Dead and Gone

by Tina Glasneck

  Oh, God, where am I?

  With a groan, Ella raised a hand to her throat. Searching with her fingers, she explored whatever was encircling her neck. It felt like a nylon strap, with a rectangular box attached to one side.

  A dog collar? Jesus. Get it off!

  Ella fumbled at the buckle fastener, her fingers scrabbling at the webbing. Below her chin she found what felt like a small padlock.

  Fighting panic, she sat up. A rough fabric lay beneath her. A woolen blanket, maybe. And a pillow.

  A bed?

  In addition to the throbbing in her temples, Ella’s lower back was on fire. Reaching behind her, she felt a pair of raised welts just above the line of her underwear.

  From his shocking device?

  Carefully, she eased her legs off the bed, finding the floor with her feet.

  Now what?

  A harsh light suddenly came on.

  Squinting into the glare, Ella quickly scanned her surroundings. She was on a small bed in the corner of a rectangular, windowless room. To her left and behind her, concrete walls formed three sides of the chamber. To her right, the thick metal bars of an iron door formed the fourth.

  Ella’s breath caught in her throat.

  On the other side of the bars, her abductor sat lounging in a chair, an arm’s length from her bed.

  Hairs rose on the back of her neck.

  How long had he been watching?

  “Why are you . . . why are you doing this?” Ella stammered.

  The man stared, his expression displaying nothing. Slowly, he cocked his head, as if he were inspecting an insect.

  “My parents have money,” Ella pleaded, trying to keep her voice from quavering. “I promise I won’t tell.”

  The man shifted. As if considering Ella’s proposal, he leaned forward, forming a steeple with his fingers.

  Ella had only glimpsed the man briefly during his attack. Now she regarded him carefully, hoping for an explanation. He was tall and appeared to be in his early forties. He was also strikingly handsome, with thick black hair that came to a widow’s peak in front, and a muscular, athletic torso. Despite his movie-star appearance, Ella shuddered as she looked into his eyes, seeing nothing behind them but cold, endless darkness.

  “Please,” Ella begged, suddenly close to tears. “Just . . . let me go. I won’t tell.”

  The man raised a hand. In it, he held a small device. He pressed a button.

  A tone sounded from Ella’s collar.

  Her hand went to her throat. “What was that?”

  “A warning. No more lies.”

  Ella fell silent. Unable to meet the man’s gaze, she again glanced around her prison. In the light of an industrial ceiling fixture, she noted a steel sink mounted on the back wall. A preformed plastic tub and shower stall sat beside it, a cabinet and a toilet nearby. On the ceiling, near the light, was an exhaust fan and what appeared to be a webcam. She also noticed that her bed was bolted to the floor.

  “You will bathe when your light is first turned on, and you will keep your cell clean and presentable at all times,” the man instructed, his voice devoid of even the smallest trace of compassion.

  Again regarding her captor, Ella suddenly had the impression that despite his handsome face, it was as if he were wearing a mask, a façade of mimicked human expression that hid something unspeakable beneath.

  “You will find a supply of dry food, makeup, and toiletry items in the cabinet by the sink,” the man continued. “You may occasionally receive a hot meal. Each day you will place all trash and uneaten food in a plastic bag and set it outside the bars. Near the cabinet is a composting toilet, which requires following directions on the lid. Drinking water is available at the sink. Do you understand everything so far?”

  “Please let me go,” Ella sobbed, lowering her head.

  “Do you understand?” the man repeated.

  “Yes. I . . . I understand.”

  “In addition, you will wear any garments I may provide, and you will follow any instructions I give—immediately and without question. Again, do you understand?”

  Ella nodded.

  “Out loud.”

  “I understand.”

  Raising her chin, Ella risked another look at her captor. He was sitting in a small alcove, walled off from her prison by the bars of the cell door. A portal with an archery-slit window and a deadbolt lock was set in the wall behind him. Photography lights stood nearby, along with articles of camera equipment. There was also a cabinet, similar to the one in her cell. Behind the photography lights was a chest refrigerator, with ropes and pulleys mounted above it. An industrial handcart was leaned against a nearby wall, close to a metal storage box with holes drilled in the top.

