“Look, Jacob, we both know how that could pan out. I can’t stand the thought of some thickheaded beat cop tromping around up there, jumping to the wrong conclusions. If there’s even a trace of evidence left to read—psychic or otherwise—I want my eyes on it first so we can leave a record.”
Jacob considered me for a moment, then said, “You already called it in. Could be hours before we hear anything—or it could be a lot less. We’d better act fast.”
Back when Jacob had first been assigned to me, I might have looked askance at him failing to refill my spritzer bottle. Now,though, when we headed to the car, I discovered he hadn’t come unprepared. He popped the trunk, and there beneath a set of emergency flares and the ugly crochet afghan his mother gave us was gear for basic evidence collection. Yes, we’d already been through the apartment. But the stakes were a lot higher now that we knew we were looking at more than some delusional guy’s paranoid fantasies.
We approached the apartment decked out for a crime scene in booties and gloves. Whereas before I’d just noticed the boringness of the place, now I took note of every last scrape or scratch. Had it been a bookshelf dragged across the scuffed hardwood…or a body?
“That closet door isn’t original,” Jacob remarked.
No. It was close. But white paint can be weirdly hard to match, and it looked newer than all the other woodwork. “That’s right where I saw the repeater.” She wasn’t there now, but that was fine—it wasn’t etheric evidence I was after. We pulled out our pocket flashlights and went over every inch. You’d be surprised how easy it is for a tuft of hair or fiber to get snagged in the damnedest places. What we found was a whole lot of nothing….
Until Jacob gave the door frame a spritz of luminol and brought out the black light. And the whole thing lit up like a disco ball.
It wasn’t just a drop or two. It was a constellation, with flecks radiating out like the aftermath of a hard swing. Luminol doesn’t lie. It latches onto the iron in blood and fluoresces, even if somebody tried to cover it with bleach, elbow grease, and a fresh coat of landlord white.
“We’ll need to hand the case off,” Jacob said regretfully.
“At least we’ve got enough evidence here that it would take a hell of a lot of effort to screw it all up. Even without a body, there’s blood, there’s an eyewitness, and as soon as Records gets us a name, there’ll be a positive I.D. on the victim.”
It wouldn’t be as satisfying to see someone else wrap up the case, it’s true. But I hadn’t gone into homicide for the glory. I’d always just figured that talking to dead people didn’t leave me suited for anything else.
Sunglass Sarah might have family who’d been wondering why she went no-contact. And even if she didn’t, very few people are entirely alone in this world. Friends, co-workers, neighbors—someone would be sure to get some closure.
And, let’s be honest. If that smug asshole Zachary Sledge was a murderer…it would feel really good to put him away.
Talking to repeaters never makes a damn bit of difference. They can’t hear you, not any more than the mustard stain on your favorite tie can hear you. But it wasn’t the repeater that needed convincing. It was me.
I didn’t currently have a visual on Sarah, but I remembered where I’d seen her well enough. I backed up so as not to be standing right in the middle of her and said, “Whatever happened, Sarah…we’ll get to the bottom of it. It’s probably too little, too late. But we’ll do our best.”
No repeater. Not that I expected one, given how hard she’d been to see before.
Jacob stared intently at the spot, laser focused. Judging by the deep furrow between his brows, he wasn’t picking up any more than I was. He’d dealt with his share of domestic violence as he worked sex crimes, so the case was in his wheelhouse, too.He hadn’t known about his extrasensory skills back then. But it looked like there was nothing here for him to pick up, either.
“We got this,” I told him. “Even without a repeater—maybe especially without a repeater—there’s enough evidence here to put Sledge away. The only thing a more obvious repeater would’ve done was tell us where to find it.”
Jacob nodded slowly. “And once it’s all over, you can put her to rest.”
“True. I dunno how much difference it actually makes for a repeater, but it seems like the right thing to do.”
I started mentally cataloging what props I should bring along for the exorcism. Repeaters are notoriously difficult and I’ll use whatever gives me an edge. At least the scene wasn’t somewhere public, and no one would have to redirect traffic or close down a subway station while I worked. And hopefully Carl would be back from his abrupt vacation by then….
A call from HQ interrupted my thoughts. I grabbed it and put it on speaker, fully expecting a victim’s first name, last name, and a pat on the back for being so clever as to solve a disappearance that was kicking around for a few years.
“Good news—Doordash was a lot easier to lean on than the local hospitals,” the guy from Records told me. “We got a name for you. Sarah Dombrowski.”
Jacob and I locked eyes. He nodded grimly. “And how long has she been missing?”
A pause…and then, in a slightly baffled voice, the guy said, “She’s not.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
CLEARLY, RECORDS WAS wrong. Or maybe someone named Sarah had been visiting the victim the day Doordash came. Or some other completely logical explanation.
“Nope,” the Records guy said. “Once we had a name, our systems triple referenced it and found some positive hits. Ms. Dombrowski wasn’t on the lease, but she was likely living there during the timeframe you requested.”
“All right. Then she’s the next one I’ll need to interview. Send me her current info.”
“Sure thing. I should have it within three to four working days.”
