Never Alone

by C. J. Carpenter

  Megan liked Sam. He knew his business, and he knew how to work a crime scene. He had started out in Narcotics and had made some big drug busts, but in the end you’re always one step behind the drug dealers. One would get knocked off or arrested and there’d be another waiting in the wings ready to take his place.

  Nappa was getting close to burnout mode when he decided to switch to Homicide. He thought helping to solve murders would give him some kind of closure. That was about a year ago. So far, there had been little in the way of closure.

  Megan waited while the crime-scene photographer took some shots before she went over to the dead body.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d come.”

  “Fu—” Megan paused to stare down at the position of the victim. “Fuck you,” she whispered.

  “Sorry for the earlier comment about ‘do it for the memory of your father’ bullshit.”

  Megan scratched her forehead, hearing his apology as mere white noise. “Hmm.”

  Nappa continued, “Young, maybe late twenties, early thirties. Looks like strangulation. No sign of a break-in.” Nappa released a heavy sigh. “So far, no sign of prints. Forensics just got here, so they’ve really just started. She’s fully clothed, in workout clothes, so I doubt there was any sexual assault. Nothing’s been torn on her. The super found her this morning when he came to fix the kitchen faucet.”

  “Where is he now?” Megan asked.

  “He’s with a uniform downstairs. He’s pretty rattled. We’re working on getting the contact information from the lease to see if we can get in touch with next of kin. The super said her family lives somewhere in Connecticut. We should have the information soon.”

  “What’s her name?” asked Megan.

  “Shannon McAllister.”

  “Can I take a look?” Megan asked the crime-scene photographer.

  The photographer stopped chewing a large wad of gum to respond. “Go ahead, I’m done. I’m moving into the next room.”

  Megan walked around to the other side of the couch to inspect Shannon McAllister’s dead body.

  Oh Christ.

  “This was exactly how she was found?” Megan asked.

  Shannon lay on her side, her head placed delicately on a pillow. Her hair was brushed neatly over her shoulders and her hands lay peacefully cupped one within the other in front of her forehead. Her legs were bent at a ninety-degree angle. She looked as though she could have been sleeping peacefully, if her eyes weren’t bulging open and gray.

  “Exactly,” Nappa replied. “I spoke with the first uniform on the scene. He said he didn’t touch her.”

  “What about the super?” she asked.

  He shook his head.

  Megan knelt down beside Shannon. She looked hard into her vacant stare, then moved Shannon’s jaw side to side, inspecting the contusions on her neck. She was as gentle inspecting Shannon’s lifeless corpse as she’d be placing a baby in a crib. She looked around the immediate surroundings: books sprawled across the floor, an empty Tiffany’s jewelry box.

  “You’re sure she wasn’t touched?” Megan asked again, hoping the answer would somehow be different, though knowing it wouldn’t be.

  “Positive.”

  Megan read the inscription on the heart dangling from the bracelet on Shannon’s wrist. Carpe Diem. Megan tugged at her own necklace, a compulsive habit she’d developed when she was deep in thought.

  “I guess seizing the day is no longer an option for you, Miss McAllister,” she whispered.

  Megan picked up Shannon’s right hand to see if there were traces of anything under her fingers. She found bruises near her wrist and an Irish Claddagh ring, the crown turned outward. There was a faint scent she couldn’t place.

  Nappa crouched down beside Megan and whispered, “McGinn, tell me what I’m thinking is wrong.”

  She raised an eyebrow in sympathy, whispering, “Sorry, Nappa.” Megan started to walk around the apartment to view Shannon McAllister’s body from different angles. “Obviously, she was deliberately placed in this position.”

  “It looks like she’s sleeping, almost in the fetal position.”

  Megan paused. “Maybe.” It was a good theory, but there was something more to it; at least that’s what her gut was telling her. But it was also telling her something else.

  This won’t be the last victim.

  Two policemen were in the corner of the room chatting about the score of whatever sporting event took place the previous night. When their conversation got above a whisper, Megan snapped. “Hey, is our investigation interrupting your conversation? Take it outside, for Chrissake.”

