The Hooker, the Handyman and What the Parrot Saw

by Patricia Harman

  “Dora!” the woman cried as a ratty little terrier bebopped out of the back yard and into her arms.

  Finally, a cruiser arrived and she handed the hysterical woman and rat-dog off to the officer and returned to Jake. He started for the back door, but Charlie grabbed his arm. “We have more backup units coming, wait.” He glared at her, but waited. As the sun continued to rise, the scene became more and more horrifying. Daniel Silver’s body floated in the red pool water. His head was wrapped in plastic wrap and a large gutted Doberman floated a few feet away with blood still oozing from its sliced abdomen. The writing on the fence . . . clearly not paint.

  I DID IT FOR YOU.

  Charlie felt the blood draining from her face as she sat crouched next to Jake and the patrol units set up at the front of the house. Jake kept his eye on the back door but reached behind him and reassuringly gave her hand a squeeze. She nodded to the patrol sergeant and she and Jake made entry through the unlocked rear sliding door while the patrol units covered the front.

  The inside of the house was a horror show and reeked of blood and chemicals. Charlie’s stomach objected, almost to the point of upheaval. Once the house had been cleared, Jake and Charlie returned to the SUV where Clint and the captain, who had arrived at the scene, were now waiting with looks of both concern and…what? Something else.

  “You two okay?” the captain asked. Clint draped a protective arm around Charlie’s shoulder, drawing a glare from Jake.

  “Is this where you two were set up?” the captain said as he stood next to the Fed Mobile.

  “Yes, Sir,” Charlie answered.

  “It’s a good spot,” the captain said and nodded.

  “How long do you think he’s been dead?”

  Charlie shook her head, “I don’t know, Cap. It looked like he’d been there a while.”

  “Do you think it happened before you got here last night?” the captain pressed.

  “No,” Jake jumped in. “We were here when he got home last night. Our last log entry was at twenty-two-hundred, when he arrived home alone. Nothing after that.”

  The captain rolled this information over in his mind. “I don’t know why you didn’t hear anything though.”

  “You will know once you see the crime scene, Captain,” Jake said quickly, trying to disrupt the captain’s thought pattern. “It looks like everything happened inside the house before the bodies were disposed of in the pool.”

  “Bodies? As in more than one?” the captain asked with alarm.

  “One is a dog,” Clint said absent-mindedly. Jake shot him a look, which Clint ignored. Charlie shook off her fatigue and shock, and filled in the captain and Clint about the screaming woman and the message on the back of the fence. Clint became visibly uncomfortable as Charlie explained what was written there, and the blood that was used to write it. Clint knew the message was for Charlie. He knew that Charlie knew the message was for her, but he didn’t want anyone to say it out loud. No one did.

  “Any ideas, Charlie?” the captain asked.

  “How the hell would she know what it means?” Clint snapped protectively. The captain fired a warning look at him, ignored his outburst and made a mental note to chew his ass out later.

  “You worked the Daniel Silver case, Charlie. Can you connect any of the dots?”

  “I can’t, Cap,” she said quietly.

  “The Count has arrived,” announced Clint, trying to change the subject and motioning toward the Crime Scene van. The captain gave Charlie a quick paternal hug and a pat on the back. “You two can call it a night. A day. You can write up your statements tomorrow. Clint will take primary.” Clint nodded in agreement.

  “You want me to drive you home Charlie?” Clint offered.

  “What? No, Clint. You’ve got point on this.”

  Jake glared at Clint. The captain saw what was happening and stepped in. “Okay, okay, we’re all a little stressed. You two get out of here. Come in tomorrow and get your reports done. Clint will call you if he has any questions that can’t wait so keep your phones on, okay?” Charlie agreed and Jake nodded toward the SUV and started walking, hoping Charlie would follow. He needed to get her away from Clint.

  Chapter 20

  Breathe, Sarge

  Clint couldn’t help himself. “Hey Count. Better double up your booties. It’s nasty inside.”

