Molten Mud Murder

by Sara E. Johnson

  Rangiora nodded. “The Culture and Heritage rep wasn’t altogether surprised. Relocating skeletons was common. The chief in the cave is urban legend. Must have made the looters mad when they found the cave empty. But how did they find the chief’s grave?”

  “Someone had to be spying on Herera as he prepared to move the body.” She hugged the tote closer to her chest. “Did we ever locate Officer Cooper’s uncle?”

  Rangiora nodded. “His daughter, Coop’s cuz, had a car accident. Taylor Cooper was at the hospital all day and night Saturday. Trimble checked it out. So he couldn’t have killed Herera.”

  “I’m glad,” Alexa said. Her clothes were wet, and she was shivering. “Is the cousin okay?”

  “Yeah nah. She will be after rehab.”

  “Gotta check in at the lab,” she said.

  “You should towel off first,” Rangiora said with a nod.

  As Alexa walked in, Jenny said in a rush of breath, “I was just about to leave. I don’t like being down here alone, even with the guard at the door. I’ve been busy. One set of prints on the shovel match Herera’s.”

  Alexa stashed the teacup bag on a shelf and followed Jenny to her work station. Evidence was neatly arranged and numbered. She realized Jenny was referring to the shovel taken from Herera’s shack.

  “The shovel blade matches the marks left where the bones were dug up,” Jenny said. She pointed at the photo Rangiora had taken of blade marks in the churned earth.

  “That’s consistent with information I’ve learned. He was preparing to move the remains.”

  Jenny pointed to bags of soil. “The soil collected from Paul Koppel’s father-in-law’s boat matches soil from Pirongia Island.”

  “That’s strong evidence Koppel had been to Pirongia.”

  “It gets better,” Jenny said, pointing to a large bundle wrapped in plastic. “That’s the sleeping bag that was halfway down the cliff on Pirongia. Officer Cooper retrieved it with a fishing hook.”

  Alexa pulled on disposable gloves and walked over to the bundle. She remembered Walker explaining how Cooper had cleverly fished it up the cliff side.

  “Since Herera was smothered and there weren’t finger marks around his lips and nose, I figured something soft was used.” Jenny, who seemed to forget about heading home, pulled on a pair of gloves too and unwrapped a section of the plastic, exposing blue nylon. “It’s a mummy bag. A portion in the top right quadrant has traces of saliva, blood, and tissue. The blood type matched Herera’s.”

  Someone had smothered Herera in his own sleeping bag. The narrow shoulders and hip width of a mummy bag, like a straightjacket, would have made it impossible to fight back. And then he was rolled off the cliff. The bag must have snagged as he slipped out and hurtled toward the water.

  Ruthless, this killer. “Excellent work,” Alexa said.

  Jenny accepted this compliment with a nod. “What I want to know is if I can lift prints from the bag? So we can identify the killer.”

  “It’s hard to secure prints from fabric.” Alexa thought for a moment. “It would probably be better if we go for touch DNA. If the killer pressed hard on the fabric, which he did to suffocate Herera, then skin cells would be left behind. Photograph the area first, and then scrape the fabric with a blade. You’ll get some fiber and debris, but you’ll also get skin cells that you can transfer into a DNA processing tube.”

  “Do you think the same person who suffocated Herera attacked me?” Jenny asked, studying Alexa.

  “If it is, count yourself lucky.” A surge of excitement replaced her shivers, warmed her core. The puzzle pieces were starting to fit. “Let’s look at the bag together.”

  The two women worked to photograph and scrape the bag. In thirty minutes, they had collected enough sample to send off for analysis.

  “Too bad DNA testing takes so long,” Alexa said. In the States, a thirty-day turnaround was considered quick. “Have we gotten Koppel’s results yet?”

  “Yes. They came in this afternoon. I emailed them to you,” Jenny said. “We’ll put a rush on this sample. But even with a rush, it takes a week.”

  Alexa’s stomach rumbled. “I’ll take a look at Koppel’s DNA results. Go home. You’ve put in a long day.”

