Come Out and Die!

By L. Keith Bauguess

As winter fully descends upon the most scenic capital city in the United States, a serial killer emerges to exact his revenge on its occupants. Set in the coastal community of Juneau, Alaska, the annual legislative session is underway, when a young senator is brutally murdered shortly after leaving the capitol. Her death sends shock waves throug

• Language: English
• Publisher: Palmetto Publishing
• Release date: Jul 15, 2022
• ISBN: 9798885905114

L. Keith Bauguess

L. Keith Bauguess, originally from North Carolina, studied at the New York Restaurant School in New York, receiving a degree in pastry arts. He and his husband, Darren Gray, met over twenty years ago in the famed Chelsea district of New York City and currently resides in Anchorage, Alaska. They have traveled extensively and love their leisure time in their favorite destinations, London, and Paris. Come Out and Die is Keith's first novel, inspired by his time spent at the Capitol in Juneau, Alaska. He is also the author of Dirty Little Cocktails.

Book preview

Chapter One

Alex Kennedy Friday Evening March 19th

T

he snowy night was in full swing. Most of the Capitol’s occupants had already fled the building after a long arduous day and week, and Senator Alex Kennedy was determined to be out of the door very soon. After a day of committee meetings, a joint floor session, and endless emails, Alex felt as if her body was floating from fatigue. This is what she signed up for, she thought. After cramming her bag with more reading material, the senator cursed at herself for foolishly allowing her staff to leave early. She had come to rely heavily on them in such a short time in office. It was finally Friday, and the weekend was calling, nonetheless. As she switched off the lights, locking the door behind her, Alex walked down the musty, cold Capitol hallway. Smiling as she thought of all the times when she was young and running from floor to floor, while her dad was lobbying for one of the largest oil companies at the time. A better time in the world, at that age. No cares, whatsoever!

After waiting for at least five minutes, Alex decided that the elevator was being stubborn and continued making the dreaded walk down the three flights of stairs to escape this tiresome day. Exiting the front doors of the Capitol, Alex was caught off guard by the wind and heavy snow. After catching her balance, Alex took off for the short walk to her apartment. Her usual route was by way of walking past the hipster Rainbow Foods and over to Franklin. Even though it was just after seven o’clock, the streets were virtually void of human presence. With the mini blizzard going on, that was not surprising. Why she had not called an Uber to take her the few blocks down Franklin to Front Street was beyond her. The harsh wind and beating snow forced the senator to walk closely to the building’s foundations, which, thankfully, kept her from falling onto the sidewalk.

Alex made her way past the entrance of the once glamorous Baranof Hotel and, for a moment, thought of popping in for a warm Cognac, but she remembered that she still had a half bottle of Le Macchiole Messorio Toscano, a fabulous Italian wine, left over from last night’s tryst with the sexy guy that she had met at the Narrows Bar. The previous evening had been one of the best that Alex Kennedy had experienced in a very long time. After having stopped by V’s Cellar for a bite to eat, and two glasses of wine, she made her way down to the Narrows, a bar in the artsy style of the ones found in New York City. When Alex settled into her seat, the sexy guy that had been sitting across the way, walked over, and asked if he could join her. Without hesitation, Alex invited him to sit. Conversation began, and three hours later, after paying a $400.00 bar tab, Alex and the mystery man made their way to her apartment for a continuation of drinking and a night of seemingly endless and steamy, careless sex.

The next morning when Alex’s alarm started blaring, she noticed that her all-night lover had disappeared. She did not mind though. She realized that the two barely talked the previous evening. Not much to say when the body is doing all the talking. It has been this way for about two months now. They would meet somewhere different each time and acted as if they had just met. They would drink and then go back to her place. He usually disappeared at some point in the night. He was attentive and strangely seemed very interested in every word she spoke. She felt herself getting lost looking into his big brown eyes. Even though he rarely said much, Alex didn’t care. He was a release for her when they were together. His gorgeous looks, smooth olive skin, and beautiful locks of black hair mesmerized Alex. When his warm body was against hers, she soaked up his smell and every touch in a way that she had never known up until this point. She never wanted the moments to end. Shaking herself back to reality, Alex continued her trek down the icy, snow-covered sidewalk.

Just as she was passing the Rockwell, Alex felt as if a hand reached out and touched her arm from the doorway. Not wanting to stop and see who or what touched her, she walked faster and soon caught the view of the ominous tall clock sitting on the corner of Franklin and Front Street. Walking was becoming more difficult at this point, but the young senator was determined to make it to her destination. Home. Refuge finally came when Alex reached the corner of the Juneau Trading Post. Taking a moment to catch her breath and footing, Alex found herself at Rawn Way, the entrance or rather an alleyway, leading to a massive set of stairs. She looked up at the flight of stairs with its one hundred and six steps, and reluctantly anticipated making the trek. Holding on to the cold handrails, the young freshman senator was eager more than ever to get into her apartment and take a long hot bath to wash away this treacherous day.

No sooner did Alex begin ascending the stairs than she could sense something behind her. She started to climb the stairs faster but abruptly stopped and turned to look around, expecting to see her follower. Seeing no one on the stairs below, and momentarily feeling pissed for being paranoid, Alex turned back around. She noticed a flash, out of the corner of her eye, of something shiny through the thick snow. What came next, Alex could never have imagined. A searing jolt of pain was felt, followed by a heavy flow of something warm streaming down her chest. What Alex did not realize was that a seven-inch knife had just severed her carotid artery as it passed along her neck from left to right.

