Authors: Grant McKenzie
CHAPTER
22
“Explain this to me again.”
Julia sat across the desk from Dr. Barbara MacDougall, a warm cup of coffee helping fend off the chill from the adjoining lab where Paul, Tequila Shooter’s former fry cook, lay on a metal tray.
“It’s quite simple.” MacDougall sucked in a lungful of vapor from her electronic cigarette. “I found a bruise on the corpse’s back that appears to be a bite mark.”
“But there are no teeth marks?”
“There are no teeth marks
visible
.” MacDougall smiled. “But using trans-illumination we can take a picture of the cells under the bruise to outline them.”
“And this will help us find whoever killed him?”
“It’s possible,” MacDougall agreed. “Everyone’s bite is unique, like a fingerprint or DNA.”
“When will you have the results?”
“In a day or so. I have to ship the section to Seattle where their Forensic Ident Unit will do the tests. So if you have any suspects, get them to bite on something. Then I can match up the marks.”
“Was he raped?”
MacDougall shrugged. “I can’t tell for sure. On first examination it appeared he had been. There is some blood and bruising around the anus, but on closer inspection it looks more like a single, violent thrust. A quick in and out.”
“What would account for that?”
“The killer may have wanted to rape him, but then changed his mind. Or maybe he forgot to bring a condom and didn’t want to leave semen traces. Or he just wanted to humiliate the victim, but wasn’t really into the sex act itself.”
“Could he have used an object instead?” Julia interjected. “To make us think the cook was linked to the other rapes rather than Selene’s murder.”
MacDougall nodded. “It’s a possibility.”
Julia unclipped the nightstick from her belt and slid it across the desk.
MacDougall picked it up and stroked it across her palm. “Handy little toy,” she smirked.
“Could one similar to it have caused the damage on the body?” Julia asked.
“I’ll need to do some measurements, but my initial reaction is yes. It’s got the right diameter and more than enough length. Do you think it was used?”
Julia shrugged. “I don’t know, but I don’t like to limit my options.”
“That’s the best way to be in this business,” MacDougall agreed. “People are a hell of a lot sicker than we give them credit for.”
CHAPTER
23
Dr. Barbara MacDougall kicked off her shoes as soon as she walked through the front door of her home, dropped her coat on the floor, and walked into the kitchen to pour herself a Rusty Nail — two fingers of Scotch with one of Drambuie over ice.
It was her father’s favorite drink.
He always bragged that it put hair on his chest, but then complained it did nothing for the bald palette of his head. Barbara enjoyed its sharp, sweet bite and her only complaint was that her fingers weren’t fatter.
After the second sip, the stress of the day’s autopsies began to flow away. By the third, they were a distant memory. It had always been Barbara’s good fortune to be blessed with intuitive stress control. It was another thing she had learned from her father. He suffered a stroke at the age of 48. Worried himself near to death one day over a missing $12 receipt for, of all things, a receipt book.
His near-fatal attack taught his twenty-four-year-old daughter one of life’s most valuable lessons: Who gives a shit about a missing $12 receipt?
Barbara poured herself a second elixir and carried it into the bathroom. There, she filled the tub with hot water and apple-blossom bubble bath. Her clothes fell around her feet in a pile and with a sigh of contentment she slumped into the tub’s warm comfort.
Twenty minutes later, with the smell of death sweated out of her pores, Barbara dried and powdered her voluptuous body. She knew she was heavier than society’s rigid standard, and the skinny girls through the years had teased her mercilessly, but she felt perfectly sexy. Besides, those frigid bitches never got half the cock that she did.
Giggling to herself, Barbara pulled on a black teddy with a snap-away crotch. Then, just for fun, added a red lace garter, sliding it up her meaty thigh until it met the thorny stem of a tattooed rose. Her father had a similar tattoo on his left bicep. The only difference being his also bore the name of Barbara’s mother, Doris.
When the doorbell rang, Barbara debated whether she should cover up with a nightgown, finally deciding not to. When she walked into the hallway, her guest was already standing inside. The door was locked behind him. The drapes were closed.
Barbara giggled again, then struck a provocative pose: back arched, stomach in, tits jutting like hydrogen bombs. Her guest advanced, his coat and tie falling to the floor.
