Chris picked up the tubes that the man had been holding. With his finger, he squeezed one of them. “The blood, furthest from the needle, is thick. It wouldn’t have as much air as the rest of the blood. It’s like a vacuum. He didn’t get much because it was thicker than it normally would be. She was already beginning to coagulate.”
Ethan made notes.
He was proud of his wife and her team. They were doing their job. She was right. He needed to have faith in her.
“Okay, Doc, it looks like we’re back to the big question of the day. How did she die?”
He didn’t even hesitate.
“Her hyoid is going to be fractured. I’m calling COD as strangulation.”
Doctor Perette stared at Ethan Blackhawk. “Is this how you run your team? He’s guessing. We don’t do that as an ME. This is all about the science, and he’s inept!”
Elizabeth hopped down from the spot where she was sitting. Everyone knew she was pissed. No one called them names, and not in her presence. No one ragged on Christopher Leonard and lived to tell about it.
“Excuse me. Did you just call my ME inept?” she asked, pointing at him.
The man stared at her. “He’s guessing.”
“Well, I’ll take his guesses any day over your postulations. My team is the best. I handpicked each one of them from a pool of eight hundred employees. My ME is many things, but he’s far from clueless. You need to have some respect for him and his years of service to the FBI, or I will boot you out of here.”
When the man glanced over at her husband, she wasn’t having it. This was her team.
Not his.
“If you think Ethan Blackhawk will save your ass, you’re wrong. This is my show, and your job is to stand there and answer my damn questions.”
He stared at her. “I can’t guess and be sure I’m being accurate. That’s all I’m saying.”
She headed back to her spot. “Say it a little less. It’s pissing me off, and no one likes me when I’m angry.”
There was a chorus of ‘amens’ from the techs. She was preaching to her choir.
Chris laughed. “I do have a question,” he asked.
“What?”
“When I protest, like he just did, is it that annoying?”
Ethan and Elizabeth answered at the same time. “Yes.”
“I’m so sorry.”
Chris went back to focusing on the doctor. He was a fellow scientist, so he would explain that he wasn’t really guessing but picking up subtle cues from the dead.
“When I was manipulating her body, I could tell she hasn’t been dead all that long. We’re talking less than six hours, since rigor hasn’t set in. I could also see, from this angle, that there is slight bruising to her throat. Feel free to substantiate my hypothesis.”
Doctor Perette took out his knife and made the cut to her neck. The Y-incision proved what Chris had just ‘guessed’. The hyoid was, indeed, fractured.
“Well, I can’t believe it.”
“And that’s why he’s my ME, and why I refuse to work with anyone else but my people. I trust them, and they’re the best of the best.”
His eyes met hers. ‘Thank you for believing in me,’ Chris mouthed.
‘Always. I have your back, Christopher,’ she replied.
And she did.
Chris pulled off his gloves. It looked like he still had game after all. That helped heal that wound in his soul. Now he’d get ready to do the paperwork and charts. The last thing he wanted was to hear the other doctor bitching.
As Elizabeth began grilling the team, he started pulling off the protective garb and rolling it into a ball for the biohazard can.
“Okay, for the next round of make the boss lady happy…,” Elizabeth began.
Chris smiled, listening to his best friend. As he tossed his bloody gear into the biohazard bin, he stopped.
His eye caught something out of place. Then he realized what it was.
“Lyzee,” he called, interrupting her.
She glanced over. “What?”
“Come here.”
As she headed his way, Ethan was right behind her. Chris began gloving back up.
“We have a problem.”
“What?” she asked, as she pulled on her own gloves to touch the garbage can.
Chris rolled the can to its side. “Doctor Perette, when are these cans taken out and emptied?”
“The last tech on duty for the night empties them before he goes home. The biohazard company picks them up the following morning before we get in.”
“Who’s the last person to touch the can?” Chris asked.
He thought about it. “Max Howell.”
Elizabeth glanced over. Her agents were interviewing that man right now.
“What’s wrong, Christopher?” she asked.
He gently pulled out some of the garbage can liner, and there sat what he’d thought he’d seen.
A liver.
Elizabeth went to touch the plastic, but he grabbed her arm. “Everyone double up on gloves and put on plastic shields.” He glanced over his shoulder at her. “Lyzee, honey, back up. You can’t be this close.”
She did want he asked. Even Ethan took a step back.
Chris grabbed a face shield, added another paper gown over his clothes after he double gloved.
“What’s wrong?” Doctor Perette asked.
Then he saw it.
“Oh boy.”
“What?” Elizabeth asked, still not sure what the hell was going on with the can.
Chris pulled out a tray and gently lifted the liver onto it. As he did, Elizabeth could see that it wasn’t healthy.
Hell!
It was a hot freaking mess.
“If this liver belongs to that girl, she has Hepatitis C. I can tell by the striation and marks on the liver.”
She knew that was a contagious disease. “Okay, so he cut her open, took out her liver, knew she was sick, and tossed it?”
