Thicker than Blood (Zoe Bentley Mystery)
Page 1
OTHER TITLES BY MIKE OMER
ZOE BENTLEY MYSTERIES
A Killer’s Mind
In the Darkness
GLENMORE PARK MYSTERIES
Spider’s Web
Deadly Web
Web of Fear
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2020 by Michael Omer
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Thomas & Mercer, Seattle
www.apub.com
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Thomas & Mercer are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-13: 9781542042444
ISBN-10: 1542042445
Cover design by Christopher Lin
To my parents, who helped every step of the way
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
CHAPTER 55
CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER 57
CHAPTER 58
CHAPTER 59
CHAPTER 60
CHAPTER 61
CHAPTER 62
CHAPTER 63
CHAPTER 64
CHAPTER 65
CHAPTER 66
CHAPTER 67
CHAPTER 68
CHAPTER 69
CHAPTER 70
CHAPTER 71
CHAPTER 72
CHAPTER 73
CHAPTER 74
CHAPTER 75
CHAPTER 76
CHAPTER 77
CHAPTER 78
CHAPTER 79
CHAPTER 80
CHAPTER 81
CHAPTER 82
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHAPTER 1
Friday, October 14, 2016
Catherine always believed that her soul was weightless. It was a thing made of thoughts, and feelings, and beliefs—all bodiless, as light as sunshine. But the soul also contained a person’s secrets. And those turned heavier every day.
If she could carry the weight on her back, perhaps she could go on as usual. She imagined a sturdy backpack, like her uncle used to have, with buckles and padded shoulder straps. She’d put all of her secrets there and adjust the hip belt, spreading the weight uniformly.
Instead, her secrets chose where they lay. They’d settle around her neck one day, dragging her down, making her neck stoop. The next morning they’d crawl into her gut, and she’d constantly bend over with cramps, running to the bathroom every hour. Right now, the secrets lurked in her heart, squeezing it, until it felt like it would shatter, or simply stop.
She’d called in sick that morning, third time that week. Her dad was getting worried, and she circumvented his questions by mentioning “lady problems.” It was now late in the evening, and she sat in her living room. The television screen flickering in front of her as she tried to cry.
Her tears had forgotten their way out. They constantly filled her throat, making her voice brittle and whiny, but they hadn’t emerged in days. If she only managed to cry, it would be a release. Perhaps the weight of the secrets would become bearable. Her eyes remained dry. Her lips quivered, and that only made her feel childish and stupid.
Secrets were sticky. They could clog your tear ducts if you weren’t careful.
She toyed with her phone, as she had many times in the past weeks, opening her contact list, her dad the first one in her favorites. Appropriate, since he was her favorite. Her favorite parent, her favorite human, her favorite thing in the whole world. She could tell him the truth. The weight in her heart would dissipate into nothing. Her finger wavered over the screen. For a second she could almost feel the anticipated relief.
And then the images came. His hurt face. He wasn’t a young man anymore. He’d had a heart attack last year, which the doctors called a “near thing.” What would this do to him?
The imaginary relief morphed into thorny fear and guilt. She couldn’t.
She let out a raw, feral sob. Dry as dust, no tears.
A sudden knock on the door made her heart skip a beat. For a second she couldn’t fathom who it could possibly be. It was very late. Her friends or neighbors would text her before showing up on her doorstep, especially at this hour. Then she knew. It was her father. He was worried about her, wanted to see how she was doing.
He’d take one look at her face and know something serious was wrong. That if these were “lady problems,” they weren’t the kind that happened on a monthly basis. Would she be able to lie to him when he asked her? Not right now. Not this evening. She’d have to tell him everything.
Relief, fear, and guilt flooded her at once as she got up, stumbling to the door. She took a quick glance through the peephole.
“Oh,” she said in surprise. She knew this man, but he wasn’t her father.
She reached for the dead bolt, more out of confusion than intent, her mind foggy after a long day. As she did it, she felt the sudden wrongness. Her thoughts, scrambling in panic, tried to order her fingers to stop, that this door should remain shut. This man shouldn’t be here at all. And something shimmered in his eyes. Something dangerous and unstable.
But there was a moment of disconnect between her brain and her body. As if in slow motion, she turned the dead bolt knob, unlocking the door.
It shoved open, slamming into her face, a sudden blinding pain. She fell back to the floor, the entire right side of her face throbbing, her vision foggy. Tears sprang into her eyes, finally finding their way out. She tried to scream, to speak.
A hand clamped on her face, blocking her nose and mouth. She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t make a sound. She struggled, and he hit her.
The world went blissfully dark.
