Page 58 of I'm Watching You

‘Is Sara joining us?’ Ayden said.

‘I’m here,’ Sara said, breezing into the room. Her neat ponytail suited her khakis, crisp white shirt, and polished brown flats. ‘And please tell me no one expectsDNAthis morning.’

They all laughed.

‘Let me guess, your crankiness is a sign that you’re scheduled to speak at the academy today. Am I right?’ C.C. said.

‘I was there last Friday. I’ve heard it said there are no stupid questions, but sometimes I wonder,’ she said, smiling, then opened her file. ‘Everyone under twenty-two thinks it takes the press of a button to getDNAresults. TheCSIcraze is killing me.’

Again everyone laughed.

‘What have you found?’ Zack said. He didn’t mean to sound so abrupt.

Sara straightened. She was all business. ‘From the crime scene, I didn’t learn that much. So let me start with the body. I spoke to theMEthis morning. Harold was killed with a .45-caliber shot to the heart. We’ve got the slug but so far no matches to anything in the ballistic databases. Icantell you that Harold was dead before he hit the ground. The bullet shattered his heart. He had no defensive wounds or any other signs of trauma on his body. His hand was removed postmortem with the use of a very sharp object.’

‘Any theories on the instrument that was used to cut his hand off?’ Warwick said.

‘Machete or an ax. TheMEand I are leaning toward a machete. The cut was narrow and did minimal tissue damage at the wrist. Bone was severed cleanly.’ She flipped a page over. ‘We won’t have the toxicology screen on him for a couple of weeks, but there were track marks on both arms and behind both knees. This guy was a full-blown drug addict. Just the promise of drugs would be enough to get him to go almost anywhere.’

‘Which explains why he’d have gotten into a car with his killer,’ Warwick said.

‘Exactly.’

‘And the crime scene?’ Zack said.

‘The killer was very careful and very methodical. He left no fingerprints, shell casings, or hair or fabric fibers; however, there was a footprint. I was able to get a very good footprint impression by the back gate. The ground had been softened by a leaking garden hose, so the soft soil created the perfect medium to make a mold.’ She glanced at her notes. ‘Men’s size twelve running shoe. And I can tell you that his foot turned inward. My guess is that he has an excessively high arch, which can shorten a foot up to an inch. If the print belongs to the killer he has a slight limp. Also, there was an unidentified white powder on the heel. It’s definitely not drugs and I’m having it analyzed.’

‘That’s it?’ Ayden said. He looked frustrated.

Sara nodded. ‘As I said, the killer was careful and, unfortunately, I only had a couple of hours to collect data beforethe rains came and literally obliterated the evidence. We returned after the rain, but the backyard was a mess.’

‘What about the hand sent to Lindsay O’Neil?’ Zack said.

Sara nodded. ‘It’s definitely Harold’s. His prints match ones we had on file. I also checked the hand’s nails, hoping for a partial print from the killer, but nothing. The flowers are fresh irises. They can be bought in fifty different places in the metro area.’

‘What about the flower box?’ Ayden said.

Sara frowned. ‘The only prints on the outside and inside of the box were Lindsay’s and her assistant’s.’

C.C. nodded. ‘I worked with a couple of robbery detectives last night and we called all the florists in the city. None had an order for the shelter address yesterday.’

‘Did anyone notice who delivered the box?’ Ayden said.

Zack shook his head. ‘The cop parked in the driveway was on the phone with his kid’s day care. He’d received a call that his child had been badly injured. Turned out to be bogus. And Ruby Dillon had three calls come in at once to the shelter. She was too distracted to notice the guy.’

‘You and Sara refer to the Guardian as a male, but do we know for sure that the Guardian is a man?’ Ayden said.

Zack frowned. ‘Not for sure.’

‘What about theTVnews crews?’ Ayden said. ‘Think a camera might have picked up something? Shaw at Channel Ten had her cameras running all morning.’

‘I’ll talk to Shaw,’ Warwick said.

‘Do you think the killer delivered the flowers personally?’ Zack said.

Warwick shrugged. ‘Who knows?’

No one spoke for a moment as the weight of what he’d said sank in. Did the killer return to the shelter to deliver the hand?

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