Among the Dead

by J. R. Backlund

  “But why change his method?” Carly asked, as if she had been reading Rachel’s mind. “If this is such a great way to . . . you know . . . take someone out, why didn’t he kill McGrath the same way?”

  “Maybe he likes to mix it up,” Fisher said. “Maybe he gets bored.”

  Rachel said, “I think you’re right, Shane.”

  He and Carly both looked surprised.

  “I mean about the first part,” she said. “This guy is too good.” She stepped around the sofa and squatted down next to the body, looked at the broken ax handle, then the rag. Then the knife. “I bet our guy would have preferred to kill both victims this way. He hits them from behind, thinking they’ll fall forward and land facedown. Then he severs the brain stem. Very little blood. Victim dies instantly. Only it didn’t work out that way the first time. Imagine, he hit McGrath from behind, but McGrath was leaning against the counter. He might’ve slumped forward, but then he bounced off and landed on his back, face up. The killer would’ve had to roll him over, and that would’ve increased his chances of transfer. Blood, fibers, hairs, something . . . so he went to plan B. Not as quick, but just as effective.”

  Fisher was staring at the body. He looked up at Rachel and said, “I don’t know if you know this or not, but it gets a little scary when you start talking like that.”

  * * *

  Rachel went outside and found Braddock on the phone.

  When the call was finished, he said, “That was Ted. I told him we needed some time to get a handle on things before he shows up here and puts everyone on edge. He says he’ll wait till just before sunup.”

  “How about the ADA?” she asked.

  “You want him here too?”

  “Yeah. I want a warrant for the house. I told Shane and Carly to just focus on the body and whatever’s in plain view until we get one.”

  “You think the wife might be involved?”

  “Maybe. You know . . .”

  “Right,” he said, shaking his head. “Can’t rule it out.” He called Pritchard back and told him about the warrant. After he hung up, he asked, “How does it look?”

  “Clean,” she said. “It’s definitely our guy.”

  “So I guess we shouldn’t expect to find much in there, huh?”

  Rachel turned to look at the house, thought for a moment about the concept in forensic science known as Locard’s exchange principle: all contact between a perpetrator and a victim will leave a trace. She said, “I might have an idea about that. How long before the ME gets here?”

  Braddock checked his watch. “About twenty minutes or so. Why? What are you thinking?”

  “I’m thinking you should call him and tell him to turn around. I want more time with the body before he moves it.”

  * * *

  The medical examiner agreed to give them a few hours. When Bruce Moore, the SBI crime scene search specialist, arrived, Rachel brought him to the front door where Fisher, Braddock, and Carly were standing.

  She huddled them together and said, “Right now, our best chance for collecting any trace evidence from our killer is to process the body while it’s still here at the scene. The ME’s given you guys some time, so let’s use it.”

  Moore and Carly went inside to get started. Rachel said to Fisher, “You guys have any red crime scene tape?”

  “Yeah, I got some in the trunk,” he said.

  “You might consider using it to tape off the entrances and the area outside by the back door. Creates a second barrier to protect the scene while they’re processing it.”

  He looked around the front yard. “Yeah, I think you’re right. We already got too many cops inside the yellow tape.”

  “What’s your next move?” she asked.

  “Thought I’d go next door and talk to the wife.”

  “Good call.” She started to walk away.

  “Where are you going?” Braddock asked.

  “Back to the car to take a nap. Shane’s got this under control.”

  She turned to leave and caught a glimpse of Fisher, who didn’t bother to hide the look of pride on his face.

  14

  Rachel woke with a start, and Braddock looked sorry for tapping on the window. He held up a can of Monster Energy, which was enough to get her out of the Tahoe. It was still dark outside.

  “I sent a deputy on a coffee run,” he said. “But I thought you might want one of these instead.”

  “Perfect,” she said, cracking it open. “Thank you. Have they found anything?”

  “I think so.”

  She followed him back to the house. Moore, Fisher, and Carly were standing by Moore’s Explorer at the end of the driveway. They looked exhausted.

  Moore raised his arms over his head to stretch. He yawned and said, “Good call asking the ME to hold off. We found a hair. It was on the back of his shirt over the right shoulder blade. We probably would’ve lost it if they’d moved him. It looks straighter and thinner than the victim’s. At least to me.”

  “Does it have a follicle on it?” Rachel asked.

  He shook his head. “Sorry.”

  “Damn.”

  “Does that mean it’s no good?” Fisher asked.

  “It means the lab won’t be able to run nuclear DNA analysis on it,” Moore said.

  Fisher looked confused. “You can’t get DNA from a hair?”

  “You can get mitochondrial DNA,” he said, “which you can use for exclusion, or for comparison if you have a suspect, but not for CODIS searches. Unless it’s for missing persons. Mitochondrial DNA is passed from the mother, so all maternal relatives would have the same profile.”

  Fisher looked even more confused.

  “It means we can’t use it to search the databases for a suspect,” Rachel said. “But it’ll come in handy once we have one.”

  “Can the state lab run a mitochondrial test?” Braddock asked.

  “No,” Rachel said. “It’ll have to go to the FBI. Assuming it’s long enough.”

