“What’s the white stuff?”
“Salt,” Gupta said grimly.
“They rubbed salt into her wounds to make the pain even worse.”
The stench of human excrement was breaking through the mentholated cream beneath Jake’s nostrils. He applied more cream, then turned to Joanna.
“Do you want to take a look?”
“I guess,” she said, trying to focus her mind. Outside she heard a police helicopter coming closer and closer. It reminded her of the helicopter ride she and Paul had taken from San Francisco to Carmel. And the ride back the next evening had been so spectacular, with the lights of San Francisco twinkling in the darkness.
“Is something wrong?” Jake asked.
“No,” Joanna said.
“I’m just waiting for the noise to die down.”
“Between the helicopter and the jackhammers outside, the noise has been almost incessant,” Gupta complained.
“You cannot hear your own voice. We tried closing the window, but the smell became intolerable.”
Jake looked over to Farelli.
“Why the helicopter?”
“A neighbor saw somebody on a rooftop. It turned out to be an old man feeding his pigeons.”
Joanna snapped on a pair of latex gloves and forced herself to
concentrate on the victim’s body. Push your grief aside for now, she told herself, hoping her brain would listen. She slowly circled the body, paying particular attention to the cuts. They were all small—no more than an inch or two in length—and deep. No part of Maria’s body had been spared. Now Joanna was studying the victim’s head. There was a vertical gash over the left temporal area and a black-and-blue swelling along the jawline.
Joanna glanced at Farelli.
“Whoever it was, they forced their way in.”
Farelli nodded.
“The door chain was ripped off.”
Joanna closed her eyes and tried to reconstruct the crime. Images flashed through her mind. The broken door chain. The gash over the temple. The black-and-blue swelling on her jawline. The gold wristwatch on the floor in the living room. All of the pieces suddenly came together. Joanna opened her eyes.
“Maria Gonzalez didn’t know these people. She had never seen them or heard their voices.”
Jake quickly scanned Maria’s body, looking for the clues Joanna had seen.
“How can you be sure of that?”
“It happened this way,” Joanna said quietly, again visualizing the events.
“There is a knock on the door. Maria comes to answer it, but there is no peephole. She asks who’s there. Someone answers, but she doesn’t recognize the voice. Cautiously she opens the door, leaving the chain in place. The killer slams the door into her head, breaking the door chain in the process.”
Jake asked, “What’s the evidence to show that actually happened?”
Joanna pointed to a deep gash on Maria’s temple.
“This wound is vertical and wide, not short and narrow like the others. It was made by a blunt edge, such as the side of the door. So now we have an explanation for the broken door chain and the unusual gash on her head.”
“And that knocked her out,” Farelli concluded.
“No. That knocked her down,” Joanna went on.
“She tried to get up, but he was on top of her in a flash. Then he slugged her on the jaw and knocked her out.”
Joanna pointed to Maria’s jawline.
“You can see the black-and-blue area here.”
Gupta stepped in for a closer look at the traumatized area. He had missed it altogether, just as he had missed the significance of the forehead gash. He would never have related those findings to the
broken door chain, never in a million years. He wondered if Joanna Blalock was really that brilliant; perhaps she had some remarkable psychic power that allowed her to see into the past. Whatever it was, she made most medical examiners look like amateurs. Gupta leaned over and carefully examined the victim’s hands and arms, searching for defensive wounds. There were no bruises or abrasions.
“She didn’t have a chance to defend herself from the blows.”
“Maybe she did,” Joanna said.
“We found her wristwatch on the living room carpet. Perhaps she brought her hand up to defend herself and the killer’s fist knocked the watch off her wrist.”
Psychic, Gupta decided. Joanna Blalock had to be part psychic.
Joanna went back to studying the wounds on Maria’s breasts.
“What do you think was used to make these cuts?”
“Something very sharp,” Gupta said.
“Like a scalpel.”
After a pause, Joanna said, “I don’t think so. Scalpels would make longer and wider slashes. I’d bet on a razor.”
Jake’s eyes narrowed.
“And the killer wouldn’t have walked out of here with a bloody razor in his pocket.”
Joanna nodded.
“He would have chucked it.”
“Into a trash can or down the garbage disposal,” Jake said, thinking aloud.
“And there’s only one way to hold a razor.”
“Between the thumb and index finger.”
“That damn razor could have a wonderful set of prints on it.” Jake quickly turned to Farelli.
“Check out all the garbage cans, particularly those in the hall and near the elevator. Is there a Dumpster in the rear?”
“Yeah,” Farelli said.
“Near the back door.”
“Check that too.”
As Farelli hurried from the room, the jackhammers outside started up again.
Joanna and Jake looked at each other and exchanged knowing glances, both thinking the same thought. Maria Gonzalez could have screamed her lungs out and nobody would have heard her above the noise of the jackhammers.
“What the hell did they want?” Jake asked again.
“And why did they do this to her?”
