How can these small-time merchants afford such high-powered legal help?
The deeper Cat digs into the firm, the more things seem not to make any sense.
Some of the clients seem to fit; others don’t.
The partners do not make sense.
The fact that either Isabella seems to carry two family names, or Thomas Pierce is lying about her identity, does not make sense.
The tie-in to Yekaterinburg and the frequent trips there don’t make any sense.
And what about Roxie Jennings? Is she just a secretary who has watched too much CSI and Law & Order on TV? Or is she really in danger?
Cat glances down at her watch.
She rubs her aching eyes. They hurt from reading the too-small print on her laptop’s screen. Cat massages her temples.
She checks the time. It is past one thirty in the morning. She needs to sleep or she will be useless to anyone in the morning. Cat takes a sleeping pill, turns out the lights and lays her head down. Questions still swirl in her mind.
As sleep approaches, her thoughts leave the world of Black and Knight and she finds herself thinking about her relationship with Joey. Somehow, she isn’t as sure as she used to be about herself. Her abilities to mother him. It appears, since Mark died, she feels she cannot control things. After all, she was unable to shield Joey from the madness of the Burning Man. She was unable to protect her own son. She watched him change over the last year. He became more isolated. Less secure in himself. His abilities. Less caring of the world around him. Less caring about many things, even her. His own mother. Did watching Mark’s brutal murder affect Joey in ways that even Cat, with all her psychological training, could not fathom? She doesn’t know. She doesn’t have any answers. At least not now.
She forces herself not to think of Joey, fast asleep in his bed. Picturing him in her mind, his body softly breathing and safe, finally, she finds peace and sleep.
CHAPTER TWELVE
What is done well is done quickly enough.
—Suetonius, “Augustus Caesar,”
The Lives of the Twelve Caesars
Cat awakes from a dead sleep with a startle at 6:05 a.m. Her cell phone is ringing. She fell asleep with it still clutched in her hand.
It is Nate on the line. All he says is, “We got another one, get down here now.”
Cat jumps out of bed, hurrying to slide into a pair of jeans. She throws on a bra and a red T-shirt. It doesn’t much matter what she looks like; only a skeleton staff will be at the Broward County coroner’s office at this time of the morning. She doesn’t much care what she looks like anyway.
Within a minute, she is having the valet pull her C-Class around to the front of the hotel. She hands the guy a five-dollar bill and is off.
She calls Nate on the car ride in, patching into the C-Class’s on-board phone system that is synced with her phone. It is one of the reasons she likes the Mercedes. It makes it easy to talk on the phone while driving. “So, what we got?”
“Another floater. This one’s fresher. Gators haven’t gotten to her yet.”
“Great.”
“She’s been in the water, I’d estimate, less than twenty-four hours.”
“Great. You got coffee brewing?”
“Yup.”
“I’ll be there in twenty. Make sure no one touches the body until I get there.”
“She’s already in the morgue examining room on a table waiting for you.”
At this time in the morning, South Florida’s streets and the 826 aren’t jammed with wall-to-wall traffic. Cat makes it to the nondescript three-story stand-alone building that houses the morgue within fifteen minutes. Outside her car’s AC, the air is already gathering humidity.
Her T-shirt bears sweat circles before she walks through the glass double doors.
Nate is waiting for her.
“What time did they find her?”
“Maintenance workers were out in Alligator Alley last night doing road repairs. They found her at about four this morning. It took them a little time to get her out of the water and to call. The guy that found her was shaken up bad. Told the cops he’d never seen a body before. She was transported here at five thirty this morning. I called you when I found out where they found her floating facedown. And then there is the hair.”
“Like the others?”
“Yes.”
“Long dark hair, just like the others.”
Cat and Nate walk into a small room next to the morgue’s gleaming silver double doors. Soon Cat is climbing into a white full bodysuit, positioning her microphone just in front of her mouth, like she has a thousand times before. “Photos already been done?”
Nate nods. “Yeah, I had one of the morgue assistants do that already.”
“Great.” Catherine realizes it seems to be the only word she knows how to say this morning. Maybe her lack of sleep is taking effect. She needs coffee.
“Any identification on her?”
“Nope, she’s clean.”
As Cat steps into the autopsy suite, with its heavy chemical smell and strong overhead fluorescent lights, a wave of nausea sweeps over her. She has never had this reaction before to a body. Maybe it is because she hasn’t had any breakfast or coffee yet. Maybe lack of sleep. Maybe stress.
She steps through of the double swinging doors just in time to catch Nate before he walks around the corner. “Coffee. Black,” she shouts at him.
“Sure. I’ll see what I can do.”
Cat turns to see a young woman’s body laid out on the surgical steel table. She looks no older than eighteen or so. Long dark hair, clumped, matted and damp with salt water. All Catherine can think is, Thank God the alligators didn’t get to her. Thank God that road crew just happened to be out there last night. Sometimes, luck did happen to play a role in investigations, although cops never admitted to it.
The water hasn’t ravaged her.