  Jenny didn’t resist. “I’ll see you in the morning. The guard will walk me to my car.”

  And then Alexa was alone.

  Locking the door made her feel marginally better. At least the strobing fluorescent light in the hallway had been replaced. Alexa decided to look at Koppel’s DNA results before dusting the cup. She logged in, noting her hands were shaking, and scanned her email for the report.

  Like fingerprints, no two people share identical DNA. The introduction of deoxyribonucleic acid analysis while Alexa was in graduate school had revolutionized forensics. Her professors had been stoked. While fingerprints could be wiped away, criminals often left their twisted ladder genetic makeup behind without knowing. Blood, hair, skin cells, sweat, semen, spit. And now DNA technology was so common that people were using their own spit to trace their roots. Swab your cheek and mail it off to find relatives you never knew existed.

  Those ancestry kits were also helping to solve cold cases.

  Alexa held her breath and scanned the results, searching for answers to Paul Koppel’s murder. What had the real estate agent, councilman, husband, and father gotten himself into? Why risk the Hallmark life, even if money was tight? Those little guys needed their dad.

  The analysis was a letdown. The DNA from fingernail scrapings and hair follicles found on the lower part of Koppel’s blackened body had been degraded by the heat. Samples from Koppel’s teeth and bones only indicated Koppel’s DNA, of course. However, there was the cigarette butt found at the mud pots. Saliva transferred from the mouth of the smoker to the butt yielded enough epithelial cells to prove Koppel hadn’t smoked it. Who had? Dittmer?

  She switched her mind to the art of fingerprinting. Teatime, finally.

  Alexa scanned the lab, aware of silence, her own breath gone jagged, and then retrieved the teacup, gingerly removing it from the bag. A pounding at the door made her drop it.

  “Shit.” Royal Blue was upside down, the handle severed. The door handle jiggled. Flashback. She reached for her cell, in her pocket this time, and then heard a muffled “Ms. Glock.”

  Trimble. She carefully scooped the cup into the paper bag and stepped to the door.

  “Don’t blame you for locking it,” he said when she opened. “I just finished interviewing the janitor.”

  Alexa pulled her gloves off and tried to look unruffled.

  “Would you believe he got the job as security guard through his parole officer?” Trimble asked.

  Alexa shook her head and casually set the paper bag on the desk.

  “Sometimes authorities carry these recidivism programs too far.” Trimble rushed on. “Rogers said he looked through the lab window Sunday night, said he was checking that the door was secured. That’s your face, eh? I asked him about the propped exit door. He denied it. He said the door was locked. But when I mentioned cell phone records, he flat out caved.” Trimble thumbed through his ubiquitous stack of papers. “He received a phone call prior to coming to work Sunday evening. Take a stab?”

  Cat still had Alexa’s tongue.

  Trimble looked gleeful. “Kauri Antiques. Your fellow Dittmer’s place.”

  “No way,” Alexa said.

  “Rogers ‘bout cried to Mummy when I showed him the records. He said some dude paid him to leave the door open. Said he never met the guy, just talked to him on the phone. An Aussie.”

  “Was Rogers working the morning Jenny Liang was attacked?”

  “He had worked the night before. His shift ended at midnight,” Trimble said. “I have him in a holding cell.”

  “Have you told DI Horne?”

  “Thought yo
u’d want to be the first to know. I’m on my way to tell Horne now,” Trimble said, waving goodbye.

  “Thanks, Detective.”

  A celebratory lager would hit the spot. And a medium-rare rib eye and fries. But Alexa knew she was getting ahead of herself. Time to dust the teacup. Hammer a final nail in Dittmer’s coffin. The little Alexa knew about fine china was that it was sturdier than it looked, and this piece confirmed it. Only the handle had broken off. The smooth, nonporous surface of the fine china should have preserved the natural oils and sweat Dittmer’s fingers left behind.

  Black granular powder was best. Alexa was careful not to over-apply as she swirled the brush on the side of the cup opposite the handle. In her mind, she saw Dittmer lifting the little beauty to the light, admiring its translucency. Then she thought of how his small hands were skilled in the art of mau rākau. Spears. Clubs. Carefully setting it down with trembling fingers, she readied the tape, pressed it to the blackened surface, and lifted.

