Broken Angels

55

They met on the bank of the Schuylkill River, near the oil refineries in the Southwest. The crime scene was partially hidden from both the river and the nearby bridge. The acrid smell of effluent from the refineries filled the air, their lungs.

The primary detectives on the case were Ted Campos and Bobby Lauria. These two had been partners forever. The old cliche about finishing each other's sentences was true, but it went beyond that with Ted and Bobby. One time they had even gone shopping separately and bought the same tie. Once they found out, of course, they never wore the ties. They weren't too crazy about the story being told, for that matter. It was all a little too Brokeback Mountain for the likes of a pair of old- school tough guys like Bobby Lauria and Ted Campos.

Byrne, Jessica, and Josh Bontrager pulled up to find a pair of sector cars, about fifty yards apart, sealing the road. The scene was far south of the first two victims, nearly at the confluence point where the Schuylkill met the Delaware, in the shadow of the Platt Bridge.

Ted Campos met the three detectives at the side of the road. Byrne introduced him to Josh Bontrager. A CSU van was on scene, as well as Tom Weyrich from the ME's office.

"What do we have, Ted?" Byrne asked.

"We have a female DOA," Campos said.

"Strangled?" Jessica asked.

"Looks like it." He pointed toward the river.

The body was lying on the riverbank, near the base of a dying maple tree. When Jessica saw the body, her heart sank. It was something she had feared might happen, and now it had. "Oh no."

The corpse was that of a child. No more than thirteen or so years old. Her slight shoulders were twisted at an unnatural angle, her torso was covered with leaves and trash. She too wore a long vintage dress. Around her neck was what looked to be an identical nylon belt.

Tom Weyrich stood next to the body, dictating notes.

"Who found her?" Byrne asked.

"Security guard," Campos said. "Came down for a smoke. Guy's a fucking wreck."

"When?"

"About an hour ago. But Tom thinks this woman has been out here a while."

The word shocked everyone. "Woman?" Jessica asked.

Campos nodded. "I thought the same thing," he said. "And she's been dead for some time. There's a good deal of decay."

Tom Weyrich approached them. He pulled off his latex gloves, slipped on his leather ones.

"That's not a child?" Jessica asked. She was stunned. The victim could not have been much taller than four feet.

"No," Weyrich said. "She's small, but mature. She was probably about forty."

"So, how long do you think she's been out here?" Byrne asked.

"I'm guessing a week or so. No way to tell here."

"This happened before the Shawmont killing?"

"Oh, yeah," Weyrich said.

Two officers from the crime-scene unit emerged from the van and began to make their way to the riverbank. Josh Bontrager followed.

Jessica and Byrne watched the team set up a crime scene and perimeter. Until further notice this was not their case, nor was it even officially related to the two murders they were investigating.

"Detectives," Josh Bontrager called out to them.

Campos, Lauria, Jessica, and Byrne all made their way down to the riverbank. Bontrager was standing in an area about fifteen feet from the body, just slightly upriver.

"Look." Bontrager pointed to an area behind the scrub of low bushes. In the ground was an item so incongruous in this setting that Jessica had to get right up to it to make sure that what she thought she was looking at was indeed what she was looking at. It was a lily. A red plastic lily stuck into the snow. On the tree next to it, about three feet from the ground, was a painted white moon.

Jessica took a pair of photographs. She then stood back and let the CSU photographer document the whole scene. Sometimes the context of an item at a crime scene was as important as the item itself. The where of something sometimes superseded the what.

Л lily.

Jessica glanced at Byrne. He seemed to be riveted by the red flower. She then looked at the body. The woman was so petite that it was easy to see how she could have been mistaken for a child. Jessica could see that the victim's dress was too large, and had been unevenly hemmed. The woman's arms and legs were intact. No amputations visible. Her hands were open. She held no bird.

"Does this sync with your boy?" Campos asked.

"Yeah," Byrne said.

"Same MO with the belt?"

Byrne nodded.

"Want the case?" Campos half smiled, but was also half serious.

Byrne didn't answer. It wasn't up to him. There was a good chance that these cases were going to be grouped into a much larger task force soon, one that involved the FBI and other federal agencies. There was a compulsive killer on a rampage, and this woman may have been his first victim. For some reason this freak was obsessed with vintage costumes and the Schuylkill, and they hadn't the slightest clue who he was, or where he was going to strike next. Or if he already had. There could be ten bodies between where they were standing and the Manayunk crime scene.

"This guy is not going to stop until he makes his point, is he?" Byrne asked.

"Doesn't look like it," Campos said.

"The river is a hundred fucking miles long."

"One hundred twenty-eight fucking miles long," Campos replied. "Give or take."

One hundred twenty-eight miles, Jessica thought. Much of it shielded from roads and expressways, bounded by trees and shrubs, a river that snaked through maybe a half dozen counties into the heart of southeast Pennsylvania.

One hundred twenty-eight miles of killing ground.