“That I can’t answer,” Joanna said and began circling the corpse once more.
Jake watched Joanna as she searched for more clues, now totally immersed in the case. Good, he thought. At least for now her sadness
and broken heart were set aside. But that wouldn’t last. The pain would return. It always did. Particularly at night, when you were alone with your thoughts.
“Want to take a look at this?” Joanna asked after pulling back the strip of tape covering Maria’s mouth. Her lower lip was almost bitten off.
“The pain was so bad she bit through her lips.”
Jake studied the chewed lip, then glanced down at the woman’s genitalia. There were cuts there too. He looked away, disgusted.
“So vicious,” Joanna said softly.
“It defies description.”
Farelli came back into the kitchen waving a handful of twenty-dollar bills.
“Hey, Jake! Look what the boys found in the bedroom closet.”
“How much is there?”
“Over two grand,” Farelli said, flipping through the stack of twenties.
“Maybe this is what they were after.”
“Maybe,” Jake said skeptically.
“But I don’t think so. With the pain she was going through, she would have given up her own mother.”
“And the thought of being cut and disfigured,” Joanna added, shivering.
“She would have given up anything to avoid that.”
Farelli said, “They found something else in the back of the closet.”
“What?” Jake asked.
“A Latino type with a tattoo over his nipple and a bullet hole in his head.”
“Her cousin,” Jake commented dryly.
“Who?”
“Nothing,” Jake said.
“Make sure to check those bills for prints. That’s probably some of the money the bombers gave her husband.”
“Right. By the way, no razor blade yet.”
“Keep looking.”
Jake turned back to J
oanna.
“It was something else they wanted. Something they were willing to kill her for. What the hell could it be?”
Joanna shrugged.
“Only one person in this room knows for sure, and she’s dead.”
Jake clasped his hands behind his back and began pacing the floor, talking to himself.
“She’s in excruciating pain. She’d tell them anything they wanted to know. Anything. But she doesn’t. Why not? Why doesn’t she answer their questions?”
Joanna thought for a moment. “In general, there are two reasons why people won’t answer a question. Either they don’t want to or they have no idea what the answer is.”
“So you’re saying she may not have known what the hell they were talking about?”
“It’s a possibility.”
Jake started to circle the kitchen once more, again grumbling to himself. He stopped in front of a wall cabinet to have a cigarette. As he reached for the pack, his eyes focused in on the side of the cabinet.
“Where’s the calendar that was up here?”
Gupta said, “It’s on the dinette table next to your card.”
“Did you put them there?” Jake asked at once.
Gupta shook his head.
“They were there when I arrived. No one has touched them.
They had some blood smudges on them, so we’re going to check them carefully for prints.”
“Son of a bitch! Son of a bitch!” Jake pounded a fist into his palm.
“Those bastards were here.”
Jake hurried over to the table and quickly examined the calendar and the card with his name and phone number on it. There were smudges of blood on them but no obvious fingerprints. Jake’s gaze went from the table to Maria’s body to the chair between them. He pointed to the empty chair.
“One of the terrorists sat here and showed Maria Gonzalez the calendar with the dates marked. They probably focused in on April nineteenth, which was circled in red.”
Joanna nodded.
“They thought she really knew what was going to happen on that date, and she didn’t. They kept torturing her for information she didn’t have.”
Jake nodded back.
“And they knew we’d been here. They wanted to know everything she had told us.”
Farelli looked at Jake quizzically.
“How could the terrorists be so certain you’d been here?”
“I left my calling card,” Jake said hoarsely.
Farelli shook his head.
“Uh-uh. That doesn’t work.”
“Why not?”
“Because the terrorists didn’t see your card until after they broke in. They must have known beforehand that you two had been here.” He scratched at his ear.
“Hell, that’s why they busted in here to begin with. Otherwise why would they bother with a young widow who’s an illegal alien? She sure
as hell isn’t going to the police or the FBI.” “But how could they have known we interrogated Maria Gonzalez?” Jake asked.
“We only got her address yesterday afternoon from the—” His face suddenly went cold as he turned to Joanna.
“Did you talk with anyone about our visit here yesterday?”
“No,” Joanna said promptly.
“Me neither. Except to Lou and Hurley, I haven’t mentioned it to a soul.” Jake lit a cigarette and spat a bit of tobacco from his lip.
“Which means we’ve got a leak. Somebody passed that information on to the terrorists.”
“And it had to be someone at the rehabilitation institute,” Joanna said.
“They’re the ones who gave us Maria Gonzalez’s address. They were the only ones who knew we were coming here.”
Jake held up a hand and began counting on his fingers.
“Let’s see now. There were the two doctors, Wales and Bremmer. And Lucas, the black therapist. And the gal who brought the chart in from the file room.”
“And the receptionist,” Joanna added.
“And anyone else at the institute who they might have talked with. We’re going to have to check out the whole damn place and everybody associated with it.”
