Page 17 of Inside Silence
“Thanks, but I’ll come grab them. I need to season them first,” I respond as I approach her. Deciding to capitalize on the positive vibes she gives off, I kiss the top of her head as I slip by.
As I liberally grind black pepper and sprinkle sea salt over the meat, I listen with half an ear to a discussion about hair products between my daughter and Savvy. Tate is more animated than I’ve heard her in months. The topic is definitely way the hell out of my scope, since the only thing I do with my hair is buzz it as short as I can every couple of weeks. I do it myself.
All through dinner Tate is carrying the conversation, peppering Savvy with questions about the best place to find cool clothes, and whether or not Silence has a library because she doesn’t like the books they have at the school one.
That launches a discussion about favorite books and authors, something I also know little about because the only thing I read is the newspaper, trade magazines, or the occasional biography.
I end up being an observer at my own table, and I don’t mind it one bit. The only thing I’m required to contribute is an occasional grunt when someone looks at me for an acknowledgement or confirmation.
“Sorry if we left you out of the conversation,” Savvy notes when I walk her to the door after dinner.
“No need. I was glad to see Tate come out of her shell.”
When Savvy stops in the open door and smiles up at me, I resist tugging at one of her curls, which is stuck to her lip.
“It’s tough, losing your mother. I was older, but I lost my mother at a very vulnerable time in my life and I struggled for a while.”
As far as I know, her mother had been alive when I left.
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
She shakes her head and waves it off. “Long time ago. Anyway, I enjoyed talking to your daughter, she’s a sweet girl and it was just what I needed after the day I’ve had.”
“Bad?”
She glances over her shoulder at the dark street before answering.
“Let’s just say, it’s not one I’d care to repeat. Except,” she adds quickly, turning back to me, “for that dinner. It was delicious. Thank you for that.”
“Hey, I couldn’t in good conscience let you eat a frozen tray of artificial food for dinner.”
I take a small step closer before I continue, “And if you are serious about a repeat, I would love to cook for you again.”
She lifts her hand, touching a few fingers to the center of my chest before thinking better of it. Her cheeks stain a deep blush as she looks up at me, but the next moment she turns around and walks toward the cruiser, parked along the curb.
I’m not sure whether to be relieved or disappointed.
Chapter 6
Savvy
* * *
I close my eyes and squeeze the bridge of my nose but it doesn’t help.
Opening my desk drawer, I rummage around to find the bottle of Advil I was sure I had in there. I need something to kill this headache building behind my eyes. I can’t afford it, there is too much to do.
I only got maybe four hours of sleep before spending the rest of the night staring at my ceiling, mulling over the case. At about five, I gave up and came into the office to find an email from Tom Richter confirming the identity of our victim.
I’ve talked to Tom on the phone in the meantime, going over some of the remarks in the report he attached to the message. He agreed with Buck; this had not been an animal attack, but a particularly brutal murder. He’d found some lake water in the victim’s lungs, suggesting that when he went in the water, he’d likely still been breathing. It turns my stomach to think he was still alive after sustaining those horrific injuries.
Richter informed me there was blunt force trauma to the back of the skull, suggesting a blow to the back of the victim’s head, disabling him. He further noted the injuries to the man’s face and abdomen indicated a determined precision that didn’t match the severity of the wounds. The resulting damage alluded to a violent, enraged attack, but the cuts had been clean and confident, which would be more in line with a very controlled and measured killer looking for maximum impact.
For a murder you generally investigate those close to the victim first, which is the direction I’d been looking. But Richter’s conclusions have me consider the possibility the killer was unknown to the victim, making Franklin Wyatt a random target.
I suspect this perpetrator wanted the body found, or he wouldn’t have bothered with the graphic mutilations. Tossing the victim in the lake is another indication he was, at the very least, not concerned with the body’s discovery.
“You don’t look so good.”