Her eyelids fluttered open. Her mouth felt strange, woolly, and it took her a moment to realize something was stuffed in it. She lifted her hand to pull it out.
“Don’t.”
The command froze her.
>
“I need that there. I can’t have you screaming.”
Her eyes focused on the familiar face, and she blinked, beseeching him mutely to let her go.
“This will only take a few moments,” he said, sounding almost apologetic. He held something. A needle.
He pulled her right hand toward him and raised the needle, about to stick her. She let out a muffled scream, tried to pull her hand away. She was weak, and his grip was strong enough to hurt, but the sudden jerk surprised him, and he missed his mark. She gasped as the needle plunged into her arm.
“Look what you made me do!” he snarled, angry, and she saw that gleam in his eyes again. His grip tightened on her wrist, hurting her, and he stuck the needle again. She tried to claw at his face with her other hand, and he slapped her.
“I can’t hit your vein like that,” he muttered. The needle went in again. He shook his head and mumbled to himself, frustrated.
She wrenched her hand away, a blinding pain flaring through her arm as the needle twisted. Blood seeped from the ragged hole in her arm. She felt dizzy, thought she was about to faint.
“Damn it!” He tossed the needle away in fury, and it clattered in the corner of the room. He looked at her, gritting his teeth in anger. Then he glanced down at her bleeding arm. His eyes widened. His throat constricted as he swallowed.
He lowered his head to her arm and, to her revulsion, licked the blood. The rough feeling of his tongue on her skin made her squirm in disgust and horror. She tried to pull away, but he held her arm tight, making a strange sound. A snarl.
His lips tightened on her skin, and he began to slurp. She stared mutely as he sucked blood from her torn skin. He finally pulled back, a trickle of blood running down his chin.
“I had to.” His face twisted in shame. “I’m sorry.”
The world faded again.
When she came back to her senses, he was gone. A strange keening noise echoed somewhere nearby. Crying? Yes. It was him. He was still in her home, and he was crying.
The police. She had to call the police. She tried to force herself to move, to get up, but her limbs wouldn’t obey her. Blood seeped from her arm, dripping to the floor.
Finally she managed to budge. To pull the gag from her mouth. She was about to rise when a noise behind her made her freeze.
And then a fabric tightened around her throat, choking her. She clawed at it, couldn’t get a grip on the noose, her mouth opening wide as she tried to scream. No sound. No breath. Spots danced in her eyes as her vision clouded.
A low chuckle, full of malice, and a growling voice whispered in her ear. “Now for the fun part.”
CHAPTER 2
Saturday, October 15, 2016
Detective Holly O’Donnell stood in the hall and watched as the medical staff gently placed Catherine Lamb’s body on the stretcher. The body had been zipped in a body bag, out of sight. But the image was seared in her mind. The strands of matted hair, glued to the victim’s cheek with dried blood. The bruises on the skin, contrasting with the paleness of death. The torn clothes, Catherine’s final unavoidable indignity. Sometimes, O’Donnell could summon a barrier of professional aloofness. Not today.
The two men carrying the stretcher took a moment to maneuver out of the living room, doing their best to avoid stepping in the large smeared stain of dried blood. As they left, O’Donnell gave herself a moment to refocus. The murder scene’s atmosphere always changed when the body was removed. Voices grew louder. Officers moved around more freely, their actions businesslike. Someone would crack a joke. A general sense of relief settled over everyone. The dead were gone. It was time for the living to tie up the loose ends.
She scrutinized her surroundings in the soft light filtering through the window. It was a small house, and she imagined that before the recent gruesome events it had been a sweet place. A cozy bedroom, a pleasant living room with a couch and a small TV. The kitchen was a bit cramped, but Catherine Lamb had done wonders with the space, hanging pots and pans on the wall in a way that almost made them seem like part of the decor. Through the window in the kitchen, a glimpse of the backyard could be seen. Lawn gone wild, spotted with weeds and dry leaves.
O’Donnell turned toward Officer Garza, who stood in the kitchen, flipping the pages in his sketch pad.
“Let’s do the living room,” she said.
He took a second too long to nod, a flash of resentment on his face. She was getting used to those moments of spite. Of cops looking at her like she didn’t deserve to call herself a detective, or a cop, for that matter. And as if she definitely didn’t deserve to be calling the shots.
Well, she called the shots, deserve it or not. Garza would have to deal.
He entered the living room, sketchbook in hand, and waited for her. She hesitated for a moment, the large bloodstain on the floor frustrating her. For someone as tall as Garza, it posed no problem. But she couldn’t just step over the stain. She would have to jump over it, like she had twice before already. And with the shoe booties, which she had insisted everyone wear, she could easily slip and fall. Not to mention that in her own mind she looked ridiculous, hopping like a rabbit in a cheap suit.
