myself, we'd have to figure out what happened.

When I'd entered the residence, a couple uniforms were talking to a woman in the living room. I backed out of the bedroom and went to talk to her.

I guessed her at forty-five, maybe fifty. She looked pretty good for that age, unlike a lot of women who seem to give up once gravity and life take their toll. She was no young girl with a tight ass and perky tits, but I don't really get off on young girls anyway. No, this woman did a nice job of filling out her tight jeans and snug knit top. She had the figure of a mature woman -- heavy tits, a wide ass, and a waist that wasn't fat but wasn't all that small either.

Her face was pretty nice too, and it didn't look to me like she'd had any work done to make herself look younger. There were crow's feet at the corners of her eyes and some smile lines around her mouth. Only her shoulder-length hair, light brown with some gray showing in the part, looked like she'd been fighting getting older.

I told the uniforms I'd take over but for them to send me their reports, then asked the woman to sit down. I thought it was interesting that she didn't appear to have been crying, but for all I knew at that point, she might have been a next door neighbor.

"Ma'am, I'm Detective Mark Robbins. What's your name?

She smiled at me, and that was odd too. Most people get pretty nervous when a police officer talks to them.

"I'm Monica Mitchell. That's my husband Jack in there on the bed."

"Can you tell me what might have happened to him?"

Monica shook her head.

"I don't know. He was all right when he went to bed. He had a glass of wine like he always does, and then went straight to bed. He said he felt tired. I guess he was more tired than he thought."

"What time was that?"

Monica thought for a second.

"Let's see. I was watching a movie that ended at ten and he was still up then, so maybe ten-thirty? I don't really know. I started watching a comedy show then. When the first commercials came on, he wasn't there, so it might have been like ten-fifteen."

I asked Monica if Mr. Mitchell was still OK when she went to bed. She dropped her eyes then.

"I don't know because we don't sleep in the same bed. I sleep in the guestroom. Have for the last six months. Jack told me I was too old and wrinkled for him."

"Mrs. Mitchell, I hate to ask you this since you just lost your husband, but were you two having any other problems?"

Monica looked up at me with a scowl on her face.

"You think I had something to do with this?"

I shook my head.

"Mrs. Mitchell, I don't know how he died. I'm just getting information so I can figure that out. I don't suspect anybody at this point."

"Well, yes, we were having problems. He was trying to divorce me and I wouldn't agree to give him my share of the business. I mean, when a man starts running around with another woman and then tells his wife he wants a divorce and then has the gall to tell her he wants everything they worked for, that's too much.

I didn't want him anymore, not after he started screwing her. I said if he wanted out, we'd have to split everything down the middle -- the business, savings, and checking accounts. I said I'd worked just as hard as he had and I deserved half. Right now, his lawyer and my lawyer are negotiating, but I'm not going to give up what I worked so hard for. He can have his little whore, but he's not going to leave me with nothing."

She frowned then.

"I guess I have it all now, don't I? What a hell of a way to get it though."

As I was writing all that down, I was thinking Monica had a pretty good reason, if there is such a thing, for killing her husband. She didn't want to stay married to him but she didn't want to give up whatever their business was. If she killed him and managed to get away with it, she'd have everything she wanted.

"Mrs. Mitchell, what is this business you don't want to give up."

"We own JaMon Pharmacies. We started it with one store right after we both graduated from pharmacy college twenty-four years ago. Since then, we've grown the business until we have six pharmacies now."

I nodded.

"I see. Would you happen to know the name of this other woman? I'll want to talk with her too."

Monica frowned and she sounded really pissed.

"Of course I do. I hired a private detective to find out. Here...I'll give you his report."

Just in case Mr. Mitchell had decided losing his business wasn't worth a divorce and that being dead would be better than staying married to Monica, I asked Monica if he'd been taking any medication. She said none that she knew of but I was welcome to look in the medicine cabinet in the bathroom if I wanted to.

I knew that given what Phil suspected, the techs would look for all medications anywhere in the house, so I told Monica I'd let her know what we found out as soon as I knew. Then, I drove back to the station to read the PI's report.

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As it happened, I knew the PI because he'd been part of the drug enforcement group when I joined the force twenty-five years before. He was a PI now as a result of a raid on a house suspected of being a drug dealer's place of business. He and his group announced they were police and were coming in, then smashed the door. Jerry led the group through the door and got about three feet into the house, when he was hit by a bullet from an AK.

It was a lucky shot in that it didn't hit Jerry anywhere vital, but it pretty much shattered his shinbone beyond repair. The doctors screwed a plate to the bone so Jerry could walk again, but they wouldn't certify him for duty. Jerry retired from police work and became a PI.

