The Peake Sisters
Chapter 5: The MurderThe Following Saturday Afternoon
Tom Peake looked up as he heard someone enter his office. "Well hello there, kiddo! You getting ready to take off for another late Saturday afternoon ride with your handsome detective?"
He watched the cycle helmet slowly lift off the head of curly hair, and then tilted his head when he recognized the face and laughed loudly, "Ok, you fooled me! What's with the hair?"
"We need to talk, daddy."
Tom Peake's expression turned solemn, "We'll talk tomorrow when everyone is home. I've tried to do the right thing for all of you. I'll be telling the whole family."
"Is that so?"
"I'm very proud of this store, it's been a real team effort, we've all had a part in its success."
"Ya, keep telling yourself that, daddy."
"Oh come now. I want you to all work together. In fact I'm hoping all my children will consider working here together."
"Oh please, stop it."
Tom Peake watched in disbelief as he saw the gun come out of the motorcycle jacket and get leveled straight at him and heard it fire.
Two hours later Mitch Bernet walked into the motorcycle shop for a meeting to finalize the upcoming scheduled motorcycle classes. He wasn't surprised to find the door unlocked since they had talked earlier about getting together that afternoon. Mitch shouted out Tom's name and when he didn't receive any response climbed the stairs to the store office where he found Tom Peake's body slumped over his desk. He verified his friend was dead then immediately left the office and called the situation into Metro from a phone downstairs.
Starsky and Hutch were returning to Metro planning to wrap up some paperwork and spend the evening with Mercedes and Meredith Peake when the call came over their radio, "Zebra-3, Zebra-3, come in"
"Zebra-3 here. Go ahead."
"Zebra-3, see Lieutenant Mitch Bernet at Peake Motor Sports. Ambulance is already in route to same location."
"Zebra-3 responding. Out." Starsky and Hutch looked at each other; they knew it couldn't be good. Hutch put the Mars light out and flipped on the siren as Starsky made a u-turn and punched the gas.
When they arrived, the ambulance was parked at the main entrance flanked by a couple squad cars, lights flashing. The detective team of Baxter and Gray were also pulling up to the scene as Starsky and Hutch got out of the Torino.
Detective Jane Baxter looked at them with a confused expression, "Is this your call?" She liked and respected this famous detective team, and knew they got their choice of assignments.
"Ah, no Jane, we got a call to met Lieutenant Bernet here that's all." Hutch responded.
Her partner Daniel Gray walked past them giving them a quick look and said, "Come on partner."
She shrugged her shoulders at them and nodded her head in a 'come on' gesture, "You're lucky, he's in a good mood today."
Starsky and Hutch shook their heads, and followed her into the building. Detective Jane Baxter had come a long way in the department. She was assigned with Hutch three years ago when Starsky was in the hospital and had impressed Hutch with her intelligence and keen eye for details. She sometimes still sought out Hutch for his perspective on a case, but that was becoming less and less as her experience and skills continued to grow.
The four detectives huddled around Mitch Bernet and heard his story of finding Tom Peake dead. Gray took out his notepad and motioned to his partner to go up and check out the office. Jane turned and touched Hutch on the elbow, "Like to come along?"
Hutch nodded to Starsky, and then followed Jane up the stairs. Hutch stayed behind her and watched her work. She stayed at the office entrance and methodically surveyed the room and the body still lying across his desk at the far end. She requested the officer taking pictures to get a few specific shots, and after that entered the room going straight to the body. She looked for clues, but didn't see much and finally released the body to the paramedics that were anxiously waiting for the police approval so they could leave.
She turned to Hutch, "See anything that might be helpful?"
He smiled to himself, that's exactly what he did to her when she had been the rookie. "Safe is open, but there's still money lying in plain sight, so robbery probably wasn't the motive. No weapon, so it wasn't self inflicted. No sign of any struggle, probably can speculate he knew who killed him."
She walked to the front of the desk to the two chairs positioned there, "Wounds were point blank, person was probably sitting here or standing close. Would you say this is five or six feet?" She turned around to look at Hutch but her gaze went up to the ceiling, "Well, well, maybe we'll catch a break here."
Hutch followed her gaze to the security camera mounted at the ceiling, it was aimed directly at the desk and safe that sat behind the desk. "Some detective teams get all the luck."
She smiled, she really wanted to impress Hutch, "Well we'll see. With our luck, it'll be turned off, or not connected, or just ran out of tape minutes before the murder."
Hutch chuckled, "Ah, I see you luck runs along the same lines as ours."
Gray and Starsky walked in and did a visual check of the room; years of training made it an automatic reflex. Starsky caught sight of the camera and nodded, "No microphone, but you might have some pictures to tell you a story."
Gray added, "Ya, and if there's one camera, there might be more. Maybe one outside to see what kind of vehicles were here." He then laughed to himself, "Nah, we're never that lucky."
"Was Mitch's statement of any help?" She looked at her partner, "Did you get next of kin, who we need to contact? And maybe an assistance manager so he can come and lock this place up?"
"No, yes, and yes."
She looked at her partner, "And?"
Gray smirked, "Oh, you want the details? No, Mitch's statement wasn't very helpful. As you heard, the body was cold when Mitch arrived and no one else was here. Next of kin is a wife and four adult kids, a daughter, ah…", he flipped open his notebook, "Mercedes Peake would be who we need to contact regarding this place."
"Ok, let's get some addresses and inform the family. God, I hate this part of the job." She hesitated and looked over at Starsky and Hutch, "It goes without saying, since you've been at the crime scene, if you see or hear of anything that might help in this investigation, please pass it along." She then moved behind the desk again next to Starsky and looked at the blood stained carpet, "See something?"
Hutch spoke up, "We can contact Mercedes and Meredith Peake if you'd like us to, we know them and where they live."