John nodded. “Throat slit, bled out. Seems obvious. He sedates them with injections, and then kills them.”
Adele wrinkled her nose, scanning to the bottom of the document and flipping through the pictures from the victims—the least pleasant part of the job. But as she scanned, she slowly shook her head. “The needle was small. But why sedate them, if you’re just going to cut their throats? There’s no torture.”
John winced. “Sexual assault?”
She shook her head. “None visible. Doesn’t seem like that either.”
“Would be strange if so. Such different victims. If the killer was using them for sadistic pleasure, he certainly doesn’t have a type.”
“That’s a morbid thought. But… he’s almost humane towards his victims.” Adele shook her head, scanning the last few items of the report. Then, once finished, she slowly lowered her laptop lid and stared at the backrest in front of her. Again, John tried to flick her knuckles, but this time she was too quick, and she slammed the laptop on his fingers.
He yelped and jerked his hand back. “Serves you right,” she muttered. “Especially after throwing me under the bus with Foucault.”
John shrugged petulantly. “Not my fault you’re off yelling at factory workers.”
“It was nothing,” she said, curtly.
She could now feel his gaze burrowing into the side of her cheek. But she refused to look at him. Not even John knew about her side investigation—she wasn’t sure why she hadn’t shared. Somehow, it simply felt too personal.
Adele exhaled slowly, reaching up to fiddle with the small air conditioning nozzle above her. She thought about the case again, mulling over the details. Why would the killer inject his victims, sedate them, just to slit their throats later? Why not just cut their throats to begin with? It didn’t make much sense. If he wanted to play with his victims, then the sedation made sense. Adele had seen a similar MO on her first case back in France, but then the killer had tortured his victims. He had gotten off on it. This time, though, there was something almost clinical about the cuts. The least amount of pain possible. Almost, and the word barely applied, but it almost felt humane. As if the killer had wanted to sedate them so they didn’t know they were going to be killed. This didn’t fit with anything she knew about psychopaths.
“What are you thinking?” John asked.
She leaned back in the airplane chair, pressing her head against the cushioned headrest. She tried to close her eyes, to focus, and inhaled slowly. “Seems procedural,” she said, softly. “Clinical. I don’t think he’s a sadist. I don’t think he’s getting off on it.”
“Then why kill them?”
“A German farmer, a French sommelier,” Adele said. “Why kill them indeed. I guess that’s the question.”
She listened to the buzz and hum of the airplane, another quiet rattle as they made their way out of turbulence, and the subsequent sigh of relief from a couple of wealthy travelers in the front section of first class. Adele tried to inhale fully, then exhale to calm herself. She never particularly liked cases that involve knives. Images flashed across her mind’s eye at the thought. Cuts, scars, swirling, looping patterns painted in agony and flesh.
Adele winced, gritting her teeth, her eyes sightless as she stared at the back headrest in front of her. Normally, when she went for a jog in the mornings, it helped clear her head, and it helped her focus. Now, though, she could feel the anxiety swirling in her chest. She could picture the images, the screenshot memories of her mother’s case, her mother’s corpse. Memories perhaps best forgotten, or filed away deep, deep in her subconscious.
Still, despite her distraction, it was up to Adele to solve this particular case. Clinical or not, humane or otherwise, there was a killer on the loose, and it was her job to find him before he killed again.
CHAPTER SIX
Agent John Renee hated small cars. His long legs pushed up against the back seat in the squad car the Bordeaux Police Department had sent for them. Adele was in the front passenger seat, and he felt certain she had pushed her chair as far back as it would go on purpose.
He could feel his knees pressed up against the leather, and he glared at the back of Adele’s head over the head rest. Her shoulder-length blonde hair was pulled back in a neat ponytail. She had showered before the flight, and he could smell the faint fragrance of strawberries and soap.
“Nice scenery,” Adele said absentmindedly, gazing out the front window.
The local cop who had been sent to fetch them didn’t reply, but just nodded once, his eyes fixed on the road ahead of them as they moved down the road. On either side, fields stretched across in the shadows of mountains; hilly terrain was replaced by flat, open expanses. John could see the effect of swirling wind meandering through various trees, and row after row of vines married to wooden supports on either side of the road.
Adele murmured, “It’s been a while since I’ve been out here. It really is quite pretty.” She pushed a finger against the window button and it slid a bit. A warm, fragrant breeze swirled through the vehicle, and Adele smiled to herself, the corner of her lips just visible to John.
“Yes, fine,” John snapped, indifferent to his partner’s existential moment. “Mind moving your chair forward a bit?”
She turned slightly and looked at him over her shoulder. Even her profile was quite pretty in an exotic sort of way. French, American, and German. Adele was the full package. John wrinkled his nose at the thought, though, and quickly distanced himself from it. He replaced the sentiment with another burst of frustration. “I’m serious, you’re cutting off my circulation.”
Adele’s tone carried every level of condescension as she said, “Maybe if you weren’t such a filthy, filthy lover, your blood flow would be better regulated.”
Then she turned back and made absolutely no effort to adjust her seat.
John leaned back, jamming his knees into her chair, realizing exactly how childish this made him seem. As he looked at Adele, though, staring at her from the back of the squad car, he felt a flicker of unease. She had been acting strangely ever since the case in Germany with the missing children. He had been there, after she had fallen out with her father.
Part of him wondered if he ought to ask her about it. That’s what a decent person would do, or so he assumed. He rarely spent much time around any of those.
The squad car pulled up a dusty dirt path, kicking up debris and rattling as it made its way along the unpaved road. John winced each time one of his knees jammed painfully into the back of Adele’s seat. He gripped the handle above his window, and waited, until they pulled to a halt.
“This is it?” he asked, growling.
“Yes, sir,” said the local. “It’s where they found the body. The vineyard where she works is only two miles down the road.”
Adele was already exiting the car, pushing open the door and stepping out. She closed the door behind her, giving John time to figure out how to squeeze out of the cramped backseat on his own.
At last, he managed to extricate himself, stepping out into the dusty, cool terrain beneath the sun veiled by a scattering of clouds. He blinked a couple of times, his eyes narrowed against the glare in the sky as he examined the crime scene.