We had a second victim.
Chapter Three
The maze increased the difficulty level of getting Emmaline to the ambulance, but Carter arrived and solved the paramedics’ dilemma by picking his mother up and carrying her out. I let everyone head out without alerting them to the other body. I’d already done a quick dip down and checked, and based on the lack of pulse, the huge stab wound in his back, and the enormous pool of blood underneath him, the man was long past medical help.
Carter needed to be with his mother and his sense of duty wouldn’t have allowed him to go if I’d told him there was a dead guy behind me. Besides, staying behind meant his attention would have been split, which wouldn’t have done anyone any good. A quick discussion sent Walter to the parking lot to follow Carter and Emmaline to the hospital. Ida Belle, Gertie, and I would head for the hospital after we’d brought Deputy Breaux up to speed on the situation so he could secure the funhouse.
Well, and handle the dead guy that I hadn’t mentioned.
As soon as we’d exited, I’d given Ida Belle the head nod and she immediately understood that something was up and she should follow my play. Sometimes I felt Ida Belle and I were an even better pair of operatives than I had been with Harrison in the CIA. We seemed to be on the same wavelength, and it came in handy. So after the paramedics drove off, I stuck my hands in my pocket, then made an exclamation, for anyone standing nearby to hear, about my wallet not being there and how it must have fallen out in the funhouse. Then Ida Belle and I headed back in to ‘find’ the other body.
And just like that, our cover story for not reporting the other body when the paramedics were there was in place.
Deputy Breaux was already on his way to secure the funhouse for the forensics team, and Walter had already told the guy running it to shut down, so there was no danger of a random civilian tripping over the body. After I retrieved my ‘missing’ wallet, we headed back out to wait for Deputy Breaux. When we exited the tunnel, Gertie came trudging up.
“Emmaline?” she asked, wheezing.
“Still unconscious but off to the hospital with Carter,” I said. “Walter is following.”
Gertie nodded. “Can you believe the paramedics wouldn’t even give me a lift back here? And they were on the other side of the fairgrounds but I didn’t want to wait on dispatch to send them. Heck, I was starting to wane before I even set out running for them—that dragon costume is no joke to walk around in and my legs were already weak. Now I just feel like I’ve been run over by the bumper cars. And worse, every deep breath tastes like I’m sucking on an exhaust pipe.”
Ida Belle and I listened to her rant without interrupting and when she finally finished, she looked at both of us and narrowed her eyes.
“What’s up?” she asked. “You two know something.”
“There’s a dead guy in there,” I said.
“What?” Gertie’s eyes widened and she yanked her head around to the exit tunnel. “You’re sure?”
“Sure he’s dead?” I asked. “Yeah, I’m positive on that one. No vitals and there’s a pool of blood big enough to float a ship. Huge knife wound in his back.”
“Well, who is it?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “He’s facedown. I checked vitals and figured I best not mess with him anymore. It’s bad enough we’ve contaminated the crime scene going in after Emmaline, and God only knows what kind of damage Celia did fleeing the place—good Lord, what happened to Celia?”
“I ran into Sheriff Lee on my way back,” Gertie said. “He said Dorothy and some of the God’s Wives managed to get her up and partially walking. They were going to take her to the hospital so someone would take a look at her head. He said she seemed pretty out of it.”
“She hit that glass hard enough to shatter it,” Ida Belle said. “And her knees were already skinned up when she ran out.”
“She probably tripped over our dead guy or Emmaline or both, and that’s what freaked her out,” I said.
“Well, she’s definitely left her mark all over the crime scene,” Gertie said.
“Not to mention, half of Sinful has probably already tromped through there touching everything beforehand,” Ida Belle said.
I nodded. “Well, none of that can be helped, but you know how the state police get. I’m sure everyone will get a dressing-down.”
“State police?” Gertie asked. “Who called the state police?”
“No one yet,” I said. “But I imagine the ME is going to. Carter can’t investigate a murder where his mother is also one of the victims.”
Ida Belle groaned. “Crap! I hadn’t even thought that far. The chances of some yahoo from the state police catching the guy is slim to none. They give things half a lick and not even a promise and then stamp the file and shove it in a drawer. Before Carter came back to Sinful, things just mostly went unsolved.”
I nodded. I could see that. Sheriff Lee had been past his prime since the wheel was invented. And Deputy Breaux was a good guy and took his job seriously, but he was green, and I wasn’t sure he’d ever have the mind for detective work.
“No way Carter’s going to sit back when his mom was attacked,” Gertie said.
“He won’t have a choice,” Ida Belle said. “If the state police catch him even raising an eyebrow, much less lifting a finger, they can take his badge and there’s not a thing Sheriff Lee would be able to do about it.”
Gertie flopped down on the exit steps. “That blows.”
“You think you’re mad, wait ’til Carter puts it together,” I said.
Ida Belle nodded. “You know what we have to do.”
“Get in the middle of official police business,” I said. I’d already planned to do that the second I realized it was Emmaline and that someone had struck her from behind. I don’t care how excited and turned around you got, you couldn’t hit yourself on the back of the head like that, then land face-first. Not unless you were in the tunnel doing acrobatics.
Or maybe if you were Gertie.
Deputy Breaux came jogging up, looking so anxious I was afraid he might pass out. He slid to a stop in front of us and leaned over to catch his breath.
“Emmaline?” he asked in between draws.
“On her way to the hospital,” I said. “Carter’s with her.”
“How bad?” he asked.
I shook my head. “She took a good crack on the back of the head. There was some blood loss. Her pulse and breathing were both compromised by the time the paramedics arrived, and she never regained consciousness. Long and short—we don’t know.”
Deputy Breaux was clearly upset. “I don’t understand. Who in the world would want to hurt Emmaline? She’s one of the nicest people on the planet.”
“Uh, I’m afraid there might be more to it,” I said. “You see, after the paramedics left, I realized I was missing my wallet, so Ida Belle and I stepped back inside to retrieve it. And that’s when we found another victim. This one is dead.”
He stared at me in dismay. “You’re serious?”