  In “olden days,” an examiner would use side-by-side micro- scopes to compare prints. Alexa had a flicker of nostalgia for the searching of deltas, creases, and scars as she readied the optical comparator for another round. She turned it on and let the National Fingerprint Identification System scan through its millions of prints. An eternity passed in sixty seconds.

  Green light.

  * * *

  DI Horne was alone. Staring at the corkboard in the conference room.

  Where is everyone?

  He turned and watched her cross the room. One eyebrow lifted. “Why are you limping?”

  “I fell in the cave,” she answered brusquely. Any hint of tenderness on Horne’s part might unravel her. “Did Trimble tell you about the janitor?”

  “He and Rangiora have gone to bring Dittmer in.”

  “Has anyone located Milchner?”

  “He is no longer…a person of interest.”

  “What?”

  “I can’t say why. Not at this juncture.”

  Juncture? Alexa took a deep breath. “I went back to Dittmer’s store today to buy a teacup he handled in my presence. The prints I just now lifted from the cup match the duct tape prints from Paul Koppel’s body.”

  Horne stared at her, his mouth dropping. “What?”

  “They…”

  His eyes went dark, hard. “You went back to the store? By yourself? Without telling anyone?”

  He reached into his pocket, and for a crazy moment, she thought he was pulling out a gun. He stabbed numbers on his phone, shouted something about waiting for backup, and then looked at her. “You put yourself and my team in danger. I can’t have that.” His voice had reverted to steely calm. “Leave. Go home.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Why did I ever come here? Get involved? Alexa fumed as she tore out of the station parking lot. All the work I’ve done.

  The rain had tapered to a fine mist, and darkness had descended, cloaking the eerie city, its stinky smells and internal rumblings, in glistening black. Alexa forced herself to slow down and buckle her seat belt.

  She’d never been told to “go home” in her entire life. People valued her contributions.

  Anger surged through her, came out in a scream, and left when Alexa cracked the window, felt cool air stroke her hot temper.

  A sliver of her mind knew the DI was right. She had overstepped boundaries. Again. Why? Was she trying to impress Bruce Horne? If so, her plan had backfired.

  Big time.

  At the northern tip of the lake, as she turned onto Okere Falls Road, Alexa was startled by car lights in the rearview mirror. The road was usually deserted. Keeping the same distance behind, the car turned too. Probably Sarah or Stevie Ingall. The hair on the back of her neck stood despite her reasoning. For a long mile, the car kept its distance. To see what would happen, instead of making the final turn onto Trout River Road, Alexa continued straight. To who knows where. In the mirror, she watched the car turn.

  Relief.

  It had been one of the Ingalls.

  After half a mile, Okere Falls Road turned gravel. It took ages to find a driveway in which to turn around, and once she did, Alexa resumed fuming. She had several days left on the Trout Cottage rental agreement, but maybe she’d leave early. Head to Auckland. Contact Mr. Red Sneakers at the forensics lab.

  No other cars on winding Trout River Road. Or pulled off on the narrow shoulder. Alexa relaxed and pulled into her driveway. The car lights lit the empty area in front of the cottage. Something long and fast skittered away at the beam’s periphery—a stoat, probably. Alexa had read about these out of control weasel-like predators—killing far more than needed, especially baby birds, to satisfy hunger.

  And purposefully introduced. People are idiots.

  Cutting the engine, she stepped out of the car. “Get the hell out,” she growled into the darkness. Slamming the door, she wondered what was happening back at the station. Had they found Dittmer? It was torture not knowing.

  She listened for a moment. Silence except for river burble and an engine ping. No hooting ruru or chirping bird. She walked across the drive to the porch.

  Hadn’t she left the porch light on? Why was she so reckless? And hadn’t Bruce said the absence of the ruru’s hooting was a warning?

  Unlocking the front door and pushing it open, Alexa tossed keys and tote on the bookcase.

