Deceit Chapter 4
Don got out of his black SUV with a grim look on his face as he looked upon what seemed to be yet another gruesome crime scene. The Los Angeles police department met him as he walked over to the victim. " So what do we have?" he said biting his lower lip with a look of sadness overtaking his face.
"Young, white woman, seems to be around late twenties or so. Her wallet is still in her purse but her drivers license was removed," the policeman said as the two walked over to where the victim's body laid.
"So other than these needle marks in her arm, did we find any other traces of violence or a struggle?" the FBI agent asked.
"Actually yes, look at this," he said lifting up the back of the woman's shirt.
Seeing the horrible bruises and lacerations on the woman's back, Don had to look away. "So what do we think, was she tortured before she was killed?"
"Well actually, just based on some preliminary observations by the M.E., we are thinking that these were inflicted after she died, indicating that her body was just dragged a long distance to here." the officer said looking at Don, hoping that he would have some insight.
"Why would someone drag a body out here? To a car that is not ever her own? And I guess without an immediate I.D. we can't even trace if this is her car right away?" Don replied.
"Actually, as a matter of fact, the car belongs to those people up there. They are the ones that found her." the police officer quickly replied, pointing towards an elderly couple talking with Megan and other officers on their porch.
"So this couple has never seen this woman before in their lives?" the agent asked.
"Well, that's what they said, but we'll question them more, see if they maybe saw or heard anything."
"Ok good, yeah I want everyone living around this house to be questioned as well, someone had to have seen or heard something, after all who moves a body in the middle of the day time without anyone seeing anything." the older Eppes said as he saw Megan and Colby walking down the driveway.
"Well, the couple is pretty shaken up and have positively I.D. this car as theirs—I saw the insurance papers." Megan quickly chimed in as she walked towards the agent.
"Yeah and we have already started canvassing the area looking for her drivers license, any evidence we can use." Colby responded.
"Yeah I'm going to want to get a DNA and tox screen on her immediately—and get these new photographs off to my brother as soon as possible for him to enhance them and try to narrow his search for commonalities. Oh and these number combinations, I want him with these in his hands A.S.A.P.; he is going to have to go back and rethink the patterns, and I really don't want another victim on our hands." Don ordered as he began taking his gloves off and heading over to a quieter spot, trying to call Charlie, with a disgusted look on his face.
"Hey Don, wait a second look at this," Megan immediately said upon looking closer at the victims arms and legs. " Look at these rock that are indented into her body, not only was this woman dragged, she was dragged across one hell of a rocky road to get here."
"Yeah your right, nice find Megan, and look over there," Don said indicating a house a ways down the street with a freshly graveled drive way. "Hey, why don't you two take David over there to question, I saw a van parked in front of the house on the way down here, may be worth something to us."
Colby and Megan left to go get David, who was talking to the Medical Examiner, to go question the house Don mentioned, when the lead agent's cell phone began ringing. "Eppes," he said. "Oh hey Charlie, uh huh yeah, I am still here at the scene trying to just make something from basically nothing—yeah we do have the pictures, I'll bring them over to your office on the way back to the office." Don said, trying to indicate which house he wanted Megan, Colby, and David to investigate, talk to his brother, and try to get information from the L.A.P.D. officer, all at the same time. "What Charlie, huh I can't hear you, what, ok fine Charlie I am just going to bring over the pictures alright," and with that Don hastily closed his phone in frustration and ran his hands through his hair, trying to collect his thoughts.
Turning around to see his agents begin knocking on the door of the house, Don noticed that the van parked outside of the home. "You know, that really looks like—oh no it can't be, she's home with the flu." the lead agent said under his breath "Gosh, I know the sleep deprivation is getting to me, with that dent in the car, the model, the color of the car, god that looks just like Emma's car, except with different plates. Nah it can't be, I think I am just worrying too much about her being sick, I am just overly tired that's all," he said, rubbing his tired eyes. After that, the thought that it could be one of his agent's cars just left his mind entirely.
