“Lucky. Right.”
“And give your contact info to the officer up there, in case we need it.”
Will stood motionless as she trudged up the embankment and back in the direction of the church, her auburn hair whipping in the wind like a kite tail. Chet had been right to hurry him. The sky had turned the color of a tombstone. The air felt heavy, ready to burst.
Will traversed the silty river bottom, as a few stray raindrops broke the water’s surface. When he reached the pipe’s opening, the victim came into full view again, and the tightly coiled muscles in his shoulders unwound. Lately, he’d been more comfortable with the dead bodies than the live ones. The dead had no expectations. They made no demands. Most of all, they didn’t let you down or screw you over. They gave up all their secrets in time if you knew where and how to look.
Chet knelt over the body, carefully studying the dark bruising around the neck with his gloved hands. He looked up as Will sloshed inside. Then he rose to his feet, groaning with the effort. Fog Harbor was lucky to have him. Most of the smaller counties couldn’t afford MEs and employed coroners instead, wannabes who spent two weeks at coroners’ college and called themselves experts.
“Looks like you managed to piss off the second-smartest doctor in this town.”
Will chuckled. “You know her?”
“Sure do.” Chet moved around the body—Will mirrored him—examining the hands, the boots. Marc Jacobs, according to the logo stamped on the wet soles. “Most folks around here know Olivia Rockwell. She’s kind of a big deal. Local girl. Moved back a couple years ago to take care of her mom. She’s chief psychologist over at Crescent Bay.”
Will nodded as if he didn’t care. As if he didn’t loathe the idea that a shrink had unearthed the skeletons in his closet, probably via the Internet, the place where old bones never stayed buried.
“So, what do you think?” he asked, eager to change the subject. Besides, he wanted to get a head start before JB, his know-it-all partner, showed up to put his boot on Will’s neck like usual. “Killed somewhere else and dumped here?”
“Looks that way. She’s well past rigor mortis. I’d say she was probably asphyxiated shortly after she went missing. But I’d expect a few more critters would’ve got to her if she’d been down here since early Thursday morning. Also, the skin back here…” He gently lifted the exposed right shoulder, where the shirt had been pulled away. “It’s intact. Not much maceration or softening like you’d see with a long period of immersion in water. I’d venture a guess she was moved here today.”
“Sexual assault?”
“It’s possible. But the undergarments appear intact. Maybe he started to and was interrupted. Killed her in a panic. We’ll have to wait for the autopsy and the labs to be sure. I’ve gotta warn you, though, a lot of the evidence is probably a wash. Literally.”
Will pointed his flashlight down the pipe. Past the first twenty or so feet, the leaves and graffiti and cigarette butts ended. Beyond that, the darkness consumed everything, even the shadows.
“I didn’t see any drag marks or tracks,” Will told Chet. “Except for Maryann Murdock’s—she found the body. And your ‘big deal’ doctor. Why is she such a big deal anyway?”
Chet shrugged, moving back toward Bonnie’s head. “I’ll let her tell you.”
“What makes you think I plan on speaking to her again?” He asked himself another question. Why do I want to?
“Have a look at this, will ya?” Chet shined his penlight onto the victim’s neck. The ligature, denim blue. Near the back, underneath the clumps of her matted hair, the color changed to a sunshine yellow that seemed all wrong down here.
“What is it made of?”
“Can’t say for absolute sure, but it seems to be fabric. This yellow could be a stamp of some sort. To me, it looks a helluva lot like prison blues.”
The drainpipe glowed from within, lit by a fleet of high-powered utility lamps, as the officers combed the length of it for evidence. Will looked on from the top of the embankment while they bagged Bonnie’s hands and carted her off in a bag of her own. Chief Flack had insisted on delivering the official news to James and Bonnie’s mother herself, which saved Will from his least favorite part of dealing with dead bodies.
“Want to start with the husband in the morning?” Will asked, while JB glowered and lit another cigarette. That man’s chest was empty as a steel drum, and he had the four ex-wives to prove it. “We can get more background on the vic while we wait for the autopsy. What do you say?”
JB took a long drag and exhaled in his direction. Will would’ve rather passed out than give him the satisfaction of a single cough. He wished the rain would start up again and extinguish that cigarette with a single fat drop.
“I’d say you should’ve waited for your partner to do the walk-through with Chet. I’d also say you don’t call the shots around here, City Boy.”
City Boy. Will liked it better than what they’d called him in San Francisco. Rat. Traitor. Snitch.
“Alright, JB. Whatever you want. You tell me where you’d like to start.”
“Now you’re talking. How ’bout we start with the husband?”
Will had gritted his teeth and nodded. Nothing that a few hard right hooks couldn’t fix. And now that he’d made it home, to the cabin he’d rented outside of town, he planned to make good on his promise to take it out on the heavy bag.
He changed quickly, stripping off his mud-spattered vigil-wear and tossing on an SFPD T-shirt and shorts—working out was the only thing they were good for these days—and headed into the one-car garage he called a gym. Or his salvation. Depending on the day.
Will waved at a darting shadow in the corner. “Hey, get outta here!”
That damn one-eyed cat had been weaseling its way into the garage every rainstorm for the last few weeks. Probably because he’d broken once and left out a can of tuna. The cat slipped out the way it came through a feline-sized hole in the garage door siding. The whole cabin was a fixer-upper he didn’t have the time or energy to fix up. So, he couldn’t hold it against the poor fella. Truth be told, he felt a kinship with that orange tabby; permanently damaged with nobody to claim him.
Outside, the rain sounded indignant. Beating against the roof like it channeled his outrage.
Will didn’t bother with boxing gloves. Just wrapped his hands like he’d learned at King’s in Oakland. He cranked the music he always played for these sessions. His 1980s hard rock mix that started with Bon Jovi and ended with Guns N’ Roses.
First, a left jab to the face. That’s for JB. The bag swayed right to left and back again. Not bad for a guy on the wrong side of forty.
Followed up with a heavy right cross. That’s for whatever sicko had ended Bonnie and dumped her body like a sack of trash in a sewer drainpipe.
Then, a couple right hooks to the body. For the old bones of his past. The whole goddamned skeleton.
Last, he delivered the knockout. A fierce uppercut that juddered his whole arm but still wasn’t hard enough. One more. And another. His knuckles stung as he pictured his brother’s face.