The Paige Bleu Series
Case 92
By
Shiralyn J. Lee
Case #5 in The Paige Bleu Series.
This is a lesbian genre story.
Copyrights:
Copyright @ Shiralyn J. Lee January 20th 2015
All characters within this story are fictional and bear no resemblance to anyone living or dead and are purely coincidental.
A Shiralyn J. Lee story created on January 12th 2015 this book or any parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise without the prior written permission of the author. Piracy is a crime.
Shiralyn J. Lee stories are downloadable on reputable sites. If for any reason you are reading this for free or from a non-reputable site, then you are viewing an illegal download. Please refrain from doing so.
Contact information:
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Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter One
Forty-five minutes ago we’d arrived at Taylor Connor’s apartment. Dirty-used-needles had been left scattered on the dining table. The sink and kitchen counter tops were piled up with filthy dishes and stale-rotten food had stunk up the apartment—open cans of cheap beer had spilled wherever they’d been thrown on the ground. A neighbor, Carolyn Jennings, had called the local police department after finding Taylor, dead. On her way to visit a friend, she had to pass Taylor’s front door in the hallway. She noticed the door had been left open, so she called out to Taylor but received only silence. The apartment was in darkness—the TV on, and the smell of a lit cigarette lingered in the air. At first, Carolyn was too scared to venture inside but something compelled her to investigate. She called out Taylor’s name again and still she received no reply. Knowing that Taylor was a non-smoker and not the kind of person to leave her door open—for fear of strangers coming in, Carolyn’s adrenaline forced her to probe further. The discovery that she had made in the bedroom was horrifying to her. Taylor was on the bed—naked. Her wrists had been tied to the metal spindles on the headboard and her ankles shackled the foot of the bed. Remnants of vomit were still in her mouth and had coated her chin and splattered over the uncovered mattress. The bed sheets had been thrown to the ground in a crumpled heap and the pillows placed neatly on an old wooden-kitchen chair.
The forensic team had been called in and Carolyn was already giving her statement to one of the cops when we entered the apartment.
We quickly scanned the scene—looking at the grubby apartment for any clues as to what had occurred as we walked through to the bedroom, where forensics were already at work. “Can you give us a time of death?” Emily asked.
“Maybe two hours, no more than two-and-a-half, rigor mortis hasn’t set in yet.” Brian answered. He had worked in the forensics field for twelve years and occasionally we had crossed paths with him. He was a man with a boring personality and never really had too much to say.
The victim was an attractive girl, possibly in her mid-to-late-twenties. Evidence that she was a heroin addict was apparent and to the untrained eye, the cause of death would have been assumed as an accidental overdose. But closer inspection gave way to indicate that there was more to this death. Faint markings on her neck, similar to that of two thumbs being pressed down on her throat, signified foul play. Someone had tied her to this bed for sexual gratification. It was up to us to find out whether she had been a willing participant or not.
A photograph of a girl with an older couple had been placed face down on the bedside table. It was the dead girl, and most likely her parents. It looked as though it had been taken a few years ago.
“What a waste,” Emily remarked, looking over the girl’s body. “Seems as though she liked her heroin by the look of these track marks on her arm.” She tapped Brian on his shoulder and asked him to take photos of the marks.
I stood on the other side of the bed and leaned over her body and stared at her face. “She was left to die alone. Someone was here with her and they fucking left her,” I uttered in anger.
“Hey, it happens all the time. I wouldn’t get upset over it, Paige. I’m not even sure if we really need to be here…are you?” Emily suggested.
“It’s not that, Emily. She is someone’s daughter, yes a drug addict, but left naked, tied up and discarded like she was a piece of meat,” I retorted. I backed away from the bed and looked around the dreary room. This girl really didn’t have much in the way of personal artifacts. “It just sickens me, that’s all.”
“The coroner’s here now, ladies. I’ve taken DNA and vaginal swab tests and I’ll send you over my findings later this afternoon. But I will say that my gut instinct is that she died during sexual activity. My bet is auto asphyxiation,” Brian said as he was leaving the apartment.
“Can I go now?” Carolyn asked—sniffling loudly and then blowing her nose into a wad of tissue.
Taylor’s body was lifted into a body bag and the zip done up.
My stance was hostile with my arms crossed over my chest. “Do you know if Taylor had a boyfriend?” I asked Carolyn.
“She…she had a couple of male callers on the odd occasion. I don’t recall her ever saying that they were boyfriends as such.”
“So do you know who these men are?” I asked.
“No, I never knew their names. But I doubt that they would have been intimate, not in that way,” she said shaking her head.
“And why is that?” Emily asked her.
“She was a lesbian. She always made it clear that she hated the thought of having sex with men. She said that they made her flesh crawl. I don’t really know what else to tell you.”
“Thank you, Carolyn, you’ve been most helpful. Here’s my card. If you can think of anything else that might help us identify what happened here, please don’t hesitate to call.” I had a feeling that we would be talking to her again.
