BLUE MERCY (32 page)

If she hadn’t been parked outside, the kid would still be alive.
You killed him for me, didn’t you, you son of a bitch. You had to show off
.

“It’s not your fault, Kay.” Finn stepped into the kitchen behind her. “You couldn’t have known. Guy comes out the back with a pizza sack under his arm, tells you there’s no one home. I’d have let him go too.”

She felt his hand on her shoulder. Normally she’d rebuff any public show of affection, especially in front of other cops, but tonight she welcomed Finn’s support. If she could, she would have let Finn hold her while she cried for Jason Beckman.

“They found the kid’s delivery car,” he said. “It was ditched down on Clipper Road. Other side of the expressway. No way to know if the killer hiked from there or if he had his own vehicle down there on Clipper. If we’re lucky, maybe he parked up around here, closer to the house, and the uniforms got his tag number.”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but luck hasn’t been beating on my door lately,” she said, hating that she sounded sorry for herself. “Who the hell is this guy, Finn? Cuz that sure as hell wasn’t Jerry Bates or Scott Arsenault I slammed up against the car tonight.”

There was a beat of silence, then Finn gave her shoulder a final squeeze. “Come on,” he said. “We got lots of work here. There’s more.”

Roach steered the Park Avenue into the sweep of Jones Falls Expressway that curved under Preston Street. Traffic was thin, trickling south into the city. His heart still raced, and his knuckles were white around the wheel.

Divine opportunity. That’s what it had been. Not impulse, but providence. As if the Angel of Death had just handed him a freebie.

And Lady Luck too. He might have parked his Buick closer to the house, but after his trip back from Leakin Park this morning he’d needed to unwind, needed the six-block walk. So, he’d left the car down on Clipper Road.

And if necessity was the mother of invention, then, tonight, necessity had bred absolute genius.

The whole thing had taken no more than two, maybe
three, minutes from the moment the delivery boy arrived to when Roach finally stepped onto the back porch. The kid had barely knocked when Roach opened the door. “Sorry, my power’s been out.” The kid lapped up the lie and stepped into the dark kitchen. That’s when Roach nailed him.

Kid had barely hit the floor before Roach was emptying the delivery pouch; it was still warm as he’d slid in his laptop and the few belongings he’d gathered from the house. Using the penlight on his key chain he’d grabbed the kid’s cap, taken one last look around, and drawn out his knife.

He’d thought twice before doing it. But the temptation to leave something for Delaney had been too great. The Spyderco’s blade had gone in to the hilt. Clean and smooth, nicking once across bone.

It had been almost as exhilarating as the moment in the alley, standing right there, in front of Delaney, looking her in the eye while he boasted the kid’s blood on his red Windbreaker. And Kay Delaney had no fucking idea.

Roach didn’t realize he’d been smiling until a horn blasted next to him. He jerked the wheel to the right, bringing the Park Avenue square into his own lane. The SUV passed him, and Roach caught the guy’s hand gesture in the light of the truck’s dash.

Then, in his side mirror, Roach spotted the radio car in the left lane behind him.

Careful, you brilliant son of a bitch. Last thing you need is to be pulled over on some traffic violation
.

But it was too late. The cruiser tucked in behind him, its light-bar flashing in his rearview.

KAY KNEW THEY’D FOUND
the killing house.

Although the threadbare furnishings had seen years of use, nothing in 311 Keystone indicated anyone actually lived there: no soda can on the coffee table, no ashtray or
TV Guide,
no shoes by the door. Even the fridge sat empty, except for grease-stained containers of leftover takeout.

Finn turned on the TV, flipped through snowy channels. According to Gaines, the basic BG&E usage and phone were included in the rent. But the tenant hadn’t hooked up the cable. Why? Kay couldn’t imagine the killer not following the local news coverage. Did he live somewhere else? With a girlfriend? With his mother?

Kay turned several times in the middle of the living room, trying to conjure up an image of the man who, only a short time ago, had probably stood on the same spot and devised Jason Beckman’s slaughter as his escape.