Even though she has been floating in Alligator Alley overnight, there are still signs that she bled out before being dumped in the water. Her clothes show faint bloodstains. Cat is careful to take additional close-up photographs of them before removing them. Each stained area is clipped and will be sampled for DNA. It is possible the blood is not this girl’s but that of her killer.
After these photos are taken, Cat photographs every square inch of the body, both faceup and facedown and from all angles. Cat usually takes her own photos, regardless of whether someone else has already done so. As a young pathologist, she screwed up once by relying on someone else’s work. In that case, the perp walked because of it. The first case Cat lost. A stupid mistake. Lisa. Cat never forgets the look in Lisa’s mother’s eyes that day in court. The day a child murderer walked free.
Cat made sure that would never happen again.
Concentrate on what you’re doing.
Concentrate on the here and now.
Perhaps there is a chance to get some DNA from this girl and find the bastard who did this to her.
As a pathologist, Cat knows not to rely on what appears to be the cause of death. The gaping knife wound across this girl’s throat, cut almost from ear to ear, seems to be a pretty good indicator of how this girl died, but there could be drugs involved too. The knife wound could have been made after she was dead.
“Now, let’s see what you can tell me,” Cat says as she looks at the girl’s face.
Every corpse has a story to tell.
Some more than others.
That much is true.
This young woman will be no different.
After checking the toe tag and seeing yet another Jane Doe designation, Cat goes about her business with the autopsy. She notes external features such as scars, eye and hair color and length, height, weight, dental work. The body bears no tattoos or moles. There is a single scar on the girl’s knee, about two inches long. Cat sees nothing else remarkable.
Cat moves her eyes down to the girl’s hands. Even though she has been found floating, someone had the good s
ense to bag her hands. Cat removes each bag and carefully checks under the girl’s fingernails for foreign matter. There is nothing under the nails on her left hand. The water has already scrubbed that hand clean. But under the nails of her right hand, there is a small amount of skin and a tiny amount of blood.
Good. At least she got a piece of him.
Cat removes what is there. It is just enough matter to send for analysis both to the FBI lab and to the local lab associated with the Broward County coroner’s office. It is an important enough piece of evidence that having it tested at both locations makes sense.
After examining the girl’s pelvis and vagina, Cat is sure the girl was repeatedly raped before she was killed. Cat can see extensive vaginal tearing. Even salt water can’t hide that.
Cat collects the small amount of semen that remains in the girl’s body and sends it to the FBI lab for DNA typing. Hopefully, it will come back with a hit on some criminal already in the FBI’s system. If not, at least it is something.
After this, Cat takes the girl’s bladder out. She removes a small volume of the girl’s urine and sends it to toxicology, along with a measure of her blood. This analysis will be critical in determining if the girl was drugged before she was killed. Many drugs, such as barbiturates and Valium, are excreted by the kidneys and are concentrated in the bladder, making the urine a good place to detect their presence.
With careful attention, Cat begins examining the girl’s eyes and eyelids, just as Nate walks in with her cup of black coffee and turns away from the body. Cat sometimes forgets that other people are not used to being around corpses, especially ones that have been opened and with organs already removed. Cat tells Nate to leave the coffee and go. He all but runs out of the room, making Cat laugh. He looks like he’s going to throw up.
Cat steps to where Nate has left the coffee, removes her headgear and lifts the microphone. She takes a big gulp of coffee, sets the cup back down, replaces all her gear. She steps back to the body.
Keep going.
She centers her attention on the girl’s eyes and her neck.
“Now, what do we have here?” she says.
Judging by the petechiae in the conjunctiva, Jane Doe was strangled or choked before she was killed. The knife wound at her neck is not ragged, but straight at the edges. A clear slicing movement, probably from someone behind her. From the looks of it, someone much bigger than she, directly behind her, maybe holding her at the same time. The knife injury is so deep it goes almost all the way back to the girl’s spine. Whoever did this to her is big and strong.
Just about sliced her head off clean.
“Good God,” Cat says under her breath. Normally she doesn’t curse, but this girl’s been brutalized. Someone—no, something has done this to this poor girl. She’s been savaged.
No life should end like this.
The girl’s brain tissue and matter are unremarkable. But Cat sections some of the tissue and sends it for a toxicology screen.
From the looks of it, the girl may have been drugged and was certainly raped. Then her throat was slit by somebody much bigger than her. It is someone she knows, as there are no defensive wounds on the girl’s hands, wrists or arms. Either that, or she never saw the attack coming at her from behind. Finally, whoever did it dumped her like garbage in Alligator Alley, hoping no one would find her for a while.
Or hoping that the alligators would do their job.
Cat smiles at the corpse and says, “We’ll just show him, now, won’t we?”
She finishes the autopsy, all the while dictating her findings for a report that will be compiled later, once the toxicology report comes back and the DNA results are in.
Her work with this girl finished, she turns and walks away from Jane Doe.
This girl does not belong here.
