AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The victim wore a red, long-sleeved shirt with a paw-shaped pin attached near the collar. It read, Dogs are for life.
The door chimed and the soles of dress shoes, dampened by plastic booties, slapped the linoleum floor. It was Malone, and he got right down to business.
“Name’s Leah Bernard. Eighteen. A Berta Russo found the deceased at five AM when she came inside to pay for her gas. There were no calls to nine-one-one prior to that, so presumably no one heard or saw a thing. Of course, we’ll get officers out canvassing. But that’s all we currently have.”
Again, Amanda took in the young woman. The whimsical touch of the antlers had Leah looking younger than eighteen. Maybe fifteen or sixteen even. “Then pretty much nothing.”
“She didn’t push the panic button?” Trent pointed to a small red domed light under the counter.
“She must have run out of time.” A cold summation of her reality. The totality of it.
Malone picked up and said, “The owner of the gas station is on his way over. He didn’t handle the news well and said that he gave Leah night shifts against his better judgment.”
Typically, the next of kin were the first notified, but they needed to watch the security footage. It was assumed that was the reason Malone had called the man. “Is he insisting on a warrant?”
Malone shook his head, getting the underlying reference. “He’s agreed to be fully cooperative. Whatever we need. He’s prepared to bring up the video the minute he gets here.”
“That’s good at least,” Trent said.
Malone frowned. “The poor girl was due off at six. A man by the name of Marty Evans was scheduled to relieve her then.”
That was less than twenty minutes from now. “Was she still living at home with her parents?” Amanda scraped out, her thoughts painting the scenario of anxious parents awaiting their daughter’s return home, only to be left in limbo.
“Yeah.”
Her poor parents. They’d soon find out Leah would never walk through their front door again. Amanda pushed the heartbreaking thought aside and turned her attention to the scene.
The till drawer was shut, and the display of lottery tickets appeared untampered with. The only thing that appeared out of place was some broken shelving and busted bags of chips. It could indicate an altercation, but there was nothing to suggest a robbery had taken place.
“What happened here?” It was a slip, the words tumbling from her lips of their own accord. They sat out there, rhetorical and dangling, roping in the great cosmic existential question of why. The energy in the room intensified.
Malone eventually broke the spell with, “I think that’s your job to figure out.” He smiled, as if to soften the blow and rubbed his beard. It was always short and neatly groomed, but the mannerism was one he sometimes employed when trying to tamp down intense emotions, be they grief or anger.
“It doesn’t look like a robbery,” Trent said. “Personally motivated?”
The suggestion raised her hackles, the sheer coldness of the possibility, even if the scene supported the theory. In fact, the most immediate path would be digging into the girl’s life to see if they could unearth the shooter. Even if the surveillance video revealed something else, one thing was certain: the hearts of Leah Bernard’s parents were about to break.
TWO
Amanda typically preferred to be armed with more answers before serving notification to loved ones. Something that might support offering assurance or an explanation of some sort. At this point Leah Bernard’s death had no meaning. It hadn’t been a robbery and might not have been Leah in the wrong place at the wrong time. They’d be going to the Bernards with so few pieces of the puzzle, but the goal was to reach them before they started to fret when their daughter didn’t arrive home. That was one small kindness they could extend.
After hearing Amanda’s plan, Malone said he’d stay around and wait for the owner of the gas station, though he stepped out of the store. As he was walking out, crime scene investigators Emma Blair and Isabelle Donnelly were coming in. They held tightly to their collection cases, grim expressions on their faces. They must have heard it had been a young woman to lose her life.
“She’s behind the counter,” Amanda told them, her words taking her back to Officer Cochran saying that to her and Trent. What felt like hours ago had only been a handful of minutes.
Wyatt intercepted her and Trent on the way to the car and filled them in on Berta. “She lives in Maryland and has a clean record. Far as I see it, she’s not who we’re looking for. We have her info if you wanted to follow up later on.”
Amanda shook her head, picking up on his implied question. “She stays for now. The owner’s coming so we can review the security footage. After that, we’ll revisit this conversation.”
“I’ll go tell her the good news.” Sarcasm alive and well and, with that, he spun to leave.
Amanda wasn’t going to feel guilty about her decision. Until they knew what they were dealing with, they couldn’t afford to release her. “Oh, Officer Wyatt,” she called out, and he turned back to her. “Should a Marty Evans show up, keep him around too.”
“And who is Mr.Evans?”
“An employee here who is due to start at six.”
Wyatt looked at his watch. “Past that now by a few minutes, but I’ll keep an eye out for him. Or should I send a car around to his house? Just in case he’s involved with what happened.”