  Judging how everyone else in the room responded, mannequins had better circulation after one of Megan’s outbursts. Nappa was immune to them by now. “Jesus, McGinn, get up on the wrong side of the bed today?”

  Got up on the wrong side of the wrong man, is more like it.

  She just shrugged. “Something like that. Keep going. What else is there?”

  “Wallet’s still here with money and credit cards inside. Jewelry is still on her. Maybe boyfriend trouble?”

  “I doubt it. She’s wearing an Irish Claddagh ring.”

  “Doesn’t that mean she’s in love or something?” Nappa asked.

  “She’s wearing the Claddagh ring on her right hand with the heart facing outward and away from her body. She’s single, offering her heart.”

  “Are you sure?” Nappa asked.

  Megan looked over at Zachary Jones, the assistant medical examiner on the scene. “Hey, Jonesy, the Italian is questioning his Mick partner about Irish Claddagh rings. What’s up with that?” she joked.

  “Beats the hell out of me. I’m not Irish, what would I know about Claddagh rings?”

  Zachary Jones, commonly referred to as Jonesy, was thin and had precision-cut brown hair. He always wore Oxford shirts with matching ties—which Megan joked were clip-ons—underneath his blue medical examiner’s windbreaker. He was smart and young, and had a direct sense of humor. Megan considered it a dry humor, while most people meeting Jonesy for the first time thought he was bleak, sometimes bordering on crass.

  “Do you want to know why there’s a dead girl in the middle of the room, or are we going to chitchat about jewelry some more?”

  Megan could see why people thought Jonesy insensitive. She smiled, remaining quiet as Jonesy explained how Shannon Mc­Allister was murdered.

  “Carpe jugulum.”

  “Sorry?” Nappa interrupted.

  “Go for the throat.” Megan had trouble grasping as well as remembering the Ten Commandments in Catholic school, but Latin had always fascinated her.

  “Very good, Detective. You two have a fresh kill on your hands.”

  Megan shot a look over at Nappa, then back to Jonesy. “What do you mean fresh. It’s barely eleven o’clock.”

  “Maybe three hours, if that. I’ll have a better idea when we do an autopsy, check the temp of the liver.”

  Fucking ballsy unsub, Megan thought.

  Jonesy continued, “I think he wore surgical gloves, two pairs, specifically. Based on the bruising around the neck, I think the killer first attacked from behind. Then, because of the abdominal bruising, I’d say he put his knee on her side to hold her down while he strangled her. So far no fingerprints, and I mean not one print, even from the victim. It looks like he wiped the whole place down.”

  “Don’t forget to bag her hands,” Megan said.

  “I’ll bag ’em, but I don’t think we’ll find anything,” Jonesy said.

  “Why not?” Nappa asked.

  “Look,” Jonesy knelt down and held up one of Shannon’s wrists, moving her clutched hand side to side. “He cleaned her hands and trimmed the nails down to the quick. It looks like he used nail polish remover or rubbing alcohol to do it. I’ll do a chem test to tell for sure
.”

  “The killer cleaned her hands?” Megan asked.

  “Yes, and he was extremely thorough about it.”

  “So he kills her and gives her a manicure.” She looked up at Nappa. “I doubt he threw any cotton balls, or whatever he used, in the trash can.”

  He shook his head. “Nope.”

  “He killed her, gave her a manicure, and cleaned her apartment. That’s a hell of a Merry Maids service, isn’t it?” Jonesy said.

  “This has not been a good fucking morning,” Megan whispered to herself. A moment later, her cell phone vibrated. She turned away from the group for the slightest bit of privacy. “Detective McGinn.” The call was one she’d receive every now and then. “Well, is she okay? Did she hurt herself ? Okay. Good. I’m going to have to call you back.” She hung up without saying goodbye and reconvened with the others. She stood with her arms crossed as if preparing for a fierce chill.

  “There aren’t any signs of a break-in, so she knew him, or he had a key and waited until she got home,” Nappa said. “What do you think? Any connection to the murder on the Lower East Side?”

