by Leslie Wolfe
“You don’t know that,” Michowsky replied, no longer trying to hide his anger. “You’re assuming.”
“What do you think would’ve happened if the kids would’ve spotted him dumping the body, during all that time he took to secure it with the fishing line? He would have killed them both, right where they stood.”
“No, I meant you’re assuming these kids actually told you the truth, that the body wasn’t there when they arrived.”
“You don’t fake that,” Tess replied, pointing at the two youngsters. “You assumed, Michowsky, you assumed they were afraid of their parents. You assumed, you didn’t press on, and you were wrong. Just like last time,” she blurted, instantly regretting that last phrase.
Michowsky’s face scrunched up in anger, and his fists closed.
“Someone moving a body in this advanced stage of rigor needs a large SUV, minivan, or truck,” Tess continued. “Now that we have the precise time the killer was here, we can pull video from street cameras. Pull all surveillance in the area, see what you can find. I don’t think there was a lot of traffic at that time.”
“I don’t need you to tell me how to do my job,” Michowsky snapped.
“Well, apparently you do. Let’s just get it done.”
Michowsky squinted, his jaws clenched, and his mouth twisted, flanked by two deep ridges.
“You haven’t changed a bit, Special Agent Winnett. I heard you’re on your last stretch with the bureau. People are saying everyone’s fed up with you. With a little luck, who knows? Maybe this will be your last case. The world will have one less bitch with a badge.”
She hesitated, taken aback by the harshness of his words. Every one of the words he’d spoken tore her up inside. She managed to reply with a shred of dignity.
“Keep on dreaming, Michowsky. The day’s still young.”
Sonya
Tess followed their car all the way to the precinct and took a few minutes securing a parking permit from the front desk. Then she climbed the stairs to the second floor and found both Michowsky and Fradella huddled around a computer. She stood next to them, unsure what to say. It seemed like everything she said only made things worse with Detective Gary Michowsky, far from what she wanted.
Fradella searched through the missing persons’ database, every now and then comparing the faces in there with the picture on his phone.
“There she is,” Fradella said, “this is her. Sonya Weaver, 22. Reported missing five days ago, on March 22.”
She took a step back, suddenly feeling sick to the stomach while staring into Sonya’s beautiful blue eyes. Five days… five days of terrible fear, of torture, of pain. She felt her skin crawl, as a million goosebumps sent frozen shivers to her taut nerves. She shuddered.
What did that monster do to her for five whole days? Tess rubbed the back of her neck furiously, running her left hand from her nape to the side of her neck, under her ear, pressing hard. Five days… they’ll find out soon enough, once Doc Rizza wrapped up his examination. Yet she was sure that no matter what they found in the coroner’s report, Sonya Weaver had welcomed the blade ending her life.
She shuddered again and took another step back, backing into a desk. She leaned against it and closed her eyes for a second, trying to get her bearings. Against her closed eyelids, nightmarish images formed freely, haunting her. She opened her eyes, still yearning for the solace brought by withdrawal into oneself, another little thing she’d lost forever. Instead, she welcomed the crisp light of day, the only thing that dissipated her nightmares and shattered her fears.
“What’s wrong?” Michowsky asked, sounding indifferent.
“Nothing,” she lied, “just a migraine. I’ll get some coffee. When was she last seen?”
“Um… five days ago, in the evening. She vanished after a night out with friends. They were celebrating. She’d just graduated from college, cum laude,” Fradella replied.
“All right,” she said, rubbing her nape one more time. “Let’s get phone records, social media accounts, financials, the works. When’s Doc Rizza going to be done?”
“He just started,” Michowsky pushed back. “It’s not even noon yet. You’re in one hell of a hurry.”
“And you aren’t?” Tess replied, staring at Michowsky intently. Then she lowered her eyes. “Let’s start over, what the hell. We’re on the same team.”
“Are we?” Michowsky replied coldly. “It doesn’t feel like that from where I’m standing.”