  Grecko ignored Clint as he walked past him. A good CSI prefers to not know the facts of a crime scene and let the evidence speak for itself. If he listened to what Clint had to say, he might be influenced despite his best efforts, so he kept walking to the front of the house and waved his hand acknowledging Clint’s comment. He had been apprised by dispatch that the bodies were in the backyard pool. Meticulously, room by room, Grecko documented with photos. All of the rooms appeared undisturbed. That’s always hard to tell in a house you are unfamiliar with but bad housekeeping helps. Dust is a great tool for investigators.

  Watching his footing, Grecko turned the corner of the foyer hallway leading to the kitchen and family room. He swallowed hard. Some things, you’re not supposed to get used to.

  Getting closer to the end of the trail of blood he followed, his nose inhaled that familiar odor . . . bleach. A CSI’s worst nightmare. He straddled the trail until he reached the master bedroom. In all his years of working crime scenes this was one of the worst scenes he had processed. The wall nearest the headboard and the headboard itself were covered in blood and smeared. The bleach, he used the bleach to clean up, thought Grecko. Thrown on the floor adjacent to the closet were sheets balled up, red and wet with bleach.

  Once Grecko was finished with his cursory he knew exactly what he needed to process this crime scene . . . time and lots of it. The interior of the house could wait. The priority needed to be placed on the backyard and pool. He knew that if the bodies stayed in the pool water much longer, there was a good chance evidence would be lost. The water in the pool would need to be drained. The sliding glass door was open with the blood trail going over the top of the threshold, across the concrete patio, and coming to an end at the pool.

  Floating face down in the red pool water was a white male in his boxer shorts, no shirt, and plastic wrap surrounding his head. The dog, a Doberman Pincher, was floating next to the victim. “Jesus Christ, the dog too . . . what a sadist.” The dog’s head was wrapped in plastic just like its owner. The dog looked like he had been butchered. On the fence scrawled in blood was a message . . . I DID IT FOR YOU.

  “Charlie,” Grecko whispered, and felt himself getting unsteady.

  Distracted as he was, Grecko carried on. He made the call himself since he was going to have to convince the M.E. to let him pull the body out of the water. Forensic evidence was disappearing in the water with every passing minute. Clint was standing outside of the gated fence when he heard a bellow from within the perimeter. “Hey Clint I need some muscle in here.”

  “Is the CSI asking for assistance from me? Well, well, well let me go grab my ice skates.” Clint walked into the backyard. As he entered through the gate he could not help but to again notice I DID IT FOR YOU written in blood. Clint’s mind was racing. Was the killer taunting Charlie or the police in general?

  “So, just what do you need my help with?”

  Grecko was laying out two body bags and lining each with clean white sheets. Clint’s eyes shifted back and forth. “Oh no, if you think I’m going to help you get those floaters out of the water you’re mistaken.”

  “Come on Clint. How about backing it up and getting over here. I’ll do the icky part so you won’t need to dirty your pretty little hands.”

  Clint walked over to the pool and looked at the floaters, wrinkling his nose in disdain. “We have to wait till the medical investigator gets here.”

  “We can’t. Exigent circumstances. We’re losing evidence every second they are left in the pool. Just put on a cou
ple pairs of gloves. See Mr. Boxer Shorts?”

  “Yeah, what about him?”

  “I’m going to take the pool catcher and pull him closer to the edge. While I pull him on to the patio I want you to slide the sheet under him. Then we’ll carry the sheet and him into the body bag. Got it?”

  “Yeah, I’m not a moron.” Grecko had a grin on his face thinking what he truly thought about Clint . . . moron.

  The two men struggled with Boxer Shorts but managed to get him and his dog out and into separate body bags. Grecko could now see the dog’s chest and belly had been sliced open but the organs were still there. Daniel Silver was the same. His chest was sliced open. His organs, intact.

  Clint heard a ‘hello’ coming from the other side of the fence. It was the medical investigator. Grecko yelled, “Come on in. By the pool.”

  “Bagged and tagged?”

  “Yep, and all yours. We’ll be lucky to find any usable evidence thanks to the water.”