With the powerful pumping of the left ventricle, a usual small opening can result in a significant blood loss, but in this case, a major opening would certainly compromise the circulation of blood in the brain and ultimately lead to dying from blood loss. In the split second after the attack, Alex Kennedy felt a sadness overwhelm her body. She could sense her left hand struggling to reach for her throat, and a quick feeling of regret overcame her. As darkness was eating into the mind of Alexis Renee Kennedy, 26, newly elected senator, Yale graduate, and older sister to three siblings, her body began the descent backwards. It had been a severe and intense pain but lasting only mere seconds. Before her body could hit the cold, hard metal stairs below her, Alex felt her soul rise upwards. This time the floating was not from fatigue, but from the blackness of death.

Chapter Two

The Morning After

T

he loathsome snowstorm from the night before had eased up to just a light flurry by the time Trent Abbott darted from his house and into the morning darkness to catch the bus. Usually, he catches it at the end of Gold and 2nd, but with the night’s snow, there was no way the old city bus could make it up the steep and winding hills of Juneau, so he was forced to take the stairs down to the corner of Front and Franklin. With a backpack in hand, Trent knew he had exactly forty-five seconds to be down the stairs and at the corner to not be late for his new work gig in the valley.

What Trent Abbott came across on his trek down was something that would haunt him in his dreams for years to come. Officer Janice Anderson was the first officer on the scene. After ten years with the Anchorage Police Department, she had had enough of the day-to-day monotony and decided after a very stressful day to approach her supervisors about a transfer to a much quieter environment. Juneau had been that place after her first divorce, and again after her second, over the past fifteen years. Each time her relationships fell into the cracks, Janice would hop a plane to Juneau and head deep into the wild.

Having found a small A-frame house at the end of Thane, this became the therapy that Janice needed most when things went south. Life as a cop was tough, especially in a relationship, but it also had its perks. The time off when needed was always available and this cop needed her space on more than one occasion. After the 911 call came in from a hysterical caller, it was determined that the caller was the mother of Trent Abbott. It seems that as Trent was darting down the stairs to catch the bus, he made a rather grisly discovery none like any horror movie that he had ever seen.

The body of Senator Alex Kennedy was fully drenched in congealed and crystalized blood. She was lying face up, eyes wide open. The amount of blood that had flowed from the neck wound was unimaginable. The snow around where the late senator lay was saturated with blood and it gave off an even brighter glow than one would think in the low morning light. Janice knew first and foremost that it was paramount to how she handled things from this moment on at the crime scene. She knew that her actions could greatly affect the success or failure of the homicide investigation. Trent Abbott’s older brother, Brad, was the only one waiting at the top of the stairs when the first officer arrived. Since it was so early, most people chose not to take the stairs on their way to work, so there was no additional foot traffic to worry about.

Officer Anderson, careful to not disturb any potential evidence, was trained to safely observe the surroundings, seeing no one around and feeling that there was no immediate danger of the attacker returning, Anderson began the procedure of providing medical attention. Kneeling, it was evident that the young lady before her was indeed dead, but until the coroner declared an individual deceased, the protocol was to try to administer any life-saving techniques. After finding no pulse, Officer Anderson called for backup. Having secured the area at the top and bottom of the steps, Anderson had a few moments to access the area around the body. There did not seem to be much disturbance around the crime scene. The snow, from the night before, had covered any tracks that a perpetrator or anyone involved would have left. It was well after five in the evening by the time the body had been identified, photographed, and taken to the city morgue.

The area had been thoroughly canvassed, videotaped, and searched, and fingerprints were taken. Some then; more later. When the body was examined by the coroner, trace evidence, fluids, and fiber samples were properly packaged as evidence. It would be late in the night before Officer Anderson would be able to finish up her paperwork and gather her thoughts on the day’s events and have a moment to reflect in the privacy of her haven. Until then, her tiny home at the end of Thane would remain empty of its number one fan.

The process of making the next of kin aware of the passing of a loved one is not a pleasant job, and most police officers will tell you that it is the hardest task to have to complete. No one wants to be the bearer of bad news and especially the news that a family member is dead. Identifying Alex Kennedy was an easy task, as her purse had not been stolen in the attack and besides that personal article, there was the late senator’s laptop bag, which had spilled its contents as she fell. The light gray pantsuit that Alex Kennedy had been wearing was now a dark maroon. Pretty much everything that was with or around the senator where she had died was totally covered with thick dried cold blood.

Hours later, and back at her desk, Janice was able to finally make that dreaded call to the parents of Senator Kennedy. After explaining the bare bones of what she knew at this moment, she expressed her deepest sympathy and assured them that she would be keeping them abreast of any and every bit of information that she found out. Officer Janice Anderson then headed over to the morgue.

Chapter Three

Coroner’s Office Autopsy of Alex Kennedy Sunday

C

hief Medical Examiner Terri Brown began the arduous task of ascertaining the manner of death when cut throats are presented with no proper history or witnesses. It appears that at autopsy, a deep, oblique, long incised injury was found on the front of the neck. The initial postmortem investigation revealed no suspect. The clothes showed a vertical distribution of blood. The lungs showed aspiration of blood and there were not any