I read his report and it was very informative. Monica hired him to find out if her husband was stepping out on her. According to the report, Mr. Mitchell had told Monica he'd bought a new set of golf clubs and was going to play three afternoons a week to see if they helped his golf game. She became suspicious after she'd been looking in a closet they didn't usually use and found the new clubs still in the original package. When she asked Jack about that, he told her he needed to play several rounds with his old clubs and average his scores before using the new set. The next day though, his new clubs weren't in the closet or anywhere else she looked.

Jerry had tailed Jack to a small house on the edge of town and had taken pictures of him going inside. The woman who met him in the pictures was a blonde about thirty and was dressed in shorts and a halter-top. When Jack came out two hours later, the blonde was wearing a skimpy little satin robe that barely covered her ass. Jerry tailed him two more times to the same house and took more pictures that were about the same.

When Jerry traced the occupant of the house, he came up with one Janice Bryerly. He didn't look any further, but I understood why. He'd done exactly what he'd been paid to do. He'd proven Mr. Michell was seeing the blonde, and the way she was always dressed when Mr. Mitchell left was pretty good proof they hadn't been discussing politics. He'd also gotten the blonde's name and address which he included in his report to Monica.

It was pretty easy to see why Mr. Mitchell had decided to divorce Monica. The little blonde in the pictures looked like she'd be an absolute ball in bed while Monica probably wasn't, or at least she didn't look like she'd be. I figured Mr. Mitchell was tired of the old model and decided to get a new one.

I was a long way from making an arrest though. DA's won't touch a case unless they have nearly conclusive evidence a crime has been committed. All I had was a theory. I'd need Phil's report on cause of death as well as proof Monica was the killer and had a motive to kill her husband. Motive could make the difference between first degree murder and manslaughter if the defense attorney was worth a shit. The only motive I had was the blonde, but it's unusual for a woman to kill her husband over another woman. Money is a lot stronger motive than infidelity.

I walked over to see Suzie Lee, one of the CPA's in the department who can walk through the finances of people and companies and make sense of it all. I asked her to find out what she could about JaMon Pharmacies. She said to give her a couple of days.

Since there was only one other person I knew to be involved with Mr. Mitchell, I drove out to Janice Bryerly's house to speak with her. If she was screwing Mr. Mitchell, I didn't think she'd kill him, but she might have some knowledge about his and Monica's relationship. In my experience, most people in affairs eventually tell all the gory details to the third person in the triangle.

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Janice wasn't what I'd figured. I thought she was probably a young woman who'd found a wealthy older guy and saw the possibilities. The little blonde who answered the door was just as hot as she'd looked in the pictures Jerry took, but she didn't talk that way.

I introduced myself and asked her if she knew a Mr. Jack Mitchell. She said, "You'd better come inside. I don't want my neighbors to see me crying."

She flopped down in a chair, looked up at me and said, "Yes, I knew him. It doesn't make any difference now though, does it? He's dead."

Mr. Mitchell had only been found that morning, and I knew the department wouldn't release any details until Phil was convinced of the cause of death.

"Yes, he is. How did you find out?"

Janice sniffed and wiped her eyes.

"His wife called me about two hours ago. She wasn't very nice about it either."

"What do you mean, she wasn't very nice?"

Janice blew her nose on a tissue and then wiped her eyes again.

"She said I wouldn't be getting sex anymore because Jack was dead. Then she laughed and said she hoped I never found a man to...to screw me again."

"Well, Janice, I'm trying to find out what happened to Mr. Mitchell. Any information you can give me will help even if you don't think it's important. How did you meet Mr. Mitchell?"

Janice took a deep breath.

"I'm a waitress down at Gilly's Pub. Jack came in there one afternoon and I waited on his table. It was too early for our usual crowd, so there was nobody else there. I sat down at his table after I brought him his beer and we started to talk.

"He was a really nice guy. I know you've been looking at me. So do all the other guys who come into Gilly's. I've had my boobs squeezed and my bottom pinched more times than I can remember. Jack didn't do anything like that. He just talked to me.

"He told me he was having some problems at home and he really liked talking to a woman who listened instead of nagging him all the time. I felt sorry for him. I mean, a wife is supposed to support her husband. That's what I told him. He smiled and said he wished he was married to me instead of to her.

"Jack kept coming back to Gilly's about the same time every day, and after a week, he said his wife was making him sleep in their spare bedroom now. I said that wasn't right because a woman is supposed to take care of her husband that way too. He put his face in his hands and I think he cried a little. Then he said all he wanted was to be rid of her, but when he'd suggested they just divorce and split everything, she said she wanted it all. He said if he could keep at least half of his money, he could take me anywhere I wanted to go.

