Chapter 1
“Are you lifting at all?” Homicide detective Ashley Haines strained as she pulled the queen size mattress up the last step to her second floor apartment.
“I’m lifting, I’m lifting! Christ, Ash, it’s not a race.” Michael Haines had spent thirty-four years racing after his older sister. Though only three years separated the two siblings, Ash always seemed decades ahead of him in sports, academics, work and friends.
The only thing he had managed before his overachieving sister was meeting the love of his life, then settling down and having two beautiful children. Ash was resolutely single.
Ash peered around the side of the mattress with a mischievous grin. “So, if I let this go, you’ve got it?”
Michael’s eyes widened. “Don’t you dare!”
Ash shook her head, and pulled the mattress toward her. “That’s what I thought.” Michael knew better than to argue with her, and in particular while a hundred pound mattress bore down on him.
“Stow it and move, Haines.” Michael teased. “All this chatter makes me think you need a rest.” As the last word left his mouth, the mattress lurched out of his hands.
“Shit!” He grabbed at the loosely fitted plastic that encased the pleated fabric, before realizing the mattress was defying gravity and moving away from him, and up the stairs on its own. Looking up to see a smirking Ash pulling the mattress up and off of the stairs, Michael put his hands on his hips and shook his head. “Show-off.”
Ash heaved the mattress around the corner of the landing on the stairwell, and slid it toward the door at the far end of the hallway.
“Hater.” She stuck her tongue out playfully at her brother. Michael turned and started walking down the stairs. “Hey, where are you going?”
Without looking back, Michael waved over his shoulder. “You clearly have this under control.”
Ash rested the mattress against the wall in the hallway as she fumbled in her jeans pocket for the key to her front door. “I shouldn’t have called you a hater, Mike.”
Her brother’s voice echoed up from the stairwell. “You mean that?”
Ash bit her lower lip and smiled. “Absolutely. You’re clearly a bitter bug.”
A faint laugh filled the space as Michael opened the glass exit doors on the first floor. “See you later.”
The click of the door downstairs, and the ensuing silence signaled to Ash that her brother had left her to manage the mattress the last twenty feet into her apartment and back to her bedroom. In spite of her slight frame, Ash was nearly six feet tall in heels, and years of sports and exercise had afforded her more strength then her appearance would imply. She grabbed the mattress and easily slid it down the hallway towards her front door.
Unlocking and opening the front door, Ash muttered to herself as she took hold of the mattress. “I didn’t need his help anyway. The bum.” She had just pulled the mattress completely into the living room of her two bedroom apartment when the cell phone in her back pocket began to vibrate. Walking around to close the front door, Ash looked at the caller ID and frowned.
“You wouldn’t be calling me on a Saturday morning unless someone is dead.” She flipped the deadbolt on the door.
After a second of silence, a man’s baritone voice emanated from the phone. “I don’t even get a ‘yo’ before you start complaining?”
“I’m sorry, Cris. Yo.” Ash flopped down in a dark brown leather recliner. “Now that we’ve dispensed with the pleasantries, who’s dead?”
“What passes for pleasantries these days makes me sad, Ash. Did it occur to you maybe I called to shoot the shit with my partner? Why does it always have to be about death with you?” Cristelo Martinez was fifty-three, and had been a homicide detective with the San Antonio Police Department for over fifteen years. He had been Ash’s first and only partner since she was promoted to detective nearly four years ago in 2008, and over the years they had become friends. Ash appreciated his irreverence and overarching sarcastic attitude toward the most mundane aspects of life.
“We’re homicide detectives. I think the jig is up.” Ash smirked.
Cris laughed. “I’m not sure what jig you’re referencing, but a white male, mid-thirties named Paul Garrett was found badly mangled in his apartment.”
Ash stood up and side-stepped the mattress that was partially blocking her path back to the bedroom. “Text the address to me and I’ll meet you there.”
“Or - and I know this is novel - I can just give you the address now and you can write it down.” The familiar sarcasm was out in full force today.
“What’s this writing you speak of?” Ash bantered as she reached for the pad of paper and pen on the nightstand next to her bed.
“Giving as good as you’re getting today, Haines.” Cris chuckled.
“You caught me after my coffee. So what’s the address?” Ash pulled the cap to the pen off with her teeth, and wedged the phone between her ear and shoulder.
“5450 Rowley Road. Near the Medical Center.” Cris said.
