Cyra and Callen followed her to the large stump.
Whitefox ran his gloved hand across the cut. “It’s been like this a while, Lyzee,” he stated. “I’ve cut logs for Wyler to make his totems, and they get this patina when they’re out in the weather for so long. This tree wasn’t cut in the last year.”
Cyra picked up a little cauldron to inspect the contents. Cautiously, she dumped it in her hand. “Looks like dirt mixed with blood.”
Elizabeth was out of her element here. “We need to bag it all up and take it in. We’ll start doing research on this one to figure out what all of this means.”
Cyra and Callen helped bag up each item. There was a shell with bloody water, various incense, and quite a few black candles that sat around where the body had been found. Oh, and almost all of it was covered in blood.
As they were moving the crusted up cloth, Elizabeth stopped them. “There’s something beneath it.”
Carefully, they folded it up to discover what was hidden.
“It’s another pentagram,” Callen offered, pulling out his phone to snap additional pictures of it. “It matches the one on the victim’s body.”
Elizabeth stared at it. She reached back into every case she had ever worked, until she found the information that she’d squirreled away. The last time she’d seen anything like this was back in Salem, when she met Ethan. “Yeah, this one is different,” she stated. “It’s inverted. We were wrong to think that we had witches.”
Callen didn't like the sound of that.
“An upside down pentagram means that we have a devil worshiper instead.”
“Oh hell,” Callen muttered. It was definitely worse.
“Yeah, exactly.”
* * *
Monday Late afternoon
Ethan sat through the entire autopsy. There had been so many in his life, that they stopped bothering him a long time ago. It was just another part of the job.
What made it uncomfortable was that the town ME was sitting not far away and visibly unhappy with the situation. When he had returned from his side trip to clear their story with the police chief, he was in a very foul mood. Now, having to sit there and watch one of the best Forensic Medical Examiners in the states run the show was making him borderline irate.
Chris Leonard was putting his previous autopsy to shame, as the victim was in far more capable hands. He had already started the Y-incision in the woman’s chest, after the tech team had re-swabbed every inch of the victim’s body. No one in the room could get past the fact that the man had dismissed doing a full autopsy before releasing the victim’s body.
Who did shit like that?
In the world of law enforcement, it just wasn’t done, and now Doctor Parrish was sitting three feet from Ethan with his arms crossed and very tense.
“All of this was unnecessary,” he muttered to neither man in particular. “It was easy to find cause of death. The woman didn't have a drop of blood in her body, and then there was the little detail of her jugular being cut from ear to ear.”
Blackhawk was prepared to tell the man off, but his ME jumped into the conversation.
“Doctor Parrish, how you choose to run your autopsies is up to you. Your name has to go on those, but when the FBI does a full one, regardless of the outward appearances, we do it by the book. My name is at the bottom of this one, as it heads off to trial. I’m not going to have all my years of working with the FBI or medical degree questioned, solely because I took a shortcut.”
It pissed the man off.
“What if the victim swallowed a finger she removed from the killer’s hand? I have to check everything to find stomach contents and get her last meal. My boss will need everything, and trust me, you don’t want to do it half assed when it comes to her.”
The man didn't care. “That poor girl suffered enough. Someone took her life and slit her throat. From the amount of blood all over the scene, it’s obvious how she spent her final minutes. She didn't need to be cut open more. You didn't find anything different than I did.”
Chris was elbow deep in the woman’s body when his hand encountered something. “Yeah, I just did.”
Ethan was up and out of his seat to see what he had found. “What do you have, Chris?”
Doctor Parrish was at his side too.
Cutting into the lower esophagus, he reached in with his fingers to pull out a chain. “It’s a piece of jewelry,” he stated as they all watched it slide out. When he had it free of her body, he laid it in the palm of his hand for his boss to take a photograph.
“It’s a pentacle,” Patrick Parrish stated. “I can’t believe it. I owe you an apology, Doctor. You were right on this one.”
Chris dropped it in an evidence jar. “No worries, Doctor Parrish. It happens to the best of us. Accidents can happen when we’re used to doing the same thing every day.”
Blackhawk wasn’t feeling all that magnanimous. He had to give the man credit. If Chris didn't push for the full autopsy, this would have escaped their attention. This was why Elizabeth had insisted on taking their people with them.
They were simply the best.
“Hey, are we having a party here in the morgue?” asked Elizabeth from the doorway.
At the sound of her voice, Ethan relaxed. His wife was now back at his side, and that meant he could be at peace. His eyes met his brother’s and Callen signaled that it was all under control.
“Yeah, we’re having a big one,” Chris stated, staring into the woman’s cavity. “Want to come play?”
She wasn’t sure how to answer that. “What did you find?” Elizabeth asked, moseying on over to stand beside her ME. “Hello, who are you?” she inquired, staring at the man beside Chris.
Ethan did the introductions. “Director Elizabeth Blackhawk, this is the ME in Circle Rock, Patrick Parrish.”
Immediately, she understood the underlying tension in the room. Local and Feds had been clashing before her arrival. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Doctor Parrish. I hope you don’t mind us utilizing your facility for the duration. We promise to clean up after ourselves.”
