Free Even Steven by John Gilstrap Page B

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. We found his badge and ID in his back pocket."
    Russell's right eyebrow scaled his forehead. He nodded toward the empty holster on the corpse's hip. "Where's his weapon?"
    Tim shook his head. "Haven't found it yet. Doubt that we will."
    "Shot with his own gun, you think?"
    "Hard to say till ballistics gets done with the bullets. Here, take a look at the entry wounds." As Tim spoke, he pointed out the different holes with the point of his pen. "We've got one here in the shoulder, sort of between his shoulder blade and his collarbone, one here at the suprasternal notch, and another here on the top of his head."
    Tim dug using phrases like suprasternal notch. Russell would probably have called it the top of the breastbone, or maybe the base of the throat.
    "High, downward angles," Russell observed. "You figure the killer was hiding in a tree?"
    Tim shook his head. "I thought that at first, yes. But look down there in the woods. You see that orange evidence marker? That's a stray bullet lodged in a tree trunk."
    Russell could see the scar itself, gouged in the base of a tree about twenty feet away. "So, what are you telling me? The guy was crawling?" Well, that's the million-dollar question, isn't it? I figure maybe it foiled rape attempt. Judging from the powder burns, this guy was shot like point-blank."
    Coates stood again and scanned the area around him. "But his pants are up and his pecker's tucked in, right?"
    "Sure looks that way. Maybe he was still trying to subdue her when he got shot."
    Russell's head bobbed as he considered that. "Okay, so why didn't she call the police when she got down off the mountain? And why steal his gun?"
    "Scared, maybe? I don't know, rape victims freak out all the time. You know that."
    "Maybe." Russell strolled in a small circle around the body, trying to imagine a scene as it might have unfolded. Suicide was out, if only because of the angles of entry. What does that leave? Murder, certainly, but how? And why out here?
    "There's something else -"
    Russell silenced Tim with a raised finger. He saw something. Not sure what it was, exactly, but it was something. Call it insight, call it intuition; but whatever it was, he'd learned to trust it. Something about the arrangement of the leaves. There it was, right over there: a cleared spot among the mess of rocks and leaves. If he used his imagination a little, he could almost see a faint circular imprint in the ground.
    He walked over to the spot, and still not saying a word, he stooped and then knelt, feeling along the ground for a telltale sign of -
    "Here it is," he announced. "The stake hole from their tent." Removing his pen from his pocket, he gently probed the hole. Sure enough, it extended down at an angle; and from the angle, he could guess where the other stakes had been. "There was a campsite built here last night. I want plaster casts made of these stake holes, Tim. And I want casts made of every footprint and of every tire track down there on the fire road."
    "That'll take forever." It wasn't a complaint; merely an observation.
    "You've got more pressing business, do you?"
    Tim smiled.
    "You were going to show me something else," Russell prompted.
    "Oh, yeah. Damnedest thing. Parker over there found these." Tim led his boss out farther into the woods. "Look."
    Russell followed Tim's arm down to two more footprints. "Am I looking at something that is more than it appears?"
    Tim started to wipe away the leaves for a clearer picture of the

    Crime Scene is done with everything. Make your point with your hands in your pockets."
    Tim blushed. "Parker noticed that these prints are deeper than the others, and that they're unusually close together. The boot treads seem to match, so it would seem that both feet belong to the same person."
    Russell laughed, then grew instantly apologetic once he saw the expression in ever-serious Tim's face. "Relax, Timbo. I suddenly got this image of a guy walking around with someone