Emily tapped my arm. “Bats for your team, hey. I bet they won’t find evidence of semen inside her then,” she commented.
The body bag was placed on a stretcher and taken away and we were left to go over the apartment to search for any indication of foul play. The half-smoked cigarette didn’t belong to Taylor and Carolyn had reported smelling it still burning when she had entered the doorway. I bagged it as evidence. We had to determine whether Taylor had been a victim of murder or if she had been involved in a sex game that had gone horribly wrong—sadly resulting in fatal consequences.
A small girl was skipping in the hallway and when she reached the open door, she stopped and gazed inside the apartment.
Emily darted over to her to prevent her from entering. “Oh sweetheart, where’s your mommy?”
The girl peeked around Emily’s leg. “Are you looking for the lady?” she asked.
I stood next to Emily, then crouched down to the girl’s level. “It’s okay. The lady isn’t here anymore.” I said softly.
The girl rubbed her nose with the flat of her palm. “I know she’s not. I saw her leave. She told me not to say anything and that it was our secret.”
This girl had taken me by surprise. Was I actually speaking to a potential witness? “What’s your name?” I asked her.
“Lachelle. My mommy calls me Elle and sometimes she says Elly and then other times when she’s being silly, she calls me smelly, but I’m not smelly really.”
“Well, Elle, I think you might be able to help me. Would you like to help me?” I asked her.
She pressed her forefinger against her mouth and smirked. Her eyes—sparkling—looking upwards, she nodded her head. “Yep.”
I
tucked her curly hair behind her ear and smiled at her so that she felt comfortable enough to recall this woman’s description. “Can you remember what this lady looked like?”
“Yep.” She swung her hips from side-to-side playfully.
“Would you like to tell me?”
“Yep. She was a nice lady and she said that I had to keep a secret.”
“Okay. Now can you tell me what she looked like?”
“She had long hair.”
“Can you remember if it was blonde, or brown, or black, or red?”
“She had dark hair, it was nice and shiny.”
“You’re doing really well. Can you remember what she was wearing?”
“Um, black pants and um, a light blue t-shirt.”
“Thank you Elle, you’ve been a great help. Now, where is your mommy, she must be very worried about you?”
She looked down the hallway and then back at me, pointing behind her to a door that was closed. “Mommy lets me skip while she talks to her boyfriend.”
“Is your mommy with her boyfriend now?” I asked her.
She looked again back down the hallway and then back at me. “Yep.”
“Well I think if I say pillow talk, I’m not going to be wrong, am I?” Emily whispered to me.
“Did the lady do something bad to Taylor?” Elle asked.
“Let’s not talk about that now. I think that I should knock on your door and let your mommy know where you are.” Elle nodded and placed her small hand into mine. I walked her to the door and knocked lightly.
“Elle, I told you to play in the hallway,” a woman yelled from inside the apartment.
I knocked again. “This is agent Bleu from the FBI, I need to speak with you.”
The door opened and a woman dressed in a white-robe—her hair disheveled, greeted me with a surprised look on her face. “What’s happened, what did Elle do?”
“There’s been an incident with one of your neighbors and it’s not appropriate for Elle to be running around the corridors right now.”
She stuck her head out of the doorway to see if there was anything going on. “What kind of incident?” she asked.
“There’s been a death. That’s all I can tell you at this point.”
“Get inside, Elle.” She grabbed Elle by her shoulder and yanked her inside the apartment, closing the door abruptly in my face.
“Wow, nice neighbors,” Emily jested, still standing in the deceased’s doorway.
Chapter Two
2:45 a.m. I woke to find that Kate wasn’t in bed. Hearing the TV was on downstairs, I ventured down to the lounge, where I found her curled up on the sofa watching a movie. “Hey babe, what’s going on?” I asked. I leaned over the back of the couch and kissed the top of her head and then sat beside her. Glancing at her and stroking her leg, I asked her again what was wrong.
“I hate that house,” she said with her teeth gritted and her eyes wide, glaring directly at the window.
“What house?”
“Rachel’s house. I hate seeing it all in darkness. It’s like the house died but she’s still in there watching us…watching me with those hateful eyes. It gives me the creeps.” Tears welled up in her eyes.
I gave her leg a gentle comforting squeeze. “She’s never going to hurt you again, babe.”
“Paige, I love you,” she said—her voice quivering and then she burst into a tearful meltdown.
“Hey, Kate, everything’s going to be all right.” I wrapped my arms around her and held her tightly, pulling her in close so that she could nuzzle her head into my shoulder. “I love you too.”
We watched the movie until it bored us in to falling asleep.
♦♦♦
My phone ringing, jolted me awake. My neck was stiff from being propped by the arm of the sofa and having my arm around Kate’s shoulder, as she had snuggled into my shoulder all night. “Hey, Emily, what’s up?”
“There’s been another girl found. I’m on my way now to pick you up.”
“Okay, I’ll see you shortly.”
Kate stirred and stretched her arms out wide. Yawning loudly she asked, “Who were you just talking to?”
