Fred Limberg - First Murder

“So we don’t know if he was tricking, or pimping, or if he was picked up for lewd behavior, or diddling little girls, or what.” Kumpula took a swig of his blue drink. “I’ve only had it for a couple of hours, sorry.”

“No, this is good, Jonny.” Ray turned to Carol. “You got anyone you know out there that could help us?”

“I’ll have to check my files. I’ll find someone.”

“It could be important.”

Kumpula sorted through his pile and pulled another, thinner folder out. “We found a thumbprint and two fingers from Stuckey on the doorjamb of the master bedroom upstairs. At some point in time he was upstairs in the house.”

Tony remembered the graphite smudge on the doorframe from his last visit to the house, remembered wondering whose it could be. The vibe in the room turned even more serious. Quieter. Everyone was processing this information. All of them; Ray, Carol, and the others were trying to figure out what Stuckey might have been doing upstairs in the Fredrickson house. Ray finally broke the silence.

“I know you would have brought it up immediately but I have to ask. Did you get anything off of the knife?”

“The handle was smudged. Now that’s interesting because it means it was wiped with a synthetic, most likely a nylon or rayon cloth. It could have been silk or a real lightweight wool blend, too. That would tend to leave a smear. Cotton or terrycloth, like a dish towel, would have wiped it clean.”

“That is interesting.”

“And then there’s the mug.” Tony remembered the mug in the sink with dried coffee stains. “It had been wiped too, on the outside. It was wiped completely clean, though. We’re thinking with the hand towel that was on the counter.”

“What about DNA from the coffee residue?”

Kumpula cocked his head at the rookie detective, impressed that he’d noticed the mug in the sink and remembered the details. Ray looked at him too. He’d missed that, or maybe it was in his notes or on the recording and he hadn’t placed any importance to it.

“Sorry, no.”

“It was probably the vic’s, anyway.” Ted Lipka wasn’t as close to the case as Ray and Tony. To him Deanna was just another victim. Tony wondered if by thinking of her always as Deanna that he was getting too close, too involved with her as a person. He’d have to ask Ray about that.

Ray, dug through a pile of papers on his desk, apparently found the one he was looking for, and his face darkened as he read. Worry lines sprouted across his forehead.

“What’s wrong?” Tony leaned over to see what had Ray so puzzled. It was the coroner’s report.

“Kump, try again on the DNA, okay?” Kumpula started to protest. If it wasn’t there it wasn’t there. “Deanna Fredrickson didn’t have any coffee in her stomach.” That stopped the whining. “Just try, okay buddy?”

“I’ll have to go off the reservation.” Kumpula meant he’d have to try to get the FBI involved. They had better toys.

“Wherever you need to.”

Kumpula nodded while he made a note on the folder, then he looked up. He wasn’t done.

“And there’s the Fontaine woman.”

Fontaine? None of the ‘Go Girls’ was named Fontaine. Tony was puzzled until Kumpula added, “Lakisha Fontaine.”

Tony watched Ray closely. He’d seen the two of them flirting. At least he thought it was flirting. Ray’s attitude didn’t change. He was engaged and curious.

“Lakisha Fontaine did three and a half years in Shakopee for manslaughter. ‘80 to mid ‘84.” Kumpula looked only at his notes while he told the story. “There was a bar fight. Minneapolis. Fontaine killed a woman named Tonya Reller. Reller was stabbed once in the chest. Fontaine claimed it wasn’t her knife. There was some gang connection that isn’t clear from what I’ve got so far. They took it through trial. Fontaine had a PD. They argued it was self- defense and lost. Since then…nothing.”

Ray remained stoic. If the revelation about Lakisha Marland affected him Tony couldn’t see it. Ray made a few notes before he looked up.

“What else have you got, Kump?”

“Boom Boom Bork used to get in a lot of fights. Big surprise. Hey, you think I could get anything on eBay for that comp card?”

The case review ended up being a lot shorter than Tony imagined it would be. The senior evidence tech had put a lot of intriguing science and research in front of them. Kumpula headed back to the lab and the five detectives gathered round Ray’s desk.

“Okay folks, let’s get organized.” Ray flipped through his notebook. “Ted, Vang, I want you back in the neighborhood. Karen Hewes says she stopped by the house Monday morning. She thinks it was between 7:30 and 8:00. See if anyone can confirm that. She drives an Audi, a black A-4.”

“The next door neighbor, Mae, heard a car door,” Tony said, remembering his visit with her. “Maybe she can pin the time.”

“Maybe you should do it, check with her,” Vang suggested.

“I want Tony to have another chat with Mr. Stuckey. Tonight? No, tomorrow’s Friday. Tony, see if you can manage to run into him at that film class. I’ll go over how I want you to approach him later.”

Tony was pleased. Ray trusted him to approach Stuckey, who was now, at least in Tony’s opinion, a bona fide suspect. There was no denying that the coincidence of the ‘Go Girls’ trip to LA and Stuckey’s appearance in the Twin Cities could be important. And he’d been picked up for something called sexual misconduct. What was that about? Tony tuned back in when Ray gave Carol her assignment.

“Carol. I need you to find out all you can about Stuckey’s arrest. Kumpula’s not usually vague. What was it he said? It’s murky? He was arrested and taken far enough through their system that his prints are still there.”

“Maybe they screwed up. Maybe the case was dropped, the charges dropped…”

Ray interrupted her. “Let’s find out before we speculate too much. See if you can get the facts.”

“You’re right. Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. It’s a hell of a coincidence.”

Carol flipped her notebook shut and stood. “California’s two hours behind us. I’ll get started now if there’s nothing else.”

“You go ahead. And let me know as soon as you find out what’s going on out there. It’s going to make a difference in how we approach Stuckey.”

Vang and Lipka headed out too. Late afternoon was a good time to catch people coming home from work. Some detectives would have thought it was busy work. Tony was relieved he hadn’t drawn the assignment, but both of the older detectives knew that if you kept approaching the same people asking the same questions over and over, phrasing them differently, that it often led to something.

Scott Fredrickson was still at the hotel he’d retreated to after discovering his wife’s body. His son and daughter were in adjoining rooms. The son had been cleared. The daughter had too, courtesy of a park ranger that told them he had helped the grandmother find their campsite. Ray and Tony didn’t want to talk to them. They wanted to talk to Scott Sr.

Scott invited the detectives to join him on the balcony. He pulled out a cigarette. Ray noticed it was an English Oval, unfiltered and expensive. He had acquired a taste for them on a trip to Europe some years back.

There was a white noise on the second floor balcony, the sound of cars and trucks, both near and far away. It sounded like an urgent mechanical wind. Anemic October sun was hazed by thin high clouds. It had no color or warmth. Most of the trees had lost their leaves. Scott Fredrickson was pale and colorless too, still sad.

“I know why you’re here.” He got right to it. Ray had only asked a question with his eyes. “I wasn’t thinking very clearly. Still can’t, really.”