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But it wasn’t working out as planned. He’d gone through all of Roadie’s pockets looking for that phone, but without success. He must have left it in the car!
Vince stood, looking around for the car keys he’d heard drop, and finally found them beneath Roadie’s body. He sneezed as he was reaching for them, then heard a knock at the door.
He froze, holding his breath, listening and waiting, hoping they’d just go away. But it sounded like kids, and they kept pounding and calling Roadie’s name. Then to his horror, he saw the doorknob turn. At that point, he forgot the keys and bolted to the bedroom, pulling upthe hood of his sweatshirt as he ran, and climbed out a window and down the fire escape before disappearing up the intersecting alley.
Paul and Dougie Deal had been sent to borrow Roadie’s car and were pounding on his door without success. Roadie was friends with their dad, who was in jail for assault and battery, and their mom needed groceries. Roadie always let the teenagers borrow his car, or took them to the store himself. But he had been gone for days, and they were hurtin’ for food.
They had their EBT card from their SNAP membership, but no means of transportation. But when Wynona Deal looked out her kitchen window and saw Roadie’s car in the parking lot again, she was overjoyed. It was Saturday. No school today, and the timing was perfect. She made them put on their jackets, gave them the grocery list and her EBT card, and told them to go beg Roadie for the car.
Now, the boys were at the door but weren’t getting any response.
They kept knocking and knocking.
“Hey, Roadie! It’s me, Dougie.”
Nothing.
Dougie frowned at his brother, Paul. “His car’s in the parking lot, right?”
Paul nodded. “Yeah, Mama looked before she sent us over.”
Dougie shoved his hand through his shaggy blond hair and knocked again, then turned the doorknob. To his shock, the door swung inward. He stepped across the threshold and shouted again.
“Roadie! Hey, Roadie! Are you home?”
“Maybe he’s sick. Maybe he fell and hurt himself,” Paul said. “We should at least check.”
“Right,” Dougie said, but they didn’t get far. One glance into the living room and they saw him crumpled on the floor. “Oh shit! Oh no!”
Paul started to run toward him when Dougie held him back. “Don’t touch him. Look at his head. It’s turned wrong. He’s dead. Call 911.”
They ran out into the hall, crying as they made the 911 call, then called their mother to tell her what they’d found and sat down on the floor to wait for the cops.
By the time the police arrived, Wynona was outside the apartment with her boys. Her three-year-old daughter was sitting in Dougie’s lap, and her eighteen-month-old toddler on Wynona’s hip. She didn’t trust cops, and she wasn’t having this disaster pinned on the first two teenagers on the scene.
Once the detectives arrived, it didn’t take long to realize that the boys had scared the killer off before he could take anything, because the bedroom window was open to the fire escape and the apartment didn’t look like it had been touched.
When the coroner showed up, he confirmed Roadie had died within the hour, apparently from a broken neck,but would confirm further details after the autopsy. He also made mention of the fact that Roadie was over six feet tall. Neither of the boys were over five foot ten, and Roadie’s neck had been broken with one twist. They couldn’t have done that without Roadie putting up one hell of a fight, and there wasn’t a mark on him.
His wallet was there. His car keys on the floor beside his body. The only thing missing was his phone, and the boys had been searched. All they had on them was their mother’s EBT card.
After the coroner’s departure with the body, the crime scene techs began dusting for prints and bagging evidence, both inside the apartment and inside Roadie’s car. That’s where they found the phone and a checkout receipt from Bullard’s Campgrounds in Jubilee, Kentucky, with yesterday’s date. This corresponded with Wynona’s statement about Roadie having been gone for the past five days.
For the moment, Detective Joe Muncy, the lead detective, had all the info he needed.
“Mrs. Deal, you and your boys are free to go, but we may need to speak to you again.”
“Fine, you just do that,” Wynona said. “And while you’re at it, if you come back, bring food. We don’t have a car. I don’t have money for an Uber. We always borrow Roadie’s to go to the store. He’d been gone five days. Now he’s dead, for which I’m sorry, but I’m pretty near outta everything and sorrier that my babies are hungry.”
Joe thought of his three little ones at home, then looked at the woman and her four kids and sighed.
“I’ll take the boys to the supermarket for you. And I’ll bring them home.”
Wynona’s defiance crumpled. “You’d do that?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Wynona took a shaky breath. “Then I thank you,” she said, and turned to her boys. “Douglas Edward, Paul Allen…I expect nothing but your best behavior, and for you to thank the ground this officer walks on for helping us today. Do you understand me?”
