Linda Crowder - Jake and Emma 02 - Main Street Murder Read online

  Still, she didn’t strike him as someone who went through life with her guard up. She was trusting of strangers - strangers like him - and that was going to get her killed. Could he just walk away?

  “Damn,” he swore under his breath, mindful of the ears he assumed were always listening to him. He would warn her. From there, she was on her own.

  Finished with his packing, he went to the kitchen for a beer then started rummaging through the junk drawer. He pulled out a battered notebook and a pen and sat down at the table.

  He wrote quickly, stopping once or twice to drink his beer and stare out at the storm. When he finished, he read over what he had written and nodded to himself. He had done his part. The ball was in her court now.

  He rummaged again until he found an envelope. He folded the letter, put it in the envelope and went to pick up his bag. He would drop it off on his way out of town.

  He was reaching for his keys when he heard a noise. He froze. He listened intently and realized it was the sound of someone at his door, working the lock. “Damn,” he swore again. It was their apartment, of course they would have a key.

  If they were sending someone to make sure he did his job, that person would have knocked at the door, or followed him as he assumed they’d been doing for months. Breaking into his apartment - how had they known he was leaving town? Fear clenched around his heart as he retreated to the bedroom to buy time.

  He scanned the room for a hiding place, not for himself – he knew there was no place he could hide – but for the letter he had crumpled in his hand on hearing the noise. He heard the door open and listened while someone stepped inside and quietly shut the door.

  Frantically, he looked for somewhere he could put the letter where they wouldn’t find it but the police would. His eyes fell on the unmade bed. He shoved the letter into the pillow case and hoped they wouldn’t notice it. Then he cast his eyes around the room for something that would serve as a weapon.

  “Why do I have to be the only man in Wyoming who doesn’t have a gun?” he thought as he heard the bedroom door open.

  The shot made too little noise to attract the attention of what few neighbors lived in the building. A figure bent over the body and felt for a pulse. Satisfied, the figure straightened and stood calmly, surveying the small bedroom, waiting.

  A cell phone chirped and the figure pulled it out and read the text. Moving to the bed, the figure felt inside the pillowcase and pulled out a crumpled envelope, opened it and read the letter inside.

  In the darkness, the figure turned to look at the dead man on the floor and smiled. That had been too close for comfort. The figure looked up into a corner of the room and gave a thumbs up signal in the direction of a very well hidden camera.

  4

  As quickly as it had come, the snow melted. Emma had developed a healthy respect for Wyoming winters. They could be very long and there had been years when she wondered if spring would ever come, but it always did. The May sunshine appeared at last and chased away the remnants of the blizzard, covering Casper Mountain in a haze of green as hopeful grasses poked up from the once-frozen ground.

  Emma loved spring. She found something to love about every season but spring held her heart. Every afternoon she would hurry home from work and wander over the ten acres she shared with Jake searching for new signs of spring. She joyfully counted the crocuses popping up through the last of the snow and cheered when the daffodils and tulips made their appearance in her flowerbeds.

  Spring brought the barn cats out of hibernation and they accompanied Emma on her afternoon treks. Neighbors honked and waved at her, smiling at the wake of cats that trailed behind Emma wherever she went.

  Reaching the far fence line, Emma turned and watched as the cats caught up with her. They trotted along at their own pace, stopping here to poke a head down a mole hole or there to pounce on another cat who’d stopped to investigate a suspicious scent. That would send them off on a wild cat chase followed by a rollicking wrestling match. Afterward both cats would shake themselves and stalk off in different directions.

  Jake never bothered to look for his wife in the house on warm spring afternoons. Tossing his briefcase and keys on the table in the entry, he followed the trail of cats to find her leaning against the fence, staring absently at the view of Casper laid out in the valley below her.

  She turned and smiled at Jake as he joined her at the fence. “Isn’t it amazing?” she asked him. “Last week there was four feet of snow and just like that,” she snapped her fingers, “it’s spring.” Emma tucked herself into her husband’s arms and leaned against him, looking back up toward the house. She sighed, “Life is good.”

  Jake smiled and kissed the top of her head. “That it is,” he agreed. They stood like that for a long while, at peace with each other and the world before them. Then Jake stirred and spoke, “I hear the police have a lead on that murder in Kristy’s building.”

  Emma turned to face him. “Do they know who did it?” Kristy had come into Emma’s office the first morning they’d been able to open after the May Day blizzard. She’d been visibly shaken - unusual for the woman who was normally stoic in the face of a crisis.

  The police had knocked on her door that morning, asking if she’d heard anything the day of the storm from the apartment on the floor below her loft. She hadn’t, she’d told them. They’d shown her a picture of a man and asked if she knew him. Kristy told them she thought he lived in the building but she didn’t know his name.

  He’d been murdered, they’d told her, shot to death at some time during the previous two days. The building manager had found the body during a routine check of the apartments to see if there had been any damage from the storm.

  Emma had commiserated with Kristy and they’d talked about the man. Kristy thought she’d met him once by the mailboxes and she remembered once or twice seeing him after that but she couldn’t remember what they’d talked about. “Small talk,” she’d told Emma. “Nothing at all really.”