  Reaching for the light switch, a sudden crash from the bed- room paralyzed her hand. A black shape came barreling at her. She whipped around and ran back out, slamming the door. Dashing to the car, she realized she had no keys. She dodged the Toyota and sprinted toward the river path, ignoring knee pain, hopping over a shrub, and slipping on the wet bank, landing on her butt.

  Flipping and rising on primal adrenaline, Alexa caught a flash of illumination as the cottage porch light flicked on and then off, followed by crunching gravel.

  Someone was after her.

  She hurtled blindly toward the river, glad for the inky blackness of the sweater she had thrown on this morning. The crunch of footsteps dissolved to silence. The intruder was now on grass.

  Maybe she could hide and call for help. She felt the outline of her phone pressing against her groin.

  River rumble deepened as she neared the track, reached it, veered left, toward the Ingalls’ home a quarter mile away. Accelerating, Alexa splashed through puddles, her mind a tornado, her body responding to coursing endocrine. She ran and ran, cutting corners at each bend, scraping wet foliage, eyes darting, ears straining. The river roar was intensifying, the seven-meter falls screaming beside the path, drowning the sound of her heavy breathing, her pursuer.

  The path. The side path to the Ingalls’ house. Safety. If she could reach it.

  Was she still being chased?

  Unarmed, alone, she had become prey. She thought suddenly of the stoat, its lethal cunning and stealth, and abruptly halted and darted off path, river side, slipping behind the tall harakeke that reminded her of the bamboo in her Raleigh yard, careful not to step too close to the edge, the river rushing by twenty feet below.

  Huffing. Statue still. No moonlight. A crunch. Footsteps running by. A flash of white.

  Dittmer.

  She held her breath. Dogs barked.

  Iris and Echo.

  No.

  Her damn phone.

  She pressed her pocket to stifle the sound. Surely, the roar of the falls had drowned out the ringtone. Pawing. Pressing. Praying.

  “I heard that,” came a shout. Then closer. “Come out.” Dittmer’s voice penetrated the thunderous falls.

  A rush of air.

  Flax to Alexa’s right was beheaded.

  Whirr.

  Foliage to her left decapitated. Suddenly, Dittmer was in front of her, holding a machete—no, a Maori club—inches from her rib cage, his eyes bulging, his to
ngue flickering. To her horror, the club vanished in the air and then suddenly was at her throat.

  “One thrust and your jugular is severed.”

  The coldness of the greenstone against her naked neck jolted instinct to survive, and she lurched backward.

  “I should have killed your lab friend when I had the chance.” Alexa involuntarily lurched farther back at Dittmer’s words.

  Too close. A foot hung over the abyss.

  She lunged sideways, into more flax. “But you got Koppel,” Alexa shouted, now on her knees.

  “Koppel was my golden ticket to the island. He jumped at the chance for a little excitement and, well, payment, of course.”

  Alexa could not see his face, those crazed eyes, just disembodied white hair.

  “You lured him to the mud pots,” she yelled.

  Flax and ferns above her fell to the ground, sliced from the stalks. “A man who regrets his own actions is too dangerous. A liability. Such a shame.”

  Alexa crawled back until one foot slipped over the edge and then the other. She was hanging above the falls, digging ten fingers into earthy ledge. Her right foot kicked into roots and rock, and she hauled herself up over the ledge and sprang up perpendicular, through the thicket, swordlike leaves slashing exposed skin, and ran until her sidling intersected another path, a different path. Confused for a moment, Alexa realized this path must lead to the cave. The cave Bruce had promised to show her. The cave closed because a tourist had slipped to her death.

  Dittmer’s voice filtered through the river racket. “I watched you at the store today.” The voice floated, followed her. “Where’s the pretty teacup?” A maniacal laugh.

  Alexa bounded down the narrower path, ducking and dodging limbs and leaves, tripping on a root, falling hard. Her already injured knee hit a rock; she bit her tongue not to scream and scrambled onward on all fours, walls of rock closing in on either side, her hands groping wet moss and ferns, her eyes latching onto green lights, little green lights down low, leading the way.