“Yeah, I know where that’s at. What’s the apartment number.” Ash wrote down the information and said goodbye to Cris.
Quickly stripping off her jeans and t-shirt, and pulling her thick, long brown hair into a loose bun, Ash took a quick shower before donning a pair of black slacks, a lite Kevlar vest, and a button-up grey fitted dress shirt. In spite of her 5’9” height, and because shoes were one of her few vices, she slipped on a pair of two inch black Cole Haan heels.
Unlocking the small floor safe in her walk-in closet, Ash clipped the black leather holster with the Glock 17 in it to the left side of her belt. On the opposite side, she clipped a black badge holder containing her gold detective’s badge and photo ID.
Stepping around the mattress, she shook her head at how often the nature of the work she had chosen left other aspects of her life incomplete. Outside of her family and a few friends like Cris from work, she didn’t have much of a social life. Walking to the parking garage adjacent to her apartment building, she was in fact having trouble remembering the last time she had been on an actual date.
As Ash put the key in the ignition of her four door hardtop silver Jeep Freedom, she remembered Melissa from the gym had been the last actual date she had been on, and that - to Ash’s dismay - was nearly four months ago.
Tuning the satellite radio to the South Texas sports channel, Ash listened to the pre-game show for her alma mater the University of Texas in their upcoming game with Oklahoma as she drove toward Paul Garrett’s crime scene. She had begrudgedly declined an invite from her older brother Jason to join him and his wife Katy in Austin for the game because she was on call this weekend.
She was the middle child and only girl between two brothers, who, along with her father James, were avid sportsmen. In return, Ash had grown up with an appreciation for nature and hunting. Her time during middle school and high school was spent playing every imaginable sport from soccer to tennis. During the various hunting seasons, she and her brothers would accompany their father to deer leases in north Texas. Ash remembered these trips fondly because it was always an opportunity for her to spend quality time with her father.
James Haines had been a fire fighter in San Antonio for nearly thirty years before retiring six years ago. It was in no small part his commitment to public service that had influenced Ash’s decision to become a police officer. Specifically, to return to San Antonio after completing her Bachelor of Science degree in Criminology to work in the community she had grown up in.
Pulling into the parking lot next to Paul Garrett’s apartment complex, Ash saw the crime scene investigator’s dark blue SUV parked near five patrol cruisers. She took a deep breath. No matter how many times she did this, it always gave her an uneasy feeling. She hoped that would always be her reaction to the brutality she witnessed all too frequently.
“The pen worked, I see.” Cris greeted her near the door to the apartment.
Ash ducked under the yellow cr
ime scene tape as she flashed her badge at the middle aged patrolman guarding the entrance. “I got a cramp in my left hand, but it’s a small price to pay if it makes you happy.”
Cris nodded. “I don’t think there’s much that could make me happy right now.” He gestured for Ash to enter the apartment. “The mess in here is -” Cris shook his head. “Horrific.”
Ash’s brows furrowed and her stomach knotted. Cris had been in homicide a long time, and if this scene was bothering him, she couldn’t imagine how she would process it. She didn’t allow herself to display any outward signs of her hesitation and concern.
She had learned in her first year on the job never to show signs of the scene getting to you. It gave the people around you pause, and made them question how objective you were being when analyzing the evidence.
Ash walked into the spacious luxury apartment. Based on the furnishings and the apartment itself, it was obvious Paul Garrett had made a comfortable living. Considering how orderly the space was, he had also been very particular and neat. “Bedroom?” Ash looked at Cris.
“Bathroom.” Cris pulled a pair of blue latex gloves from his jacket pocket. “CSI is done; so we are clear to enter.”
Ash pulled a pair of white latex gloves from her pant pocket, and out of habit snapped them against her wrist as she pulled them on.
“Who called it in? And how long has the vic been dead?” She pulled a pair of blue disposable shoe covers from their box near the bedroom door, frowning as she slipped them over her Cole Haan heels.
“Female caller, anonymous, from a gas station payphone near IH-10 and Wurzbach. Based on the body temp and coagulation, he died sometime last night between eight and midnight.” Cris stepped aside as the two detectives entered the master bedroom.
Ash recognized Amanda Weis from the CSI division as she approached her and Cris. “Detectives.” Amanda and Ash had gone out a couple times nearly two years ago, and in spite of Amanda’s insistence there were no hard feelings when Ash called it quits, the petite red head remained chilly whenever the two women’s paths crossed.