Jake tapped a finger against his chin, his eyes drifting back to the calendar and the notation “Friend at Memorial.” It was partially obscured by a smudge of blood.
“Maybe it was their so-called friend at Memorial. Maybe that was their source.”
Jake took out his cell phone and called Dan Hurley. He told Hurley briefly about the new findings and asked him to concentrate his computer search on the staff and employees at the rehab institute.
“And V may represent the first letters of one of the terrorists’ names.” Jake pressed the phone to his ear.
“Yeah. Like Evelyn or Eva.. .. Yeah, it could be the female terrorist…. I haven’t seen her picture. I’ll check with Farelli on that.”
Jake put the cell phone away and turned to Farelli.
“Have you seen the police artist’s sketch of the female terrorist?”
“Yeah,” Farelli said, reaching into his inner coat pocket.
“I got a copy just before I came over here.”
Jake studied the sketch at length. The terrorist was young, in her early thirties, with thin lips and high cheekbones. She was attractive, but there were no distinguishing features or marks. Jake visualized her as being thin and bright and middle class. And deadly
as hell. Farelli said, “There’s some uncertainty about her hair. The technician who saw her says it was pulled back, like Grace Kelly used to wear hers. The cop in the lobby who thinks he saw her says it was just cut short.”
Joanna stared at the sketch, her mind flashing back to an attractive woman, stepping off the elevator.
“It was pulled back.”
“Are you sure?” Jake asked quickly.
Joanna nodded, still studying the portrait.
“I’m positive.”
“How accurate is the sketch?”
“It’s not bad,” Joanna said.
“But the lips are too thin and the cheekbones a little too high.”
Jake rubbed his hands together, pleased. A really good picture was what they needed. It would give them a face to chase.
“Have you got time to talk with our sketch artist today?”
“Sure.”
Jake carefully folded the sketch, then glanced around the kitchen to see if he’d forgotten anything. He stared at Maria Gonzalez’s tormented face before turning to Girish Gupta.
“Would you mind if Dr. Blalock did the autopsy?”
“Not at all,” Gupta said in a clipped British accent.
“But I would very much like to assist.”
“Is nine a.m. good for you?” Joanna asked.
“That would be most convenient.” Gupta was about to turn away, then he looked back at Joanna.
“Oh, by the way, I have the number of my friend in Montreal for you.”
“What friend?” Joanna asked, caught off guard.
“Surely you remember,” Gupta said.
“Last month I told you about my friend who is on the pathology staff at McGill University in Montreal, and you asked me to obtain his number for you. Don’t you recall?”
“Oh, yes,” Joanna said weakly. She had wanted to talk with the pathologist about possible forensic openings at the Montreal medical school. In her mind’s eye she saw Paul du Maurier smiling and waving to her. All of her sadness returned.
“Just leave the number with my office, please.”
Gupta studied the change in her expression.
“Is there something wrong?”
“No,” Joanna said, trying to keep her voice even.
“It’s just that the room is getting a little stuffy.” K. Jake and
Joanna left the apartment and took the elevator down. It moved in a slow, jerky way and made a sound like it needed oil. A small fan above them barely stirred the air.
“I did all right for a while,” Joanna said quietly.
“You did damn good,” Jake said and gave her shoulder a quick squeeze.
“You held up great.”
“But I’m about to come undone.”
“Can you keep it together until we get to the car?”
“I’ll try.”
The elevator door opened, and they quickly walked down a hall and out the front door. The sidewalk was blocked off in both directions with crime scene tape.
Uniformed police were everywhere. Across the street a large crowd had gathered, some with binoculars hoping for a better view. The windows of the surrounding apartment buildings were all open, people peering out and talking loudly in Spanish.
“Let’s get a drink,” Jake said, opening the car door.
“I’m not in the mood,” Joanna said as she ducked to get in.
The door window suddenly exploded and shattered into a thousand pieces. Then the rear window blew out with a loud bang. In an instant Jake pushed Joanna down onto the front seat and lay atop her.
He heard the crowd screaming as they scattered in panic. Policemen were yelling, “Get down! Get down!” Then there were more shots. It sounded like a high-powered rifle firing from above. Maybe from a rooftop, Jake thought, concentrating his hearing and waiting for the next round.
Everything went quiet. Seconds ticked off, and the silence seemed to deepen. A baby cried out briefly, then the stillness returned.
Joanna lay motionless beneath Jake, but he could hear her breathing.
“Are you okay?”
“I—I think so,” she whispered.
“Stay down and don’t move.”
In the background they heard police radios with officers trying to communicate through the static. Somewhere in the distance there were sirens and the sound of an approaching helicopter. Jake considered turning on the ignition and making a run for it. But he would still have to look through the windshield, and that would expose part of his head. He stayed put.
“There he is!” a uniformed cop yelled out.
“On the rooftop across the street!” xSuddenly there was a barrage of gunshots. Police fired round after round with pistols and rifles and shotguns. The noise was deafening.
Lethal Measures Page 23
