Breaking Creed

13

Maggie O’Dell sat at a corner table in the cafeteria. The window looked down at the beginning of the forest. From her perch she could see the unmarked trailhead. It was overgrown and easy to miss unless you were looking for it. O’Dell was one of the few who used this path into the pine forest and onto the running trails that forked and wound through the trees.

Right now she wished she had her running gear on and she could escape. Even the heat and humidity would be a welcome relief. She’d already retreated from her cramped office down in the Behavioral Science Unit, six floors below ground. Lately she found herself needing a window, to see the outside and the sky. Sometimes even the elevator trip down made her feel like she might suffocate from the walls of earth surrounding her.

She knew her claustrophobia was progressing but she didn’t dare tell anyone. Assistant Director Kunze would find a way to use it against her. She’d learned years ago to hide any vulnerabilities and discovered early on that it was best not to remind her male colleagues that she was different. She wore form-hiding suits: navy or black, sometimes brown or copper. No jewelry, other than a watch, nothing that could get pulled or caught or grabbed. No spiked heels, only leather flats had become a part of her uniform. And never, ever anything pink.

She had the cafeteria to herself, if you didn’t count the sounds coming from back in the kitchen. O’Dell hadn’t been seated for five minutes when Helen — who had been a reliable and constant force in the cafeteria for longer than any agent could remember — brought out two coveted chocolate-frosted cake doughnuts on a plate and set them on the table in front of O’Dell.

“You’re getting too skinny,” she told the agent, pursing her lips to confine her smile, obviously pleased with herself for remembering how much O’Dell loved doughnuts, and that chocolate-frosted ones were her favorite. As quickly as Helen put the plate down, she pivoted on her tiny feet and scurried back toward the kitchen.

“Thank you,” O’Dell shouted, but the woman didn’t take time to turn, instead she raised her bird-like hand to wave her acknowledgment.

A run would have been better at calming her, but she bit into the soft cake doughnut and decided this was a well-deserved treat for putting up with Kunze’s floater assignment.

She had brought her laptop, a notebook, pen, and a color printout of the photo she had snapped of the victim’s tattoo. It hadn’t taken her long to find similar images, despite the red pustules that marred this victim’s skin. Her first impression had been wrong, but not by much. The tattoo wasn’t a version of the Grim Reaper but rather a female skeleton referred to as Santa Muerte, the saint of death.

Turns out people prayed to Santa Muerte for “otherworldly help” for a variety of things, such as landing better jobs or stopping a lover from cheating. O’Dell had been raised Catholic, but the idea of praying to some mediator other than God had always seemed like a waste of time and effort. Her mother, however, prayed to Saint Anthony when she couldn’t find something and invoked Saint Christopher before she stepped from the Jetway onto an airplane. Of course, the prayers to her favorite saints were usually fortified with her earthly companions, Jim Beam and Johnnie Walker.

Having tracked serial killers, mass murderers, and terrorists, O’Dell had grown weary of and impatient with those who used religious icons and ideology simply to promote and validate their predilections. So she wasn’t surprised when she discovered that some prayed to Santa Muerte for fending off wrongdoing and carrying out vengeance. Nor was she surprised to learn that Mexican and Colombian drug runners often sought out Santa Muerte’s protection to ward off law enforcement. Safe houses set up shrines with miniature altars. Smugglers placed small statues of the saint on the dashboards of their vehicles, even as they drove across the border.

The more O’Dell read, the more she believed the victim from the river probably didn’t tattoo his left shoulder blade with the saint so he could find a better job. Chances are it was to protect him from the job he already had. And O’Dell had made up her mind about the man before her cell phone started vibrating on the tabletop.

She glanced at the caller ID as she grabbed the phone. It was an extension she recognized from the ME’s office.

“This is Agent O’Dell.”

“I’m confirming fire ants,” Stan Wenhoff said without an introduction. “The blisters contain a toxic alkaloid venom called solenopsin. It’s from the class of piperidines. The liquid is both insecticidal and antibiotic. Odd combination, I know.”

“So fire ants inject this when they bite?”

“Fire ants bite only to get a grip. They actually sting and inject from their abdomen.”

“Impressive little buggers. Can this stuff cause death?”

“This many stings could certainly have sent him into anaphylaxis. He’d have difficulty breathing, rapid heart rate. His throat would swell. Certainly may have contributed to his death. His lungs and heart tissue showed signs of congestion, consistent with undue pressure. Probable cause of death was suffocation. I need to wait for blood analysis results, but I suspect a high concentration of cocaine will have also contributed to his demise.”

“What about the ligature marks?”

“Definitely restrained. Both the wrists and ankles. I can’t estimate for how long, but there was a good amount of struggle.”

“I’m looking at similar images of the tattoo,” O’Dell told him.

Before she could go on, Stan interrupted. “And you’re discovering it might be linked to the drug trade.”

“So you recognize it?”

“No, can’t say that I do. But I’m guessing a man who puts a tattoo of a female skeleton that looks like the Grim Reaper on his back, a man who may have died of a drug overdose and who was most likely tortured by being tied down on top of a massive mound of fire ants… well, it wouldn’t take a stretch of the imagination to guess this is drug-related.”

“Dumping the body in the river could be a warning, but why in the Potomac? You said you believe he died somewhere down South. Do you still believe that?”

“You’re free to double-check, but my recollection is that fire ants don’t exist in areas that periodically have temperatures below freezing. Messes up their whole colonization thing. Besides, I’m guessing he probably died closer to his home.”

“And you know where that is?”

“Yes. I can even tell you his name.”

The offer surprised O’Dell enough that she hesitated before asking, “How are you magically able to do that?”

“Actually, no magic at all. I found a driver’s license shoved halfway down his throat. And despite the fact that he is currently a bit bloated, the resemblance is enough that I’m quite certain it’s his.”