Sleep Tight

Chapter 11

"I'm home!"

He hurried down the basement stairs. In one hand was a cup of hot chocolate and a carryout bag of food he'd picked up at an all-night gas station. He'd agonized over what to get her as a reward, and then he'd spotted the hot chocolate. Bingo. She would be hungry. She would be glad to see him.

His heart beat in anticipation. This was the one. He was sure of it.

He unlocked the door to the narrow room and leaned his shoulder into it, shoving it open.

The acrid smell of vomit hit him in the face. He recoiled and then forced himself to step inside. She was lying on the mattress, her hands cuffed behind her. He rolled her toward him; her body was heavy and cold.

"I brought you hot chocolate," he said with hesitation.

Skin the color of paste.

Eyes partially open and dried out.

He ripped the duct tape from her mouth to reveal blue lips and not a stirring of breath.

NO!

Dead! She was dead!

He roared like a bull elephant and threw down the cup. Hot chocolate exploded against his pants.

She'd suffocated.

NO!

Not Charlotte! Not his Charlotte!

He'd covered her mouth so she wouldn't scream while he was gone. How was he to know she would get sick? He didn't have all the answers. He wasn't the Answer Man.

He slammed the door and went upstairs. This can't be happening.

He sat down at the kitchen table and unwrapped the prepackaged sandwich he'd gotten for her. He wouldn't have picked it out for himself. It was something a girl might like, with thin slices of turkey, slimy cheese, and wilted lettuce. Light mayonnaise. He would have preferred regular. He was halfway through the meal when he started sobbing. He almost choked because his mouth was full of food that just wouldn't go down. He gagged and spit it out.

He quit coughing. He quit crying. He sat there trying to figure out what he was going to do.

Daylight will be here in a couple of hours.

"I know. I know," he said to the empty room. "Don't you think I know that? I'm thinking. Just let me think."

Twenty minutes later, he went back downstairs.

She was still there, just the way he'd left her, lying on the mattress he'd put there just for her. He would like to have kept her awhile, but he knew from experience that it didn't take long for a dead body to start smelling, start drawing flies.

It was hard getting her upstairs. He was out of breath, and his back hurt by the time he got her to the bathroom.

Once there, he removed her clothes, then put her in the tub. He arranged her legs so she would be comfortable. He filled the tub with cool water and, with a washcloth, removed all traces of vomit. When he was finished, he crossed her arms over her chest. He caressed her hair, smoothing it on either side of her face.

"Not your fault, little girl." Not his, either. Like the bumper sticker said, Shit Happens. It was an oldie but a goodie.

Oh, she was beautiful and sweet and innocent. He was terribly afraid she'd been the one.

Don't think about that. You can't think about that.

He let the water out of the tub, then photographed her, snapping frame after frame. He shot close-ups of her face and shots that took in her entire body. He was caught up in the wonder of her. He wanted to have sex with her. Should he? Did he dare? He finally decided it wouldn't be right; she deserved to be treated like a lady. He wrapped her in the shower curtain and carried her back through the house, into the garage. He put her in the trunk of his car.

He could see her face through the plastic.

Under cover of darkness, he drove.

He wanted to take her back where he'd found her, but cops were crawling all over. They had dogs and helicopters. The National Guard. He'd seen it on the news. So he'd have to take her someplace else. She was special; she deserved a place that was special.

He didn't want to leave her where nobody would find her. He didn't want to leave her where animals might eat her. He wanted to baptize her. He wanted to give her extreme unction. where the current would carry her away with cheT-ished abandon. She was heavy, and he staggered under the weight as he walked along the old railroad tracks that led to the bridge.

The night was dark, and the water was black.

"I commit you to the night, to the water," he whispered, unwrapping her from the plastic shower curtain. Standing on the bridge, he let her go. A moment later, he heard a faint splash.

It was one of those autumn days that brought people out to enjoy the fall colors and possibly the last warm day of the season. Children perched on their fathers' shoulders, chubby hands splayed across foreheads. Bicyclists cruised the Mississippi Mile, and groups of people paused in their stroll across the Stone Arch Bridge to admire the river gushing through the dam.

"Ball," a baby said, pointing with a wet finger.

The object tumbled into view and then vanished into the churning, roaring water.

"Ball," the baby repeated, giggling.

"Where'd it go?" asked the mother, enunciating clearly.

They waited but didn't see it again.

"All gone," the father said with mock sadness. "All gone."

Just then, to the right of the tumbling falls, something bobbed to the surface where the water became silent and smooth as black glass.

"Ball," the baby said, happy again.

Everyone at the bridge smiled and looked. The object drifted closer, and the voices fell silent.

"What the-?" a man finally said.

It was near enough for the crowd of people to be able to make out two undulating arms, a back with the indentation of the spine. Deeper beneath the surface, legs and feet. A body, drifting facedown in the water.

The Behavioral Science team at Quantico had signed off on Mary's profile. She and Anthony put together a press release and were presenting it to Elliot Senatra when the call came.

Elliot's body language changed in a fraction of a second. He was tense, hypervigilant. "Where?" Elliot said into the receiver. Then, "We're on our way." He hung up and looked from Mary to Anthony. "A woman's body's been found in the river near the Stone Arch Bridge at Saint Anthony Falls."

