DF02 - Dead Guilty

by Beverly Connor

‘‘I think I’d better go home. See you tomorrow.’’

  It was well after ten o’clock before Diane got home. She was tired and couldn’t wait for a shower. After letting the water run over her for a long while, she ran a warm bath, put a capful of lemon juice in the water and just lay and soaked with her head resting on a folded towel on the back of the tub. She was tempted to stay the night there, just soaking in the water, letting the smell of death become overwhelmed with clean pure water. She would have stayed if her telephone had remained quiet.

  Diane followed the directions to a small house in a clump of trees about a half mile from the Bartram University campus. The house, a bungalow with white wood siding and fieldstone columns and steps, looked like it might have been built in the late 1920s.

  She parked her car on the side of the road and walked across the yard. She looked briefly up at the second-floor gabled window and leaning rock chimney. It looked like housing rented to students. Maintained enough to keep the roof up, but not enough to rent to anyone looking for a family home.

  She showed her badge to the officer guarding the door, slipped covers over her shoes and went in.

  A girl was sitting on a futon sofa in the living room, sobbing. The room was in disarray, drawers pulled out of a desk, their contents emptied onto the floor, couch pillows scattered about, chairs overturned.

  Douglas Garnett, chief of detectives of Rosewood, and Whit Abercrombie, county coroner, were standing at the entrance to a room off the living room. Whit was Lynn Webber’s counterpart, but he wasn’t a medi cal examiner. He was a taxidermist with a master’s in biology. They nodded to Diane.

  Chief Garnett was a large, lanky man in his midfor ties with a full head of salt-and-pepper well-kept hair. He had a deep crease between his abundant blackand-gray eyebrows.

  ‘‘In here,’’ he said.

  The body was on its knees, leaning forward against a rope around the neck and tied to the clothes rod in the closet. The closet door stood open, and the fulllength mirror showed a side image of the gruesome scene. Diane looked at the purple swollen face with its dead stare and protruding tongue. Even with the distortion of death, she recognized the face.

  ‘‘Oh, my God,’’ she whispered.

  Chapter 9

  ‘‘You know this kid?’’ Garnett asked.

  ‘‘I know who he is.’’ Diane shivered—not from the

  gruesome scene—the room was cold. She tore her

  gaze away from the dead face and looked at Chief

  Garnett.

  ‘‘It’s Chris Edwards. He’s one of the two men—the

  timber cruisers—who discovered the bodies hanging

  in the woods.’’

  She looked around the bedroom, the single bed with

  its sheets pulled away, the chest of drawers open with

  its contents spilled out over the sides and onto the

  floor. A bloody hand weight lay in the middle of the

  bed.

  ‘‘We need to contact the other man who was with

  him.’’

  Chief Garnett moved to the living room and di

  rected his attention to the woman sobbing on the

  couch.

  ‘‘Miss... Beck, Kacie Beck?’’

  She pushed her blond hair out of her face and

  rubbed her red-rimmed eyes with the tips of her

  fingers.

  ‘‘Miss Beck,’’ said Garnett, ‘‘do you know . . .’’ He

  turned to Diane.

  ‘‘Steven Mayberry,’’ supplied Diane.

  ‘‘Steve?... Yes.’’

  ‘‘Where does he live?’’

  ‘‘Over on Udell. He has a trailer over there.’’ ‘‘Do you have his telephone number?’’

  ‘‘Telephone number? No . . . Chris knows it.’’ She

  started sobbing again.

  Garnett pressed a rapid-dial number on his cell

  phone. ‘‘Steven Mayberry, did you say?’’

  Diane nodded. She motioned to Whit as Garnett

  called for the address.

  ‘‘We need to get Miss Beck out of the crime scene.

  She can sit in my car until Garnett questions her. I’ll

  call my team to start working this. . . . And I’ll need

  a warrant.’’

  ‘‘Garnett has one coming.’’ Whit pushed his straight

  black hair from his forehead as he glanced back at

  the bedroom. ‘‘You think this is connected with your

  other case?’’

  ‘‘I don’t know. If not, it’s an amazing coincidence.’’ Whit was escorting Kacie out of the house when

  Garnett got off the phone.