  Rachel had read the FBI’s Handbook of Forensic Services more than once. She knew the hair would need to be at least two centimeters long in order for them to test it.

  “It is,” Moore said, “but not by much. They’ll destroy it when they run the test.”

  “That won’t sound good to a jury,” Braddock said.

  Rachel remembered that Braddock had a bad history with DNA evidence. It happened during his fourth homicide investigation. The killer had strangled a woman with his bare hands, which left small amounts of his skin on her neck. Those few epithelial cells had provided the lab techs with just enough material to perform what they had called “touch DNA” analysis, a new technique at the time. At the end of a three-month investigation, the case went to trial, and Braddock watched as a talented defense attorney introduced the jury to the concept of secondary transfer. The victim, he claimed, had shaken his client’s hand several hours before her murder, leaving some of his skin cells on her fingers and palm. If she had touched her neck at any time between that handshake and the time when she was attacked, his skin cells could have been transferred. Touch DNA was just too sensitive, he had said. He even had a report from the American Academy of Forensic Sciences to bolster his claim. The jury bought it, and the killer walked.

  “I’m sure the DA will want to have a say in that decision,” Rachel said. “In the meantime, the state lab can still do a microscopic comparison to make sure it didn’t come from the victim, the wife, or any of us. You should go ahead and get all the samples you need for elimination.”

  “Mind if I get a break first?” Moore asked. “I figured now would be a good time to take one, since we’re still waiting on the warrant. And I’m starving.”

  Braddock said, “Go for it. The ME will be here soon anyway.”

  They dispersed, and Rachel pulled Braddock aside.

  “I know you have reservations about DNA,” she said, “but when the time comes to make that decision, I think you should push to have the hair sent to the FBI.�
��

  He looked skeptical. “I don’t know, Rachel. We have one hair, and we want to destroy it on a test that can’t give us a definitive ID? I’d feel much better just having it analyzed for comparison.”

  “Trust me, Danny. You don’t want to go to trial without DNA evidence. Juries expect it. And right now is a bad time to be presenting microscopic hair analysis in a murder case. The FBI has come out and admitted that matching a hair to a suspect without DNA is basically junk science.”

  Braddock’s phone rang. He answered it and listened for a moment, then said, “Okay. See you in a few.” He put the phone back in his pocket. “Well, like you said, it’s going to be up to the lawyers to decide.”

  “Who was that?”

  “Ted. He’s on his way here with the ADA. They just got the warrant.”

  * * *

  The assistant district attorney looked like he had graduated from law school a week ago. After complaining about having to wake the judge up at 5:00 AM, he listened as Braddock summarized everything that had happened at the scene and said he would talk to the district attorney about the hair. Then he left in a hurry to avoid being spotted by a pair of news vans setting up at the end of the street.

  Pritchard looked despondent. Braddock said, “Better perk up, boss. Those cameras will be up here in a minute.”

  “I think you should talk to ’em,” Pritchard said.

  “Oh, I wish I could, but, you know, I can’t be tied up in an interview if somebody needs me for something. Or if I get a call . . .”

  Pritchard looked at Rachel.

  “Not in my job description,” she said.

  “I quit,” he said. “And you’re both fired.”

  15

  Gifford woke up to screaming. He jumped out of bed and nearly lost his footing. His left leg tangled in a sweat-soaked sheet. He looked out his bedroom window and tried to guess the time. Sunlight peered through the leaves of a rock oak at the edge of his property, which told him it was midmorning.

  Another scream, and he knew it was his mother. Then a man yelled at her.

  Gifford untangled his leg and stormed out of his room. “What the fuck is goin’ on out here?”

  “Get away from me,” Gifford’s mother yelled at the man hovering over her. She was sitting in her favorite spot on the sofa next to the side table that held her ashtray. The cigarette in her right hand was nearly burnt out. “Get him away from me!”

  The man took a step back and looked at Gifford with fear in his eyes.

  “The fuck are you doin’, Bert?” Gifford asked.

  “Throw him out on his ass,” his mother yelled.

  “He ain’t my goddamn boyfriend,” Gifford yelled back.

  “He ain’t mine neither,” she said. “Not no more.”

  “Whatever. Y’all need to keep it down while I’m tryin’ to sleep.”

  “I just want my money back,” Bert said.

  “What money?”

  “The money I lent to her.”

  Gifford’s mother lit another cigarette.

  “Did he give you money?” he asked her.

  Bert said, “She gave it to that worthless brother of yours.”

  Gifford walked over, looked at his mother, looked back at Bert, and punched him in the mouth, knocking him down. “Say something about my brother again, you sorry-ass motherfucker.”

  Bert scrambled to his feet, holding a bloody lip, and kept his head down as he ran out the door. Gifford yelled after him, “Let me hear you call him worthless one more time . . .” He turned to his mother. “You know I don’t need this kinda bullshit in my house, Momma.”

  “Kevin needed the money,” she said, avoiding his eyes. “It’s not like you give him any.”

  “Jesus Christ,” he said. “If only you knew the kinda shit I was doin’ for you two.”

