Before She Dies

by Mary Burton

Rokov donned his own gloves and dug into the pocket. He found a few rumpled dollar bills, a couple of pennies, and gum wrappers. It wasn’t until he got to the back left pocket that he found the betting stubs. “Looks like he bought tickets on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday week before last.”

  “He was at Colonial Downs?”

  “That he was.”

  “It’s a two-and-a-half-hour drive from that track to Alexandria. A man could drive back and forth if he really wanted to establish an alibi. Diane appears to have been held for several days.”

  Rokov dug deeper into the pocket and came out with another stub. “Friday. And the time stamp is about the time Diane met our man in the van. And here’s another stub for Monday.”

  “I’ll call the track and have them pull surveillance tape and confirm it was Ingram who bought the ticket.”

  “Sounds good.”

  Sinclair shook her head. “The witch tattoo keeps coming back to me. What was the point of that?”

  He dropped the pants and scanned the room for anything else that might tell him more about Ingram. The visual sweep, including a horse race poster and stacks of race bulletins, simply confirmed that Ingram’s spare time was spent at the tracks. “I don’t know.”

  Sinclair moved to a secondhand dresser and studied the collection of beer bottles, rumpled receipts, and loose change. “Maybe we should ask your pal Charlotte Wellington to look in her crystal ball and tell us what happened.”

  Rokov raised his gaze from a collection of well-read porn magazines on the edge of the bed. “What are you talking about?”

  Sinclair grinned. “There was a little buzz about her at the station this morning. Fact, I’m surprised you didn’t hear it at the courthouse.”

  “Spit it out, Sinclair.” Annoyance snapped at the singsong tone in her voice.

  She picked up on the irritation but it simply sparked delight in her gaze. “Apparently she ran into Kane last night at the carnival and told him she used to work at Grady’s carnival as a psychic.”

  Out of the dozen past biographies he’d imagined for Charlotte, he’d never landed anywhere close to that one. “Didn’t take Levi long to spread the word, assuming it’s true.”

  “You know how it goes. Alexandria is a big small town. He likely told a few folks. And they told a few. There are enough in law enforcement who aren’t crazy about the high-and-mighty Ms. Wellington and are happy to gossip about her.”

  He straightened and rested hands on hips. “You don’t like her.”

  “How can you tell? Was it the way I choked a little on her name?”

  Rokov moved out of the room. “What’s your beef with her?”

  “It’s not personal. I mean she’s professional, and you know where you stand with her. But she’s a defense attorney, and I don’t like them as a general rule.”

  “Everyone has a right to a defense.”

  “So they tell me.”

  He shook his head. He understood her sentiment. It was hard to work months on a case, secure an arrest, and see a scumbag walk. “We’re done here.”

  When the place was locked up and both were headed back east, Sinclair studied Rokov. “You really like her.”

  He tightened his hands on the wheel, wondering when his partner was going to let this bone go. “Who?”

  She brushed imaginary lint from her pant leg. “Please! Wellington. You like her.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “’Cause I’ve heard you bitch about defense attorneys before. But never Ms. Wellington. And we all have a right to a defense. Shit. You’ve never said that.”

  “She’s smart. Owns a successful business. I respect that.”

  She snorted. “You like the way she fills out a tight skirt better than her brain.”

  True. But there was so much more to her. “What’s with you trying to hook me up with her? You were busting my balls about her the other day.”

  She folded her arms over her chest. “Because it takes a lot to get a reaction out of you, and when I mention her, you become a windup toy with a hair trigger. All I have to do is sit back and watch the show.”

  “Sinclair, if anyone needs romance right now, it’s you, not me. You need a life.”

  She shrugged. “True, so very true. But until I do get a man, I can live vicariously through your relationships.”

  “I don’t have a relationship.” Correct enough on so many levels that it wasn’t far from a lie.

  Rokov wondered what the cops would say if they knew of his connection to Charlotte. Shit. He knew. It would be open season.

