Homicide for the Holidays Read online

  Sawyer, a skinny guy who looked about twelve, nodded, and with a sweep of his arm indicated I should follow. When we were out of earshot from Mac, he said, “Hey, you’re that news lady. My mom watches you every night.”

  I smiled as my youth gave me the finger from the ledge on which it was precariously perched. “Please tell her I appreciate the loyalty.” My mind hamster-wheeled as I followed him to his squad car. Waiting until we were strapped in and the car was in motion, I said, “Sure was hopping in there tonight. Any luck with the investigation?” I snuck a sideways glance at him to see if he’d taken the bait.

  My bluff worked because he sat up straighter and lowered the squawking from his radio. “Your guy was the third Santa hit today. The others were within minutes apart earlier this evening, and we still don’t have a motive. Union Station was central to the shootings, so that’s where we set up command.”

  The information took a second to absorb into my still-shocked brain. “Why haven’t the Santas been told to stay off the streets?”

  “We’ve tried to get the word out, but it’s not like there’s a union we can contact. Some of the Santas aren’t with the Salvation Army, they’re community volunteers, so detectives dressed in costumes are walking the streets to warn and protect them.”

  “Any leads on the identity of the Santa Slayer?” As a member of the media, I couldn’t help but coin a cutesy phrase that would play well on air.

  Sawyer chuckled but didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Santa Slayer. I like that.” He darted a quick peek in my direction. “The first Santa was some bigwig at PNC bank. The second was a self-employed CPA. We’re looking for a connection but so far nothing. Your guy didn’t have ID on him.”

  Despite Mac’s request to not use the lights, Sawyer had flipped his on during the heavy weekend night traffic, and we arrived at IU Health Hospital in less than ten minutes. Because of my police escort, I was assigned a room before the ink on my signature dried, but the Saturday night crowd had been howling at more than the moon, and the place was rocking.

  The ER visit went relatively fast, considering. With my cracked rib shrink-wrapped, and my ruined dress bagged for evidence, the only advice the doc gave me was to rest and take Advil for the next six weeks. While I exchanged the hospital gown, open in back to provide maximum humiliation, for a pair of scrubs, bells jingled from the hallway. I pulled the curtain to find a gorgeous man dressed in Santa pants and an unbuttoned Santa coat prowling the hallway in front of my cubicle, a white beard dangling from his fingertips. My fatal flaw convinced me to investigate, and I slipped out. Half-dressed Santa, looking like a cover model, stopped in front of a cubicle a few curtains past mine, wringing the beard like worry beads. Tugging the hem of the scrubs, I stepped around the carnage common to all ERs and snuck up beside him as he paced between three side-by-side cubicles.

  The smell emanating from the rooms was that of an unattended litter box. Inside all three areas was a scene straight out of Misery The Musical. Three Santas, sans beards and topcoats, were puking into kidney shaped bowls while nurses stood off to the side, holding damp cloths.

  I edged up to the only Santa left standing. “What happened?”

  “Food poisoning. Probably the eggnog.”

  A young woman in scrubs bustled by, speaking as she whisked into the middle stall. “Not food poisoning. The urine analysis shows high levels of arsenic. These men were poisoned.”

  My Santa, since in the few seconds I’d laid eyes on him I’d come to think of him as mine, dropped his beard and inhaled so sharply I considered giving him the Heimlich. “Wh…what? We were at a party.” His face held a quizzical expression. “I don’t drink.”

  Doesn’t drink? A sure reject on my dating profile.

  The lure of a good story helped me recover from my shattered dream. “Was anyone else dressed as the jolly old elf?”

  Confusion shone in his eyes, and he offered a half-hearted shrug. “No, just the four of us. We were supposed to be working after hours collecting money near Circle Centre Mall for a special project, but the cops made us leave. We went to the party instead.”

  I moved in for the kill. “What party?”

  “The Capital Improvements Board’s holiday party.” He made a whirling motion with his finger that encompassed himself and his three hapless buddies. “We’re on the board.”

