She’d been a victim.
“Here’s some breakfast. I don’t want you not eating. It’s the most important meal of the day.”
He handed her the bag and started down the stairs. “Lock your door. You need to be safe.”
Her heart skipped. He was a good man. He wasn’t trying to push his way into her room, and he wasn’t being bossy. He was the opposite of Derek.
“Detective, wait.”
He turned around. “Yes, Miss Peyton?”
“Why are you really here?”
“You look like you need a friend, and I won’t hurt you. Someone did, but I can guarantee it will never be me. We all need to find someone who we can talk to and who understands.”
Tears filled her eyes.
Still, he didn’t move.
Merry had to make a choice. “Want to have breakfast with me?”
“Not if it’s going to make you upset,” he offered. “I don’t want to see you hurt or scared. That’s not why I came here. If being in that room with me, as we share a meal, frightens you, I’ll pass.”
How he knew, she didn’t understand, but he did, and that was important.
She unlocked the door. “I trust you.”
And she did.
Oddly, she felt safer with him there.
“Are you sure?” he asked, still not moving.
“Yeah, I think I am.”
He slowly moved toward her. “Thank you for trusting me,” Boone said, taking the takeout bag from her.
What choice did she have?
The man saw right through her.
And that was scary too.
* * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *
Morgue
When they arrived, the place was empty. Merry had left for the morning, and Chris was holding down the fort—alone. As they strolled in, she was glad they’d thought to bring him some coffee.
“Chris?” she called, catching him off guard.
He actually jumped, scattering a few tools he’d been putting away.
“Hey! Are you okay?” Elizabeth asked.
“Yeah, I was thinking.”
She handed him his coffee. “I thought you might need this after working all night.”
He kissed her on the cheek. “Thanks, honey, I did.” Chris waited for her to hop onto the empty morgue table, and Callen to join her.
“So, what do you have?”
“Six dead bodies in total disarray, and it’s one hell of a hot mess.”
Yeah, she was aware.
“The agents mentioned that you had their research on the victims.”
“I do. They sent it over around two this morning, and I added it to the file.”
“Okay, then let’s see what you have so you can call it a day, and I can start mine.”
Chris flipped open the first file. Inside, he scanned the information, acclimating himself with the details.
“Our first victim was a gentleman by the name of Beaumont Deforest. He’s the only male in the group.”
“Lucky him.”
Chris continued, “Since he was already dead, I simply had to go over his body and double check all of Doctor Perette’s findings.”
“And?”
“I can’t tell you what killed him. Why you ask? The beetles ate most of his heart. There wasn’t enough tissue left to see if he indeed did die of cardiac arrest. That’s what the ME called in the file. As for the agents finding anything, he was clean—not even a parking ticket to his name.”
“Well, that sucks for us.”
“Yeah, it does. You know how I feel about putting my name on anything that isn’t to my standard.”
She was well aware.
Unfortunately, some things were out of their power.
“What about victim number two?” Callen asked.
“We have Fay Gagnon. She was a local call girl who ultimately met her demise by the hands of an angry pimp.”
Elizabeth took that in and weighed it against what she already knew about the last two victims.
“The agents found a shit long list of arrests, and most of them were for drugs and solicitation. Once again, that’s what I’m told via file. Since she and Beaumont were the first ones in the beetles, they had the least amount of flesh. By looking at the bones, I can tell you that she had a greenstick fracture, a couple skull fractures, and it looks like the ME was right on target with this one.”
Callen made notes.
“Number three?” she asked.
“We have Lauren Martin. She was a preschool teacher, and from the report from Seaton and Madden,” he paused, glancing up, “or is that Seaton and Seaton?”
“She’s keeping her last name as far as I know. I think it’s to keep people off her trail.”
He nodded. “Anyway, Lauren Martin was a decent person, who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.” Chris glanced up. He was thinking about his wife. She’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time too.
“Chris?”
“Huh?”
“COD?” she asked.
“It was her body versus a vehicle. Needless to say, we both know who won that one, and it wasn’t her.”
“Yuck.”
“Yeah, most of her organs were pulverized. I don’t know if the liver survived, and since the nut job still took it, I’m guessing it was passable.”
Yeah, but for what?
Who the hell wanted a pulverized organ?
“She shouldn’t be here, but then again, Fate is a bitch. She takes whoever, whenever.”
They stared at Chris.
He didn’t look good. They now knew who he was thinking about. He was relating the death to Cyra’s. That wasn’t going to be a good thing.
“Christopher.” Maybe he shouldn’t be working.
“Victim number four,” he said, ignoring her. He was well aware what she was going to say, and he didn’t want her mercy, sympathy, or mothering. “Mary Oliver was her name, and stripping was her game.”
“Laissez Les bon temps rouler,” Elizabeth stated.
Chris nodded. “Those good times rolled right over her. She was definitely a party girl. She also had about a zillion arrests, but not for soliciting. This girl was violent. She’d been in more fights than anyone should in their lifetime. It’s as if she enjoyed settling things with her fists, not her brain.”
