CHAPTER TWO-3
453 Words
“HIS NAME’S CASIO LAUTARO.” Brita was crouching next to the body. She glanced up at her partner, Bud Hinks and frowned. “The racer?”
Hinks nodded. “Yup!” He c****d his head at the bloody lump on the ground. “Doesn’t look like the guy I saw on TV last week.”
Brita snorted. Lautaro had been beaten so badly he was almost in pieces. Blood spread around the body in a wash, coating everything within three feet of where he landed.
“This guy really pissed somebody off.”
Brita looked up into the nearly black eyes of the photographer. She’d stopped shooting pictures and was shaking her head.
Brita nodded. “Got that in one, Shamile. This is definitely a crime of passion.” She lifted the evidence bag with the bloody knife in it and examined it closely. Though the blade was covered in blood, the handle had been wiped partially clean. Probably to remove prints. It was odd that the killer had left the knife on the scene.
She stood up, looking at her partner. “Stabbed, beaten, and then strangled as close as I can tell.”
Bud jerked his head toward the body being loaded into the back of the first ambulance. “Any ID on her?”
The woman with Lautaro had had her throat cut. She’d been found a few feet away from the racer, lying in a wide pool of her own blood.
Brita nodded. “Her name was Candy Sweet.” She lifted an eyebrow at her partner and he chuckled. “With a name like that, I almost hope we learn that she’s a stripper or something. Any mother who would name her daughter Candy Sweet should be beaten.”
Brita and Bud walked toward the street. They were in an alley in downtown Indianapolis, with a bar on one side and a flower shop on the other. “When we’re done here, let’s start with the usual stuff. I’ll question everybody at the Speedway. You take his residence. Find out if anybody’s been around there lately who looked like he wanted to stab, bludgeon, and strangle Lautaro.”
Bud smirked. “Can I have the bar?”
Brita shook her head. “Nice try. You get the flower shop.”
“I got allergies, Muldane. You’re killin’ me here.”
She laughed, shaking her head. Bud was a recovering alcoholic and they both knew a bar was the last place he should be. She clapped him on the shoulder. “You can pick up some roses for Betty while you’re in there.”
He threw her a disgusted look, but was grinning when he turned toward the shop. The owner stood in the doorway, her long face pale as she watched Lautaro’s body being zipped into a bag.
Brita headed into the bar to question the bartenders. Surely somebody saw something the night before. She found it hard to believe Lautaro could be murdered so thoroughly without some sign of trouble leading up to it.
Brita had to agree with Shamile. Lautaro must have really hacked somebody off.
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- Writer
