Shamed (Kate Burkholder #11) - Linda Castillo Page 0,77
Explorer, and pick up my radio mic. “Skid, what’s your twenty?”
“Township Road 14. Went around the block. I got nothing.”
“Looks like someone shot through the front window. Drive around to the back of the property. You see anyone, make the stop. I got the front.”
“Roger that.”
I zip down the lane, too fast, eyes left and right, and head east on the county road. Amish country is dark as sin at night. No porch lights or streetlamps. Just acres of fields separated by greenbelts thick with trees and the occasional stream.
The woods across the road are an ocean of impenetrable blackness. I stop in front of the Helmuth farmhouse, which puts me a hundred yards away, and I get out. Around me, the night is dead quiet. No movement. No hiss of tires or rumble of an engine. The only sounds come from the sigh of the wind through the trees and a dog barking somewhere in the distance. All the while I’m keenly aware that there’s likely someone nearby with a rifle, intent on doing harm.
My replacement .38 presses reassuringly against my hip as I look toward the house and the window through which the bullet passed. I think about the angle to the kitchen. If the projectile went into the refrigerator, the shooter likely stood exactly where I’m standing now or else just beyond in the woods.
I turn, scan the darkened forest on the other side of the fence. The vague outline of the Schattenbaum farm down the road. I speak into my lapel mike. “County?”
“I’m ten-sixty,” comes a male voice—the sheriff’s deputy, meaning he’s in the vicinity.
“Can you ten-eight-five?” I say, asking him to look for an abandoned vehicle.
“Copy that.”
Tugging out my Maglite, I shine the beam on the gravel shoulder, looking for tire tracks, footprints, or spent casings, but there’s nothing there. I cross the road, check the other side, but the gravel is undisturbed. The shooter could have parked right here, turned off his headlights, and fired from inside his vehicle.
Turning off my Maglite, I cross through the ditch and climb the tumbling-down wire fence. Chances are, the shooter made the shot and fled in a vehicle. But the woods would be an advantageous position. He would have a clear view of the house, close enough to make the shot, and yet be hidden within the cover of the trees—where he wouldn’t have to worry about being spotted by Skid.
That’s when it occurs to me he could have parked on the county road south of here and walked through these woods unseen. After taking the shot, he could have run back through the woods and reached his vehicle in two minutes.
Darkness closes around me when I enter the woods. There’s just enough light filtering through the clouds for me to avoid a collision with a tree trunk or low branch. The trees are bare, but tall and tightly packed. I do my best to tread quietly, but leaves crunch beneath my boots. Fifty feet in, I stop, listening. I can just make out the silhouette of the Helmuth farmhouse behind me. It would take a good marksman to make the shot from this distance, but I’ve no doubt it could be done.
I’m reaching for my shoulder mike to hail Skid when something rustles in the leaves. I see movement twenty yards ahead. I freeze, squint into the darkness. I can just make out the silhouette of a man. He’s stone still, looking at me. I don’t see a weapon, but that doesn’t mean he’s not armed. For an interminable second, we stare at each other.
“Police! Get your hands up!” Sliding my .38 from its holster, I start toward him. “Do not move! Get your hands up now! Slowly. Get them up.”
The man spins and runs.
I hit my lapel mike, give the code for suspicious person. “Ten-seven-eight.” Need assistance.
“Stop! Halt! Police!” I sprint after him, dodging trees, plowing through bushes and saplings. All the while I shout into my lapel mike. “Ten-eighty! Subject is on foot! Southbound, approaching County Road 79. Male. Dark coat.”
I’m no slouch when it comes to running, but the man is faster and putting space between us at an astounding rate. I skirt a brush pile. Brambles claw at my coat and trousers. Branches whip my face. I fling myself over a fallen log, splash through a shallow creek. I’m thirty yards from the road when I see the flash of a dome light.