Dust Up With The Detective

“Yep,” the investigator answered.

“Great. Make sure to get some more pictures. Especially of the spatter.”

The officer nodded, taking the camera. The strobing flash made Jeremy flinch, as if each picture was the crack of a bullet that had come too close.

He had to pull his crap together. For the next hour or so, he couldn’t see the body as his brother if he wanted to get through this. This couldn’t be Robert—it had to be just another face, or he’d never be able to be right again. And for dang sure, he didn’t need Blake worrying about him. She needed to focus on her investigation.

He took a deep breath.

Blake took a swab of the body’s hands. She tried to move his arm, but he was at full rigor. Leaning down, she sniffed his hands and then wrapped them in paper bags.

“You smell anything?” he asked, glancing down to the place where the handgun rested.

“Hard to say,” she said with a slight shrug. “His hands smell heavily of dirt. That can cover the scent of powder.”

He nodded.

“You want to take a sniff?” she asked, motioning to the bagged hands.

If this was his scene, he would have done it, but he still couldn’t let go of the fact it was Robert. No matter how badly he wanted to, he couldn’t feel his brother’s cold, lifeless flesh.

“I’m good, but make sure you’re getting everything.” He pointed at Robert’s underarms. “Did you get a picture of his coat? How it’s bunched up where someone would have put their hands if they were dragging him.”

Blake frowned like she didn’t agree, but she motioned to the officer taking pictures. “Make sure we get a picture of that.”

The man nodded, his camera flashing.

“After the coroner’s done, I want you to bag that gun and send it off to the crime lab. I want prints pulled and a ballistics test. Got it?”

“No problem,” the officer said between pictures.

She turned to Jeremy. “You know I’m sorry about your brother and everything that’s going on in your life right now, but that doesn’t mean you can come in and tell me how to run a crime scene.”

That’s not what he had implied, but apparently he had hit a sore spot. “Right.”

She pulled off her blue gloves with a snap and turned to the other investigator. “You done?”

The officer nodded, handing her camera to her. “I think we’ve got everything you’ll need.” He started down the tunnel, leaving Blake standing alone with Jeremy.

She stood up and brushed off her knees. “Don’t worry, Jeremy. Even though it’s just little ol’ me in charge, we can figure out what happened.”

* * *

OUTSIDE THE TUNNEL, Blake set the camera on the table at the makeshift command post and she tried to control her breathing. The vic may have been Jeremy’s family, but that didn’t mean that he could come in and try to tell her how to do her job. She never should have let him trail along. She should have trusted her gut and kept her distance.

The industrial lights made the night as bright as midday. Jeremy sat outside the mine’s entrance as a few other officers milled through the grass and brush looking for any other evidence. The coroner walked down the trail from Robert’s driveway, and she gave him an acknowledging wave.

She flipped through her camera, looking at the different photos of Robert’s body, the gun and the walls in and around the scene. The last picture was of the blood spatters on the wall behind the body. The spray had moved far in the chasm, but the heaviest was just to the right of where Robert had slumped.

She made a note in her investigation report as the coroner stopped beside her.

“Have a dead one, eh? Lucky for you, the state’s hotel is always open,” he said, trying to make a joke. She didn’t find it funny.

Blake nodded in Jeremy’s direction. “That’s the vic’s brother, so be careful what you say.”

The older man’s flabby, jovial face turned placid. Most coroners were former police officers and more of the quiet type, but this one had come out of Wyoming and seemed to live for his job.

“Got it. So what do you think? Suicide?” He looked over her shoulder at the camera. “Oh, that’s some nice spatter.”

She put the camera down and out of sight of the death-happy coroner. “Right now I’m unsure. It’s presenting like a suicide, no drag marks.”

“Hmm...” The coroner made a note. “Anything else?”

“The vic had a bullet wound to the left side of his head.”

“Was the vic left-handed?”

She hadn’t thought to ask Jeremy. “I don’t know.”

The coroner nodded. “Well, I’ll see what I can make of it.”

“Sounds great, thanks. My investigator will take you to the body.” She pointed to the other officer, who motioned for the coroner to follow him.

The coroner talked constantly as he and the other man made their way into the mine.

She opened her computer and pulled up her investigation report. Based on the rate of algor mortis, rigor mortis and livor mortis, the man had been dead approximately twelve hours. She looked at her watch. That put time of death at a little before noon, but the family hadn’t been able to contact him for several days. Was it possible that Robert had been trapped in the mine and, instead of waiting to asphyxiate, had chosen to take his own life? Or had there been others involved? Had someone collapsed the entrance of the mine in hopes of covering up a murder?

Robert was a recluse. If someone had wanted to murder him, hiding him in the mine was a hell of a way to take care of his body. If things had gone another way and his family hadn’t reported him missing, he may never have been found.

She looked over at Jeremy. His head was in his hands and his shoulders were slumped; he looked broken. Guilt flooded her. She should have been more patient with him and his interference in her investigation—he’d only been trying to help. She walked over to him and put her hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

He nodded but didn’t look up.

“We’re going to get to the bottom of this. Don’t worry.”

“I just don’t understand it. Robert had problems, but...I never thought...”

She sat down next to him, their legs brushing. Though they barely touched, she hoped that her nearness brought him a small measure of comfort. “You and I both know that no one ever thinks this is going to happen. The only thing we can do for Robert now is to piece together how he ended up where he is.”

Jeremy shifted slightly, like he was recoiling from the words...words he had no doubt said himself many times over.

“Do you know—was Robert left-handed?”

Jeremy nodded. “He could have done this to himself. But you know Robert...knew Robert,” he said, correcting himself. “He wasn’t the kind who’d do this. He was too angry. Too cynical. He lived to prove the world wrong.”

They sat in silence as she watched the firemen pack up their gear and head out. Once in a while Jeremy would move like he was going to stand up, but he would quickly stop and sit back down.

Finally the coroner appeared at the mine’s entrance and, spotting her, made his way over.