“We’re trying to be, but it’s a process,” she said, fighting to contain a chuckle. Men and their egos. They just had to have the last word. She silently promised herself she’d shut up, no matter what his last word was going to be.
“Whatever,” Michowsky said, somewhat appeased, making it easy for her to change the subject.
“Let’s do a Google search for her; see what we can find.”
Fradella executed. Many young women named Sonya Weaver had their profiles online. They found the right Facebook profile and started looking at her past postings, pictures, and interests.
“Nah, the public stuff’s too general,” she commented after screening a few days’ worth of postings. “Nothing usable. We need to get access to her entire profile. Let’s get her ID confirmed. We need to notify next of kin.”
“Yeah, we know that,” Michowsky replied dryly, a little irritation tinting his reply.
“Before doing that, I want to speak with the cop listed on her missing person’s report. Who handled it?”
“That’s one Felipe Garcia, from North Miami,” Fradella replied, reading from the screen.
“Thanks. Let’s get moving with the ID.”
“Already sent her ID to Doc Rizza.”
As soon as he spoke his name, the phone on Michowsky’s desk came to life with a loud, disrupting ring tone. The display read, “Coroner.” Michowsky took the call on speaker.
“Go for Michowsky.”
“Need you all downstairs.”
Doc Rizza’s voice sounded somber and tired.
Autopsy
She lay there immobile, lifeless, seemingly serene, against a backdrop of stainless steel and white tile. A white sheet covered her body, leaving only her beautiful face exposed. Her eyes were closed now, probably the coroner’s doing. The sand was gone from her hair, leaving it smooth, shiny, spread silk on the cold, barren steel of the examination table.
Tess swallowed hard, a little choked. She stood next to the table, looking at Sonya’s serene visage, murmuring senseless words without even noticing. What kind of man would do that? And yet she knew just what kind of man. She’d seen such men before. In her tenure as an investigator, she’d hunted them down, she’d caught them, or she’d killed them. This bastard would be no different.
She’d been an FBI agent for 10 years and had encountered all sorts of psychopaths, hideous human beings whose minds had been overtaken by the darkness of their deviance, and who had acted on their most sadistic, incomprehensible fantasies, leaving trails of bodies for agents like her to put to rest. One by one, Tess had caught the killers she’d pursued, and yet, a part of her failed to understand them. After 10 years… there wasn’t much hope she’d ever understand how such minds worked, and, for the most part, she didn’t even want to. She didn’t want their horror to contaminate her, she didn’t want the abyss to look back onto her. She wanted to know and understand just enough to be able to catch the killers before they could kill again.
Her hand almost touched Sonya’s hair, but she stopped herself and plunged her fisted hand deeply into her pocket. How little did they know about Sonya… just that she was a young college graduate getting started with her life. As for her killer, they knew nothing about him. No prints, no traces, nothing. But no matter how smart he was, or how careful he’d been, she’d still find him. That was a fact. It was more than a promise; it was reality. It was the pledge of her impeccable service record that even SAC Pearson had to acknowledge. She will find him. Soon.
“I d
o that too, you know,” Doc Rizza said softly.
“What?”
“Speak to them,” he said, gesturing toward the exam table.
“Ah… do they speak to you?”
“Yes, they do, every time. She’s told me a lot already, and we haven’t even finished our conversation.”
“Care to share?”
“Let’s wait for Michowsky and Fradella. They should get here in a minute.”
“All right, yes, of course,” Tess replied, letting her eyes wander, absentmindedly observing things, countless details about Doc Rizza’s office. His diplomas, neatly framed, hung above his desk, probably displayed in chronological order. No other framed pictures adorned the cold walls, but near his desk a couple of shelves hosted a few personal items. A small radio, a predigital relic that probably still worked. A few illustrated reference titles on entomology, marine biology, botany, zoology, also predating their respective database versions, no doubt. A coffee mug with a message reading, “Medical examiners are cool too,” a typical sample of their trade’s dark humor. She hadn’t visited in years, but little had changed.
