Sin was one step ahead of him. She walked around the scene until she found what she was looking for. “Evidence bag,” she yelled.
One of the crime scene officers handed her a bag in which she dropped an envelope identical to the last.
Snapping out of his fog, Quincy started shouting commands. “All right everybody you know the routine. Let’s gather all the evidence and transport the body back to the morgue.” He clapped his hands together. “Let’s move it.”
Once the scene was cleared and the body was loaded into the morgue van, Sin and Jack walked back to where they parked. Nearing the perimeter, they were accosted by reporters. Tiffany was leading the attack.
Sin held up the crime scene tape so she and Jack could duck under. “It’s time to do what you do best, McGuire.”
“And what’s that, O’Malley?”
“Spew bullshit and make the young girls swoon.”
Tiffany shoved the mic in Sin’s face as she swung her leg over her Harley. Sin didn’t take the bait or give Tiffany the time of day. She simply looked back at Jack and cocked her head toward the pert reporter. “Start here.”
Jack held his hands over his head to quiet the reporters and nodded at Sin. Taking his cue, she kick-started her bike, twisted the throttle, and quickly parted the crowd.
Through her rearview mirror, she saw Jack engage Tiffany and the other reporters. Maybe his being here was a good idea. One for Frank, she thought as her bike rumbled onto Brickell Avenue.
Punching the gas, Sin tore over the I-395 Causeway toward South Beach. She needed to clear her head of the images she had just seen and the ocean seemed like the perfect place.
21
Ash sat on the edge of the couch watching the live news report with nervous anticipation. He watched as the camera fanned from the crowd to his newest creation, and began biting his nails as the camera zoomed in on the reporter.
“This is Tiffany “Tiff” Swenson reporting for Action News. If you just joined us, I am standing on Brickell Avenue in front of Waterfront Park where another victim of the Painted Beauty Killer has been found.”
She went on to describe the scene while the camera panned out. That’s when Ash saw the men holding sheets to hide his creation.
“They’re not going to show your work!” she screamed.
Ash snapped his head toward the voice. “Shut up!” His face reddened in tune with his angry emotions. It was the first time he acknowledged the voice verbally. “I’ve taken care of it. Just like I took care of everything else.” Picking up a cup, he watched as it splintered into shards when it struck the wall.
Ash dropped to his knees, covered his face with his hands, and rocked back and forth as her laughter filled the room. He wiped his tears and turned his attention back to the television.
The camera zoomed in on the makeshift tent and Ash got a good look at Agent O’Malley, the medical examiner and two others, before they disappeared under the sheets.
“That’s the one you’re going to have to be careful of,” she whispered. “That FBI agent is more than she seems.”
Ash, glued to the screen, subconsciously nodded in agreement.
“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer,” she murmured.
Time seemed to stand still while he watched the action unfold on the screen. The local news cut pieces of the crime scene into the broadcast, and Ash bit his nails to the quick waiting to see his artwork. He watched a clip of the morgue van driving away and only then did the sheets come down.
Ash reveled in the reaction of the crowd when they saw the empty chair, and he felt slight redemption. If that has their attention, wait until they see the real artwork.
The camera panned back to Tiff who was now walking and trying to talk at the same time.
“I’m going to try and get a word with Special Agent O’Malley and find out exactly what the FBI is keeping from the public,” she huffed.
“Look at the sleazy whore,” she shrieked. “Teetering in her stilettos and trying to talk at the same time. Hell,” she laughed, “this is almost worth the price of admission.”
Once the newscast was over, Ash went to his closet, found the garment bag he needed, grabbed the manila envelope off the kitchen table, and headed out the door.
“Nothing gets in the way of the art,” he mumbled.
“That’s right,” her voice had softened, sounding more like it did when Ash was just a boy, “nothing.”
Driving to his destination, the two of them repeated their mantra, “Cruelty has a human heart, and jealousy a human face; terror the human form divine, and secrecy the human dress.”
22
The smell of the sea and the feel of the warm breeze helped clear Sin’s head as she rode along Collins Avenue. She rode down to South Point Beach and parked her bike on the boardwalk that hugged the sand. She stared out at the turquoise waters hoping to unsee what she had just witnessed, and called up a strong memory that would perhaps bury the new horror under the one layer of her past that continued to haunt her….
Sin and Jack were working a drug smuggling case in Louisiana. They had arrested a few of the middlemen in the operation but no one would talk. It was obvious that they feared whoever was in charge of their illegal world far more than they did the FBI.
During a warehouse bust, Sin found three young girls who were scared to death. She was able to gain their confidence, and soon they began to spin a wild tale of how they were taken from their homes in the mountains of Nicaragua and used as drug mules. Sin later found out that the girls—ages eleven to thirteen—had been sexually assaulted and brutalized.
Sin and Jack went back and interrogated the captured men in ways that definitely went against the Geneva Convention, not to mention
