The Swap Ch. 01

"I know." said Tanya, "and they want to start examining the body but I thought you might want to see it first."

"Uhh, where are you?" I asked, realizing that we were talking at cross-purposes.

"River Valley Country Club, covered parking deck." Tanya said. "One of the members, an Anthony Warner, was shot in his car."

"Oh, wow." I said. "We've got a two-fer going on. I'll be there right away." I said.

Just then Cindy Ross came up with a crime lab technician. "We've got something." she said. The technician showed me one of the orange electrical cords. The insulation had been stripped to the bare wires just below the female end of the cord, and it was discolored around that end.

"Bag it." I said. "That is likely our murder weapon. Cindy, tape off and preserve that little shed area; post guards if you need to. I want to look more closely at it, but we may need the light of day to see anything in there. And also, I've got to go: there's been another murder in town. You're in charge here, and I'll try to get back as soon as I can."

"Another murder?" Cindy replied. "Hell of a Thursday night, already."

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"Whaddya got, Nash?" I asked as I walked up to the crime scene at 10:30. Our newest hire, Detective Martin Nash, was next to the car, an expensive Mercedes. Martin Nash was in his early 30s, about 5'10", slender, dark brown hair, his face slightly dimpled but otherwise handsome. He was dressed in a well-fitting suit and simply had the look of a quiet, competent law enforcement agent. His actions so far had borne out the look, and I hoped that with more time and experience his imagination and problem-solving abilities would come through.

"Dead man is Anthony Warner." Nash replied, quietly but confidently and firmly. "He's 48 years old, married, two kids in college. He's the CEO of DynaCorp, fairly big company in town, they do manufacturing consulting. His company's board was meeting here tonight... I'm told he has board meetings here fairly often so they can eat dinner. He's a member here at the Club."

"And one of the better-paying ones." I said. "This roofed parking area is reserved parking, and Warner's place here is close to the walk to the clubhouse. Takes hefty donations as well as dues to get one of these slots." The parking lot was to the left, almost hidden as one came to the large open parking space in front of the clubhouse. A separate side door and canopied walk led to the covered parking lot to keep those wealthy members dry as they went to their cars. "Sorry to interrupt you, Martin. What else?"

"There was a dinner and board meeting tonight." Nash replied. It lasted until nearly 10:00pm, then broke up after some chit-chatting. Mr. Warner was the only one of the board members parked in this lot; the others went out the front door to the main parking lot."

"Exactly how close to ten p.m. when the meeting ended?" I asked.

"Within five minutes of ten." Nash replied.

"Who discovered the crime?"

"Employee at the club. Looked out the window and saw the headlights of the car were on. Five minutes later, the car was still there with the headlights on, so he went out to check, and found Mr. Warner slumped over his car and lots of blood on the head, neck and back of the shirt. He ran back inside and they called us at 10:10pm."

I looked around, gathering the full scene into my mind. Hugh Hewitt was also at the scene, as was Tanya Perlman. And... oops... an agent of the State Bureau of Investigation, the SBI.

His name was Ted Crenshaw. His hair looked like he used black shoe polish on both ends of him, or else that was a badly-fitting toupee. But he seemed to be decent enough, not the asshole that Dick Ferrell or Steven Ikea liked to be. Ted Crenshaw was in his mid- to late-thirties and had been in the City Police Force for several years. I was really hoping he was a product of the SBI's recent attempts to have better relationships with local constabularies.

"Agent Crenshaw, what brings you here?" I asked as I glanced at the crime scene.

"Hello to you too, Lieutenant. I got a call from a club member. Your guys were already here and Detective Perlman threatened to whip my ass if I tried to call in a State Crime Lab team." Crenshaw said, his smile set and forced.

I laughed, but noted the tension. "Yes, it would be smart to let Supervisor Perlman and her Crime Lab teams do the job. So, is this Mr. Warner's Mercedes?"

"Yes." said Martin Nash. "Looks like he got in the car, was turning the ignition on but did not actually crank it, and at that moment he was shot in the back of the head. The Lab guys have dusted the back door and inside the back seat for prints already."

I looked in the back seat, as the left rear door was open, and Detective Nash said that it was open when he arrived at the scene. He'd felt for a pulse from the dead man and found none; that was the only contact with the car by the police until the Crime Lab team got there.

