"Will you call it in?" Roarke asked.
"I'll check it out myself first. I should say we'll check it out," she amended as he was up and dressing as she was.
"Celina?" "She'll have to deal." Eve strapped on her weapon. "We all have to deal with the stuff in our heads. Let's move." She let him drive. It might have irked that he handled a vehicle any vehicle with more skill than she, but it wasn't the time to quibble about it.
It wasn't the time, she admitted, to quibble about psychics either. She yanked out her communicator and requested a patrol to report to Memorial Park to check out a possible assault.
"Look for a male, between six four and six eight, muscular build. Approximately two-seventy. If found, detain only.
Consider said individual armed and dangerous." Eve leaned forward, as if to give them more velocity as they streaked toward southern Manhattan. "She could be seeing something that's going to happen, not that has. It could be what do you call it?" "Precognition." "Yeah." But there was a heaviness in her belly that told her otherwise. "I'm close. Goddamn it, I know I'm on the right track." "If he's killed tonight, he didn't wait two months." "Maybe he never has." They chose the west entrance, off Memorial Place, and pulled up behind the black-and-white snugged to the curb.
"How many ways in and out of this?" Eve asked. Three, four?" "About that, at a guess. I don't know for sure. It's only about a block square, I think. One of the smaller and more tasteful of the original WTC memorials." She crossed the sidewalk and, drawing her weapon, moved through the stone archway that led into the green.
There were benches, a small pond. Big trees, plots of flowers, and a large bronze statue depicting firefighters raising a flag.
She moved past it, and heard the retching.
Swiveling toward the sound, she walked quickly south and saw the uniform on his hands and knees, puking into a bed of red and white flowers.
"Officer-" But she saw the bench a few feet away, and what was on it. "Deal with him," she told Roarke and walked to the second uniform who was holding his communicator.
She had her badge up. "Dallas." "Officer Queeks, Lieutenant. Found her just a minute ago.
I was about to call it in. We didn't see anyone. Just her. To ascertain death, I checked her pulse. She's still warm." "I want this scene secured." She glanced back. "Is he going to do us any good?" "He'll be okay, Lieutenant. Rookie," he added with a small, pained smile. "We've all been there." "Get him on his feet, Queeks. Secure the scene and do a sweep of this park. Carefully. This isn't where he killed her.
There'll be another site. I'll call it in." She drew out her communicator. "Dispatch, this is Dallas, Lieutenant Eve." "Acknowledged." "Homicide, single victim, female. Location Memorial Park, southwest sector. Contact Peabody, Detective Delia, and crime scene." "Acknowledged, Dallas, Lieutenant Eve. Dispatch out." "You'll want this," Roarke said from behind her, and offered her a field kit.
"Yeah. I need you to stay back." She sealed up, hooked on a recorder.
He watched her approach the victim, begin to record the scene visually and verbally.
It was fascinating to watch her work, he thought again.
And sometimes it was unspeakably sad.
There was pity in her eyes, and there was anger. She wouldn't know it showed, and he doubted anyone but himself could see it. But it was there, inside her as she put a madman's latest work on record.
She'd study the dead, he thought, and the details. She'd miss nothing. But it wouldn't only be murder she'd see. She'd see the human. That made all the difference.
A little more slender than the others, Eve thought. Not as curvy. More delicate, and maybe just a bit younger. But still in the ballpark. Long, light brown hair a little bit of a wave, but nearly straight. Had probably been pretty, too, though you wouldn't know it now. Not now that her face was ruined.
The beating she'd sustained was more severe than Maplewood's. He was enjoying that part more, she thought.
He was less able to control himself.
Punish her. What she stood for.
Destroy her. What she stood for.
Whoever this woman was, it hadn't been she he'd killed.
Whose face had he seen when he'd tightened the cord around her neck? Whose eyes had stared back at him? When the position of the body, the visual injuries were on record, she drew the hands apart to run prints.
"Lieutenant!" Queeks called from her right. "I think we've got your kill site." "Secure it. Block it off, Queeks. I don't want anyone walking around on my scene." "Yes, sir." "Victim is identified through fingerprints as Lily Napier, age twenty-eight. Listed address is 293 Vesey Street, apartment 5C." You had been pretty, Lily, Eve thought as she studied the ID picture on her screen. Soft, slight. A little shy.
"Employed O'Hara's Bar and Grill, Albany Street. Walking home from work, weren't you, Lily? It's not very far. Saves the transpo fare, and it's a warm night. It's your neighborhood.
You'd walk through the park, and then you'd be home." She fit on goggles, examined the hands, the nails. Death hadn't yet leeched all the heat from her body.
"Looks like dirt, some grass. We can hope for fibers or skin. Broken wrist, looks like a broken jaw. Multiple contusions and abrasions on face, torso, shoulders. Did a number on you, Lily. Appearance of sexual assault. Some evidence of vaginal bleeding. Contusions, abrasions on thighs and genital area. Removing some fibers into evidence." She worked meticulously, plucking tiny fibers from the body, never flinching as she took them from the genital area.
She sealed them, tagged them, logged them.
And if part of her system revolted, much as the rookie's had, if part of her wanted to scream at the visions of rape, she refused them, and continued on.
Still wearing the goggles, she leaned down into the dead face and studied the bloody holes where the eyes had been.
"Smooth, clean cuts, similar to those inflicted on Elisa Maplewood." "Dallas." "Peabody." She didn't look around, and thought only briefly that she missed, for some reason, the telltale clomp of Peabody's uniform shoes. "We've got the kill site just south.
First on scene is Queeks. Verified that scene's secured." "Crime scene's right behind me." Take part of the team with you, have them start looking in a direct path from that scene to this for impressions in the grass. But don't let anybody mess with that scene until I've seen it." "On that. Uniforms found her?"
"No." Eve straightened now. "Celina Sanchez had another vision." Eve finished her exam of the body and the dump site, then walked to where Roarke stood, just behind the crime scene sensors Queeks had set up.
She'd remember that, she thought. Remember that Officer Queeks worked quick and quiet and didn't annoy the primary with a lot of chatter and questions.
"You don't have to wait." "I'll wait," Roarke said. "I'm in it now." "Guess you are. Well, come with me. You've got good eyes. Maybe you'll spot something I miss." She took a wide circular route to the second scene. If he'd left impressions in the grass again, she didn't want to disturb them.
She nodded to Queeks. "Good work. Where's the rookie?" "I got him out securing the entrances with a couple of the guys. He's okay, Lieutenant, just green. Only been on the job three months, and this was his first body. It was a tough one, too. But he maintained until he was well away from the scene." "I'm not writing him up for hurling, Queeks. You see anything I should know about other than the body?" "We came in the same entrance as you. Got one on all four sides. We headed south, intending to make a circle. Saw her pretty quick. Didn't observe anyone else. Not in the park or on the street. We were just coming out of a double D on Varick when the call came through on this. Some street people out, some die-hard LC's trolling, but no one that fit the description we were given." "How long have you worked in this sector?" "About a dozen." "You know O'Hara's?" "Sure, Mick place down on Albany. Decent place, food's tolerable."