The Bone Collector (Lincoln Rhyme 1)

"No," Sachs whispered. "I don't see how . . . No."

"Is the room secure?"

Sachs glanced at the officer, who'd heard the transmission and nodded.

"Scene secure."

Rhyme told her, "I want the ESU trooper out then you and the medic go check on her."

Sachs gagged once on the smell and forced herself to control the reflex. She and the medic walked in an oblique path to the pipe. He bent unemotionally forward and felt the woman's neck. He shook his head.

"Amelia?" Rhyme asked.

Her second body in the line of duty. Both in one day.

The medic said, "DCDS."

Sachs nodded, said formally into the mike, "We have a deceased, confirmed dead at the scene."

"Scalded to death?" Rhyme asked.

"Looks like it."

"Tied to the wall?"

"A pipe. Handcuffed, hands behind. Feet tied with clothesline. Duct-tape gag. He opened the steam pipe. She was only a couple of feet from it. God."

Rhyme continued, "Back the medic out the way you came. To the door. Watch where you put your feet."

She did this, staring at the body. How could the skin be so red? Like a boiled crab shell.

"All right, Amelia. You're going to work the scene. Open the suitcase."

She said nothing. Kept staring.

"Amelia, are you at the door? . . . Amelia?"

"What?" she shouted.

"Are you at the door?"

His voice was so fucking calm. So different from the snide, demanding voice of the man she remembered in the bedroom. Calm . . . and something else. She didn't know what.

"Yes, I'm at the door. You know, this is crazy."

"Utterly insane," Rhyme agreed, almost cheerfully. "Is the suitcase open?"

She flipped up the lid and glanced inside. Pliers and forceps, a flex mirror on a handle, cotton balls, eyedroppers, pinking sheers, pipettes, spatulas, scalpels . . .

What is all this?

. . . a Dustbuster, cheesecloth, envelopes, sifting screens, brushes, scissors, plastic and paper bags, metal cans, bottles--5 percent nitric acid, ninhydrin, silicone, iodide, friction-ridge-printing supplies.

Impossible. Into the mike she said, "I don't think you believed me, detective. I really don't know anything about CS work."

Eyes on the woman's ruined body. Water dripped off her peeled nose. A bit of white--bone--showed through the cheek. And her face was drawn into an anguished grin. Just like the vic that morning.

"I believed you, Amelia," he said dismissively. "Now, the case is open?" He was calm and he sounded . . . what? Yes, that was the tone. Seductive. He sounds like a lover.