Mind farts. Judge’s affliction could generate thousands of them. An outburst was queuing up.
“…pig-faced, mung testicles…”
Inside the yellow caution tape, he and his two dogs and Owen stood in what used to be a tanning salon in Blacksburg, but was now a day-old crime scene, unmanned at the moment and picked over by the authorities, maybe even by the locals. He was glad it had been worked already. It reduced the chance of finding uncollected body parts. Otherwise it could become Iraq and Afghanistan for him all over again. This time his anxiety grew from the tangle of wires and wood and broken cinder blocks and exposed plumbing, plus a horrible blood splatter on a surviving section of ceiling and wall near the front entrance to the salon.
“Judge…”
Owen gave him room while swiveling his head to check for witnesses to the TS lapse. “Bro, it isn’t cool you losing your shit like this in the middle of, you know, a crime scene.”
Like Judge didn’t already know. Like he could control it.
The meds, they did work, but sometimes what he saw in this business got the better of him, his inner being, his soul.
Judge launched into it again, a string of spit-laden holy-fucks and shits and things that rhymed with pig testicles then doubled over at the waist like he’d been gut-punched. Maeby pushed into the crook of his neck, to comfort him and to be comforted. The tirade soon petered out. Overhead, next to the bloodied ceiling, a large hole showed through to a clear morning sky where the roof had been blown into pieces, exploding onto surrounding properties.
The reasons for the yellow tape: one, it was a crime scene, and two, what was left of the middle of the store appeared to be unsafe, including the floor. A gas explosion after an IED blast, this was the official ruling by the fire department according to an overnight cable news report. When Judge and team got there after midnight last night they cruised the scene. Well-lit enough then, but seeing it in daylight made a lot more sense, and would be a whole lot safer. They had found a local mom-and-pop motel and crashed until morning.
What they were looking for now was proof that this was Larinda Jordan’s doing, and Maeby’s nose was getting hits all over the place from different bomb-making materials, some on the floor, some on what was left of the walls, some on a tanning bed. They were pretty much past the bomb discovery phase, so Judge gave her leash to Owen. It made them both happy, and it gave Owen something to do.
“Yo. Judge. She likes this spot over here.”
“Good. Thanks. Give her a treat.”
Something Judge had learned when they checked into the motel last night: Maeby liked Owen. She stayed with him in his room while J.D. stayed with Judge. There’d been one challenge with the arrangement: Owen said he talked someone at the bar into coming back to his room, and Maeby didn’t let her in, forcing him and his “date” to consummate their arrangement in the woman’s car.
“Judge. Over here, too,” Owen said.
“Great. Give her another treat.”
After Maeby’s third hit and treat, a wizened Owen said, “Hell, dude, I’m just babysitting her, aren’t I?”
“She likes you, Owen, but yeah, pretty much.”
Judge concentrated on his big guy, newly rejuvenated with a whiff of Ms. Jordan’s tee shirt. J.D. nudged a metal trashcan, upside down in the rubble, small, round, and blast-furnace black with a hint of a pastel green enamel in one section, like it had once been a trendy office cubicle trashcan, or something from a powder room. He pushed at it with his nose until it flipped onto its side. Judge tugged him away from it so he could get a better look. False positive; the can was empty.
They moved through the rubble, not sure how much time they’d have before an authority-type showed up and told them to get the hell out. The Shepherd jerked Judge into an about-face and stuffed his head back inside the same trashcan, pawed at its interior, pulled back out and barked.
“All right, you convinced me.” Judge looked closely again at the bottom of the can. Not any less empty. “Sorry, J.D., I don’t see anything.”
He pawed at the inside wall of the can, his nails removing some of the soot to expose green enamel underneath. He licked at his paw. Judge put a hand inside, scratched with a fingernail at more of the blackened metal. Caked against it were threads from a flimsy fabric. He peeled a small patch of it back, its visible side black, but its underside had thin layers of material soiled a crusty brown, like a gauze pad with dried blood on it. In Ms. Jordan’s apartment they’d found gauze and gauze pads and blood on her bathroom sink.
His dog wanted to eat the evidence. Judge wrenched him away from the trashcan and sat him down, rewarding him with kibble. “Good boy, J.D.”
