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Leigh slid her hand across the worn wood as the entire station seemed to empty into the parking lot. “What’s going on?”
The lieutenant settled that unbreakable gaze on her. “We’ve got another body.”
FIFTEEN
Lebanon, New Hampshire
Saturday, March 13
4:30 p.m.
Roxanne. Her name was Roxanne.
The deputy medical examiner she’d known as Dr. Jennings stared back at her as though she’d been waiting there for hours. Killed same as the others but not left in the middle of the night. Their unsub was growing far more confident. Escalating as Livingstone had predicted. He’d dropped a body in daylight. In public. With kids around.
Jennings had been positioned against the bandstand centered in the middle of Colburn Park. Right over the storage access. Red brick, a seafoam green metal roof, and white vinyl trim unburied memories of late nights, firework shows, and family picnics. Her parents would drag her and Troy and all their stuff right here in front of the bandstand two days before the parades would make their way through town just to get the best seat. With its Christmas Revels Festival, nature preserve area, farmer’s markets, live music, and playgrounds, this park acted as a pulse within the town itself. A half-melted snowman family, complete with hats, scarves, and button eyes, watched on from a few yards away. Thousands of families visited this place to escape their monotonous lives and to socialize.
It was the best—and the worst—location to dump a body.
Their latest victim wore the same clothing she’d noted beneath the personal protective equipment from the morgue during Michelle Cross’s autopsy. Inside the hospital she’d been Dr. Jennings, the key to identifying their killer. Out here, she was nothing more than flesh and bone.
Her black slacks had practically been shredded in the process of torture. Wood chips landscapers used to fill between the usually purple and pink blooms had scattered into the grass and around the body. Eight square, red pavers with grass trying to claw its way around the edges ensured Dr. Jennings’s balance against the light gray cement protecting the stand’s inner electrical and storage compartment. It was as though the good doctor had simply sat down to take a break on her way through the park.
Leigh could’ve convinced herself that was the case if not for the exposed teeth and gums dried out from the wind cutting through the trees. Healthy black hair had dulled since she’d seen Dr. Jennings last, stringed with sweat and blood. Her skin, once full of life, had drained of color, but there wasn’t any slippage yet. She hadn’t been out here long enough.
“Witnesses?” Leigh tried to keep her warmth by burying deeper into her coat, but its loss had nothing to do with temperatures. This was sorrow. She hadn’t known Roxanne Jennings more than a couple days, but she’d left an impression. She’d cared about the people she cut open. Providing families of the dead peace and answers had given her validation and a reason to serve. For her, it’d been a privilege to be part of their healing. She hadn’t said as much, but Leigh had known by the way she’d handled Michelle Cross’s body. How she’d taken her time so as not to miss anything crucial to the investigation. It hadn’t just been about duty. She’d genuinely wanted to help.
Now she would… as a victim.
“Multiple callers all within a five-minute span. A mom who brings her kids here said one second she wasn’t there, the next she was. Didn’t see anyone near or around the body, but it’d be easy to avoid being seen with all these trees.” Boucher’s notebook and pen were at the ready. “Her kid found her.”
Leigh’s insides clenched. Nightmares were made of scenes like this. Driving her hand into her blazer, she smoothed her thumb over the clean cut made to the toy soldier protected inside her pocket. The emotional rawness determined to tear her apart eased. Chandler Reed had delivered it to her hospital room personally, although she didn’t remember that. He’d left it for her because he’d known it’d been important. He’d never know how much. “We’ll need the medicolegal investigator to search her pockets when they get here.”
“You thinking we’re going to find another soldier with your name on it?” Boucher asked.
She had a feeling Boucher already knew the answer. She memorized Dr. Jennings’s wide-open gaze, the end of the soldier’s rifle stabbing into her thumb in her coat pocket. How did a medical examiner play into this? What was the connection between her and the first two victims? “Guess we’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?”