All three charged out of the room, pulling on coats as they hurried down the hallway.

The falls, located just a few blocks from the FBI building, was a popular spot with its view of the locks and jogging paths that took in the Stone Arch Bridge, Mill Ruins Park, Nicollet Island, plus both sides of the Mississippi.

Mary, Anthony, and Elliot arrived on the scene as the victim was pronounced dead. There wasn't a lot that could be processed when a body was found floating in the water, but detectives, lab techs, and the medical examiner were doing what they could. Detective Wakefield was there, along with another officer who was snapping photos. Wakefield acknowledged them with a nod; then he bent his head to converse with a nearby policeman. Reporters with TV cameras swarmed, the media outnumbering crime investigators twenty to one.

"Could be a suicide," Mary commented, crossing her arms and scanning the crowd, not wanting anybody to get ahead of themselves. Both nearby bridges were packed with people hoping to see something. "Or an accident."

"Mind if we take a look?" Anthony asked, flashing his ID.

The man with the camera stepped back. "Go ahead."

The three FBI agents approached.

The body had been pulled from the water and put in a lined body bag. From there it was taken to shore, the bag unzipped for evidence collection and photos.

"Dead less than twenty-four hours, wouldn't you say?" Mary asked, glancing up at Anthony. He was bent, hands on his knees, dark hair falling forward.

"Yeah."

Mary crouched down. If the body hadn't been found in the water, they would have documented everything on the spot, rolling her over to get both sides. Now the main objective was to keep any possible evidence inside the bag with the body. But everyone knew water usually erased all traces of evidence.

"Any visible signs of trauma?" she asked the medical examiner, a heavy middle-aged woman with graying temples.

"Not readily apparent." The ME focused back on her tablet.

The body belonged to a female, about seventeen. Her hair was blond, her skin the color of marble, her lips blue. One eye was half open, the pupil a creamy white, like a cataract.

She still had her eyes.

Mary visually studied her fingernails. Except for abrasions most likely caused by banging around in the river, they seemed unharmed. She looked up at Anthony and could see that he'd made the same observations.

He moved closer, crouching down opposite Mary. "Looks like our girl," he whispered.

"We'll have to wait for the fingerprints or her family's ID, but I think you're right."

They moved back so the crime scene investigators and medical examiner could finish up. The body was tagged, the bag zipped and secured with a seal to maintain the chain of evidence. It was then loaded into the van to be taken to the morgue.

Gillian and Ben arrived as the vehicle was pulling away. "Got caught in traffic," Gillian explained. "Looks like we missed the whole thing."

"Water cases don't take as long to process on-scene," Elliot commented.

Wakefield came up behind them. "A meeting in my office-right away." He began walking in the direction of the police station. As soon as he stepped under the crime scene tape, microphones were jammed in his face. "Come on, people. You know better than that. I can't talk to you until we have the facts."

One reporter wouldn't relent. He needed a sound bite for five o'clock. "Someone said it was a young girl. Can you confirm that?"

Wakefield stopped. "Yes. It appears to be the body of a woman. That's all I can say." He pushed them aside and continued on.

Elliot had his own technique for dealing with the mob. It could have been called pretend-they-don't-exist. It appeared to work extremely well, and Mary made a note to try it the next time she was bombarded with unwanted questions.

They must have made a strange group to anyone who met them on the city sidewalk outside the police station. Six stone-faced people, most dressed in black, moving silently and with purpose, their strides long and deliberate, looking like the opening scene of a police drama.

When they reached the seclusion of Wakefield's office, everybody began talking at once.

"… still had her eyes."

"… fingernails intact."

"Doesn't fit the MO."

"If it is Charlotte Henning, she wasn't killed right away." That comment came from Gillian.

Wakefield nodded in approval. "Anybody care to guess how long after she was kidnapped?" he asked.

"Twenty-four hours," Elliot said.

"Maybe longer," was Anthony's observation.

"So is it the same guy?" Ben asked, his face reflecting the confusion they all felt.

Everybody looked at Mary and Anthony. They were the experts. They were supposed to have the answers.

"Well?" said Wakefield.

Mary shook her head. "'I don't know."

"We need more facts," added Anthony.

"You must have some initial feeling about it," Wakefield argued.

"There are similarities," Mary said. "But they could simply be coincidence. It could even be a sort of copycat. Not a deliberate copycat, but someone who was given the idea to kidnap and kill a blond teenage girl. I'm hoping the autopsy reveals something. I'd like in on it, if that can be arranged."

"Shouldn't be a problem," Wakefield said. "Anybody else want their name on the list?"

"I may not be able to make it, but put me down," Anthony said.

"Me too." That from Gillian.

"What about you?" Wakefield was looking at Ben, who'd suddenly turned a pasty white.

He glanced at Gillian, as if expecting her to come to his rescue. "Uh, I'm not sure I'm ready for an autopsy."

"This would be a good one to start on. She's pretty fresh."

Ben gestured with his hands buried deep in the pockets of his black hooded sweatshirt. "Sure. Okay."