Phoenix Feather Read online

  “Cause of death, Casey?” Bryan asked.

  The medical examiner leaned over the body and examined the eyes. Tiny pinpoints of red dotted the whites. “Petechial hemorrhaging. That and the bruising around her neck suggest strangulation.” She checked liver temperature. “Time of death between eight and twelve hours ago. She’s almost in full rigor mortis.”

  Bryan’s partner, Jess Harris, joined them. Her 5’6” and slight physique masked the spunk that made her a formidable cop on the streets. “Manager says he closed up and went home around eleven o’clock last night. Didn’t hear or see anything out of the ordinary.”

  Bryan moved around to get a view from a different angle. He was twenty-nine, and this was not where he had imagined his life would end up. When he had first wanted to become a cop and majored in criminology, he’d had this delusion that he would become a hero and help make the world a better place. Time and experience shattered that. He didn’t make a difference in the world; he just cleaned up its messes.

  “What are the other marks?” he asked. “They don’t look like knife wounds.”

  Casey lifted a shirtsleeve. “They appear to be burns.”

  “Like she was in a fire?” Jess asked.

  “No. These are isolated, inflicted. I’ll be able to tell you more at the autopsy.”

  “Any chance she has ID on her?” Bryan asked.

  Casey felt the jean pockets and around the body. “Wait, here we go.” She lifted the girl slightly and found a purse underneath her.

  Jess reached in and grabbed it. She pulled two cards out. “Jenny Rosland,” she read, and held up the picture IDs for Bryan to see. “Driver’s license, and Student ID for Seattle U.”

  Bryan wrote the name and address in his notebook.

  Jess sifted through the purse. “No cash, but credit cards are still here. Cell phone, car keys to a Honda. I’ll see if I can find the car in the area.”

  Bryan nodded. “No apparent rape. It doesn’t appear to be a robbery either. So what happened?” Finding the answer to that question was what kept him up late at night. He went off to help uniformed officers canvas the neighborhood, but no one saw anything. Jess returned after searching a five-block radius, but no car matched the set of keys.

  “Let’s go by our vic’s apartment,” she said, and then waved at Casey. “Call when you’re ready to autopsy?”

  The M.E. nodded. “I’ll try to make it soon.”

  Bryan and Jess headed out to the victim’s address, located at one of those large apartment developments. No one answered the door, so they went around to the office to speak to the complex manager. The guy was a middle-aged accountant type who was all too willing to help and didn’t even bother asking about search warrants. He confirmed that Miss Rosland lived alone, and gave them the key to her unit. They asked him to find the rental paperwork and meet them over there.

  Bryan and Jess headed back and let themselves in to the one-bedroom apartment. The place showed no signs of a struggle. Jenny’s taste in decor was eclectic. She had two dark red couches, stringed dragonfly lights wrapped around a small computer desk, and a bar-height dining table in the kitchen with bright blue and green spotted placemats. The two detectives branched off to look around.

  “There are a few pictures here with different guys in them,” Jess said, peering at frames on the wall. “But none that really stand out as a boyfriend.”

  “How can you tell?” Bryan asked.

  She gave him a wry look. “No one’s acting overly affectionate in any of them; not one guy is in more pictures than the rest. If she had a boyfriend, it would show.”

  “Maybe we’re looking for an ex.” Bryan stopped at a row of picture frames on top of a short bookcase. He picked up one of Jenny from a Fourth of July party. She was smiling and wearing one of those antenna headbands with red, white, and blue tinsel bouquets mimicking fireworks. Bryan remembered with a pang of guilt how he had missed the last two Fourth of July barbecues with his brother and friends. He had been buried in work.

  “Maybe it was a date gone bad,” Jess said. She moved to the desk and started going through the single drawer. Jess, like Bryan, was devoted to work at the expense of much of a personal life. She had never married and rarely went on dates. She did have a sister and brother-in-law with two kids, whom she adored and spent nearly every day off with. When was the last time he spent a day off with other people? He liked to go to the gym, but he didn’t talk to anyone, and mostly he stayed home and pored over open case files.

