Walking on Brimstone by Dan Raburn

Author:Dan Raburn [Raburn, Dan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-08-26T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

The first thing Millie saw was the blood spatter. It was visible above the heads of the cops and other first responders standing behind the crime scene tape, a perfect arc of pink and other wet matter adhering to the gray block wall of the high trap house on the skeet range. The body, which lay near the wall, was already covered with its ghostly sheet, pictures made and evidence collected, by the time they arrived. Two EMTs lounged in the open back doors of an ambulance. They awaited the arrival of the medical examiner, who’d had to be called away from a show at the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville.

Darkness had descended over the shooting range and a distant hardwood clad hillside, but both the high and low trap houses and the half-circle of shooter positions between them were bathed in the white glow of a single stadium light situated between the skeet range and its roadside parking, now half filled with police cruisers and unmarked cars. The range was oddly located on the west side of a country club, but the guns were aimed away from the golf course toward the low-lying hill.

Gip Henry turned to meet them before they reached the tape, tucking his unruly shirt. “Thanks for coming on short notice. Killers are notoriously bad mannered.”

Billy gestured to Millie. “You remember Millie, Gip.”

“I do. Really sorry again, ma’am. I understand you’re sort of a cousin?”

“Yes—I guess that’s close.”

“We can’t locate any other family nearby. Could you confirm the i.d.?”

She looked askance of Billy, and he said, “Make sure it’s him—in case somebody stole his identification. Strange things happen sometimes.” At the tense look on her face, he turned back to Henry. “I can do it, Gip. I met him.”

“Really need someone from the family, Billy. You know how it is.”

“Jesus, Gip—this can’t be pretty.”

Henry raised a hand. “All right—no worries. Later—later at the morgue will do.”

Millie shook her head. “No—don’t drag things out for me. Let’s get it over.”

Billy touched her arm. “Sure, Mill? This has been a tough day already.”

“Yeah, for both of us. Let’s get it over.”

Gip looked uncertain, then nodded and led the way through the onlookers. He ducked under the tape and held it up for them. Then he approached the body and gestured they circle around. “Stand there by his feet. No need to get close in this light.”

Millie waited, her heart in her throat as he slowly pulled back the covering. First she saw the crew-cut, and the skin beneath that was no longer tan but dirty gray. He lay face down as he had fallen, his jaw against the ground and his mouth and eyes open. A single bloody hole marred his skull an inch above the left ear, but a darkening circle around his head foretold an uglier wound on the other side. He wore jeans and a light green polo shirt, and his back and left shoulder were riddled with a half dozen more wounds that had soaked the shirt with blood.

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