Killing by Blake Pierce

Author:Blake Pierce [Pierce, Blake]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Unknown
Published: 2020-07-23T18:30:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

As she followed her partner and the local lawmen out the door, Riley was thinking about what she’d just promised Johnson.

“I’ll do as I’m told.”

She intended to keep that promise … if she could.

She realized that, like her, he was intent on using the skills that he knew best. That’s what had worked for both of them in the past. But what if she got worried that Johnson’s methods were putting more lives at stake? What if his plodding techniques seemed to be missing the most important clues?

Riley hoped they wouldn’t butt heads again, but she couldn’t help feeling that the case mattered much more than getting along with a partner.

Outside the station, she was glad to see that the clunker car she had borrowed was still parked where she had left it. Fingering the keys in her pocket, she wondered if she might need that little hatchback again soon.

For now, she climbed into Dawes’s vehicle along with her three colleagues. As they pulled away from the station, Chief Berry told them all about the phone call he’d just gotten from a hysterical woman who’d found her neighbor dead in her basement. Electrocuted, the caller had told him between her gasps and sobs.

“The victim’s name was Stacey Pugh,” Berry added. “That’s all I know just yet. I called some of my people out on patrol, told them to get straight over to the crime scene. They’ll be there ahead of us.”

“We’ll find out more shortly,” Johnson said, sounding as though he was recovering from his momentary lapse in self-confidence.

They soon reached a sleepy-looking working-class neighborhood, where the flashing lights of police vehicles came into view. A couple of patrol cars were parked in the driveway of a modest, ranch-style house. As Berry parked his vehicle, Riley could see that the small police team was already efficiently at work, warding curious and gawking neighbors away and putting up police tape to isolate the area. The streetlights shed some illumination on the outdoor scene, but there didn’t seem to be any lights on inside the house.

“The house is still dark,” Berry commented. “The woman who called said she came over because she saw her neighbor’s lights go out.”

As they got out of the car, Riley and her colleagues readied their flashlights. They walked past two figures sitting on the front steps, a female cop and a distraught-looking woman in curlers, slippers, and a bathrobe.

Riley guessed that the woman was the hysterical neighbor who had called Chief Berry about Stacey Pugh’s death. The night was getting chilly and the woman was obviously still in shock, but the female cop seemed to be taking good care of her. Shivering deeply, she had a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, which Riley guessed that the policewoman had considerately obtained for her.

Berry stopped and crouched in front of the cop, whose nameplate identified her as Officer Tori Hayworth.

He said quietly, “Is this the woman who called?”

Officer Hayworth nodded and said, “I don’t think she’s ready to talk to anybody yet.

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