And why this house?
Anonymity was the obvious reason. But why this dump when the bodies he left were so clean, his crimes so organized? Was this all he could afford? Was it a retreat from his real life? Was the house significant? Or merely convenient?

Through the living room and past the foyer, the smell of bleach and Lysol intensified, becoming almost overwhelming as she moved once again to the full bath at the bottom of the stairs.

When she’d first stepped into the bathroom, she hadn’t been surprised to find it scrubbed clean. The 1930s honeycomb tile on the floor and partway up the wall gleamed. Even the faded enamel of the claw-foot
tub sparkled, and what little chrome wasn’t tarnished on the old fixtures held a sheen it hadn’t probably seen in years.

She’d sent in Lenny DeSousa, one of the best techs with the Mobile Crime Lab. Now he crouched over the tub, angling a high-intensity light.

He shook his head. “There’s nothing here.”

“Anything in the sink trap?”

“Nothing earth-shattering. Looks like your guy shaved recently. Got some stubble out of the drain. No good for DNA though without the roots. But we found a couple head hairs that should give us something.”

“And what about the tub and surrounding area? You getting anything there?”

“I’m not seeing anything.”

Kay imagined the killer on his hands and knees, scouring each tile with a toothbrush.

“Can you tell me why we’re going over this room when the body’s in the kitchen?” DeSousa asked.

“This is a separate scene,” she said. “Separate crimes.”

The scent of death was here, beneath the bleach and the lemon cleaner. Kay wondered if anyone else could smell it. If they could taste it in the air the way she did, feel it crackling in the room around them. It reminded her of Eales’s house; sitting empty for a year, but still she had felt the death there.

“This is where he killed them,” she whispered to Finn, standing next to her. She scanned the pristine room again. Again, no evidence of anyone living here. No toothbrush or glass on the wall-mounted sink with its exposed plumbing. No magazine on the back of the ring-stained toilet. No meds in the cabinet. Only a single bath towel hanging perfectly folded over the rack by the sink.

She nodded to the new AC unit mounted in the high
window behind the tub. “He kept them cool,” she said to Finn.

“So what exactly are we looking for?” DeSousa asked.

“Blood.” The blood of B. J. Beggs and Patricia Hagen for sure. Kay prayed there weren’t others.

“You want us to luminol then?”

“Luminol the whole damn room,” Finn said before she could. “Every inch. I want to see exactly what happened here.”

“All right then. Give me a few minutes to set up.”

“Wait.” Kay stopped DeSousa at the door. “You’ve taken samples, right?”

“Of what? I can’t see anything to sample.”

“Do the drain traps. The sides of the tub. The sink and the grout. Just swab. Do it before you spray. I’m not going to have the luminol destroy what little DNA evidence we might have here.”

DeSousa gave her a nod. “I’ll call you when we’re ready.”

“We’ll be upstairs,” she said, and Finn followed her.

The air on the second floor was stale. Kay thought she could sense death up here as well. The back two rooms didn’t appear to have been used. Bare mattresses in battered bed frames, dressers with their drawers pulled out, closets empty. It was the master bedroom, overlooking Keystone, that the tenant had used. The sun-warped vinyl blinds were drawn. A lamp on the nightstand had been switched on by one of the officers who’d cleared the house for the team. In its dull glow, Kay saw evidence of the killer.

He’d left clothes: several shirts and a couple pressed khakis hanging on dry-cleaner hangers, a pair of loafers and folded socks. On the top of a small desk in the corner was some loose change. All precisely stacked. The single drawer of the desk was empty.

Finn found the phone line. The five-foot cord was plugged into the wall socket, the unused end lying behind one desk leg.

“What do you figure? A modem?” he asked.

Kay nodded. Of course he’d have a laptop. He’d probably followed the coverage of his murders through the WBAL news site. Maybe even lurked on Eales’s website, chatting online. Could she actually have read his posts on the board?

There was little else. What few personal belongings he’d had in the house, he’d no doubt stuffed into the insulated pizza pouch along with the laptop.