The car was new and clean. I sat down on the seat, which had been covered by a plastic tarp and looked forward. I could see the back of the dead man's head as he was slumped forward over the steering wheel, his black, gently curling hair matted with bloodstains. Peering closely and shining my light onto the wounds, I could see the small bullet holes. There were four of them.

"Small caliber weapon." I said. "Agent Crenshaw, you worked Organized Crime when you were with the City Police, didn't you?"

"Sure did." he replied, not outwardly showing any sign of wondering how I knew that.

"Take a look and see if you're thinking what I'm thinking." I said. Agent Crenshaw peered into the car. It did not take him long.

"Mob hit, I'd say." Crenshaw said. ".22 long rifle caliber, probably a revolver."

"Exactly." I said, then turned to my team. "You guys see something like this before?" All of them shook their heads no, so I asked Crenshaw to explain.

Crenshaw gave a good lecture: "One of the most common types of professional mob executions is for someone to wait in the backseat of a car or come up and get in just as the driver is getting in, then shoot the victim in the back of the head with a small-caliber pistol like a .22 long rifle, hopefully timing it with the cranking of the car. Not much noise, happens very fast, usually no one sees anything. In this case, it looks like the shots were fired before the victim actually cranked the car." He continued with a few examples from his past experiences.

"Is there anything that you could say is out of the ordinary about this particular shooting, Agent Crenshaw?" Martin Nash asked.

"Come to think of it..." Crenshaw replied, "four shots is a lot. Usually it's just one or two... bang-bang... and then the killer is gone. Also, this is a pretty quiet place, not like a parking lot in a mall with traffic. So the shots might have been more easily heard."

"What does that tell you, Martin?" I asked, immediately putting him to the test.

"Amateur trying to make it look like a pro hit?" Martin ventured. Tanya nodded.

"Totally agree." I said. Martin had passed my quick test. "Okay, I'll back out of the way and let the forensics people get to work. Have the grounds been secured?"

Detective Nash replied "The clubhouse area, this parking lot and the other parking lot have been secured. But there's a golf course behind the clubhouse and that's a lot of ground."

"That sucks. Any record of entries and exits?" I asked.

Tanya replied quickly "Officer Feeley is at the guardhouse up front. He's getting that information now."

Just then Officer Pete Feeley arrived. I did not fail to notice how he looked at Tanya Perlman as he walked up.

"Lieutenant, I've got all the names of everyone who went in or out of the gate for the last 24 hours, and they've secured the video footage for the last 24 hours for us, also." Officer Feeley said. He was extremely efficient in gathering evidence and information, I thought, but just did not have the imagination needed to bring the fruit of solving a case from that data.

He continued: "Most of the DynaCorp board members had left already, but one, the Vice Chairman, is still here. He wants to go home, so I told him you'd be here as soon as possible."

"Okay, good job." I said. "Feeley, make sure you get any video of any surveillance inside the clubhouse and around the grounds, too. Call in for a warrant if you need to."

"Yes sir." Feeley said, then stalked off.

"Martin, Hugh, go inside and conduct the interview with the board member who is here, then let him go home... unless he confesses to the murder, of course." I said. "Ted, let's you and I walk our way back along the path Mr. Warner came out."

There was not much to see, especially in the dark. As I returned to the car, I said to Tanya Perlman "This is going to be tough at night, but see if there are any paths leading away from here to the back of the clubhouse or onto the golf course, and see if you can find something... anything. We'll wait until dawn to really search the grounds, but try the cart paths. Damn.... really sucks having to do this at night, and with another murder sucking up half my manpower."

"That's why they pay you the big bucks, Lieutenant." Tanya replied, needling me hard. I love my team, I love my team, I love my team, I kept reminding myself...

My cellphone rang. It was Cindy Ross. "The husband just got back home, and we may have a neighbor that witnessed a car leaving."

"I'll be right there." I replied. "Don't let the husband into the house until I get there."

Part 5 - The Electric Company

At 11:05pm, I pulled up to the Schelle residence in my black Police SUV, which the Chief insisted I drive because the glass was bulletproof and because of the potential threats against me by Ned as well as the Sergei Molotov gang. One good thing was that it had a portable computer inside, as did many squad cars, and I was able to read Myron's quick research on the husband before getting out of the car.

