Sudden Death

Stieger pulled out the chain. “Price, George L.,” he read. “This looks like U.S. Army. No medical restrictions, blood type A negative. Christian. Have the Social as well.”

Both Megan and Black wrote down the information. One of Simone Charles’s crime techs snapped pictures. Stieger put the chain down and Megan didn’t hear anything. “Wait,” she said.

“Excuse me?”

“There’s only one tag.”

Stieger held up the chain again and felt along the chain. “Right. One.”

Megan said, “There should be two tags. Either attached and separable, or the second tag on its own small loop.”

“There’s only one tag,” Stieger repeated. “Maybe he lost it.”

“Not likely,” Black said. Megan glanced at him, and he added, “My girlfriend is a veteran. She still sleeps with hers.”

He got it, and Megan didn’t have to explain.

“Maybe the killer took it for a souvenir,” she said.

Or maybe the victim did lose it. Or maybe he’d been injured or there was some other reason the second tag had been removed while he was a soldier. The missing tag felt odd to Megan, but she didn’t have any facts to back up her instincts, so she kept her mouth shut.

“How long has he been dead?” Black asked Stieger.

“Decomp is telling me about twenty-four hours, but with this heat, could be as few as five or six.”

It was eleven in the morning; Megan had been on scene for over an hour. The body had been discovered just after seven a.m.

“I’ll have to do some calculations,” Stieger added. “Factor in his clothing, the position of the body-fortunately, he’s not in direct sunlight. I’ll take a wild stab-and I mean a not to put in your report guess-at six to ten hours. I know, he looks and smells like twenty-four plus, but he’s not. He’s still in rigor, and heat speeds up that process instead of slowing it down.”

Simone Charles, the CSU supervisor, approached and said to Black, “I found something you need to see.”

Megan tagged along, though she felt as if Simone was antagonistic. Megan was used to it. It surprised her that in law enforcement, some of her biggest hurdles were fellow female cops and staff.

Black said, “So what did you find?”

“Follow me.”

Megan and John Black followed Simone down the alley to 12th Street between J and K Streets. Instead of crossing the crime scene tape, Simone turned into the stairwell of the parking garage.

She pointed toward the cement outer stairwell at the same time as Megan saw what had to be blood.

“Cast-off,” they said simultaneously. They were a half block from where the body was found.

Along the ground were bright yellow numbered cards and they told the story as Simone spoke. “We tested the wall, it came back positive for blood, but we’ll have to retest it in the lab. The victim was walking west toward Eleventh Street, and the killer sliced his hamstrings, from right to left, and the blood spattered on the wall. But he had complete control of the knife because there are no drops consistent with him holding the knife after the attack.”

“Which means?” Black asked.

“He sheathed it.” Simone demonstrated. “Slice-he can’t avoid the spatter because of the momentum and the suddenness of the attack-but he sliced, then stuck the knife right back in its case. Probably on his belt loop for ease of use.”

She pointed to the numbered cards. “Those are from the victim. He fell here”-she pointed to an area just inside the stairwell that had a smeared, small dried pool of blood with two clean sections in between, most likely where the victim had fallen to his knees-”then he was picked up and carried up the stairs.”

She moved up the stairwell and Megan followed.

Simone exited on the third floor. There were several crime scene technicians working the area.

“Wait,” Megan said. “Did you say he was carried?”

Simone grinned like the cat who ate the canary, knowing she’d scored. Megan had to give her credit, Simone held that card nicely. “Oh, yeah. Carried.”

Megan looked at the ground, the stairs, and the numbered markers, then saw what Simone saw. “No drag marks.”

“Exactly.” The criminalist beamed. “The guy couldn’t have walked anywhere, so the killer would have to drag or carry him. The vic was pretty big, but I suppose a larger, strong male could have hoisted him over his shoulder.” She frowned, looking down the stairwell.

“But then,” Megan said, “the killer would have had his arms around the victim’s legs.” She demonstrated by pretending to haul something large onto her shoulder. “There wouldn’t be this kind of blood trail. Maybe a few spots, but nothing this extensive.” If the victim had been dragged up the stairs, the blood would have been smeared-not in this drop pattern.

“Exactly,” Simone said in an admiring tone, as if she’d just realized that not all FBI agents were morons.

“There were two people?” Black asked.

Megan nodded. “Carrying him by the armpits, lifting him up.” She followed the blood spatters. “You can see some small, narrow drag marks in places-nothing deep, probably from his shoes.” She frowned. “He was barefoot. Where are his shoes?”

“He was homeless,” Simone said. “Right?”

“He’d have shoes,” Megan said. She’d seen many homeless dead, too many. Their shoes might have been too small or too big, but they wore shoes. “His feet weren’t that dirty-he couldn’t have been barefoot on the streets for long.”

“Weren’t the other victims barefoot?” Black asked.

“Yes,” Megan replied.

Nowhere in the reports from the previous crime scenes had the investigators indicated any suspicions of the two perps. Megan’s heart beat rapidly with the new and potentially valuable information. She couldn’t imagine the police holding back from federal law enforcement such important information as a killing pair.

The three of them followed the yellow markers across the parking garage. “I’ve already called for all security tapes, but there’re many blind spots. The main entrance, exit, and all pedestrian entrances are covered, but not every inch of each parking floor. Still, we should be able to view any vehicle entering or exiting. The garage opens at five a.m. six days a week, but it’s closed on Sundays-only those with card keys can get in.”

“So the killer had a card key?”

Simone shrugged. “I don’t know. He could have tricked the system, or walked in and stolen a pass from someone else’s vehicle to get his own in. We’ll figure that out when we get the tapes from security. Or he could have come in before the garage closed at eight p.m. Saturday night.”

“Do you need a card key to get out?” Megan asked.

John and Simone said in unison, “No.”

“And they have tapes on all exit points?”

“Yes.”

Megan was cautiously optimistic. If they had tapes of the vehicle, they may have a view of the driver. Or passenger, if there were in fact two killers as the blood evidence indicated. Make and model would be obvious, and very likely a plate number or partial plate.

In the center aisle of the garage, Simone stopped. Three parking spaces had been cleared and yellow crime scene tape was posted. “People aren’t going to like me. I closed the garage as soon as we found the trail, but there were already some people parked inside. They’re not going anywhere until I finish collecting evidence.” She pointed to what first appeared like nothing.

Then Megan saw the blood. She glanced behind her and saw the trail of numbered yellow cards, and they stopped here at the rear of the parking slot.

“My guess is a van,” Simone said. “If they had a card key they could have gone anywhere.”

“Then why dump the body in this alley?” Black asked.

Megan asked, “Wouldn’t security have towed it?”