Flesh and Blood. Patricia Cornwell

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СКАЧАТЬ a terrorist. I don’t recall that he was Muslim, either.”

      “Perception,” Benton says.

      “And Marino’s perception has nothing to do with anything political or religious. He believes this case is connected to ones in New Jersey. If that’s true,” I reiterate, “the FBI certainly has more than a passing interest.”

      “We don’t know what we’re dealing with, Kay. The shooting could be self-inflicted. It could be accidental. It could be anything. It might not even be a shooting. I don’t trust what anyone says until you actually see the body yourself.”

      “You don’t want to come?” I cover the panzanella with plastic wrap.

      “It’s not appropriate for me to show up.”

      The way he says it makes me suspicious. I know when Benton is telling me what I should hear and not necessarily what is true.

      “Anything?” I ask him about the video recording.

      “Not so far, which isn’t making me happy. For sure someone was at our wall. If it was completely missed by our cameras then the person knew exactly how to come and go without being seen or recorded.”

      “Unless this really is nothing and whoever did it just happened to miss cameras he didn’t even know about,” I remark.

      “A coincidence?” He doesn’t believe it and I don’t either.

      The Tuscan salad goes into the refrigerator where the swordfish and pitcher of my spicy Bloody Mary mix will stay. Maybe tonight we can have a nice dinner that was supposed to be brunch. But I doubt it. I know how days like this go. Sleepless, relentless, take-out pizza if we’re lucky.

      “Our agents gave Nari a rough time. Doesn’t matter who started it.” Benton gets back to that.

      “I’m not surprised. He certainly didn’t strike me as easy or nice.”

      “If we rush in uninvited it won’t look good. The media will make something of it. There are protests in Boston and Cambridge tomorrow and a march scheduled on Boylston Street. Not to mention anti-FBI and antigovernment protestors, and even local cops who are bitter about how we handled the bombing.”

      “Because you didn’t share information that might have prevented MIT Officer Collier from being murdered.” It’s not a question. It’s a reminder. I’m judgmental about it.

      “I can try to get us on the seven p.m. flight into Fort Lauderdale.”

      “I need you to do something for me.” I open a cabinet near the sink where I keep Sock’s food, medications, and a box of examination gloves because I hand-feed him. I pull out a pair and give them to Benton. Then I give him a freezer bag. From a drawer I retrieve a Sharpie and a measuring tape.

      “The pennies,” I explain. “I’d like them photographed to scale and collected. Maybe they really are nothing but I want them preserved properly just to be on the safe side.”

      He opens a drawer and retrieves his Glock .40 cal.

      “If Jamal Nari was murdered then his killer wasn’t far from here this morning, not even half a mile away,” I explain. “I also don’t like the fact that you noticed something glinting from the trees, and added to that I got a strange communication last month from someone who mentioned pennies. There was something in it about keeping the change.”

      “Directed at you?”

      “Yes.”

      “You’re just telling me this now?”

      “I get whacky communications. It’s nothing new, and this one didn’t seem all that different from other ones—not at the time. But we should be careful. Before you go back into the yard I think it would be a very good idea to get the state police chopper to do a flyover, check the woods, the Academy, make sure there’s no one on the roof or in a tree or lurking around.”

      “Lucy already checked.”

      “Let’s do it again. I can ask Marino to send some uniforms over there too.”

      “I’ll take care of it.”

      “You might want to book our flight for tomorrow,” I decide. “I don’t think we’re going anywhere today.”

      I head upstairs. Sunlight streams through the French stained glass over the landings, illuminating wildlife scenes like jewels. The vivid reds and blues don’t inspire happiness at the moment. They remind me of emergency lights.

      Inside our master suite on the second floor I take off my jacket and drop it on the bed, which I’ve not gotten around to making. I was hopeful we hadn’t finished with it yet.

      Through windows facing the front of the house I can see Marino leaning against his unmarked dark blue Ford Explorer. His shaved head is shiny in the bright sunlight as if he polishes his big round dome, and he has on wire-rimmed Ray-Bans that are as old-fashioned as his worldview. He doesn’t seem particularly worried about an active shooter at large as he lingers in the middle of our driveway.

      I can tell he was off duty when he got the call. His voluminous gray sweatpants and black leather high-tops are what he usually wears for heavy bag training at his boxing club, and I suspect there’s a vest under his zipped-up Harley-Davidson windbreaker. I don’t see Quincy, his rescued German Shepherd that Marino has deluded himself into believing is a service dog. He shows up at most crime scenes these days, snuffles around and typically pees on something disgusting or rolls in it.

      Inside the bathroom I wash my face and brush my teeth. Stripping off my drawstring pants and pullover I’m confronted by myself in the full-length mirror on the back of the door. Handsome, attractive in a strong way according to journalists, and it’s my belief they’re actually thinking about my personality when they make such comments. I’m small, formidable, generously built, petite, medium height, too thin, sturdy, depending on who you ask. But the fact is that most journalists have no idea what I really look like and rarely get my age right or understand anything about me at all.

      I examine the faintly etched laugh and smile lines, the hint of a furrow from frowning, which I try not to do because it makes nothing better. Mussing my short blond hair with gel and adding a touch of lipstick are an improvement. I brush a mineral sunblock over my face and the backs of my hands.

      Then I pull on a T-shirt and over that a soft armor tactical vest, level IIIA, coyote tan, mesh lined. In a drawer I find cargo pants and a long-sleeved button-up shirt, navy blue with the CFC crest, my winter uniform when I respond to deaths or related scenes. I haven’t bothered swapping out for lightweight khaki yet. I was going to do it after Florida.

      Back downstairs I retrieve my rugged black plastic scene case out of the closet near the front door. I sit on the rug to pull on ankle-high boots that I decontaminated with detergent after I wore them last. I think of when that was, the end of April, a Sunday. The nights were still dipping into the low forties when a Tufts Medical School professor walking a trail in Estabrook Woods got lost and wasn’t found until the next day. I remember his name, Dr. Johnny Angiers. His widow is owed life insurance benefits thanks to me. I can’t undo death but I can make it less unfair.

      Grabbing my case, I head down the brick front steps. In and out of sunlight I pass beneath flowering dogwoods СКАЧАТЬ