“How do you stay sane, Doc?” Tess asked.
“After doing this?” he replied, finishing up at the sink. The sound of metallic instruments being dropped in a tray resounded loudly in the large room, echoing against the barren, tile-covered walls.
“Yeah...”
The water stopped running, and, for a second, the only thing she could hear was the low hum of the refrigeration compressor.
Doc Rizza straightened his back and wiped his hands on a paper towel, then discarded it in a sensor-activated trash can. Then he ran both his hands against his thinning hair, one after another, as if to persuade the remaining strands to stay in place. He too hadn’t changed much in the years since she’d visited his morgue. A little less hair, a few more pounds, a few more wrinkles.
“I think of each laceration and contusion as useful hints to help you guys catch these animals. By the time they reach me, these victims are gone. They don’t hurt anymore. They found their peace. I try to think of that.”
Tess glanced at him, surprised. He looked troubled, haunted, despite what he was sharing. He continued after a little while, his voice barely audible.
“There are days, though, when my dinners are liquid, if you know what I mean. I get out of here, and I can’t see anyone, can’t talk to anyone, I just go home and lock myself in there with a bottle of strong liquor, hoping it washes everything away.”
“And does it?”
“Nah… just dulls the pain and the anger a little. Makes it bearable, and gives me the strength to come back here another day.”
He clasped his hands together, deep in thought.
“I listen to classical music as often as I can,” he continued after a little while. “Classical does it for me… it’s pure, clean, filled with emotion, with life. And I fly on occasions.”
“You’re a pilot?”
“A private pilot, yes. Just the bare minimum license to go up there on my own. I rent a small plane every now and then. I take it up there, and I just let that serenity sink in. For an hour at a time, I can imagine the world is a better place, free of such senseless horror.”
He stared into nothingness for a while, then asked, “What do you do?”
She thought of the answer she was about to give. Not much she could really share without opening the door to even more questions.
“Oh… I read, mostly. Crime novels, if you can believe it,” she chuckled. The sound of her voice echoed eerily in the cold stillness of the room. “Serial killers, police procedurals, old-style investigations, modern detective stories. Thomas Harris is one of my favorites; I have a bunch of theories on the psychology of Dr. Hannibal Lecter.”
“Don’t you get enough of that on the job?” Doc Rizza’s eyebrows shot up, wrinkling his tall forehead.
“I do, and then some. It keeps my mind open to new ideas though. I’m fascinated about how the world of crime suddenly turned deviant, for lack of a better word, some 50 years ago. Before the 1970s, crime was relatively simple. Stabbings, strangulations, gunshot wounds. Clear motivations, like jealousy, greed, or revenge. Clean, almost elegant crime, compared to today. Whodunit was a challenge for the brain, most of the time. Not something that turned your stomach.”
Doc Rizza’s face lit up.
“I know exactly what you’re talking about. One theory says that in the 1970s, with the expansion of television, people started being more aware of these types of crimes, when, in fact, they had existed since the beginning of time. History has its examples, like Jack the Ripper, or even Caligula, two thousand years ago. Another theory says that even psychopaths need inspiration, and with the current entertainment trends, in music, film, and literature, they get all sorts of ideas. But that’s not how you stay sane, Winnett, that’s how you get better at what you do. Are you dodging my question?”
“Not intentionally, no. I—”
“Sorry it took so long,” Michowsky said, preceded by the whoosh of the automatic doors. “We ran into the captain. He wanted an update.”
“Okay, let’s get started,” the doctor replied. All the excitement brought by their earlier conversation was now gone, replaced by an unmistakable expression of sadness mixed with disgust. “This is not the full report. You know better than to expect that before 48 hours. This is preliminary. I wanted to get you a head start.”
Michowsky and Fradella pulled out their notepads.
Doc Rizza let out a breath of air before speaking.