Patrick Parrish nodded. This must be the ‘boss’ Christopher Leonard had been talking about. It was funny, because she didn't seem all that ferocious. He was more taken aback by her two apparent body guards and the pretty blonde woman.
Chris laughed at the term ‘clean up’, since he’d done just that, only this time it had been after the other ME. Their people weren’t going to be the issue. It was all going to be on the faculty in town.
Elizabeth lifted a brow. “Something funny, Christopher? Want to share with me?”
He shook his head and grinned, but before he could make a comment, he saw her and the smile disappeared. Behind his boss stood Cyra, and she looked as gorgeous as ever. “Hello Agent Austin,” he said neutrally. He’d found when he was near her, his brain froze up and he said incredibly stupid things.
It wasn’t easy to not look like a fool when she was in the room.
“Hey, Doctor Leonard.” She kept it light, even though that wasn’t what she was feeling at that moment. The man was in his lab attire, and the scientist glasses hiding his blue eyes made her heart skip. He was absolutely adorable, and she’d love to fix the spikes of sandy brown hair that were standing up.
Elizabeth looked back and forth between the two of them, and then stared over at her husband who was grinning. He had a look on his face, and it was completely out of character for him.
“What did we find?” Callen asked, befuddled by what was going on around him.
Chris finally found his brain. “First off, you can have the trinket that was down her throat. She either swallowed it willingly, or it was pushed down there post death.”
Elizabeth took the jar that was sealed in plastic and examined it in the light. It was a pentacle, and unlike the markings on the altar, it told them that they were dealing with witches. “Okay. What else?”
“I prepared the samples for tox. They’re in the coole
r until the team gets in from the field. I can tell you now that she was relatively healthy.”
Patrick Parrish voiced his opinion, “We already knew that before you began. She was a young woman.”
Elizabeth glanced over at the ME and then to her own. Chris simply rolled his eyes and gave Elizabeth enough of a hint as to what was going on in the room. They had worked together long enough that they didn't need words to clue the other in.
“What else, Doctor Leonard?”
“Her throat was definitely slit from ear to ear, and I’m calling cause of death as homicide with exsanguination as COD.
There was a sound from the town ME, “If you’ll excuse me, I have some paperwork that needs my attention. You’re not finding anything that I didn't already tell you.”
Elizabeth watched the man leave. “What the hell has his knickers in a twist?”
Chris spoke up, “He was about to release the body without ever doing an internal autopsy. He missed finding evidence and is a bit angry that the Feds came in and showed him up on his own turf.”
Blackhawk shrugged. “Let him be bitchy. He screwed up and that’s on him.”
Elizabeth let them in on the cop situation and the note that he had tossed. What she chose to leave out was the lingerie comment. Unfortunately, she knew who wouldn’t let that little tidbit go.
Immediately, Callen gave the remaining details.
“What?” demanded an outraged Blackhawk.
Cyra began laughing.
“I’m going to hunt him down and feed him to the garbage can,” Ethan demanded, pissed that any man was picturing his wife in anything less than full Kevlar and sixteen layers of clothing.
Chris decided to bail his friend out. “Back to the autopsy,” he stated. “Scarlet Red had wrist abrasions that are indicative of struggling. She was awake at some point and fighting to get free. They’re also on her ankles too. Since we didn't find rope on the scene, and from the pictures that I saw, it was possible that she was posed after her death.”
Elizabeth had to agree. “Did he drug her?”
Chris shook his head. “That I can’t tell you until the team runs the tox. I can give you TOD, and place it around midnight last night, give or take a few hours. It’s relatively cold outside at night. It may have altered my estimate by an hour here or there.”
She was okay with that.
“If you want more, I need a show and tell moment.”
Ethan, Callen and Elizabeth all groaned. Here they went again. For some reason, her medical staff liked to torture her with making her play victim for their amusement.
It was the sick little game that they thoroughly enjoyed. Before she could object, Cyra Austin volunteered.
“I’ll do it.”
Elizabeth wanted to kiss the woman. “Thank you,” she stated as she laughed. “I’m never going to autopsy without you again.”
She walked towards Chris Leonard. “Will I be suitable to play your victim?”
He had to force himself to think. “You’ll work perfectly, since you’re relatively the same height.” It was getting warm in the morgue as she moved closer to his body. He was trying to not notice the pretty pink button down shirt and the well fitted black pants. It made him wonder if he’d ever find out what was beneath them.
“Uh, Doc,” Elizabeth stated, breaking their apparent trance. “Let’s get this show and tell on the road. I’m hungry and tired.”
Chris nodded as he led the agent by the hand to the table. “Can you lie on your back, Agent Austin?”
She hopped up and was oddly touched that he helped her delicately get into place. “It’s Cyra,” she reminded him.
He stared into her eyes and prayed that he wouldn’t do anything stupid. “Okay, the killer had the victim on the altar,” he began as he moved her arms above her head. “When I examined her brain, there were no hemorrhages and no fractures to the skull.”
“Meaning if he did knock her out, it wasn’t to kill but to incapacitate,” added Blackhawk.
“Exactly,” he said, as the rest of the team moved around the morgue table to watch his breakdown.
