I'll Protect You (Clueless Resolutions Book 1) Page 5

  “Rough night?” was Maggie’s greeting to Max as he walked to the entrance of the house.

  “I’ve had worse” Max quipped as they exchanged understanding glances. Then it was down–to-business time.

  Max reviewed the interior of the property and went outside to take measurements, pictures and make notes pertaining to conformance with zoning codes.

  “What’s next on the list? Max asked Maggie when it was time to move on.

  “We have a small, three-unit commercial strip in the center of the village on 312 Oak Street. Two units are rented with solid leases and there is one office-style vacancy.

  “Francine had it listed but she doesn’t have the commercial property connections to move the property fast enough. It should have sold, but the owner is in some type of financial bind and ran out of time. The lender has filed for foreclosure”. Maggie summarized.

  “If you can get us in and out before lunch, I’ll buy”. Max offered to Maggie.

  “You’re on, I’ll meet you there” she replied.

  Maggie showed Max through the two occupied units of the small strip type retail/office property and, as they were at the entrance to the vacant, third unit she stopped and turned.

  “I am really getting hungry. How are we doing for time?” she asked.

  Max, taking the bait, quipped; “If we keep on moving at this brisk pace we can have one of those nice, extended lunches.” Smiling, Maggie unlocked the front entrance to the vacant office unit and pushed it open.

  “After you” said Max playfully, as he followed her into the dim interior.

  Max noticed a single-pole coat rack with an overcoat hanging on one hook and a tweed cap perched on top. Maggie had passed by it without paying attention. With Maggie’s back to him, Max quietly laid the coat rack down on the floor and asked, “Is there a light switch here?”

  As Maggie turned toward him with a quizzical look, Max, with perfect timing, jumped back while pointing to the object on the floor and yelled “Holy Shit!”

  “Jesus!” Maggie gasped, as she backed away from what she thought, for a moment, was another dead body.

  Max broke out with a cackling laugh as he watched Maggie try to process her gullible naiveté at the obvious prank.

  “You bastard!” she blurted, “That’s nothing to screw with, you ass! My heart just jumped almost out of my throat!” Max stifled his laughter as best he could, and reached out to give Maggie a reassuring hug.

  “Sorry, Mag, I thought that, with all the tension we’ve been dealing with lately, a little comic relief is what we needed,” he said.

  Maggie relaxed, returned his hug and said quietly, “You’ve got that right Max.” After a short pause, she continued with pretended coyness, “Let’s wrap this inspection up and grab that lunch you promised me.”

  At this point, there was a mutual urge, which they knew they both felt, to blow off the afternoon appointment and head out of town, for a private, romantic, light supper, four “nips” of good vodka (2 double martinis each), one half pint of dry vermouth… and a one-night suite.

  Instead, being the responsible business operatives that they were, Maggie and Max had individually decided to suppress any madcap compulsions, dutifully stick to business, have a local lunch at Jerry’s Pub and complete the afternoon inspection appointment, as scheduled.

  During the lunch at Jerry’s, the “Terrific Twosome” quietly exchanged ideas about how to proceed with their business lives in the community, in view of the mysterious, unexplained, recent dead body discoveries and how the rather clandestine personal involvement they had self-induced complicated matters.

  Max was prone to continuing things as they were, while trying to deduce, on their own, how their business involvement coincided with the gruesome crimes.

  Maggie, with her straight forward and no-nonsense personality that Max was so attracted to, favored ‘getting things out in the open’. The two viewpoints, Max with his analytic, scientific approach to problems, and Maggie with her overt, instinctively confident, roll-the-dice tendencies, both resulted in the decision to meet with Chief Lou Devaro. They both trusted that he would be fair and forthright and they wanted to get his personal input on the situation.

  They would, no doubt, be in for a lecture from “Police Chief Lou” on giving up any information that they might have and on assisting the police in the handling of the law enforcement. However they felt that, Lou, the friend, would give them perceptive personal advice on this matter.

  Chapter 11

  On Wednesday morning in late May Detective Salvadore had received a preliminary finding on the cause of death of the second corpse from the medical examiner’s office. He was not all that surprised that the result was almost a carbon copy of the last report, ‘Death due to blunt force trauma causing a ruptured larynx and a collapsed right side carotid artery and a bruised jugular, within 12 to 24 hours prior to discovery, causing loss of air to the lungs and/or loss of oxygen to the brain.’ The time of death was estimated.

  He had instinctively phoned the examiner’s office, as a trained detective, to make certain that they hadn’t mistakenly duplicated the notification from the first sudden death from a few weeks earlier.

  With a cool tone in her voice, the assistant medical examiner informed him that their system, designed with built-in redundancy, insured that an error on this type of report would be caught and corrected before it was dispatched. The report was “accurate, and specific to the present case.” according to her.

  The thinly disguised professional insult to Salvadore, for questioning the competency of the medical examiner, was lost on him. He was accustomed to insults and he had never investigated a killing before this. He had been studying some criminal justice text books for accepted police procedures. Besides that, he was only covering his ass prior to passing the information on to the chief.

