They turned him over, handcuffed him, and dragged him toward a squad car, opened the back door, and shoved him inside horizontally, hands on his shoulders, legs, and feet. The door shut loudly.
Shock wobbled through her own body. What was Noah doing here, naked and covered in blood? He was a good student, quiet, friendly. Wasn’t that what people always said about serial killers after they were exposed?
“What happened?”
A co-ed asked Cheryl Beth the question, and she realized a crowd had gathered.
“I don’t know,” she said quietly.
“Do you know this man?”
It was the sergeant. He was a deputy sheriff, not one of the campus police officers. He had red hair and a wide, muscular body.
“He’s one of my students.”
“Here?”
Cheryl Beth nodded, and the sergeant wrote down the information, including her name and phone number in a small notebook.
“When was the last time you saw him?”
“Last week. He’s doing his clinical work.”
She stared at the squad car that held Noah.
“Someone should at least check his pulse.”
“We’ll take care of all that. Now you need to leave.” The sergeant then raised his voice. “You all need to move on. This is a crime scene.”
Cheryl Beth walked back the way she had come, her legs feeling weak and stringy, her mind wondering what had happened. She would read about it in the newspaper, but that would never tell the whole story. She actually knew a cop. But it had been a long time since she had seen him.
Chapter Four
“Pee-eye-pee-eye-oh!”
“What do you want, Dodds?”
Will Borders swung his body out of the bed with difficulty. The clock said 6:45. He thought about reaching for his cane and standing, then thought better of it. He already had the cell phone in one hand and his legs were feeling both tight and uncertain. He sat and listened to his old partner sing off-key.
“It’s a homicide, buddy.” His voice dropped into its normal roomy baritone.
“I kind of figured, since you’re a homicide detective.”
“Here in Over-the-Rhine, waiting on your white ass.”
“So? A homicide in Over-the-Rhine? I can record something later on the info line for the reporters, post it on the blog.”
“Not this time,” Dodds said. “A white man in a new Lexus with a blade sticking out of his chest. Two television news crews are already here, and we need our PIO on scene.”
Will muttered a profanity.
“Can’t be hard,” Dodds went on. “You’re living in the ghetto already.”
“All right, fifteen minutes.”
“Make it ten.” The line went dead.
Will took his seven a.m. Baclofen early, reached for his black steel cane, and stood. He knew the drill: Tight abdomen, stand with the interior muscles of his legs, and pull his shoulders back and down using his lats. It worked. The days when he could roll out of bed, shower, dress, and be at a crime scene in fifteen minutes were gone. But so were the days, after being discharged from the hospital, when dressing left him exhausted and in tears. Today he used the electric shaver, brushed his teeth, and combed his hair almost like a normal person. In the closet, he sat on a bench and dressed in a suit and tie with only moderate pain and discomfort. At least he could feel something below his waist. At least he was off the pain meds.