Harm None: A Rowan Gant Investigation

by M. R. Sellars

  By now, Dr. Sanders was kneeling next to the body of the young woman and had thrown back the sheet that had been covering it. The injuries appeared very similar to those of Ariel Tanner. The skin had been peeled away from what I could see of the woman’s chest, leaving behind raw, exposed muscle. Her eyes stared off blankly, and her face wore a grimace of excruciating pain and horror. Her arms were twisted behind her body, and though I couldn’t see them, I was sure they were bound.

  A departure from the similarity with Ariel’s torture was the fact that Karen Barnes’ mouth was covered with a wide strip of duct tape. It had been wrapped tightly around her head to keep it from coming loose. Her ankles were also secured in the same fashion, and the tape wrapped around the post of a stall to keep her legs in place.

  “I’ll have to do a swab,” Dr. Sanders was telling us. “But if he’s establishing a pattern, I doubt if she was raped. The Tanner woman wasn’t.”

  “He didn’t rape her,” I said. “That would have soiled her. He wouldn’t defile his sacrifice.”

  I moved around to get a better view of the body and was about to expand upon my statement when the angle that had been blocked by the doctor’s kneeling form came into my line of sight. Directly beneath Karen Barnes’ rib cage, a deep, ragged incision stretched horizontally across her flayed torso. The uneven gash puckered open like a bloody, toothless smile, exposing lacerated internal organs. Instantly I turned away and bolted for a stall, bile rising in my throat.

  A few moments later, I heard Deckert asking from behind me, “Are you gonna be all right?”

  I had just finished expelling the contents of my stomach into the toilet I was kneeling before. I spat and wiped my face then stood and flushed.

  “Yeah,” I answered weakly. “Sorry about that. I’m not as used to this stuff as you guys.”

  “Used to it, hell,” he answered. “I came close to doing the same goddamned thing earlier.”

  I walked out of the stall, and Deckert patted me on the shoulder as I passed him. Dr. Sanders was cutting the body loose from the metal post, and the County Coroner had come in and was preparing a body bag. Ben was facing away from the morbid activity looking very green.

  “Her heart has been removed. Can anyone here tell me if it was found?” Dr. Sanders asked as she and her peer rolled the body and slid the open, rubberized bag beneath it, then let it gently back down.

  “You won’t,” I told them, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. “He took it with him.”

  “What, like a souvenir or somethin’?” Ben asked.

  “No,” I replied. “As part of the ritual.”

  The violent bout of vomiting had shocked my system and broken my concentration, effectively weakening my defenses against otherworldly interference. Dizziness swarmed over me as the room began to spin. I was losing control. My ears filled with a rushing sound, and color melted liquidly from the images before me. I fell backwards down a dark tunnel, speeding inexorably away from an ever-diminishing point of light. When I at last jerked to an abrupt halt, I was floating above the room, looking down upon the recent past.

  A hooded, cloaked figure.

  A pretty, vital young woman bound nude on the floor.

  A dirk. I know that dirk. It belonged to Ariel.

  She wants to struggle but she can’t. I can feel her trying to scream, but he’s taped her mouth. Her head hurts. She remembers someone attacked her from behind.

  What are you doing? Get away from me with that knife!

  I can feel the silent scream, the searing pain as the knife bites into flesh, peeling back the skin.

  “Stop it you bastard,” I say to myself, struggling to break the connection.

  “I’m sorry,” he says to her.

  Why is this happening? Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come...NO!

  I see him press the knife, Ariel’s athamè, into her solar plexus and draw it across carefully, making the ragged cut.

  The pain is unbearable, indescribable.

  He slowly removes a surgical glove.

  He thrusts his hand into the incision. With a twisting motion, he wrenches it back out.

  Still quivering.

  Dripping.

  Karen Barnes heart lay in his hand.

  “Rowan,” Ben’s voice echoed in my ears. “Hey, Rowan.” He was nudging me. Colors flashed back into the scene and kaleidoscoped wildly before finally settling to their proper shades and places.

