“What do you make of it?” Jarsdel asked. “Knocked unconscious before…before whatever happened to him?”
“No, I don’t think so. I’ll show you why.” Ipgreve lifted the cadaver’s head. “If he’d been struck from the front, then we’d also likely have contrecoup bruising on the back or sides of his head, where he fell. But thanks to all the hair being burned off, we can see it’s clean. No bruises.” Ipgreve gently lowered the head back down. Using a pen, he indicated the discolorations. “We’ve got several major blows—at least four, probably five. We might even have a skull fracture with this one here. I think these injuries were sustained as he struggled to escape. Either that, or…”
“What?”
The ME made a face. “Might’ve done it on purpose—tried to knock himself out. Had to’ve hurt like hell, going out that way.”
“Then that’s your finding? He was baked alive?”
“You know it’s too early for me to say conclusively, but considering the nature and extent of the perimortem trauma, I’d put it at the top of my list.” Ipgreve shook his head, marveling at the thing in front of them. “Can’t wait to get this guy on my table.”
“I admire your enthusiasm.”
“You have any idea just how odd this is?” Ipgreve went on. “Yes, it was an oven, but not an ordinary oven. Something big enough to hold a man, but with no element or open flame. The heat was immense but indirect. Not even a rack, else we’d have grill marks on the body. Rules out anything you’d have in a restaurant, even an industrial baking facility. And it’s gonna play hell on your timeline. Won’t see any of the usual determining factors, like putrefaction or rigor, and obviously, he won’t cool like a normal body.” As he spoke, Ipgreve inserted a probe below the sternum. He removed it, then fed a thermometer into the hole. The digital readout blinked.
“I’d say our fella here was exposed to temperatures in excess of four hundred fifty degrees. While it won’t be any help with time of death, a liver spike’ll at least give you an idea of when he got here.”
The thermometer beeped, and Jarsdel leaned closer for a better look.
“138.3,” said Ipgreve, writing down the temperature. “What’d it get down to last night? Upper fifties? So…” He made some calculations.
Jarsdel knew whatever Ipgreve came up with would be very rough. Time of death using body temperature was usually calculated by an algorithm based on Newton’s law of cooling, and ideally incorporated two measurements taken hours apart. The fact that this body was outside, in an unstable temperature, further complicated the estimate.
“What time’s it? Almost nine? Then he hasn’t been here more than about three hours, give or take.” Ipgreve concluded. “If it were much longer, he’d be at more like 120, maybe 110. Air temp has only risen to 66 degrees, which is still on the chilly side, and you also gotta figure the sidewalk would’ve acted as an effective cooling agent. But the body’s still warm. This guy’s bigger, of course, but what you said about it being like a turkey wasn’t far off. Just imagine taking your bird out of the oven on Thanksgiving and putting it on the patio. Won’t stay hot for long.”
That wasn’t good news. Jarsdel had checked: Thai Pavilion, the restaurant located above the market in Thailand Plaza, closed at midnight, with the last employees leaving around one thirty. That meant that not only would no one at the restaurant have seen anything, but foot traffic would’ve been practically nonexistent when the body had been dumped that morning.
Ipgreve was right—calculating a timeline would be next to impossible. There was no telling how long the body had been kept in its original location before being moved. They’d have to link it with a name before they’d be able to reconstruct the victim’s final hours, and getting an ID was going to be tough. They couldn’t exactly put a picture of him on television, and considering the damage to the hands, fingerprints would likely be useless. Forensic dentistry could confirm a victim’s identity, but it didn’t do any good unless you already had someone in mind. Their best bet was to coordinate with Missing Persons, then arrange for DNA matching once a likely subject emerged.
Jarsdel found his gaze drifting back to the body. He tried to imagine who the man had been and how he’d come to deserve—according to someone’s peculiar logic—this particularly gruesome end.
“Gonna go look for my partner.” Jarsdel stepped outside. The fresh air felt good. So did being away from that grinning thing in the tent.
