"Kava, Alex - Maggie 03 - The Soul Catcher" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kava Alex)

"The girl's underpants were ripped in the crotch area,"
Racine couldn't resist adding. She padded over to the table, tucking the goggles up onto her spiky blond hair.
Maggie waited for Stan to notice and reprimand Racine, but he was occupied with getting the nests of maggots out of the girl's pubic hair. Then she reminded herself that she needed to concentrate and not let Racine get under her skin. She continued scraping evidence from beneath each fingernail, bagging the findings and labeling each as to which finger it had been taken from.
Besides, why should she care if Racine insisted on sticking with her theory of this being a rape that got carried away? That the District PD hadn't noticed yet that their detective was incompetent shouldn't be Maggie's problem. Yet, it did matter if Maggie was going to be on this case, even as a consultant. The last case she'd worked with Racine had left Maggie with a bad taste in her mouth-Racine's mistakes had almost cost them an indictment.
Maggie swatted a strand of hair off her perspiring forehead with the back of her wrist, so as not to contaminate her latexed hands. She caught Racine watching her. Maggie looked away.
Quite honestly, other than the one botched case, Maggie knew little about Julia Racine except what she had heard through rumors. She probably had no right to judge the woman, but if there was any truth to the rumors, Detective Racine represented a breed of woman that Maggie despised, especially in law enforcement, where playing games could get someone hurt, or even killed.
Since day one of her forensics fellowship, Maggie had worked hard to be just one of the guys and to be treated as such. But women like Racine used their sex as some sort of entitlement or bribe, a means to an end. Now, as she felt Racine's eyes watching her, Maggie hated that Racine still thought she could use that tactic, especially with her. After the last time they had worked together, Maggie thought Racine would know better-pouring on the charm or flirting wouldn't get her any favors from her. But when Maggie glanced up and caught the woman watching her, Racine didn't look away. Instead, she met Maggie's eyes, held her glance and smiled.
CHAPTER 25
Ben Garrison strung the dripping prints on a short length of clothesline in his cramped darkroom. The first two rolls of film had been disappointing, but this roll...this one was incredible. He was back in the saddle again. Maybe he'd even be able to get a little bidding war started, though he wouldn't be able to waste any time. His fingertips tingled with excitement, but his lungs ached from the fumes. He needed to take a break despite his impatience.
He took one of the prints with him, closing the door on the fumes and heading for the refrigerator. Of course, it was empty except for the regular array of condiments, some kiwi fruit he couldn't remember putting in the back, a container of mystery goop and four long-neck bottles of Budweiser. He grabbed one of the bottles, twisted off the cap and returned to
the kitchen counter to admire his masterpiece in the shitty fluorescent lighting.
A knock at the door startled him. Who the hell? He rarely got visitors, and he thought he had trained his meddling neighbors to fuck off. His artistic process was time sensitive. He couldn't be disturbed if he had prints in the fix bath or a roll of film in the developing canister. No respect. What was fucking wrong with people?
He flipped all three locks and yanked open the door.
"What is it?" he growled, causing the small gray-haired woman to step backward and grab the railing. "Mrs. Fowler?" He scratched at his jaw and leaned against the doorjamb, blocking his landlady's wandering eyes. Apparently he hadn't trained everyone in this dilapidated old building to leave him alone. "Why, Mrs. Fowler, what can I help you with today?" He could turn on the charm when necessary.
"Mr. Garrison, I was just wandering by. I've been checking on Mrs. Stanislov down the hall." Her beady eyes were darting around him, trying to get a glimpse into his apartment.
Several weeks ago, she'd insisted on accompanying the plumber to fix his leaky faucet. The old woman's birdlike head pivoted around, trying to take in the African masks on his wall, the bronze fertility goddesses that adorned his bookcase and the other exotic trinkets he had amassed during his travels. That was when the money was flowing in, and there wasn't a photo he could shoot that someone at Newsweek or Time or National Geographic wouldn't pay top dollar for. He was the hottest new commodity to hit the photojournalism world. Now he was barely thirty and everyone seemed to consider him a has-been. Well, he'd show them all.
"I'm actually pretty busy, Mrs. Fowler. I'm working." He kept his voice pleasant, crossed his arms to stifle his irritation and waited, hoping she could see his impatience through her trifocals.
"I was checking on Mrs. Stanislov," she repeated, waving a skeletal arm toward the door at the end of the hall. "She's been under the weather all week. There's that flu bug going around, you know."
If she was expecting some show of sympathy, they'd be here all night. That was above and beyond his ass-kissing ability, cheap apartment or not. He shifted his weight and waited. His mind wandered back to the print he had left on the kitchen counter. Over thirty exposures to finally capture that one image, that one'
"Mr. Garrison?"