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"Maybe no one is home," Megan said looking to the other agents.
"No, trust me, someone is definitely home, with a car in the driveway, and look the upstairs light it on," Colby responded
"Yeah well what if they just accidentally left the light on Granger?" she responded
"Hang on wait, I hear footsteps," David said, interrupting the two of them.
Just then a woman, who seemed to be in her mid thirties, answered the door, in a bathrobe. "Hello," she asked inquisitively.
"Mam, we are from the Los Angeles FBI, can we ask you a few questions?" David said.
"Yes sure, I thought I heard some commotion going on outside, but it was hard to tell because the shower was running," the woman responded.
"Actually, that is what we are here to talk to you about, have you heard or seen anything strange in the past few days?" Megan asked.
"No, not that I can think of, other than all of the voices of you people this morning, that was the only thing," she said sweetly, trying to readjust her robe.
As the three agents continued to question the woman, they heard a lot of noise going on behind the door. "Shhhhhh", the woman said loudly, trying to keep her sweet and complying nature about her. "Mommy is busy," she yelled back into the house, beginning to raise her voice.
"You have children?" Colby asked, trying to lighten the mood
"Yes, yes I do," she said clearing her throat. "Four actually, and as you can tell, they an be rather roughty." Just then the three agents heard what seemed to be glass breaking. They seemed rather surprised to see the barely clothed woman not do anything about the crash. All of a sudden, Megan saw what seemed to be a man come flying out of the window running very quickly away from the house. Immediately, the three agents took off after the adult, noticing that he seemed to have blood spattered all over him and tar down his pant leg.
"STOP, FBI," They yelled "FBI, stop running!"
At that moment, the man pulled out a gun and began rapidly firing at the three agents, all of whom were not wearing their bulletproof vests. Hearing the blaze of gunshots, Don immediately broke away from speaking with the Medical Examiner and ran over to meet his fleeing agents. "We have shots fired, I repeat shots fired, requesting back up immediately" Don yelled into his phone as he was quickly trying to aid his team.
Megan, Colby, Don and David quickly pulled out their guns to try and fend off the shots hurling at them; however, as all four agents began returning fire, more shots from other locations rang out. "Megan watch out!" Don yelled, seeing multiple shooters in the windows of the home. All of the other people present at the crime scene quickly took cover in the elderly couple's home.
The team tried combating the bullets as fast as the could, but just as they thought they may have taken out one shooter, more appeared, and the others just kept letting off more and more rounds.
While returning fire, Don felt a horrible stinging sensation in his thigh and quickly looked down; letting out a yell of extreme pain and seeing the cold blood begin to trickle onto his jeans. "I've been hit, agent down, agent-" were the only words he could make out before collapsing onto the ground from the shot.
"Don, Don, Don, are you alright?" David yelled out, seeing that the leader was laying on the ground, unresponsive to their questions. "Colby, I think Don's been hit, cover me, I need to go over and keep him from being hit again."
With that in mind, Granger backed up where David had been standing and shot into the windows of the house. He managed to wound one of the shooters, but not before they all had run out of the house towards a car.
As the shooters were frantically running out of the home, the man that seemed to be the leader let off one more round of shots, hitting Don in the chest. "DON!" Megan screamed out as she ran over to help her partner, dodging the bullets that were coming at her from all angles, while all of the men, and the woman in the bathrobe, sped away in the dented van, parked out in front of the house. Despite her best efforts, Megan felt herself be hit in the arm, but kept running towards Don to try and help him.
"Call and ambulance", David said with great anger as he ran over to his boss.
The three agents, now all huddled over Don's badly wounded body all tried elevating his leg and putting their hands on his other wound to stop the bleeding, but it was too late, he had already lost consciousness and stopped responding to their hesitant, but reassuring words. As Megan continued to bleed, she began to loose her will power and let out a large scream of anguish and knelt down, grasping her arm, trying to stop the blood.
"We need a paramedic, NOW!" Colby yelled out with furry, hearing the screams and looking upon the body of the barely breathing agent.