The first thing I wanted to do was get a feeling for my suspects. I knew Jack, was afraid of Willie, and didn’t trust Cecil. The other two, O’Malley and Fedorov, were complete strangers to me. That meant it was time for some research.
Which made for a perfect opportunity to pay Brent a visit. Now that the long holiday weekend was over, he’d be at work. I could do my Internet searching from one of the library’s terminals as easily as I could from my laptop. Plus, I could find out how Sammy was doing.
It was a classic case of killing two birds with one stone. Even if the metaphor was a little cringeworthy at the moment.
A few minutes later, I was tooling up the Boulevard on my way to the library. I pulled over to read a poster that Felicia Johansson was putting up in the window of her insurance agency. It included a hotline folks could call with information related to Ollie’s murder.
Felicia waved. I returned the gesture with a smile. Despite the difficult circumstances that brought it about, my heart swelled to see her in charge of the former Borus Insurance Agency. As far as I was concerned, the more women-owned businesses in my hometown, the better.
With each pedal stroke, the July heat began to beat down on me. Despite the ride’s short distance, by the time I pulled into the parking lot, a bead of sweat trickled down my cheek. The utter lack of clouds meant there was no respite from the heat of summer.
Like there was no respite from the search for Ollie’s killer.
After chatting with the library employee at the checkout counter, I made my way to Brent’s office. He was looking at his computer monitor when I arrived at the doorway. Circles under his eyes as dark as coal stood out against the screen’s glow. They were a stark reminder that while Oliver Watson’s loss of life was horrible, other people had suffered, too.
I knocked on the doorframe. “Hey, handsome dude. How are ya?”
He tossed his glasses on the desk and rubbed his eyes.
“Didn’t get much sleep last night. Sammy did okay once I got his pain meds into him, but I kept waking up, worried that he was in pain. Then, this morning, I had to carry him to the backyard so he could do his business. That was an adventure.”
“I’m so sorry.” I slid into the chair across from him. “Is there anything I can do?”
As if to emphasize his pitiable condition, he let out a big yawn. “No. I’m sure it was first-night jitters. I’ve got my lunch break in about an hour. Plan on popping over to the house to check on him.”
“I’ve got some research to do here. How about I pick up some lunch and take it over when you get home?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Now that’s an offer I cannot refuse.”
With that settled, I headed for the research section of the library. The first thing I wanted to do was read any reports in the Beacon about the big drug bust and trial. If O’Malley and/or Fedorov had a hand in Ollie’s murder, my case timeline needed to start all the way back then.
Information about the trial was frustratingly sparse. A group of alleged drug dealers were put on trial in federal court in Indianapolis. The proceedings lasted two weeks, with the jury returning convictions against all defendants. Ollie’s name only came up as one of the witnesses who testified for the prosecution. If he’d served in some special role, the powers that be had kept that detail under wraps.
My research confirmed Matt’s comments that O’Malley and Fedorov had been low-hanging fruit in the organizations. They’d both cut plea deals to implicate the bigger fish. A little more digging revealed that they had, in fact, been released from prison a few months ago and were living right here in Brown County.
That was the kind of news to make sure you locked the door at night.
I was making note of their physical appearances when my phone buzzed. Brent was ready to roll. With a few clicks, I’d placed a take-out order for burgers and fries with Big Al’s Diner. The least I could do was make sure my beau had lunch from the best burger joint in North America. And if I got to have one too, who was I to complain?
The first thing I did when I arrived at Brent’s house was help him take Sammy outside.
“It’s not the weight, it’s trying to navigate the doors,” he said once the doggo was safe on the ground in the backyard.
The poor thing sniffed the grass, then looked at his bandaged leg, then at us.
“At least he doesn’t have to wear a cone of shame.” Brent took a bite out of his burger. “If he starts biting at the bandage, then I’ll have to put him in one.
“Yeah, those are the worst.” Ursi had to wear one a couple of years back. A spot on her head got infected when she kept scratching at it. She only had to be in it a few days until the spot healed but was miserable the whole time.