  Positioning a body was akin to a holy ritual.

  Over the years, he’d grown quite rote in his approach. Eyes to the sky, arms outstretched, clothes neatly arranged, and of course, the Witch tattoo on the forehead of the slain. Today, however, he’d taken an extra moment to cover the windows. He’d had the growing sensation that someone was watching him. Grace, no doubt. So he’d taped garbage bags on the windows so that she could not see him and try to stop him.

  “God is in the details,” he whispered.

  He adjusted Maya’s head, so that it was a little straighter, and then he fanned out her hair around her face. Death had vanquished the evil from her body, and she looked so utterly peaceful.

  He leaned forward and kissed her lips. “Go with God.”

  He glanced around the abandoned office floor. A sliver of moonlight illuminated the building’s third floor. Wires hung from a dropped ceiling, the industrial gray carpets were still indented with the impressions of long-gone cubicles, and watermarks stained the west wall. Outside the large window, stars winked behind wisps of clouds above the Alexandria skyline.

  By early morning the place would be filled with workmen ready to demo the building.

  In the early days, he didn’t take the time to position his prey. He simply dumped the bodies and ran. In those days he did mark his victims but only with crude lettering carved with a knife. Many times, the word was illegible and the warnings to the world unclear.

  That’s the way it had been with his first. He’d been so scared in the hours and days after her kill. Each time the phone had rung or someone had knocked on his door, he was sure it was the police. But the days and weeks passed and no one came for him.

  Realizing he’d gotten away with murder, he’d been jazzed and had gone to a tattoo artist. He’d had the witch’s name tattooed on his bicep as a reminder that real evil existed and that he must always be vigilant.

  He glanced at the faded tattoo.

  Grace.

  He’d told the artist she was his girlfriend and he wanted her to be a part of him forever. The artist had suggested a heart wrapped in roses. He’d liked the idea but told the man to add thorns as well. They’d both shared a big laugh over the perils of love.

  But he’d just come to realize he’d not killed Grace. She had sent a decoy to take her place.

  He pulled the stakes and mallet from his backpack. Carefully, he positioned the pointed edge of the stake on her open palm, and then hammered it through the cold flesh into the hard floor. He repeated the task on her next palm and then her feet.

  Breathless, he backed away from the witch, taking one last moment to admire her. He pulled a bag of salt from the same bag and drew a clean careful circle around her body. He etched a pentagram in the dirt just below her feet.

  Perhaps God had denied him Grace, so that he would learn and grow as a hunter.

  And now with the carnival in town again, he had to admit that life had certain symmetry. God had not only revealed to him Sooner, the witch’s spawn, but gifted him with Grace.

  Chapter 16

  Wednesday, October 27, 6 a. m.

  Rokov had gone home well after midnight and fallen into bed exhausted. For eight days they’d been chasing leads and talking to all of Young’s clients. They’d walked the crime scene and the area around it until their feet ached. They’d revisited Diane’s sister. Spoken to neighbors. But there’d been no leads on thei
r killer. Dr. Henson had found skin scrapings under the victim’s fingernails, but DNA results had yet to come back from the Commonwealth’s lab. He wasn’t holding his breath for a quick return. The backlog at the state lab was crushing, and even a high-priority case had weeks to wait.

  The call from uniformed patrol came just after six in the morning. His buzzing cell phone woke him up out of a sleep so sound it had been dreamless. Sitting up bolt straight, he checked his watch and snapped up his phone. “Rokov.”

  “It’s dispatch. Uniforms found the body of a young woman. She was killed like your victim.”

  His victim. He shoved out a breath and swung his legs over the side of his bed. “Where?”

  He scratched out the address on a pad always on his bedside table and told dispatch he’d be on scene in a half hour. As he moved across the room, stiff muscles aired their grievances. The bed is too small. The mattress too soft.

