Rest Stop

Collinsport. As the long stormy night continues, Lieutenant Mills had hoped for a quiet night at home so as to curled up with her favorite author, a glass of wine, and the prospect of a relaxing night away from the Mayor and the Town Council and the administrative headache of acting Chief of Police. With the conclusion of the Silva case, which has irritated her not only for the fact he had been a consultant to the Collinsport Police Department, but that the Collinsport Star had seen fit to call him the Vampire Murderer. But, as she dozes off listening to a favourite classical piece while reading, she is about to be awakened to yet another grisly murder.

Every since the view of her first body, a drug dealer who had been shot several times in his car outside his home, Lieutenant Mills habitual performed the same ritual. She would sit behind the wheel of her car, and looked up into the rear view mirror. Not for any considerable length of time, but for just a moment. A moment to look at her reflection. At her eyes. Even though she had felt herself fully prepared that first time — a rookie with the Augusta Police — the grim view of the blood and the white fragments of bone and the brain matter splattered on the driver-side window had taken her aback. Since that time, she took this moment. This solitary moment to steel herself. She reached now for the cup of coffee she had stopped to get at the Circle K on route. She took a sip of the warm coffee and looked now through the rain-wet windshield. She took a long breath and then slowly let it out just as her hand reached over and grasped the handle of the car door. As she heard the sound of the latch, she felt herself now ready. Ready – for whatever human carnage had been left for her to investigate.

Of course, the worst crime scene she had seen of late had been only a few months ago – the discovery of those girls at the Cranshaw House. A case she never felt was adequately resolved.

She had awoken with a start. She had at first reached over and picked up the still open Agatha Christie murder mystery, “Murder on the Orient Express,” which she had been reading, when she had apparently fallen asleep, before quickly reaching over to grab the cell phone from her bedside table. Officer Anderson informed her that two bodies had been found out on Old Jerusalem Lot Road – the rest area not all that far from Collinsport— and just within CPD’s jurisdiction, rather than New Bedford’s Sheriff Department. She was at first irritated at the lateness of the call but also relieved that it was within her jurisdiction. Not that Sheriff McCauley wasn’t a competent man – she had had some interactions with him—but New Bedford only had a population 546 and he was not all that experienced with multiple homicides. CPD would have been asked for help in any event. It would be better for CPD to handle the case rather than try some interdepartmental investigation – she wasn’t a control freak, it was just less bureaucratic.

Her hand pulled the handle of the door and she heard the latch release.

Dark asphalt glistens with the brilliant blue and white flashes of the police cars that strategically block Old Jerusalem Lot Road as she closes the door behind her. The evening’s rain has for the moment subsided into a fine mist that has become more like a fog now along the lonely stretch of highway. The night air is filled with the cacophony police radios. Officers move about the isolated rest area, their high beam flashlights skimming the wet ground.

Officer Anderson nods to her as she walks in front of the headlight beams of her car, “Lieutenant Mills, this one is a bad one.”

She nods as she takes a sip of her cooling coffee, watching now as Samantha Brook tires to slip back under the blue and white police tape stretched out into a square around the outline where the body had been. She has taken note of the black hummer of the medical examiner, which had pulled to a halt only moments before her.

“Scott! Get the lights up.” She yells over to Officer Stephenson as she turns to look at Anderson, “So Brook called it in?”

“Yes, Samantha Brook.” He tells her, motioning to Samantha who is being directed by Officer O’Malley to moved back and she goes to stand beside the car parked at the rest stop – not in a parking slot, but oddly at an angle. The car has Virginia plates. The driver’s door is open and the interior light is on.

The Lieutenant thinking to herself, oh God, about having to deal with Brook, but instead says, “And why’s she out here at this time of night?”

“Said she was out walking – she’s been drinking.” Officer Anderson tells her. Mills nods, suspecting that was the case.

“Ah Miss Brook, We meet again.” She says walking up toward Miss Brook, once more attempting to move under the thin barrier of the blue and white tape, “How’s the mouth?”

Samantha Brook freezes and stuffs her hands into the pockets of her coat.

“Please, come out here Miss Brook. I’d like to have a little chat if you don’t mind.”

Mills turns back to see Isabella Collins, who had rolled onto the scene only moments before her, opening the passenger-side door of the black hummer and reaching in to grab her large black forensic kit from the passenger seat. She adjusts her dress.

