–
‘We’ll have to wait for the test results, but I’d put money on it,’ Brindle replied.
Garcia turned his attention back to the burned woman. ‘What I don’t get about this is – how come it looks like she’s got different degrees of burns all around her body?’ He cautiously moved a step closer. ‘The skin on her torso, arms and thighs has blistered and ruptured open. You can tell that the exposed flesh has simply cooked, as you’ve put it.’ He nodded at Hunter. ‘But her lower legs, feet and hands have burned to a fucking crisp. Most of it has carbonized for chrissakes. And what in God’s name has happened to her face? It’s like different parts of her body have been exposed to different intensities of heat.’
‘And they have,’ Brindle admitted. ‘As I’ve said before, this thing at full tilt would feel like a forest fire.’ He pointed to the fireplace. ‘She was just about a foot away from it. I’m sure the killer was controlling the heat, torturing her, but because of her armchair sitting position, her lower legs and hands are about a foot closer to the fireplace than the rest of her body. That extra proximity could mean a rise of two, maybe three degrees Celsius. Given the probable amount of time she was exposed to such intense heat, the body parts closer to the fire would’ve sustained considerably more damage, as you can clearly see. Now, when it comes to her face—’ he shook his head with uncertainty ‘—I’ve seen enough burn victims, but I’ve never seen anything quite like this before. The skin on her face has crumpled into melted-looking lumps, like a dinner candle.’
‘Could the killer have used an accelerant?’ Hunter asked.
‘In my view, that’s the only explanation,’ Brindle admitted.
‘Something like cooking oil?’
‘Cooking oil?’ Garcia repeated in a disbelieving tone. ‘You think the killer smothered her face with cooking oil, placed her in front of a fire and watched it sizzle?’
Brindle tilted his head and shrugged in a ‘who knows?’ gesture. ‘You’ll have to wait for the autopsy and the lab results to be certain, but something had to have helped the skin on her face burn the way it did, causing it to look like it’s melted away. Fire and heat alone wouldn’t have done it.’
‘Why not?’ Garcia asked.
‘Skin can’t melt,’ Hunter said, bending down and having a closer look at her face.
‘That’s right,’ Brindle confirmed. ‘I’m not gonna get scientific on you, but it’s a biological and physical impossibility. It’ll burn and carbonize, but it won’t melt.’ He paused for a second and rubbed his left eye with the heel of his hand. ‘We checked the whole house, Robert. That’s all the blood we found.’ He pointed to the small pool under the armchair. ‘If this is the same killer who got to the priest a few days ago, there was no ritual this time. If there was, it certainly didn’t involve blood. It’s like this is an entirely different killer. His MO has changed completely.’
Hunter nodded, but saw no point in revealing to Brindle what they’d found out earlier in Father Fabian’s journal.
‘Anything from dusting?’
‘No prints yet, just a few fibers, but they could’ve come from anywhere in this house.’ Brindle shrugged. ‘There’re rugs, carpets, curtains and fabrics just about everywhere in this place.’
Hunter walked around the room, checking the furniture for anything out of the ordinary. He found nothing. ‘Who else has seen the number on her back?’
‘Only the people in this room,’ Brindle replied confidently. ‘The two Malibu detectives decided to wait outside while we cut her loose. They didn’t look too well.’
‘And you haven’t told them that’s the reason why we’re here.’
‘Nope. I told them the skull found in the fire was the reason I wanted you two to have a look at this case.’
‘Let’s keep it this way,’ Hunter said, approaching the door. ‘Have you found her clothes and bag?’
‘Not yet, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the killer took them with him.’
Forty-Five
Hunter closed the door to his apartment behind him, leaned back and shut his eyes. The headache that had started at the house in Malibu had intensified on the way home. It now felt as if a rat had woken up inside his skull, panicked and tried to scratch its way out through his eyes.
The obnoxious smell of burned flesh had managed to bypass his coverall and it’d impregnated his clothes. A bitter tang so strong that it unsettled his stomach, stung at his eyes and constantly made him gag. He needed a shower – urgently.
Hunter undressed quickly. He grabbed a black trash can liner from the kitchen and dumped his clothes into it, knowing that washing them, no matter how much detergent he used, would never fully get rid of the smell.
In the bathroom, he ran the shower as hot as he could tolerate and leaned against the white tiles, letting the water sluice over his head, shoulders and back. Now, away from everyone’s eyes, his chest heaved and he finally threw up. By the time he turned off the water, his skin had gone a dark shade of pink and his fingertips were soft and wrinkled. He’d been through almost an entire bar of soap, but still the smell lingered. It wasn’t on his skin, he knew that. The unsettling odor had clung to the hairs inside his nose and no amount of blowing was getting rid of it. For the time being, the only solution he could come up with was to numb his brain.
The first two shots went down neat and in one single gulp. The third, a double, was poured over a single cube of ice and sipped slowly.
It was late, but Hunter knew sleep would be bordering on impossible. It was already hard enough on a regular, non-eventful day.
He paced the room for a while before stopping by his living room window. He stood there for a moment, staring at the empty street. His mind full of thoughts. Nothing made sense.
The single malt seemed to be doing the trick where the smell of burned flesh was concerned, but his head still felt like a ticking bomb. Headache tablets had never really worked for him, so he discarded the thought as it entered his mind. But pills reminded him of something else, and it made his pulse race – Monica, the girl who’d dropped by the station earlier.
Over the years, he’d seen his fair share of crazy people and charlatans, all of them positive they could lead the police to an unfound body or to an elusive killer, but something told Hunter that wasn’t the case this time.
There was something different about Monica. Hunter saw a conviction in her eyes he’d never seen before in any of the so-called psychics. She wasn’t after a free publicity ride or attention. In fact, she looked scared, as if talking to the police would expose her to something or someone she’d been running away from.
Hunter took a deep breath and ran his hand through his wet hair. Her words still echoed in his ears.
He felt the same old destructive guilt creep up on him, and he finished the rest of his Scotch in one large swig. It burned the back of his throat, and that’s when he remembered the last thing she’d said to him.
‘
Forty-Six
Hunter was leaning against his car in the empty LACDC parking lot. His hands deep inside his jacket pockets. It was a clear day, but cold according to LA standards. A cup of flavorless machine coffee purchased from a gas station rested on the hood of his old Buick. It was 7:10 a.m. Doctor Winston had called him about half an hour ago saying he’d already concluded the autopsy on the new body.
Hunter had been waiting less than five minutes when Garcia pulled up and parked next to him. As he stepped out of his Honda Civic, Hunter noticed his reddish eyes and pale complexion.
‘I guess I wasn’t the only one who got no sleep last night,’ Hunter said, reaching for his coffee.
Garcia shook his head slowly. ‘I freaked Anna out last night.’