“It looks like it.”
Then it hit her.
“He took blood. We have someone walking around with a vat of Hep C blood?”
“Oh yeah, we really do. That’s one hell of a dangerous container. This is more proof it’s not a doctor. If he knew what disease she had, he wouldn’t have bothered taking it.”
“Lord, this can’t be good.”
Chris looked over. “It’s not.”
That was all she needed to hear.
Someone was strolling through a tourist haven with a jug full of disease.
And he was clueless…
* * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *
Mayor’s Office
Truth be told, Boone was having a damn hard time thinking about anything but Meredith. He could smell her on his skin, and that lovely floral scent kept assaulting his senses.
Each time he thought about something else, he’d catch a whiff and be right back to thinking about their evening.
They’d made love a few times.
He couldn’t help himself.
His intent was to sleep off his concussion, but when she rolled over in the middle of the night, snuggling against him, he was screwed.
Okay, she was screwed.
It led to kissing, touching, and finally a reunited fire in both of them.
What he loved most of all, was that she didn’t stop him. In fact, she dove in, driving their lovemaking to amazing heights. What astounded him was that this little, broken woman was so generous in bed.
She didn’t take, but instead offered him all the pleasure he could ever want.
He was crazy about her.
When he walked out the door, heading to the mayor’s, he knew she was the one.
Meredith Peyton was already imprinted on his heart.
Now he had to figure out how to get her to feel the same way.
He was snapped back to reality when Mayor LaCroix called him into his office for the morning update. Honestly, Boone hated being there.
The ma
n behind the big desk rubbed him the wrong way.
“Tell me what you have.”
Boone broke it all down, specifically what had happened in the cemetery. That would be what the man was most worried about, since it was all over the news.
It was a mess, and he knew it.
“This won’t do, Detective.”
“Sir, I know this looks bad, but we can’t help that the killer is playing games. At least no one was hurt. Had the lunatic been successful, or a tourist had been there, it would be worse.”
Phineas Mortimer spoke up, “It’s still bad, Detective. The mayor doesn’t need this in an election year.”
“Yeah, I know he’s busy tossing beads and schmoozing it up to worry about getting blown up. I on the other hand…I nearly did die, so that’s my focus.”
Phineas Mortimer stared at him. “That’s not what I meant. I was only saying…”
The mayor cut him off. “Fin, take a walk. I’ll talk to the detective.”
The man excused himself.
“I’m sorry about that, son. Coffee?” he asked, getting up to pour two cups from a china pot.
“Uh, no thank you.”
The mayor ignored him.
“I like you, Detective. We should spend more time together. In fact, you can do me a favor.”
This was the part he hated.
“What?”
Boone didn’t want to owe the mayor anything.
Hell!
He didn’t want to see the mayor.
“What do you know about the one director for the FBI?” he asked.
“She’s very competent. Does her job, and has damn good reflexed.”
Even if Boone hated her, he wouldn’t throw a fellow cop under the bus. He didn’t rat out Rolly when he showed up drunk, and he wasn’t going to shit on Elizabeth Blackhawk.
He wasn’t stupid.
“No, the other one.”
“Callen Whitefox?”
“Yes, him.”
“He’s smart, good natured, and does his job.”
The mayor placed the cup in front of the detective, lingering just a little too long for Boone’s liking.
This was why he didn’t like it here.
It was uncomfortable, but he didn’t know why. His gut was screaming.
“Is it true what the media says?” he asked.
“About?”
“About them being a threesome?”
Boone sipped the coffee. “Yes, I guess. If you’re asking if they’re inappropriate, they aren’t. They keep it to themselves, but they don’t hide it either.”
“That’s interesting.”
“Why?” he asked.
The mayor grinned. “Just making sure I see all the cards on the table. I want you to watch them for me.”
Bullshit.
Yeah, that wasn’t happening.
“I really have to go, sir. We have interviews…”
The man understood.
“Go, and we’ll talk later. Detective?”
Boone stopped at the door. “Yes?”
“Thank you for stopping in and seeing me. I’ll make sure I convey how happy I am with your performance to your boss. It’s been a real PLEASURE.”
Boone left.
It was things like that which creeped him out. Boone headed out, blew past Phineas Mortimer, and never looked back.
He had to hope he wasn’t going to be stuck doing the updates for the mayor.
It just wasn’t his thing.
* * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *
Callen sat in the security room scanning the footage of the morgue. What was crystal clear wasn’t the feed but that this killer had some brass ones. He didn’t seem to care that he was on video, or that he was committing a heinous crime right under their noses.
In fact, he was almost proud about it.
Callen watched as it played out, and he shook his head. Elizabeth was going to be pissed.
Then he saw it in the background.
Apparently, they had another direction to take this. They might just have a witness at the time when the killer was leaving the morgue.
Pulling out his zip drive, he downloaded the footage to his tablet. He wanted to get this to his partner, so she could see what he had found.
It was going to make her day—after she got over being pissed at the killer’s audacity.