Mills frowns—what is it with Collins? Doesn’t she own any regular clothing? Looks like she’s just left a strip club. Mills even when off duty always dresses sensibly. She almost smiles as she wonders what the Belgian detective would think seeing wearing that dress to a crime scene.

Mills looks back over at the marked off area where an outline of a body has been chalked on the wet cement, “The medical examiner just got here, so why’s the body been moved?”

Officer Anderson rather than answer, looks over at Officer O’Malley, who looks a bit uneasy “I am sorry Lieutenant, but – I mean, what with how the Town Council has been going on about the Vampire Killer and all, I just got Stephenson to help me put him in a bag,” He indicates a body bag off to the side, “I mean, not wanting anyone to drive by and see it – like that, you know headless.”

Mills glares at him. “Headless?”

“The vic had been decapitated Lieutenant.” Anderson informs her.

See can see Tillinghast making up Star headlines now.

“Brook the only witness?”

“All we have at the moment.” Anderson tells her.

She sighs and removes a tape recorder from her pocket and steps over to Samantha Brook. She presses record: “Why don’t you tell me what you saw then, eh?”

Isabella Collins pulling on a pair of blue latex gloves she walks over to the crime scene eyeing the detectives, not at all happy at what she sees as she takes note of the taped off area, the outline of a body on the wet cement of the parking lot, “May I ask—where’s the body?”

Officer Anderson points over to a body bag.

“Before I had an opportunity to see it first? You moved it?” She asks.

“Hey I know.” He holds up his hands in defense, “I was not first on the scene. O’Malley should not have moved it, but—” Officer Anderson tells her indicating the body bag off to the side. “It is what it is.”

“It is a f**k up, is what it is.” She says angrily.

“Firstly Miss Brook, are you hurt in any way?” The Lieutenant asks.

“Well—I have been having some rather bad headaches lately.” Samantha Brook replies, “But, otherwise, no I don’t think so.”

Isabella Collins stops and glares at the body bag and than back at the officer in growing anger.

“From the mouth?”

Samantha shakes her head, “Naw, that’s much better – this is. Headaches, you know.”

“That is good.” The Lieutenant tells Miss Brook, and she now looks at the woman inquisitively. She has been drinking, that is for certain. “Now, can you tell me what you saw when you arrived here, and what time you did?”

“And WHAT do you think I can do with that,” Isabella snaps at the officers, “Now that you have moved it! The weather’s bad enough—washing away no telling how much evidence, cross contamination, but, you . . . “ Her eyes filled with the infamous Collins anger, “Whatever possessed you to move the body?”

O’Malley steps back and sighs. “Well, like I was telling the Lieutenant, what with all that talk about the Vampire Killer, and how the Council has been all in a mighty uproar about tourists and all, I didn’t want anyone seeing . . . this one just yet.”

She looks at the deserted highway, “You mean the constant flow of traffic?” Her voice is filled with angry sarcasm.

Officer Anderson shines his high-beam flashlight on the body bag as she steps over and kneels and unzips the stiff nylon.

Samantha Brook’s attention is diverted over to the sound of the zipper and the body bag.

“Are you alright, Miss Brook?” The Lieutenant asks, seeing her sway slightly as she looks over at the remains exposed in the beam of the flashlight.

Inside is the body of a man. He was tall, maybe 6 feet. He is wearing a bloody t-shirt and jeans.

Isabella Collins kneels and sighing deeply, she places her head in her hand and rubs her temples.

Samantha Brook starts digging in her coat trying to find a watch of some sort, trying to remember what time it is, what time it was . . . when she found the body

Isabella sees that the corpse is missing a head.

Lieutenant Mills focuses her attention on Miss Brook – her reactions to the display of the body more than the corpses revelation.

“Ummm. . . umm.” Samantha says unable to take her eyes off the corpse, “When did I call you?”

“Close to 40 minutes ago.” The Lieutenant tells her—aware she is certainly not going to be at all a very viable witness, “So right after you saw the victims, you did what? Walk around? Touch the body? Call the police? Have another drink?”

“Yes,” She suddenly grins happily. “Yes, I called the police.”

“And you did not touch anything?”

“Well, I poked him with a stick . . . “ Samantha tells her.

Isabella Collins overhearing the conversation almost jumps at the witness in her desire to wrap her long fingers around the person’s neck. She steps over to her, “What stick?”