Two vehicles hopped the curb at the corner, one a cop car, the other an unmarked sedan, no sirens but both were advertising. Screeching tires, slammed doors. As trespassers Judge and Owen hustled back under the yellow tape and tried to nonchalant their way toward their parked van across the street. Judge resisted the urge to whistle while they walked.
“ATF! You two, stop!”
They complied and turned around, with Judge more resigned than nervous, then nervous as hell when he saw the guns. Four drawn firearms, two plainclothes ATF, two uniformed cops. His dog almost left his feet, snapping at the sight of guns and bulletproof vests that weren’t his master’s.
“Stay. Easy, boy…”
Judge reined J.D. in and had him sit, his deputy growling but otherwise behaved. Maeby, also growling, hadn’t left Owen’s side.
“Show me some ID,” one of the ATF agents said, the only black guy.
Judge’s fugitive recovery ID came out first, then his permit to carry, then his driver’s license.
“I have a Glock. In my belt, around back. Nothing else on me.” One of the cops relieved him of his piece and its holster. He shushed his dogs while the agent patted him down, except he couldn’t shush himself.
“…testicle.”
A Tourette’s aftershock. Not much more than a peep, but still too loud. He coughed, gritted his teeth.
“You say something?” the agent said.
“Just quieting my dog,” he said, stroking his deputy’s head.
Another car arrived, screeching to a stop. “That’s FBI,” the ATF agent announced. “This is an ATF crime scene, but they piss off just as easily as we do, gentlemen, so be smart and cooperate.”
Two more men climbed out, both in suits. They assembled alongside their gathering. Owen got more questions than Judge did, produced his driver’s license and was polite, but Maeby stayed wary. They searched Owen, took his flask, but didn’t try to search the dogs. A wise read on their part.
The black agent: “What were you doing in there?”
Judge answered before Owen could say anything. “We’re tracking a bail jumper from Texas. This could be her work.”
“This your van, Mister…” he looked at the ID, “Drury?”
“Yes.”
“We need to look inside.”
Owen’s beer, far as Judge knew, had been fully consumed, but there were a number of empties in there. “Suit yourself.”
His canine deputies needed to relieve themselves. A cop escorted the troupe to a nearby grassy patch while other cops tossed the van. The black agent motioned them back after the search.
“What is in your van scares the shit outta me,” the agent said, “but my FBI friends here say you both check out. You, Mister Drury, apparently know someone in the Bureau. Some advice, gentlemen. In the future you need to consider this yellow tape, all crime scene tape, like it’s a fucking radioactive pest strip. Don’t go near it. Understand?”
“Yes, sir,” Judge said. “We were just leaving, sir.”
“Here’s your gun, Mister Drury.”
Owen spoke up. “How about my flask?”
“You’re lucky it was empty. You guys are both lucky the beer bottles were empty, too,” the agent said. “Quit while you’re ahead, Mister Wingert. Go.”
Judge was feeling benevolent. “You need to check out that office trashcan,” he volunteered to the agent, pointing at it in the debris.
“For what?”
“Just look it over. My dog’s nose says the fugitive we’re tracking left something behind. Something that probably has some DNA on it.”
They’d gotten what they came for, proof she was here, which also proved she was more dangerous than at first thought. The agent’s thank-you for the evidence lead said they scored some points.
On their way back to the van they gave the unmarked FBI vehicle a wide berth. Owen got chatty again, looking to fill in some new blanks. “You know people in the FBI?”
“Geenie’s daughter is an agent. Actually a supervisor. The two of them have this love-hate thing going on between them. Too much alike.”
They ignored that the door to the unmarked car was open, and that the agent inside was scratching his balls while he answered a radio call, but they couldn’t ignore the exchange. “Go ahead, Dispatch.”
A female voice crackled over the FBI radio. “It’s confirmed. Another clinic. Falls Church, Virginia. Five dead. Building is on fire. Stay where you are, gentlemen. Homeland Security and ATF are on it. More info when available. Out.”
Four more hours to D.C. They’d be there by early afternoon. The clinic was across the Potomac from the Capitol; they would pass it on their way.
Same itinerary as Larinda Jordan, except she apparently decided to make it a stop.