As he entered the room, everyone was dressed like there was a plague, and Elizabeth and Ethan were in a corner.
“What’s going on?”
She handed him gloves. “We have a victim with Hepatitis C.” Elizabeth told him about the located liver. “We don’t know what he touched in this room, and we’re not taking any chances.”
Callen immediately gloved up. That was a blood illness that he didn’t want to catch. Granted, you generally had to have blood to blood contact, but why take any chances? If she had Hep C, she might also have HIV.
“Do we have another hooker?” he asked.
“Yeah, she was. Ethan ran her. Wait, how did you know she was a prostitute?”
Callen grinned. “Elementary, my dear Watson.”
She pointed at him. “We don’t have time for your literary kinkery,” she said, busting his ass.
That made him laugh. He did get off on two things in life. Her and books.
“Okay, you got me. I saw him carrying her in on the footage. She wasn’t dressed like a tourist, that’s for damn sure. He also left with something under his arm.”
Yeah, the blood.
Yuck!
He handed Elizabeth the tablet. She began running the footage. The killer’s face was covered by a hood. As he was leaving, he flipped her off.
Ethan started laughing.
Oh, this killer was going to get his ass handed to him as soon as Elizabeth got his scent. She was a pit bull on a regular basis, but challenge her?
Yeah, she’d run him into the ground to bring him in. There would be nowhere in the world he could hide to avoid her.
She’d make sure of that.
“He gives me the finger?” she asked. “He’s the one killing people, trying to blow me up, and toting around contaminated blood, so I should be the one flipping this jackwagon off.”
Ethan watched over her shoulder, and then he found something. “Is that a cab in the corner?”
“Yes, yes it is. I have the number. We can trace it, and maybe the driver saw something. This might give us a lead.”
That was a start. It gave them a place to jump off. It was more than they had five minutes ago, as they tried to figure out what to do about the liver.
Before she could give any directions, the door opened and Detective Savage entered.
Elizabeth glanced at her watch.
He had perfect timing.
“What did I miss?”
“Not much. Let me catch you up to speed. We had a killer deliver a body to us here in the morgue, we found he didn’t like the liver, oh, and she’s contaminated with Hepatitis C so he could be out infecting people with tainted blood.”
The man immediately glanced across the room at Merry, who was in close proximity to the body.
She smiled reassuringly.
Elizabeth grinned.
Yeah, a hickey, plus looks of concern?
She was right on target with this one. Her head tech and the detective had something brewing between them. You could see that the man wanted to say something to her.
Elizabeth was giddy with the prospect of a romance blooming for her tech. Merry deserved it.
Hell!
After their jobs, they all did.
Finally, the detective broke his silence. It wasn’t to ask questions, or add anything to the conversation.
No, it was so much more telling.
“Be careful, Miss Peyton.”
On cue, Ethan pulled a twenty out of his wallet and handed it to his brother. Callen tucked it into his shirt pocket without even batting an eyelash.
“I’m done placing bets,�
� Ethan said. “The house always wins.”
Elizabeth was amused, especially when no one got it but them. Then she was pissed.
Apparently, Ethan was betting against Cupid.
She elbowed him in the ribs.
“Crap. You’re mean today,” he muttered, rubbing his side. “It was a moment of weakness.”
Elizabeth let it go.
“Merry, and team, I want this entire lab gone over with a fine tooth comb. He was in here, so we’re going to see if we can find him.”
The team got to work.
“Don’t forget the doors. He might have touched them on his way in, when he was carrying her, or on his way out.”
Callen shook his head. “He had gloves on when he went in, and when he came out. The footage isn’t crystal clear, but they look to be leather ones.”
“So we can’t see any skin?”
Callen shook his head.
Well, crap!
This was all going to come down to the cab driver. He might break this wide open.
Then again, with their luck, he might be a dud.
“Okay, Ethan and Callen, I need you two to make a little trip to the cab company. Find the driver, get his story, and pray we find something. This fruit loop left her liver behind. That’s going to piss him off.”
Ethan happened to agree. “If he didn’t escalate before this, he might now. If he’s killing to get these livers, losing one will not make him happy.”
Great.
This case had shades of their other ones where organs had gone missing.
It was so damn wrong.
She glanced over at the detective. “Call your partner. I want you to transmit her face to him. He’s been in ‘The Quarter’, so he might have seen her tricking on the street.”
Merry pulled out her phone. “I’ll email you the picture,” she offered.
“Thank you, Miss Peyton.”
“You’re welcome, Detective.”
Elizabeth wiggled her eyebrows and Merry blushed a furious shade of red.
Ethan knew his wife.
She was going to have fun with this. Only he couldn’t focus on that. He had something else on his mind.
And it was troubling.
“While we’re playing at the cab company, what are you going to be doing?” he inquired. “I know I’m not going to get that lucky and have you camp out here babysitting. If that happens, I know I’m still asleep in our room.”
Blood Shall Run (An FBI Romance Thriller Book 15) Page 34