“So, you poked him with a stick.” Lieutenant Mills nods, ignoring Miss Collins. “To validate the dead. I see. Now, did you see anyone else in the area?”

“Nopes” Samantha says and shakes her head a bit drunkenly. She points to a twisted branch lying at the rear of the car, “It wasn’t pointy.” She says in regards to the stick.

Miss Collins looks at it, then back at the witness, before she is suddenly aware that some of the officers are starting to move the already bagged body. Isabella rushes back over to them, dunking under the blue and white tape, and swats them away, “Don’t you touch that. The damage you’ve already done is already far to numeral to count. You don’t have to make it worse.”

Lieutenant Mills glances at Collins for a moment, and then back to the witness, “So, do you know who they are?”

Isabella protectively stands over her body and places down her kit. She glares at O’Malley and then kneels to unzip the bag again all the way down and quickly begins a preliminary examination of the remains, a fire flickering in her eyes as she contemplates the compromised evidence. She looks up suddenly at Officer O’Malley standing beside her, “Where the hell is its head?”

“Umm I don’t know them . . . “ Samantha replies listening to the attractive woman in the very nice dress berating the officer.

With a small evidence bag containing a wallet in his hand, Officer Anderson informs her, “This one is Peter Moxley, from Falls Church, Virginia, Lieutenant.”

Lieutenant Mills shuts her eyes and rubs the bridge of her nose. “THANK you officer. I was asking Miss brooks here.”

Officer O’Malley, hands on his thick black leather belt looks down at the medical examiner, “”Well, ma’am, we can’t find it.”

Isabella glares up at the officer with a growing fury, “What do you mean you can’t find it? It’s a head. A spherical object that was once attached to the neck, it’s not something you would overlook. This gentleman,” she motions to the remains within the body bag, “Obviously had one, maybe if you had waited to bag the body till a professional got here you wouldn’t have lost it.”

“I didn’t lose it—” He tells her, his lips drawn tight.

“Was the head separated when you found the bodies?” Lieutenant Mills asks, having overheard the altercation between O’Malley and the ME.

“Ahh.” Samantha says.

“No, I was asking Officer O’Malley.”

He looks back at the Lieutenant and then at Miss Collins, “Naw, it was gone. It looks like whoever did this . . . took it.”

Lieutenant Mills turns to look at Samantha Brook, “Miss Brook?”

“Ummmm.”

“Did you see a head lying about?” She notices that Miss Brook seems for some reason to be highly disoriented.

“But we have been looking—everywhere.” O’Malley tells the ME.

Isabella Collins she looks back at the body and checks the neck examining the wound closely, “So—the head was missing.” She says almost to herself noting the tear of the tissue around the neck . . . as if the head might have been wrenched off – or bitten off? But she does not want to make that determination until she has it in her lab.

“Yes, ma’am that was why I—put it in the bag, I mean, if someone happened to see it—you know, a headless body—lying out here, what with all this vampire business . . .”

“Vampires don’t decapitate their victims, Officer.” Miss Collins snaps.

Samantha Brook stands watching intently—so, she knows about vamps, she thinks to herself.

“Miss Brook?” The Lieutenant tries to regain her attention.

“Was this the only body found at the scene . . . or did you already bag another to save passer-bys the horrible sight.” Miss Collins asks.

“No ma’am, it’s over in the men’s restroom—there,” he points to the old cinder block building behind him.

Officer Elliot, who has been stationed at the taped off entranceway now motions with his flashlight and points to the door of the rest area bathroom.

Isabella Collins cocks an eyebrow at the officers and stands upright once again and with a glance at the building grabs her bag and walks over briskly to check on what she hopes is an uncompromised corpse. She calls out over her shoulder to O’Malley and Anderson, “Don’t either of you touch my body again until I come back.”

Anderson looks at O’Malley, “You heard the lady.”

“D**ned Collins.” O’Malley mutters to himself.

Miss Collins along the front of the spray-paint tagged cinder block building, taking note that the outside fluorescent light is not working. She spots woman’s shoe kicked off to the side in the shadow. She steps past the officer stationed at the entrance and enters the horrid smelling men’s room to find a headless woman’s torso lying on the filthy bathroom floor.