  “What do you think is with the plastic?”

  Rogers shrugged and said, “Lots to talk about at the next medical examiners’ conference.”

  “Autopsy today?” Grecko asked.

  Rogers sighed.

  Grecko pushed, “This is our fourth victim and there is a good chance more victims are in our forecast since we are dealing with a serial killer.”

  “I know. I’ll see what I can do. I’m still working up and writing the report from our last guy.”

  Grecko decided it was time to focus on the interior crime scene. Evidence never lies; people do, evidence doesn’t. Follow the evidence. He needed to stop this for Charlie. He wanted to be the one to put an end to it. For her. He would do it for her.

  “Breathe, Sarge,” Jake ordered when they settled into the SUV, leaving Clint and Grecko to their work.

  “I’m okay. Just tired. Confused. Jesus Jake, it happened while we were sitting here.”

  “Yeah,” he said quietly and then turned up the radio to end the conversation.

  “I’m coming upstairs,” Jake said as he pulled into a parking space in front of Charlie’s apartment. She didn’t even pretend to object.

  Once they were inside the apartment, she asked him if he wanted a beer, which he refused. “You need some sleep, Charlie,” he motioned to the couch. “I’ll just hang out here.”

  “Hi Brown Eyes,” Moses greeted them. They both ignored the happy bird.

  “Do you think he knew we were out there?”

  “Silver? I doubt it.”

  “No, not Silver,” she said, irritated. “The suspect. The killer!”

  “We’re not going to talk about this now, Charlotte. We’re too punchy. Now go to bed.”

  Their eyes locked and she had to force herself to look away so she could make her feet move toward the bedroom. She quickly stripped off her clothes and took a hot shower. In minutes she was under the covers and fast asleep. Jake was out cold as soon as he knew she was asleep. He didn’t know how he knew she was asleep, but he knew. He sensed it. His last thought before he drifted off was whether or not he had thrown the dead bolt on the door, but he found himself unable to fight his way back out to check it. Jake and Charlie slept the sleep of the entombed in separate rooms; unconscious in their exhaustion.

  Hours later he arrived. He crept through the apartment like a panther. Without making a sound, he quietly opened the door to Charlie’s room. For a moment he thought she was gone. She was barely audible as she slept and barely visible in the mound of blankets. He shouldn’t do this. He didn’t want to do it but it was out of his control and the thought brought him to a shiver. Out of his control. He instinctively looked behind him. Watch your six. He took very slow deliberate steps as he moved toward her. His eyes finally adjusted in the dark room and he could finally make out her face. She looked like an angel and slept like a child but that was where the innocence ended. A burning feeling heated up inside his gut. Inside his balls. No. This is what he did not want. Everything he did, he did to avoid this feeling. Suddenly, desire turned to anger. She would not do this to him. He would not allow her to do it to him. He was in control, not her. He reached for her, pulled the covers up around her neck, and gently tucked them all around her and left.

  Charlie sighed in her sleep and it melted him. Melted his heat, his anger, and his heart. He felt tears welling up in his eyes as he willed himself to walk away.

  How did he get here? Why did he stop? Why was he crying? Tears? He hadn’t cried since he was sixteen years old.

  Hours later Charlie woke as she did every day, with a song in her head she couldn’t place. It was a strange way to wake up and she attributed it to years of waking to her brother and his partying friends with their heavy metal music blaring into the wee hours. The room was bright and she knew she had slept a long time. She must have needed it, she thought, because she felt good, really good, until she remembered.

  Oh shit. Oh no.

  She could see the blood on the fence I DID IT FOR YOU and the body of Daniel Silver and the gutted dog floating in the red swimming pool. She started to get up but realized she couldn’t move. She was restrained—mummified in a cocoon of blankets. She fought her way out as if someone were holding her against her will. Breathless, her eyes darted around the room looking for danger but there was only sunshine. She started to reach for her laptop and then remembered Jake and bolted out of the bedroom to look for him, startling him awake as the bedroom door flew open. He was curled up on the couch, no blanket, still dressed, shoes and all.

