Page 5 of Dirty Valentine
“I won’t know for certain until I get him back to the lab,” I said, pulling out my thermometer and a scalpel to take a liver temperature reading.“But while there’s evidence of compression from the boards on his chest, this doesn’t look like death by crushing.He wasn’t even restrained.No ligature marks on the wrists or ankles.If someone was piling stones on my chest and I had mobility I’d be doing everything I could to get them off.”
I made a small incision and inserted the thermometer, checking my watch to note the time.“Core temperature is seventy-nine degrees.Given the ambient temperature and exposure, I’d estimate time of death between 3 and 4 a.m.”
“The witching hour,” Martinez observed, looking up from his notes.“How perfectly appropriate for our location.”
“So our killer had plenty of time to stage this scene,” Jack said.“Martinez, I need you to expand the perimeter to include the entire section of the cemetery.Look for any evidence of how the killer got here—tire tracks, footprints, anything disturbed.”
“Already started a preliminary sweep,” Martinez replied.“Found some tire impressions.Looks like someone drove a vehicle right up to the edge of this section.”
I continued my preliminary examination, checking for obvious wounds while documenting the position of the body.“No visible trauma to the head, neck, or extremities.I’ll need to examine the torso more thoroughly once we get him back to the lab.”
“Martinez, you and Riley start a grid search of the access roads leading to this section.See if there are security cameras.If I remember right, the county council voted against them because of the expense, but maybe one of the nearby houses has cameras.”
I snorted and said, “Hey, at least the council president got them to confirm a brand-new Cadillac as his city vehicle.You’d think he was part of the presidential motorcade.”
“Well, priorities,” Cole said dryly.
Martinez’s mouth quirked in a smile and he said, “I’ll grab Riley and get started.”And then he headed off, making a detour around where the group of kids was huddled waiting to get on the school bus.
“I need to find the real cause of death,” I said.“This is smoke and mirrors.”
“Could be a copycat like that Jack the Ripper case we had,” Jack said.“Could be someone trying to send a message.Or…”
“Or?”I asked.
“Or could be our killer is just plain crazy.”
“My favorite kind,” Cole said.
As if on cue, a cool breeze rustled through the ancient oaks overhead, sending shadows dancing across Bridget Ashworth’s weathered headstone.The whisper of wind through the leaves sounded almost like voices—the accumulated whispers of three centuries of the forgotten dead.
I shivered despite the warm temperatures, suddenly aware that we were standing in a place where justice had been perverted once before.Where an innocent woman had been crushed to death by the weight of lies and fear and small-town politics.
“We need to find out who he is,” I said, taking one last photograph of the victim’s peaceful face.“He wasn’t picked at random.”
“CSI team just pulled up,” Martinez said, his voice coming through the radio attached to Jack’s belt.“And I can see the news van right behind them.”
“Perfect,” Jack muttered.“Nothing like having the media turn murder into a circus.”
I looked down at our victim one more time—at his peaceful face that belied the violence of his final hours, at the careful arrangement of his body on top of Bridget Ashworth’s crumbling grave.The killer had chosen this spot for a reason.Had positioned him here like an offering to the dead witch beneath the stone.
“You know what bothers me most about this?”I said, my voice barely above a whisper.
“What’s that?”Jack asked.
“Whoever did this knows our history.Knows about Bridget Ashworth, knows about the pressing, knows exactly which buttons to push to get our attention.”I stood slowly, my knees protesting after crouching for so long.“This feels personal.”
The wind picked up again, rustling the leaves overhead and carrying with it the faint scent of decay that seemed to seep from the very ground beneath our feet.In the distance, I could hear the news crew setting up their equipment, ready to turn our investigation into entertainment for the masses.
But here in this forgotten corner of the cemetery, surrounded by the graves of the unwanted and the damned, something darker was stirring.Something that had been waiting three hundred years for the right moment to claw its way back to the surface.
And whatever it was, it had found its voice in death.
CHAPTERTWO
The driveback to Bloody Mary should have been peaceful.Spring had settled over King George County like a benediction, painting the rolling hills in every shade of green imaginable.Dogwood trees lined the winding roads, their white blossoms scattered like confetti against the deeper emerald of old oaks and maples.It was the kind of day that made you believe in new beginnings and second chances.
Too bad we were hauling a corpse.