  ‘‘Got an address. I called for backup to meet us

  there.’’

  Outside, Diane slipped off the shoe covers and

  rang David.

  ‘‘Yeah?’’

  David obviously had been asleep, as Diane wished

  she was.

  ‘‘David, Diane. I need you again tonight.’’ ‘‘Gee, Diane, if I’d known you’re this demanding,

  I’d have gotten myself a woman with less energy.

  What’s up?’’

  Diane explained, and he was quiet for a moment. ‘‘Can’t be a coincidence.’’

  ‘‘I’ll call Jin. You’ll have to wait for a warrant be

  fore you can go in.’’

  ‘‘Sure.’’

  A young woman answered Jin’s phone. ‘‘Just a

  minute.’’

  Her voice sounded sleepy, and Diane heard the rus

  tling of covers as she waited for Jin to get on the

  phone.

  ‘‘Yo?’’

  ‘‘Jin, this is Diane. We have another crime scene. I

  need you and David to work it tonight.’’ She gave him

  the address. ‘‘I’m sorry to do this to you.’’

  ‘‘No problem.’’ Jin sounded wide awake. Diane turned to the chief. ‘‘I’d like to ride out to

  the Mayberry house.’’

  He gave her a curt nod, and she climbed into his

  Lexus and buckled herself in.

  ‘‘These murders . . .’’ Garnett paused a moment.

  ‘‘It’s going to be a test of our new crime scene unit.

  I don’t need to tell you how important it is to get

  it right.’’

  Several ways of answering him flitted through Diane’s

  mind. Sarcastic was right up front, considering that it

  was he and the mayor who had virtually blackmailed

  her into housing the new crime lab and heading it up.

  But when she opened her mouth, it was her good friend

  Gregory’s wisdom that tempered her tongue. ‘‘It’s a good unit with good people. We’ll find all

  the evidence that’s there to find.’’

  That seemed to satisfy him. He said nothing for the

  remainder of the trip. Instead, he tapped the steering

  wheel with his fingers as he drove. Diane was glad it

  wasn’t a long ride.

  As they rounded a corner and turned into a drive

  leading to the trailer park, Diane saw a police car

  parked out front. The single trailer was lit, revealing

  silhouettes of two uniformed officers moving through

  the length of it.

  As Diane and the sheriff stepped out of the car, the

  two uniforms emerged. One was Janice Warrick. Good thing her eyes aren’t phasers, thought Diane as

  they came face-to-face. Warrick held her chin high and

  jaw clenched and addressed the chief of detectives. ‘‘He’s not here.’’

  ‘‘How’s it look inside?’’

  ‘‘A mess,’’ said Janice Warrick. ‘‘Chairs overturned,

  drawers pulled out and emptied. We’re looking for

  Mayberry now. Officer Wallace is calling his pa
rents

  and friends, and we have an APB out for his car.’’ ‘‘Did you see any blood, drug paraphernalia...?’’

  Garnett asked.

  Janice shook her head. ‘‘Nothing but the mess. We

  only did a casual look through. That’s all we could

  do.’’ Her eyes darted in Diane’s direction and back

  to Garnett.

  ‘‘Stay here and see if he shows up. We need to

  find him,’’ said Garnett. He turned to step back into

  his car.

  There was nothing for Diane to do but go back to

  the crime scene. With three people working, perhaps

  it wouldn’t take the entire night.

  ‘‘Sorry, guys,’’ Diane said to her crew.

  ‘‘No problem. Who needs sleep?’’ said David. The warrant had arrived in her absence, and Jin and

  David, clad in head and shoe coverings, had already started. David was photographing the body, and Jin had begun a fingerprint search, starting at the front entryway and following a path to the bedroom. Whit stood just outside the bedroom door watching David. Garnett stopped beside the body. Whit wore gloves and shoe coverings. Garnett did not.

  On the porch, Diane had donned a hair cap and fresh shoe coverings. Now she slipped on a pair of gloves and examined the knots in the rope that bound and strangled Chris Edwards. Of particular interest was the knot tied in the middle of the rope between the clothes bar and Chris Edwards.

  ‘‘Get good photographs of the knots.’’

