The Drowned Girls (Angie Pallorino Book 1)
Page 5
“At least the precip is holding off, for now,” Hickey said, ducking as pinecone debris was flung at him in the wind.
“Global warming,” said the tech. “There’ll be more and more like it. Increasingly violent weather.”
“Thought the globe was supposed to be getting warmer, not colder and stormier.”
The tech shrugged.
“You think our perp chose last night because of the storm?” Holgersen said. “Because he could use it to hide? Because everyone was locked up cozy indoors?”
Angie did not reply. Instead, she stilled a moment, trying to breathe it all in—the dark, wet tombstones. A mausoleum to her right. Dead flowers, some in plastic cones, poking through the layer of snow on the internment plots. A black stone angel peered down at her, wings hanging like a vulture. The trees around them were gnarled and twisted giants, some coniferous, other deciduous, their bare branches draped with green witch’s hair. With several entrances to this cemetery, Jane Doe’s attacker could have come in from several directions.
“Wouldn’t catch me doing no ghost tour in this crap,” Holgersen said, turning in a slow circle beside her, following her gaze. “When did the city last have a snowstorm like this one anyway?”
“It’s because the wet front coming in is clashing with the colder air from the arctic outflow that’s been locked over us since late November,” she said quietly. “The snow won’t last long now as the warmer front moves in.”
Officer Hickey and the tech started back down the path, taking them toward the twisted, leafless hedge of trees that bounded Dallas Road and the ocean below. Here the wind was icier, angrier, and the sound of waves crashing in Ross Bay grew loud. Angie’s coat snapped sharply about her calves. Her eyes watered in the cold. Her thoughts turned again to the little girl in pink she’d seen on that road below last night. An involuntary shiver chased through her.
“This is where Constable Tonner and I found the paramedics working on her,” Hickey said, stopping in front of a grave site. “The ghost tour group had come down via that entrance.” He pointed. “And stumbled across our vic lying here.”
The ground was a slushy mess, tracked out with prints and pinked with blood. Forensic ident personnel in white Tyvek jumpsuits had started working the area around the interment plot, scraping back snow, searching for trace evidence, photographing and sketching the scene.
The tech said, “The scene was compromised by the paramedics, the ghost group, the first responding officers, a City Sun photographer who apparently arrived later—we’ll be lucky if we find anything uncontaminated.”
Angie’s gaze tracked up from the bloody slush on the ground to the granite pedestal upon which a large stone statue had been mounted. She read the inscription on the pedestal below the statue.
Mary Brown, 1889–1940.
Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me.
Her attention moved from the epitaph and up to the statue itself. The blank stone eyes of the mother of God gazed sightlessly down at the ground where the victim had lain. Sculpted robes draped her body, and she held her arms out slightly at her sides, palms up. Suppliant. Angie’s blood turned cold at the symbolism.
“Our circumcised Jane Doe was left at the feet of the Virgin Mary,” she said softly. Turning to Hickey, she said, “How exactly was she lying?”
“On her back, face up,” Hickey said. “Her head was there, right at the base of the pedestal, and her arms were folded over her breasts, one hand atop the other, like this.” He placed his hands over his heart.
As if in prayer …
“And her legs were splayed open, displaying her bloodied crotch.” He cleared his throat. “She was drenched. And the snow was starting to settle on her. How she survived, I … I don’t know.” He coughed and cleared his throat again.
“She was posed,” Holgersen whispered, staring at the bloodied snow.
A noise like a gunshot cracked behind them. They all jumped and spun around. A tree branch came crashing down in the wind, bits of bark and moss exploding off it as it hit a gravestone and then tumbled to the snowy ground.
“Shit,” Holgersen said, shaken.
Hickey looked white. He was shivering harder.
“And there are no ponds or anything nearby?” Angie said, her attention moving from the broken branch back to the grounds.
“Negative,” said Hickey.