  “Could be. It’s too early to tell.” Megan muttered again, “Could be.” She walked a few steps around Shannon to look at her from a different vantage point. “The other vic didn’t have anything under her nails, right?”

  “Totally clean,” Nappa answered.

  Megan thought a moment. “She was found a few days after being killed. Maybe there’s a time issue with what he used to clean under the nails, something that couldn’t be detected after a few days.” Megan stepped back. “But the other victim wasn’t placed so … thoughtfully. Maybe the killer didn’t have time with the other vic.”

  “Yeah, something could have rushed him, but the Lower East Side girl was a hooker. There are so many more possibilities with a vic like that,” Nappa said.

  “A hooker who’s murdered and still has nine hundred dollars on her was definitely not killed for lack of performance. And she wasn’t murdered by her pimp or a john wanting his money back.”

  The details of the other murder were sketchy. A young girl, probably a runaway at one time, fell into prostitution. She was found strangled in her studio apartment with no signs of a break-in. Megan knew something wasn’t right, but nothing added up. The girl was placed in the cold-case files.

  Megan smelled her surroundings again, thinking it odd there was an odor more fitting for an Entenmann’s factory than a room housing a slowly decomposing body. She looked around to see if there were scented candles nearby. There were none. “Nappa, what’s that smell?”

  “That’s what else I want to show you,” he said.

  Megan followed Nappa into the kitchen.

  “Open the oven.”

  “Why?”

  “Open it.”

  Inside Megan found a loaf of bread slowly warming. “It’s bread, Nappa.” She checked the stove. The oven had been set to 150 degrees. “But … baking bread wouldn’t cover the scent of a decomposing body. We both know there is nothing more putrid than that.” No human being could ever forget the first time such a pervasive smell entered their life. Megan’s first experience was investigating an odor neighbors called in on the Lower East Side. She entered the apartment to find a man, once Caucasian, now black, bloated and dead on the floor. He’d been there for five days. A fetid pile of human remains surrounded by feces and dried urine made even the toughest cop dry heave if not run for the hall to retch completely.

  Megan looked again into the stove. “It’s Irish soda bread. Mom would buy it on the weekends to have with breakfast.” Saying those words made her wince with sadness knowing her mother no longer had the memory of cooking those old-fashioned Irish family breakfasts. She glanced around the kitchen. “Awfully clean for someone who just made homemade bread.”

  “And murdered a girl before breakfast,” Nappa said glancing back at now-deceased Shannon McAllister.

  The vic let you in, you sneaky bastard, Megan thought. “Let’s go talk to the super.”

  “I’m not sure how much help he’s going to be.”

  Megan released a heavy sigh. “Dot the i’s, cross the t’s, right Nappa?”

  Few crime scenes sent a chill down her spine. This was the second in as many months.

  four

  Megan and Nappa made their way to the basement level to speak with the building’s super, Mr. Mendoza. There were a handful of cops standing outside his office. An EMT attended to Mr. Mendoza, giving him oxygen, checking his pulse and blood pressure.

  They squeezed through the narrow entrance into his office.

  “Mr. Mendoza, I’m Detective McGinn,” she began. “This is my partner, Detective Nappa. I think you met earlier. I know this has been a difficult morning for you, but can you tell me everything you remember from the moment you entered Ms. McAllister’s apartment?”

  Mr. Mendoza took a long drag of oxygen before pulling the mask below his chin. “Oh, that poor, poor girl. She’s the nicest girl in the building. Most tenants ignore me when they see me in the hallway, not Miss Shannon. She’s an angel, I tell you, an absolute angel.” He turned his head in Nappa’s direction, as if trying to convince him of Shannon’s saintliness. “She stop and ask how my wife and children are all the time. My wife, she had these things removed from her feet a few months ago.” His index finger shaking as he pointed down toward his feet. “Bunions? Something like this. Well, Miss Shannon made my wife her favorite galletas … um … cookies.” He stopped to take a sip of water, most of it missing his mouth. “A lovely girl. Just lovely.”