  ‘‘Of course,’’ said David.

  ‘‘What about the knots?’’ Garnett stepped up be

  hind her.

  Diane wondered if he had decided to take the lead in the investigation. Janice Warrick hadn’t yet been replaced, and Garnett had stated to the press when he accepted the appointment as chief that he was going to take a hands-on approach.

  She handed him a pair of latex gloves and covers for his shoes. He looked at them quizzically for a moment before he slipped them on.

  ‘‘The rope and knots are different from the ones used with the other victims,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘That’s significant?’’

  ‘‘It is indeed.’’

  ‘‘Diane is an expert in knots,’’ offered David, snap ping another photograph. ‘‘In that she has had to hang from them herself on many occasions.’’

  David was good at keeping conversational tones, treating people like Garnett as if he was one of the team and not an adversary—which was the way Diane saw him.

  ‘‘Uh, you’ll have to explain that,’’ said Garnett. He gave Diane a sidelong glance.

  ‘‘I’m a caver,’’ she said. ‘‘I work on rope a lot.’’ Diane sniffed the corpse’s hair. ‘‘Shampoo. He’d just come out of the shower. I take it Miss Beck found the body. Why so late?’’

  ‘‘She just got off work,’’ said Garnett.

  Diane studied the body. Chris Edwards was clad only in briefs, and there were bruises on his face, ab domen and arms. Despite the discoloration of his face resulting from the strangulation, bruises were still evi dent on his right temple and the right side of his jaw, as well as his arms. Dried blood was caked on his nose, down around his mouth and in his hair. He had put up a fight.

  ‘‘He looks like he was kicked.’’ Garnett pointed out the bruising on his side.

  ‘‘It looks like it,’’ Diane agreed. ‘‘Who’s going to get the body?’’

  ‘‘Rankin. He’s our medical examiner. You thinking maybe he should go to Webber because of the connec tion to the other victims?’’

  Yes, she wanted Webber to do it. If the cases were related, it would be better if one examiner did them all.

  ‘‘I think it would be a good idea.’’ When the words were out of her mouth, she wondered if she sounded too curt.

  Garnett thought for a moment. ‘‘Webber would make sense, especially if this turns out to be truly connected to the others. However, we don’t need to offend Rankin.’’

  Diane could see that Garnett was going to make a political decision, and started to say something, but Whit beat her to it.

  ‘‘We’ll send them to Dr. Webber.’’

  Garnett looked sharply at Whit Abercrombie, as if forgetting for a moment that it was Whit who had the power to make that decision. Whit’s black eyes spar kled as he returned Garnett’s gaze, and his teeth gleamed against the border of his short black beard.

  ‘‘I’ll talk to Rankin,’’ Whit said. ‘‘I’m sure he won’t mind.’’

  Garnett nodded. ‘‘If you have everything under con trol here, I need to see about finding Mr. Mayberry.’’

  Diane was glad to see him go. He might be the lead detective, but his presence was like a guest who ar rived uninvited for a dinner party and you didn’t quite know where to put him.

  ‘‘How did you get mixed up with the Rosewood police?’’ Whit asked when Chief Garnett was safely away. ‘‘Last time I heard, you weren’t on their Christ mas card list.’’

  Diane explained the complicated scenario.

  ‘‘So you got blackmailed into it, and Rosewood got free space for a crime lab.’’

  ‘‘That’s about the size of it. I have to admit, I rather like it. But I can’t tell the mayor or the chief of detec tives that.’’

  Whit laughed. ‘‘I understand. It’s like, ‘Please, Brer Fox, don’t throw me in that briar patch.’ ’’

  ‘‘Thanks for making the call on Lynn Webber.’’

  ‘‘It makes sense,’’ said Whit. ‘‘Rankin won’t mind. He’s not as political as the people around him.’’

  Lynn Webber arrived with the medical technicians to transport Chris Edwards’ body to the morgue. Diane asked the technicians to wait on the porch while Lynn examined the body and Diane and Jin finished processing a path to the door.

  One of the technicians, a white man about twentyfive with brown receding hair and dark blue eyes, asked if it was all right to sit down on one of the porch chairs.

