Icy Betrayal Read Free

reached over, opened the door, and made the introduction.
    “Investigator Serrano will take good care of you. She’s the best we’ve got, so you’re in good hands.”
    Mia smiled and replied to Brooks, “There’s a thermos of hot coffee in the front seat of my car. You look like you could use some.”
    “You’re a lifesaver, Investigator.”
    Mia walked to the driver’s side of the car, climbed in the cruiser and started in.
    “I’m very sorry you had to experience this, ma’am. Can I get your full name?”
    “Lisa Ann Sullivan,” the woman replied, looking away.
    “May I call you Lisa?”
    The woman nodded as a fresh stream of tears ran down her cheeks.
    “I know this is a horrible experience for you, but I do need to ask you some questions as to what happened out here this morning. I hope you understand.”
    “It’s okay, I just feel so bad for that poor man. I just never saw him till it was too late.”
    “Okay, let’s start from the beginning.”
    Sullivan told Mia she had left her home in Rosebud at about five that morning, setting out for her sister’s apartment in the town of Big Pine some forty miles away. Her sister had been going through a nasty divorce and had called in the middle of the night, very upset. Sullivan decided she’d go to Big Pine to be with her sister.
    “It was so dark,” she sobbed. “I was coming around that corner and there he was. I wasn’t speeding, honest. It was slick, and I was worried about ice.”
    “How fast do you think you were going?” Mia asked.
    “I’m not sure. Maybe twenty-five, thirty miles an hour. I tried to stop. That’s when it happened.”
    Sullivan described the impact with more detail than the investigator expected. She said she hit him full on, and the victim was thrown onto the hood of her car. After contact, she slammed on her brakes and the man went skidding off the hood and landed on the shoulder of the road. She stopped and quickly checked on him, trying to find a pulse but couldn’t detect one. She told Mia she worked as an LVN at the hospital near Rosebud, and that from her training she knew he was dead. She then “freaked out,” as she put it, and after gathering her wits about her, used her cell phone to call 911.
    “I’m so sorry, Lisa. We will need to get a more detailed statement from you at headquarters in Castle Springs. Deputy Brooks will take you there, and we’ll see that your car is towed. We’ll need to process your vehicle as part of the investigation—this is just routine protocol in these kinds of incidents. Would you like me to call your sister?”
    Lisa Sullivan shook her head. “I’ll call her.”
    “Okay, wait here and I’ll have someone come and take you to headquarters.”
    Sullivan agreed and Mia climbed out of the car. She shielded her eyes from the morning sun, now breaking over the horizon to the east, and walked towards Larry Voss to check in with him on the progress being made. Her crew would likely be on scene for the better part of the day completing the preliminary investigation. With traffic fatalities it was important to get everything needed from the scene the first time around, especially when weather was a factor. The forecast that day called for snow.
    “Investigator, you might want to check this out,” called out a deputy coming out of the trees and onto the road thirty feet beyond the body. Mia walked over for a look. There, off the edge of the shoulder, was a rifle, its barrel obscured by fallen pine branches. Mia reached into her pocket for some latex gloves, put them on and carefully removed the rifle from the branches. She examined it closely, noticing the initials GML carved in the handle of the weapon. The rifle, as well as the orange vest George Myron Lombard was wearing, led Mia to believe their victim had been out hunting when he was struck and killed by the driver of the Fiesta.
    It all fit and made sense, so why was she so uneasy?

FOUR

    T he sheriff’s department building