Lieutenant Mills, having determine that Samantha Brook is useless as a witness – crazy as well as drunk, closes her notebook. She looks over at Officer Scott Anderson, her most efficient and intelligent officer, “Officer Anderson, finish taking Miss Brook’s statement.’

“Yes, ma’am.” He says.

“And Scott, where the hell are those floodlights?” She asks moving over to the cinder block building. The whole area is dark, as the florescent tube that lights it has burned out. She walks now over toward the entrance where Officer Elliot remains standing, he nods to her as she takes a sip of her cold coffee.

“It looks like she must have ran into the men’s room, and the killer followed her.” Officer Elliot surmises as he stands in the narrow entry and watches the ME approach the body.

Mills enters the darken entryway – the scent of stale urine mixed now with blood a thick a very malodorous miasma.

“HEY!” Samantha Brook calls out as she enters, “That’s a men’s room!”

Officer Elliot shines his high-beam flashlight in front of the Lieutenant lighting the way for her. She notes a footprint in blood. “I kept O’Malley out of here for you. Everything is as it was found.” Elliott tells them.

Lieutenant Mills turns the corner to see the badly lit men’s room,. There is a lone light bulb incased in some metal circular cage to protect it. The sinks are foul and mildewed. The walls have layer upon layer of graffiti and spray-paint tags. There are urinals along the wall beside the terrible sinks – and they look even worse. A stall, with the door half attached is to the right. On the floor lies the body of a woman. She appears to have been perhaps in her late twenties, maybe a little older – by her body – as her head too is missing.

The splatter of blood is everywhere on the grimy floor.

The Lieutenant observes Isabella Collins intently examining the body, bent down, as if the grime and filth and blood on the floor were not there. She wonders just what the reaction of the Belgian detective would have been to have to enter this room, to have to bend down and examine a body in something this filthy.

It was a far cry from the Orient Express.

Blue latex gloves firmly in place, Miss Collins is gently touching the neck wound bending closer to examine it.

“There’s a bloody footprint at the door.” She tells the Lieutenant, not looking up from the neck would, “A man’s work boot by the looks of it. Size eleven”

Officer Elliot shines a light on a hacksaw lying on the floor, “Looks like that the murder weapon!”

Isabella continues to examine the body, ”No, that’s window dressing.

“Window dressing?” Mills asks.

“Blade is not consistent with the wound – it was left here to appear to be the murder weapon.”

“Why—something about the wound they are trying to cover-up?” Mills asks – d**ed the coffee is too cold.”

“Won’t know until I have her in the lab.”

Lieutenant Mills takes note of a light switch, flips it, but nothing happens. “More burned out bulbs?”

“Odd isn’t it.” Isabella notes.

Outside Anderson and O’Malley get the crime scene floodlights up and turned on. A blaze of light covers now the front of the bathroom, as well as the taped off area where the body was once lying in the parking lot.

“Elliot, get some tape over this door.” The Lieutenant tells the officer standing who is standing beside her shining the flashlight for her. “Collins, a word if you please?”

Isabella, looking up and motions to the hacksaw, “Bag and tag it anyway.”

“Right Lieutenant.” Officer Elliot says and hurries out of the narrow confines of the entryway of the men’s room. The room is lit by the dim 60 watt bulb above the sinks.

“I am busy if you please.” Izzy tells the Lieutenant, leaning to sniff at the body.

“Collins, just what the f**k are you wearing?”

Isabella Collins glances up through her long black hair at the officer and ignoring the question and then returns to running her gloved hands over the body’s torso.

“You do not show up to examine a crime scene wearing S&M garb. I expect a level of professionalism and I seem to not be getting it.”

She falls silent as Officer Elliot returns with a plastic evidence bag and carefully puts the saw it in, “This is bad, Lieutenant. Two more tourists.”

“GOOD GOD! Elliott forget tourists. “ She says looking at all the blood on the floor, “Look at this, what is it a massacre?”

Samantha Brook pokes her head in the door, “Yes . . . yes it is.”

Isabella Collins stops and looks back over her shoulder, then at the Lieutenant. She does not want to say it, but thinks, if you worried half as much about the unprofessionalism of these officers and less about fashion.

Mills turns and snaps at Miss Brook, “You – out, out of here.”

She looks over at Officer Elliot, “Have Anderson take control of the scene.”

