Elizabeth patted her hand. “Ethan thought that too, and look at how that ended. You don’t know what you can or can’t do until you try.”
The tears filled her eyes and threatened to fall. “Don’t yank me from this assignment. I’ll do whatever you want. If you want me to see a shrink after we finish up, I’ll do it. Just let me work this assignment.”
Handing her a tissue, she calmly waited for the woman to compose herself. “Why Tori?”
“Because my brother was killed in the Middle East, my dad found out and died of a heart attack. I don’t know where my mother is, because she left us years ago. If you pull me, I’ll sit at home alone and think. I was a soldier and thinking is your worst enemy. I just need to do. Inside I’m still a soldier, and I don’t know how to not be one.”
Elizabeth sighed. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.” She left the room and went back over to Whitefox’s office. “Cal, can you go out in the field with Julian to the scenes? I can’t send Tori out today.”
“Sure angel. I don’t mind. What will you be doing?”
Elizabeth went to his side and dropped a kiss onto his lips. “I have Detective Austin arriving shortly, and then we’re heading down to autopsy for the new details.”
“We can check out the scenes and then meet you back here for lunch. Then we can start breaking down what we know.”
“Thank you, Cal.” She ran her fingers down his cheek.
“Is she going to be okay?” Julian asked, needing to know.
Elizabeth shrugged. “What she needs is some patience, a few friends and I think some therapy.”
At least it wasn’t him. He tried to tell himself he didn’t want to be saddled with a woman that had baggage, but something about her drew his attention. “If she needs anything, I’m available.”
“Christmas day we’re playing football, eating copious amounts of food, and celebrating the birth of Christ. That may help.”
Both men looked over at her and she started laughing. “What? Now you Indians have a thing about the baby Jesus too? First we can’t have a Columbus Day party, then I have to have Thanksgiving early, and now Christmas too?” Elizabeth winked at Callen. “Warn me now if you have some Native Easter Bunny envy.”
Whitefox started laughing at the absurdity of Elizabeth’s statement. “Get me the list of the crime scenes and we’ll head out.”
When she left the room, Julian looked over at Whitefox. “Football?”
“We have a game almost every holiday. You’re on Lyzee’s team.”
“Works for me.”
“Here’s a little proposition for you. You throw the game and I’ll make sure you get included in the bet.”
“What’s the wager?”
Callen grinned. “Ethan and I get alone time with Elizabeth doing whatever we want for date night.”
Julian grinned. “I get alone time with her too? Count me in on that one.”
Callen wasn’t buying it for a minute. “You get alone time with the woman you want.” He didn’t have to say her name, because both men knew he was referring to Tori. “I saw your face when she came into the room, and you have more than a friendly interest in her. Nice try with the deflection, but the jig is up, Julian.”
He shrugged. “She doesn’t want to be anywhere near me.”
“I’ll handle that, you just throw the game on Christmas. Let Ethan and I do the rest.”
Littlemoon held out his hand. “Deal?”
“Deal.”
Elizabeth went to the cooler and grabbed two bottles of water for her and Agent Christensen. Now that she was pregnant, she needed to skip the coffee as much as possible or she’d pickle her child in caffeine. While the men were missing, she’d start pounding water, and then have coffee later if they were around. Keeping the pregnancy a secret was going to be a pain in the ass. Thank God Christmas was in only a couple days.
Entering her office, she handed the woman a bottle of water and leaned against her desk watching her. Apparently, Tori Christensen was good at pulling herself together and fast. “Better?” she asked, drinking her water.
“Yeah, thanks for being…”
Elizabeth grinned. “The opposite of an uncaring bitch who derives pleasure from scaring the life from the agents she bosses around?”
Tori laughed. “The gossip has nothing to do with you being a bitch,” she said, feeling considerably better.
“Care to tell me what the gossip is then? I do love to know when the minions are planning an uprising.”
Christensen held up her left hand and pointed to the ring finger. “Your ring has them all stirred up. Word travelled fast and furious.”
