Note: See Part 1 for disclaimers.
THE ONLY EASY DAY IS YESTERDAY
"The Journey of Jeremy Keller"
Part 11
Officers Bob Jacobs and Ryan Woods had been back at the
station for about an hour when Berry from the garage came up to see
them. Berry was a short skinny man, very fastidious and neat. He was
like no other mechanic they had ever met, he kept the garages and
vehicles impeccably clean. The man even wore a white lab coat instead
of the industry standard coveralls.
"I wish you guys would tell me when you've been at a crime
scene." He said as he approached them in the hall.
Bob and Ryan exchanged looks "What are you talking about."
"If you had told me about the blood you had tracked into your
cars, I would have been able to get to it when it was fresh, it's a lot easier
to clean that way." Berry had a way of making something that irritated
him greatly sound like it was just part of a normal conversation.
"Blood?" the two officers looked at each other. "We've both done
nothing today but write speeding tickets." Bob said.
"Well," Berry replied "you both found some blood to walk in
some where."
"The only place we were both at today was the Neon Moon."
Ryan said. "and there was nothing going on there, just a few bikers
sitting around."
"Come to think of it." Bob continued as the fog lifted from his
over worked mind. "Fred the bartender was acting really weird, barley
said a word the whole time."
Both men came to the same conclusion at the same time. "Shit!"
Officer Jacobs said as the two headed for the door. "Try to get Fred on
the phone." tell him we're on our way out if you can."
In the early morning mist, Anita Ropper pulled her rental car
over to the side of the road behind several state police vehicles. They
were all parked on the road since the bar's whole parking lot had been
cordoned off. Luckily, this area was the jurisdiction of State police and
not some local good'ole boys.
Several state troopers approached Anita as soon as she got out of
her car and inspected her ID very carefully. When they were satisfied,
they escorted her to the detective in charge.
Anita was lead to the only other woman on the site who greeted
her with a smile. "Agent Ropper, its nice to meet you, I'm Detective
Mary Janoitz. I hear you may be looking for the man who did this?"
After looking over the empty parking lot with its burnt up motor
cycle Anita said "Perhaps, what do we have?"
Janoitz lifted the yellow tape that surrounded the lot and let
Anita under then followed her. "We have a mess, two bodies, two
missing bodies, a witness who is talking non-sense and four other
witnesses that we'll probably never be able to find."
Their first stop was the remains of a motorcycle. A forensics'
team had surrounded the site and was just finishing its search. "What
do you have for me?" Detective Janoitz asked as they approached.
"Well, ma'am," one of the men said. "We do have samples of
blood and tissue on the remains of the seat and bike. I would say
somebody was sitting on this thing when it exploded but we have no
idea where the body is. The explosion would not have been great
enough to throw a man more then ten feet."
"Could a man have survived and been able to walk away?"
Agent Ropper asked.
The man looked at detective Janoitz who nodded permission for
him to answer. "Who ever was sitting on this thing when it blew up was
shredded and burned, very ugly and painful way to die."
The two women then approached the building. In front was a
marked spot next to a pool of dried blood where the first body was
found. Anita was handed Polaroid's of the body. It was stripped and
rolled wearing only a blood soaked T-shirt and filthy brown underwear.
Next to it was a pile of burnt cloth.
"Who moved the body before these pictures were taken?" Anita
asked.
"That's the way we found him."
Anita pointed to the pile of cloth in the picture. "Can I see this?"
Detective Janoitz motioned to an aid who quickly produced a
large clear plastic bag. Agent Ropper put on a pair of latex gloves and
pulled some of the things out. In it was a set of burned and shredded
clothing, including a pair of pants, leather jacket and some kind of shirt.
The stuff smelled of smoke, gas and burnt flesh. Anita dropped the
everything back into the bag without saying a word.
The next stop was the bar. Portable lights had been set up to
highlight the areas of interest, including a pool of blood in the middle of
the room, a marked spot against the far wall where another body had
been found and a large knife imbedded nearly to its hilt in the bar.
"What happened in here?" Antia said trying to take in the scene.
"Best we can tell," Janoitz said "two people must have been
attacked here in the middle of the room then dragged into the back and
left for dead. Apparently one of them survived, because he came back
fighting." Mary then indicated the bar "He impaled someone's hand to
the bar. They would of had to cut the hand all the way through to get
away."
"Why do you think two people were attacked?"
"We followed the trail of blood into the store room where there is
another pool of blood. You can see the marks of blood and foot prints as
someone pulled them selves up and walked back out. There had to have
been two victims because there is no way someone could have lost that
much blood and come back fighting."
The detective then indicated a path around the bar. "He came out
and immediately stabbed the person here at the bar. He then walked into
the middle of the room, where he probably shot the man over there. It
then looks like he walked around the bar several times, even stopping
behind it to eat a burger. We have some very good bloody finger prints
from the store room and the plate the burger was on, we've already
matched them to your Jeremy Keller."
"Did you find anything that may have belonged to Keller?"
Ropper asked
"Besides empty shot gun shells? Well, we did find a blood
soaked shirt that doesn't match any of the wounds of the bodies we have,
it must be from the second victim."
Anita examined the shirt they produced. The blood it was
soaked in had come from a large gash in the back. "Why would he
switch clothes on the other victim?"
"I don't know, perhaps so it wouldn't look like a body."
Anita dropped the bag on a table and said "What if there was one
man attacked here?"
"What?" the surprise in Detective Janoitz's face was forced. Her
two victim theory was obviously devised to explain the impossible.
"If it was just one man who was attacked, it would explain why
there is no body in back, and why he changed clothes." Anita said as she
paced about the room once.
"That's not possible," Janoitz whispered "The wound in that shirt
is fatal, and the blood in here proves it."
Anita frowned "Lieutenant Keller has a knack for walking away
from deadly encounters. That's what makes him so damned hard to
catch. Now you said there was a witness."
"He's down at the station, but nobody's been able to get through
to him."
"Mind if I have a chat with him?"
"Not at all."
to be continued..............