Isabella returns to the corpse. She takes the women’s hands in hers and examines the fingers one by one, then followed by the wrists, and then the rest of the arm to the shoulders.

“Lieutenant, when you call me out here in the middle of the night . . . you will be lucky I am wearing clothing at all.” She tells her.

“We will talk later Collins, but mark my words, this is far from over.” And the Lieutenant leaves the building.

“O’Malley, start collecting and photographing. Thomas, set up a road block on this section.” She directs, looking for someplace to trash the cold coffee. “Scott! Good, you’ve got the lights up. Go check the women’s rest room for more bodies.”

“Right.”

Isabella Collins, grabbing a set of tweezers from her bag, carefully takes a few hairs form the woman’s shirt and bagged them.

Samantha Brook pokes her head back in the door after Mills leaves, “Sooo. . . . . . do you like just strip when it hits 5 or. . . .?”

Miss Collins glares at her.

Samantha dodges back out of the door.

“Thank you for your help Brook.” The lieutenant says as she turns back to motion the woman way from the men’s room, “We’ll call you if we need any more information.”

Miss Collins places her instruments in her bag and standing up shoulders it, pointing to an officer. “Okay, bag her up carefully and ship her back to my office.”

She steps outside the horrid men’s room of the rest area into the bright lights mounted on the tripods and moves back toward the scene of the male victim.

“What’s the COD?” The Lieutenant asks Miss Collins.

“Decapitation.” Officer O’Malley replies.

“Oh, you’ve determined that?’ Isabella Collins asks walking past him, “So, what, you’re the new ME?”

“Well, their heads are missing.”

“Heads can be removed post-mortem officer.”

“Lots of blood for post-mortem—“ he says.

Samantha Brook having hurried over to women’s room where she had seen one of the officers head, having been so directed by Lieutenant Mills, finds herself knocked back by the door as he exits, “HEY.”

Lieutenant Mills takes a deep breath, so far she has very little to go on. She walks over to Chief St. Clair’s car, the one she has been using, opens the door and slips inside to get out of the misting rain and to use the radio, “Jim,” She speaks into the radio mike, “get me the information on a Virginia Plate, license number KJG 2934.”

Officer Anderson stands looking at the taped off area as Isabella Collins steps up, “Looks like the husband, he gets attacked first and then wife . . .”

“Looks as if he went to use the rest room. She waits. Another car pulls up. He comes out, and there, under what was a lit florescent tube, whoever is in the second car, confers with him – they then walk toward the Moxley car. Something happens, and he tries to defend himself. She gets out to no doubt in order to try and help. Then he get’s killed.” Isabella says as she walks along to the first crime scene and motions toward the body bag that contains the husband—she likes Anderson; he is sensible and can become a good cop. “She runs toward them – must have seen him killed and so she then runs in a panic . . .”

“To the men’s room.” He finishes.

She nods.

“How?”

“The evidence, what there is left of it, is all over, Officer Anderson.” She tells him.

Isabella Collins goes over to the scene and crouches down by the outline fading in the rain on the cement and muttering about the chalk particles getting in the way of her investigation. She examines the massive amount of blood loss in the head area and then, seeing something, opens her bag and reaching inside pulls out her tweezers and takes up another strand of hair from the soup of rain, blood and chalk. She looks at it closely.

“So you don’t think the beheading killed them?” Mills asks stepping up to the taped area, coming back from the car, having thanked Jim back at the station for the information he had given her.

“It’s too early to speculate just yet. Not enough information.” Isabella tells her.

“So far we have been lucky, seeing as this the Old Jerusalem Lot Road, there’s been almost no traffic.” Officer Anderson says to the lieutenant and the medical examiner. “Odd that the [i[Star[/i] hasn’t gotten someone out here yet.”.

“It’s the middle of the night – and it is Old Jerusalem’s Lot Road after all.” Mills reflects.

Samantha Brook’s gaze drifts off to the woods and suddenly she freezes.

Isabella Collins, in the bright light of the mounted crime scene floodlights now looks over the contaminated ground where the body had been, and moves closer to where the head should have been –

Slowly, standing up and never taking her eyes off the woods, Samantha Brooks rises stiffly.

“When the morning shift comes on, we need to get more of us out here.” Lieutenant Mills states, wanting a nice hot cup of coffee, “we need to go over all of this.“ She motions to the entire rest area.