“I can tell that from the angle and depth of the cut that he was standing on the left side of the victim. The cut is deeper at where he would have started. If he’d been on the opposite side it would have made an awkward cut and not bled out the way it did.”
Elizabeth began picturing the crime scene in her head. “Okay, so I need a visual. Draw me a pentagram on a piece of paper and lay it on Cyra’s torso.”
“Okay,” stated Chris, moving towards this tablet. With his finger, he drew exactly what she was asking for and placed it on the woman’s body.
It matched up to the one carved in the wood. Had the killer been on the opposite side of the altar, the pentagram would have been point facing up. Because of the angle of the cut, they knew the point was facing his body.
Callen got it relatively quickly. “It was an inverted pentagram. We’re not reading it backwards. The killer did it on purpose.”
Blackhawk could feel his skin crawl. He’d had one case he’d worked a long time ago that crossed paths with a killer who was madly in love with Satan. Her goal was to be his bride. It had been bloody, murderous, and a mess. In the end, they caught her, but she’d taken out quite a few ‘sacrifices’ along the way. “So, we have a devil worshipper.”
Chris glanced up. “Oh great.”
Everyone looked over at him.
He covered his comment. “It’s almost Halloween. All the crazies are coming out to celebrate the holiday.”
“Anything else that you can tell us about the victim? At this point we really don’t have enough to even speculate more than the obvious,” added Elizabeth.
Chris thought about it. “Well, she was alive when he slit her throat. Most of the blood was gone from her body. Had she been dead already, she wouldn’t have bleed like a gusher. I venture to say that her heart was still pumping.”
“That rules out strangulation then,” stated Callen, continuing, “We have no other marks or signs of death.”
The ME agreed. “Unless he drugged her, but that won’t be back until tomorrow at the earliest. When the lab does the tox, you’ll be the first to know as always.”
“Can I get up?” Cyra asked, staring up at the man above her. It was really hard to hear a single thing that he’d said, since she had been staring at his lips and wondering if she would ever get another kiss from him.
God, Cyra wished that she had never invited him back to her place after the Christmas party. Maybe… She pushed it out of her mind, since it didn't really matter.
That boat had sailed almost a year ago.
“Yes, I’m so sorry, Cyra,” he stated, helping her up to a sitting position. “Thank you for being my homicide victim. It was nice for a change to not have to fight someone to do it for me,” he added as he stared over at Elizabeth.
“Hey, I don’t come down here and ask you to hold a can on your head to be my target when I need to practice, do I?” she asked, pointing at Chris. “There are boundaries, even between friends.”
He laughed. “I could be your target. I’ve seen you shoot. I’d be perfectly safe.”
Callen laughed. “Have you seen her when she’s mad? Elizabeth and Ethan hold wicked grudges. I would retract that statement if I were you. They just let you off paperwork duty, and it’s been months.”
Callen took a rib shot for his comment.
Chris assisted Cyra off the table and couldn’t help but enjoy the way his hands felt on her hips. “You have a point.”
Staring into his eyes, she found herself lured into the serene color. Then her senses were assaulted with the scent of his aftershave. “Thank you,” she said softly, as she tried to remain blank on the outside.
He released her, knowing his bosses were observing the entire thing, and he was sure they were going to bust his ass. After all, he tormented them about being a couple.
“What do you need me to do next?” C
hris asked, feeling his body reacting to the woman so close by his side. He took a chance and actually placed his hand on the small of her back, just to feel her a little longer.
Elizabeth didn't miss the action or anything that had just gone down and she was about to play cupid, when her husband interjected before her.
“Wrap it up for the day. We can’t do much more until the tech team goes over everything. Why don’t you call it a night? It’s almost dinner time, and we’re going to work out of our hotel room later.”
Chris was fine with that. “Room assignments?” he asked, praying that he’d be right beside Cyra’s.
Blackhawk opened his tablet. “You’re in room two twenty one, Chris.” Ethan transferred some numbers around and made it possible for the man to make his move on the agent. It was obvious that both of them were attracted to the other. He may not be as astute at these things as Elizabeth was, but he could see this one a mile away.
“Where am I?” Cyra asked as she crossed her fingers and said a silent prayer.
“It looks like you are in two hundred twenty.”
Elizabeth was going to give her cupid partner a big wet kiss when they were out in the hall. She knew what he was doing and it was beyond sweet. “Oh look, you’re right across the hall from Cyra.”
Ethan winked at his ME, going off to tell the lab team their assignments too.
It was official, Chris Leonard had a new found respect for Ethan Blackhawk. There was no doubt that their earlier conversation influenced their assignments.
“Cowboy, we’ll be outside waiting,” Elizabeth said as she and Callen strolled for the door.
“Night, Chris,” Cyra said softly, preparing to follow her boss. Before she could get too far from him, his hand was on her arm.
Little shocks jolted through her body, as skin met skin and her heart began to thunder in response.
“Cyra, will you have dinner with me?” he asked nervously. Here was the woman of his dreams, and all he could think of was how he was so damn stupid to not go home with her on Christmas.
Devil Hath Come (an FBI/Romance Thriller ~book 7) Page 10