Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 107766 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 539(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107766 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 539(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Even standing there in the driveway, he could feel the affection these people had for each other, and it reminded him of his own family. A wave of gratitude filtered through him when he pictured Josie’s mother’s house. He didn’t know a lot about his birth mother’s situation other than she was young and impoverished. He didn’t know if he’d have grown up in a circumstance like Josie’s, but he knew for sure he’d have had less opportunity. He was grateful to everyone involved in gifting him with his life, including the woman who’d birthed him and made the loving choice to give him up.
The blond woman jogged back down the steps, holding a piece of paper out to him. “I’m Dawn Parsons, by the way.” She smiled. “I jotted my number down on there as well if you happen to need anything else.”
“I appreciate that very much. Thank you for your time, ma’am.”
His phone buzzed in his pocket, and he gave Dawn a wave as he turned toward his car and connected the call. “Copeland.”
Zach listened, a pit in his stomach gaping wide as he gripped the door handle, pulling it open with more force than necessary. “I’ll be there in ten.”
As he pulled away from the curb, his head swam. Holy Christ. What the fuck did this mean?
* * *
“Who found the body?”
“Neighbor,” the cop who’d first arrived on scene said. “Said she comes over to sit on the porch and have a smoke some nights with the deceased. There was no answer tonight, but when she tried the door, it was unlocked. She came in, found the old lady splayed out in the living room.”
So she’d been expecting someone. Had she unknowingly called come on in to a sadistic killer when he’d knocked on her door? He looked back toward the house where the dead, mutilated body that had been described to him still lay on the floor. Josie’s mother.
“Thanks,” Zach said, seeing the first criminalist arriving. He pulled on the gloves he’d had in his car. “Will you tell the neighbor to stay put? I’m going to need to interview her before I leave.”
“Will do.”
Zach waited for the criminalist, a guy named Barry, who he’d worked with a time or two, and they both slipped booties over their shoes before entering the house together. The house smelled the same as it had that morning, only now there was the additional scent of burned flesh. Other than the body on the floor, things looked about the same as they had earlier. No signs of struggle. Nothing out of place other than a TV remote on the floor, batteries next to it as though it’d been dropped. He came up next to the body as Barry began opening his kit. “Jesus,” he murmured.
“Not a pretty sight,” Barry agreed. He picked up his camera and began taking photographs of the body from different angles.
The woman who Zach had met that morning was staring blindly up at the ceiling, tongue lolling, eyes bugged out, tiny circular burns over every area of her face. It appeared that someone had used a cigarette to burn her flesh. “Pre- or postmortem?” Zach asked, pointing at her scarred face.
Barry lowered the camera, considering the woman. “See the blood on that one by her eye? And the pus on a few of the burns on her cheeks? Indicates she was alive when burned.”
Christ.
Zach hadn’t entertained nice thoughts about this woman, but no one deserved to die this way.
“She must have screamed,” he murmured.
Barry pointed to what looked like a kitchen towel partially balled up on the floor next to the body. “Might have been used as a gag. I’ll have it tested.”
Zach nodded, hardly wanting to picture Diana Stratton’s last moments. But it was his job. If he was going to do it well, he had no choice. The challenge was to move the images aside when he closed his eyes to sleep at night.
He glanced around. There was a full ashtray on the coffee table that he knew would be tested to determine if any of the cigarette butts had prints from someone other than Diana Stratton.
For some reason, Detective Pickering’s words about the profile of the killer came back to him: Know this, detectives—you will likely only find what he wants you to find.
Barry used his gloved hand to open Diana Stratton’s bathrobe. “It’s not just her face that’s burned either.” He bent, shooting the camera between her legs. “Same burns on her genitals.”
Zach felt ill. “Signs of sexual assault?”
“It’s hard to tell with the burn trauma. Cathlyn will have to determine that.”
“Cause of death?”
Barry lowered the camera. “Wouldn’t have been the burns, as excruciating as those would have been.” He stepped forward, squatting next to her head and using a gloved finger to push her lower eyelid down. “Petechial hemorrhages and lots of them.” He then moved the high neck of her robe, exposing her throat. “There you go. Strangulation.”