Wait.
If the victim bled out at the scene ...
How was she restrained?
No drugs were mentioned in the preliminary toxicology screen, indicating she hadn’t been drugged, and certainly she wouldn’t have just lain there of her own free will.
Sarah hadn’t been able to get a copy of the autopsy. When she’d asked the first time, the stock answer had been that the report wasn’t ready for release. Which meant the ME hadn’t completed the report. Then, upon her second request, the contact who’d provided the crime-scene photo at significant personal gain had chickened out on her and refused her calls. The results of the tox screen had been given in a press conference late yesterday.
Sarah stared at the victim’s wrists, then her hands. Those markings on her wrists could have been tape or rope burns. But how had the killer kept the victim’s arms out of the way while doing his or her evil work? There was nothing to tie her arms to on either side of her torso or above her head. Unless ropes had been stretched from the center of the chapel floor to the support beams at the sides of the structure. Sounded like a lot of extra effort to Sarah, and why would the restraints have been removed before the crime-scene photos were taken?
Not standard protocol.
What were the other markings on her hands? The tops of Valerie’s hands appeared skinned or scraped. The tissue certainly looked torn. More patches of torn skin left a path up her forearms. All the way to the bends of her elbows.
Sarah studied the markings for a long while, and then she knew.
“Son of a bitch.”
She scrambled off the bed and pulled on her Converses.
Her theory couldn’t be confirmed without a copy of the autopsy, and that wasn’t happening in the middle of the night. But there could be something at the scene.
All she had to do was remember how to get there.
Sarah braked to a hard stop.
“Damn it.”
She’d passed it again.
After dragging the gearshift into reverse once more, she hit the accelerator. The car lunged backward. She slammed on the brake. Jerked forward.
Puffing out a frustrated breath, she let off the brake and eased down on the accelerator with a little less force. The tires spun, then grabbed on to the icy dirt and propelled the car slowly backward. When she’d reached the halfway point along Chapel Trail, which she now recognized after passing it twice, she moved cautiously to the side of the road and slowed to a stop. Shutting off the engine, she peered through the darkness. With nothing but the aid of the moonlight, she could barely see the cluster of broken trees she’d noted on her first visit. Yep. The chapel was close by.
She grabbed her shoulder bag and climbed out of the car. Once she’d fished out the flashlight, she slung the bag over her shoulder and headed into the woods.
The wind had died down, but it was still as cold as hell. She shrugged her coat collar up around her neck. Man, she’d give a hundred bucks for even a cheap scarf and pair of gloves right now. Back home, vendors dotted the streets of Manhattan. Forgot your umbrella? Not a problem. Check any street corner and you could buy a piece of crap for ten bucks that would get you through the day.
If she’d had any common sense, she would have waited until daylight. But she’d never been accused of possessing any patience much less any common sense.
She hated waiting.
Maybe it was some kind of phobia related to all those nights she’d waited for her mother to come find her.
Until that last time . . .
“Yeah, yeah. I’m totally screwed up.” Just like my daddy and mommy. DNA was a bitch.
Once she spotted the yellow tape hanging from a tree branch, she was good to go. If the wind had been blowing as it had earlier, she would have spotted the tape fluttering midair from the road. As it was, the long strips flanking either side of the path up to the chapel lay impotently on the ground.
She accidentally veered off the path and stepped into ankle-deep snow, swore a couple of times and found her way back to the path Conner had used. If she stepped in the indentions others before her had made, the snow didn’t rise above her Converses. The wind had blown the strands of tape wide apart, making it more difficult to stay on the path in the darkness. She didn’t have the patience to take it slow and let the narrow beam of her flashlight do its work.
Luckily for her, wherever there was a break in the tree canopy, the snow reflected the moonlight, making her trek somewhat less difficult than it could have been. She slipped once or twice but quickly regained her balance.
She held on to the railing and climbed the steps up to the chapel. With the drop in temperature since nightfall, the damp stones were slick with a coating of fragile but slippery ice. By the time she reached the top step, she wished again that she had brought her gloves. Her hands were freezing.
“And the boots,” she muttered. Her toes were numb.