And she made sure I was miserable right along with her.
“This is his first surgery since I had him fixed. He did pretty good then. Hopefully, it’ll be the same this time around.” He took a sip of his drink. “I imagine it’s too early for a progress report on the case.”
The abrupt change in topic left me with a momentary sensation of whiplash. Then again, Brent had to be back at work soon. I told him about my suspect list.
“Jack seems like a stretch. That could play in his favor, though.” Brent dipped a fry into his ketchup. “Everyone thinks he’s this great guy. Maybe some deep-buried PTSD symptoms came to the surface and he lost it.”
“There is no way in the world he had anything to do with this.” I raised my index finger to stop Brent from responding. “I promise I’ll look into him, though. The only person I’m not willing to put on a suspect list is my mom. Everyone else is fair game, as far as I’m concerned. With the exception of you and the folks we were hanging out with.”
“That’s a pretty dim view of society.”
“Indeed.” I dabbed a fry into some mayonnaise. “Alas, such is the state of the world these days.”
“What’s your take on the drug dealers?”
“It sounds like something straight out of one of my authors’ thrillers. To me, the idea of a revenge killing only puts the spotlight back on the gang. And those two in particular. Unless they did it to send some kind of message.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s a way to let people know they’re back in business.”
“What if they have alibis?”
“That’s a good question. It won’t fly if all they can do is alibi each other. If someone else can . . .” I shrugged.
Brent glanced at his watch. His lunch break was running short. “How about a different approach? Instead of making assumptions about potential suspects, let’s figure out what we know about the murderer.”
“Ooh, I like that.” It was such a relief having Brent working with me on the investigation. In everyday conversation, he helped me consider things from all sorts of perspectives. Like now. I was lucky to have him in my life.
“Let’s see.” I closed my eyes to give me a few moments to organize my thoughts. “Fact—our perp used a firearm. Fact—the police recovered one bullet. Hopefully, there will be enough of it left to figure out the type of firearm used. Fact—it was almost dark when the shooting occurred. Fact—nobody else was shot.”
“Does the last one matter?”
“It does to me. It tells us the shooter had a single target in mind. Which makes me believe it was an intentional act, not someone taking random potshots at a crowd.”
“Okay, any other facts?”
“Not until the results of the bullet testing come through. Once we get that, assuming Matt is willing to share it, we can begin to narrow down the firearm used. That should also help us determine how far away the shot came from.”
“How long will that take?”
“A while.” I got to my feet. Sometimes walking around helped me think. “Maybe a few weeks. Which means I need to forge ahead.”
“With what?” Brent fetched Sammy. “I mean, you just said there’s not much to go on.”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to put on my thinking cap and come up with something creative.”
A little while later, Ursi and I were strolling down the street when an idea came to me. I pulled out my phone and dialed.
“Hey, Star. I know it’s been a while. Do you have a few minutes?”
Star Rockwell was a nurse at the hospital. She’d also been close friends with Valerie Briggs, the girl who’d disappeared over twenty years ago. Star had helped me unravel the mystery of Valerie’s disappearance. At the conclusion of that case, she told me to call her if I ever needed anything.
Well, now I needed her insight.
“Anything for you, Allie. What’s up?”
“I apologize for bringing up old wounds, but it’s about Ollie Watson.”
“That poor man. I wasn’t working when they brought him in, but I heard they did everything they could to save him. It’s a huge loss.”
“Indeed.”
Star’s tone indicated she viewed the departed in a light quite different than me. On the other hand, I was trying to find his murderer, so if I read Star’s words correctly, she’d be more than ready to help.
“He taught a self-defense class at the hospital twice a year. Since so many of us come and go when it’s dark, we appreciated him doing it. I’m going to miss him.”
“I didn’t know that. Look, someone asked me to investigate his death. I know you and your fellow Four Horsewomen of the Apocalypse got a little wild back in the day. Did you ever hear of anyone having it in for him? Like wanting revenge for him arresting them?”
