Where Angels Fear (Detectives Kane and Alton)

“Eight-thirty.” Wolfe cleared his throat. “Julie is keen to see the horses. Over.”

“We’ll take them for a ride.” Jenna stared ahead into the blanket of white, trying to recognize her surroundings. “It will be a nice break from searching for potential murder victims. Over.”

“Are you assuming the Axman disposed of the bodies of the potential victims by using the crusher? Over.”

Jenna exchanged a glance with Kane. “Yeah, is there a problem? Over.”

“It would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack. If the killer is smart enough to do that, he wouldn’t leave the crushed remains close by but add them to a pile. Usually there are stacks of cubes of flattened piles of metal waiting for pickup by the recyclers. I figure it will be best to look at the ones that have the least amount of snow on them. I’ll do them first then scan the office for trace evidence. Over.”

“Sure. Over and out.” She hung up the radio. “The truck ahead of us made the turn to the junkyard. I figure that’s the owner, Mr. Sawyer.”

They followed the vehicle along the snow-covered road but, surprisingly, the going wasn’t as bad as Jenna had expected. In fact, she could see the tracks of a number of vehicles in the hard-packed snow. “This road has been in use during the shutdown.”

“It was clear like this when I came by on Tuesday. I figured the snowplows kept it open for the plants.” Kane swung the truck around a sweeping bend, then pulled up beside a red pickup. “I’ll call them when we get back to the office and get their schedule.”

Jenna turned to look at him. “I’ll speak to the owner while Wolfe and Webber are hunting down the crushed vehicles and conducting a sweep for trace evidence.” She glanced at the many rows of snow-covered cars. “Check out the cars at the front and see if Sky’s car is there.”

“Okay. My truck will fit down those rows.” Kane rubbed his chin. “If it’s not in the first few vehicles, I’ll take a drive around the yard.” He gave her a long look. “I did a background check on Bill Sawyer and he came up clean, but take a look at him. He fits the description Ella gave us of the Axman.”

Jenna’s attention moved to the man getting out of his vehicle. “So I notice.”

Thirty-Six

Jenna climbed out the truck and, wrapping her scarf around her face, crunched through the snow to the burly man standing beside the gate to the recycling yard. “Bill Sawyer?”

“The one and only.” Sawyer’s ruddy face creased into a good-natured grin. “Now what’s all this about illegal use of my crusher?”

Jenna pulled the search warrant from her pocket and handed it to him. “We have a warrant to search your premises; we believe there may be evidence to support a missing person’s case we are investigating.”

“Okay.” Sawyer stuffed the warrant inside his pocket without glancing at it, pulled out a set of keys and unlocked the gate. He waved them inside. “Knock yourselves out.”

“I’d like you to explain the system to me.” Jenna waited for him to walk inside the yard then followed him, with Kane and the others close behind.

“When the vehicles arrive, my crew strips them of all working parts and pulls out anythin’ that can be resold. Hazardous materials are removed, the battery and the air conditioning drained. What’s left is crushed or shredded.”

Jenna nodded. “How many people have keys to this yard?”

“Me and my cousin Wyatt. He’s holdin’ a backup set in case of an emergency. I hold his spare set too.” Sawyer indicated past Jenna with his chin. “He owns the meat processing plant up yonder but that’s on shutdown right now too.”

Making a mental note to get his cousin’s full name, Jenna glanced behind her. Wolfe and Webber were busy brushing snow away from stacks of crushed metal and Kane had climbed up to peer inside the open mouth of the crusher. She turned back to Sawyer. “Do you have many vehicles waiting to be crushed?”

“That line there will be next.” He waved toward the rows and rows of vehicles piled up at the back of the lot. “The ones at the back we use for parts mostly, and when they are just shells, we crush them.”

“Do many people come by and ask you to crush their vehicles without removing anything?” Jenna watched his face but there was no change in his expression.

“Some do.” He shrugged. “I’ve had a few where the wife has argued with her husband, got his car in the divorce settlement then crushed it out of spite, but if they insist on crushin’ the entire vehicle, we still remove the battery and hazardous waste but we charge a higher price. Our profit comes from recyclin’ parts.”

Jenna nodded. “I gather you check the title before you crush the vehicles?”

“In most cases, yeah I

do.”

“So you believe it’s not always necessary? That would be illegal.” Jenna stared hard at him, but the man did not miss a beat.

“Nope. If they are abandoned and not valued at more’n five hundred, I crush them; and I get shipments via insurance companies, burned-out wrecks, abandoned cars with no identification numbers or plates. They are logged and then crushed.” He gave her a long look. “I check inside and the trunks before I crush anythin’. I don’t want no dead bodies stinkin’ up my place.”

Jenna’s neck prickled. He had just voiced her exact suspicions. “That’s a strange thing to say.”