  “Yeah,” I half whispered. “Yeah, I’m okay.”

  “You kinda spaced on us there,” he told me.

  “Just a second.” A sudden realization hammered down upon me. “Dr. Sanders, don’t you do something with Superglue and a black light to find fingerprints on skin?”

  “Cyanoacrylate fuming,” she corrected. “And it’s a bit more than just a black light. But it really depends on the circumstances. Sometimes we use Ninhydrin. Fingerprints on skin are very short lived. Perspiration and other natural secretions destroy them rather quickly. Why?”

  “He took off his glove before he removed her heart.”

  “How can you know that?” Detective Deckert asked me.

  “Intuition. Inspiration. Divine perception. It doesn’t matter,” I spoke quickly. “Trust me on this. He took his glove off.”

  CHAPTER 7

  With some colorfully worded urging from Ben, the medical examiner finally agreed to check the body for latent fingerprints. Still, neither she, nor Detective Deckert, seemed inclined to believe my claim about the glove, and I couldn’t really blame them. I could provide no evidence to back up my statement, and they really had no idea who I was. I often thought that life would be much easier if I could just say, “Hey, I’m a card carrying Witch, see?” and show an ID badge. Of course, that would only work if the rest of the world were disposed to saying, “Oh, well, why didn’t you say that in the first place?”

  We spent a few additional minutes looking over the interior of the restroom, and I took several more pictures, including some of the body, shot in haste to avoid another bout of vomiting. Deckert pointed out the remains of Karen Barnes’ Jack Russell terrier heaped in a corner. The animal’s skull was crushed, apparently from having been repeatedly dashed against the cinder block wall. Grossly violent yet still a much more merciful death than faced by its owner. Dr. Sanders bagged the remains of the dog at Ben’s request, and then we followed her back out into the stormy night. Detective Deckert and I tagged along behind as Ben drew up next to her.

  “What are the chances of getting’ some preliminaries back tonight, Doc?” Ben asked.

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “No,” he answered bluntly. “Did I sound particularly funny to you?”

  The rain had slowed momentarily, but the earlier downpour had flooded the low-lying sidewalk. The wheels on the gurney containing Karen Barnes’ body made sadly mournful swishing noises as they rolled through the puddles.

  “Who’s going to authorize this?” Dr. Sanders stopped in her tracks and stared angrily back at Ben. “Remember, I’m only here in a consulting capacity.”

  “Look,” Ben softened, “I’m sorry about the wisecrack. It’s been a long day, and right now I’m not seein’ the end of it.”

  “I know,” she answered, calming. “Same here.”

  “Listen, no offense,” he addressed the county coroner. “But do you have any problem with allowin’ Doctor Sanders here do the autopsy?”

  “None taken. It’s unusual,” he answered with a weary nod. “But it’s okay with me. I don’t suppose it would be a problem with the right paperwork.”

  “Submit whatever ya’ need, and I’ll sign off on it,” he told him with a tired smile.

  “Where can I reach you?” Doctor Sanders queried.

  “Right now I’m not sure where I’ll be. You can try to catch me at my office, and if you don’t get an answer then beep me. The number’s on my card.”

  “Okay.”

  Deckert and I
had stopped behind them and allowed Ben to do the talking. We stood in the light rain and watched as Doctor Sanders and the county official loaded what was once a living, breathing human being into the back of the coroner’s hearse. The hatch-like door slammed shut with a dull finality as if audibly marking the end of Karen Barnes’ existence.

  Farther in the distance, across the parking lot and behind the police barricades, a small city had grown. Microwave dishes and retractable towers were pointed skyward, extending from the roofs of numerous news vans. Bright lights shined surrealistically through the night, igniting the falling raindrops into fleeting fiery gems. Primped, pressed, and preened reporters staunchly clutching umbrellas faced cameramen and rehearsed their expressions of concern.

  “Fuckin’ vultures,” Ben muttered.