  Kristy had sighed and Emma had nodded. You just don’t think about something like this happening here in Casper. Emma had her own unwelcome brush with murder and those killings had stunned the town. Murder was the exception, not the rule, in Casper Wyoming.

  At least, Emma would like to think so. She didn’t like the idea of murder striking so close to home again. She looked up at Jake, who shook his head. “They aren’t any closer that I know of to finding out who the killer is.”

  “What lead do they have then?” asked Emma.

  “The victim’s employer received a letter that the victim had apparently mailed right before the storm hit. He was leaving town due to a family emergency and wanted to let his boss know he was grateful for the opportunity he’d given him when he first came to Casper.”

  “How did you hear about it?” Emma asked him. Jake explained that he’d known the man for years. They’d met for lunch that day and his old friend had been visibly upset.

  “He’s an ex-con himself who found it tough sledding once he got out to get anyone to give him a job so he started his own auto repair shop. Now he gives other guys getting out of prison a chance to have a good job at a fair wage. They work for him for a few years, learn the trade and build up a solid work record, then when they’re ready to move on, he helps them find a job back home.”

  “Then the victim had a record?” asked Emma.

  Jake nodded. “In another state. He got permission from his parole officer to come to Wyoming when he got the job offer.”

  “How did he know about your friend - what’s his name?”

  “Luke Camaretti,” answered Jake. Emma nodded, recognizing the name. Jake took their cars to his shop when they needed work. “Luke got a call from a guy who worked for him a few years ago, recommending Vince Shipton - that’s the victim’s name, by the way. A lot of the guys Luke’s helped over the years come word of mouth. Luke spoke to Vince on the phone, then to Vince’s parole officer and told him he’d give Vince a job if
they transferred his case out here.”

  “Wouldn’t he be violating parole by quitting the job and leaving town like that?” asked Emma.

  “Absolutely,” answered Jake. “Which is why Luke called the guy who recommended Vince to him. The crazy thing is, when he finally got hold of the guy’s girlfriend, she told Luke he’d been dead for more than a year. There’s no way he could have made that call.”

  Emma’s eyes widened. “Then who did call Luke to get him to hire Vince?”

  “And why?” Jake added. “Those are the million dollar questions all right. The police will try to track the caller down using Luke’s phone records but I’d be willing to bet the call came from a prepaid cell phone that no longer exists.”

  Emma shuddered. “I don’t like to think about something like this happening in Kristy’s building.”

  “I can’t imagine she’s in any danger,” Jake assured her. “It’s just coincidence he lived in the same building. She didn’t know Vince, did she?”

  “No,” Emma shook her head. “She remembers meeting him but couldn’t even remember his name.” Emma turned to break up a cat fight that had gotten a bit too loud. She turned back to Jake, “I’m glad it doesn’t have anything to do with Kristy.”

  Kristy stood with her legs shoulder width apart, knees gently bent, her right leg slightly in front of her left. Her arms were held straight in front of her, her right hand cradling her pistol and resting on her left hand to steady her aim. She closed her left eye and drew a bead through the rear site, lining her aim up carefully with the front site.

  She took a shallow breath, unconsciously holding it while she fired. Her arms rocked back with the recoil and she quickly steadied herself and fired, repeating the motion until she had emptied the ten round clip into the target.

  Pleased, she pulled off her protective glasses and pink camouflage ear protectors and pushed the button that brought the target gliding toward her on a smooth track, suspended to hang at eye level. She closely examined the marks on her target, noting that her aim had improved considerably since she’d started coming to the Casper Hunt Club Shooting Range.

  She smiled. Emma had recommended the range after she had taken shooting lessons in order to surprise Jake with her marksmanship. Those lessons had saved both their lives, inspiring Kristy to brush up on her own shooting.

  She carried her pistol for protection but other than a quick “how to” from the gun dealer, she hadn’t really given it much thought. She had never expected to use it, but keeping it with her gave her peace of mind. With a murder just one floor away, Kristy had decided it was time to put some effort into becoming a good shot.

  She took the paper target from the track and tucked it into her bag. She was a methodical person and liked to keep track of her progress. She gathered her pistol and equipment and moved out of the range area to a workbench in the next room. Here she took the pistol apart, cleaned it and reassembled it.

  “You’re starting to look like you might know what you’re doing with that gun, Miss Castle.” Kristy smiled and greeted George Walker, volunteer manager of the range, who had taught Kristy most of what she knew about firing and maintaining her weapon. He was a retired Army sergeant, who now spent his time teaching hunter safety when he wasn’t drinking beer and trading stories down at the Legion Hall.

  “Thank you, G.W.” replied Kristy, smiling up at him. “You were right, you know. It really is more fun to shoot when you hit the target once in awhile.”

  The older man laughed. Kristy liked the sound of G.W.‘s laughter. Not one of those polite “ha ha ha” laughs that never seemed to reach the eyes, his was full and loud and sounded like it came all the way from his toes. He reminded Kristy of her grandfather and he in turn thought of her as one of his own children.

  “I read in the paper about that guy getting shot over there by you,” he said. “I figured you’d be in after that.”