  Sawyer, who’d been sitting at the opposite end of the hall, wormed his way past the ER personnel and came to a stop beside me, resting his hand on my shoulder. “We need to go back. Detective Muldoon wants your statement.”

  Divesting myself of his hand by rolling my shoulder, I whispered to Only-Santa-Left- Standing, “Was a large man with a limp at the party?”

  He tilted his head and ran a hand through his fabulous mahogany mane. “Yeah, there was a guy with a limp. Older, plump, wearing a dark sweatshirt and dark pants. I remember because I didn’t know him and he looked out of place. I thought he might’ve been a party crasher, looking for free booze.”

  Sawyer parked his hand on my shoulder again, this time applying enough pressure to force my attention. “Detective Muldoon needs you.”

  “He only thinks he needs me. He’ll recant soon enough.”

  Expelling a heavy sigh, he propelled me toward the main door, stopping so I could sign release papers.

  Sawyer must have been worried about Mac’s legendary black temper because he blasted the siren and lights all the way back to the downtown district headquarters. Instead of parking the car, he dumped me near the front entrance, but he did escort me to the door.

  Inside, the chaos had amped-up. More people filled the space and everyone seemed to be in a flurry of motion. Mac Muldoon stood front and center in the mayhem, gesturing wildly and shouting orders.

  Charging like a hungry panther when he noticed me, he hooked my arm and weaved through the throng until we came to a vacant conference room. Closing the door, he said, “We need to talk.”

  “Damn straight we do. Why’d you dump me?” I’d been so pissed at his defection that I’d refused to take his calls.

  “Being with you was like always being on air. We had no privacy. I had no privacy.” Flopping into a chair, he propped his elbows onto the table. “That’s not what I meant when I said we needed to talk. You saw the assailant, and he saw you. You’re well known in this community, so he could’ve recognized you.”

  He had a point on both counts. I’d been so captivated with Mac and my vision of our future together, that his betrayal had decimated my spirit. I’d been busy molding my career and hadn’t given any consideration to how the constant circuit of business dinners had affected my reserved betrothed. I loved to hate him because doing so usurped my own sense of culpability, but now wasn’t the time to pick at the festered scab over my jilted heart. Another year older and another year wiser, I understood the error of my ways. And I had seen the shooter, someone who at this point could be considered a spree killer.

  I stood between Mac and the door. Weighing my options, I did a one-eighty and pushed open the door.

  He caught me by the wrist. “Don’t leave. I’m sorry for being an ass, but I died a thousand deaths when I saw you standing near that slain Santa. I thought you were next.” He eased me into a chair. “I need a description, then we’ll assign you a security detail until the shooter’s caught.”

  Relenting, I gave him a description of the man, including Only-Santa-Left-Standing’s description of his clothing, but I didn’t add how I’d obtained that particular element. I planned to discover if the dead Santas were on the Capital Improvements Board, then research who’d have a motive to kill them. “I don’t need some rookie who’s been banished to babysitting detail dogging my every step.”

  “I’m not assigning a rookie. I’m going to cover you myself.” He blinked hard, as if he’d realized the double meaning.

  With a dramatic sniff, I rose. “As much as I’ve missed being covered by you, I’ve discovered I’m quite proficient in…coverin
g myself.”

  Nary a muscle moved on his face, but he narrowed his eyes. “No need. I found that aspect of our relationship to be quite satisfactory.”

  My hackles raised, upped the ante, and called. “Satisfactory?” I’d thought that “aspect” had been bombs-bursting-in-air fabulous.

  He raised his eyebrows into a critical arch. “Maybe my memory’s faulty. If you’d like a do-over—”

  This time I stormed out of the room, past the command center, and out the front doors. Barely two steps outside, a truck backfired, and I hit the sidewalk.

  Mac reached down. “My house or yours?” He pulled me up and dusted off my scrubs.

  “Mine. I need my computer for research.” Admitting I was wrong had never been one of my finer traits.

  Mac toddling around my house in the wee hours of the morning severely cramped my style. With my laptop open on my bed, I slammed the lid every time footsteps neared my bedroom door. Before our breakup—something the primitive part of my brain acknowledged might have been my fault—Mac had suffered from insomnia, so his rambling brought back memories.