  With a shiver, Ella realized she had probably been transported in that very box.

  The man stood. “Remove your blouse and skirt.”

  Ella shook her head. “No, please . . .”

  The man scowled. Pressing a button on his device, he delivered a brutal electrical shock to Ella’s throat.

  Ella screamed, clutching at her collar.

  Though the shock lasted less than a second, it was cruelly convincing.

  “Stop,” Ella pleaded. “No more.”

  “Remove your blouse and skirt,” the man repeated.

  As Ella began undressing, the man brought his remote control close to the bars. A display on its face read, “10.”

  “It goes to a hundred,” said the man. “Don’t make me use it again.”

  Later, as she lay alone in the darkness, Ella recalled the photographic equipment she had seen outside her cell. Were it not for her initial confusion, she would have known earlier.

  Now, she did.

  She had seen news accounts of a kidnapper whom the media were calling The Magpie, and she had seen the online photos he had posted of his victims. She now knew who had taken her, and what was to be her fate.

  And with that knowledge coiling in her mind—scathing in its hideous, unalterable consequence—Ella screamed, screamed, muffling her cries with her fists, her eyes welling hot, bitter tears, her heart filled with desolation and hopelessness and abject, bottomless despair.

  4

  Autopsy

  After catching a last-minute flight home from Boise, I grabbed a cab at LAX, made a quick stop at the West L.A. station, and returned home to my house in Malibu.

  The next morning, following a few hours of sleep, I drove Catheryn’s Volvo to the Los Angeles County Coroner’s office on North Mission. Being Sunday, traffic was light most of the way in. Arriving early, I spent some time in the Volvo reviewing the case, perusing a thick, three-ringed binder known in LAPD vernacular as a murder book.

  The murder book, which against departmental regulations I had borrowed from the station the previous evening, would eventually contain all records and files pertinent to the UCLA homicide investigation—autopsy findings, field-interview summaries, detailed measurements of the dumpsite, and so on—although at the moment the only records present were Deluca’s death report, his preliminary entries in the crime report, and several photographs. Although over the course of my career I had seen more than my share of human cruelty, I found those photos difficult to view.

  Thirty minutes later I attended a Class A postmortem exam of the remains of the unidentified young woman whose nightgown-clad corpse had been found on UCLA campus—her body hung from a stand of bamboo in the Mildred E. Mathias Botanical Garden—her long, wet hair clinging to her scalp, a ritualistic application of makeup painting her face.

  The official coroner’s report, including a toxicology screen for the presence of drugs and toxins, would not be available for days, but the initial findings were consistent with a cause-of-death diagnosis of carotid obstruction and asphyxiation by strangulation, with carotid bruises on internal tissues demonstrated at autopsy. Although the hyoid bone in her throat was still intact, petechial lesions—burst capillaries on her face and the conjunctiva of her eyes indicative of str
angulation—were also noted.

  Livor mortis, a port-wine staining of the skin caused by pooling of blood in the lowest portions of a body after death, was present on the young woman’s back and buttocks. Because livor mortis becomes fixed and unchangeable within a few hours of death, the purplish markings indicated that the body had been moved postmortem and placed in a different position. From this I concluded that the Botanical Garden probably hadn’t been the murder site, merely the place where the body had been dumped.

  Additional observations by the forensic pathologist included the presence of ligature marks on the woman’s wrists and ankles. Tissue bruising indicated that these lesions had occurred premortem, as opposed to a number of postmortem injuries to the chest, legs, and forearms caused by her body having been hung with wire—again suggesting that the young woman had been murdered elsewhere.

  Other findings included a two-inch encirclement of roughened skin on the neck, a lesion not considered as having been caused by ligature, but rather by the prolonged presence of some sort of collar. Within the “collar mark,” fresh burns on one side of the throat were present, along with additional burns in various stages of healing. Puncture wounds were found on the woman’s back. I had seen similar injuries during a departmental Taser demonstration, left after the Taser’s electrical barbs were removed from an unhappy volunteer’s skin.