She jumped over it and did in fact slip and almost fall. Then she straightened and eyed Garza, daring him to laugh. He didn’t.
Focusing on the job at hand, she began measuring the room with a tape, calling out the measurements to Garza, who jotted the details on the page. Garza and his partner had been first on the scene. When O’Donnell had shown up, she’d asked Garza to be the sketcher, while his partner was in charge of the scene perimeter. They’d already done the bathroom and the bedroom and had waited for the body to be removed before they started with the living room.
She placed an evidence marker numbered eight next to the victim’s phone, discarded on the floor. Evidence marker nine was placed by the torn bra. Evidence markers ten to fifteen next to the bloody footprints that covered the floor. On one of her first homicide trials, they’d almost lost the case because they had marked three footprints with only one marker, leading to shoddy photographs. Never again.
“Make sure to point out the direction of the footsteps in the sketch,” she said.
“I will.” Garza was measuring the distance of the victim’s phone to the room’s doorway.
“And triangulate the distance of each one separately.”
He shot her a disgusted look but said nothing. Of course, he knew how to do his job; there was no need to micromanage him. But it was better safe than sorry. O’Donnell had had enough sorry in the past months for a lifetime.
She paced around the room, careful to avoid the bloodstains, searching for anything she might have missed, but found nothing. Then she strode over to Garza and glanced at the sketch. She grudgingly had to admit to herself that the man did a good job. The sketch was tidy, the triangulations careful and methodical.
Loud voices caught her attention. The officer outside was arguing with someone, and the tone got more and more heated. Media already? Or a nosy neighbor?
She jumped over the bloodstain again, not slipping this time. Definitely getting better at bloodstain jumping. Then she marched out of the house, squinting as she adjusted to the sunlight.
They’d cordoned off Catherine Lamb’s house and tiny front yard as well as a patch of the sidewalk. Garza’s partner, a rookie fresh from the academy, stood on the sidewalk inside the perimeter, the crime scene logbook in his hand. On the other side of the yellow tape were a man and a woman. The woman wore a long beige trench coat, her hands in her pockets. She had a matching brown wool hat and scarf. The man had a black overcoat, which he wore over a gray suit.
The woman’s voice rose over the traffic noise as she berated the rookie. “We just need a few minutes. It’s in your best interest to—”
“Excuse me,” O’Donnell called, striding over, her breath clouding in the cold air. “Is there a problem?”
“Feds,” the rookie said. “They want to enter the crime scene.”
O’Donnell frowned and turned to face the two feds. The man was black haired, tall, with wide shoulders. His posture was ridiculously casual, almost slouching, like a high school student trying to seem cool. The woman was, to some extent, the complete opposite. She didn’t even reach the man’s shoulder, and wisps of auburn hair peeped from underneath her wool hat. Her delicate lips were pursed with displeasure, and her entire body seemed poised, as if she was about to lunge at someone. Her nose, long and curved, was pink from the cold. She turned her gaze to O’Donnell, who almost took a step back. The woman’s eyes were the color of grass, and their intensity was deeply unnerving. It was as if she wasn’t just looking at O’Donnell—she was actually scrutinizing each and every one of her skin pores.
“I’m Detective O’Donnell.” O’Donnell forced herself to meet the woman’s stare. “And you are?”
“Agent Gray.” The man flashed his FBI badge. “And this is Dr. Bentley.”
“This is a Chicago PD crime scene, agents. You can’t come in. Not until we finish processing it.”
“This murder might be relevant to an ongoing case we’re investigating,” Bentley said. “We just need a few minutes to—”
“Who said this is a murder?” O’Donnell asked.
Gray flashed his partner an annoyed look, which she didn’t seem to notice. He sighed. “Lieutenant Martinez tipped us off. He called to tell us a twenty-nine-year-old woman named Catherine Lamb was strangled to death in her home.”
O’Donnell maintained her poker face, doing her best to hide her anger. She’d always thought well of Martinez, who, like her, worked in the Area Central detective bureau. What was he thinking, contacting the FBI about a local murder? And giving them preliminary, unverified information, like the cause of death, was a mistake even rookies didn’t make. “How is this murder related to your case?”
“We’re not at liberty to say,” Gray said quickly, just as Bentley opened her mouth.
O’Donnell gave them a tight-lipped smile. “I have a crime scene to process. Have a nice day, Agents.”
“Wait.” Bentley’s voice sharpened, eyes flashing in anger.
O’Donnell turned away. She’d have a talk with Martinez later and figure out what this was all about.
“Detective O’Donnell,” Agent Gray called after her. “Two minutes of your time, please? We might have some information.”