Survivor in Death (In Death 20)

Somehow it cheered her to know it. At least the kid got a last taste of sweet. “Murder weapons?”

“Identical. Most likely a ten-inch blade. See here.”

He gestured to the screen, magnified the wound on the child’s throat. “See the jags? There, on the edge of the diagonal. Swipe down, from his left to his right. Not a full smooth blade, or a full jagged. Three teeth serrating from the handle, the rest smooth-bladed.”

“Sounds like a combat knife.”

“That would be my take. It was employed by a right-handed individual.”

“There were two.”

“So I’m told. Eyeballing it, I’d have said the same hand delivered the killing blows, but as you can see . . .” He turned to another screen, called for pictures, split screen on Grant and Keelie Swisher. Magnified the wounds.

“There’re slight deviations. Male vic’s wound is deeper, more of a slicing motion, more jagged, while the female’s is more of a draw across. When all five are put up . . .” He nodded as the screen shifted to show five throat wounds. “You can see that the housekeeper, the father, and the boy have the same slicing wound, while the mother and the girl have the more horizontal drawing across. You’ll want the lab to run some reconstructs, but it’s going to be a ten-inch blade, twelve at the max, with those three teeth near the handle.”

“Military style,” she stated. “Not that you have to be military to obtain one. But it’s just one more piece of the operation. Military tactics, equipment, and weapons. None of the adults did military time, or appear to have any connection to the military. Can’t link any of them, at this point, to paramilitary or game playing.”

Then again, she thought, sometimes a cozy family was the perfect cover for covert or dark deeds.

“I’ve cleared the Dysons.” Eve glanced back at Linnie. “Have they seen her yet?”

“Yes. An hour ago. It was . . . hideous. Look at her,” he urged. “So small. We get smaller, of course. Infants barely out of the womb. It’s amazing what we enlightened adults can do to those who need us most.”

“You don’t have any kids, right?” Eve asked.

“No, no chick nor child. There was a woman once, and we were together long enough to consider it. But that was . . . long ago.”

She studied his face, slickly framed by black hair pulled cleanly back in one sleek tail that was bound in crisscrossing silver twine. Under the clear, protective suit, stained now with body fluids, his shirt was silver as well.

“I’ve got the kid, the one they didn’t get. I don’t know what to do with her.”

“Keep her alive. I would think that would be priority.”

“Got that part handled. I’ll need those tox reports, and anything that pops, as soon as.”

“You’ll have them. They wore wedding rings.”

“Sorry?”

“The parents. Not everyone does these days.” Morris nodded toward the scribed band Eve wore on the ring finger of her left hand. “It’s not very fashionable. Wearing them is a statement. I belong. They’d made love, about three hours prior to death. They used a spermicide rather than long-term or permanent birth control, whi

ch tells me they hadn’t ruled out the possibility of more children in the future. That, and the rings, Dallas? I find that both comforts and angers me.”

“Anger’s better. Keeps you sharper.”

When she walked toward Homicide in the massive beehive of Cop Central, she spotted Detective Baxter at a vending unit, getting what passed for coffee. She dug out credits, flipped them to him. “Tube of Pepsi.”

“Still avoiding contact with vending machines?”

“It’s working. They don’t piss me off, I don’t kick them into rubble.”

“Heard about your case,” he said as he plugged in her credits. “And so did every reporter in the city. You got most of them hassling the media liaison and hammering for an interview with the primary.”

“Reporters aren’t on my to-do list right at the moment.” She took the tube of Pepsi he offered, frowned. “You said most. Why is Nadine Furst of Channel 75 even now sitting on her well-toned ass in my office?”

“How do you know? Not about the ass, anybody could see Furst’s got an excellent ass.”

“You’ve got cookie crumbs on your shirt, you putz. You let her into my office.”