He thinks, Bella scoffed in her head.
Gary hadn’t done a damn thing to protect her crime scene. In Bella’s opinion, professionalism began to diminish the moment the department created a test to determine whether officers should be promoted. Unfortunately, supervisors got promoted because they knew someone important, or they tested well, or they were handed the test in advanced. Sadly, because of that, some supervisors tended to have little common or street sense. Gary’s lazy ass had to have fallen in one of those categories.
Bella rolled her eyes and walked over to the refrigerator. She pulled it open and looked inside. To her surprise, it was fully stocked, proving that the house wasn’t truly abandoned. She closed the door and moved to the basement door. If she thought the house smelled like death before, death had been confirmed as soon as she opened the basement door.
Bella took a second to allow herself to adjust to the putrid aroma of rotting flesh before taking the first step down the dark stairway. She pulled out her flashlight from her back pocket and turned it on. When she made it to the landing, she noticed a light in a far corner. She heard movement as she made her way toward the light. Bella pointed her flashlight toward the walls of the dark, smelly basement. She was in search of a light switch. She figured since there was electricity in other parts of the house, there should’ve been electricity in the basement.
Bingo!
Bella found a light switch and flicked it on. She smiled when the main room of the basement was illuminated. As she inwardly celebrated, Bella made a mental note to find out who’s name the electricity bill was in,ifthere was an electric bill. Nowadays, folks knew how to cipher electricity illegally.
“You startled me,” a voice called out in the darkness. “I never thought to turn the lights on.”
Bella strained her eyes to see the man in the dark corner. His uniform identified him as the evidence technician.
“This your case?” he asked.
“Apparently so. Detective Devereaux,” Bella said, introducing herself.
“Bob…Bob Henry. Come. Your victims are over here.”
Bob, the evidence tech, led Bella to the corner. The scent of death got stronger as Bella approached. She looked down at three, totally naked, dead white women. Her first question was, ‘How did they wind up in this house, in this part of town?’The area that they were in wasn’t exactly known for producing white bodies.
The women, who couldn’t have been more than nineteen or twenty, appeared to have been badly beaten, and each of their throats had been slashed. It was a terrible bloody mess. Their hands were tied at the wrists and hoisted above their heads, and their ankles were also bound. The young victims were staring up a Bella with dead, glassy eyes, and she could still see dried tear stains on their cheeks.
Bella looked down to see if the evidence tech’s shoes were covered. They were. So, she took a second to grab shoe covers from her bag before approaching the victims. Bella slipped the covers over her own shoes and asked, “Where’s the ME?”
This was definitely a scene where the medical examiner’s presence was needed.
“En route,” Bob responded.
The evidence tech handed Bella a pair of gloves. Even though she’d brought her own, she took them.
“Come and look at this,” he told her.
Bella put the gloves on and stepped closer to the technician. He kneeled closer to one of the victims and lifted her wrist. Bella squinted to see the small tattoo on her wrist. It was a barcode with and a series of five numbers.
“They all have it,” the tech revealed.
Bella tilted her head at the evidence tech.
“You a medical examiner?” she asked him.
“No, but—”
“Then stop touching my bodies,” Bella ordered.
“You tell ‘em, girl,” a feminine voice cosigned.
Bella smiled and turned toward Dr. NiYah Reed, Bella’s childhood friend. She and Bella had been friends since the third grade. When they first met, they’d gotten into what turned into a schoolyard brawl over a game of hopscotch. Both, Bella and NiYah, had different versions of how the fight began and ended. And even though they were eight when it happened, their playground fight came up every single time they had a little Don Julio in their systems.
Bella chuckled as NiYah approached the victims. She slid on a pair of gloves and lifted the chin of one of the victims. Whenshetouched the dead woman, Bella had absolutely nothing to say. After all, Dr. NiYah Reed was actually the medical examiner.