  Salvadore still resented the condescending lecture he had received from his boss and he was jacked up over an opportunity to show the chief, who he knew was politically appointed and had probably handled few homicides, just who was the better detective.

  Lieutenant Salvadore had been on the crime scenes of both deaths and had an ‘ace up his sleeve.’ The ‘ace’ was a detected clue that he knew would sound a little weird and, as a result, he had kept it stifled.

  Fingerprint scanning and DNA sampling had been completed at the scene in both cases but there was no one on record locally with which to run a match.

  Working on his strong hunch, Salvadore had investigated the whereabouts of both Max Hargrove and Maggie Marshall during the time of the deaths. Hargrove was registered at an out of town hotel, attending a two day seminar and obviously was not involved in the second one. However, his cohort, Maggie, was unaccounted for during that time. He had no other suspects.

  In detective books which he had read and in detective movies he had seen, the instinctive hunch of a detective, in the absence of real concrete evidence, had been what sometimes solved cases against the craftiest perpetrators. Now was the time, Carpe Deum, he thought, Seize the day! Go to the chief and ask for an arrest warrant or a ‘Detained for Formal Questioning’ order on Margaret, “Maggie” Marshall.

  Salvadore was prepared to state his case unequivocally as he strode to the chief’s office. The headquarters secretary stopped the Lieutenant to inform him that Chief Devaro was out on personal business and would be back late. “That’s just fucking great! Fine, I’ll catch him early tomorrow, right after roll call.” Salvadore rationalized silently.

  “Thanks, no big deal, I’ll catch him another time.” he said to the attractive secretary with a deceptively cheery tone.

  At that very moment, Chief Devaro was sitting down for a talk with Maggie and Max, at their request, in a seldom used mezzanine conference room located upstairs above the tennis club lounge.

  “I know you have a full plate right now, Lou. Maggie and I appreciate your making time for us.” Max stated somberly.

  “For you two, an
y time!” the chief said with a laugh. Then, with an abrupt change in tone and a slight scowl, he continued; “But this had better be really important.”

  “It’s really important to us. We have something to tell you and we need your advice”. Maggie said, getting right to the point.

  The chief eased up and said, teasingly; “Miss Maggie, you’ve got to come out of your shell and speak right up.”

  “Yeah, right” she replied, “Speaking up has gotten me into a few jams, Lou, but in this case we think it might be appropriate.”

  For approximately fifteen minutes, Maggie and Max took turns at laying out their business and private life histories in the East Wayford community. They summarized how they began to work almost exclusively with each other and how their compatibility in business had proved to work smoothly, to the benefit of their employers, their clients, and to themselves.

  Max decided, although he and Maggie had not discussed it, to bring up one other point.

  “Lou,” he began, “What has occurred to us is that both of the deaths were at locations at which Maggie and I did property inspections. Both properties were being handled by Stanley Realty, Maggie’s employer, and both were going up for auction by Jenson & Associates auction house, my employer. This might be a coincidence, but we are a little nervous about that getting around.”

  Lou thought that the effort to conceal the personal relationship was a bit over emphasized, but he, admittedly, had very little experience with the ethics involved with their type of work. He did, however, understand how important public trust was in politics and in his police profession wherein fraternization with the general public was always a tricky line to walk.

  He lectured them on how, during a probable criminal investigation, knowledge of a discussion such as the one they were having this day could eventually jeopardize the prosecution of the case against the guilty party, or parties.

  As Max and Maggie had anticipated, the chief urged them to tell him everything they knew about the mysterious deaths. They were surprised, however, that he wanted them to include their instinctive thoughts on any curious or unusual actions they had noticed, by anyone involved, even though they could not be proven. Basically he asked about any hunches they might have regarding the cases.

  Max mentioned the incident about Maggie being followed and the chief noted on his pad the plate number and description of the car that Max had spotted and a description of the young looking driver. Max also explained his puzzlement over his boss Carl’s odd reaction to the news of the first death.

  Maggie mentioned how the new trainee at Francine Stanley’s office didn’t seem to fit the image of the typical real estate salesperson and how both Maggie and Max thought it was strange how she had moved in with Bruce Grover, of all people, and had subsequently moved out. They added, however, that Bruce always acted somewhat odd.

  Detective Salvadore’s pestering method of questioning also came up during the conversation, but Max suggested that the detective’s suspicions could have been sparked by his detecting some hesitation in Max’s and/or Maggie’s answering of his questions. This would have been with questions that got close to the secretive, intimate connection that he and Maggie had tried to keep from becoming common knowledge in the community.

  Lou Devaro had listened to them, lectured them, and listened further. He had made notes of certain aspects of the conversation. He sat quietly for a long moment and then he spoke, slowly and deliberately, although not loudly.

  “I appreciate you both spilling this out, you did the right thing. Your guarded reaction to police questions can raise suspicion in a case such as this. Nothing we discussed today will go any further from me, and I want assurance from both of you that you will do the same. Give me some time to reflect on this and we’ll talk again.”

  Both Max and Maggie agreed and, somewhat relieved, left the chief looking intently at his notes.

