Nothing could go wrong. After these photos hit the newsstands, he would be king of the fucking world again.
As soon as he got back to his room he threw his duffel bag on the bed and stripped out of his clothes, bagged them in one of the plastic hotel laundry bags and tossed the bag next to the other trash he’d dump in the morning. He set his boots in the whirlpool tub to clean later and slipped on the plush terry-cloth robe that the wonderful housekeeping staff had left fresh and clean on the back of the bathroom door.
He had packed his developing tank and enough chemicals to develop the film. He could make a contact sheet of the exposures he wanted to sell. That way he wouldn’t have to take them to a local twenty-four-hour photo shop and have some pimply faced kid freaking out by what he saw.
While he pulled out everything he’d need, he called down to room service. He ordered their roast duck with raspberry chocolate cheesecake and the most expensive bottle of Sangiovese on their wine list. Then he dialed his own number to retrieve his messages. After the
He was right. There were fifteen messages. His damn machine could take only eighteen. He grabbed the notepad with the hotel’s embossed logo and began going through the list. He could hardly contain the smile and finally laughed out loud at the two messages from Curtis, the first wanting to know why he hadn’t brought the exclusive to him and the second telling him he’d beat anyone’s price for whatever else Ben had. Oh, yes, life was good again. It was very good.
One of the messages was from his old pal, Detective Julia Racine-he had been hoping to hear from her. Unlike the other messages, Racine didn’t waste her breath sweet-talking or befriending him. Instead, she threatened to arrest him and charge him with obstruction of a police investigation. Jesus! She could turn him on just with her voice, especially when she talked dirty. Hearing her call him a “fucker” gave him an incredible hard-on. He played the message again, just to enjoy the sensation. Then he decided to save it for future use, rather than erase it.
He flipped through his little black book, and it occurred to him that he might be able to make it up to Detective Racine. As much as he enjoyed her calling him a fucker, he wouldn’t mind cashing in on one of the quid pro quos she was so famous for. From the tone of her voice, the poor woman probably hadn’t been laid for some time, be it male or female. And he had to admit, tonight had sorta put him in the mood. He was quite certain he could come up with a proposition that might be as interesting to Racine as it was to him.
Finally, he found the phone number he was looking for and started dialing Britt Harwood’s number at the
CHAPTER 56
Tully still couldn’t believe it. If it hadn’t been for cellular technology, he’d be back at the hotel with Gwen, perhaps even making their way through that gift basket of champagne and condoms. How close had they come to making a huge mistake? Yet, he’d give anything to be back there with her instead of standing under a moonlit sky, up to his ankles in mud, listening to a chain-smoking detective mangle the English language as they waited for the medical examiner.
At first, he’d wanted to strangle Morrelli for the interruption, even if there really had just been a murder similar to the one at the FDR Memorial. He caught himself wondering if Morrelli had done it on purpose, which he knew was crazy. After all, how could Morrelli have known what he was interrupting? Hell, Tully hadn’t known what was going to happen. Fact was, he still couldn’t believe he had even kissed her, let alone…What was he thinking? Maybe it was for the better that they had been interrupted. Otherwise…otherwise, it could have been…hell, otherwise, it would have been pretty incredible.
“Here’s maybe the marks you talkin’ about?” Detective Kubat shone the flashlight on an area six feet from the body.
Tully bent down and examined the circular indentations. One was clearly stamped in the mud. A possible second one looked rubbed out. They did look like the marks at the FDR Memorial. What the hell did they mean?
“Did someone get a photo of these?”
“Hey, Marshall,” Kubat yelled. “Get your ass over here and shoot a couple of Polaroids of this here.”
“What about her clothes?”
“Folded all nice like and piled up over there.” He swung the flashlight to highlight the spot, though the clothes had already been bagged and taken by the mobile crime unit. “Weird thing, though, they’d been all ripped up and ripped pretty good.”
Tully stood and looked around. They appeared to be in a fairly secluded area of the park. On one side were trees, on another a brick wall, and yet the girl’s body was sitting against a tree and staring out at a clearing with a wooden bench and lamppost. In fact, it looked like she was staring right at the bench, posing for some admirer sitting there.
“What about ropes or cords? Anything?”
“Nope, nothin’. But get a load of this.”
He led Tully closer to the body. A police spotlight lit up the area around her, its stark light transforming her into a white-faced puppet. She was bruised much worse than the Brier girl, a black eye and bruising from what looked like a left hook to the jaw. Her head tilted to one side, revealing three or four tracks of ligature marks. Without saying anything more, Kubat bent down and snapped off the spotlight. At first, Tully couldn’t figure out what he was doing and then he saw. The girl’s neck lit up, the track marks glowing in the dark.
“What the hell?”
“Pretty fuckin’ weird, huh?” Kubat said, and snapped the spotlight back on. “Anything like that with your victim?’
“There was some sort of glittery stuff found on her neck. I guess I didn’t realize it glowed in the dark.”
“Oh, hey. Here’s Doc Samuel,” Detective Kubat said, waving to the tall, distinguished-looking woman in a trench coat and black rubber ankle boots. She looked like the only one who’d come prepared. “Doc, this here’s that FBI guy, J.R. Scully.”
“Actually, it’s R.J. Tully.”
“Really? You sure?” Kubat looked at him as if it were possible Tully could have gotten his own name wrong. “I was thinking it was like that
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Yeah, I’m sure it’s gotta be Scully.”
“Agent Tully,” Dr. Samuel said, ignoring Detective Kubat and holding out her hand. “I’ve been told you might know a thing or two about this killer.”
“Maybe. It looks like the same guy.”
“So the victim’s ID might be in her throat?”
“Yeah, sorry, Doc,” Kubat said. “If that’s the case, it sure would speed up things on our end.”
“As long as we can do this without compromising any evidence,” the medical examiner told him with a stern tone that sounded more like a schoolteacher’s. “You mind putting out your cigarette, Detective?”
“Oh, yeah, sure thing, Doc.” He stabbed it against a tree, pinched the end off with his fingers and tucked the unused portion behind his ear.
Dr. Samuel found a dry rock big enough to set her case on. She began pulling out latex gloves, forceps and plastic bags. She handed Tully a pair of gloves.
“You mind? I may need another pair of hands.”
He took the gloves and tried to ignore the knot forming at the pit of his stomach. He hated this part and missed the days when he could stay in his office and do his own style of analysis from photos and digital scans.
