Flesh and Bone (Body Farm 2)

“Sickening, isn’t it?” said Art. “I spend hours every day looking at filth like this. It’s getting to me, I have to tell you.”

“I can’t even begin to imagine. How on earth did you get into this? And for heaven’s sake, why?”

He sighed. “You remember that little girl who was abducted, raped, and murdered a few months back? The perp represented by your buddy Grease?” I nodded, grimacing; Art had been deeply distressed by the case, especially the fact that the abductor’s lawyer, Burt DeVriess-“Grease,” most of the cops called him-had delayed the search of the car in which the child had been kidnapped. “Well, when we finally searched the guy’s house and his computer, we found tons of child pornography. Not surprising-a lot of child predators trade kiddie porn over the Internet, and some of them troll for victims in online chat rooms.” I nodded. “After that case, the chief decided that it was time for us to go after guys like that before they struck, rather than after. Guess who won the coin toss?”

He sounded bitter about the assignment, but I knew Art better than that. What he was bitter about was the existence of child predators. Spending his days and nights in their virtual company would be bound to take a toll on him, but I knew he would pursue them with relentless zeal.

“So what’s with the ‘Tiffany’ business?”

“That’s one of my chat room IDs. I’m a thirteen-year-old girl who hates her parents, loves to chat, and can’t wait to find out what love is really like. I’ve got a dozen dirty old men across the state just dying to initiate me into the pleasures of the flesh.”

“Clearly they have a different picture of you than I do,” I said, eyeing Art’s stocky body and graying hair.

“Oh, absolutely,” he said. “I’m actually tall and slim, but all the boys say I have nice boobs and a great ass.”

I shuddered. “Yuck. I can’t believe you have to think like that.”

“Tell me about it. One of these creeps is about to talk me into sneaking away to meet him. Some jerk down in Sweetwater who thinks I’ll be there this weekend visiting my aunt, who just so happens to live near the Motel Six. I can’t wait to see the look on his face when I kick in the door of the motel room, flash him my badge, and say, ‘Hi, asshole, I’m Tiffany, and you’re under arrest.’”

I had to laugh, in spite of the seamy subject. “But Sweetwater’s fifty miles south of here. Isn’t that a little outside your jurisdiction?”

“Not anymore,” Art said. He picked up a badge from the desk and handed it to me. It was a five-pointed gold star encircled by the words UNITED STATES MARSHAL.

I whistled. “U.S. Marshal? How’d a lowly KPD cop swing that?”

“We’re working with the feds,” he said. “FBI and postal inspectors. I’ve got arrest powers anywhere in the state. Believe it or not, this”-he swept his arm in an arc that encompassed the dingy space-“is the headquarters of the Tennessee Task Force on Internet Crimes Against Children. Mainly me and a couple of stolen computers so far, but we’re about to get some serious money and manpower.”

“Good for you,” I said. “Reminds me of my own job-the work stinks, but somebody’s got to do it. Can’t think of anybody who’d do this with more commitment and integrity.”

“Not sure how long I can take it, though,” he said. “I’m only two months in, and already my blood pressure’s through the roof, I’m having trouble sleeping, and once I do get to sleep, I have awful nightmares.”

Knowing what a decent guy Art was, that didn’t surprise me. “You’re on a rough diet right now,” I said. “Nothing but rotten fruit from the tree of knowledge.”

“Isn’t there supposed to be some good fruit on that tree, too? Last time I read the Bible, it was called the tree of knowledge of good and evil.”

“Yeah, but the good stuff ’s on branches neither one of us gets to pick,” I said. “Speaking of bad fruit, let me show you what I need you to print. You might want to glove up for this.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out a pair of latex gloves for him, plus a pair for me. Then I opened the small cooler Jess had given me. Inside, propped on a bed of ice and sealed in a plastic bag, was the Chattanooga victim’s penis. A bloody thumbprint-bigger than the one Jess had planted on our research subject-showed clearly through the bag.

If I’d known Jess was bringing this grisly piece of evidence with her, I’d have asked Art to meet us at the Body Farm. I didn’t mind playing courier, though, as I hadn’t seen Art in weeks and I welcomed the chance to catch up with him, even briefly.

When he recognized the object in the baggie, Art’s eyes widened and he gave a low whistle. “Ouch, man. Well, you’ve certainly come to the right place,” he said, nodding toward the computer monitors. “Feels like we’re in the theme park from hell here. What’s the story? There is a story, right? I mean, it’s not every day somebody brings me a severed pecker on ice.”

“Sure, there’s a story. We just don’t know what it is yet. The guy this belonged to was found tied to a tree in a state forest outside Chattanooga. He was wearing a woman’s wig, makeup, and leather corset. Head and face were bashed in pretty bad. And this was stuffed in his mouth.”

“I can think of a few more guys that deserve the same treatment,” he said. Then: “Sorry-I don’t mean that this guy did. I shouldn’t let what I’m working on here poison my thinking about other cases.”

“It’s okay,” I said. “Be tough not to.”

“You thinking homophobic hate crime?”

“Well, that’s sure what it looks like. First glance, anyhow.”

Art switched on a small desk lamp beside one of the monitors; mercifully, he also switched off both monitors. Holding the severed organ gingerly in the palm of one gloved hand, he leaned close and studied the bloody print. “Not a bad print, considering,” he said. “If your killer is considerate enough to have prints on file, we might just get a match. I’ll need to take it back to the lab, though. You wanna come along?”

“Don’t you need to stay here…Tiffany?”

He glared at me, then cupped a hand behind one ear. “I think I hear my mean old mom calling me,” he said. “She says I have to log off and do my stupid algebra homework. Like, what a total bitch?”

He switched the monitors back on, prompting me to flee to the front of the pawnshop, where I inspected Tiny’s merchandise. The glass display case contained several iPods, a handful of heavy gold neck chains, and at least a dozen handguns, ranging in price from one hundred dollars to three hundred. I couldn’t tell any difference between the least expensive and the most expensive, so I asked Tiny to explain. “This here’s a Hi-Point,” he said, pulling out the hundred-dollar gun. “Lots of ’em out there, ’cause they’s so damn cheap. Some folks say they’re bad to jam, but that’s mostly because of cheap ammo, is what I think. ’Course, if you can’t afford but a hunnerd-dollar gun, you probably got to buy cheap ammo, too. So either way, you could be screwed.” He pulled out the expensive gun. “This is a SIG Sauer,” he said. “Everything about this weapon is top-notch. If I’m needin’ to shoot some sumbitch, I want to be able to trust my piece. Don’t you?”

“Um, sure,” I said. “Damn right I do.”

“Okay, Deadeye, let’s go,” said Art. “I have to do homework for a whole hour, and then I’ve got a chat room date I have to get back for.”

CHAPTER 4

THE KNOXVILLE POLICE DEPARTMENT was housed in a gray and tan concrete and brick fortress of indeterminate vintage-late 1960s or early ’70s, maybe, the heyday of “urban renewal,” when whole blocks of old buildings were razed to make way for parking lots and stark, boxy structures. Situated a stone’s throw from two of Knoxville’s low-income housing projects, it probably saved the city thousands a year in fuel costs just by virtue of its location.

As Art and I passed the front desk I looked for Gunderson, the sergeant I’d joked with earlier in the day, but evidently his shift was over, for the desk was staffed by a young Latina woman. She waved at Art, studied me and my coole

r briefly, then pressed some button that opened the elevator for us.

For years the fingerprint lab was down in the basement, but these days, it inhabited quarters on the second floor. Art nodded at a countertop, which I took as a sign to set the cooler down. It was a good guess; he opened the top and lifted out the bag containing the penis.