“At this time, I can confirm cause of death. She was stabbed, with a scalpel most likely, then the blade was pushed forward, like this.” He took a knife to a mannequin and demonstrated. “He didn’t slice. This deep stabbing followed by the push-forward cut caused both her jugular and carotid to be completely severed. There were no hesitation marks. She died of exsanguination, very quickly. Arterial blood spray must have been massive. When you find the primary crime scene, you’ll see what I mean. That’s where the relatively good news stops.”
He waited for Michowsky and Fradella to catch up with their notes, then continued.
“As expected, there are no trace elements or fingerprints on her body. By placing her on the beach, he exposed her to sand and ocean spray, and that washed everything off.”
“How about her tox screen?” Tess asked.
“We’ll get there. Preliminary toxicology report came back a mess of trace amounts of various chemicals. I’ve sent samples for a full array. We’ll know more in 36 to 48 hours.”
“I’ll see if I can put a rush on that,” Tess offered. “Pull some strings.”
“I tried my best, but see what you can do. Maybe the feds carry more weight than us locals. Now, let’s go back to her actual death. Blood pooling shows she died and was kept postmortem in that praying position, but without her knees touching the ground.”
“What the hell do you mean, Doc?” Michowsky asked.
“It means she was suspended in some sort of harness when she was killed.”
“Oh, God,” she said quietly.
“Then, after rigor was fully set, he moved her and posed the body the way we found it.”
“That means ligature marks?” Tess asked.
Doc Rizza pulled away the sheet delicately, exposing only her left arm and leg.
“Very minimal. I was expecting more. The absence of deeper ligature marks can only be explained if he used something like this,” he said. He clicked a button on a remote and projected an image on the wall-mounted TV. “These harnesses are sold at high-end sex shops. They’re lined with artificial fur and, although they restrict movement effectively, they’re also soft and don’t break or scrape the skin. They could leave friction marks though, if the victim struggles against such bondage for a long time, which is precisely what I found here,” he clarified, pointing at her wrist. “Her ankles show the same type of friction and also her neck. Her waist shows less friction, but there is
some, enough to let me estimate the type of harness she was restrained with.”
He clicked another button, and the image changed to show a sex harness commercially packaged in shiny colors. The packaging depicted an image of a woman suspended from the ceiling. Her wrists were cuffed and pulled forward, her waist and shoulders supported by a thick, leather-looking band lined with fur, and her legs immobilized at the ankles, with the knees half bent. There was a man in the picture, shown approaching the suspended woman from behind while tugging at the harness straps with both hands, to position her as he wanted.
A wave of nausea hit Tess, as she watched the images on the monitor. She took a few deep breaths, pushing the nausea away. Doc Rizza turned an inquisitive eye toward her, but she dismissed his concern with a twitch of her lips and a quick shake of her head.
“This stuff is available in some stores out there,” Rizza continued. “Could be this brand or could be a different one. Here’s something you could potentially use: these things don’t come cheap. They go for hundreds of dollars. This killer has means. Not many sex shops carry them; only the high-end ones. Very few manufacturers and importers too. You might be able to generate a short list of stores and maybe trace a transaction.”
He took a sip of tea from a large cup, then grimaced. It was probably cold and stale.
“She was raped, sodomized, and beaten,” he continued, “repeatedly, over the entire time he had her. I’ll know more when I’m done with the full exam. I didn’t find any fluids; no DNA we can use.”
“Fingerprints?” Tess croaked, her voice choked. She cleared her throat. “I mean, hers?”
“Her fingerprints match the ones filed on her missing person’s. The report was too new for the prints to have been in the system, but they match. There’s more.”
“Sorry…” Tess whispered. This was the second time she’d interrupted him.
“She was cut, superficially, many times, using a sharp blade, a scalpel, or maybe a box cutter. I counted 153 different cuts, not more than a couple of millimeters deep, on her back and on her thighs, barely deep enough to leave an almost invisible, hairline scar. All cuts were peri-mortem. Some are almost completely healed.”