“Oh brilliant, perfect idea than,” Isabella mutters to herself, moving as if she is stalking a piece of lost evidence – there is something just there . . .

“Ah. . . ah. . . ah,” The Lieutenant now hears Miss Brook mumbling as if trying to speak.

“Did you get a story for WHY Brook was here in the middle of the night Anderson?” She asks Scott as she steps over to watch Miss Collins, who now moves over to where the head would have been chalked also, and seems to be peering into the blood and the mixture of rain at . . .

“She said she was out walking, that she does it a lot.” He says, “You know, the woman is a bit . . .you know.”

“Crazy.”

“Yeah.”

“Find something Collins?” The Lieutenant calls out aware of the medical examiner’s odd movements around the chalked out area.

“I need a camera over here,” Isabella replies.

“Scott! Camera for Collins.”

Officer Anderson hurries over to his patrol car, and takes the 35mm bag out of the trunk and hurries over.

Completely blocking out the rest of the world her eyes focus on the blood pooled at the base of the chalk outline—she reaches up and takes the camera Officer Anderson offers her, and removes the lens cap.

“What is it?”

“Something was under the blood – something drawn on the ground.”

He peers down, “W-what?”

“Just traces, the blood and rain – but there was something,” She takes several photos from different angles.

The flash explodes light into the night.

“Miss Brook!” The lieutenant yells over to Samantha Brook who is standing staring into the woods. “Just one more question for you. I completely neglected to ask what you where doing at this ungodly hour so far from civilization.”

Samantha Brook’s eyes flash a dull shade of yellow and she suddenly grabs Officer O’Malley as he walks past and pulling him into a tight headlock she quickly grabs and draws his gun.

“Miss Brook. Now, perhaps you would,” but her questions are abruptly halted as the woman grabs O’Malley for no good reason, and she’s pulling his gun.

Lieutenant Mills has her Sig out and aimed at Brook, “Release Officer O’Malley! Now!”

“Keep. . . keep him away from me!” Samantha yells back and keeps the drawn gun pointed not to the officers, but towards the woods.

“Put the gun down!” Officer Stephenson yells, his weapon drawn.

“Miss Brook! Drop the gun! Now!” Mill’s voice hard edged as she tries to see what Brook is looking at—why she is waiving the gun at the woods.

A battered pickup drive up slowly, the driver seeing the all the flashing lights, slows and moves by as an officer directs him past the scene.

Samantha Brook just sudden collapses, dropping the gun as she spins around clutching at her head, muttering and mumbling.

Lieutenant Mills quickly moves to secure the fallen gun, “Elliot! Take her into custody!”

Officer Elliot steps over and quickly whips her around and slips handcuffs on her and grabbing one elbow moves her over to a patrol car.

Isabella Collins glances over at the sudden confrontation between this Brook woman and the officers. She sees Lieutenant Mills holstering her weapon and handling a gun to O’Malley.

Samantha Brook doesn’t move, so the officer has to drag her toward the car, “Come on now Miss Brook,” He tells her.

“This whole affair is quickly turning into a Charlie foxtrot,” Mills says and sighs looking over at the medical examiner and then to Officer Anderson – only hours before she was in bed on the Orient Express with Hercule and now she’s out here – in the rain, two bodies, both beheaded, in a stand-off with a crazy woman with a gun . . . this crazy-a**ed town.

A second officer helps Elliot now by opening the patrol car door. Elliot makes sure she does not hit her head as he places her in the seat and closes the door.

Lieutenant Mills steps over and looks into the victims car, standing in the open door, “Call Arliss Mills and have him come out here and get this car and take it into impound.” She leans in making certain there is nothing in the drivers seat and carefully sits down, looking over the interior.

“God, what was all that about,” Elliot asks to the other officer.

The second officer shrugs, “Hell if I know. Like she saw something out in the woods.”

“Yeah.” They both look over to where she was pointing the gun, feeling uneasy – there was just too much of the hint of the ‘History’ in all of this.

Isabella Collins bagging up her equipment shoulders her bag and walks over to the officers now that the arrest had been made.

Lieutenant Mills exits the abandoned vehicle with no more clues than she entered.

“So Collins. Can you tell me anything?”

“It’s my job to tell you things.”

“Then tell me who died first?”

Samantha Brook suddenly lunges at the windows of the squad car.