Elizabeth shrugged. “What are they saying?”
“You’re having some torrid affair behind your husband’s back, that you’re a threesome involved in kinky weekend games where you swing, and that you're a nympho.”
Now she was laughing. “Wait until word of my pregnancy gets out. Then it’ll be a pool to guess who’s the baby daddy,” she said snickering.
Tori shook her head and smiled the first genuine one for the day. “You know, what they say about you isn't true.”
“Rumors and gossip seldom are, Tori. That’s why I told you that you can tell me anything. You’re my agent, but now you're my field partner and I’d like to think my friend.”
Before Tori could spill anything else, Elizabeth’s intercom buzzed.
“You have a detective out here waiting for you, Mrs. B,” stated Ginny.
“I’ll be right out. Have her wait right there.”
“Yes, Mrs. B.”
Elizabeth stood. “Well, shall we go down to autopsy and see what our doctors found out about the women laying in the morgue?”
Christensen nodded. “I’m ready.”
Elizabeth banged out a text to Chris Leonard, warning him that they were on their way down.
Out in the lobby stood the police detective, and she was looking around taking it all in and observing the agents that passed by her.
“Detective Austin, how are you this morning?” she asked, holding out her hand in greeting.
“I’m good Director Blackhawk, and I’d just like to tell you that whatever you said to my captain was amazing. He officially cleared my workload and has sent me to be at your every whim and need.”
“Wasn’t me, Detective. The governor had all the pull on this one. My co-director can be very persuasive. He called and requested your assistance in his most spectacular, bossy way.”
Cyra Austin shook the agent’s hand next. “Well either way, thank you. I get a break from…” she almost said her partner. That wasn’t a good thing to let drop out there in conversation.
“This way,” she led them towards the elevators. “You don’t have to cover for Detective Jackwagon. I know he’s a hot mess in a pair of loafers.”
Detective Austin said nothing.
“He has more time in as a detective in the homicide unit, and yet you're the lead detective. That means one thing; he’s out of control and you act like the babysitter to reel him back from the edge. Then there was the telling fact that you were genuinely surprised when I informed you the file was incomplete. Your eyes flickered over to him, so I’m betting you asked him to fax it.”
Agent Christensen liked working with Elizabeth.
“Then last but not least he’s a glory hound and only after his name in lights on this one, and I have no time for that in my busy day.”
“In his defense, he is a really decent cop. Brian just has temper issues and impulse control.”
Elizabeth pushed open the doors to the autopsy suite, noticing no one was around. When she turned, out of the corner of her eye, she saw motion coming at her and immediately, she defended herself.
Chris Leonard needed to see if the wounds consistent on the one victim were from fending off an attack and the best way was to practice on a human. When he saw Elizabeth, he lunged for her, and didn’t think she’d move as fast as she did. She was pregnant, and ma
ybe it was a bad idea all around, but it was all in the name of scientific experiment.
Elizabeth grabbed his arm, twisting, foot sweeping his legs from behind and pinning the man to the floor with her knee on his groin. Both the detective and agent beside her pulled their guns and pointed them at him.
“Chris, is there a reason you’re trying to assault your boss in autopsy?” she asked, applying more pressure before she continued, “especially with your evaluation coming up in about two weeks?”
Tony Magnus started laughing. “I warned him that he should attack anyone but you, but he insisted. There was some twisted rationale in his head that you would be the least likely to shoot him.”
“Lyzee, can you get off me?” he said, hoping she didn’t move more, or he was in for a world of hurt. Then he noticed the other two women with guns, and one of them was new to the building and absolutely amazing.
“Why Chris?” she asked again, standing and this time offering him a hand up.
“Because victim number five had a ton of defensive wounds and I needed to see how a woman would react if I jumped out at her. I couldn’t tell you I was going to do it.”
“Chris, what if I shot you? Ethan would have paperwork to do and you know that makes him cranky.”
Yeah, he never thought about that little issue. “We don’t have to tell Ethan or Callen about this do we?” he said sheepishly.