“Oh, man.” She was silent for a while. “Back then, we all hated his guts. He acted like he was the new marshal in town, come to rid the community of the scourge of marijuana and other recreational drugs.”
“But something changed.”
“Yeah. After the big drug bust, he chilled out. It was like he’d made his big score and was happy to coast after that. I don’t want to speak for anyone else, but I grew up, too. Don’t get me wrong, I think weed should be legalized, regulated, and taxed. Over the years, though, I’ve come to see us all from back then through a different lens. The man had a job to do, and he was trying his best to do it.”
“Do you think anyone from back then, or even now, would have it in for him? Like, Cecil Burgess, maybe?”
“Bobcat? As much as I despise that man with every fiber of my being, I have a hard time seeing that.”
“He hasn’t bothered you, has he?” Cecil Burgess, commonly known as Bobcat, had treated Star unspeakably when they were in high school. After living with the trauma for decades, she’d recently confronted him about it.
“No. I saw him at Marinara’s a while back and he ran away like a scared rabbit.”
I laughed. It was good to hear Star finally getting the better of the man who had hurt her all those years ago.
“Do you think anybody else would have wanted to do away with him?”
“You know, I’ve heard all these rumors. I don’t get why everyone is overlooking the obvious.”
“And that is?”
“His wife. I mean, Ollie was a good dude and all. But he was kind of a slob. Would you want to be living with him twenty-four-seven for the next twenty years? I wouldn’t.”
I didn’t know Ollie’s wife, Zoe. They lived in Morgantown, a burg even smaller than Rushing Creek a twenty-minute drive to the north. I didn’t go there often, in part because one had to climb a majorly steep hill along the way. I had little interest in putting myself through a lung-busting bike ride just to visit its park or barbecue joint.
A report in the Beacon I read the day after Ollie’s life was taken stated his wife was an attorney at a law firm in Franklin. Morgantown was about halfway between Ollie’s workplace and Zoe’s. It made sense to me that they’d split the difference.
There wasn’t a lot of information about the woman in the article. There’d been a photo, though. Zoe Watson was a striking woman. She was tall, with a statuesque figure and gorgeous dark hair. She was also younger than Ollie by five years.
“But his wife’s only fifty-seven. She’s too young to quit working.”
“I wasn’t being literal.” Star sighed. “Look, they don’t have any kids. A little odd, don’t you think? Especially for a couple that was together almost thirty years.”
“A little, I guess.” I couldn’t help thinking that I was in my thirties and had no desire to have children. “Maybe they were married to their careers as much as each other and didn’t have time for kids. Or agreed not to have any.”
“Sure. I’ve met her, though. She’s as prickly as a cactus. And if she doesn’t think of you as being on her level—with a high-paying job or someone with connections—she doesn’t have time for you. Between the two of them, it always seemed to be a marriage of convenience, more than anything.”
“Money’s always a good motivator. Presumably, his death benefits will go to her.” I thought about another couple I knew who’d been married for a long time before the husband’s untimely death. “Do you know if they have any money problems?”
“I didn’t know Ollie that well. Zoe dressed like they had all the money in the world, though. I’d see them around town every now and then. Her casual outfits looked every bit as expensive as her work suits.”
“Fair point. I imagine living with a cop meant she had plenty of opportunities to become familiar with firearms, too.”
“That sounds more like the Kickboxing Crusader we all know and love.” She chuckled at the faux superhero nickname Sloane had given me. “Ollie may have been a slacker those last few years, but he was a good guy. He didn’t deserve to go that way.”
“You’re right. Thanks for the chat, Star. Next time I see you at the Pub, drinks are on me.”
We ended the call and I looked at Ursi. My fur baby was seated on all fours, looking at me with her big golden eyes.
I raised my eyebrows. “You’re right, girl. Time to head home. I need to learn more about the enigmatic Zoe Watson.”
For the first time since I’d agreed to investigate Ollie’s murder, it felt like I was making real progress. I’d found a path that was more akin to the yellow brick road than the road to perdition.
At least, that was the hope.