"Well, I'd heard that before. What that always means is if I sleep with the guy he'll promise me anything until he walks out the door. Then, I'll never see him again, and that's what I told Jack. He shook his head and said it did matter because he wanted to show me how good life can be. He said if we were together, he'd never leave me, no matter what.

"I know what you're thinking. You're thinking I was stupid to fall for that line. I didn't fall for it. I told him if we were together, the money didn't matter to me. He looked up at me and asked if I really meant that. When I said yes, he asked if he could hug me.

"Well, that hug felt pretty nice since I hadn't been out with a man in almost a year. I got all warm inside and well...you know. I told Jack if he'd pick me up at ten when I get off, I could help him out a little. I didn't intend for it to go further than just once, but when we did it...wow...I'd never felt that way with any other man. He started coming to my house because I asked him to. I didn't love him or anything like that, not at first. It was just a way to make us both feel better.

"About a month ago, after we...you know...he said he loved me and asked me if I'd marry him if he could get his wife to leave him with enough money to start over. I asked him how long that would take and he said probably about a month. I said I'd marry him even if it took a year."

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Janice didn't know any more about the relationship between Jack and Monica. Evidently he'd spent most of his time seducing Janice. I came away from the interview thinking two things. One, Janice had to be the most naïve woman I'd ever met, and two, Jack Mitchell was a real asshole. I didn't know if he really loved Janice or not, but it was obvious she loved him. He'd caused her to feel that way by playing on her sympathy.

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It was too late to do much more so after I checked out of the station I went home, but I didn't stop thinking about the case. No detective really does. Once a case gets in your brain, the only way to get it out is to find the perp and see them go to jail. Even then, you still remember the case. It just doesn't come to mind every hour of every day.

Monica had told me Jack was divorcing her and she'd agree to the divorce if Jack agreed to an even split of their assets. Jack had told Janice that Monica was divorcing him and didn't want to give him anything. I didn't think Jack was telling Janice the truth, but I didn't yet have any reason to believe Monica's side of the story either.

The next morning there were two folders in my inbox. One was from the supervisor of the crime lab and contained everything they'd found and analyzed so far. The other was from Phil and was his preliminary autopsy report.

The Crime Lab report was just a couple of pages, about what I expected. I closed it, dropped it back in my inbox and pulled out Phil's report.

Phil still hadn't called it a homicide or suicide, but he did have a probably cause of death. His report said Mr. Mitchell's blood had a high concentration of cyclobenzaprine, high enough to stop him from breathing. I'd not heard of cyclobenzaprine, so I walked down to the morgue and asked Phil what it was.

He frowned.

"Cyclobenzaprine is a muscle relaxant which has an antagonistic effect on histamine, serotonin, and muscarinic receptors.

I've never understood why Phil can't talk in common English, but he doesn't seem to be able to.

"OK, what the hell does all that mean?"

Phil looked at me with the same look my ex used to give me when she was explaining something I should have known but was too stupid to figure out.

"In your muscles there are these things we doctors call receptors that transfer information around, kind of like a radio transmitter and receiver except they use chemicals called monoamine transmitters like histamine, serotonin, and muscarinic. Cyclobenzaprine blocks the receptors from receiving signals so the muscles can't work. It's used in small doses in animals and humans to temporarily paralyze them in preparation for surgery. This guy had enough cyclobenzaprine in his blood to kill a horse so it's no wonder he stopped breathing."

"Any idea how it got into him?"

Phil nodded.

"His stomach was full of wine with about the same concentration of cyclobenzaprine as his blood, so I figure it was in the wine. I haven't found any other way it could have gotten into his system, so I still can't rule it a homicide. The guy was a pharmacist so he had ready access to cyclobenzaprine and he knew what it could do. Me, I wouldn't want to lay there helpless while my body shut down for lack of oxygen, so I'm thinking homicide, but I don't have anything that proves the guy didn't kill himself.

Phil frowned then.

"We done yet? I gotta pop the hood on a gal with the biggest tits I've ever seen. Your guys found her propped up against a dumpster with a needle in her arm and they want me to find out what killed her, like it's any great mystery."

I thanked Phil and went back my office. At least I had a cause of death now.

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In looking through the Crime Lab report, I found they'd searched the house, garage, and trashcans, but hadn't found any drugs except a bottle of aspirin and some vitamins. That fact had me leaning toward homicide too. If Mr. Mitchell had mixed up a cocktail of wine and muscle relaxer to put himself permanently to sleep, he probably wouldn't have taken the trouble to toss whatever container that muscle relaxer came in.