He spotted Morales on the other side of the pagoda, conferring with an FSD tech. The man was his partner but also his superior, a fifteen-year veteran with the LAPD—six of those in homicide. He was squat, dark-skinned, with a broad face and almond eyes. His coarse black hair was swept back into a stiff, unmoving helmet with what Jarsdel supposed must have been handfuls of styling gel. When he walked—which he avoided doing as much as possible—he did so stiffly, like a retired athlete who’d amassed a catalogue of injuries.
Morales saw Jarsdel approaching. “Hey, Prof.”
Jarsdel smiled without humor. “Morales.”
“You know Carl? He’s doing our sketch.”
Jarsdel shook hands with the FSD tech, who went back to drawing on a tablet with a stylus. The tablet was a recent innovation. Crime scene sketches had always been done by hand, maybe with the aid of a compass to get the scale right. But technicians with the Forensic Science Division used software like ScenePD or Crime Zone, allowing them to create crisp and accurate diagrams of even the most complex scenes in a matter of minutes. And while all officers were trained in sketching a crime scene, the FSD’s work was usually more impressive to a jury. Its members were considered impartial specialists, with no particular stake in the direction an investigation went. That made it harder for defense attorneys to cast them as bad guys out to get their clients.
Jarsdel moved closer and looked over Carl’s shoulder as he drew. “I know we’ve got lots of reference pictures, but I want as much detail on the altar as you can get.”
Morales looked dubious. “This pagoda thing? You think it’s important?”
“I think it’s the most startling aspect of the case.”
“Startling, huh? Shit, Professor. You oughta take a look at the body, you want startling.”
“I already have.”
“But this is what gets your attention.”
“The body was posed right in front of it. I doubt that was arbitrary.”
Morales grunted and studied the pagoda more closely. The head that sprouted from the golden statue’s neck featured four faces. “What do you think, Buddha? You an integral part of this investigation?”
Jarsdel glanced up from the tablet. “That’s not Buddha. He’s Phra Phrom, the Thai representation of Brahma.”
“Who cares?”
“It’s not a minor distinction. Brahma’s a Hindu god, much older than the Buddha. Different cosmology and way of worship. If leaving the body here has any significance, it lies in the killer’s understanding of who this god is.”
“So what, like, people used to sacrifice to this guy?”
Jarsdel frowned. “No, not at all. That’s what’s so strange. Brahma’s the god of creation, a force of good, of benevolence. He’s never associated with harm or destruction.”
“So maybe it’s just a coincidence the body being here, and your theory’s bullshit.”
“Possible.”
“Besides, I thought your specialty was dead white guys.”
“My bachelor’s was in political science. Had to take classes in cultural literacy.” Morales rolled his eyes, but Jarsdel pretended he didn’t notice. “It was a deeply cynical and profane thing to do, dumping the body here.”
“Not to mention killing the guy in the first place, though, right?”
Jarsdel looked around. “How are we doing on surveillance cameras?”
Morales pointed to the Thai market, which w
ould normally be open by now. “Just one, but it’s trained at an angle on the door. Wouldn’ta captured anything near the altar. Might be able to get something off a traffic camera, but it’s a real long shot. Closest one is three blocks east, so unless the body was strapped to the roof of the car on its way over here, I don’t know what we’d be looking for.”
Carl, the FSD tech, turned his tablet so Jarsdel could get another look at it. “What do you think?” He rotated the image and zoomed in and out on various points of interest. He’d rendered the image without the privacy tent, of course, and had placed the body exactly as it lay at the foot of the altar.
Jarsdel nodded his approval. “Good. Send it to me.”
Another FSD man approached the detectives. “I think we’re done. Got a few cigarette butts, a flattened Coke can, some chewing gum. Scene’s pretty clean. The pagoda’s covered with prints, but it’s a public street. Anyone could’ve left them. I’m ready to release the scene if you are.”