Barbara turned to run, to stimulate him further, but she only made it as far as the kitchen sink before his strong arms wrapped around her from behind and his hands crushed into her breasts. She gasped at the electricity that flowed from him as his mouth locked onto her neck.
She could feel a racing pulse throbbing through his fingers, lips, rising cock. She reached behind, freed the snake from its zippered cage, and stroked its hairy balls. The python’s owner whimpered, his teeth sliding across the sensitive skin of her neck to her shoulders.
One of his hands released her breast and slid down to her crotch. The teddy snapped open on the first forceful tug. Barbara gasped again as eager fingers explored within her.
Then everything changed.
His hands were no longer gentle; his kisses no longer sweet. His teeth dug into her back while his hands encircled her neck and his cock battered against her, forcing her open.
Barbara tried to scream, but his powerful fingers were too tight around her throat. She could feel blood oozing from her back as teeth ripped at her flesh. Her mind couldn’t comprehend the change. Pain flooded her body, everywhere, as he battered into her. Hot breath and spittle seared into the rips on her back.
Barbara fought with all her strength, but he had caught her by surprise. She felt her throat collapse beneath the pressure of his thumbs and she crumpled to the floor.
He stood above her, gasping, his face flushed with anger. Barbara knew she was dying. Like a fish out of water, she couldn’t breathe. Already her mind was clouding, slowing.
He washed himself at the kitchen sink, standing over her, unflinching beneath her unblinking gaze.
DEPUTY GILLES SAT
in his Camaro in front of Tequila Shooter’s, sipping from a flask of homemade corn mash. His shift wasn’t due to start for another hour.
He had time to kill.
After slipping on a pair of black gloves, he walked into the hotel. The manager was no fool; he knew exactly how fast he could be closed down by someone who knew all the dirty little secrets. He gave up the bitch’s room number without a fuss.
Riding the elevator, Gilles wondered how he should do it. The smart plan would be to quietly break into the room, put a pillow over her face and smack her a half-dozen times. She wouldn’t be so good looking after that, and the pillow would prevent his knuckles from bruising.
It would be a waste right enough to have the bitch squirming below him and not do anything about it. Despite her redheaded temper, she had a body that made him drool. Besides, with the pillow over her face, she wouldn’t know who he was. And if something went wrong, he could simply toss her out the window. Suicide caused by grief over the loss of her friend. Sounded plausible.
Gilles grinned. He was a cold-hearted bastard.
The elevator shuddered to a halt on the fourth floor. Gilles sauntered through its doors with confidence, a nightstick in his hand. He pressed an ear to Veronique’s door and listened for movement. Everything was quiet inside.
With a grin, he pulled the master room key out of his pocket and lifted it to the lock.
A loud buzz erupted from the pager on his belt, stopping his heart and loosening his bowels. The pager buzzed again: all-officer alert.
Gilles cursed himself for leaving the pager switched on as he abandoned his plans and dashed for the stairs.
CHAPTER
24
“Son of a bitch, son of a bitch, son of a bitch,” Sheriff Marshall ranted as he stomped across the tiny kitchen, bumping into the assistant coroner at every turn.
“I’m going to cut this bastard into chewable fucking pieces,” he screamed.
Julia squatted beside the assistant coroner, her eyes surveying the bites and tears that marred Barbara’s opulent corpse. The assistant coroner, a young man with a cobweb of thin white hair that struggled to keep its grip on a receding hairline, noticed her stare.
“I’ll do a comparison when I get her back to the morgue,” he said. “But this attack is much fiercer and the bites much deeper than what I saw of the cook.”
Julia nodded, her eyes filling with tears as she resisted the urge to cover the coroner’s torn body and chase every gawking male out of the house at gunpoint.
Then, Deputy Gilles burst through the front door of the crowded bungalow.
“Where in Hell’s damnation you been, Gilles?” Marshall yelled. “Helping the goddamn murderer escape?”
“I was setting up roadblocks on either end of town, Sheriff. Then I was. . .”
“Then you was what?” Marshall bellowed, the veins popping out on his forehead.
“I . . . I was going to talk to witnesses.”
“What witnesses?”
“Neighbors, you know? They might have seen the culprit, or his car, or something.”
“Then what are you talking to me for? Get your ass over to the neighbors.”