  He and Detective Deckert traded cards and set up a meeting time for the following morning, as they were both assigned to the Major Case Squad. We shook hands and parted, leaving Deckert to wrap up everything at the scene while Ben was to go get the ball rolling with the rest of the MCS. We had barely made it halfway to the van before we were ambushed.

  “Detective Storm, Detective Storm, can I have a word with you.”

  A lithe, young beauty in a neatly fitted trench coat and high heels was sauntering quickly toward us. Her hair was fashionably coiffed and honey blonde, the exact shade of which I was certain could only be available from a bottle. The cameraman behind her suddenly switched on an intense spotlight and bathed us with its harsh glow. As we squinted against the glare, the woman stopped before us, effectively blocking our path.

  “I’m here on the scene with Detective Benjamin Storm of the Saint Louis City homicide unit. Detective Storm, does the fact that you’re here mean that the Major Case Squad has been called in?” she spoke rapidly into a microphone and then thrust it forward into Ben’s face.

  “Go away Brandee,” Ben told her. “I’m not in the mood for this right now.”

  Ben started around her, but she quickly sidestepped, her high heels clicking on the pavement.

  “Is it true that this homicide is related to Wednesday evening’s murder of Ariel Tanner?” Again, the microphone bearing the stylized logo of her station shot forward.

  “Talk to the public relations officer,” Ben returned flatly.

  “And you sir, your name is?” She shoved the microphone toward me.

  Before I could get “no comment” past my lips, Ben reached out and removed the microphone easily from her dainty hand. With a quick snap, he disconnected the line cord and handed the device back to her.

  She looked at him, dumbfounded for a moment, then angrily stamped her foot as her luminous, blue eyes grew large, clearly revealing an empty void behind them.

  “I said,” Ben, told her, as he brushed past, “go away Brandee.”

  We heard her wheel about as we continued across the lot to the van. She let out a frustrated shriek that was rapidly followed by the sound of the disconnected microphone as it roughly impacted the pavement near us and skittered by.

  “I’m going to get this story, Storm!” she screamed after us. “You’re not doing this to me again!”

  By the time we climbed into the van, Brandee Street was berating her stony-faced cameraman, her arms flailing wildly as he simply stared at her.

  “What’d she mean ‘you’re not doing this to me again’?” I asked Ben as he started the van. “And what the hell is she chewin’ his ass for?”

  “Brandee Street has never, I repeat, NEVER gotten a story from me,” he answered, pulling his plastic poncho over his head. “As for ol’ Ed out there, she probably just caught him addin’ to his collection.”

  “His collection?” I puzzled, removing my own rain slicker. “You know that guy?”

  “Hell yes, all the coppers know Ed. He’s been a cameraman for years. As to the collection, he tapes reporters when they throw temper tantrums. He’s got a whole library of ‘em... calls hers ‘Brandee Whines’.”

  “Seems like they would try to get him fired.”

  “Oh, they have,” Ben, continued. “Ed’s got a couple of things goin’ for him though. First, he’s the best cameraman in the state. Second, a real good union.”

  “Bet that pisses them off,” I mused.

  “Uh-huh. Drives ‘em nuts. I’ll have ta’ give you a call next time Ed wants to get together for some beers and ‘movies’.”

  “Count me in.”

  We pulled out of the parking space in silence. The windshield wipers tapped out an irregular swooshing tempo as they displaced the rain, only to have it return a second later. We slowly started past the news vans, enduring the bright lights that were quickly brought to bear on us. I was sure that Ben felt some extra heat coming from the savage glare Brandee Street was throwing at him as we hooked around her vehicle.

  “So,” Ben said as he nudged the van along, exiting the small city of reporters. “You went off into ‘la la land’ there for a minute.” He shot me a quick glance then returned his eyes to the road. “That where you got that whole glove thing from?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “That’s what I saw him do. I don’t know if it will do any good or not. He didn’t take the glove off until just before he pulled her heart out.”

  “Shouldn’t that have caused you some damage or somethin’?” he queried. “You know, like Felicity was talkin’ about this afternoon.”