  Chapter 12

  In the last full week in May, Thursday had dawned with a glowing, orange-red sky and a gentle easterly breeze. Under these conditions, the old time whaling men sailing out of Connecticut ports would have been keeping a wary eye on the New England weather, hence the old adage; “Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning.” The inevitable result would be heavy winds and rain, not the best of conditions when out sailing on the open seas.

  Here in modern day East Wayford however, the warning signs would be more applicable to the local policemen going out on the streets into a ‘media storm’ which was brewing.

  Both the early news broadcasts and the morning newspaper had come alive with multiple articles and items recounting individuals and groups, among the local citizenry, who were voicing concern over the two recent mysterious and unsolved deaths.

  Headlines such as; “Many questions – Few answers” summarized the general theme of the escalating outrage in this normally placid community.

  The morning TV news broadcast showed reporters from one local station and one from a national network-affiliate station videotaping commentaries. The reporters were standing outside in front of the police headquarters, using the 1950s style, yellow-brick building as a backdrop. Word had been circulating within the gathering media huddle that a statement would be forthcoming, around noon time, with an update concerning the progress of the investigation of the two local killings.

  Inside the headquarters, at the morning roll call, a gruff-looking Chief Devaro was standing by, while his top sergeant was covering the usual road construction activity and assigning traffic and patrol duties. When finished, Detective Salvadore detailed what to look for concerning what he felt would help his homicide investigation.

  The headquarters secretary approached the chief and handed him a note from Eugene VanDyke, Mayor of East Wayford. The note suggested that, due to the restlessness and rising concern over the investigation results, the chief should schedule a news conference for the noontime news broadcasts.

  When Salvadore finished, a red faced Lou Devaro spoke to the assembled force.

  “We’re getting pressure over the homicide investigation. As can be expected, the public is getting stirred up and looking for answers. I don’t want anyone in the department making any statements outside of this room, to the press, or to anyone else about these cases while an investigation is underway. If approached, defer all questions to Detective Lieutenant Joseph Salvadore, the officer in charge of homicide investigations.”

  A murmuring could be heard among the squad. The chief glared at the group and, after a two second pause, he barked;

  “Are there any questions…or am I making myself perfectly clear?” After a moment of silence he dismissed the squad.

  It was obvious that Chief Devaro was losing his patience. He had not been sleeping well of late, partly due to the onslaught of arthritis and partly from the nagging murder cases. He realized that Salvadore was in over his head with his first homicide investigation and that he might have to request assistance from the State Police DCI, the Division of Criminal Investigations.

  As Detective Salvadore drove out of the station parking lot a TV news truck was pulled up across the street where a small crowd of people were being interviewed.

  A female reporter, not part of that scene, stood on the sidewalk, close enough to the emerging police car that she had to jump back animatedly, in order to avoid having her toes run over.

  Salvadore stopped and lowered the driver side window to ask if she was okay.

  “Oh, I’m fine, aren’t you Lieutenant Salvadore?” she asked, raising a microphone to the open window.

  As a cameraman walked out from behind her with the lens trained on the scene, Salvadore realized that he had been ambushed, but he was flattered that this comely young newsperson, whom he had never met, recognized him.

  “Yes I am, I’m Detective Lieutenant Joseph Salvadore. I’m in charge of investigating the recent murders here in East Wayford” he blurted out callously.

  The reporter looked and acted as though she was just s
tarting out in the news business. She was actually a seasoned, freelance paparazzi-style reporter, an expert at eliciting unwise statements. These recorded ‘gotcha moments’ would then go up for sale as TV sound bites.

  Salvadore, the perfect, unsuspecting patsy, came across as being not concerned with the victims, or any of the family, or any close associates they might have had, and he seemed to have complete disregard for the growing concern in the community over the deaths.

  The “cub” reporter knew that she had Salvadore in the palm of her hand as she pressed him for details on the investigation.

  Acting as though he was her big brother, helping her through this assignment to interview a tough, veteran cop about something in which she was totally naïve, Salvadore answered her questions in elementary school level language. He didn’t think that he had jeopardized the investigation though, or the public perception of it, and he finished by saying;

  “I have to get to my detective work now. He was videotaped driving off into a beginning light rain, looking very important.

  Chief Devaro left later that morning in one of the standard patrol cars, which was driven by a retired reserve officer so that he could avoid the press people hanging around the headquarters front entrance. It was raining now and the media crowd was thinning.

  The chief was dropped off at a three-story Main Street brick structure, a former retail building which had been converted to two levels of apartments over a first floor law office. The gold lettered sign on the front window read; Eugene D. VanDyke, Esquire.

  As chairman of the Town Council, VanDyke was officially the top public safety officer for the town. He was technically Lou Devaro’s boss, although he had applied a hands-off approach with the chief, whom he liked and respected

  Gene greeted the chief, whom he had known for a long time, with a vigorous handshake.

  Mayor VanDyke was a stocky man in his late fifties, standing about five feet, six inches in height, with thinning, yellow-blond hair and a ruddy complexion. He liked to call himself a “Down East Swamp Yankee, relating to his south-eastern Massachusetts roots and he had a distinct accent typical of that locale.