Then I turned my back on him as Jacobi appeared at my side, saying that he’d collected the security tapes, including those that had been trained on the loading docks.
We paused to watch cops usher paying customers through the promotional glitz and out the door. Nobody was very happy, to put it mildly.
“If we don’t nail these psychos,” Jacobi said, “I’m taking early retirement. Without a party. And you, Boxer, you’re going to be busted down to meter maid.”
“You know what I’m wondering?” I said to my old partner. “How the hell did they get that girl in here?”
Chapter 81
I KEPT RUBBING MY ARMS against the chill inside the morgue as I took in the pitiful sight of our latest Jane Doe lying nude on a steel table.
She looked as innocent and as vulnerable as a sleeping child.
Claire greeted me from her stepladder, where she was shooting the victim from above, while at ground level, nonessential personnel ogled the naked, pretty woman.
“Hey,” Claire barked. “Everyone, get out. Out! Not you, Lindsay. Bunny! Bag and tag the shoes. Give everything to Loomis and don’t forget the necklace. It’s right there on the table.”
Claire stepped heavily down from the ladder, adjusted the light a few degrees, revealing four faint smudges fanned out on the girl’s left cheek.
Fingerprints.
I could hardly believe it. Thank God, we finally had something.
“Those are a child’s prints,” Claire said, crushing my half second of elation. “Left by the six-year-old boy who found her.”
“Nuts,” I said. “Hey. What’s that?”
I moved in closer to better see the glint of something in the girl’s mouth. Was it a clue? Maybe a message?
“Too sad for words, that’s what it is,” Claire told me. “Show Girl here is wearing braces.”
The air went out of me.
She was so young. Too young to die, especially like this.
Why were you working, little girl?
I watched Claire scrape under the victim’s nails, clip them into an envelope. Seal it, sign it. Walk around the table and do the same to her other hand.
“I got the tox screen back, Lindsay,” she said. “Same sorry story, girlfriend. Her blood alcohol was point one one zero, and there was a ton of Rohypnol in her system. Same as the others.”
“So they liquored her up and drugged her, of course. Why take any chances she’d fight back? Cause of death?”
“Like before, they probably burked, smothered, and strangled her sometime around midnight. Definitely a homicide.”
“Those pricks are consistent, aren’t they? I’m guessing they gave her a bath to get rid of trace evidence. Like the other two.”
“So you think she was killed in a hotel room?”
“Yeah, and she’s probably a working girl. Three girls down, and I’m still looking for one decent lead.”
Claire said, “I think I’ve got something for you, honey.” She turned to her assistant. “Bunny, help me roll Jane Doe. Can you do that?”
Claire placed Show Girl’s right arm across her body and pulled her over to her side as Bunny balanced her.
“Look here,” said Claire, pointing to the smudge behind the girl’s left knee.
I stooped down, saw the crisp ridges of a fingerprint that had been raised by fuming the girl’s skin with superglue.