  Genital tearing and bruising, along with the presence of a spermicidal lubricant, indicated that the young woman had been raped premortem, but the possibility of postmortem penetration was not discounted. Because of the spermicidal gel, it was likely that the assailant had used a condom, making the presence of semen doubtful.

  In a case such as this in which rape is suspected, the coroner’s investigator had undoubtedly taken DNA swabs at the scene. Nevertheless, at my direction, a second set of swabs were procured from the victim’s mouth, vagina, and anus. Swabs were also taken from the carotid areas of the neck, in the hope the killer might have left trace DNA during the act of strangulation.

  The presence of soap under the victim’s nails and the damp condition of her hair suggested that the killer had washed her body after death, making the procurement of skin evidence—touch DNA, fibers, hairs, semen, latent fingerprints, and so on—unlikely. We ran the tests anyway.

  Although I realized we were undoubtedly duplicating efforts made at the UCLA site, because I had not been present at that time, I had additional photographs and fingerprints taken as well, along with dental radiographs to assist in identifying the body.

  The killer had been extremely careful, implying that this wasn’t his first murder. From the photos, it was also clear that he liked what he was doing, and that he possessed more than a passing knowledge of police procedures.

  Bottom line, I had a bad feeling that this was just the beginning, and it was going to get worse.

  5

  Botanical Garden

  Following the autopsy, I took the 10 Freeway back across town, unsettled by what I had learned.

  Traffic continued to be light, and twenty minutes later I turned north on the 405 Freeway, exiting via the Westwood off-ramp. Upon arriving in Westwood I planned to meet my partner, Detective Paul Deluca, at the UCLA Mildred E. Mathias Botanical Garden. Before proceeding any further with the investigation, I wanted to get Deluca’s take on the case.

  Still thinking about the autopsy, I descended onto Wilshire Boulevard and headed toward UCLA. Before arriving, however, I received an unexpected call from my daughter. Even before picking up, I knew what she wanted.

  “Please tell me you’re covering the UCLA murder,” Allison blurted, getting right to the point. Despite the rush of city noise outside the car, I could hear the excitement in her voice.

  Although my Suburban had Bluetooth capability, I had never liked using my car stereo for conversation, so instead I switched my iPhone to speaker and placed it on the dashboard. “What makes you think I’m back from Idaho?” I replied, avoiding giving her an answer.

  Allison was a newscaster for CBS2/KCAL9. She had recently moved up to an anchor position on CBS News at 6, her meteoric rise at the network mostly due to brains, talent, and perseverance. Nevertheless, at least part of her ascent up the media food chain was thanks to her ability to worm information out of her police-detective father, who would be me. When it came to my job, Allison and I had butted heads over the issue of access in the past, and more than once.

  “Grandma Dorothy told me you were back,” Ali replied, her tone indicating that I should have known.

  Catheryn’s mother, Dorothy, had driven down from Santa Barbara and been staying at our Malibu beach house for the past several weeks. Despite being a brand-new mother, Allison had returned to work shortly after giving birth, and Dorothy was helping to care for my granddaughter, Katie.

  “C’mon, Dad,” Allison begged. “Lauren says this story is going to go national,” she added, referring to the Los Angeles CBS bureau chief, Lauren Van Owen. “Talk to me.”

  “What do you want to talk about?” I asked, attempting to delay the inevitable.

  “Dad . . .”

  “Look, Ali, I just got back to town. I don’t have anything to tell you. And even if I did, I’m not in a sharing mood.”

  “Okay. I understand. But let me point out something here, in case you’ve forgotten. We worked well together on the Infidel investigation. Granted, I got a promotion, but you got something, too. Never hurts to have a friend in the media, remember?”

  “I remember,” I said, begrudging the point.

  “So I’m simply suggesting the same arrangement as before. Anything you can tell me without compromising your case will be held in strictest confidence. Then, when I have your permission to use it, I’ll attribute whatever you give me to ‘unnamed sources in the department.’ What do you say?”