Ipgreve emerged from the tent, peeling off his gloves. “We gotta get him indoors,” he said. “You almost done?”
Morales turned to Jarsdel. “Well, Prof? We good here?”
“Why are you asking me?”
“Want you to take lead for now.”
“Why?”
Morales paused, studying his partner. “Chain of command, rookie. Sounds like you got some specialized knowledge to offer on this case. Put some of that schooling to work.” Morales gave him a saccharine smile. “Look on the bright side. When we find the asshole, you can be the one to make the report to the LT. Maybe even get another chevron on your jacket.”
Jarsdel knew the inverse of the statement was equally true: that if they didn’t find the asshole, he’d be the one having to justify their investigative strategy to Lieutenant Gavin. And Gavin didn’t like him any more than Morales did.
A news copter had joined them, beating the air overhead and forcing those on the ground to shout to be heard. Jarsdel looked from his partner to the mass of people pressed against the barricade, then past them, to the crush of traffic struggling up Western. A street vendor was taking advantage of the captive potential customers, moving up and down the rows of cars with bags of cotton candy. Haarmann’s prisoner was bucking back and forth in the patrol car. Seeing Jarsdel looking at him, the man stopped, shouted something, and stuck out his tongue. It was a child’s gesture and felt strange and ugly coming from a grown man.
“You home, Professor?” asked Morales.
Jarsdel gave a slight nod, looking once more at the statue of Brahma, likely the only witness to the identity of the murderer. He’d sat the night in vigil, in quiet contemplation, tranquil as a frozen lake even while confronted with the astounding savagery visited upon one of his children. Jarsdel felt a sudden sense of shame on behalf of his species, who’d been given so much and repaid it all with blood and steel.
But look, he thought at the statue. I care. I’m here, and I’ll make it right. Just give us a little longer to push back the darkness.
One Day You’ll Burn
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Reading Group Guide
1. Jarsdel isn’t very popular with his coworkers in Hollywood. Do you think this comes from jealousy or something else? Why?
2. One of the reasons Jarsdel tries to classify the killer is to “demystify” him and make him less frightening. Can you think of anything you were afraid of until you learned more about it?
3. Early in the book, reporters call for the Eastside Creeper to be “deleted,” saying “we don’t need to understand it, and we don’t need to reason with it. We just need to get rid of it.” Should we classify killers as “inhuman” and refuse to understand their motives? What problems could this type of thinking cause?
4. Jarsdel is asked what one thing he would change to improve the world. How would you answer that question?
5. Did you agree with Jarsdel’s decision to avoid filing a report on the car door incident?
6. Varma says that both ugliness and beauty are contagious. How is this demonstrated throughout the book? Can you think of any examples from your own life?
7. Father Ruben Duong protests Varma’s crime deterrent measures, such as PuraLux and the ReliaBench, saying, “Treat a man like a criminal and he behaves as criminals do.” Do you think Varma’s measures would make you feel like a criminal? Would that change your behavior?
8. Jarsdel barely gets to work with Oscar Morales in this book. Do you think his process suffers? How?
9. Jarsdel seriously questions his own motivations for leaving academia. Do you think he was originally looking for an ego boost? Did you think he might leave the police force?
10. What do you make of Ed Sponholz? How does he compare to the Creeper?
A Conversation with the Author
You discuss weapons in great specificity. How do you research them and choose the ones that make the most sense for the book?
Law enforcement agencies publish lists of firearms their officers are approved to carry, so much of that information is public. You can also search in reverse—looking up the gun manufacturer and seeing which agencies contract with them. If I have a specific scenario I’m unsure about, I’ll always ask a technical consultant.
What kinds of resources did you use to learn about behavioral science? Was there anything interesting that you learned but couldn’t include in the book?