  “Hey there,” he said with a sleepy half-smile. “You okay, Sarge?” She stared at him wide eyed, unable to answer.

  Am I okay? No. I am not okay. I haven’t been okay for a long time, she quietly confessed, but only to herself, not to him. Jake quickly got to his feet and guided her by her shoulders to the couch.

  “Sit down, Charlie,” he instructed.

  “Y-you didn’t have to stay,” she stammered. “I’m used to being on my own.”

  “I did it for you,” he said.

  Shit! The second the words were out of his mouth his stomach jumped into his throat. Charlie stared at him in shock. He knew he had screwed up and quickly changed the subject.

  “It’s a cruel trick the mind plays on you isn’t it? Mornings?” he said trying to engage her. “Mornings?” she asked, confused.

  “You know, when something bad happens and you wake up the next day and forget about it for the first few seconds after you wake up?” She nodded, understanding exactly what he meant. Charlie had felt it after her parent’s death, after Thompson’s death, and after her husband left. She knew exactly what he meant and wondered how many mornings Jake woke up like that after his parents died in the earthquake. She wondered if her ex endured the mornings she had endured for months. Many months. Did he wake up and think “How could I do this to her?” or did he just smile and think, “Thank God I am rid of her,” or “I have a new life to think about it, she no longer exists.” Charlie was forever running these scenarios through her head. Why didn’t he fight for her? But she suspected she knew the answer. She wasn’t good enough to fight for. It was easier just to accept this.

  “Did you sleep?” he asked.

  “I did. I don’t know how but somehow I did. Actually Jake,” she swallowed hard, “I think it really helped having you here. I felt . . . safe,” she said quietly, opening herself to him.

  “You were safe. Perfectly safe,” he said resolutely, “and you always will be when I am around,” he lied.

  She smiled a small smile and he reached for her face and pushed her bangs out of her eyes. Her stomach flinched at his touch and she could feel the blood rushing to her head. Then just as quickly he pulled away.

  “How about I run out and get us some coffee?” he said.

  “Coffee you twit!” Moses squawked and Jake rolled his eyes. There was a long sil
ence as they locked eyes and she wrestled with the fact that he had just pulled away from her—again. The rejection closed her throat. How much rejection was one person expected to endure in one life?

  “No, Jake you should go home,” she said, embarrassed.

  “Charlie, I want to stay,” he said with determination. “I think we should stick together.”

  Confused she innocently said, “Why?”

  His heart melted all over again. Damn this woman.

  “Because of the message?” she asked. She shook her head. “We don’t know that that was for me. It could just as easily been meant for the molestation victim.” She waved a hand and avoided Jake’s eyes. “I did it for you—could have all kinds of implications. Jeez Adams, how long have you been doing this job, ten minutes?”

  Jake tipped her chin up and forced her to look at him. “Charlie . . .” He started to speak but the sound of his voice was leaving her. Her blood was pounding in her ears making it impossible to hear what he was saying. Electricity pulsed from his fingers, through her chin and into her stomach. She looked at his lips trying to follow his words but that was making it worse. His perfect soft full lips. If we kiss, it will be my decision, not yours. Do you understand? His words echoed in her head making her body ache. She leaned into him. He drew her closer and then quickly pushed her face down into his chest.

  “Damn it, Charlie!” he scolded her while he held her tightly to him. “I’m trying to keep you safe and you are trying to distract the hell out of me. Now quit it!” he said with annoyance.

  “Nice to know I am having some effect on you.” She pulled back and dropped her head into her hands. He stood up and faced her as she sat. She could see his shoes toe-to-toe with her bare feet and she knew he was both towering over her and glaring at her but she didn’t want to look up. It shook her to her core that he could resist her so easily. Why couldn’t he feel the connection she was feeling? And who asked him to protect her anyway? Is that what this was? Pity? She was a cop for Christ’s sake! Why didn’t he . . . But before she could finish her thought she felt him gather the hair from the base of her neck in his fist and yank her head up and back.