“So she had to have been immersed in freshwater somewhere else, then brought here, where he carefully arranged her as if in prayer at the stone feet of the virgin mother of God.” Angie’s mind went to the Ritter and Fernyhough cases, the crucifixes that had been drawn onto their foreheads after they’d been sexually assaulted by a masked assailant. In both cases the girls had been drunk, and they were vulnerable because of it. They’d both left social gatherings solo. Both had been attacked from behind, smashed down into the ground, and raped facedown, a knife held to their throats, before receiving blows to the head. Both remembered their assailant saying the same words as he fisted their long hair with a gloved hand and held his blade to their throats.
Do you reject Satan, father of sin and prince of darkness?
Do you reject Satan and all his works …
He’d forced them to say I do … before he penetrated them from behind.
She and Hash had discovered that those exact words formed part of the Catholic church’s baptism rite. The girls had both come around to discover a red crucifix had been drawn on their brows with a permanent marker. And a lock of hair had been snipped from each of their heads.
Those words, the crucifix on their brows, the missing hair—it had all been holdback evidence, so the similarities between those sexual assaults and this new one was unlikely to be the work of a copycat.
He was back—it was her guy. The guy she and Hash had been after. She felt it in her bones.
Angie raised two fingers and touched them to her brow. “In the name of the Father”—she lowered her fingers, touched her sternum—“and the Son”—she touched her left shoulder, then right—“and the Holy Ghost,” she said quietly, then turned to Holgersen. “He immersed her in water, and he marked her with the sign of a cross. He assaulted her, then he defeminized, desexualized her, and posed her here to die under the watch of the Virgin Mary. This is not rape. It’s ritual—he baptized her.”
The others stared at Angie.
The wind howled suddenly, switching direction. Ice pellets began to spit from the sky.
“Fucking freak,” whispered Holgersen. “We gots us a Baptist. And this … this sure as hell ain’t this guy’s first rodeo. He’s done it before, and he’s going to do it again.”
CHAPTER 6
“Still no change in our Janie Doe’s condition,” Holgersen said, killing his second call to the hospital. “And still no ID.”
Angie’s fists tightened on the wheel as she took a corner on Fairmont. She was driving them to the station, and adrenaline hummed through her blood. She itched to get her hands back onto the case binders for Fernyhough and Ritter. Their Jane Doe just had to hang on long enough for her to get her teeth fully into this, and the sooner they obtained an ID, the better, because without knowing who she was, they were hamstrung in their investigative approaches.
One of the most significant factors in this kind of attack was victimology—what was Jane Doe’s personality, where did she go to school, did she have a job, hobbies, where did she live? The bottom line was: What had she been doing at the time of her attack? What had brought her into the orbit of her assailant?
“So, wanna wager how long it takes for this to go to homicide?” Holgersen said. “Sexually motivated, yeah, but our perp leaving our vic there like that—he intended to kill her. That’s attempted homicide. Perhaps he even thought she was dead already. And she got lucky.”
“Lucky my ass.” She shot him a hot glare. “I want this case. Don’t fuck it up for me.”
“I want this for Hash, okay? It always bugged him to hell that we never solved those serial rapes. If this guy is the same suspect as in those other cases—”
“Ooooh, I get it—it’s personal.” He turned to look out the window. “Dangerous, Pallorino,” he said quietly. “Verrrry dangerous. When things get personal, you lose objectivity.”
Her jaw tightened. She pressed down on the accelerator.
“Pull over,” he said suddenly. “Right over there, that mall.”
“What? Why?”
“I need a coffee. A decent one.”
“Are you serious?”
“I’ve been up, since, like the whole night, so yeah, I need caffeine.”
“You always like this?”
“And you?”
Angie cursed and swerved into the parking lot of a small strip mall that boasted a Starbucks on the far corner. “Make it fast,” she said. “Vedder’s waiting.”