  Kristy shook her head sadly, “It’s a sad thing coming when you can’t even be safe in Casper anymore.”

  G.W. leaned an arm on the workbench and looked down at Kristy. “Hell, you can get yourself shot anywhere, Kristy. Some people just seem to find trouble wherever they are.”

  Kristy nodded, “Or trouble finds them.”

  Cheri Jackson was not looking forward to the day ahead of her. She’d moved to Casper with her husband Joe more than 20 years ago. He’d been in the oil business and she found a job as a teller in a local bank to counter the loneliness of the “week on, week off” oil field schedule.

  She was a hard worker, quick but accurate, friendly but professional with the customers. Over the years she’d worked her way through the ranks, completing her business degree in the evening with the help of the bank’s tuition reimbursement benefit. Five years ago, she’d been promoted Vice President of Operations. She and Joe had celebrated with dinner out but the celebration had turned tragic when their car was hit by a drunk driver on the way home.

  After Joe’s death, Cheri found solace in her work and in the home they’d built along the shore of the North Platte River. Most days, she spent her time resolving logistical and personnel issues that arose naturally from overseeing operations at six branches scattered across four Wyoming counties.

  Today she had to perform her least favorite task, letting go of an employee whose performance had not risen to bank standards. Cheri opened the folder on her desk and carefully reviewed the personnel file. She cross-checked the steps that had been taken to improve the employee’s performance against the bank’s polices manual.

  From verbal coaching to performance improvement plan to written warning, the supervisor had documented every effort to work with an increasingly truculent employee. Cheri had met with both the supervisor and the employee twice, once when the warning was issued and later, when she had placed the employee on probation. Both encounters had been unpleasant for all concerned.

  Cheri had supervised staff in some capacity for nearly ten years and she was still saddened and surprised when a troubled employee was either not willing or not able to turn things around. She’d earned a reputation within the bank of being tough but fair because while she gave employees every opportunity to excel, she did not hesitate to act when problems arose.

  One bad apple spoils the bunch, she reminded herself and it was certainly true in managing people. Turn a blind eye to a problem employee because you hate confrontation or feel sorry for the person and you can ruin an entire team’s performance and morale. Cheri never lost sight of the pain it would cause the employee to be let go, but she believed that pain to be ultimately self-inflicted.

  There was a light knock on her door as Cheri’s assistant opened it to show in both the supervisor and the employee in question. Cheri rose to shake hands with each and her assistant quietly withdrew from the room, shutting the door behind her.

  5

  Spring warmed into summer and thoughts of murder faded from the public mind. The citizens of Casper were gearing up to host the Summer Solstice Rodeo, a Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association sanctioned event that drew barrel racers, bareback riders and bull riders from across the country.

  Cheyenne, the state capitol, claimed top rodeo honors with Frontier Days. Founded in 1897, this “Daddy of them All” event was part of the national rodeo tour, dwarfing other Wyoming rodeos. Casper’s Summer Solstice Rodeo couldn’t compete on so grand a scale but the community was justifiably proud of the event.

  Most Wyoming towns, certainly of any size at all, hosted some sort of rodeo event. Even tiny Shoshoni, on the shores of Boysen Reservoir, boasted a pint-sized rodeo ring. Rodeo was the marquee sport at several of Wyoming’s high schools and community colleges.

  Emma had never been to a rodeo before moving to Wyoming, but it was so much a part of the fabric of the community that she had looked forward with excitement to her first Summer Solstice event. Barrel riding, a women’s event where horse and rider work in perfect harmony to complete a complex circuit of barrels within the
arena in the shortest time possible, was Emma’s favorite event.

  Kicking off the four day rodeo was a community parade. During her first year in Casper, Emma had been surprised that most businesses closed on “parade day” to give their employees a chance to share the event with their families. Now she was always a little surprised that there was anyone left sharing the sidewalk with her as a parade spectator because it seemed like everyone was in it.

  Bands from the high school and both middle schools played Sousa marches, the city’s oldest World War II veteran rode in a convertible amidst the American Legion marchers who proudly saluted the uniformed military in the crowd. Even the Tiny Tots Tumblers showed off newly-mastered summersaults on their float, padded with brightly colored mats.

  It was a celebration of all things summer in small town America, thought Emma, though the people of Casper would have bridled to hear her categorize them as “small town” since Casper was the second largest city in Wyoming. People drove hundreds of miles to “the big city” to shop in Casper’s big box stores and eat in her national chain restaurants. Locals knew the best sites were often outside the chains.

  With Wyoming having the smallest population in the country, Emma often heard people joke that there were more cows than people in Wyoming. At least, she’d thought they were joking until Jake told her there were actually almost three times as many cattle in Wyoming as there were people. Cattle and sheep ranching, while no longer as dominant as energy and tourism, were still an important part of the Wyoming economy.

  Emma grew up in California, where she could drive for hours without ever leaving a metropolitan area. There were more people in her home town than in all of Wyoming and her high school graduating class than in 46 of the smallest Wyoming towns. She’d taken many drives around the state since moving to Wyoming and was always struck by the wide open spaces.