She stepped back onto the porch and whistled at McKenzie. He was on his cell phone, raised his eyebrows in question. She gestured for him to come to her. He nodded, said something briefly into the cell, then slapped it shut and bounded up the stairs. Taylor spoke quietly.
“I’ve got the victim’s sister in the house. Kid’s completely shattered. She needs to have someone with her. Would you mind?”
“Not at all. Everyone’s on their way.”
“Great, thanks. Come with me,”
They reentered the house, and Taylor led McKenzie to Letha.
“Letha, this is Detective McKenzie. He’s going to talk to you for a few minutes while we check on your brother. We’re going to go upstairs now. If you need anything, anything at all, you just ask Detective McKenzie, okay?”
The girl nodded, silent as the grave. She gave Taylor an odd feeling, a premonition that worse things were to come, though she couldn’t pinpoint why.
“How about wre go into the kitchen, Letha?” McKenzie held out a hand. The girl took it and rose, unsteady on her feet, eyes blank. She allowed herself to be towed away. Shock. Poor, creepy little thing.
The staircase was mahogany, sweeping, twin rises that met together in a catwalk loft on the second floor. They took the left set of steps, Taylor unconsciously counting as they went up. Thirty-three stairs. The view down to the grand foyer was only slightly obscured by a brilliant chandelier strung with fake cobwebs, creating a gauzy veil on the downstairs. The hallway floor was wide-planked oak topped with elegant throw rugs and capriciously placed tables covered in ethnic crystal and wood tchotchkes. Tribal masks lined the corridor. The parents were either travelers or collectors.
Four doors bled off the center hall. One was open.
Taylor glanced back over her shoulder at Baldwin. His face was calm, placid, ready for anything. His eyes met hers briefly, questioning. She hadn’t realized she’d stopped in her tracks until Si mart cleared her throat.
“Everything okay?”
Was it? Taylor had the strangest sense, almost like a strong hand was pushing at her chest, pushing her away from the bedroom door. She couldn’t detect any of the usual smells that accompanied a violent crime scene-blood, fear, human waste. It smelled…like flowers. Once she realized that the scent was coming from the open bedroom, she placed it. Jasmine. The murder scene smelled like jasmine. Once her nose got used to that idea, she did catch just the tiniest hint of copper, tangy underneath the cloying sweetness.
The odd sensation left her. She smiled at Simari.
“Sorry. I’m fine. Just…smelling.”
“I know,” Simari said. ”It’s weird. I don’t usually expect boys to wear perfume, but what do I know? In this world, anything is possible. He’s in there.” She pointed toward the open door, let Taylor take the lead.
“Probably the sister’s. Though I didn’t catch it downstairs,” Baldwin said.
Sometimes at a crime scene Taylor had the overwhelming feeling that she was on camera, that some unseen videographer tracked her every move. She was fodder for the silver screen, walking down a darkened hallway while the audience knew something horrible lay just beyond her grasp. Look out behind you, don’t go into that dark space alone, better run out of the safety of the house into the forest when the killer is coming after you with a knife. Goose bumps paraded up and down her arms. God, she hated horror movies.
She shook it off. Halloween always got to her. A crime scene on Halloween was just designed to play into her overactive imagination.
Steeled, she stepped into Jerrold King’s bedroom.
She struggled to take in the whole scene and not make judgments. Her job as lead investigator was to make sure her detectives didn’t jump to conclusions, didn’t make snap decisions about the case. She emphasized considered opinions, reasoning, a belief in the evidence. But Jerrold King’s body made her want to discard all she’d been taught.
She edged closer. He was naked, lying on his back, arms spread to the sides. His mouth was open, slack, with small edges of spittle gathered in the corners. His lips were blue; eyes unfocused and slitted. There were no ligature marks, no strangulation bruises. Granted, that could show up later-contusions took time to develop. But for now, his naked skin was free of visible hematomas. In their place were bloody channels, carved into his flesh. The red-on white effect was startling, gapes in the tender skin. A sharp knife, no doubt. But these weren’t stab wounds. There was a distinct pattern to the slashes.
She was a foot away from the bed now, and carefully bent to get a closer look. Baldwin was on the other side of the bed. She looked up from the wounds into his worried eyes.
“No,” she said. “It can’t be”
“It most certainly can,” he said.
“Urban legend,” Simari said.
Taylor stepped back a few feet to see if she could make sense of the wounds. Yes? from a distance, she could see it plainly. Five slashes, connected at the points, outlined in a ragged circle. A pentacle, carved into the dead boy’s chest.
Two
The scream startled Taylor, and she jerked back from the body.
Simari’s shoulder radio crackled and Taylor’s cell rang almost simultaneously. She looked at the caller ID. It was Lincoln.
“Yes?” she answered.
“You need to get down here now. We’ve got a serious problem.”
“What?”
“There’s another one.”
“Another victim?”
Simari was already hightailing it out of Jerrold King’s bedroom. Taylor slapped her phone shut. She and Baldwin followed Simari down the staircase and onto the porch. The screaming was coming from the other side of the street, three houses down.
“Help! Please help me!”
A woman stood in the driveway, waving her arms. Lincoln was standing by her, unsuccessfully trying to calm her down.
The street was nearly as bright as day-all the houses” front lights were on, headlights from the influx of patrol cars cut through the murk, multitudes of Maglites were trained on the faces of people standing frozen in their driveways.
As they ran up the street, Taylor felt all eyes turn to them. Her boots clanged against the asphalt, ringing out louder than Baldwin’s steps. She had an odd thought; terror wasn’t a familiar fee ling in this neighborhood.
They reached Lincoln, and Taylor skidded to a stop, some loose gravel nearly causing her to turn an ankle. She caught her breath.
“Ma’am, I’m Taylor Jackson, Metro Homicide. What’s the problem?”
“My daughter. My daughter is-” Her voice caught, the sobs breaking free from her chest. “She’s dead in her room.”
“Show us,” Taylor said.
“I can’t. I can’t go back in there.”
Imploring Lincoln with her eyes, Taylor nodded at Baldwin and Siniari. They hurried into the house, strangely similar to the King home, and up a sweeping staircase. The scent of jasmine lingered in the air. Taylor’s chest felt tight.
The scene was easy to find. There were towels scattered on the floor, the mother must have been bringing up some laundry. A plaque on the girl’s door had the name Ashley in pink bubble letters. Below it was a stop sign that screamed, Ashley’s Environs. KEEP OUT!
The door was ajar. Taylor stepped over the wad of towels into the girl’s room.
She was faceup on the bed, arms stretched out over her head. Her brown hair was pulled into a ponytail and a green mask had dried on her skin. There was an open bottle of nail polish on the bedside table, the scent acrid. Giving herself a home spa treatment, a facial, a manicure. Typical afternoon in a teenage girl’s life, her innocent ablutions cruelly interrupted by death.