Page 43 of Killer Clone

“Actually, the best place to excavate, if you will, is only about a hundred and fifty years old. There’s stuff in the basement of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and the other great museums of the world, that no one remembers is even there. There’s a whole horde of ancient material that we have incollections around the world that have not even been translated yet. You could write an entire doctorate on this.”

Stella mentioned, regretfully, that she’d never visited The Met, and Werner recommended the best works to see and explained how to avoid the lines. The conversation moved on.

The main course was both tastier and stranger than Stella had expected, and the rest of their dinner topic revolved mainly around the cuisine.

Guilt settled into her chest as they pulled out of the parking lot.

The conversation and the evening had been too smooth and comfortable. Too normal and enjoyable. She wasn’t sure they should be able to live that easily after all the things they’d seen that day.

And all the things they’d face tomorrow.

19

In the morning, Hagen felt for Slade as his boss rested his fingertips on the meeting room table. A weariness hung on his face and dragged his chin toward his chest.

Each new victim seemed to add to a weight on his back.

Hagen had never seen himself leading a team of FBI agents. He’d always assumed that once he’d dealt with Ramirez, he’d be arrested. Or killed as he fled the scene, if not by the police, then by one of the men who killed his father. The best he could expect would be to fade away, disappear with a new identity.

Now he had a future. Ever since Ramirez’s death, he could imagine a life filled with promotion and advancement. A career. He hadn’t thought about it in detail. But, during their sabbatical in Pennsylvania, the first notions started popping up in his head.

The sight of Slade each morning as the body count rose hadn’t killed the shoots of that new idea. But it did show him the cost.

Slade’s weary eyes landed on him. “Hagen. Fill us in. How does the second victim compare to the victims you found in Pennsylvania?”

Hagen took a deep breath. “Put simply, this victim appears to have been killed in almost exactly the same way as the victims in Claymore. The similarities are clear enough. Deep slash across the throat. Massive loss of blood. The cuneiform writing on the wall. Stella sent pictures last night to the cuneiform expert we used on the last case and to a forensic document examiner.”

“The main difference in terms of the writing itself,” Stella elaborated, “is that the marks in Otto Walker’s apartment were on the wall, painted by what appears to be a paintbrush, and not carved on his back like the victims in Pennsylvania.”

“Thank heaven for small favors.” Anja shuddered with a delicate shiver.

“That said, we did find writing on the wall at one of the victims in Claymore Township.”

“The sheriff, right?” Slade had apparently pored through the Claymore Township reports.

Stella nodded. “But the difference in how Otto Walker and Patrick Marrion were killed is remarkable. Marrion was bled by a small, precise cut to the carotid artery, not a slash to the throat. There was no writing located near him…except for the possible attempt to scratch into his back. But we’re not certain about that.”

“Considering all the evidence we have supporting Walker killing Marrion, it makes sense. Walker wouldn’t give his own carotid a neat little cut, would he?” Sarcasm didn’t really suit Slade. The SSA rubbed the scar above his temple and changed angles. “Don’t suppose you’ve heard back from either of your experts yet, have you?”

“I heard back from the forensic document examiner. The marks in Otto Walker’s apartment were created by different hands than the victims in Claymore Township. Which stands toreason, considering Maureen King, who made the markings in Claymore, is deceased.”

“Great. We have a lot of dead murderers. Not much use at all.”

Ander rocked back in his chair. “You said Patrick Marrion had no writing at all anywhere near him. I don’t think we should dismiss the scratches across his burns. Those abrasions might’ve been a writing attempt that failed.”

Slade glared at Ander’s rocked-back chair. Ander set the front legs back on the floor.

“Wouldn’t the unsub have written on the alley wall if they couldn’t cut their message into Marrion’s back?” Stacy waved a finger, as though the alley stretched out in front of her, and she only needed to point at the brickwork.

Stella shook her head. “Not necessarily. The alley was where the body was found. Not where he was killed.”

“So Patrick Marrion was the only victim not left at the place he was murdered?” Eagerness swept over Anja’s face, as if she needed the details.

Stacy tapped her pen on the table. “Yes. And we know that. So maybe, after struggling with the victim’s scar tissue, the unsub wrote his message at the murder scene instead. Like Maureen King did in the shed when she killed her husband. And that message is still out there somewhere.”

Stella tugged at the golden stud in her ear. “Right. Stacy and I speculated that our perpetrator left Marrion out in public as a message. What if our guy was trying to get our attention?”

“Otto Walker probably killed Marrion.” Next to Hagen, Ander circled the wordfuneralin his notebook. “What kind of attention would he want?”

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