As Holgersen loped his gangly way over to the coffee shop, Angie fisted the wheel. With shock she realized she was trembling slightly, her whole body. She put her head back against the headrest and closed her eyes a moment, trying to steady her breathing. Instead, a pulsing red image pounded into her brain—her rocking naked on Mr. Big D. The rhythmic boom of the bass from the club. The pulse of red light behind the drapes … then suddenly a little girl in pink running through mist as her car careered down onto her. Angie’s eyes snapped open, her breaths coming short and fast.
Not good, not good. Stay focused … She stared at the coffee shop door, impatient for Holgersen to exit. Wind gusted. Sleet started ticking again on the windshield. Suddenly she saw him inside, through the misted window, moving back and forth. He appeared to be talking on his cell phone. And that’s when she noticed his cell phone lying on the passenger seat beside her.
She frowned. Had he wanted her to stop so he could make some kind of urgent call? On a private phone?
Holgersen exited the Starbucks, returning to the vehicle with two cups and a brown bag. He got in, placed the cups in the holders, then fished into his bag. The scent of food and coffee filled the vehicle. “Here,” he said, holding something out to her.
“What’s that?” she said.
“Egg and bacon on an English muffin. Figured you might also be hungry.”
Her stomach clenched. She took it from him, and he unwrapped his own breakfast sandwich and bit into it.
“You can go—you can drive now,” he mumbled around his mouthful as he reached for his coffee.
She studied his face, trying to read him.
He paused chewing. “What? You vegetarian? Vegan? Gluten intolerant?”
“Who did you phone inside there?”
He stilled his chewing, and slowly his eyes narrowed. He swallowed, cleared his throat, and said, “I didn’t phone nobody. Left my cell in the car.”
She continued to hold his gaze.
“Besides, Pallorino, even if I did, it’s none of your fucking business. I got a life, even if you don’t.”
She swore softly, dumped her wrapped sandwich onto the dash, engaged the ignition, and accelerated out of the parking lot, making him spill his coffee as she swerved into the street.
“Is this what you did to the other guy?” he snapped as he tried to dab up the spill on his jeans with a paper napkin.
“What other guy?”
“Your previous partner—how long did he last with yous? Alls of three months?”
“He didn’t have what it took. Not my fault.”
“So, he wasn’t Hashowsky. I get it, Angie.”
“That’s Pallorino to you.”
“Yeah, yeah, okay, Pall-or-eee-no.” He turned to look out the window, sipped his coffee, then said, very quietly, “I intend to keep this job, Pallorino. I’m gonna make sergeant someday—okay? I got stayin’ power your other dude didn’t have. So pace yourself.”
CHAPTER 7
James Maddocks shook out his umbrella and inserted it into the holder by the door of the Blue Badger Bakery along with all the other wet umbrellas. They’d finally gotten seats. The place was choked to the gills, and the line outside was still growing despite the blustery weather.
Their server, wearing a funky short skirt and long red boots, led them to a tiny table with chairs that were not designed to accommodate the frame of someone Maddocks’s size. Outside the window, tables and chairs on the wooden deck glistened wet and empty. Beyond the deck, gunmetal-gray water rippled with wind.
Ginny had insisted on brunch, and she’d insisted on the Badger. It’s the cool thing to do in Victoria, Dad … they make a great eggs benny. Maddocks could think of a lot of “cooler” things to do with Ginny that did not involve standing in a line outside in gusting wind and sleet for half an hour. Or plunking down a fortune for eggs he could fry up himself in his yacht galley. These places didn’t take reservations, either. What was so cool about eggs benny? But his goal in moving here was all about Ginny and trying to salvage what he had left of a family. Maddocks wanted a second chance with his daughter before he lost her altogether, so when she’d been accepted at the University of Victoria, he’d started looking for a job here, too.
Ginny shucked off her coat and draped it over the back of her chair before sitting. Maddocks shrugged out of his own gear, wondering if Jack-O needed to pee. The old dog had been in the car for almost an hour already. As he hung his coat over his chair and seated himself, he noticed ink poking out of his daughter’s T-shirt.
“Is that a tattoo?” he said.