  The manager appeared in the open door and held up a copy of Jenny’s paperwork.

  Bryan took it and looked it over. “She’s lived here two years? Was she a good tenant?”

  The manager nodded. “Always paid rent on time.”

  “Any problems with neighbors? Complaints?” Jess asked.

  “There was a parking issue last year, but those people moved out three months ago.”

  “Is her car here?” Bryan asked.

  The guy paused. “Uh, no.” He frowned. “I haven’t seen it since this past weekend. Come to think of it, haven’t seen Miss Rosland since then either.”

  Bryan and Jess exchanged a look. “You ever see any guys around?” he asked.

  “I don’t pay that close of attention. I just know she was a nice girl who liked to hand-deliver her rent payments.”

  “Why did she like to hand-deliver them?” Jess asked.

  The manager smiled at his thought. “She joked once that it was her OCD.” His smile faded just as quickly. “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s okay, thanks.” Bryan flipped the folder closed. “We’ll be in touch if we need anything.”

  The manager nodded and made his way out.

  Bryan tapped the edge of the file against his palm. “So where’s she been the past few days?”

  “You handle putting an APB out on the car from the info on the rental agreement,” Jess said. “It’s my turn for notification.”

  Bryan didn’t argue. Notifying next of kin was one of the worst parts of the job. Another was digging into a life that no longer existed. Sometimes that bothered him the most, especially if he found a commonality with the victims, something they would never get to do that he hadn’t done either. He still had the chance, but usually work took precedence. He kept working while that list kept growing until he felt he was wasting his life while these people were unjustly robbed of theirs.

  His cell phone beeped with a text message. “CSU is just about finished gathering the evidence at the alley. They’re heading back to the station,” he read.

  Jess nodded. She had found an address book in the desk, which she tucked under her arm. “Let’s go.”

  Back at the precinct’s homicide division, Bryan sat at his desk amidst the hustle and bustle of the bullpen and went over the results of the dump on Jenny Rosland’s cell phone. Jess had gone to observe the autopsy after the family had come down for positive identification. Bryan looked over the calls and saw nothing that suggested stalker, harassment, or, as Jess had pointed out earlier, a boyfriend. Calls to and from the cell phone were pretty regular: place of employment, family, friends, and pizza joint.

  Jess came in and dropped a folder on his desk. “M.E.’s report. Casey said not all the burn marks were fresh, that the victim had been held captive for at least three days. Lividity confirms she was killed somewhere else and dumped in that alley.”

  “I talked to her employer,” Bryan said. “She was at work Sunday morning, and didn’t have another shift until Friday night. If she had been missing that long, why didn’t anyone else report it?”

  “The family said she had a tight school schedule and only saw them on weekends.”

  “But she probably didn’t show up for class.”

  Jess shrugged. “It’s not a teacher’s job to report a college student on attendance. As I understand it, graduate classes only meet once a week anyway.”

  Bryan flipped open the autopsy report and skimmed the highlights. “No signs of
sexual assault?” That surprised him.

  Jess shook her head. “None. The guy’s a sadist though. Casey found several different types of burn patterns. Looks like he used a cigarette lighter, a blow torch, and, get this, a firebrand. He tortured this girl as if it were personal.”

  Bryan leaned back in his chair. “I don’t know. It’s brutal, but almost methodical. And with no rape…”

  “I don’t want to jump that far ahead,” Jess said.

  “Neither do I.” He read the official cause of death: asphyxiation caused by strangulation. “What’d the killer use to strangle her?”

  “Rope. Casey found fibers consistent with rope you can buy at any hardware store.”

  Bryan sighed and leaned forward again. “So far, we know the last time she was seen was leaving work Sunday afternoon. We need to narrow it down.”

  “Unfortunately, this girl doesn’t seem to be the type to have used a day planner,” Jess said. “Or if she did, CSU didn’t find it at the scene and we didn’t find one at her apartment.”

