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“You okay?” Jonah asked.
She hadn’t realized that she’d crowded so close to him. Professional pride demanded she back up, tell him she was fine. But she was trying so hard not to retch that she couldn’t move or speak. Fortunately, Finch whirled around and spotted them, interrupting before her inability to react became obvious.
“What’s she doing here?” He addressed Jonah while hiking a thumb at her as though she wasn’t standing within earshot.
Francesca understood that he was angry about yesterday, but holding a grudge over a little humiliation seemed pointless. How could he worry about something so petty in light of this? Not long ago, the blob of putrefying flesh sitting on the concrete had been a living, breathing human being….
As Jonah’s eyes shifted to the victim, his nostrils flared, which told her he was struggling with what he saw, as well. Still, he kept his voice steady. “I thought she might be able to identify the deceased, but—”
“Actually, I’m glad you brought her,” Finch broke in, and nudged Francesca as he motioned to the victim. “Now this is what a corpse looks like.”
Despite the dizziness that nearly overwhelmed her, she somehow remained standing and managed to give him a dirty look as she found her voice. “No kidding.”
Hunsacker joined them. “So? Do you recognize her?”
Too preoccupied to put him in his place, even when he laughed, Francesca answered without the stinging reprisal that would’ve been part of her response on any other day. “No.”
The victim’s head looked like a jack-o’-lantern that’d softened and caved in on one side. Her right eye was missing and her nose had been so badly pummeled it resembled putty more than human flesh. The features that were still distinguishable were swollen out of all proportion and her tongue protruded in a grotesque fashion.
Jonah’s stoic expression melted into a grimace. “Looks as if she took a severe beating.”
Finch sobered. “Like the others. You can bet she’s got plenty of broken bones to go with that fractured skull.”
Hunsacker rolled his feet to the outside in his habitual way. “So you think this might be the work of the same killer?”
“Dead Mule Canyon’s only a few miles away,” Jonah said. “The victims there were beaten, too.”
“Shit.” Hunsacker spat on the ground.
“Once word of this gets out…” Finch didn’t finish.
Francesca was listening but it felt as if she stood at a distance too removed to participate. Mostly, she could hear her own heart pounding in her ears. The body wasn’t easy to look at, but would’ve been worse if those wounds had been recent. The coagulated blood surrounding the woman’s injuries appeared to have dried a day or two ago, based on the blackish color. It was the dirt that Francesca found curious. Tiny granulated rocks, the kind so characteristic of desert soil, clung to the woman’s hair and her gaping wounds, suggesting she’d been buried and subsequently disinterred.
Why? Why would a man kill a woman, bury her, then dig her up and prop her in such a public place? How could anyone be so morbid?
Francesca didn’t ask this question, but when she tuned in to the conversation again, she realized Finch had inadvertently answered it.
“He’s proud of his work, eh?”
Jonah thrust his hands in his pockets. “He definitely wants it to be seen.”
“What a monster,” she murmured, but was this monster the same man who’d sat in her lawn chair last night throwing rocks at her window? Was it Butch?
The image of him wielding that bat popped into her mind. It was a frightening memory. But his audacity, his lack of fear, provoked her at the same time. He wouldn’t get away with this. She’d make sure of it.
Anger provided some much-needed adrenaline, making it easier to stay on her feet, breathe, think. “A bat could’ve done this.”
Hunsacker didn’t seem impressed with her detective skills. Either that or he wasn’t willing to credit her with much intelligence. “So could plenty of other things.”
“How long do you think she’s been dead?” she asked Finch, but it was Jonah who answered.
“At least thirty-six hours.”
Francesca tried to rub away the goose bumps that’d jumped out on her arms. The temperature was quickly climbing and would likely top yesterday’s high before the day was over, but somehow she felt chilled to the bone. “How do you know?” she asked. Having switched her specialty from employer-solicited background checks to missing persons only a year ago, she hadn’t seen a lot of death.
Obviously warmer than she was, Finch loosened a tie that’d already been loosened once. As usual, he looked uncomfortable in his work clothes. “He knows it’s been at least that long because there’s no rigor. Rigor generally comes on in the first twelve hours, remains unchanged for twelve hours and dissipates in another twelve.”
“From the bloating, I’d say it’s actually been longer,” Jonah added. “See the marbling? Takes a while for that to set in, even in this heat.”
