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“Saint Miguel. Or Saint Michael. He fights off Satan’s army. And a bunch of other stuff I don’t remember.”
“How come you know so much about the saints?”
Jack grinned, the dimple in his cheek making an appearance. “I dated a lot of Catholic girls. I learned a lot.”
I arched a brow and then rolled my eyes. Jack had pretty much “dated” most of the available women in a tri-state area. As long as I was the last in the line, I didn’t care about his history. I was mostly grateful he’d had all that practice. Heknewthings.
“I appreciate all the research you did on my behalf.”
“Hey, I knew you’d look my way at some point. I wanted to be ready when the time came.”
“Do you think other couples flirt with each other over dead bodies?”
“Maybe. If they spend most of their time around dead bodies like we do. But I wouldn’t bring it up to a therapist. It could be cause for concern.”
“Good call.” I removed the necklace and bagged it and then I focused on the dagger. “Interesting hilt,” I said. “Looks old. Some of the engraving is worn away so it’s a smooth, but it looks like an eagle.”
The eagle was carved at the end of the hilt, but the hilt itself looked like it was made from a polished ivory or bone. I didn’t have a ruler to measure the hilt, but it stuck out of his chest a good four or five inches.
“Hold him steady,” I told Jack. I got a good grasp on the hilt and removed the knife.
“Whoever did this has some strength behind them. Stabbing someone in the heart isn’t as easy as it looks on TV. It’s always better to go for the soft tissue areas.”
“Is that writing on the blade?” Jack asked.
I took a closer look and sure enough something was inscribed on the blade. “I can’t make out what it says. We’ll need to look at it under better light, but it doesn’t look like English. That blade is probably close to ten inches. Very unusual.”
“We don’t have a lab, and I doubt Joe’s going to authorize the expense of sending it off to a bigger city for examination. We can do some Internet searching and send a photo to any of the known collectors. If it’s as old as it looks it might not be too hard to identify.”
“He’s still in primary flaccidity, but rigor is starting to set in because of the heat. It can speed up the process. But I’d say his death is less than two hours old. That works with Father Fernando’s statement of when he found the body. It’s just after six o’ clock.”
I looked at the area around the body and then lifted Leon’s shirt and looked at his back. “He was definitely killed here. There’s no sign that the body was moved and blood has started to settle in the lower parts of the body.”
Jack shook his head. “Man, that’s a killer with balls of steel. There was basically a thirty-minute window of time to make the kill, position the body, and escape. And during that time anyone could’ve come upon them. How much would you estimate Leon weighs?”
I shrugged and looked him over. He was thin and bony, but he had height on his side which would add to his weight. “Maybe somewhere between a hundred and fifty to a hundred and seventy-five.”
“Lets say for the sake of argument and time that Leon agreed to meet the killer here. The killer knows time is short so he doesn’t bother with conversation. He walks right up and stabs him in the heart with the dagger. By looking at the worn patches of his trousers, I’d say Leon fell to his knees before falling to his side on the ground where he scraped the side of his face. The killer has blood on him after a deathblow like that. No way to avoid it. He then straightens out Leon’s body and positions it the way he wants him to be found. Then he escapes out the side gate, not realizing he brushed up against the iron bars and leaving blood behind. That is efficiency at its best.”
“Damn,” I said for lack of anything better. “Lets get Joe and figure out how to transport the body without making it a circus.”
“I’ll tell you again. We don’t have to do this, Jaye. It’s our honeymoon. We can say no.”
“I know, but Leon Stein deserves better than what this island’s resources can give.”
“That’s only one of the reasons I love you. I’ll go find Joe and see about getting the body back to the jail. Maybe he found out something interesting from one of the parishioners.”
I didn’t ask, but I was curious to know some of the other reasons Jack loved me too.
Chapter Five
“Heat and deadbodies are never a good combination,” I said to Jack and Joe a little while later. “Can you at least bring me in extra fans? Otherwise this is going to be very unpleasant for all of us in a very short amount of time.”
“Sure, I’ll call my nephew and have him bring some by. Hopefully the added power doesn’t blow the circuits. Though it should cool off considerably when the storm rolls in tomorrow.”
“We’ll take our chances with the power. Decomposition isn’t an easy smell to remove. You’ll thank me later.”
“When can I tell the family the body can be prepared for burial?”
