Joe considered rushing them, but they were both bigger as well as filled with the official hubris that always resulted when there was a multiple homicide in a single-digit crime rate county. Their blood was running hot with purpose. He knew better than to try and get through them.
Instead, he circled the house hoping he could see inside. If he saw April, he decided, he was going in even if he had to fight his way inside. He walked on the lawn around the left side of the house and saw a side door with another deputy stationed at it. Joe waved and kept walking, looking in every window and seeing nothing out of the ordinary. He walked the length of the back of the house and around the side. He was noting a broken window to what looked like the kitchen when the tip of his boot ticked something metallic. He stopped and looked down. Spent cartridges from a handgun blinked in the sun. He counted eight before he stopped counting, then stepped back and away so he wouldn’t crush them into the ground. From the location of the spent shells, he could imagine a gunman standing just outside the kitchen and firing inside. It bolstered his theory when he noted there was no broken glass under the window in the flowerbed-the glass had been blown inside the house. He wanted to show the FBI agents what he’d found.
Coon was exiting the front door of the ranch house, struggling with the removal of a pair of latex gloves. As Joe approached, Coon held up a gloved hand made a sick yellow by the latex covering and said, “I’d suggest you stay where you are. Agent Portenson just gave the order to seal up the crime scene as soon as we get more photos of the victims taken out of there.”
“Who are the victims?” Joe asked, feeling his chest constrict.
Coon said, “An adult male DOA in the kitchen. Another adult male in critical condition. The EMTs are loading him on a gurney as we speak.”
“Anyone else?”
Coon frowned. “Should there be?”
“The nine-one-one call mentioned bodies outside. Is there a girl in there?”
“No.”
“Can I look?”
“I said…”
“Stay the hell out,” Portenson interrupted, appearing behind Coon. He was red-faced. “Why are you always around, anyway?”
Joe sighed in frustration. “Can you at least describe the scene to me? What’s your best guess what happened in there?”
Portenson rolled his eyes and shouldered past Coon toward the helicopter, making it clear he didn’t have time to waste with Joe. Over his shoulder, he said, “I want Stenko. I want his head on a platter.”
When Portenson was out of earshot, Coon said, “He is not a happy man.”
“He never has been. What’s going on?”
Coon said. “Tony is in big trouble because of that incident earlier today. Our bosses don’t like that kind of thing anymore because it attracts the wrong kind of attention in the press and in Washington. We’re supposed to be counterterrorism these days except for the occasional slam-dunk mob arrest. And when we screw up like we did this morning, the shit rolls downhill.”
Joe nodded.
“I think you know that all Agent Portenson really wants is to get out of Wyoming. What happened earlier doesn’t help. Neither one of us is out of the woods yet. Hell, I don’t mind whatever happens. I like it here and so does my family. But Tony…”
“… wants out,” Joe said. “I know. He wants to run with the big dogs.”
Coon nodded. “The only way he can make amends is to nail Stenko.”
Joe gave it a beat. “So what’s it look like inside?”
Coon finally got his right glove pulled off with a sharp snap. “As I said, two victims. One under the broken kitchen window. Male, thirties, dressed in tennis togs, if you can believe that. His ID said he was Nathanial Talich from Chicago. He was the youngest of the three brothers and considered to be the craziest…”
“The psycho,” Joe said, repeating the term from the call.
Coon nodded. “Multiple gunshot wounds. I could see one right below his eye, but my guess is he took at least a few more in the belly the way he was curled up.”
“The other guy?”
“The sheriff said he’s the owner of the ranch. A guy named Leo Dyekman. Also of Chicago,” he said, raising a single eyebrow. “We think he’s a known associate of Stenko. His money man, we think. Portenson is in communication with Washington now to confirm that.”
“Can you tell what happened?”
Coon shrugged. “It looks like a gunfight. They were both armed and I’m guessing they shot each other.”
Joe shook his head. “I doubt that. Can Dyekman talk?”
Coon narrowed his eye, not pleased by the Joe’s casual disregard of their theory. “Why? What do you think?”
“I’ll show you in a minute. Can Dyekman talk?”
“I’d be surprised if Dyekman ever talks, judging by the amount of blood he lost. I don’t think his wound was fatal-it looks like he got hit on the side of the neck-but he might have bled out after he made the call. There is a lot of blood in that house.”
Joe hoped none of it was April’s.
Coon said, “That’s the problem with living out here in the middle of nowhere. The EMTs can’t get to you in time.”
“So why do you think the two guys shot each other up?” Joe asked.
“Because that’s what it looks like, Joe. But that’s why we called in forensics. They might be able to figure out what the hell happened in there.”
“So why did Dyekman refer to more bodies?”
Coon shrugged. “Who knows?”
“Was there any other blood anywhere?”
“I told you, Joe, there’s blood all over the place. It looks like a slaughterhouse.”
“So why is the kitchen window broken?”
Coon gave Joe a big-eyed exasperated expression. “I don’t know, Joe,” he said with annoyance. “That’s why we called in our team.”
“I can’t wait for your team,” Joe said. “Look, there’s brass on the side of the house outside the kitchen window. I tried not to disturb it much. But what it looks like is that somebody stood outside and started blasting.”
Coon stared at Joe skeptically.
Joe said, “April’s not here. Every minute we wait for your team she gets farther away.”
Coon threw up his hands, said, “We don’t even know that she was ever here, Joe. Come on…”
Joe held up his hand and extended a finger for every point: “One, she said she was going to a ranch in the Black Hills. Two, these guys are associated with Stenko. Three, the caller said there were people who might be injured. Four, someone who is not on the floor in there stood outside the house and fired inside. Which says to me they got away from here and they probably took April, who might be hurt.”