“Hi Amanda.” Ash smiled. She had sworn off co-workers after Amanda, and was being reminded now why. “What’s the story?”
Amanda frowned. “I’m doing well Ash, and yourself?”
Ash looked at Cris, who turned his head to mask his amused expression. She forced an exaggerated smile and emoted a sing-songy voice several octaves above her normal mezzo-soprano pitch. “I’m splendid, Amanda. Thank you for asking.”
Amanda huffed and turned her back to Ash and Cris. “Follow me.” The three walked to the doorway of the bathroom. Amanda stepped through the door, and then turned to face the detectives.
“Right, so - Paul Garrett, Caucasian male, age thirty six, as determined by identification found on the premises. Time of death is estimated at sometime between eight PM and midnight yesterday. Victim was found naked and prone on his back in the shower stall of the master bathroom. Multiple lacerations, broken bones and -”
The rest of what Amanda was saying became a low hum in Ash’s ears as she tried to process the massive amount of blood, flesh and bone that littered the white tile floor of the bathroom.
Paul Garrett’s naked, lifeless body lay at an awkward angle with his upper torso in the shower stall, while what was left of his legs were sprawled on the bathroom floor. His once tan skin had taken on a sickly blue hue, except for the blackened and red areas where the skin had been punctured and ripped. His head was bent back at an unnatural angle, and both of his collar bones were protruding through the skin. Someone had taken the man apart.
Ash took several steps toward the body, and crouched down on her haunches. “Are those bite marks?”
Amanda, who had been writing down the bathroom’s dimensions on her CSI report nodded. “They are, but until I get the saliva analysis back, I’m putting source of the bites as inconclusive.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Cris stood in the doorway.
Clutching her wooden clipboard against her chest, Amanda sighed. “It means, detective, that we can’t assume they’re human. In fact -” the woman knelt down near the body, careful not to touch Ash. “The bite marks are irregular, and like nothing I’ve ever seen before.”
Pointing at a particularly pronounced bite near where Paul’s neck and shoulder met, Amanda continued. “The puncture marks where I would expect the incisors to be are inordinately deep, almost as if -”
“The incisors were elongated?” Ash looked at Amanda.
Amanda nodded her head. “Yes. But if my initial measurements are accurate, the elongation would mean the perpetrator’s incisors would extend beyond the normal human bite radius by nearly a full inch. I’m thinking some type of prosthetic.”
“You mean someone was wearing dentures when they did this?” Cris shook his head. “That’s fucked up.”
Amanda stood up. “Actually, it’s not unheard of. There was a series of vicious murders during the seventies in the northeast Brazilian state of Para where the perpetrator – who was never apprehended - ate chunks of his victims, and it’s assumed wore a metal dental plate that left a bite pattern similar to what a vampire would leave.”
Looking away from the body and at Ash and Cris’ shocked expressions, Amanda cleared her throat. “Not that vampires exist, but if they did the plate would mimic -” Amanda bit the inside of her lower lip and went back to filling out her report. “Anyway - no signed of forced entry, wallet and other valuables are still on site.”
Cris walked over to the towel rack where a blue bath towel was neatly folded. “Is that blood?
Amanda glanced at the towel. “Yes. We think the assailant showered over the corpse, dried off and then left.”
Ash shuddered. “Then there should be DNA, hair, skin - all over his body?”
Amanda looked at the body. “You would think, but so far we haven’t found so much as a follicle. Not even under the nails.” She made a note on her report. “His nails are shredded though, like he was scratching at something very hard.”
Ash looked at the investigator. “Was he in a box or closet at some point?”
Amanda shrugged. “Not that we can tell.”
Ash shook her head and sighed. Looking at Cris who was crouched down next to the body. “Does that make sense to you?”
Cris stood up, and frowned. “It’s unreal.”
“Who’s the M.E., Amanda?” Ash continued to look at her partner. She could see from the confused expression on his face that he wasn’t able to make any more sense of this grotesque scene than she was.
Amanda pulled her iPhone out of the pocket of her jacket. “Ah, it’s Doctor Atman.”
Ash chewed on the inside of her cheek nervously. She had first met Doctor Emma Atman nearly three years ago at what had been one of the worst times in Ash’s life.
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Ela: Forever (Waking Forever) Page 21