  In between his roaming footsteps, I’d pulled up IndyStar.com and searched for information on the slain Santas, then cross-referenced their names with the Capital Improvements Board website. Both were on the CIB managers list. No mention had been made in the news of the sick Santas in the ER, but Only-Santa-Left-Standing had said they were on the CIB, so I pulled up their glamour shots and voila—names, and occupations. Several more taps on the keyboard and I culled an article with a photo about the CIB board members, along with other organizations, dressing as Santa to collect money for charity. All nine of the current board members stared back at me as if red velvet was in vogue.

  Once Mac’s solitary footfalls quieted, I began the arduous task of searching for a link between the CIB managers and a disgruntled constituent. The board had been granted the right of eminent domain, and in the past decade, multiple stories of unhappy property owners had circulated in the press.

  After several mind-numbing hours of searching, I located an article on the death of a woman whose husband had been a well-respected local businessman named Chester Rogers. A blurry video of the funeral showed her husband, a middle-aged, overweight, Caucasian with a limp, walking beside her casket. The story went on to detail how she’d committed suicide after her hubby had refused to sell a property to the CIB. He accused the board of retaliating by tattling to the local police about the building’s use as a swinger’s club. For several weeks after the wife’s death, the media had dogged the man’s every step, exposing not only an illicit affair, but also a child born out of wedlock. Months later, he’d filed for bankruptcy and lost his business. The CIB got his property, and he got the shaft.

  While searching for a phone number for Chester Rogers, I speculated on why I hadn’t made the connection sooner. The press had slobbered over the story for weeks, but I’d been working on a feature story that would subsequently launch my career and hadn’t been paying attention. Finding Roger’s cell number, I sent a text.

  Mac burst into my room, his laptop cradled against his chest. “What haven’t you told me?” Dismissing my attempt at a faux astonished expression, he said, “When you were so quiet I knew you were up to something. You haven’t changed your Wi-Fi and iCloud passwords since I left. You’ve been obstructing justice from the comfort of your bed.”

  “You can’t use my passwords without my permission.”

  He held the computer aloft. “I just did.”

  “That pesky fourth amendment. I’m assuming your interpretation of unreasonable search doesn’t include my private information.”

  His expression indicated civil rights weren’t his top priority. “Apparently you’ve made a connection with the CIB and our slain Santas.”

  The look he shot my way threatened a pox on my future lineage, but I was a seasoned professional. I rolled my shoulders and elevated my brows to bite-me stage.

  “This,” he speared the air above my head with his finger, “this is what I mean about placing your career before anything else.”

  Relenting, I laid out everything I’d found and finished with, “He chose to kill them while they were dressed as Santa to make a statement. Knowing I can identify him might make him contact me in the hopes the media attention will help him gain public sympathy.”

  “Or he’ll kill you.”

  “Maybe so, but he isn’t finished.” I handed Mac a sticky note that included three former CIB managers. “Here’s the other three names on his hit list. They aren’t currently on the board, so they aren’t doing the Santa thing, but they were on the board during this incident.” What I didn’t hand my ex Mr. Right was my phone, the new one not yet hooked up to my Wi-Fi. On it was the time and place Chester Rogers, the likely Santa Slayer, had agreed to meet.

  Mac snatched the paper. “If you’d told me earlier we could’ve put these people in protective custody.”

  Turning the computer screen, I showed him a list of the sick Santas. “These guys, too. They were poisoned and are probably still at the hospital.” I pointed to Last-Santa-Left-Standing. “Except for him. He wasn’t on the board then.” I willed Mac to hurry up because I was meeting Mr. Rogers at a playground in under an hour.

  Mac fished his phone from his pocket. Jabbing numbers on the screen, he bellowed orders to the poor soul on the other end. Two more quick calls and he addressed me. “A new security detail is five minutes out. Stay inside with the doors locked until they get here.” His face darkened and another hex on my future offspring winged my way.

