Page 6 of Silent Ridge

I lift the frame while he’s not looking. It’s a picture of a young woman who bears a strong resemblance to the murdered Leanne Delmont. A boy is in the background playing on monkey bars at some park. She’s smiling and clapping. The boy is maybe four or five. The glass is fractured into a spiderweb. I put it back like it was.

Sheriff Gray gives me a cautioning look and clears his throat. He speaks to the tech: “Let her look in the bathroom and we’ll get out of your hair.”

“Yes, sir.” The tech isn’t happy but he calls the other tech out of the bathroom. “Don’t touch anything. And be careful of the blood.”

I already don’t like him. I straddle the blood on the carpet like I’d seen the other tech do. I lean forward and try not to touch the doorframe. I feel like a contortionist, and although it’s almost a month since I was shot, my chest seizes. Pain radiates out from my solar plexus and runs down both arms, but I have time to see all I want to see.

Monique’s body hangs from the shower head. A piece of white electric cord is wrapped around her neck; the end with the plug is draped over her shoulder. She is a short woman and her toes barely touch the tub. Her skin is all in one piece, lying in the tub beneath her. One piece. Like a wetsuit with a wig and face mask.

Her head is slumped to the side, eyes bulging out of the sockets like bloody marbles. There are two teardrop-shaped, blood-filled cavities where her nose should be. Her jaws hang open as if she died screaming. Tony said there are no close neighbors and I didn’t see any as I came to the scene.

No one heard her screams.

I feel dizzy, nauseated; my legs are buckling. Luckily, Sheriff Gray has moved up behind me and takes my arm. He leads me back into the bedroom. One of my booties gets blood on it and I hear the tech let out a grunt of disapproval. I almost snap at him but I want to throw up even more. I rush out of the bedroom, into the hall and down to the half bath before I lose it. I gag and retch but nothing comes up. My stomach is in knots.

I pull some toilet paper from the roll, dampen it in the sink, and wipe my mouth. To hell with the techs. I splash water in my face and use more toilet paper to pat it dry. Tony was right: There is no way to identify what’s in there as Monique Delmont. Even the hair is so caked and stiff with blood that it’s impossible to tell the color. I look in the mirror. Good thing I don’t wear much makeup. I return to the bedroom.

“You okay, Megan?”

I’ll never eat rare steak again, but I’m fine.

“I’ll be okay. I just had breakfast this morning.”

My stomach lurches but I won’t give the tech the pleasure of seeing me throw up again.

“Good thing you didn’t have the greasy bacon, huh?” the tech says, and Sheriff Gray turns on him.

“Deputy, I think you’d better get back to work. I want all the photos and your reports in two hours. Do you understand?”

Both techs say nothing. Their body language says it all. We’re interlopers, idiots who have raided their domain. Crime Scene can be that way sometimes. I know Mindy is here somewhere and I want to talk to her. She won’t be such a wiseass. I haven’t seen Jerry Larsen. He’s probably sitting in his van, having coffee until he can take the body.

“Your chest giving you problems again?”

“It only hurts when I breathe.” I smile at him. He doesn’t smile back. He knows I’m hiding the pain. I won’t take painkillers. I can’t let my guard down, and those things put me to sleep.

A pewter tray holding several rings sits on top of the double dresser. A necklace with a thin gold chain and a diamond and ruby pendant are next to the tray. An ornate, carved-wood jewelry box is at the other end of the dresser. The lid is open and I can see other precious pieces inside. I don’t take Monique for a person to own junk jewelry. Why did the killer leave the jewelry? Because it wasn’t a robbery.

“Seen enough?” Tony asks.

I say something that comes out as a croak, so I just nod. We go down the stairs, careful to follow our own steps back to the front door. Outside, Copsey is playing Candy Crush on his iPhone until he sees the sheriff and hurriedly puts it away. If he knew the sheriff like I did, he would have just asked Tony for some tips on the game. Sheriff Gray spends hours in his office playing some game or other.

“I want a sweep of the grounds,” I say. “One hundred yards each direction. I want to know how this guy got in here and how he got out.”

“Already being done, Megan.” Sheriff Gray points off to the right of the house. I see Mindy is in the tree line. She makes a left turn and comes back toward us in a straight line. She’s walking a grid.

“Shouldn’t she have some help?”

“She wants to do it herself,” Tony says. “She saw your police picture in there and she’s worried about you. So am I.”

I watch her methodical movements. If anyone can find evidence, she can.

“Don’t worry,” he says.

I feel like I can breathe again. He’s a good man: honest to a fault; but, like me, he’ll bend the rules a little for a friend. As far as trust goes, I trust him more than most. Besides, he knows me only as Megan. He doesn’t know the name Rylee or that I attended South Kitsap High School. And there is nothing on the picture to identify it as South Kitsap. I am being paranoid.

Mindy looks up briefly and waves. I wave back and return to my car.

Seven

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