AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“That matches with the parking pass,” Spencer said.
“Yes,” replied Baldwin.
“Anything else?” Vaughan asked.
“We found nothing else in her pockets or on her body. Hard to say at this point if she’d been sexually active or assaulted. We did pull some black hair fibers from her body, and they have been sent to the lab.”
“Do you still have Galina Grant’s body?” Vaughan asked.
“Yes.” He carefully covered the body with a sheet and closed the drawer before moving to drawer 205. “We did locate Galina Grant’s mother. She lives in Kansas but can’t afford to travel here to claim the body, nor can she afford to bury her.” He opened the drawer and peeled back the sheet to reveal Galina Grant.
Vaughan studied the young girl’s still, drawn face, already blotchy with decomposition. Anger burned in him. No kid deserved to die like this.
“Jane Doe had good dental care, while Grant had a half dozen cavities,” Baldwin said. “Radiology also revealed she’d suffered several broken bones, including her nose. That injury appeared to be within the last couple of months.”
“There was a pizza box at the crime scene, and it contained only discarded onions and pepperoni.”
“There was a partial slice of pizza in her stomach.”
“Any pepperoni?” Vaughan asked.
“Yes, as a matter of fact.”
So the killer hated the topping. “What else do you have, Doc?”
“Vaginal bruising confirms she had rough sexual intercourse before she died, but her partner wore a condom and didn’t leave semen behind.”
Spencer knitted her fingers together as she stared at Galina Grant. “She’s so young.”
“She was nineteen,” Baldwin said.
“A little older than Skylar,” Spencer said.
“Even like Marsha Prince when she died,” Vaughan said. The evidence was creating a pattern that he feared painted the picture of a serial killer.
Vaughan’s phone rang. It was Hughes. Turning and walking away, he pressed the phone to his ear. “Tell me you have something.”
“I’ve matched Hadley Foster’s credit card transactions with video footage from several stores. You might want to have a look.”
“We’re on our way.”
They left the medical examiner’s office, and as he drove east, back toward Alexandria, he glanced toward Spencer, who was sitting quietly, scrolling through her phone. “What do you think?”
Her naturally skeptical eyes swung around to meet his. “You have a killer who has a type. And he’s been active for a long time.”
“His capacity for violence is high. That’s not easy to miss.”
“He moves between jurisdictions and hunts prostitutes like Galina Grant. How many girls like Galina just vanish, and no one ever notices?”
“Too many.” He tightened his grip on the wheel. “Marsha Prince, Hadley, and Skylar Foster aren’t the kind of women whose disappearances go undetected.”
“Marsha was murdered eighteen years ago. The world was not as connected, and forensic science was still developing. But I’d wager he learned from her that hunting in affluent neighborhoods would get him caught.”
“So he shifted gears.”
“For a time, yes.”
“And then Hadley Foster returns to Alexandria,” she said.
“She and Skylar were featured in the news in March when they won a fitness competition. Maybe seeing her stirred up memories.”
“She starts him on a new killing spree.”
“I would wager he has never stopped. In fact, I would wager seeing her agitated him and made him sloppy.”
“It’s all theories until we find Hadley and Skylar.”
“Exactly.” She slowly took in a breath, drawing his attention to the long lines of her neck. She had a grace and confidence that was hard to ignore. He liked the way she pinned her hair up.
“Are you hungry?”
“Starving. But I don’t think we have time.”
“I was thinking pizza.”
She arched a brow. “Would this be a pizza place close to Galina Grant’s crime scene?”
“Maybe. Pepperoni and onions work for you?”
“Sure.”
“My kind of gal. Find the pizza place nearest the Bragg Street motel, and I’ll buy.”
She searched her phone. “There are three.”
“We’ll go with the closest.”
She called in the order, and twenty minutes later, he walked through the front door of the pizza shop, his gaze traveling to the piles of delivery boxes piled behind the counter.
“Pizza for Vaughan,” he said.
The slim Hispanic kid behind the counter rang up the order. Vaughan pulled up a picture of Galina. “Ever seen this girl?”
The kid frowned and looked from side to side, as if worried. “No.”
“I’m not here to make trouble.” He lifted the edge of his jacket, exposing his badge. “She was killed, and I’m trying to find her killer.”
“I don’t know her.”
Vaughan scrolled to the picture of the pizza box. “You ever use boxes like this one?”
“No. We always got our name on our pizza boxes.”
“Know anyone who uses this kind?” Vaughan asked.
“Maybe Gino’s. It’s three blocks from here.”
“Thanks.” He picked up the box, strode to his car, and set the pizza in the back seat.
The light from her phone sharpened the angles on her face as he slid behind the wheel. “Any luck?”
“Guy thinks maybe Gino’s.”
“Do you want me to call in an order?” she asked.
“Onions and pepperoni?”
“Done.”
The drive to Gino’s took less than five minutes, and when he pulled up, she reached for her purse. “I got it. Do me a favor and don’t park in front of the store. This vehicle screams cop.”
He chose a spot in the shadows that also gave him a clear view into the glass storefront of the pizza shop. “And if we aren’t cops, what are we?”
“Not we. Me. I’ll think of something. Stay in the car.”
“You’re the boss.”
She rose out of the car, her long legs carrying her quickly across the lot. He watched Spencer inside the shop as she grinned and approached the cashier. Her expression brightened in a way that made it hard for the cashier or him not to notice.
The cashier, an older guy with white hair and a scruffy mustache, turned and selected her box from a tall stack.
When he handed her the ticket, she touched her hair and straightened her back a fraction, accentuating her breasts slightly. The man leaned in toward her, and the two spoke for several minutes before she smiled again and picked up the box and left. The cashier raised his phone, but his gaze lingered an extra beat on her ass.
She opened his back door and put her pizza box on top of his. “That your logo?”
He turned around. “Bingo.”
“I thought so. Galina comes in several times a week. Loves her toppings. The last time he saw her was Monday.”
“Was she with anyone?”
“She came in alone and paid cash. The shop has security cameras, so I suggest you get a warrant for the footage.”
