Page 409 of Sticks and Stones
Well, shit.
This killer was one step ahead of them. There was no doubt in their minds that he’d found out that his lackeys were MIA.
Reed kept talking.
“They are so fresh I’m thinking that someone just offed them this morning. There’s no blood on the scene, that we can tell. We didn’t find any droplets in the snow, but we did find some faint drag marks from that parking lot,” he said, pointing up.
Gene was listening.
“I really thought this was a normal case, as normal as a triple homicide is, but that’s when we found this when we moved the victims to be side-by-side, and not in a pile.”
He pulled an evidence bag out of his pocket, and held it up. In it, there was a tiny bag with a white powder in it. In the second bag, there was a blue balloon.
There was shit all over it.
Literal.
Shit.
“Uh, what’s with that?” Gene asked, pointing at the balloon.
Reed filled him in.
“You know how when you die, your muscles relax, and you defecate?” he asked.
Gene nodded.
“Yeah,” he said, and then, he got it. “So that was in his bowels, and he shit it out when the killer took him out?”
Reed nodded.
“I’m betting when I get him open, I find more,” he said. “Unless you’re passing this off to your ME.”
Well, that wasn’t happening.
They wanted this quiet, and it was easiest to let Reed help them.
“You can take it. We’ll use your findings.”
They had a bigger issue. The bikers told them that they were in charge of stuffing the victims with the drugs. If they hadthe bikers, and they were the transporter, how did the drugs get in the victims?
It made sense to have the victims, but without the drugs. Then, it was a dump and run.
“EJ,” Gene said, and they passed a look between them that said the same thing.
“This is off,” Ethan admitted.
From beside them, Reed stared at them.
“Okay, what gives?” he asked. “You’re not stealing bodies, and you’re playing nice. That’s him,” he said, pointing at Ethan. “Not you. You’re a dick.”
Blackhawk laughed and then covered it up with a cough when his man stared over at him.
“For the record,” Gene said, “this city made me this way. I used to be nice.”
Somehow, Reed didn’t believe that.
This man busted balls all of the time.
