JUST ONCE(6)
Author: Blake Pierce

 

"Okay," she said. "I can accept that. Thank you for giving me the chance. I won't let you down, Connor. I promise."

 

She'd gotten her way. And now she was ready to work. She knew if she was going to help Connor, she was going to be working hard. Hopefully there would be no time to lose focus.

 

Connor unlocked the car. Cami heard the locks snap open as she rushed around to the passenger side.

 

"Okay, then," Connor conceded. “Now open the damned gate.”

 

As she scrambled in, she pressed the button to unlock the gate. Immediately, it slid smoothly back.

 

Connor hit the gas, and sped out of the garage and onto the road. Fastening her seatbelt, Cami stared firmly ahead.

 

“Are we on the way to the crime scene?” she asked firmly. Crime scenes were not her favorite place, but she was going to do her best to find this killer, no matter what it took.

 

Glancing at her, looking surprised by her tone of voice, Connor then reached behind him, grabbed a folder off the back seat, and handed it to Cami.

 

"Here are the details on the case," he said. "You'd better read it, and get up to speed, as fast as you can, because what this killer is doing is seemingly impossible."

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER FOUR

 

 

 

 

 

"Impossible?" Feeling perturbed, Cami grabbed the folder as Connor continued.

 

"This crime scene is still active, and it's just ten minutes away. That's where we're going, to see if there's any evidence to be found."

 

Crime scenes had always been a stumbling block for Cami, but this time she promised herself that whatever horrors this scene held, she was going to deal with them. For Ethan, she was going to do this.

 

Connor sped down the main road, and veered onto a side road. Cami saw signage for a large sports and athletics complex located a couple of miles ahead. Was this where they were going?

 

Quickly, she paged through the case file, so that by the time they got there, she would have a better understanding of the case.

 

Three female athletes had died so far, each one while they had been training alone, Cami read, feeling horrified and intrigued.

 

"They all seem to have had heart attacks?" she asked Connor, who was waiting impatiently at a red light.

 

"Yes. They all seem to have heart attacks while training, but there are signs that they were all involved in a struggle prior to death. Marks, bruises on their arms that couldn't be explained from their workout. One had a shoe missing. Another had lost her hair tie. And most puzzling of all, a number was scrawled on their arms in permanent marker. The first victim had the number 195. The second one, I can’t remember, and the third, who was called in this morning, had 180."

 

"So it's like an unknown killer chased them, struggled with them, and then caused them to have a heart attack, before writing a number on their arm?" Cami asked incredulously. She recognized one of the victims' names. Lynne Horwood was a well-known Boston track athlete. She'd been in the Olympics a few years ago, Cami remembered. At any rate, she'd been famous enough for Cami, who didn't take much interest in sports, to have heard of her.

 

"Scared to death, was the explanation put forward by one of the cops who attended the second scene, which was Jill Whiteley’s murder. It stuck," Connor said. "I am sure there's more to it and that's what we need to find out."

 

"If they'd been outrunning a killer, while training hard, could that have caused a heart attack?"

 

“I’m not buying that, not three different women.”

 

Cami also didn't buy that three fit, tough-minded athletes could have been run down until they dropped, or else scared to death. Neither explanation sounded likely. But being pursued by a killer who then managed to murder them in an undetectable way seemed like a plausible scenario and it was chilling.

 

Having been chased by the gunman, the knowledge of what that felt like was fresh in her mind. It was terrifying. Not 'scared to death' level, but 'scared enough to keep running to save your life' level.

 

"So the killer is chasing these women, and somehow when he’s catching them, he’s doing something that causes their heart attacks?" Cami was struggling with the concept all over again. All of them? "And there’s no sign of anything?”

 

“No sign so far.”

 

“That's crazy! Surely he must have done something, especially if he got into a struggle with them? Surely there's more to it? Could he have suffocated them during the struggle, or something like that?"

 

"A possibility," Connor said, signaling and turning into the sports complex. "That's the sort of question we need to think about. I also don't buy 'scared to death' or 'chased to death' and we need to look further. But here we are, so we can see what happened to this recent victim. Her name is Davina Bright."

 

"Davina Bright," Cami repeated, feeling it was important to know the name, and the personality, that this woman had before her tragic death.

 

Connor pulled up near the main entrance gate. It was a huge complex, Cami saw. To the right was the large stadium, and to the left, a number of smaller buildings and outdoor training facilities.

 

Cami saw that two cop cars and an ambulance were parked outside the complex, but as Connor parked, the ambulance pulled slowly away.

 

They climbed out and headed over to the sports complex entrance.

 

There, a frantic looking caretaker, in cleaning overalls, and a man in a blue tracksuit that Cami guessed was the manager, were speaking to two policemen.

 

Cami headed over with Connor to hear what they were saying.

 

"FBI," Connor introduced himself briefly, showing his badge as the cops nodded a greeting. "What's the background here, please?"

 

"Davina booked the track arena late last night. After hours. When I checked the door, it was locked," the manager said, sounding agonized, his brown eyes wide in his lean, tanned face. "I thought one of the coaches must have locked up, and that she had left. I never checked inside!"

 

"Is there another way in?" Connor asked.

 

"Yes, there's a service entrance, and of course the underground tunnel that leads down into the changing rooms that are used for the big games. But our athletes who train late always use the main entrance that leads into the parking lot."