Like Anna Perez, she does not fit the profile of the others. She is no prostitute or runaway. Something is seriously wrong in South Florida. A serial rapist and murderer is loose. And his actions seem haphazard to say the least. Either this guy is changing up his MO or there is something else related to Anna Perez and this latest victim that doesn’t fit.
Cat’s faith in her belief that the cases are even related is shaken to the core. She prays that the DNA results will come back with something she can work with to catch whoever is killing women.
She prays they will catch a break.
She prays for the young women of South Florida.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Who will guard the guardians themselves?
—Juvenal, Satires
Always one to keep her promises, Cat gets Roxie Jennings what she promised.
Invariably, she has to pull some strings with Nate and with the head of the Police Department, but being an FBI agent sometimes carries with it a little clout. This is one of those times.
And it just so happens that a member of the Police Department lives in Roxie’s neighborhood. He can watch her house. He can watch for the black Audi by day and be paid to moonlight to do so at night. With approval, Cat hires two detectives to escort Roxie back and forth to work and do so in a way that is not obvious to anyone who might be following her.
Driving in unmarked cars, Nate and Catherine meet Roxie in person at her house that day as units are assigned. Cat instructs her, “Now, it’s really important that you do not change your routine. You must act as if everything is the same as before. We don’t want to tip these guys off.”
While Roxie nods, Cat wonders if she understands the gravity of what is going down. Cat says to Roxie, “You have to know that if whoever is watching you has any connection to the rapes and murders going on in Miami/Fort Lauderdale, things could get really ugly really fast.”
“I understand.”
Nate looks concerned. Roxie already seems apprehensive. Like she can’t handle the pressure, like she might bolt. From the looks on their faces, the two assigned detectives, Doyle and Murray, who are also in Roxie’s living room, feel the same. They don’t like this assignment.
But Roxie is all they have right now.
Cat looks at her square in the face. “The last thing we want you to do is to tip off either Pierce, Clayton or Isabella about any of this.”
Roxie nods, her eyes down, searching the floor for reassurance. There is nothing powerful or assertive in this woman. She acts as if she is trapped in an invisible cage.
Cat has a bad feeling about it, but there is not much she can do. The look in Nate’s eyes says he feels the same.
Cat reminds Roxie, “Now, we made a deal. I get you this and you get me copies of those files.”
Roxie just nods, her eyes looking at the floor. Cat and Nate know they have no choice but to move forward with this. They don’t have enough information to get a warrant. And even if they did, they don’t want to spook Pierce or Isabella or any of the other partners. With the money the firm is making, if they are spooked, they will run. And they have enough money and foreign connections to run and disappear for a long time. Never to be seen again.
Cat needs access to those files to put everything together.
Or at least some of it.
Cat told Nate this morning what she found last night on her computer. She has already told him about what Roxie said about Isabella totally losing her cool and being included in the partnership meetings. About the frequent trips oversees. The almost non-existent bio on Clayton Pierce. And she’s given him the information about the firm’s unusual clients, including the wire-transfer companies, the language school in Yekaterinburg and the tie-in with small merchants in cities all over the world. The way Natasha seems to have been made partner almost immediately on her being hired. Both Cat and Nate have their suspicions about what is going on, but they need those files to confirm them. They need specifics to have any hope of swearing out a warrant. If they try to conduct raid without one, the evidence will never see the light of day in courtroom. Cat remembers the name of the doctrine from her days testifying as a courtroom expert.
/> Cat is familiar with what lawyers and cops call “the fruit of the poisonous tree doctrine.” She saw it used against another FBI agent once. If an investigator obtains evidence without a proper warrant or reason for a stop and search, then the evidence that is found from that warrant and everything that comes after it, no matter how damning or atrocious, is considered tainted and is excluded in a criminal trial. Cat remembers her colleague Jana’s overzealous efforts to catch a serial bomber leading to nothing. During the suspect’s trial, direct physical evidence that he was building bombs had to be excluded. Thanks to “the fruit of the poisonous tree doctrine,” the bomber had walked out of court after trial, a free man, with a look on his face that told Cat and Jana he would kill again. He fled to Argentina to carry out two more bombing attacks. Jana, a bright, strong woman, was so devastated she left the FBI. Cat was shocked when she heard three months later that Jana had committed suicide. Jana couldn’t bear the fact that her mistake had allowed this bomber to walk free, right out of the FBI’s jurisdiction. Her mistake had allowed this madman to bomb and maim another day.
Cat doesn’t plan on making that kind of mistake.
Not today.
Not any day.
She needs to play it cool.
More important, she needs Roxie to play it cool.
* * *
Just as Big Tiny has always known he is different from other men, so Isabella has always known she is different from other women. She was born of a Ukrainian father and a Soviet mother, and her parents fought bitterly for as long as she could remember as a child. Finally, when she was ten, they did the right thing and divorced.
Isabella was sent to live with an aunt, who eventually told the red-haired girl she no longer had enough money to take care of her. At twelve, Isabella was sent to a Ukrainian orphanage, even though her parents were still alive.
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