I hoisted myself up into a sitting position and plumped the cushion behind me. “That was Emily. I have to go, she’s on her way over now. Are you going to be okay if I go into work today?”
“Yes, yes. I’m fine, I just feel totally stupid for freaking out last night.”
“It’s normal to react like that. She held you hostage and hurt you, not to mention the weeks of torment leading up to that, with her crazy antics. You’re my brave soldier, don’t you forget that.”
♦♦♦
Mandy Freeman had been found by her roommate Erin Miller, just after 6: a.m. when she had finished working a night shift. Mandy had been tied to the bed with leather belts as her restraints. She was naked, laid on her stomach and her face to the side.
Brian was crouched down—already examining the body. “Paige, Emily. It looks as though we have a serial killer on the loose,” he informed us.
“Let me take a look at the body,” Emily said crossing her arms and leaning over his shoulder.
“She was strangled, the thumb marks are clearly visible and you can see where the fingers pressed around her neck. Sexual activities have taken place and there’s no sign of drug use,” he told her as she examined the dead girl further.
“So can you place a time of death?” I asked him.
He looked at the clock on the wall above the bed and took a moment to work out his assumptions. “She died somewhere between 3: a.m. and 4: a.m.”
“That means she’s been dead for around five hours or so,” Emily confirmed.
Erin’s bedroom door was open. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, being comforted by a neighbor—I went in to speak with her.
“Why, why,” she cried into her hands. Her neighbor sat next to her and calmly rubbed her back.
“Erin, I’m sorry that I have to do this but I must ask you some questions.” I said to her sympathetically.
She lifted her face from her hands, her tears were rolling down her cheeks and her mouth curled down at the sides where she tried to stop herself from crying as she spoke. “Yes, I understand.”
“Do you know if Mandy was seeing anyone?”
She looked at her neighbor and then back at me. “She had started dating someone a few days ago.”
“Can you tell me their name?”
“Sam.”
“Did you meet Sam?”
“Yes, but only briefly. I was leaving the apartment as she was entering.”
“You say she?”
“Mandy was in to girls. Samantha Lambert—that was her name.”
She gave a description similar to the one that Elle had given. The neighbor stopped rubbing her back and nudged her arm as though she was trying to prompt her into telling me something else.
I quickly scanned their faces. “Is everything okay, do you have more information that you want to tell me?” I asked.
Erin nodded her head. “Mandy made a weird comment a couple of days ago.”
“A weird comment? What was it that she said?” I asked her.
Erin sniveled, hen wiped her nose on her tissue. “She told me that she wasn’t going to be around for much longer. She said that after Friday I should start looking for a new roommate. I thought at the time that it was an odd comment to make but I didn’t think anything of it. It was as if she had planned this all out.”
♦♦♦
Mike was in his office sitting behind his desk—talking on the phone. He had emailed me to meet with him as soon as I arrived. He didn’t say why he wanted to talk to me, just to go straight to his office when I got in. He ended his call as soon as I entered his office and pointed to the chair in front of his desk for me to sit down.
“Hey, what’s going on?” I asked him.
“Ah, Paige. I’m assigning a criminologist to the case that you’re working on. I’ve been going
through your notes and feel that you and Emily need an extra hand in catching whoever is responsible for these murders. Let’s get this case wrapped up as soon as possible, hey.”
“Who do you have in mind? Please tell me you’re not thinking of Donald Peterson, he’s a fucking nightmare to work with. The last time that we had to endure each other’s company, I thought I was going to end up strangling him. He really gets under my skin for some reason.”
“No, not Donald, he wasn’t available when I called him. So I was thinking more along the lines of someone that you’ve worked with before. How do you feel about Rosa Mendez helping out with the case?”
“Rosa?” I almost felt as though he had physic powers.
“Are we going to have a problem, Paige?” he asked. He removed his thin rimmed glasses from his face and placed them down on his desk in front of him.
“No, I was just surprised that she would be working on the case.”
“I suggest that you don’t let your personal life get in the way of your work, Paige. Sloppiness is a sign of weakness and I can honestly say that I’ve never viewed you as a weak person.”
I got up from my seat and left his office feeling pretty pissed off.
Chapter Three
Rosa was already in mid-speech when I entered her office. I casually made my way over to Emily who was sitting next to a young-unidentified man. Rosa then proceeded to introduce him as one of her students and she had brought him along to help further his studies. “The pathologists report suggests that both Mandy and Taylor died during sexual activity. Taylor showed signs of slight bruising inside her vaginal canal but this is not unusual when sex aids have been used to pleasure,” she informed us. “We have a set of finger prints found at the scene of Taylor’s murder. The murderer is sloppy. Hopefully this is a breakthrough for us all.”
“So we’re definitely looking for a woman then?” Emily asked.
“Yes. A female who considers herself to be an angel of mercy. Three years ago there was a similar case that was never solved. Five women lost their lives over the course of three weeks.” She handed us a copy each of the cold case files.
Case 92 Page 1
