Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #3: Books 9-12 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [reading in the dark TXT] 📗

“Ah, jeez! Do you know how many people ask me about that? That was, like, forty years ago out in the Midwest. Some ranchers complained that their cattle were being slaughtered and mutilated. We were asked to investigate, but the Bureau had no jurisdiction in a case like that. How is that a federal matter, right? I think we investigated a case on an Indian reservation because we had jurisdiction there and there was political pressure to do something. It turned out to be coyotes or some such. But the conspiracy theory websites get hold of this stuff, you know? And they make something out of nothing.”

I nodded, even though he couldn’t see me. “OK, Bernie, I thanks, I appreciate it. We need to get together some time. You owe me I don’t know how many drinks.”

“Yeah, right. Stop talking about it and do it already!”

We laughed. He told me he’d get back to me and hung up.

I strolled back toward the station house deep in thought, came to my car, and paused to rest my ass on the hood. After staring at nothing for a while, I called Donald Kirkpatrick. It rang twice and his voice, severe and impatient, said, “Yes!”

“Mr. Kirkpatrick, this is Detective Stone. Good morning.”

He seemed to soften a bit. “Oh, Detective. What can I do for you?”

“I keep hearing about somebody who got footage of the lights over Soundview Park that night. Have you ever seen that film?”

“Yes. I own the original. I bought it from the person who made it, when I decided to write my book.”

“May I see it?”

He seemed to hesitate for a moment. “Yes, of course. Are you coming to the talk tomorrow?”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“Good. Then after the conference, we can have a look at it.”

“Great. Mr. Kirkpatrick, before I let you go. You never mentioned that Paul Estevez and Jane Harrison were engaged.”

“Should I have?”

“Well, in view of the fact that they broke off their engagement on the night Danny was murdered, do you not think that was relevant?”

“Not really. Why should it be?”

“Do you know why they broke up?”

“No. It’s none of my business, Detective.”

“Apparently they had a row at your house.”

“I was not aware of it. They were terribly young at the time, Detective Stone. People of that age are always getting emotional about their relationships. Frankly, after the experiences we had just had on Macomb Mountain, I couldn’t have been less interested in Jane and Paul’s relationship.”

“How about Danny? Was he involved with anybody?”

“Not that I am aware of.” He gave a snort that might have been a laugh. “Danny was a remarkable young man, and eminently sensible. Too sensible to tie himself to any kind of long-term relationship.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Yeah, that is the impression I am beginning to get. Thank you, Mr. Kirkpatrick. I’ll see you tomorrow evening.”

I hung up and watched Dehan step out of the station house and stand for a moment, looking around. She spotted me and crossed the road at a slow run.

“You hiding, Mr. Stone?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “I’ve been looking for the movie of the lights. I don’t think it was ever uploaded to Youtube. I contacted NBC, who ran it on the news at…”

She stopped because I was shaking my head. “Kirkpatrick has it. He’s going to bring it along tomorrow night for us to see.”

She narrowed her eyes and nodded, then pointed at me. “You the man.”

“I also asked Bernie to put us in touch with the agents who—allegedly—spoke to the witnesses. We’ll see where that leads. Maybe we’ll both get abducted, or visited by men in black.”

She sat next to me and chewed her lip, staring at the blacktop. “So now we have a motive. Jealousy.”

“Mm-hm…”

“And he’s Latino. Latinos can be very jealous.”

“Is that so?”

She nodded. “Yup.” Then she shrugged and peered at me in the sunshine. “It doesn’t help us much, because, with a guy like Danny, we might have a hundred motives. There is no telling how many girls he was sleeping with.”

I studied her face a moment and was struck for the thousandth time by how exquisite it was. “Yeah, it could be a jealous husband, a jealous boyfriend, a woman scorned …” I shook my head and shrugged my shoulders. “Or any variation on that theme. But, what does help us to narrow it down a bit, or should help us, is the way in which the murder was executed. If anything should point out an individual, it is the unique character of this murder.”

We were both silent for a moment. Because, despite my insightful observation, unless it was a jealous alien or a jilted alien, the nature of the murder did not immediately point to anybody.

Then Dehan said, “One thing that did strike me was that Paul practices kendo. Samurai swords, if they are well made, can be as sharp as razor blades. And a real expert can split a lentil in half with a single strike. Paul is a seventh dan in taekwondo, Stone, I saw the marks on his belt. Believe me, that guy can kill you fifteen different ways in fifteen seconds, and he has control and precision in his strikes.”

I studied her a moment. “So we are saying, what? That he beheaded Danny at some other location…”

“Hence the absence of blood.”

“Then cut off his feet and his genitals and, somehow, in a way we do not yet understand, placed the body in the park…”

“…Set up the hoax with the UFO and the lasers, and got away, in a way we do not yet understand, without leaving any prints.” She sighed. “It is the seedling of a theory.”

I shook my head. “The only part of this theory that makes any