“With no identity, I guess it’s been next to impossible to identify friends or family members,” Ellington said.
“Yeah. We have nothing. So I will now gladly hand this over to you. Need anything from me?”
“Yes, actually,” Mackenzie said. “No prints were found on the driver’s license?”
“Just the girl’s.”
“What’s the forensics lab like at your station?”
“Not state of the art by any means, but better than most in towns of this size.”
“Get your forensics guys to take a closer look at that license. Check it under a microscope with ultraviolet light. Some forgers put a little signature or mark on their work. It’s always hidden well, but sometimes it’s there. Sort of a sneaky little middle-finger to people like us.”
“I’ll do that,” Burke said. “Anything else?”
Mackenzie was about to ask Ellington what he thought, but she was interrupted by the ringing of her phone. It was on silent, but they could all hear it buzzing from inside her coat pocket. She turned away and pulled the phone out of her pocket. She was irritated and a little alarmed to see it was her mother. She nearly ignored it but the thought of her and Frances keeping Kevin sat heavy on her mind.
She took a few steps away and answered the call, already dreading the news that may be waiting on the other end.
“Hey, Mom. Is everything okay?”
“Yes, everything is good. Kevin is perfectly fine.”
“So then why the call? You know I’m right at the start of case, right?”
“I do. But I just need to know something. Is Frances always this overbearing?”
“How do you mean?”
“Just being bossy. I know she’s been around Kevin more than I have but she’s acting like she knows every single detail about him, and questioning everything I do.”
“That’s why you’re calling me?”
“Yes. I’m sorry, Mackenzie, I just—”
“Both of you are big girls. You’ll find a way to work together. For now, I have to go. Please, Mom…don’t call me again unless it’s urgent.”
“Okay.” There was hurt and disappointment in her voice, but Mackenzie looked past it.
She killed the call and turned back to Ellington and Burke. Burke looked at her almost apologetically as he headed back to his patrol car. “I was just telling your partner here that we’ve got an office space set up for you guys back at the station. I’ve got a few other things I need to check on, so just make yourselves at home. And feel free to call me directly if anything pressing pops up.”
He seemed relieved to be leaving the scene as he got into his car. He gave them a little wave before he pulled off, leaving them to look at the section of road where the mystery woman had been killed.
“Important call?” Ellington asked.
“It was my mother.”
“Oh? Everything okay?”
“Yes. She was just calling to let me know the cage match is officially underway.”
CHAPTER SIX
The first thing Mackenzie did when they arrived at the station was to go through the physical records to get actual photos of the crime scene rather than the digital ones she and Ellington had been given. She spread them out on the large table that took up most of their designated office space and hunched over them for a moment. As she studied them, Ellington started taking down notes on his phone.
The girl was rather young. Mackenzie doubted she was older than twenty. She was blonde and had a face that most would consider pretty. But there was some quality to her, even in her emotionless dead face, that made Mackenzie think the girl may have been a runaway or a vagrant. That, or she’d been through some trauma recently. Her skin simply had a pallor to it that spoke of grime and hard living.
“No identity,” she said, speaking to herself more than to Ellington. “I wonder if she was from WITSEC.”
“Witness protection?” Ellington said. “That’s a bit of a leap. Especially with a license you think might be a fake.”
“Well, she has no real ID and she was running hard from someone. If she was with witness protection and on the run, that would give us at least somewhere to start looking. Maybe someone from her past found her.”
“That’s why I love you,” Ellington said. “You’d rather look hard at a theory without legs than admit you have nowhere to start.”
“There’s always somewhere to start,” Mackenzie said, still eyeing the photos. “It’s just that sometimes the place you start is the hardest.”
She pulled out her phone, her eyes bouncing back and forth between her contacts and the pictures of the dead girl on the table.
“Who you calling?” Ellington asked.
“I’m going to have DC patch me through to the US Marshals office to see if they’ll get me a list.”
Ellington, clearly surprised by the suggestion, nodded comically. “Yeah, good luck with that.”
As the phone was answered and she was placed on hold and then finally patched through to the Marshals office, she continued to eye the pictures. The injuries sustained by the vehicle striking her weren’t obvious in the pictures, but the harsh slit across her throat was glaring. The pavement in the pictures was slightly wet and glistening, making the dark red coming from her neck almost surreal.
“This is Assistant Chief Manning,” a rough voice said through the other end of the phone. “Who is this?”
“This is Special Agent Mackenzie White, with the FBI. I’m working a case in Salt Lake City that I believe may involve a young woman out of WITSEC. We have absolutely no ID. Her prints aren’t in any database and the driver’s license found on her body is a fake. I’m taking a shot in the dark and hoping she might be in your system.”
“Agent White, you know I can’t give you the identities of people under our security. That would be breaking about a dozen different laws and regulations.”
“I’m aware of that. But what if I sent you a picture? Using facial recognition, you could maybe come up with something and—”
“Pardon me, but even if you only suspect she might be with WITSEC, sending a picture back and forth breaks even more rules.”
“Being that it’s a crime scene photo, I think it’s permissible,” Mackenzie snapped. “She was hit by a vehicle and then had her throat slit. So I’m not sending you a glamour shot.”
Manning gave a deep sigh that indicated Mackenzie was about to get her way. “Send the picture over and I’ll have someone run a facial recognition search. Of course, I can’t promise anything. But I’ll see what we can do.”
“Thanks.”
“We’ll get back to you as soon as we can.” He gave her the information of where to send the picture before hanging up.
Ellington had been looking over the coroner’s report while she spoke with Manning. “Got your way, huh?”
“Was there ever any doubt?”
He shook his head and handed the coroner’s report over to her. “This is the most recent, fresh off the presses about five hours ago. Sort of interesting, don’t you think?”