Robert Schelle was an electrical engineer and was the owner of S.E.E.S., LLC., a consulting engineering firm. His current major client was Ward Harvester... that gave me a shudder as I thought of what had transpired there those months ago. Meanwhile, Schelle's business was small and unspectacular, only a few other employees, and Myron had added a note to the file saying he was digging further into their finances.

As I got out of the car, Cindy Ross came hurrying up to me.

"Across the street neighbor's kid may have seen something." Ross informed me. "I told them you might want to talk to them when you got here and they've been waiting up. Kid is very excited about meeting the 'Iron Crowbar', by the way."

I went with Ross to the house across the street, which appeared from the outside to be a bit bigger and nicer than the Schelle's. A young man opened the door at our knock, dressed in a bathrobe and Crocs.

"Oh wow, the Iron Crowbar!" the kid exclaimed as I was introduced to him.



"Hi Ryan." I said. "You're on the football team at Town High, aren't you?" I asked.

"Yes sir!" Ryan said, clearly impressed. "First string!"

"You're a Senior there?" I asked.

"Yes sir." he replied. Just then his mother walked up, who Cindy introduced to me as Marlena. She was wearing a heavy bathrobe also, and high heel slides. Even through the bathrobe I could tell she had nice breasts and one hell of a hot MILF body. Her legs and feet were gorgeous, and in spite of myself I felt a stirring in my loins.

"I won't waste much of your time, so you can get to bed." I said. "Thanks for waiting up for me. Ryan, we can talk on the front porch here." We stepped outside. "Now tell me what you saw."

"Well, sir, I saw sparks and light and heard a sound, and it must've been the transformer across the street. I looked out the window and saw the power was out everywhere. I was turning back when I thought I saw out of the corner of my eye a car pull out of the Schelle's RV driveway and go that way." He pointed to his right.

"Did you get a license plate?" I asked.

"No sir, sorry." Ryan said. "In fact.... I don't think it had a license plate, like one of those new cars with temp tags or something."

"That's an important clue, Ryan." I said in my most complimentary voice, then turned to face the house. "So which window did you see this from?" Ryan pointed to the upstairs window in the middle of the house.

"That's my bedroom, sir." he said. Out of the corner of my eye I was observing Marlena, Ryan's mom. She was a hottie and her legs were en fuego in the high heels, but my observations were more professional. She was definitely staring at Ryan and myself with concern... and I was sure there was more to it than just motherly love for a son.

"Ryan, I need to make sure of this: did you see this car pull out immediately after the transformer blew?"

"Uhhh, well..." Ryan said, hesitating. "It might have been a minute later. I was sort of looking out the window and my mom shouted something to me, and I might have seen it looking out a second time. I... it's kinda hard to remember exactly."

"That's fine, Ryan, people rarely remember the tiny stuff like that. But you've been very helpful tonight, and I want to thank you for your information." I said. Turning to his mother, I asked "Ma'am, is your husband at home? Did he see anything?

"No, sir, he's away on a business trip." she said, naming the company he worked for. I thanked her and headed back across the street.

"So Ross, what did you observe of them?" I said.

"Nothing out of the ordinary." Ross said. "So what did I miss?"

"Two things caught my curiosity." I said. "Did you hear Ryan affirm that he's on the football team? And do you think he's a good looking young man?"

"Yes, I heard, and he's not bad looking." Cindy said. "Of course I see things like that about the way you do."

"Yeah." I replied. "So this good looking kid, who I also happen to know is pretty popular in school, isn't out with friends or on a hot date on a Friday night?"

"With his father out of town," Cindy said, "he may have been asked to stay at home."

"True enough. Good thought." I said, then continued. "Secondly, did you observe how his mother was dressed?"

"Yes, and there is something amiss there, but I'm not sure what it is." Cindy replied.

"She's wearing a bathrobe as if she was in bed, but her high heels are not slippers... they're meant to be worn with dressy clothes." I said. "I might be totally off-base, but I think she's been wearing those heels all night."

"Oh my goodness." Cindy said, making the connection. "I think you're having dirty thoughts again. Have you been hanging out with that sex professor in spite of my warnings?"

"You betcha." I replied, grinning, my heart warmed by the thought of Laura.

"So what does this mean?" Cindy asked. "Do you think he really saw something?"