  “Could be in her missing car,” Bryan said.

  “No hits on the APB yet?”

  Bryan had only sent out the all-points bulletin an hour ago. “None. If we find it, we may find out where she was grabbed.”

  Jess nodded to the stack of papers on his desk. “Cell phone calls?”

  “Yeah.” He picked up the sheet he had been looking at. “She received two calls Sunday night by an Aidan Quinn. I ran the name; she’s a student at the same school as our vic.”

  “Maybe she can help us with the timeline.”

  Bryan picked up the phone to call the campus and get a location for Miss Quinn. “I’ll go interview her.”

  “I’ll track down some of Jenny Rosland’s classmates, see if anyone knew what her plans for Sunday and the week were.”

  Neither of them wanted to say it, but Bryan had one of those sinking feelings in his gut. If this case didn’t end up being a clear-cut instance of an acquaintance, like an ex-boyfriend, taking out some pent-up rage, he feared they would be looking at more victims.

  ***

  The clock hand twitched and slid into 10:20. The professor had not stopped lecturing, but his voice was drowned out by the shuffling of papers and ripping of zippers on bags. He gave one last shout about an upcoming paper before giving in to the intractable mob of students pushing to escape the classroom.

  Aidan shook her head as she gathered up the reflection journals and put them in her bag to grade later. Ingrates. Young people didn’t have any respect for their teachers anymore, and college courses were something to pass and check off a to-do list, rather than a place to sit and soak in knowledge and wisdom. Aidan had been Mr. Kuntz’s T.A. for the past two semesters. It wasn’t the poor man’s fault that he had a monotone, hypnotic voice. Aidan had heard students complain about the boring class on the Picts and the Romans. She agreed, but for different reasons. She had witnessed this segment of history firsthand, and while the clash of unstoppable Roman legions with the spirited inhabitants whose bravery could not be quashed was fascinating, Mr. Kuntz just did not have the oral flair of a bard. When her turn to teach one of the lessons as part of her practicum came up, she would do her best to engage these unimaginative young minds, making history come alive for them. That was her idealistic dream anyway. She did have more practical expectations.

  A man in a suit maneuvered his way through the exiting horde and into the classroom. He had sandy blond hair in a traditional cut, and did not carry a briefcase like a professor. He spoke quietly to Mr. Kuntz, who looked up and called for Aidan.

  She slung her bag over her shoulder and made her way to the front of the classroom. Mr. Kuntz left, however, once she had approached.

  “Aidan Quinn?” the man in the suit asked.

  “Yes.” She eyed him with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion.

  He reached for something in his jacket pocket. “Detective McCain. I need to ask you a few questions.”

  Aidan took in the features of his badge, yet remained silent.

  “Do you know a Jenny Rosland?”

  “Yes.”

  Detective McCain flipped open a notepad and clicked a pen. He held the ballpoint just above the paper, poised to take anything down. “When did you last see her?”

  “Over a week ago.”

  “Are you close?”

  “Not really. We’re part of the same book club, but she wasn’t there last Sunday.” The pen began scribbling and Aidan’s adrenaline stirred. “What’s happened to her?”

  The detective looked up. “She was found murdered this morning.” He had a look of sympathy, but also one looking for a reaction. “Phone records show you called her—around the time she might have disappeared. So you didn’t see her Sunday?”

  Aidan’s muscles froze. Murdered. It wasn’t a new word, but it was the first in this life, and more unexpected now than it had been in the past. Jenny was an English student; she loved books and always provided lattes and mochas when it was her turn to host the club. Aidan remembered a bubbling, sometimes hyperactive, young woman, certainly not the type of person Aidan would imagine being murdered.

  “She missed book club,” Aidan said in a quiet voice. “I thought maybe she had a paper or something like that, even though she was usually good about telling us.”

  Detective McCain loosened his shoulders and softened his tone. “I’m sorry for your loss. Do you know if she had any enemies? Maybe ex-boyfriends?”