“Yes, Sheriff, sir.”
“Worthless piece of shit,” Marshall mumbled as he resumed his relentless pacing, bumping into the assistant coroner once again. Suddenly, he turned to Julia. “I want you to find this piece of scum so I can rip out his heart and show it to him before he dies. You understand me, J.L.?”
Julia nodded.
“Good.” The sheriff looked down at Barbara’s corpse on the floor and Julia noticed tears welling up in his eyes.
“What’s happened to this town?” he asked. “Three murders in two days isn’t what happens here. New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, sure. But not here. Not in my town.”
“We’ll catch him, Sheriff,” Julia reassured.
“We better. Damn our souls if we don’t.”
Marshall released a shuddering sigh, wiped his eyes on the back of his hand, and then composed himself.
“I better check on the men. You get everything here cleaned away. Make sure you bag anything that could be of use.”
Julia nodded just as Marshall’s radio crackled to life. Both their faces turned pale when they heard the report: a fire alarm had sounded at the county morgue.
Marshall stared at Julia, his face locked in a granite grimace as if everything was her fault.
“Ignore everything I just said. I need you with me at the morgue.”
Julia scrambled after the sheriff as he moved quickly to his patrol car.
JULIA COULDN’T TAKE
her eyes off the blackened corpse. It still lay in its open metal tray at one end of the examining room, its ebony fingers curled into claws, its lipless mouth open in a snarling grin. It was almost as if it had sprung back to life when the fire was lit only to die again in blistering agony.
The automatic fire extinguishers had responded quickly, saving everything but the gas-soaked kindling: Paul.
It was difficult for Julia to imagine such hatred could live within a human being. The monster had murdered and possibly raped him, then came back to burn his corpse.
What would her mother say if she could see her now.
Julia shuddered.
JULIA DIDN’T MAKE
it back to her apartment until 4 a.m. By then she was too tired to sleep and too exhausted to stay awake.
Her eyes would close for a minute, then pop open to remind her the roadblocks had been useless.
Close again.
The neighbors saw nothing.
Close.
Barbara’s dead.
Paul’s body burned beyond recognition.
Close.
Tears.
She picked up the phone. Dialed.
A sleepy voice answered.
“Hello?”
“Hey, mom.”
Silence.
“You can talk to me, mom.”
“J.L. is that you? What time is it?”
“It’s late, mom. Is dad there?”
“He’s sleeping. Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, mom, really. Do you think I could talk to dad?”
“He’s sleeping, J.L. Have you been crying?”
A voice in the background: Is that my little girl?
“Your father’s awake now, it
” Her voice was cut off.
“Hey, Button. How you doin’ in the big city?”
Julia laughed. “It’s more of a town, dad.”
“Looks big on the Google. Does it have a 7-Eleven?”
“I haven’t seen one yet.”
“OK, it can’t be that big then, you win.”
Julia laughed again. “How’s the farm doing without me?”
“It doesn’t seem as sunny since you left, but I reckon the crop will be fine. How you doin’?”
“Feeling a little sad, dad.”
“Want me to sing you a song?”
“Yeah, daddy, I do.”
“Hold on, I’ve got my guitar under the bed.”
Voices in the background, muffled by a hand over the receiver.
“Button?”
“I’m here, dad.”
“Your mamma was just saying how happy she is I found my guitar.”
Julia chuckled. “I’m sure she’s thrilled.”
“Your mamma loves my singing, you know that.”
“Is that why you have to hide your guitar from her?”
“Well her memory’s not what it used to be. Do you know that last Tuesday I actually found my old pal here sitting by the trash? Yep, and your mamma claims she has no idea how it got there. We may have to institutionalize her soon. Call up the wagon and have them bring over one of those fancy white coats with all the extra buckles.”
Julia laughed until tears fell down her cheeks.
Her dad was laughing now, too.
“Yep, it’ll be a sad day when they cart her away, but it may just come to that.”
Julia could hear more laughter joining in now. The voice of her mother: You crazy old goat.
“What song would you like to hear, Button?”
“Something happy, daddy.”
Her father strummed the guitar and began to sing, his voice revealing why he was a farmer and not a pop star.
Julia closed her eyes, the phone pressed to her ear, until she fell asleep.