  “If I had experienced it directly,” I explained. “Like I did with Ariel. This wasn’t the same. I didn’t get pulled into the experience. It was like I was just a spectator.”

  “So you didn’t feel anything this time?”

  “Well, yeah, I felt some of the pain. Just not directly.”

  We continued along quietly for a moment or two, winding along the park access road and out to the main street.

  “Did ya’ see his face?” Ben asked.

  “No,” I answered. “I wish I had. I’ve never witnessed a past event like that before, and it came on me all of a sudden. I think when I got sick I let my guard down, and that’s why it happened. How long was I blanked out anyway?”

  “Around a minute, maybe two,” Ben told me. “Deckert thought ya’ were gonna puke again.” He paused for a moment and merged with the main street traffic. “Did ya’ see anything besides the glove thing?”

  “Ariel’s athamè,” I told him. “He used it again.” I hesitated. “A lot of fear... A lot of pain... She was trying to recite the Lord’s Prayer to herself when the bastard pulled her heart out.”

  We rode the rest of the way to my house in silence. The storm was dying out now, and the rain had tapered to a gentle, patchy sprinkle as the tail end of the system moved through the area.

  “I don’t know what’s gonna hit the news tomorrow, Rowan,” Ben spoke as he came to a halt in my driveway. “But for now, this whole thing stays with us. You can tell Felicity, but I don’t want those kids in there babblin’ all over creation if ya’ know what I mean.”

  “Yes,” I answered, “I know exactly what you mean.”

  “Do you think you can meet with the MCS tomorrow?” he queried.

  “What for?”

  “I’d like you ta’ fill them in on the symbol and inscription,” he explained. “Along with some of the ideas you had tonight. I think it might give us some places to start.”

  “Are you sure?” I asked, mulling over the implications. “I’m not some kind of ‘FBI shrink’ like Detective Deckert said.”

  “I know, but you’re the closest thing we’ve got to an expert,” Ben answered. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  “Okay. Just say when.”

  “I’ll call you in the mornin’. Go get some rest. And give the squaw a hug for me.”

  I watched as Ben backed out of the drive. The handset of his cell phone was pressed to his ear. Even at a distance, I could see his mouth moving rapidly and a sad look in his eyes. I knew then that he was talking to Allison—telling her yet again not to wait up for him.

  “We saw you
on the news.”

  I heard my wife’s voice behind me and turned to face her. She had come out on the porch where I was standing.

  “Did they get my good side?” I joked half-heartedly and then gave her a tired peck on the cheek.

  “The cheek?” she pouted. “Don’t you love me anymore?”

  “Considering the gastric event I experienced, until I brush my teeth and get a swig of mouthwash...” I trailed off.

  “It was bad, huh?” she asked, instantly understanding.

  “Worse than Ariel,” I told her. “But I can’t tell you about it until we’re alone.”

  “I understand.”

  We went into the house, and I headed directly for the bathroom where I could make myself a bit more presentable. When I returned to the dining room, the entire group was seated around the table talking. They were in a much more relaxed mood than before I left.

  “So what happened?” R.J. immediately asked as I sat down.

  “I can’t tell you much,” I answered, pouring myself a glass of tea. “Suffice it to say, there was another murder.”

  “Well,” Cally intoned. “Was it the same killer or what?”

  “We think so,” I replied.

  “We saw you on the news, Mr. Gant…” Shari stated.

  “…But just from a distance,” Jennifer continued.

  “Rowan. Please.” I nodded, remembering the glaring lights and sea of reporters at the scene. “So, what did they say?”

  “They’re calling him the Satanic Serial Killer,” Randy intoned. “They said he killed this woman the same way he killed Ariel. Is that true?”

  “I wish I could tell you guys,” I answered, “but I can’t. If the police are going to be able to trust me to help them with the investigation, then I have to follow their rules.”

  There was some grumbling, but with Cally’s prodding, they all grudgingly agreed. She was a strong young woman and level headed for the most part. With a little further training in The Craft, I felt certain she would be able to pick up with the coven where Ariel had been prematurely forced to leave off.