"Yes." I said, "but that's why I asked so specifically about the time. Someone took the time to put the damaged extension cord back into the closet. So the car didn't leave within seconds of the transformer blowout, which we may take as the time of death. Young Ryan probably looked out, talked to his mom and maybe she looked out the window, then he looked again and happened to catch the car driving away."

"What do you make of the car having no plates?"

"Rental. Okay, here's what we're going to do with Mr. Schelle..."

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Robert Schelle was 5'9" or so in height, fairly slender and in decently good shape, especially for his 42 years of age. He had chestnut brown hair which right now was cut fairly short, and he had a scruff of facial shrubbery that showed he was trying to grow (or re-grow I suspected) his beard. He came across to me as someone who liked the outdoors but was not rugged. He seemed rather milquetoast to me as I was introduced to him.

"Thank you for waiting for me to get here, Mr. Schelle. I'm very sorry for your loss." I said, throwing the standard line out to a spouse of a recently deceased crime victim.

"Do you have any idea what happened? Was it some kind of accident?" Robert Schelle said. He was trying to implant that idea into my head immediately, I noticed.

"We have no real idea yet, sir. With your permission of course, I would like to go into the house with you and have you check to see if anything is missing."

"I can go do that now."

"I'd like to come inside with you, if I may."

"Uhh... don't you need a warrant for that?" Schelle asked. Most police officers would immediately consider that to be suspicious, but I knew that the man's wife was a University professor and might have no love for the police, and that more and more people were cautious of police...and I couldn't say I blamed them.

"Well, we certainly could get a warrant, Mr. Schelle." I said. "And if we find anything that we might have to take as evidence, then I certainly would get a warrant just to keep things clean and on the level. But I just want you to see if anything is missing, and I just want to get an idea of your wife's way of living."

Schelle considered it, then finally said "Okay, let's go." We entered his home through the front door. The kitchen and back door to the deck were in back, the small dining room to the front right. To the front left was a large den.

"No, I seriously doubt that anything was stolen." I said to Cindy Ross as we entered the room. There was a full 55" plasma TV screen on the far wall, several devices to play movies in both tape and DVD format, and a full sound system. The brown leather sofa was heavy and comfy, and several blankets were strewn about it. A laptop computer was on the table next to the sofa.

"Is this your wife, Mr. Schelle?" Cindy asked, looking at pictures over the fireplace mantle, as I'd previously instructed her to do. I looked at the picture as Robert Schelle confirmed that it was. It showed the Schelles at various vacation spots, on hiking and canoeing trips. What was amazing was that Michelle Schelle, while still voluptuous and curvy, was once in excellent physical shape. She had let herself go a bit in the last few years.

"Yes." Robert Schelle said in answer to Cindy's question. "She and I were very active years ago, but the last few years she lost interest as she pursued her work interests."

"Where is your RV, Mr. Schelle?" I asked, purposefully in a sudden manner as I looked at the tapes and DVDs stored on shelves near the electronic equipment.

"Uh, I sold it about four months ago." Schelle replied. "We weren't using it much anymore, so I took a friend up on an offer to buy it from me. How did you know I used to have one?"

"Oh, the driveway and parking spot in the backyard. Oh-- I see you like old movies." I said. "Casablanca.... some Alfred Hitchcock thrillers..."

"My wife used to like those." Schelle said. "But like everything else, since she really threw herself into her work the last couple of years, she didn't watch them much any more."

"Did your wife keep an office here at home?"

"Yes, she turned the sitting room in the master bedroom into her office." Schelle said. I was familiar with sitting rooms inside bedrooms; Melina had liked the sitting room in our house in Midtown before we moved up here. We headed upstairs to the bedrooms.

The master bedroom was composed, with only a dress lying on the bed as a display of any untidiness. I surmised that Mrs. Schelle had undressed to prepare for her hot tub session.

"Did your wife use the hot tub often, Mr. Schelle?" I asked, ever changing the subject, trying to keep him from guessing the direction of my questions and thus be able to throw a prepared answer.

"Every Friday night." Mr. Schelle said. "With or without me."

We turned right to enter the sitting room, which actually was another bedroom joined by a walk-through closet. It was indeed Mrs. Schelle's retreat. The desk was littered with papers. There was a relatively small flat-screen TV and DVD player, and I noted on the desk that there were several DVDs, all with home-made labels.