“How many blows were before death?” Miranda asked.
“The majority were after. I’d say he killed her rather early on. Or she killed her. Can’t rule anything out at this point. The majority of the blows were postmortem.” Jules pointed out several more of significance. Her words were grim, and there was pain in her eyes.
Pain Jac understood.
Jules’s daughter and Rachel’s sat next to each other every single day at Brynlock. Ruthie, Jules’s daughter, had told Jac that herself so proudly at the party.
“It seems like overkill,” Jac said. “Unnecessary. Rage.”
“That’s for you guys and girls figure out,” Jules said. “But it does seem quite a bit excessive.”
“Personal,” Jac said, looking up. “It was most likely personal.”
Jules nodded, replacing the sheet over the victim respectfully. “Now, I’m not a psychologist, of course. But I live with one. It seems to me she most likely knew her killer. There were no defensive wounds. None. So I’m suspecting that the first blow was probably the fatal one. Or incapacitated her enough so that she couldn’t fight back. Dear heaven, I hope so. So she had to let someone close enough to her to do that. Rachel didn’t have a clue what was about to happen to her. She never would have imagined. She…has there been any word on the girls yet?”
Jac shook her head. “Max is overseeing the search now.”
“Let me know when they are found. The school called a few minutes ago. They’ve dismissed early. Some of the older children have learned what has happened.”
“Someone she knew was in the house that late at night. Someone she trusted,” Jac looked at the other women. “Who could she have angered so much that they would do this to her?”
Jules just shook her head, obvious tears in her eyes. “I don’t know. But find them, Jaclyn. Please. Just find those little girls before something happens to them next. I…can’t stand the thought of those children on my table. Livy has been to my house; I’ve held her in my arms when a bee stung her.”
“I’m going to find them, Jules. I promise.”
There were too many people counting on her for her to fail now.
41
It took a moment for Jac to pull herself back together. Miranda stood with her in the hall outside the morgue, her good hand on Jac’s shoulder. Miranda didn’t force her to talk.
Jac appreciated that. She didn’t know if she could.
Jules’s fear and grief had been too much of an echo of her own.
Finally, Jac pulled in a breath, promising herself that would be the last time she fell apart. She wasn’t doing those girls any good by wasting time like this. She and Miranda had one more stop to make before they would be able to head back out to the crime scene.
Forensics.
The blood-and-bios supervisor, Kelly, caught them just inside the door.
“I have preliminary results for you. I know this case is high priority. The director called me in from comp time himself. When I heard who it was…and the connection to Brynlock, I…”
Jac followed Kelly to the larger blood-and-pathogens lab near the back. Kelly’s office was off to the side behind a reinforced door. An explosive-resistant material created by Lucas Tech surrounded the entire lab. PAVAD learned from past mistakes.
“The blood samples matched Mrs. Lindsay and Mrs. Sturvin. But we have a third sample that is also female.” Kelly pulled the reports up on a large monitor, then motioned to files she’d already prepared. “I’ve circled the location on the house schematics.”
Miranda took the file report. “You’re sure it’s a woman?”
“DNA shows female. I’m running more in-depth tests on the sample now, to see if we can get something to match. But, yes, definitely a woman. Well, a female. No way to tell how old. But the sample does not show familial to Rachel Sturvin. So it’s not one of her daughters. These samples were taken near Mrs. Lindsay. Whatever happened, happened in that general location. Rain had the samples mixing, but we’ve isolated two separate samples now. The only blood samples we found in the hall belong to Mrs. Sturvin, so far. But we’re only a quarter of the way through them. Of course, we’re eliminating reference samples from the husband and the children now. Toothbrushes were collected at the scene.”
Jac stared at the diagrams of the scene, where each sample had been taken. An additional victim explained the sheer amount of blood.
Everyone had thought it seemed like a lot of blood, but with it being a drizzly, rainy morning, Jac had just thought it had been slightly diluted.
A third woman changed everything.
Jac looked at Miranda. “Is it possible that we have a female killer? That the blood was the UNSUB’s?”
Miranda nodded. “It is possible. We all know women can be just as deadly as men.” Miranda waved the plaster cast on her arm significantly.
Jac winced. Yes, Miranda had experience with that.
“Hell, yes,” Kelly added. She’d faced her own nightmares thanks to her association with PAVAD.
“How likely is that, though? Bludgeoning isn’t exactly a common method of murder for a woman,” Miranda pointed out.
Kelly had a different opinion. “Of course, it’s possible, but the location is problematic. The unknown woman’s blood samples were in the driveway, and there was a great deal of it. Almost as much as there was of Mrs. Sturvin’s and Mrs. Lindsay’s. And we’re testing now.”
“And you’re certain it’s not either one of the children’s?” Miranda asked quietly.
Jac’s breath seized as she waited for the answer to the question she was glad she hadn’t had to ask.
Kelly shook her head. “Preliminary DNA doesn’t match either of the girls. I’m not an ME, but if I had to give a good guess based on the amount of blood evidence—it’s highly probable you have a third victim out there.”
“And we still have two missing little girls.” Jac’s stomach tightened at what that meant. “We don’t know who’s out there now.”
“You’ll find them. We’ll find them. No one is doing this alone.” Kelly touched her