  * * *

  Gifford was lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, when the burner buzzed on his nightstand. He answered it and said, “Hang on.” He got up and peeked through the doorway, saw that his mother was still on the sofa watching TV and puffing on a cigarette. He closed the door and said, “All right.”

  “Everything go okay last night?” Bishop asked.

  “Don’t you know already?”

  “I want to hear it from you.”

  Gifford swallowed, wished he had a glass of water handy. “Yeah, man. Everything went good. Just like we planned it.”

  “I don’t recall you planning anything.”

  He started to sweat. Thought about apologizing but couldn’t come up with the right way to say it.

  “You’re sure nothing happened that I need to know about?” Bishop asked.

  “Yeah, man. I’m sure. That little dog was a pain in the ass, but other than that—”

  “What about the dog?”

  “Nothin’, man,” he said, touching his ankle reflexively. “It just barked a lot. I couldn’t shut the little motherfucker up. But it wasn’t a problem, all right? I got in, got out. Nobody saw a damn thing.”

  The line was quiet for nearly a minute, then Bishop said, “All right. Good job. Take it easy for today. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  Gifford said, “Okay,” but the line was already dead.

  16

  Pritchard was at his desk when Justin Sanford, the special agent in charge of the SBI’s Western District office, called.

  “I hear you caught a break this morning,” Sanford said.

  “Yeah? How so?”

  “Got a hair off the victim, is what I heard.”

  “I suppose that’s true,” he said and kicked his chair into a gentle rock. “Not sure who it belongs to yet.”

  “Hopefully it won’t take the lab too long to get back to you.”

  “Hopefully not.”

  “Anyhow, I was just calling to see if you still wanted us to send an investigator your way. I’ve got an agent that’ll be freed up tomorrow.”

  It seemed like the first good news Pritchard had heard in a long time. He said, “That’s great. Send him on.”

  “You sure? It’s okay if you all want to handle this on your own.”

  “You trying to have a laugh at my expense?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Of course I’m sure.” He sat up and leaned forward on his elbows. “Damn, Justin. We were just about begging you to send us help two days ago. And now that we’ve got another victim . . . why would you even question a thing like that?”

  Sanford took a few seconds before he said, “Well, it’s just that you’ve got Rachel Carver running things now, and—”

  “Whoa, hang on. What do you mean, running things?”

  “That’s what I was told.”

  “Danny Braddock is in charge of this investigation. Miss Carver is just here as an advisor.”

  “An advisor. That’s it?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Okay,” Sanford said in a conciliatory tone. “It’s just that . . . you know, things could get complicated with one of our former agents in the mix.”

  Pritchard understood exactly what he was trying to say. SBI special agents were brought in to assist county or municipal law enforcement agencies that lacked the resources and the expertise to handle difficult cases on their own. Since they were usually more experienced, agents were often expected to take a leadership role in the investigation. The last thing Sanford wanted was to send one of his people into a situation where he might end up butting heads with a former colleague.

  “We just hate to have too many cooks in the kitchen,” Sanford said. “You know what I mean.”

  “Yeah,” Pritchard said. “I know what you mean. You don’t have to worry about that here.”

  “All right, Sheriff. I appreciate that. My guy will be in touch with Danny first thing in the morning.”

  Braddock stuck his head in a few minutes later.

  “You called, boss?”

  “Yeah,” Pritchard said. “Come in and have a seat.”

  Braddock sat down and asked,
“Everything all right?”

  “Yep. I just wanted to strategize with you for a minute. Where’s Rachel?”

  “Back at the motel. Hopefully getting some sleep.”

  “Weren’t you gonna put her up over at Shipley’s?”

  Braddock shrugged. “I tried. She wasn’t having it.”

  Pritchard picked up a pen and tapped it on his desk. A nervous gesture.

  “You sure everything’s all right, boss?”

  He forced a smile. “I just spoke to Sanford on the phone a few minutes ago. Says he’s sending an agent our way in the morning.”

  “That’s good news,” Braddock said.

  “He was a little hesitant at first.”

  “Why?”

  Pritchard looked at him, gave him a moment to figure it out for himself.

  “Rachel?”

  “He says he’s heard that she’s running things here.”

  Braddock laughed. “Does that intimidate him?”

  “Maybe. You know how they can be.”

  “So what did he say exactly? Does he want me to run her out of town?”

  “He didn’t say anything like that. I think he just wanted some reassurance is all.”

  “What kind of reassurance?”

  “That she understands her role as an advisor. That she’ll be able to take a back seat.”

  Braddock seemed to relax a bit. “Hell, she won’t have any problem with that. The only reason she’s being so assertive is because I told her that’s what I wanted from her. But you don’t have to worry, boss. She knows how to play nice with others.”

  “Well, that’s good to know,” Pritchard said. “’Cause she can be quite assertive when she wants to be.”

  17

  Rachel’s alarm went off at noon. She stepped out of bed onto a crumpled fast-food bag and decided that she needed some exercise. She wanted to be on a mat, training jiu-jitsu, but the nearest school was thirty miles away and only held classes in the evenings. So she slipped on a pair of shorts, a sports bra, and a T-shirt and went for a run.