  “I’m sure she was, sir,” Megan said.

  “Well, she leave a note in the basement last week. We have a message board. Tenants write down what they need me to do.” Looking at Nappa, he repeated nervously in Spanish, “She maybe put her name down once in the last year. Miss Shannon never made a fuss.”

  Nappa, in his broken Spanish, told Mr. Mendoza to continue.

  “I was hosing down the sidewalk in front of the building this morning. Miss Shannon came back from her jog.”

  “What time was that? Was she alone?” Megan asked.

  “Yes, alone. I think maybe six thirty? She ask me would I mind checking the faucet in her kitchen today. I tell her no problem. She said she be gone by eight thirty. Any time after that is okay. I ring the bell twice to make sure no one is there. I don’t like to bother my tenants. I unlocked the door, bring in my toolbox, and then I see that poor girl just lying on the floor like … like …”

  Mr. Mendoza started to break down again and pulled out a handkerchief from his back pocket. He abruptly pulled it away from his face, shaking his finger. “I tell you whoever did this to that girl is a monster. I tell you, un monstruo!”

  Megan took a small step back so the EMT could administer more oxygen to Mr. Mendoza. His color soon returned to normal.

  “Mr. Mendoza, have you noticed anything suspicious lately? Anyone hanging around the building or going in and out of Ms. McAllister’s apartment? Any male visitors for Ms. McAllister?” Megan asked.

  “Boyfriends, you mean? No, no, not that I know of. She’s a quiet girl, a good girl. I can’t remember anyone.” A few seconds passed when he looked up at Megan, tapping his index finger against his left temple, stunned he could recall such an uneventful moment. He stammered, sure this would be of no use to them, “I remember she had a party at the end of the summer. She worked at a camp, a summer camp for sick city kids. She and a few other people got together to celebrate the end of the summer. Nothing big, just ordered a few pizzas, no big thing. No neighbors complained or anything like that.”

  “How did you know about it?” Nappa asked.

  “I run into her when she was paying the pizza guy. I help her into the apartment with the pizzas. There were six, maybe seven people. Nice kids.”

  Megan glanced over at Nappa. A small some
thing is better than a big nothing when it comes to leads.

  “We noticed there’s a video camera at the entrance to the building,” Nappa mentioned.

  “Yes, but I have trouble with it. It works, but not too good. The company was supposed to come last week to fix it. We never had no trouble at this building, never! I been here twenty-two years and not once, not one bad thing ever happen here!” Mr. Mendoza pulled his handkerchief out again, attempting to mask his emotion, as much as a man who just found a murdered woman could.

  “Okay, Mr. Mendoza. Thank you, thank you.” Megan placed a business card on the desk next to him. “If you wouldn’t mind providing us with information we’ll be needing, sir. Names, phone numbers of everyone in the building, and if there is anything at all that you remember, please call us immediately.”

  _____

  Megan and Nappa walked up the back stairwell to the lobby level. They were at the front door of the building when a uniformed cop attempted to warn them of the onslaught of press, but it was too late. Megan opened the door to find television reporter Ashley Peters in her face. Ashley Peters was a twenty-something pain in the ass who mastered the art of pancake makeup without all those nasty, dark foundation lines. She was glam without the glitz or the intellect, but she was driven to get the story out first, and she usually did.

  Ashley Peters pushed a bulbous microphone in Megan’s face, the network logo prominently in view. “Detective McGinn? Are there any leads as to who committed this outrageous murder? Is this in any way related to the tragic, unsolved murder of the young woman on the Lower East Side recently?”

  Megan was not in the mood for one-on-one combat with a hyper, career-obsessed, ethically challenged moron from the evening news. Ignoring Ashley Peters completely, she confidently spoke into the microphone, directing her answer to the other reporters surrounding her. “There are no suspects to report on at this time. We are treating this case as an individual incident unrelated to any previous crimes, and we will not be giving out the victim’s name until the family has been properly notified.”