  Aidan shook her head. “I don’t know that much about her. I’m studying history; she’s studying English. All we ever talked about were books. It was a way to step outside the stress of life.” She frowned. “She was murdered Sunday and no one noticed?”

  “Not exactly,” the detective hedged. “Do you know if she was having trouble of some kind?”

  “The last time I saw her she was tired, but still herself: cheerful. You think she was kidnapped first?”

  “It’s an ongoing investigation,” McCain answered. “If you think of anything, give me a call.” He dug in his wallet for a business card and handed it to her. “If I have more questions, I’ll contact you.” He closed his notepad and left.

  Aidan held the small piece of cardstock between her fingers. She couldn’t stop the images of war and death from swirling around in her mind. All those memories of lives extinguished when she, immortal, always came back. She found herself standing alone in an empty lecture hall, a place that had seen thousands of people pass through in the last century. But the updated whitewashed walls and seats bolted to the linoleum floor did not miss any of them.

  Aidan knocked twice and not very forcefully, but she heard footsteps on the other side before the door opened.

  “Hey, Aidan. What’s up?” A guy with mousy and unkempt brown hair stood in the doorway. He wore a t-shirt and shorts and didn’t look as though he planned to go out anytime soon.

  Aidan didn’t say anything as she came inside and dropped her bag on the floor. Phoebe came out from the back room.

  “Hey! Aren’t you usually at the museum at this time?”

  Aidan sat on the couch. Phoebe and Chris Anders were twins and one of those examples of the strange phenomenon that can occur between siblings separated by minutes. They shared an apartment, a university, and friends. They were so close that someone could not be a good friend with one and not the other. Aidan trusted no two people more.

  “Aidan, what’s wrong?” Chris asked, and took a seat on the sofa across from her.

  She took a deep breath and told them what she had learned about Jenny. It was awkward and unpleasant, and it amazed Aidan how easily people objectified historical deaths just because they had no personal connection to them.

  “I can’t believe it,” Phoebe said, sinking down next to Chris. He put his arms around her.

  “What do the police think?” he asked. He knew Jenny from the English department, though they hadn’t been close. Detective McCain might call to ask Chris questions as we
ll.

  “I don’t know,” Aidan replied. “He didn’t seem to want to tell me anything.”

  “Are you a suspect?” Phoebe gasped.

  “No.” The detective had been cautious at first, as was his job, but he didn’t interrogate her. “He wanted to know about ex-boyfriends, but I couldn’t help him. All I really knew about her was her favorite books and quotes.”

  Phoebe shook her head. “She was on her way to meet us…”

  Aidan stared at the floor. It was like with Ivar. One day they were together, happy, and the next he was gone, killed in an accident. There was no goodbye, no seeing him off to whatever the next world had in store for him—something Aidan would never know. Then there was a sense of regret. She wished she had gotten to know Jenny better. A thousand years from now, Aidan would be the only one left who would remember, but all she had was trivial snippets of a deeper life.

  “Oh,” Phoebe groaned. “Those jokes we made. They weren’t mean, but—but we were laughing at her when she was possibly dying.” Tears swam in the corners of her eyes.

  Chris stood up. “Okay, guys, I think you need to get off this couch and do something. How about we go out and remember Jenny the way she was?”

  Aidan couldn’t help but smile. It was as the ancient warriors used to do: celebrate the life and death of a fallen comrade. “I’ll call the other girls from the book club.”

  “Coffee,” Phoebe spoke up. “We should go for fancy coffee.”

  Aidan nodded. “Jenny would like that.”

  Chapter Three

  Jenny was in the paper the following week, a nameless column on page five: “Police Still Have No Leads in Recent Murder.” Detective McCain had called Aidan again to see if she had thought of anything new. He seemed desperate for something to go on. Aidan had nothing to give him, no clues as to why. No, Aidan was ready to accept that it was a random act of human nature, a statistic to be added to the millions that had come before.