Baptized By Fire (COMING SOON) Kindle | Paperback | Hard Cover | Audible
BAPTIZED BY FIRE
CHAPTER 1
Atlanta Georgia’s ten year veteran Homicide Detective Robert Mason hated to admit it but the smell coming from the fifty gallon drum was making him hungry. It smelled like any other backyard barbeque with the sweet smells of pork filling the air all around him. Only, he knew that what he was smelling right now was definitely not pork.
As the fire department finished putting out the flames coming from the barrel, Robert and the county Medical Examiner, Dr. Martin Whitman approached the barrel and peered inside.
Inside the metal barrel, carefully arranged in a fetal position were the charred remains of an adult human male. That is, what little remained of his charred body.
“I will never get over the smell of charred human remains no matter how long I have this job,” said Robert.
“Me either. We’re going to have one hell of a time with this one. I can tell just from looking at this that I’m going to have to be very careful not to cause any more damage to these bones than what’s already been done,” said Martin.
Martin signaled to his lab tech, Mike, to come over.
“We’re going to want to take the whole barrel back to the lab. Can you try to find a furniture dolly or something that we can use to get this onto the van?” asked Martin.
As Martin and the lab tech worked out the logistics of getting the barrel back to the morgue, Robert located the responding officer and left to go and get some more information from him.
Looking at the information that the dispatcher had given him, Robert located the name of the responding officer. Officer Marcus Jacobs a new member of the Atlanta Police Department.
“Officer Jacobs. You were first on the scene?” asked Robert.
Officer Jacobs turned to face Robert and his face was as white as if he had seen a ghost.
“First burned body?” asked Robert.
Officer Jacobs just nodded his head.
“I wish I could say that it gets easier,” said Robert. “What can you tell me Officer?”
After taking a moment to collect himself, Officer Jacobs finally answered.
“I was on Patrol when Dispatch got an anonymous 911 call from that payphone over there. Said somebody had found a body in a barrel out here. By the time that I got here, the barrel was fully engulfed in flames and nobody was around. I thought that it was probably just a couple of homeless guys trying to stay warm by building a fire in a barrel. It’s really common down here. But when I looked into the barrel I saw it,” said Officer Jacobs.
Robert looked over at the payphone and was surprised to see what could possibly be the last remaining payphone in all of Atlanta. It was even more rare that the thing still worked.
“What time did the call come in?” asked Robert.
“Two Thirty this morning,” said Jacobs.
“”What did you do next?” asked Robert.
“I threw up on the ground and radioed for the fire department,” said Jacobs.
“Ok. I want fingerprints off of that cell phone. They probably won’t lead to anything but it’s worth a shot. Do you think you can call and get CSU down here to do that?” asked Robert.
“I already called them. They’re on the way,” said Jacobs.
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