about these?'
'I'm thinking blunt force trauma,' Slater said. 'See these fragments? Slivers of wood.'
'Somebody beat her with a wooden stick?' Shock registered on Harris' young face.
'I'd guess a hard wooden object, maybe a baseball bat or hockey stick.' Jack moved down the torso to the legs. Under the mass of flesh and gore, the legs lay at an unnatural angle.
'Legs are broken,' Slater said.
'Yeah,' Jack said, but there was no satisfaction in his voice. He rose and dusted off the knees of his pants. 'Looks like somebody beat the hell out of her.'
Harris took a deep breath and ventured a quick look at Slater. 'She hasn't been dead long. The blood's partially congealed, and she's African-American cause of the hair. It's kinky.'
Jack lifted his brows and shifted his eyes to the deputy's closely cropped head. Harris smiled, rubbing his palm over the wiry bristles. 'Mine grew out, you'd see what I mean. And I think under all the… stuff, the skin tone's darker than a white person.'
'He killed her here.' Jack pointed to the ground. 'Blood loss is too great.'
'Looks like the killer went nuts and kept on smacking at her,' Harris added.
Slater looked around. 'How'd she get here?'
Harris frowned. 'Someone drove her?'
'Doesn't make sense,' Slater muttered. 'Why would somebody go to the trouble of taking a naked girl way up here and beat her to death? Where are her clothes?'
'Forced her to disrobe?' Harris asked. 'Took the clothes?'
Slater grunted.
'This looks like a crime of passion,' Jack observed, 'but – '
Slater finished the thought. 'It has all the earmarks of carefully planned, premeditated murder.'
Jack was pretty sure he knew who had done the planning.
On the way back down the mountain Jack made a pitch for joint jurisdiction even though he didn't need to be diplomatic.
'Why do the feds want to get in on a local matter?' Slater's arm rested lightly over the top of the steering wheel and his voice was mild as if he were talking about the weather.
'We've got lots of resources, manpower, databases. We could be very useful.'
'That's assuming this case and yours are connected.'
'Look, we need local cooperation to move ahead on our case and your dead body might be connected to it.'
Slater drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and slanted a stubborn glance at Jack. 'And if not, what then? Are you going to pull those resources out?'
Jack warned himself that Slater, in spite of his easy-going demeanor, was no fool. He tried another tactic. 'I don't mean to step on your toes, but I'll be honest with you. We've ground to a halt in our investigation, gave up hope of finding the suspect.'
'You sure it's the same one?'
Jack nodded. 'Why don't you take a look at my files when we get back to the office? Maybe you'll see something I missed.'
Slater shrugged noncommittally, but Jack saw the quick flash of interest in his gray eyes. He was on board whether he knew it or not. All they needed now was a quick identification of the body. Jack would lay odds it was Olivia's missing student. His gut told him so, but he didn't relish breaking the news to her.
They rode back to the courthouse in silence. Jack wanted to mention Olivia, but didn't. Did Slater know she was teaching at the university, part of his jurisdiction? Had he kept in touch with her through the years? Jack felt on the edge of some bizarre reunion, the three of them back together again.
Slater tagged Connie on their way into his office. 'Could you bring us two coffees?' He raised his eyebrows at Jack.
'Black.'
'Two blacks, Connie.'
'Now, Sheriff, you know I don't do coffee.' Connie's voice came through the open office door.
Slater smiled and broke through the grimness of the morning.
'Oh, all right,' Connie mumbled, 'but you owe me big time and I'm not like to forget it.'
While they waited for the coffee, Jack tossed the first folder on Slater's desk. He picked it up and flipped through the pages. 'Three cases?'
Jack nodded. 'That's the first DLK victim, Laura Jean Peterson.'
'DLK?'
'Dead Language Killer.'
Slater sighed. 'I suppose there's a story behind that.'
By the time the coffee arrived, he'd riffled through the first case file. After Connie set the coffee mugs down with unnecessary clatter and left, Slater opened the second folder and perused it. He looked up from the file. 'What the hell? Crucifixion?'
Jack nodded and motioned for Slater to read on.
'Good God, he was alive when he was – holy shit.'
Jack pulled a photo from the bottom of the stack. The crime scene photo showed a naked body with dark pools staining the wrists and feet.
Slater stared a long moment before reaching for the next folder. 'Something tells me I don't want to read another one.' He opened the file anyway.
Jack inclined his head toward the folder. 'We thought Angela was the final victim.'
Slater scanned the report. 'Blunt force trauma.' He looked at the pictures. 'Resembles the unidentified body at North Shore.'
'She was a thirty-one-year-old waitress from South Bend, Indiana,' Jack added, as if that were the important detail. He sipped his coffee and stared emotionless out the office window into the bullpen where deputies were gathering for the shift change.
'You've got these memorized?' Slater asked with a sweep of his hand across the desk.
Jack didn't acknowledge the question. 'After Angela, all the leads dried up and my investigation took a nose dive in the toilet.'
'And you're looking for a new lead here.'
Jack threw a fourth folder across the desk. 'First this one.'
Slater checked the date on the tab and raised his eyebrows. 'Current?'
'Discovered a few days ago.'
'You think they're all connected.' A statement not a question. 'And you think my DB at Tahoe is the fifth victim of the same killer.'
In frustration, Jack shoved his fingers through his hair as he rose. 'Shit, I don't know if this is the same guy or if it's a damn copycat.'
He grabbed his briefcase, needing to get out of here, needing a break. 'When you follow up on your victim, I expect full cooperation.' He turned toward the office door and shot his parting words over his shoulder. 'I don't want to put the screws to you on this, Slater.'
'Then don't,' Slater replied.
Jack lifted his hand in acknowledgment without turning around, feeling Slater's hard gaze like a target on his back as he made his way through the squad room and out the door toward the metal detector. A queasy feeling ran through his stomach.
Chapter Ten
Late that afternoon Olivia and Jack began their uneasy alliance in her office at the university.
'Did you learn anything about Keisha?' she asked right off.