“Someone drive that lunatic to the station and put her behind bars!” The Lieutenant’s patience having run out – it’s too early, too little coffee, too many dead tourists, and a madwoman.

“So?” She looks back at Miss Collins.

“The male victim died first.” She tells her.

“And you have no COD, even preliminary?”

“As I said, I need to get them to the lab – but other than decapitation, which is a conclusion everyone is jumping too, it also seems that almost every bone in their bodies have been broken, and there is evidence that suggests multiple organ rupture before death – hence the the bruising in the abdomen. On both victims.”

“Hey, Pete take her back to the station.” Officer Anderson tells O’Malley as he walks over toward the car where Miss Brook seems to have settled back to stare out the windows at the woods anxiously.

“The heads where pulled off, ripped right from their shoulders by something.”

O’Malley nods happy to get away from this horrible scene.

“Pulled off?”

“Yes.”

Lieutenant Mills can’t help but think of Sheriff Patterson.

“I will need to take them to the lab for more examination but basically,” Miss Collins tells the Lieutenant as she shifts the shoulder strap of her bag on her shoulder, “They got the s**t beat out of them.”

Samantha Brook suddenly screams.

Officer O’Malley shakes his head and opens the door to his patrol car, “So I get the crazy one.”

Anderson smiles, “Get’s you out of the weather and way from Miss Collins.”

O’Malley nods and gets into the car. He starts the patrol car up, turns on the sirens and pulls away, heading back to Collinsport.

“I am certain that the female, considering the beating she took was trying to crawl into the stall for some protection just before her head was removed.”

“How much gas was in the car when it was found?” The Lieutenant suddenly asks, walking back to look into the car and at the dashboard, “How long was it left running?”

Officer Anderson sighs, “Not sure Lieutenant, O’Malley was the first on the scene. You know, he was Patterson’s cousin, so he’s not . . .” he lets the comment trail off.

“I want this car gone over, thoroughly.” Mills says.

Isabella Collins takes note of who was first on scene and marks it down mentally as suspect number one on her list.

“Something you suspect?” Anderson asks.

“Basically, what I want to know is if this couple where being chased by another car before the killing, and if they started to run out of gas, tried to hide here – or . . .”

Millis checks the gas and there seems to be about a fourth of a tank—not much for this lonely stretch of highway. Car mileage is about 76,436 miles. She goes to the front lifts the hood to take a look at the engine, “Hey, all of the coolant is gone as if evaporated. Now that’s odd.”

She takes note of Miss Collins now looking back at the men’s room, “Something Miss Collins?”

“I think the florescent tube was burning and something caused it to go out also.”

She frowns, “Don’t go all Silva on me Collins.” She then takes a look at her watch. “Okay Scott, this is your case. Get that hacksaw dusted for prints and see what else you can find. I’m promoting you to acting detective until St. Clair returns to review your work and give her approval.”

Officer Anderson smiles, “Thank you, Lieutenant! Will do.”

“Oh and Collins. Get some godd**ned clothes on and get to the lab. I want Anderson to know everything that happed to those two within 2 hours of their deaths.” She says as she heads back over toward her car.

She glares at the lieutenant and sighs, “There is something else . . .”

“This is Anderson’s case. Enlighten him. I’m getting a coffee. I’ll be in the station in an hour.”

Officer Anderson steps over, “Miss Collins, you notice something?”

She smirks and adjusts her bag, “Oh, don’t worry yourself Anderson, I am sure the Lieutenant will do just find with out my findings.”

Lieutenant Mills walks over to her boss’s car and gets in. Yawns, turns on the radio to the classic music station and drives off.

On the highway heading back to Collinsport, the patrol car driven by Officer O’Malley races through the night as the road in the headlight beams seems now to be a misty fog.

Officer O’Malley looks up in the rearview mirror back at Sam Brook in the back seat.

The siren is loud, the flashing lights reflecting in the night.

Samantha Brook stares back menacingly at the Officer’s eyes in the mirror.

“So Miss – I can ask you?”

“What?” Samantha says to his reflection in the mirror.

“Have you seen the Yellow Sign?”

She grins her eyes once again flashing with an odd yellow glint, “Oh no. I have seen HIM.”

“You have seen HIM?” O’Malley asks in awe.

Samantha Brook smiles, a wicked smile, “Oh yes, HE is here.”

Cue Music End Of Episode