Chasing Justice: A Matt Royal Mystery Read Free Page A

your citizens, I think. At least that’s what his driver’s license says. Apparently, he’s been living on the mainland, in a condo in one of those new high rises on Main Street. We found him dead this morning. Or at least his housekeeper found him in the living room of his condo and called us.”
    “Foul play?”
    “Gunshot to the head. Left temple.”
    “Suicide?”
    “Not unless he got rid of the gun between the time he shot himself and the time he died.”
    “Well, as a trained detective, I’d begin to think it was murder. Good luck on the case. I’ll ask around and see if anybody knows him.”
    “He’s pretty well known, I think. The Longboat Key address on his driver’s license is on Gulf of Mexico Drive, but he’d been living in a condo downtown for at least the last couple of months. He just moved into the condo two weeks ago. I’m told he has an estranged wife somewhere, maybe on the key. Do you have time to check out his house and see if it looks lived in?”
    “And notify the wife if she’s still there?”
    “That would be super.” Death notifications were the hardest part of a cop’s job and J.D. hated doing them, but Harry had done her some good turns, and she owed him.
    J.D. made a U-turn in the police parking lot and drove several blocks north to a large bayside home. She rang the bell, waited, and then knocked on the door. No answer. She scrawled a note on the back of a business card asking that Mrs. Bannister call her as soon as possible. She stuck the card between the door and the jamb and left.
    * * *
    The police station was busy. Three people in shorts, t-shirts, and flip-flops were sitting in the waiting room, looking anxious. A uniformed officer was sitting quietly in another chair. He nodded to J.D. Iva, the civilian receptionist, was on the phone, and waved a finger as the detective came through the door leading from the parking lot. Deputy Chief Martin Sharkey was coming toward her as she walked down the hall toward her office. “What’s that all about in the waiting room?” J.D. asked.
    “Their car was broken into yesterday, and they want to file a report for insurance purposes.”
    “Where was the car?”
    “In the airport in Minneapolis.”
    “You’re kidding. Why didn’t they talk to the police up there?”
    Sharkey laughed. “They said they were running late for their flight and one of them had to go back to the car to retrieve something. The driver’s side window was smashed out, but he had to get back to the gate.”
    J.D. shook her head. “Was anything missing?”
    “The guy didn’t take time to look.”
    “Good luck with that one,” J.D. said, as she moved on.
    As she passed Chief Bill Lester’s office, he called to her. “Got time to bring me up to date on that murder?”
    J.D. went into his office and took a seat. “Not much to report,” she said. “The husband’s in the wind. No one’s seen him since Friday. The back of her head was bashed in. That’s probably the cause of death. She was nude, and there were no other marks on the body. She probably fell face first, but the body was on its back on the floor, so somebody must have turned her over before we got there.”
    “Sexual assault?”
    “No obvious signs, but she’s on Doc Hawkins’ table now. We’ll know more this afternoon.”
    “Any gut feelings?”
    “You mean other than that the husband did it?”
    The chief laughed. “The odds are usually pretty good on that.”
    “We’ll see. Do you know a man named Nate Bannister?”
    The chief’s face clouded a bit. “Yeah. I know him. A real piece of work. Why?”
    “I got a call a few minutes ago from Harry Robson at Sarasota PD, asking about him. It seems that somebody found Bannister dead in a condo downtown this morning.”
    “That’s not going to be any great loss,” Lester said.
    “I didn’t know him. What was his problem?”
    “He was just a mean son of a bitch. He was a developer here on the key until we got built out, and