Chapter 1
Penrod looked over the scene again before shaking his head.Kids with guns were always messy and deadly.Three dead today when a twelve-year-old found his mother’s gun and had played deadman, some kind of game that was made up, he was sure, and shot and killed his brother and two sisters.
He had a feeling that the boy who had done the shooting meant to kill them, but figured, like most games, he’d be able to reset the game, and they’d be alive.While he didn’t know that for sure, he’d been told that’s what happened before, and he didn’t have any reason not to believe it happened again.An entire family gone because their mother hadn’t locked up her gun, but had left it in the bedside table in the event her ex-husband came around again.
“The medical examiner is here.He said that once he’s finished, then we can move the bodies.”He nodded.“Also, the mom is home now.She’s in the kitchen with one of the female officers, wondering what had happened.She knows but is wondering how it had happened to her.”
“I’ll talk to her in a little bit.I have to sort out the things that are in here.Where’s the boy?”He said that he was taken to the hospital to be examined.“He wasn’t hurt, was he?I didn’t think to check when he came out of the house with the gun still in his hands.”
“He’s just fine.Wondering like the rest of us what happened.He said that they were playing a game, and it went off.Three times?I don’t think so.He claimed that his sisters were arguing, and it was getting on his nerves.I think this was the plan all along, but that’s just me.”He didn’t have an answer either way, so he left it be.“He has an officer with him and will be arrested as soon as he’s given the okay that he’s fine.What do you want to do about the woman?Her ex is around, too.Just a heads up.”
“I’ll talk to her as soon as the ME is gone.Make sure that everything is recorded so that there are no missteps with this one.”The officer said he’d make sure that things went according to book.“Good.Once the ME is finished, make sure you get as much recorded as you can.I don’t want this one to go off on the bad side because we missed something vital.”
“I’ll make sure we do it right.”Nodding again, he stepped onto the porch to answer his cell phone.It was his brother Stamos.
“I know you’re working, but I have a question for you.”He said that he might not have an answer right now, because he was really busy.“Then I won’t keep you.What do you know of the shooting on Maple?I’m headed there now.”
“You won’t get much.”His brother worked for the newspaper and was their number one reporter, especially on homicides.“We’ve only just arrived, and the bodies are still here.You more than likely won’t get past the line.”
He knew that he could say things like that to his brother, and he’d not use it in his report.They had an understanding between the two of them.Penrod wouldn’t give him anything on the record, and Stamos wouldn’t use anything he said in his reports.It worked out well for the two of them, and that was why his brother was doing so well.He knew that he’d get the right answers even if he had to tell him he was wrong about his conclusions.
“Thanks.I’ll show up anyway just to see if I can get anything you can use.”He said that would be all right by him.Something else that Stamos did was that he didn’t use his name to get himself out of sticky situations.Again, it had worked out well for the two of them.“Be careful there.I know things are tense when there is a shooting.”
After promising that he would, the two of them hung up their connection.Not wanting to go back into the house just yet, he made his way around the side of the house toward the kitchen, where he knew the mother was.He had a few questions to ask her about the shooting as well.Namely, what did she think was going to happen when she left a gun in an unsecure place where her kids knewwhere it was.
“My babies are all gone.”He didn’t remark; his first thought was that she knew this might happen.But he’d been jaded about his job before when it turned out the parents were directly involved in whatever was going on.Today, to him, at least, felt no different.“What am I going to do now?”
He asked her questions about the gun and the kids.Yes, they knew it was in there, and no, she had not known that they played with it while she was gone.Apparently, this wasn’t the first time that they’d gotten the gun out to play with it, and she knew about it.At least that was what she admitted when he tripped her up on questioning.She told them that it wasn’t a toy and that they were to leave it alone.Fat lot of good that had done them when they made a habit of playing with the gun while she was out.
“They always put it back before I came home.I figured they knew that it would kill them.”She didn’t look all that upset, and he noted it in his notebook.He asked her why she didn’t have a gun safe or at least a lock box with a key.“And if my ex-husband came around, what was I supposed to do?It would have taken me forever to get it out and use it on him.By then, he would have strangled us all in our sleep.”
Penrod didn’t bother commenting on her observation about him strangling them in their sleep.How would they know he was there—he didn’t like people anymore and thought that it was beginning to show in his attitude towards his job.After questioning her for an hour, he had her taken to jail to have more questions put to her.Her son, a twelve-year-old, had been arrested and was going to be tried as an adult.The mother would more than likely be arrested as well for the murders of her three children.She would if he had anything to do with it.