At least they’d get lots of prints. The Crime Lab had lifted several dozen cards’ worth already from the kitchen alone. Kay scanned the room again, turning, wishing for more light and knowing she’d have to come back in the daytime.

“The guy’s a fucking nutcase,” Finn said, looking at the bed, the corners of the sheets tucked squarely like a hospital bed’s. “Probably did some army time.”

“Or prison.”

From downstairs, Lenny DeSousa called for them. When they reached the bathroom, the tech handed them each a vapor mask. “You ever done this before?” he asked.

She and Finn both shook their heads.

“Once the spray hits any trace blood, the luminol reacts with the iron in the hemoglobins. The proteins are the catalyst to the chemiluminescence—in other words, the glow you get. Same principle as those light sticks you buy at rock concerts.”

“Yeah, like I go to those every weekend,” Finn said. “How long does it take?”

“If there’s anything there, you should see the reaction within a few seconds.” DeSousa ushered them in, fastening
his own mask and closing the door. His assistant was already standing by with a video camera, and between the four of them, it was tight quarters.

“So what’s in this stuff?” Finn nodded to the spray bottle.

“Three-aminophthalhydrazide and a little sodium carbonate.”

“Sounds healthy.” Finn snugged the mask firmly over his nose.

“If there
are
any trace blood patterns,” DeSousa explained, “we’ll get lucky in here. These pebbled tiles and this old grout hold more than the newer stuff. Where do you want me to start?”

“The tub area.” Kay took a solidifying breath, already imagining what awaited them.

“All right then.” He reached past Finn’s shoulder to the switch plate on the wall. “You ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

With a faint click, the room pitched into black. The darkness swallowed her. She felt Finn behind her, used him for support.

She heard the first pump of the spray bottle. Then another. DeSousa mumbled instructions to his assistant. Another few sprays, silent seconds, and then the eerie blue-green luminescence began to grow. With each pump of the spray bottle there was more, as though Lenny DeSousa were pumping out blue glow-in-the-dark paint directly onto the tub and wall.

The glow intensified. The entire wall, the edges of the tub, the floor around it. Everything glowed.

“God, all that’s blood?” Finn’s voice sounded thin in the hollow room.

“Doubtful.” Lenny’s voice. “It’s probably a false positive. Happens a lot. Luminol reacts to any kind of protein. My
guess is it’s the bleach.” He sprayed more, revealing the entire outline of the tub. “Just give it a while. The proteins in blood are a stronger catalyst than bleach, so if there is any blood residue you’ll get a longer reaction.”

They waited. Kay could hear her own heart beating, could feel Finn’s behind her, as the seconds slipped away into the eerie, glowing silence of the bathroom.

“Here it comes,” Lenny said at last.

And finally Kay saw it.

They spent almost an hour in the cramped bathroom. One spray after another, one savage luminescent smear leading them to the next. The fine mist filled the black air. Kay’s eyes had begun to sting, and her skin felt as if it were crawling.

The luminol’s reaction to the bleach gave way to a display of violence that rendered even the technicians silent as they worked. The wall behind the tub glowed with luminesced blood: spatters and thick arches, handprints and streaks fanning across the old tiles in frenetic patterns. With his assistant videotaping it all, Lenny DeSousa had worked his way around the room, past the sink and to the toilet. There, Finn had cursed as the chemical revealed a crude smiley face drawn across the tiles, chest high. Kay imagined the killer pausing to relieve himself, then finding amusement in an impromptu sketch with a bloody finger.

But always, Kay’s eyes came back to the tub wall: the partial handprints and wild smears. Now she knew what she’d only imagined. There
was
a reason he’d tied Patricia.
It was because of Beggs. Kay remembered the prostitute’s bruises. The blood across the tub wall had to be from Beggs, thrashing in her final bid for survival.

Even in the dark, Kay could picture him standing over Beggs, then Hagen. Each paralyzed by the ketamine, each aware of her life ending. Every heartbeat forcing the life out of them through their opened wrists.