All standard procedure. Luka examined the girl’s injuries. Beaten to a pulp was an understatement. An attack like that—no way it wasn’t personal. Their victim knew her killer, he was certain. “Maggie said you made a tentative ID?”
“She has the same tattoo as a girl I met while working a Vice operation. Seventeen-year-old, name was Lily Nolan. Maggie’s going to run the prints, see if it’s her or not. Maggie also said the blows appeared to be inflicted by a blunt instrument, but she’ll have more information after the autopsy.”
“Murder weapon?”
They both glanced around the alley and its abundance of possible weapons: loose paving bricks, lengths of rebar, stray two-by-fours broken off from shipping pallets.
“I asked CSU to bag and tag anything that might be a possibility.”
Luka pointed to the initial photos of the body, the ones taken before Maggie began her examination. Their victim was partially covered with a blood-spattered length of plastic sheeting. “What do you make of the body being covered?”
“At first, I thought the killer draped it over her body after he’d killed her—like a sign of remorse, covering her up. Or he’d used it to move her body here after killing her elsewhere.” Luka frowned and she continued, “But then I realized the only way to get that much blood on the sheet but not the surrounding alley was if he first incapacitated her—maybe with the blow to her face that caused the bloody nose—and while she was down, he threw the plastic over her and bludgeoned her in a blitz attack.”
“Why?”
“To protect any blood from spraying onto him. If you look closely, you can see pattern marks from the blows. I’ve asked the CSU guys to compare them to our possible weapons.”
He nodded, agreeing with her theory—contingent on what the medical examiner found during the autopsy. “Next steps?”
“Cell tower warrants, finish canvassing for witnesses and any surveillance cameras that might have caught our victim or our killer, confirm ID, check with Vice and patrol to see if there’s been any recent unusual activity in the area, and track down any family and known associates.”
It was a good plan, although Luka doubted she would get very far with any of her action items, not on a Sunday morning. Except Maggie was on the job, so that would help. “Okay. Let’s get to work.”
Three
Dr. Leah Wright glanced at her schedule. If they were going to do everything the kids wanted, she’d need to be in two places at once. Her daughter, Emily, and Luka’s nephew, Nate, were both in front of her as they walked across the grassy field that served as a parking lot for the annual Craven County Fair. Emily and Nate had their heads together, peering at the map, planning their day. Trailing behind Leah, already bored, was Ruby, Leah’s mother and reluctant childcare-helper.
She traced her finger down the list of events. Today, the final day of the fair, was devoted to children. Poultry showmanship. Junior dressage and roping competitions. Quilting bee and auction. Small engine repair race followed by a tractor pull. Candle-making class. Livestock judging. And, the highlight of the day as far as Nate and Emily were concerned: the food and arts competition judging. Followed by a pie-eating contest, chili cook-off, and auctioning the various homegrown vegetables and other food items the children had entered into competition.
Leah hoisted her knapsack higher on her shoulder and reached for her water bottle. It was just past nine in the morning and already the temperature hovered around eighty-five. August in the central Pennsylvania mountains was known for its hazy, hot, and humid days, but this summer had felt particularly stifling. Some days it was a struggle for each breath. Although maybe it wasn’t only the weather. Leah’s husband, Ian, had been murdered in February and now, six months later, she still woke every day expecting to see his face beside her. And then, three seconds after she opened her eyes, an awful emptiness devoured her as reality came crashing down.
The kids reached the line at the ticket booth and waited for Leah to catch up. “Ruby said if we were good, we could get funnel cakes,” Emily said. “And then she said we could get kettle corn.”
“And apple fritters,” Nate chimed in. “Don’t forget those. I promised Luka and Janine and Pops I’d bring some home for them.” Nate had left Baltimore after his mother, Luka’s sister, had died, to move in with Luka, Luka’s elderly grandfather, and Janine, their live-in healthcare aide who kept the entire family running.
“Right.” Emily was already buzzing with a pre-sugar rush, bouncing on her toes. She’d recently turned seven but still was much shorter than Nate, who was eight. “And we need to ride the carousel and the whirl-a-tilt and—”
“I want to see the horses,” Nate put in.
Emily nodded. “And we need to be at our ribbon-winning. Of course.”
They both nodded and stared at Leah as if she could alter physics to allow them to do everything in one day.
Leah’s phone buzzed and both kids groaned when she pulled it out to glance at the message. The lab with an update on a sexual assault case she’d handled earlier in the week. It was all good news for the survivor, but Emily tugged at her hand. “You’re not leaving to go back to work, are you?”
Leah smiled. “Nope. I’m yours all day long.” Despite still being on call for emergencies in her position as medical director of Good Samaritan’s Crisis Intervention Center, Leah’s new job definitely gave her more time with Emily than her previous life as an ER physician had. Still, there were some days… okay, most days… when she missed her work on the frontlines. Although one unexpected perk of working at the CIC was its fledgling partnership with Cambria City’s