Her eyes flared up to meet his. “So what if it is?”
“When did you get that one?”
“Mom doesn’t mind. I don’t see why you should. Everyone has them.”
He wasn’t a prude. He was okay with tats. Just not indelible ink on his baby girl.
“You might like having it now,” he said, “but in years to come—”
“Dad.”
He inhaled, and they perused the menu in silence while chatter rose from the tables around them. Maddocks was almost bumping elbows with the guy seated beside them. He dutifully ordered the ranch benny with bacon and sausage. Ginny went for the low-carb option, sans bagel. He knew better than to ask. His kid had long struggled with her weight, although he thought she looked beautiful. Their server brought coffee.
“How’s school?” he said as the server left.
“Fine.”
He poured cream into his mug, stirred. Ginny sipped hers straight. He wondered how long she’d been taking her coffee unsweetened and black, and whether it was part of her perpetual attempt to slim down. Guilt feathered into him. He’d been realizing since he moved here just how little he did actually know about his daughter, how much he’d missed of her childhood, her growing up.
“Want to tell me about the new courses?”
She blew out air.
“I’m trying, Ginn. Cut me a break.”
She moved a fall of dark hair back off her face. “It’s … just so obvious, Dad. So fake.”
“Hey, I’m here, aren’t I?” He smiled. “How many old dads do you see standing in that line out there in the sleet?”
Her lips curved in spite of herself. “Okay. You win.”
Baby steps. He was going to win this with baby steps. It wouldn’t be simple—his daughter was still so full of old triggers and her mother’s poison—but he was here. He was showing up. And yeah, a shrink might have a field day with him and all his reasons for relocating, including the battered old yacht he’d bought and was trying to renovate, and in which he lived at the West Bay Marina. An analyst would probably also find meaning in the fact that he couldn’t look at, let alone sign, those divorce papers his wife’s lawyer had sent him. But for now he’d secured a job locally—no mean feat since it was a highly coveted position. He started tomorrow.
This was going to work. He was going to pull it all back together. Sort of.
Whil
e they waited for the food, which was taking forever, Ginny prattled on about her new semester and how she wanted to eventually get into law. He was proud of her, and he told her so. And she warmed further, telling him about the college choir she’d recently joined, how they sang on Thursday nights at the Catholic cathedral downtown with its amazing acoustics and stained glass, and how they’d all gone out after a practice to a karaoke club downtown last Thursday. “It’s actually a gay bar,” she said. “Owned by a gay couple.”
Maddocks nodded and finished the last of his coffee. As much as Ginny was relaxing into her conversation with him, there remained an underlying and subtle need in her to provoke her father. He was not taking the bait.
“Our singers rocked the place,” she said. “We got standing ovations. And then I stayed on by myself, after the group had all left, because I still wanted to perform a solo. I sang that one from Les Miz. You know, the one where—”
“Me? Know anything from a musical?” He laughed.
She fell silent. And he knew she was thinking of her mother’s new prick of a boyfriend, who apparently loved opera. She looked down and picked at her napkin. Under the table he fiddled with his wedding ring, which he wore mostly for Ginn, to give her the idea of hope, show her that he was trying to hold on to some half-baked notion of family and long-ago promises.
“How did you get home from the karaoke club, then, if you were on your own?”
She shrugged. “Walked. It’s only, like, five blocks.”
“What time was that?”
Her gaze darted up, and defiance crackled back into her eyes. Eyes so like his own. Dark blue against her pale skin. His Welsh heritage showing in his progeny. His chest tightened with a protective surge, the rawness of a father’s love.
“It’s a totally safe city, Dad.”
“No it’s not. No city is ‘totally safe,’ Ginny.”
“Compared to Surrey, or the downtown east side of Vancouver, it is.”
“I know exactly what goes on in this city. It’s why I have a job.”
“That’s the trouble with your job, you know that? You see so much bad shit—you constantly see such an ugly, ugly side of humanity that you forget there’s even goodness and kindness in people.”