Callen continued writing.
“Was that what killed her?” Elizabeth asked.
“Stripping killed her. The police record attached to the file states that she was strangled in the back room after a lap dance. No one saw the john go in, and no one saw him come out. Her killer is still out there, much like ours.”
“Sex?”
“Yep, but was it him? I have no clue. If she was getting one man off in the back, she could have been getting them all off, right?”
He had a point.
“Swimmers?”
“None. He, they, or whoever else she opted to get down and dirty with were sealed up. They used protection.”
“Did Doctor Perette catch all this?” she asked.
Chris glanced up. “Actually, I have no complaints about his work. It’s immaculate. He just has a bad attitude when it comes to Feds. If he wasn’t such a dick, I would have liked him based on his files alone.”
She laughed. “Yeah, douche-y behavior can ruin it.”
“Next?” he asked, waiting for them.
“Yes, who do we have?”
“Our fifth victim was Page Rousseau. She was the first woman taken from the street. When the agents did their search, they came up with the same background information as Fay Gagnon and Mary Oliver. She, too, had been arrested for behavior unbecoming a lady.”
“Yeah, they aren’t all the type you bring home to mother,” Callen stated.
“I’ll keep that in mind for when I start paying for sex,” he stated, not even looking up.
Elizabeth started choking on her coffee. “What? Where did that come from?”
&nb
sp; “Apparently, left field,” he stated.
She stared at him. There was no way her straight-laced buddy had said what he just said. She had to have misheard him. Chris Leonard, or the man he once was, wouldn’t pay for sex. That was a disease risk he wouldn’t take.
She glanced over at Callen.
He, too, looked puzzled by Chris’s remarks.
The train was going off the tracks. Here was their sign.
He continued, “Our fifth victim’s COD was exsanguination,” Chris offered, flipping through the file. He knew Elizabeth was staring at him, but he didn’t care. He was simply being honest. The next woman he slept with, if he ever did again, wasn’t going to be someone he’d love. He planned on fulfilling his needs, and then going home to Bethe.
That ship had sailed when Cyra was taken from him. Not everyone could have a happy ending.
He was one of those people.
“Her throat was slit, and from the blood splattered all over the inside of the crypt,” he said, pulling the tech photographs up on the big screen. “It appears that’s where she bought it.”
“Well, that’s new.”
“Technically, not really. The others were all dead before they were snatched. This seems to be the preferred method of this killer. The sixth victim, Tasse Simon, our only African American victim, also had her throat slit. I think it might be safe to assume that from here on out, that’s the killer’s methodology. Once is chance, twice is pattern.”
Callen made a notation to give that detail to Ethan for his profile. It might be important.
“So she died the same way?”
“No, she didn’t. I checked and rechecked, and she had blunt force trauma to the back of her skull. Yes, her throat was cut, but from the wound, I can say without a doubt that there wasn’t blood flow at the time she incurred the injury.”
“The ME got it right again?”
“Yes.”
“Great. So she fell backward, knocked her head off something, or he bashed her head off the ground.”
“Pretty much.”
“And she was?” Elizabeth asked, needing her profession confirmed, even though she was sure of what he was going to tell them.
“She was a hooker just like Fay Gagnon and Page Rousseau.”
“Same arrest record?”
“It’s pretty much the same one. She had a rap sheet as tall as she was, and most was for solicitation. Merry reran all the trace, and she didn’t find anything that was isolated to one person. The killer, or person who took the corpses, didn’t leave any clues, and there was no DNA under their nails.”
Great.
They had a super smart killer. He managed to mosey on into a morgue, take the bodies, and not leave trace. That didn’t bode well for catching him.
It looked like her profiler was going to be the ace in the hole for this case. Once more, she needed Ethan’s help. Elizabeth was glad he was arriving that evening.
They were going to need him.
“What about the organ removal?” she asked. “What can you tell me about it, from your standpoint as a doctor?”
He thought about it, yawning. “Sorry. I can tell you that it wasn’t a medical professional. The incisions are sloppy, too big, and hastily done. This person didn’t know where the liver was, until they cracked the victims open. It got better as he or she went on, but at first, it looked like some sick scavenger hunt. A few of the other organs were damaged in our first and second victims.”
“Like?”
“He nicked the pancreas and the stomach. That makes me think he didn’t have familiarity with human anatomy.”
Callen started laughing.
“What’s so funny?” she asked. “You know how crazy you look, bursting into laughter in a morgue, right?”
“Is it wrong that that I’m happy that no one is getting their penises cut off, blended, or shipped somewhere in a box?”
She patted his cheek. “Good point, and no, it’s not wrong. We just have a normal crazy this time.”
Chris was quiet.
“Doc, what’s going on in your head?”
“Maybe I’m just tired, but something occurred to me.”
“That someone really likes liver?” she asked.
Callen gave her a look. “You’re the crazy one to even throw that out there.”
She was well aware.