This is a subject that has always captivated me. In my parallel life as a magician, its understanding is a matter of practical importance, as flashy effects and clever methods carry no substance without some grasp of behavioral science. A few gifted practitioners have dedicated their careers to maximizing the impact of performance through applied psychology, and those whose ideas have influenced me the most have been Juan Tamariz, Derren Brown, Pop Haydn, Eugene Berger, Richard Osterlind, and Kenton Knepper. Their work is so beautiful and mystifying as to practically blur the line between reality and true wizardry, and the world would be a less wondrous place without them.
Many of Alisha Varma’s ideas are perversions of principles illustrated by Prof. Don Norman in his extraordinary book, The Design of Everyday Things. Also crucial to my understanding of affordances was The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception, by Prof. James J. Gibson. One of my academic heroes is professor and polymath Michael D. C. Drout. His lecture, “A Way with Words: Writing, Rhetoric, and the Art of Persuasion,” stands as one of the greatest contributions to the relationship between language and behavior.
There was definitely a lot I had to leave out, lest it go from seasoning to becoming the main course. For example, magician John Szeles (aka The Amazing Johnathan) gives a terrific example of a technique we can call “framing.” You ask someone what’s the proper way to pronounce the capital of Kentucky—is it LOOEY-ville or LEWIS-ville? If they’re like most folks (particularly non-Kentuckians, of course), they’ll probably say, “LOOEY-ville.” The correct answer, however, is Frankfort. By creating a false dichotomy, the question is framed in such a way as to guide the response.
If you find this sort of thing interesting, or you simply want to be less susceptible to bad logic, cognitive biases, and other neurological glitches, you might enjoy the following: Your Deceptive Mind: A Scientific Guide to Critical Thinking Skills by Steven Novella, The Like Switch by Jack Schafer and Marvin Karlins, Thinking Fast & Slow by Daniel Kahneman, The Drunkard’s Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by Leonard Mlodinow, Sleights of Mind by Stephen Macknik & Susana Martinez-Conde, and Understanding the Mysteries of Human Behavior by Mark Leary.
Do you find it difficult to write characters like the Eastside Creeper, who kill with such brutality? How do you work with those characters?
The first house I grew up in was on Waverly Drive, just down the street from where the Manson Family killed Leno and Rosemary La Bianca. It happened a dozen years before I was born, but it made an impressio
n on me when I eventually found out about it—that something so dark and terrible could swoop into your ordinary world, something with motives and desires you could never understand, and that it could destroy you.
I’m not sure to what extent that influenced what I think of as my “terrible fascination,” but it’s a way of saying that murder has long been a haunting thing for me. I think my readers understand what I mean—that need to see, to try to understand, even in the midst of our fear and dread. And the genre that deals with fear and dread isn’t mystery—it’s horror.
I’ve never experienced horror so deeply as when researching material for my books. Some of the crimes you come across don’t ever let go of you—so astonishing is their cruelty and depravity, and you can’t help but start asking yourself those big questions about life and God and all the rest of it. In What Waits for You, I wanted to write a murder mystery that was just as much a horror story, to really explore the fallout of pain and fear and misery following a brutal crime.
In practical terms, the Eastside Creeper is a composite of several killers; some of the more obvious ones—like the Night Stalker, who terrorized LA when I was a little boy—I mention in the book. Others are less well-known. But as to whether or not he was difficult to write? No. And the reason is—apart from that moment Officer Banning sees his silhouette—he isn’t actually in the book. You never see his crimes as they’re happening, and most of the details I left to the imagination. If you read back, you’ll see I was generally unspecific. That wasn’t just to avoid sensationalizing the violence; mostly I didn’t want to witness those murders in my own head.
That doesn’t mean the result is any less easy to read, I imagine, because there’s enough in there for readers to do a lot of the work themselves. Seven will always be one of my favorite horror films—and murder mysteries—for the same reason. You’re given enough images and information to let your mind go wild. There’s an elegance to that approach to horror, a restraint that in the end creates a much more devastating work of art.
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