The rear room had been the victim’s bedroom. Nola Denniston, Bill’s training officer, was standing at the entrance to the room, her back to it. Her face was solemn and pale, and Jen was reminded of mourners at a funeral. The only difference was Nola’s gray eyes held hints of both anger and fear, emotions that one didn’t usually see at funerals.
“It looks like the same guy,” she said. “His style is pretty distinctive.”
She stepped back from the door.
CHAPTER 4
The room seemed to be painted in blood, dark red and shiny, drying slowly into rust-colored patches. The sheet covering the body and the matching fitted sheet on which it lay were a yellow floral print, the color nearly obscured by the blood that soaked them. The body lay on its stomach, the wrists tied to the vertical posts of the headboard, the head twisted at an unnatural angle. A pillowcase that matched the sheets covered the head, held in place by a black ribbon. The pillowcase had pulled up enough to allow Jen to see the beginnings of a deep slash in the throat.
The victim’s feet protruded from under the sheet. Her ankles had been secured to the footboard of the bed. Just like the other two, Jen thought, a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She hadn’t realized until now that she had been hoping something would be different about this one, that maybe they didn’t have a serial on their hands after all. The rope, the pillowcase, and the ribbon had dashed those hopes for good.
The headboard and the wall behind it were splattered with blood where it had gushed from the severed carotid artery. Jen knew that when the body was turned over, there would be little or no lividity. The girl’s blood had spurted, then trickled out, leaving little to settle to the lowest points.
Jen took a shallow breath, trying to avoid the smell of death, but it didn’t work. She’d known it wouldn’t. When she looked away from the body, she found herself staring into Will’s concerned blue eyes. That concern disturbed her more than the bold desire and cocky flirtatiousness that she’d seen there earlier. She looked away quickly and straightened, unconsciously lifting her chin in a gesture of defiance against the emotions brought on by both the dead woman on the bed and the very alive man standing next to her.
“Did anybody call O’Neill?”
Pat O’Neill was the I.D. Officer. She knew he would have been notified at once. She simply felt the need to do or say something.
“He’s on his way.” Hank had come up behind them in the hall. “The coroner’s been notified, and he’ll probably bring a couple of his people.”
“Who is she?” Al said.
“Her name is Victoria Kaufmann.” Nola said. “She’s a hairdresser at Heads Up in Eastwood Mall.”
Jen didn’t know Nola well, but what she did know she liked. Nola had come on the department just after Jen had been assigned to detectives. She’d been a nurse for several years before joining the department. Jen had often wondered what had prompted the career change, but she’d never asked.
“Who found her?” Lonnie said.
“A girlfriend,” Hank said. “Name of Sandra Norton. They work together, and the two of them went out last night. When Kaufmann didn’t show up for work, Norton called here and got worried when she didn’t get an answer. She came here on her lunch hour. When Kaufmann didn’t answer the door, Norton started looking in windows. She finally came to that one.”
He gestured toward the open window.
“Then it was flip-out time. The mailman caught her at the corner, running down the street, half out of her head. He had a neighbor call the squad. Before they got here, he got it out of her that there was something wrong here. He came and looked himself, then called dispatch. We talked to him, but he had a schedule to keep so I sent him on his way. He’s coming down to the building when he gets off work to give a statement.”
“What about Norton?” Jen said.
“I guess you’ll get the pleasure of handling that one,” Nola said. “Although it may be a while. I called the E.R. a few minutes ago. She’s in shock, which comes as no surprise, and she’s been sedated. The E.R. doc’s admitting her for observation.”
They heard the front door open and close. A few seconds later, O’Neill came into the hall carrying his photographic equipment and evidence kit. He let out a whistle when he saw the blood-soaked form on the bed.
“We got us a mad dog, don’t we.” It wasn’t a question. “Anybody been in the room?”
“Nope,” Hank said. “The rest of the house, yeah, but not the bedroom. It was obvious we couldn’t do anything for her, so we left well enough alone.”
“Good. No cops with two left feet screwing up the scene. Not that you have two left feet, Nola, but Hank here…”
He began assembling his equipment. He would take pictures of the sheet-covered body but wait till the coroner arrived before going any further. While Pat often did the evidence collection on a murder with the assistance of the detectives, they had decided with the first murder to leave evidence collection to the coroner. That way the chain of evidence would be a little shorter.
“How many of my people do you need?” Hank said.
“If you can spare them, leave me two,” Lonnie said. “Just in case reporters start showing up or the neighbors get too nosy.”
“Nola, you and Bill take care of that,” Hank said. “Nobody gets any closer than the street, understand? Not even on the sidewalk in front of this house.”
“Got it.”
Nola nodded and left the hall. Jen was pretty sure that was a look of relief on her face, and for a second, Jen
