William Diehl - Seven ways to die

“We found no DNA so I guess the killer swallowed,” Rizzo snickered, drawing a piercing stare from Annie.

Wolfsheim ignored the interruption. “The killer then withdrew the IV, the remaining blood had settled by gravity to the lower part of the body and there was no blood when the killer cut Handley’s throat.”

“Why go to the trouble of draining the blood when the nitro-Yohimbe dose would have killed Handley?” Bergman asked.

“Good question,” Wolfsheim said.

Bergman took a cautious guess. “No blood stains on the killer or in the room to mess things up?”

“Possibly, but I doubt it,” Wolfsheim answered.

“Make sure he died if by some miracle the nitro and Yohimbe didn’t kill him?” Hue guessed.

“I like that better,” said Wolfsheim.

Then Annie threw in a question: “Why cut his throat after all that?”

“Why indeed,” Wolfsheim muttered again.

“Now may I ask what happened to the blood?” Kate Winters asked cautiously.

“Sure,” said Wolfsheim. “Annie, you want to take that one?”

“Okay,” she said. “There were a few fibers at the death scene. They were on the floor next to the chair where Handley was killed. We’re checking them but we feel fairly certain they came from the towel around Handley’s neck. We’re guessing that towel was put on the floor and the blood drained into something fairly portable resting on the towel.”

“Like a hot water bottle,” Wolfsheim added. “Then it was dumped into the toilet in the guest bathroom.”

“Did you guess that?” Cody asked. “Is that why you took him out sitting up?”

“Educated guess. The blood had to be somewhere. All the killer had to do was drain half his blood supply, two-point-seven liters, to kill him. So I assumed the rest of it had settled in his lower body. Had we tilted him over it would have run out of his mouth, ears, the slit in his throat. All over the place. So, I decided to haul him out the way he was. Also the neighbors wouldn’t notice.”

Rothschild picked it up. She was excited. “The bourbon most likely came from Handley’s wet bar in the library,” she said. “The knife that slashed his throat had a serrated blade so we think it was one of the knives in a holder in the kitchen. Also washed clean in the toilet. We brought it in to test it.”

“Which still doesn’t answer, “Why make the kill so complicated?’” Hue said.

“Also it had to be somebody Handley knew,” Bergman offered. “Perhaps someone who had been there before to case the place.”

Cody had been listening to the word play. Now he joined in. “Well,” he said, “I agree he may have known Handley before that night, but it’s not a certainty. Handley could have described the layout. We have to assume Handley was discreet. He knew the only potential witness was the masseuse across the hall, who was usually asleep by eleven-thirty. So Handley would have been comfortable going to his place.”

“So would the killer,” said Bergman. “I mean, up the stairs and in the door. Hell, entry in a minute, exit in a minute. Somebody spots you going in, you abort the job. Only risk is a minute to get out.”

“Any ideas, Micah?” Wolfsheim asked. “Think about it. The killer was set up and waiting when Handley came home at 12:55 a.m. The entire procedure could have taken say twenty or thirty minutes max, depending on how much the killer was enjoying it. Clearly S amp; M is involved in this. My guess is the perpetrator was out of there by one-thirty, two at the latest. And all the killer needed to bring into the scene was a hot water bottle or some other viable container, a three-foot IV, liquid Yohimbe, two pills, gloves, and some booties.”

“Stuff easily carried in a purse or a paper bag,” Cody said. “Maybe…to complicate matters? Maybe he was testing us? Or maybe…”

“Yes?” Wolfsheim asked.

“It was just a cruel joke.”

Everybody paused to think about that. Could Handley have set up his own sadomasochistic game only to be killed by his partner?

“Could have been a her,” Annie said.

Cody nodded. “True enough. We don’t know for sure whether it was a him or a her.”

“Or both,” Hue added.

“Or androgynous,” Bergman said with a smile. “A he-she.”

“It’s unlikely for this kind of killer to be a woman,” Kate said.

“Yes, it is unlikely,” Cody told her. “But it happens. Though when women kill they usually employ the softer devices, like suffocation.”

Larry Simon looked thoughtful. “But some women torture, and even use guns and knives.” He pointed out that Nell “Hell’s Belle” killed forty men; and that Theresa Noor, who shot her first husband and tortured other victims, including her own daughter, giggled while confessing.”

“She tortured her daughter?”

“Yeah,” Simon said. “She spread a whole pot of macaroni and cheese on her daughter’s legs, made her eat every bite, then killed her.”

“Now that’s torture,” Hue chuckled ghoulishly, remembering his mother’s awful mac and cheese that was so dry it nearly choked him on more than one occasion.

Cody hadn’t been paying attention to Simon’s war stories. He was thinking his own thoughts. “It wasn’t anyone in the Stembler family,” he said. “They were all at a party in Boston last night. The old man flew in on the company plane this morning.”

“How’d he take it?” Wolfsheim asked.

“Shock, disbelief. Then when it began to really sink in I think he was overwhelmed by the whole thing. Autopsy, wedding plans to be canceled, telling his wife and daughter.”

“He volunteered to make the ID,” Kate added. “Then he said he had to make a list.”

“Yeah,” Cody said. “The businessman in him started to creep out.”

“That’s pretty cold,” Hue said.

“He’s a corporate shark. He didn’t get where he is suckling on the milk of human kindness. Most people in his spot would have been more concerned with Handley. Motives, did we have any suspects, more details. He made the arc from Handley’s death to the problems he was facing in about three minutes flat.”

“Did you tell him what happened?” Wolf asked.

“I told him Handley’s throat was slit by someone he knew and that it was not a robbery or a fight.”

“Not entirely untrue,” Wolf said.

“For now that’s all anybody has to know but us.”

“I did notice that he didn’t bring up the possibility that the killer could have been a woman,” said Kate. “I got the feeling it was an option he didn’t care to deal with.”

“Maybe we should call the perp Androg,” Bergman suggested. “Covers all bases.”

“Sure, why not,” Wolf said. “Androg. I like it. Of course it opens up a few more doors. Now we really don’t know what the hell we know.”

Everybody laughed. Then Wolf added, “I’d make one change.”

“What’s that?” Hue asked.

“Play it safe,” Wolf answered. And then added edgily: “Make it Androg 1.”

Everyone fell silent.

Cody nodded slowly.

“You agree then?” Wolf said.

Cody continued nodding.

“This is too elaborate to be a one-off. There’s a demon loose amongst us,” Wolf said.

“Yeah, and so far Androg hasn’t left or taken any trophies,” Cody said impatiently. “What are we looking for? A time sequence? A location pattern? Moon phase? What? And why Handley? Hell, we don’t even have a signature yet.”

In the back of the room Larry Simon was staring at the big board. He said, almost casually, “Sooner or later the perp will start bragging. They all do.”

The crew, except for Vinnie Hue and Larry Simon, vacated the office quickly to follow their assignments. Wolf and Annie returned to the lab to clean up.