  “When have I not listened to you?”

  Mac ignored my comment, or maybe he grunted, I wasn’t sure, but once he left and his headlights faded from my driveway, I called my cameraman who said I was an idiot. I agreed, then changed clothes, Googled the address in my phone message, and went off to slay dragons.

  Indianapolis contained a patchwork of ethnic neighborhoods, and my route took me through enough nationalities to form the United Nations. The sun had not yet peeked through the brightening sky, and the roads were nearly deserted. I reached the playgrounds in Ellenberger Park on the far eastside with fifteen minutes to spare.

  I parked the car and walked toward the playground where the empty equipment stood in deep shadows. A light breeze set the swings in motion, the sudden movement nearly seizing my lungs. I dug my pepper spray from my purse and clamped it in my palm, listening for approaching footsteps, hearing nothing but the pounding of my heart. Allowing my eyes to adjust to the low light of the sunrise, I stumbled through the crunchy sand, shook the snow off the rubbery swing seat, and gripped the chains. Before I could settle, a hand clamped over my mouth. I never had a chance to deploy the pepper spray before it was lights out.

  I woke up duct taped to the swing. With my brains scrambled, my sense of time was distorted. Shaking off the cobwebs, I took in my surroundings, but my spinal cord seemed fused and my range of motion was limited. My hands were bound, but I was able to raise them high enough to touch my neck, where something scratchy and cold abraded my skin. Feeling with my fingers, I encountered a wire looped around my neck, like a noose. Attached to the end of the loop was a sawed-off shotgun, pointed straight at my skull.

  “I’ve wired the trigger to my index finger. If anything happens to me, even an accidental trip, kaboom. Your brains get splattered,” said a shrill voice I assumed belonged to Chester Rogers.

  I twisted my body, carefully drawing the contraption along with my movements, and faced the man who held me captive.

  Murky blue eyes, the color of water churning in an angry ocean, never stopped moving. “You’re the doll on the local news, right?”

  Too afraid to move further, I lifted my chin a fraction of an inch in response.

  “I got the idea after you messaged me. Cops is on their way. So’s your TV station. When I called they said they was already headed here.” He nudged me with his free hand. “Couldn’t resist a good story, huh?”


  He continued speaking in a high-pitched voice, but I tuned out the madman’s ranting in favor of focusing on the distant sirens that grew louder with each shaky breath.

  Mac was right. I’d made myself a liability because I’d only considered what the story would do for my career. Even if I avoided execution in front of a TV audience, Mac would kill me the first chance he had.

  A car door slammed, then chunks of frozen sand sprayed close to my shoes as Mac screeched to a halt within a few feet of my position. One quick visual revolution around my throat, and his face blanched. He turned his attention to the Santa Slayer. “Tony Kiritsis, 1977. Interesting choice to emulate. What’s Miss Flynn done to earn your wrath?”

  Gesturing with his left hand, Rogers said, “Déjà vu Indy style. Kiritsis got his say in front of the cameras. She’s the golden ticket to mine.”

  Mac backed away, his palm held out in front. “Cassandra, he has a shotgun wired in a dead-man’s switch so no one can shoot him. Any movement and the gun goes off. Do you understand?”

  Paralyzed with fear, I said, “Yes.” My voice sounded like a yelp.

  “Chester, the news crew is right behind me. If I let them move forward, do you promise you’ll not pull the trigger?”

  Chester shifted his feet.

  The noose tightened.

  “Bring ’em in.”

  Blake, my cameraman for the past two years, scuttled forward until he stood in front of me. He hoisted the camera to his shoulder, but his terrified gaze never left my face. “We’re rolling.”

  Rogers yanked the wire around my neck in an apparent attempt to heighten the drama. “I’m here to report the unfair acts inflicted by the CIB. We live in the damned United States, but the damned government can still steal a man’s damn property.”

  He droned on and with every curse-filled sentence he became more unhinged. Crews from competing stations began lining the fence surrounding the playground, each wanting their shot at a juicy story. Fragments of excited conversation floated, but Mac never moved, not even to blink.