Elizabeth laughed and turned her focus back on the other women as they reholstered. “Detective Cyra Austin, I’d like to introduce you to my crack staff. This is Doctor Christopher Leonard, and when he’s not trying to assault helpless women, he’s my ME,” she grinned.
Cyra held out her hand. “It’s very nice to meet you, Doctor Leonard.” The man was absolutely adorable, in a geeky, mad scientist kind of way.
Chris was captivated. The woman was absolutely beautiful. Her hair was blonde and she had gorgeous emerald green eyes. “It’s my pleasure Detective but please, call me Chris or Doc.”
Cyra smiled. “Okay, Chris.”
Elizabeth rolled her eyes at Tony Magnus, and he started laughing. “This gentleman here is my Forensic Anthropologist, Doctor Tony Magnus.”
Cyra shook his hand too.
Elizabeth took control of the conversation “Can we talk about the victims?”
Chris refocused and walked over to the tables. “I kept them sealed up for you, Lyzee,” he stated, grabbing the five case files.
“You're the best, Chris. Thank you.”
“I have to say, the ME that did the original autopsies didn’t really do a thorough job. Well, not a Blackhawk quality autopsy. I didn’t see x-rays in the files, so I called over to the ME’s office. None were taken.”
Cyra looked confused. “Is that standard procedure?”
Elizabeth hopped up onto the empty table and crossed her legs. “Yeah, the ME usually hangs out with the fire inspector, they chit chat about the bodies, check out the scene in situ, and then they do the autopsies together. The fire inspector gives the ME information regarding the scene that may have impact on the victims last few minutes.”
“Okay, so our ME screwed up.”
Chris shrugged. “Anyway, I did the x-rays and then I tried to open them up, but the women are too fragile. They’re breakable.”
Elizabeth nodded. “Okay, so we have five incomplete autopsies.”
“Here’s what I can tell you, Lyzee. Victim one was strangled. That’s it when it comes down to COD. She’s brittle and since we shuffled her around, she’s a mess.” Then he realized what he said. “Not that I knew her personally,” he paused to try and regroup. “What I mean is that I didn’t know her then, so I can’t tell you what she was like before.”
It was funny to see her ME all flustered. Since he’d worked with her for over ten years and worked with Tori before, it only left one possibility. Elizabeth glanced at the detective. She was watching the doctor intently. The love bug must be in the filtered, re-circulating air. Thank God she’d already been bitten twice.
Chris actually took a deep breath.
“Okay, what else, Doc?” asked Elizabeth, pulling out her phone and typing in the information for later use on her white board. If she looked at him, she was going to start laughing.
“Victim number two is one of the victims that we have an ID on at this point. Christiana Dempsey was most definitely a prostitute. When I ran the tests, she was a disease fun-fest. I feel bad for anyone that got on and off that ride.”
Tony Magnus shuddered at the idea.
Elizabeth glanced up. “Great. What did she have?”
“Christiana had herpes, Chlamydia and Trichomoniasis,” he said, reading the lab report. “Her hyoid was indeed snapped, and I’m calling COD strangulation.”
Tori scribbled something down on her notepad. “Okay, so he killed a prostitute. One has to think maybe he used her first, right?”
Chris smiled. “Many killers assume that if you burn the body it takes care of all the trace, but what gets left inside doesn’t get destroyed.”
“Was there semen?” asked Elizabeth, getting excited at the prospects.
“No, but there was sex involved and our killer wasn’t gentle. I swabbed a few times, but they all came back negative. He used protection.”
“Awesome. Just when I want a john to not bag it up, we have a sexually conscientious killer. Damn those high school sex education classes.”
Tori laughed.
“Hey! I learned a lot from those classes,” joked Chris, and then he realized what he said, and in front of whom it was stated.
Now Elizabeth was grinning. The man’s torment was hysterical, and this time she didn’t have to do anything to watch it happen. Chris Leonard was a one man show. “Back in the saddle here, Doc. We don’t have time to take a side trip right now.”