“This person went looking for dead bodies. Then, he took hookers, but didn’t violently hurt them. The local cops were calling him a Jack the Ripper knockoff, but he’s not really.”
“So are you saying we have a killer with compassion?”
“Normally, we’re reconstructing a victim, putting back what he ripped apart, but this time, he was…”
“Gentle?”
“Yeah, it’s odd. There’s no violence here. In fact, he took four dead people. That to me stands out. I’d focus on that.”
She agreed, but he wasn’t saying anything she wasn’t currently thinking.
This killer was an odd one—that was for sure.
“I don’t even know where to head with this one,” Elizabeth stated. “Do we have a Jack the Ripper wannabe? Or is this something more?”
Callen thought about it.
“Could it be ritualistic? I hate to say this, but we have someone who stole bodies, took only one part, and left the rest. I don’t know much about New Orleans, but I know that Voodoo is big here.”
Elizabeth took out her phone and Googled it. With each link, one name kept popping up. “Apparently, the French Quarter has a high priestess of Voodoo.”
“Does that job really exist?” Callen asked. “Someone actually goes around with that on a business card?”
Elizabeth laughed. “Apparently.”
Chris nodded. “This is a very old city, and slavery was prevalent here a long time ago. Voodoo was brought over with the African slaves, so it’s a damn good possibility.”
“Way to use that trivia knowledge, Chris.” She offered up a fist bump. This was exactly why she liked working with her team. They got her, and they knew what she needed when she worked.
It was the best working relationship.
Elizabeth sent Callen the link. “We’re going to be paying a visit to someone by the name of Marie Babineaux.”
Callen shrugged and was game for a little field trip to Weirdsville. “Why the hell not? We’ve dealt with cannibals, witches, Satan worshippers, overzealous Christians, so why not Voodoo practitioners? I’m not surprised.”
Honestly, neither was she. You couldn’t walk ten feet in New Orleans without seeing a Voodoo, Santeria, or Wiccan shop. This town was full of crazies.
“Can you send our detective liaison a text? We need to meet him at her address.”
“When?”
“Tell him an hour.”
He did as she asked, and when he was finished with the message, he sent it. When he replied, he showed her. “It’s set.”
“Great.”
Just as she was about to get ready to order Chris back to the hotel, Callen’s tablet pinged.
“It’s the boss man.”
“Put him up on the screen,” she said.
Callen sent it to the big monitor in the room, so they could all participate in the impromptu morning meeting.
“Well, hello Deputy Director Blackhawk. What can I do for you?”
He grinned at the southern twang in her voice. It had been less than a day, but he missed her. “Hey, baby, Callen, and Doctor Leonard. I’m glad to see you’re behaving yourself and are safe. Is New Orleans still standing, or has Hurricane Elizabeth leveled the place.”
“We had an early night last night. Callen and I stayed in for the evening.”
He stared at them waiting for the catch. That didn’t sound like his wife at all.
“Okay, we nearly burned the joint down with hot sex. Better?”
Callen started choking. “Seriously? We’re not alone!”
“I didn’t describe it.”
Ethan lov
ed when his brother was all worked up. “Do tell,” he offered. “I’m sure no one minds.”
“I actually do,” Chris stated.
They all stared over at him. He wasn’t joking. Yeah, this was just more proof that he wasn’t doing well. Chris was the king of pranks and busting ass.
Now, all of a sudden, he minded? After fifteen years of riding her ass, he was going to get all HR on them?
Really?
“Well, someone write this damn day down on the calendar,” Elizabeth said. “Doctor Chris Leonard doesn’t want the dirt on my sexual escapade. If Tony was here, he’d fall over.”
Chris didn’t look up.
He was getting angry.
His heart hurt.
“Sorry I went there, Doctor,” Ethan said, lifting a brow. “It won’t happen again. So, Elizabeth, what’s on your agenda?” he asked.
“We’re heading out in an hour to interview our only suspect in the case. Well, that’s not true. The agents are heading to a cop’s house to do the same thing.”
“A cop? That can’t be good.”
“Yeah, interesting thing is, this is more than just the killings. We’re trying to solve this and figure out who let the killer into the morgue. We think he had help playing burglar. Call me crazy, but he got in and out without anyone knowing?”
“Good point. You should have a calm day, since you’re only doing interviews.”
Callen started laughing.
Elizabeth elbowed him.
“Why is my brother laughing, in the morgue, and without provocation?”
“See, Cal? I told you it was weird.”
He couldn’t help it. His brother was going to flip his shit. As soon as Elizabeth told him the details, he was going nuclear.
Three.
Two.
One.
“We’re interviewing a Voodoo priestess.”
He stared at her via the video screen. His face said it all.
“I’m sorry, what? Did you say Voodoo priestess?”
“Yes, yes, I did. Then we’re checking out the spot where the killer left the bodies. I’m just giving Detective Savage some time to handle a personal issue.”
“Back that up. Voodoo?”
Blood Shall Run (An FBI Romance Thriller Book 15) Page 15
