Drained (Edgars Family #6) - Suzanne Ferrell Page 0,114
it.
“You can’t,” Aaron said grabbing her hand gently to prevent her from touching the instrument. “I know you want the connection with your friend, but we have to preserve any prints he may have left on it.”
She nodded, fighting back both the anger welling inside and the tears that threatened.
Next, Carson pulled out an opaque plastic tub. He lifted the lid and inside were Art’s war medals and a ring.
“Is that Art’s ring?” Brianna asked.
Carson held it up and read the markings. “I don’t think so. It’s a school ring from a medical school.”
“Shit,” Aaron said as he dialed a number on his phone. “Ramos, you got an extra tech free over there? Yeah, I need someone to bag and process what we’ve found over here. As quick as you can spare them. We have to be back at the precinct in thirty. Tell Jaylon I think our next victim has already been taken and it’s a doctor.”
It was creepy dark out here.
The streetlights at each end of the block flickered dimly. The alley completely unlit.
Kirk sat in the Caddy parked across the street from the old meat packing plant. According to what he’d found, the place had been sold when the owners moved the business to the stockyards section of Cleveland in the early nineteen-hundreds. Then a local market occupied the space for a while until the Depression hit in the nineteen-thirties. A few other businesses were in and out of it until the sixties hit and people moved out of the area. It lay abandoned for decades afterward. About three years ago, Armbruster purchased it.
The windows in the place were either boarded up with plywood or blacked out with paint. The fence was old, rusted mesh steel and the landscaping looked like something out of a jungle movie not House Beautiful, that’s for sure. Everything about the place screamed “KEEP OUT!”
So, why the hell was he sitting here actually contemplating checking the place out closer?
Because he wanted to help, to do something to bring this guy hunting his fellow Clevelanders to justice. Because he wanted Paula and Stanley to be safe. Because he really wanted to be sure this was the guy’s killing spot before sending Aaron and his team storming in here. Yeah, he didn’t want to be wrong.
Don’t be a wimp. Get it done and get out.
Opening the Caddy’s door, he stepped out, pushed the lock button and closed it as quietly as he could. Standing perfectly still beside it, he listened. Didn’t hear anything resembling a chainsaw, so that had to be good. No eerie music. Only the sound of distant traffic and the blare of freight train horns.
He inhaled and exhaled. Repeated.
Okay, he’d seen enough horror movies to know he was about to do something too stupid to live, but he had a few things going for him. He wasn’t a blonde girl. He didn’t plan to actually go inside the place. And he’d keep his phone with him in case he needed to call for help.
With a quick glance up both sides of the street, he dashed across the pothole-littered street and down the darker alley beside the fenced in property, further from the street and any passing traffic. No need in getting arrested by the police when he was trying to help them.
He jiggled the fence. Pretty sturdy.
Okay, he was going to have to hop it.
Hands on the pipe at the top of the mesh he paused again to listen. This time for anything that sounded like a guard dog.
Nothing.
Taking a few steps back, he took a running hop and used the top of the fence to help him up and over, just like high jumping on the track team back in school. He landed softly, with bent knees on the other side. He remained squatting, calming his heartbeat and listening.
No barking dog with huge teeth headed his way.
No crazed man wielding a weapon.
Slowly, he stood. He rubbed his sweaty palms on his jeans, then jogged across the small yard to the side of the brick building. His back pressed against the wall, he glanced to his left, then to his right. Nothing moved.
Okay. That’s good. He’d made it here without anyone seeing him. Time to see what he could inside.
Slowly, with his back still pressed against the bricks, he moved past one boarded up window, then a second. His target was the window painted black. Maybe there would be a sliver of space to peer inside.