Leigh surveyed the snowman family. Six in total. It was obvious the smaller ones had been created by smaller hands. The button eyes a bit lopsided, the scarves looser than the others. One had a bright green sand bucket for a hat while the rest bore felt top hats. “This place hasn’t changed much. Do you bring your son here? For the festival or pumpkin carving, or caroling?”
“You really want to talk about my personal life over a dead body, Brody? That’s messed up.” Boucher shifted his weight between both feet. She wasn’t offended. Banter and humor in the face of a raw situation was an easy coping tool. It wasn’t disrespect for the dead. It was protection from the horrible reality law enforcement dealt with on a daily basis. He waited a beat, but there was an anxiety keeping him from holding still. “Tell you the truth, I don’t see my son much since the divorce. His mom’s got him most of the time. Last time I brought him out here, they had the fair set up. He ate so much cotton candy, he threw up. All over me. Couldn’t get the smell out of my beard for two weeks.”
Her laugh escaped more forcibly than she’d expected. “The last time I was here, I accidentally stabbed my brother with a pumpkin carver. You know, the really thin ones that come in sets from the dollar store. He broke my Xena action figure as payback.”
“It’s places like this that help people remember what’s important. They remind you of what real happiness feels like, you know. How good life could be if it weren’t for the shit we have to deal with every day.” Boucher turned his attention back to Dr. Jennings, splayed out in front of them. “Good a place as any to meet your maker.”
The humor was gone, leaving Leigh more empty and colder than when she’d arrived.
“Agen’ Brody. Lieutenant Boucher.” Director Livingstone pulled to a stop within the semi-circle the forensic team had outlined while uniformed officers worked on clearing the park of civilians and media. “I can see why Dr. Jennings wasn’t returning my calls. What do we know?”
“Not much. Concord ME’s office is scrambling to send us someone to collect her.” Boucher scribbled another note. It was a defense mechanism, she’d realized. Note everything. Miss nothing. Not just to have his own back and that of his fellow officers, but to prepare for problems in the future. It kept him oriented and his eye on the prize.
“Seems you got what you wanted, Lieutenant. I believe we can officially count Dr. Jennings as our third victim.” Livingstone crouched a few feet from the body, none of them daring to cross the line until the medical examiner’s office sent another pathologist to claim the remains. That was how this worked. No mistakes. No personal agendas. It didn’t matter how much this death would affect them or that Roxanne Jennings had been part of the team. They would have to treat her as any other body. “Follow up with the ME’s office and have a couple of your officers visit her apartment, talk to her neighbors. I want to know everything Dr. Jennings did between the autopsy for our second victim yesterday morning and when she was discovered.”
Less than thirty-six hours ago.
“The MO has changed again.” Leigh stopped counting the number of stab wounds penetrating through Dr. Jennings’s clothing and flesh. The lacerations the killer enacted were smaller, countless, but the bigger ones—the ones that’d done the most damage—stood out. “The killer isn’t just escalating. He’s breaking the rules laid down by our veteran. Michelle Cross and Gresham Schmidt both went missing for three days. Just like the boys killed twenty years ago. Michelle Cross alienated friends, coworkers, and family members in her obsession to investigate, took time off work, lied. She isolated herself to the point there wasn’t anyone to report her missing until her body turned up, but whoever did this had to know Roxanne Jennings wouldn’t go unnoticed. She was integral to our investigation. This isn’t evidence of a compulsion or trying to push someone else into the spotlight. This is survival.”
“You think Dr. Jennings found a lead.” Director Livingstone straightened, that telltale intensity in her voice. Her gaze cut to Boucher then back. She’d spent the most time with the medical examiner. Hers and Dr. Jennings’s back-and-forth banter had been infectious and light. They’d developed an obvious rapport, if not a temporary friendship, while the director worked this case. This loss would hit Livingstone the hardest, but she wasn’t the type to let it show. Not emotionally. “In the lab results or on Michelle Cross’s body?”