  “What do I say? I say I can’t believe I raised such a pushy daughter.”

  “Runs in the family, Pop.”

  As much as I hated to admit it, Allison was right about having a friend in the media. I thought for a moment, deciding there were a few items that would undoubtedly be revealed at a press conference later that day. “Okay, maybe there are a couple things I can give you,” I said. “But they had better not come back to bite me later.”

  “Don’t worry,” Ali assured me, something in her manner reminding me of a cheetah spotting a limp. “And thanks. Like Lauren said, I have a feeling this story is going to go ballistic.”

  “It’s not a story, Ali. We’re talking about the murder of a young girl.”

  “Sorry. You know what I mean. This investigation has all the earmarks of turning into a media frenzy, and I want to get in on the ground floor.”

  “Okay,” I said. “I can tell you this: The autopsy of an unidentified woman was performed this morning at the L.A. County Coroner’s office. The preliminary cause of death will be listed as carotid obstruction and asphyxiation by strangulation. The examination results will also indicate that the victim was probably not murdered in UCLA’s Botanical Garden, but that her body was placed there at some later time.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Not at the moment. By the way, the information I just gave you will probably be revealed at a press conference later today, so feel free to use it now.”

  “I owe you, Dad.”

  “And I intend to collect.”

  “Anytime. One last question. Was there any indication that the victim had been held for some period of time before her murder?”

  “Why would you ask that?” I hedged, recalling the partially healed burns on the woman’s neck.

  “Just a long shot—trying to connect the UCLA murder with another story. Never mind. Hey, are you going to make it to dinner at the beach tonight? My hardworking husband Mike is still shooting on location, but I’m bringing Katie, and Grandma Dorothy said she’s fixing something special,” Allison coaxed. “Travis is flying home from New York today, too.”

  “First I’ve heard of it. But u
nless something comes up, I’ll be there,” I replied. “Seeing my granddaughter is always a treat. Travis, too,” I added, referring to my oldest son, who was enrolled in a music program at Juilliard. I hadn’t seen Trav in months, and I was looking forward to catching up.

  “Excellent,” said Allison. “See you there.”

  Shortly after hanging up, I arrived at the UCLA Botanical Garden, a steep canyon preserve situated on the southeast corner of campus. Its lush acres contained diverse plants and trees from around the world, along with several ponds and a stream trailing down the center. Not surprisingly, a fleet of mobile news vans were parked on the street outside, with reporters doing stand-ups in front of the garden’s south entrance. A crowd of onlookers had gathered on the sidewalk nearby, and I noticed LAPD patrolmen in their midst taking statements.

  As the garden grounds were still under investigation, yellow crime-scene tape was strung across the corner of Hilgard and Le Conte Avenues, blocking the garden gate. Upon arriving I pulled into a red zone, parking behind an LAPD cruiser. As I exited my car, I noticed Deluca’s vehicle across the street, also parked in the red.

  “Detective Kane!” shouted a reporter as I started across the pavement. “Any update on the murder?”

  At this, the rest of the pack turned my way.

  “No comment,” I replied, heading for the safety of the crime-scene tape.

  “Have you identified the victim?” another reporter called.

  I kept walking. “No comment,” I repeated.

  One of the journalists stepped in front of me, blocking my way. “C’mon, Kane, give me something,” she begged, thrusting a microphone in my face.

  “What part of ‘no comment’ didn’t you understand, Lois?” I asked, recognizing her from an earlier case.

  Although startled by being called by name, the reporter persisted. “Considering the way the body was displayed, could this be the work of The Magpie?”

  Her question was something I hadn’t considered. I knew that a serial killer whom the press had nicknamed The Magpie was currently active in the Pacific Northwest. Upon discarding the body of a victim, one of the killer’s signature behaviors was the immediate kidnapping of another woman from the same area, hence the name. Like magpies and their larger crow cousins, the killer was leaving a shiny object—in this case the corpse of a previous victim—in place of another young woman he stole. But as far as I knew, no one had been kidnapped at UCLA.