  ‘‘It’s been dusted,’’ Jin yelled from the living room. ‘‘Might get powder on you.’’

  The other, a black man of about thirty, told him he’d best remain standing. ‘‘No telling what you might sit on at a crime scene.’’ The two of them talked to each other about football while they waited.

  Lynn twisted the neck and jaw of the corpse, and then moved his arms as far as the rope would allow. ‘‘Whit tells me I have you to thank for this.’’

  ‘‘I hope you don’t mind. They may be related.’’

  ‘‘This looks different from those in the woods,’’ said Lynn.

  ‘‘But this is one of the men who found the victims in the woods.’’

  Lynn looked up at Diane sharply. ‘‘What’s going on?’’

  ‘‘I don’t know.’’

  Lynn shook her head, pushed her thermometer into Chris Edwards’ liver and looked at her watch. ‘‘Ninety-four point five. Rigor’s . . .’’ Lynn looked around the room. ‘‘Who’s the detective on the case?’’

  ‘‘Chief Garnett’s taking the lead,’’ said Diane. ‘‘This guy’s partner, Steven Mayberry, is missing—the one who was with him in the woods when they found the bodies.’’

  Lynn’s frown deepened. ‘‘This just gets worse. Any idea what this is all about?’’

  ‘‘Maybe we’ll find out when Mr. Mayberry is found.’’

  Dr. Webber stood up. ‘‘At a one-and-a-half-degree drop an hour, it’s possible he died two and a half hours ago. He’s already into rigor. That’s a little early, but it looks like he put up a fight and that would hasten it.’’

  ‘‘His girlfriend put the call in about two and a half hours ago,’’ said Whit. He was standing back from the body, watching Dr. Webber examine it.

  ‘‘I suppose Chief Garnett needs to talk with her,’’ said Dr. Webber. ‘‘I’m done here.’’

  She turned to Diane. ‘‘Raymond has one skeleton for you. Blue Doe. He’s delive
ring it today. He’ll have Red and Green done shortly.’’

  ‘‘Good. Perhaps we can find out who they were.’’ Diane pulled out a coil of orange string to tie off the rope for cutting.

  ‘‘If this keeps up,’’ said Lynn, ‘‘you’re going to run out of colors.’’

  Chapter 10

  ‘‘Looks like autoerotic asphyxia,’’ said the black tech nician when he saw the body. ‘‘I had one about six months ago. Just a kid.’’

  Jin stopped an examination of the chest of drawers and walked over. ‘‘Most instances of autoerotic as phyxia are adolescents,’’ he said. ‘‘This doesn’t look like it. Wouldn’t you say, Boss?’’

  ‘‘I think we don’t need to speculate,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘His hands are tied awful tight,’’ said the other assistant.

  ‘‘Maybe he had help,’’ his partner suggested. ‘‘The rope is tight around the front where he’s leaning into it, but there’s a lot of give in the back.’’ They held the body while Diane tied off the yellow polypropyl ene rope with orange string and cut it.

  ‘‘He sure looks trussed up around the neck like that kid. The kid’s mother moved all the porn he had in the room,’’ the technician continued. He looked around the bedroom. ‘‘Friends and family will do that, you know.’’ The technician didn’t want to give up his diagnosis.

  ‘‘Let’s get this poor boy out of here,’’ said Lynn Webber. She stripped off her gloves as the technicians placed the remains of Chris Edwards in the body bag. ‘‘Be careful of the ropes,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘Will do.’’ The black man smiled at Diane. ‘‘Pete and I always give our guest a good ride. Don’t we, Pete?’’

  ‘‘You bet. We’ve never had any complaints.’’ The two of them laughed.

  Lynn left, telling Diane she wouldn’t be getting to the autopsy until the afternoon, so Diane could come then and retrieve the ropes.

  Whit stayed until the body was removed and Lynn was gone. Diane walked him to the door.

  ‘‘I had a talk with his girlfriend before letting her go home,’’ said Whit, leaning close to Diane and speaking low, though only she and her crew were in the house.

  ‘‘She said there’s usually a key under the mat. It was on the desk when she got here. I asked her if anything was missing that she could see. She said she thought his laptop was gone. He usually keeps it on the desk along with a DVD player.’’