Блейк Пирс - Before He Needs

“At work. He works a nine to five. I stay here and run a part-time editorial service, a work from home deal.”

“Would you please ask him the same things I’ve asked you just to make sure I get all the possible information?” Mackenzie asked.

“Yes, of course.”

“Thank you very much for your time, Mrs. Stiller. I may call you a little later if any other questions arise.”

“That’s fine,” Demi said as she led them back toward the front door.

When they were outside and Demi Stiller had closed the door, Harrison looked back to the townhouse that Josh and Julie Kurtz had once called home. “So all we took away from that was the knowledge that they had a great sex life?” he asked.

“Seems like it,” she said. “But that tells us that they had a strong marriage, perhaps. Add that to the statements from the family about their picture-perfect marriage and it makes it more challenging to find a reason for their murders. Or, on the other hand, it could be easier now. If they had a good marriage and stayed out of trouble, finding someone with something against them could prove to be easier. Now…take a look at your notes. Where would you choose to look next?”

Harrison seemed a little surprised that she had asked the question but he dutifully looked down at the notebook he kept his notes and files in. “We need to check out the first crime scene – the Sterling residence. The parents of the husband live six miles from the house, so it may be worth checking in with them.”

“Sounds good to me,” she said. “You got the addresses?”

She tossed him the car keys and headed for the passenger door. She took a moment to admire the look of surprise and pride on his face at the simple gesture as he caught the keys.

“Then lead the way,” she said.

The Sterling residence was eleven miles away from the Kurtzes’ townhouse. Mackenzie couldn’t help but admire the place as Harrison pulled into the long concrete driveway. The house sat about fifty yards off of the main road, lined with a gorgeous flowerbed and tall thin trees. The house itself was very modern, mostly comprised of windows and distressed wooden beams. It looked like an idyllic yet expensive home for a well-to-do couple. The only thing that broke this illusion was the strip of yellow crime scene tape strung along the front door.

When they started walking toward the front door, Mackenzie noted just how quiet the place was. It was blocked off from the other high-priced neighboring houses by a thick grove of trees, a lush wall of green that looked just as well maintained and expensive as the houses along this stretch of the city. While the property was not on the beach, she could hear it murmuring somewhere in the distance.

Mackenzie ducked under the crime scene tape and dug out the spare key that Dagney had provided from the Miami PD’s original investigation. They stepped into a large foyer and Mackenzie was again taken aback by the absolute silence of everything. She took a look around at the layout of the house. A hallway stretched out to their left and ended in a kitchen. The rest of the house was quite open; a living room and large sitting area connected to one another, leading further off and out of sight toward a glassed-in back porch.

“What do we know about what happened here?” Mackenzie asked Harrison. She, of course, already knew. But she wanted to let him display his own smarts and commitment, hoping he would quickly get comfortable before the case really took off.

“Deb and Gerald Sterling,” Harrison said. “He was thirty-six and she was thirty-eight. Killed in their bedroom in the same manner as the Kurtzes, though these murders took place at least three days before the Kurtz murders. Their bodies were discovered by their maid just after eight o’clock in the morning. The coroner’s reports indicate that they had been killed the night before. Initial investigation’s turned up absolutely no evidence of any kind, although forensics is currently analyzing hair fibers found clinging to the front door frame.”

Mackenzie nodded along as he recited the facts. She was studying the downstairs, trying to get a feel for the sort of people the Sterlings were before heading up to the room where they had been killed. She passed by a large built-in bookshelf between the living room and sitting area. Most of the books were fiction, mostly by King, Grisham, Child, and Patterson. There were also a few art-related books. In other words, basic filler books that gave no insights into the personal lives of the Sterlings.

A decorative roll-top desk sat against the wall in the sitting area. Mackenzie lifted the top and looked inside but there was nothing of interest – just pens, paper, a few pictures, and other household debris.

“Let’s go on up,” she said.

Harrison nodded and took a deep, shaky breath.

“It’s okay,” Mackenzie said. “The Kurtz house got to me, too. But trust me…these sorts of situations do get easier.”

You know that might not necessarily be a good thing, right? she thought to herself. How many terrible sights have you become desensitized to ever since coming across that first woman on a post in the cornfields of Nebraska?

She shook the thought away as she and Harrison reached the top of the stairs. The upstairs consisted of a long hallway that housed only three rooms. A large office sat to the left. It was tidy to the point of being almost empty, looking out into the grove of trees along the back of the house. The huge bathroom boasted his and hers sinks, a large shower, a tub, and a linen closet that was as large as Mackenzie’s kitchen.

Just like downstairs, there was nothing to paint an accurate picture of the Sterlings or why anyone would want to kill them. Wasting no more time, Mackenzie walked toward the end of the hallway where the bedroom door was standing open. Sunlight came pouring in through a large window on the left side of the room. The light swallowed up the end of the bed, turning the maroon there an alarming shade of red.

It was dizzying in a way, to step into the bedroom of a spotless house to see all of the blood on the bed. The floor was hardwood but Mackenzie could see splatters of blood here and there. There was not as much blood on the walls here as they had seen at the Kurtz residence, but there was some speckled in droplets like some morbid abstract painting.

There was a faint smell like copper in the air, the scent of spilled blood having dried. It was faint but seemed to fill the room. Mackenzie walked around the edge of the bed, looking at the light gray sheets that had been deeply stained in red. She saw a single mark in the top sheet that might have been a puncture wound from the knife. She observed it closer and found that was exactly what she was looking at.

With a single lap around the bed, Mackenzie was sure that there was nothing here that would push the case along any further. She looked elsewhere around the room – the bedside tables, the dresser drawers, and the small entertainment center – looking for even the smallest detail.

She saw a slight indentation in the wall, no larger than a quarter. But there was speck of blood around it. There was more blood beneath it, a slight dribble that had dried on the wall and the smallest little fleck of it on the carpet beneath the indention.

She went to the indentation in the wall and looked at it closely. It was a peculiar shape, and the fact that there was blood centered around it made her think one was the result of the other. She stood up straight and checked the small hole’s alignment with her body. She raised her arm slightly and bent it. In doing so, her elbow aligned with the hole almost perfectly.

“What have you got?” Harrison asked.