He nodded, grateful for her taking control and redirecting it back on track. “Victim number three has also been ID’d. Jessica Arturo was twenty years old, and worked as a stripper.” As if on cue, Tony pulled up the photo on the computer screen. “When I did the full body x-ray, we came up with severe fractures on the back of her skull.”
“He’s escalating,” stated Elizabeth.
“Not only is he escalating, but his mode of murder is changing too.” Chris signaled Tony, and another picture popped up on the screen.
“Lungs?” asked Detective Austin.
“Yes it is, Detective.”
“So he beat her to death by slamming her skull into the ground or another hard surface?” she asked.
Elizabeth spoke this time. “No, she wouldn’t have died immediately, so I’m guessing what Chris is alluding to is that she died of smoke inhalation.”
He offered her a fist bump. “That’s why you’re the director,” he said grinning.
“I’m the director because I’m certifiably insane, and have no problem babysitting the other crazies in the loony bin,” she said grinning.
“So he burned her alive?” said Tori, shuddering. “I think this is definite escalation.”
“Doc? Opinion?” Elizabeth inquired.
Chris crossed his arms. “I’m not the profiler, but I can honestly say that from victim one to this one, it appears that the patterns of injuries are most definitely getting worse.”
Elizabeth made notes on her phone, and then looked up at Tony. “Victim four was she tortured?” Elizabeth inquired.
“Yes and no.”
Tony was going to make her work for this one, she could tell. “Tony, I’m tired. I miss Ethan, and I’m three days past riddles. Spill it or I’m going to beat it out of you and let everyone in this room watch. I possibly may even allow them to take bets.”
Detective Austin looked over when Chris Leonard began laughing. She’d just watched her neutralize an attack effortlessly. The man should probably be a little more wary.
“Lyzee, you know I have to demonstrate. Take off your boots.”
“Are you kidding me?” she said, crossing her arms.
“I’m dead serious, Boss.” Tony loved his job.
She thought about it. “Not going to happen.”
“I can wait,” he stated, grinning. When he made the zipping motion across his lips, everyone looked over at her, knowing it was back to her.
Elizabeth should have known better. When it came to the doctors, anything and everything was possible. “Fine, but this better be pertinent. You know how I get skeeved out at the dead body stuff in this room.” She pulled off her cowboy boots and socks and put her feet on the morgue table. “Let’s get this over with, shall we?”
Both men were laughing. “Look how cute! Your toes are painted red and green. You’re so damn festive,” snickered Chris Leonard.
“Do you both forget who signs your damn paychecks?”
Tony cleared his throat. “Point your toes, and then pretend you’re wearing really high heels.”
Elizabeth did what he said. “This better have some relevance, Tony, or I’m telling Ethan and Callen. Don’t think I won’t.”
Detective Austin was clueless who these two men were, and then she had to wonder why there were two. Maybe they were very large, protective brothers? It wasn’t the first time she’d referenced them.
Chris laughed because he knew she wouldn’t rat them out. If Elizabeth was going to want someone hurt, she’d do the job herself.
“See this part of the foot?” he said, pointing to the arch and touching the bones beneath her skin. “This is your cuboid bone, and in our woman here, they’re fractured.”
“Okay, and?”
“You see this a lot in dancers and women that wear incredibly high heels,” stated Tony. “So, you have a prostitute, a stripper, and a woman with fractured cuboids.”
“Another dancer?” asked Detective Austin.
Tony nodded and grinned. “She liked to dance in incredibly high heels, and paid the price with fractures in her feet.”
“So how did she die?” asked Elizabeth. “Strangled or beat?”
Chris Leonard took over on this one. “The original ME called this one inconclusive, and assumed it was the fire, but after the x-ray, it was obvious how this girl was murdered.” He pointed at Tony and the next x-ray popped up on the screen.
Fire Burns Hot ((An FBI/ Romance Thriller~ (Book 5))) Page 10