  Flexing his shoulders up and down, he kept moving. As he reached the bathroom door, he heard his grandmother moving down the house’s center hallway toward the kitchen. He could tell her to go back to bed, as he’d done so many times in the last couple of weeks, but she’d simply wave him away as she brewed him a strong cup of black tea and toasted a bagel for him.

  He ducked under a hot shower and let the water pulse over his face. He turned his back to the hot spray, wishing he could stand there for an hour and let the heat work the tension from the muscles in his shoulders. But there was no time for that.

  He quickly toweled off and dressed in khakis, a long-sleeved shirt and brown-laced shoes. He slid a leather belt through the pant loops and attached his gun holster, cell, and cuffs. When he entered the kitchen, his grandmother had set the bagel and black tea on her small kitchen table. How many times had he sat at this table as a kid as she’d made him a snack after school?

  He kissed her on the cheek. “You did not have to get up.”

  As expected, she waved him away. “Of course I did. You must eat.”

  “I can always grab something on the road.” He bit into a bagel purchased at the Russian deli. Bagels from the chain stores were never as good as these.

  “I saw your suit.”

  “Yeah. I’ll get it to Dad.”

  “I’ve already taken it. He says to not dress up when you chase bad guys.”

  “I try, but sometimes the bad guys don’t give me time to change.” He sipped the black tea. She’d dropped a sugar cube into it to ease the bitterness.

  “It will be ready by Friday.”

  “Dad does not have to rush.”

  “He does not mind.” She moved to an avocado green refrigerator that dated back to the 1970s and pulled out a bottle of orange juice.

  “I mind. He’s busy enough.”

  “He is your father. He loves you. Let him do this for you.” She filled a glass with juice and sat across from him. She sipped as he ate his bagel. “Daniel, it is time you move back to your apartment.”

  He glanced up at her. “Alexa will be back in a couple of days, and then I will.”

  “I am glad you two stayed with me while I was sick, but I am better now. Now you and your sister must leave my house.”

  “I like it here.”

  She arched a brow, sensing a lie behind the words. “I’ve said it before. A young man needs his own life. A young woman needs her own life.” She raised her chin. “I change the locks in two weeks.”

  He laughed. “You are kicking us out?”

  “Yes. I have spoken to your father and mother, and they agree that you and Alexa must live your own lives.”

  “Do they agree you should live alone?” She was old but no less cagey than a seasoned thief in a police interview room.

  “That is my concern. Not yours or theirs.”

  He wasn’t sure what was driving this or why she chose to tell him now. “I don’t have time to talk about this now.”

  “There is nothing to talk about. You have two weeks.” She hesitated. “I need my ... space.”

  “Space?”

  “That is the right word, no?”

  “It’s the right word. Okay. You need space. I’ll talk to Dad.”

  “Talk all you want. But the locks will change.”

  “I’m in the middle of a murder investigation.”

  She shrugged. “Then after you catch your bad guy, I will change the locks.”

  He rose, kissed her on the forehead, and grabbed his thermos. “Aren’t you worried Alexa and I will starve if we leave?”

  She shook her head. “You both can cook. You just choose not to.”

  “We’ve got you.”

  “Which is the problem. You need a woman. She needs a man. Neither of you needs a doting grandmother. Now go and find your bad man.” It was an order, not a request. And he had no doubt that if he didn’t move his things back to his apartment, she’d put them on the curb. She loved him. Wanted the best. And she’d kick him and his sister to the curb to see that they got it.

  Rokov left his grandmother sipping orange juice at the kitchen table.

  All thoughts of his grandmother’s edict had left Rokov’s mind by the time he pulled up in front of the crime scene, an abandoned office building on Van Dorn. The parking lot was filled with seven police cruisers with lights flashing. The parking lot had been roped off with yellow crime scene tape and news crews had gathered across the street.

  He rubbed the back of his neck and got out of his car. Sinclair was on the scene as were Detectives Deacon Garrison and Malcolm Kier. The three stood together, watching as a trio of forensics technicians moved into the old modular office building, likely built in the fifties. No doubt in its day, it had been cutting-edge design. Now it looked dated and old. The grass in the parking lot islands was tall and unkempt and the asphalt pitted and cracked. A large weathered For Sale/Lease sign lay by a demolition Dumpster. Now the land was worth more than the structure.

