Dragonet

Chapter Eleven

"Looks like your pets been here" Detective Jacob Thomas remarked, looking down at the dead criminal.

"My pet?" his partner Andrew Williams asked. "When did this killer become my pet?"

"Hey, better you than me Andy" Jacob laughed. “I’d dump it on Whitman and Barlow except their narcotics and we’re homicide and this things a killer not a drug addict. ” He walked away leaving his partner so he could chat with the forensic team. "What yah got?" he asked.

A smock clothed officer opened his notebook. ".45 cal automatic, four casings. Blood and hair, red, on the muzzle. Probably match our missing clerk. Blood behind the counter, lab'll let us know in a few hours but I'm betting its our missing girls. Blood just inside tha door, same ruby-black colour as at the warehouse, more in tha parkin lot. Twelve dollars seventy-one cents in a store bag, dead perp missing a lot of blood. Stolen '71 Chevy in tha parkin lot filled with drugs and stolen guns. Perp wearing makeup tah look darker. Guys whiter than me, like he never saw tha sun. Almost looks like he was makin ah delivery, just dropped by to grab some quick cash."

Jacob made his own notes, until the lab reports he wasn't taking anything for granted. "Anything else missing?"

"Nope" the officer answered. "Manager says everything here. From what he says this Patricia Armine must have been hit around five am. She's started making tha donuts, fives her schedule for that. Apparently she’s his most reliable employee, or was until last night. Camera's broke, been broke for months so no tape, no alarm. Until tha docs finished with John Doe out there I’ll hafta take that as near tha time. Relief never showed, customer found tha body at about nine. Called us on his cell phone. Smart, never entered tha store, just waited fer us."

Thomas nodded. Nothing to do now but chase leads. But where was the girl? From that blood pool behind the counter she had to be hurt badly. Maybe even dead. Did she run off or was she taken? There just wasn’t enough evidence yet to tell and why take her anyway? It didn’t make sense. Then, with some crimes there never was any rhyme or reason to what happened. A guess was as good as you got.