Heading back to his office when the mother was taken downtown, he filled out his report and did his job.It was getting to the point where he could do his job in his sleep.It wasn’t often that they had a homicide in town, but when it happened, as he was the only officer who worked the cases, it was usually a big one.He was the only one who went to court when it came to a trial as well.Keeping his notes in neat order, he was nearly finished for the day when Kahana called him.
“I’m on duty in the emergency room today.I wanted to tell you how sorry I am that you caught this case.”He said that it was bad because there were children involved.“It always is.I’m sorry for the mother, too.I’m betting she ends up in jail with her son.She’s not allowed in the room with him, and she’s having a fit.Are you on your way home?”
“Not yet.I have some notes that I want to write up in the event that it goes to trial.I’m sure it will, so I’m getting everything written down so that I can remember when I have to.”He asked him how he could forget.“That’s true, but it might be months, even years, from now before it goes to trial, and I want to be able to remember what was said and done.I’m assuming that you have to write up something as well?”
“Yes, just to cover our asses.”He knew that feeling and didn’t envy his brother working on the bodies of the three children.“I’ll talk to you when you get home.I’m on here for another twelve hours today, and then I can go home.You be careful driving home, little brother.”
“Always.”As he was putting his paperwork away, he made sure that the timeline of the events was correct.He didn’t want some slick attorney getting him on something so little as a couple of minutes that he didn’t document.After he was finished up, he watched as the mom was questioned about the shooting.Again, it occurred to him that she didn’t seem all that upset about losing her three children, but perhaps she was just as jaded as he was anymore.
By the time he made it to his condo, he felt dirty and exhausted.Taking a long, hot shower, he didn’t bother with putting anything on but got into his bed naked.Glad that he had someone come into his place and clean up for him, he knew that resting on clean sheets was something that he looked forward to.Tonight was no different.Falling asleep immediately, he didn’t move for the rest of the night.
Eating some cereal and having a cup of tea, he was out the door half an hour earlier than usual.Once he was on the road, he was careful of the kids getting on the school bus this morning and wasglad that they seemed to be enjoying themselves while waiting for school to begin.He remembered those mornings when he had nothing to worry about but whether or not he’d gotten his homework done.He always did, but he’d still worry.
There was a lot of buzz about the shooting at the office.He looked over the report on the kid who had spent the night behind bars and was pleased that he didn’t seem to have had a good night.Cruel of him, he thought, but once he figured out what he’d done, he was going to be a good deal more sorry.At least he hoped so.The kid was going to be spending a lot of time behind bars, and he’d better get used to it.
Kahana called him twice.Once to tell him that the autopsy was starting for the three kids.Then later in the evening, to tell him that they were finished.A single gunshot to the head was the method of death for the three of them, and there were no drugs in their system.He didn’t expect there to be, but it was good to know that he’d been right about it.
The rest of his evening was spent on filling out paperwork on the shooting.It seemed like there was an endless amount of paperwork that he needed to fill out, but he did each one of them with his notes nearby.The mother had been arrested as he thought she would and put in a cell far from her son.It was going to be a lengthy trial for the two of them, and he couldn’t wait to get it over with.Three lives had been taken, and there was a lot to answer for.
Penrod was due at his brother’s house that night, and he wasn’t looking forward to it.They’d not ask him questions about the shooting, but they would tell him how sorry they were for it happening.As soon as he was in the door, he nearly went home.All his brothers were there with Mac, too.He loved Axel’s wife as much as he did his brother.Debra Author was there as well, and he greeted her with the same hugs that he’d given the rest of them.She seemed to be as much a part of the family as Mac was, and he was happy.
“How’s your heart acting up today?”Debra had had two minor strokes just two weeks ago that she was recovering from.If not for the quick thinking of Kahana, a doctor, she might well have died.The hospital was going to be sued when a nurse told Debra not to come in, wasting their time with indigestion again.“I hope you’re doing what the doctor tells you.Kahana will make sure you’re all right if you listen to him.”
“I’m sticking to my cardiac diet as I’ve been told and getting my amount of stress under control as well.It’s difficult with everything going on, but I’m working on it.”He told her that he was proud of her.“I am as well.I never want to go through that again.It was scary.”