Her small pinched face reminded him of the wrinkled kiwi fruit in the back of his frig.
"Yes, Mrs. Fowler? I really must get back to my work."
She stared at him with eyes magnified three times their size. Her thin lips pursed, wrinkling her skin beyond what he thought possible. Spoiled kiwi. He reminded himself to throw them out.
"I wondered if it might be important. That you might want to know."
"What are you talking about?" His politeness had but one level, and she was pushing it past its limits.
This time she backed away, and he knew his tone must have frightened her. She simply pointed at the package he hadn't noticed sitting next to his door. Before he stooped to pick it up, Mrs. Fowler's tiny bird feet shuffled down the stairs.
"Thank you, Mrs. Fowler," he called after her, smiling when he realized he sounded like Jack Nicholson in The Shining. Not that she would notice. The old bat probably hadn't even heard him.
The package was lightweight and wrapped in ordinary brown paper. Ben flipped it around. Nothing rattled, and there were no labels, only his name scrawled in black marker. Sometimes the photo lab down the street delivered supplies for him, but he couldn't remember ordering any.
He set it on the kitchen counter, grabbed a paring knife and
started cutting the wrap. When he opened the lid of the box, he noticed the packing material's strange texture-it looked like brown packing peanuts. He didn't give it a second thought and stuck his hand into the box, feeling for what was buried inside.
The packing material began to move.
Or was it the exhaustion and too many fumes playing tricks on him?
In seconds the brown peanuts came to life. Shit! The entire contents started crawling out over the sides of the box. Several scurried up his arm. Ben swatted and slapped at them, knocking the box off the counter and releasing hundreds of cockroaches, racing and skittering across his living room floor.
CHAPTER 26
Anything found that could have been used as a ligature? And what about handcuffs?" Maggie showed Tully and Racine the girl's wrists, but looked to Tully for answers. The bruises and marks on the wrists were undeniably made by handcuffs. She watched Tully's face, pretending to wait for the answer but really trying to see if he was okay.
This time Tully didn't glance at Racine, but Maggie did, and she could tell the detective wanted to answer, but stopped herself. Tully started pulling out his eyeglasses and pieces of paper from somewhere beneath the gown, tangling his hands in the process. Typical Tully, Maggie noted. He put the glasses on and began sorting through his slips of paper, an odd assortment that included some sort of pamphlet, a folded envelope, the back of a store receipt and a cocktail napkin.
"No handcuffs," he finally answered, and continued to search his scraps of paper.
She wished he would relax. Tully was usually the laid-back one. She was the quick-tempered, hotheaded one, the loose cannon. He was the steady, let's-think-before-we-leap type. It unnerved her how uptight he seemed to be. Something was wrong. Something more than his discomfort with witnessing an autopsy.
"You know, Tully," she said, "they make these really cool contraptions with sheets of paper all tacked together. They're called notebooks, and you can even get them small enough to fit into your pocket."
Tully frowned at her over his glasses and went back to his notes.
"Very funny. My system works just fine."
"Of course, it does. As long as you don't blow your nose."
Racine laughed.
"Humpf." Stan Wenhoff didn't have time for a sense of humor. He motioned to Maggie for help, wanting to hoist the body onto its side for a quick search of any other lacerations.
"Why is her bottom so red?" Racine asked. "The rest of her seems to have this bluish tint, but her ass is all red. Is that weird or what?" Racine attempted a nervous laugh.
Stan sighed, exhaling what sounded like a day's worth of sighs. He was not the most patient medical examiner when it came to explanations. Maggie got the impression he would post No Visitors signs if allowed. They eased the body back. And Stan turned around to peel off his gloves and begin his hand-washing ritual again.
"It's called livor mortis, or the bruising of death," Maggie said when it was obvious Stan wasn't going to answer.
She watched and waited for him to stop her. Instead, he nodded for her to continue. "When the heart stops pumping, the blood stops circulating. All the red cells are literally pulled by the force of gravity to the lowest area, usually the area of the body that's in contact with the ground. The blood cells start breaking down and separating into the muscle tissue. After about two hours, the entire area looks like this, sort of one big reddish bruise. That is, if the body hasn't been moved."
"Wow!" Maggie could feel Racine staring at her. "Does that mean she died sitting up?"
Maggie hadn't thought about it before, but Racine was probably right. Why would the killer have positioned the girl's body while she was still alive? Without asking, she looked to Stan for him to confirm or deny Racine's observation. As the silence stretched out, he finally realized they were waiting for him to respond. He turned around, tugging on a fresh pair of gloves.