  Rokov nodded to Sinclair as he approached Garrison. “What do we have?”

  “A woman murdered. No signs of a gunshot or knife wound. Water in the mouth.”

  “Drowned?”

  “No signs of a fatal wound. But I’ll leave the final verdict to the medical examiner,” Garrison said.

  Tension crawled up his spine. “Was her body positioned like the first woman?”

  “Yes. She was placed on her back, arms and feet extended and staked. Salt ring around her body. Tattoo on her forehead.”

  “Witch?”

  “Yes.” Garrison nodded toward the press. “The brass is going to be pushing us hard on this one. Two women murdered in less than two weeks.”

  Rokov glanced at the television news vans and the camera crews rolling film. “Have you made a statement?”

  “Not yet,” Garrison said. “I’d like to have more to say.”

  Rokov rested hands on his hips. “Did the victim have any identification?”

  Sinclair moved up from behind him, her notebook flipped open. “None. Forensics is rolling prints. We’re hoping for some kind of match.”

  “Any missing persons reports?”

  “None that match her description. But that could change.”

  Garrison frowned. “All right, you two, go have a look. I’ll talk to the press. Find me a killer, people.”

  Rokov and Sinclair ducked under the yellow crime scene tape and donned rubber gloves and paper booties before they entered the building.

  Rokov glanced up at a surveillance camera posted by the front door and noted someone had spray painted black paint on the lens. “This son of a bitch is really thinking this through.” He turned and surveyed the buildings around them. “He couldn’t have gotten them all. We’ll need to visit every building in the area, and if they’ve got cameras, watch their tapes.”

  “It’s like finding a damn needle in the haystack.”

  They climbed the stairs, passing several uniformed officers on the way up to the second floor. The third floor was a large wide-open box illuminated by large fluore
scent ceiling lights.

  Red crime scene tape, which forensics reserved for the most sensitive areas, greeted them. The detectives moved to the edge of the tape, where Paulie stood just inside the room, snapping photographs.

  Paulie, still aiming his camera, said, “Your boss has already been here.”

  “We saw him.”

  “And he told you the killer has a distinct pattern. This crime scene is very similar to the last scene.”

  “Yeah.”

  The technician stepped aside, so Rokov and Sinclair could look into the room. The victim lay in the center of the floor, positioned on her back, limbs outstretched and staked to the ground. Fully dressed, her hair was splayed out behind her head, and a ring of salt encircled her body. Pentagrams were drawn on two of the walls and three large glass windows had been blocked off with large plastic garbage bags and duct tape.

  He moved into the room and stared at the woman’s face. She had a wide-set jaw, high cheekbones, and dark hair. She’d not been stunning but pretty. She appeared to be in her mid- to late forties, wore a blue peasant skirt and loose-fitting white blouse and jean jacket.

  The word Witch had been tattooed on her forehead in careful, block letters that measured an inch high and an inch wide.

  Rokov forced out a breath. “The skin on the forehead is thin.”

  “I know. Pretty fucking painful.” Sinclair was careful to keep her emotions checked, but there were moments when her anger bubbled to the surface.

  “Covering the windows is different,” Rokov said.

  “Maybe he wanted more privacy,” Sinclair said.

  “Or he’s scared.”

  “Let’s hope.”

  “The circle is as defined as the last. He likes to take his time. He likes precision.”

  “He picks places where no one goes,” Sinclair added.

  “Abandoned places. He’s got a system. He’s obsessive-compulsive about getting the details right.” He stared at the neat circle. “He’s done this before Diane Young.”

  “There have been no ViCap hits.” ViCap was the Violent Crimes Database. Though effective, it wasn’t foolproof because not every jurisdiction inputted crimes into the system.