Stuart Woods - Hothouse Orchid

“You saw her?” Lauren asked.

“At the morgue.”

“Can I have the keys, please?” Lauren asked.

Hurd handed them to her.

She walked around to the rear of the car, inserted the key and opened the trunk. “I’ve got a wheelie carry-on and a purse here,” she said. She lifted the carry-on out of the trunk and set it on the ground, then reached for the handbag and stopped. “Hurd, when you saw her corpse, was it missing anything?”

“No,” he replied.

“Then you’d better get out an APB for a female body missing the right hand.”

Holly, naked and sweating, was lying in her bed with Josh next to her. “What time do you have to be at work?” she asked.

“Noon,” he panted.

“Good,” she said.

The phone rang. “Hello?”

“Holly, it’s Hurd.”

“Hey, Hurd.”

“Your idea about checking marina Dumpsters paid off, right out of the box.”

“You found her clothes?”

“First her car keys, then her car-a rental out of Melbourne three days ago. The contract was inside with her license number, and we pulled up her license: Patricia Terwilliger from Atlanta. Then we opened the trunk and found her carry-on, her purse and another woman’s right hand.”

“Oh, shit,” Holly said.

“I’m going back to the office to work this. I just thought you’d like to know.”

“Thanks, Hurd,” she said. “I appreciate the call. Maybe you’ll get a print or two off the car.”

“Lauren’s with me. She’s staying with the car until Forensics gets here.”

“Keep me posted?”

“You bet I will.”

“Will you call Jimmy Weathers? He’s the lead on the case, and I know he’d appreciate it.”

“Sure. I’ll do it right now. I’m going to keep Jim Bruno out of the loop for as long as I can.”

“Good. Oh, Hurd, I had a call from the doctor who treated me the other night. He got the tox screen back. The perp used Rohypnol on me.”

“I’ll let the morgue know.”

“He says it metabolizes quickly, but the girl could have died from it very quickly if the perp hit a vein or artery, so you might get lucky.”

“I’ll take all the luck I can get,” Hurd said. “Bye-bye.”

Holly hung up.

“What?” Josh said.

“They’ve ID’d the woman Daisy and I found on the beach. Sounds like a tourist.” She didn’t mention the hand.

“Will it help you catch the guy?”

“God, I hope so,” Holly said. “He’s not going to stop this now; he’s having too good a time. It’s all working for him.”

“Anything I can do?”

“You can tell your ER to be on the lookout for any other women who come in-women like me, hurt or unconscious.”

“I can do that,” he said, sitting up and reaching for his clothes.

Holly parked a few yards behind the state van and walked up to the blue car.

Lauren Cade was looking into the backseat with a flashlight. She straightened up, then saw Holly. “Hey, there,” she said.

“Hey, Lauren. I see you got your transfer pretty fast.”

“I sure did, and I thank you again for the recommendation to Hurd. He’s a good guy.”

“Yes, he is. Found anything on or in the car yet?”

“There are some prints around the driver’s windowsill and some sand around the pedals. I guess Hurd must have told you about the stuff in the trunk.”

“Yes. Can I see the hand?”

“You mind, Terry?” Lauren said to the guy from Forensics working the car.

“Go ahead. It’s in the van, bagged.”

Lauren went to the open van door, reached into a lab container, lifted out the zippered plastic bag holding the hand and held it up.

Holly took the bag by a corner and rotated it slowly. “This girl is thinner than the one we found,” she said. “Longer fingers and the skin is freckled.”

“I’ll get that to Hurd,” she said. “He’s back at the office.”

“Taller, too, I’d guess; it’s a pretty long hand.”

“Right.”

“And look at this,” Holly said, pointing at where the hand had been severed, a couple of inches above.

“Something cut it clean,” Lauren said. “Maybe an axe?”

Holly rotated the bag a hundred and eighty degrees. “No. Same cut on the bottom. Something cut from both directions at once. Bolt cutter, maybe.”

“The guy carries around bolt cutters?”

“It’s the sort of thing you might find in a police car,” Holly pointed out. “You found the hand in the trunk?”

“Yes. It was under the carry-on, next to the purse.”

“Was there any blood?”

“A drop or two. Terry took a sample of the carpet.”

“Good.” Holly placed the bag with the hand back in the container. “Have you had a look around the marina yet?”

“No. Hurd left immediately after we found the hand, and I haven’t had a chance yet.”

Terry walked up and shucked off his gloves. “I’m done here,” he said. “You can have the car towed now.” He began to put his equipment back into the van.

Holly looked around to see a flatbed truck coming down the road. “Make sure the driver is gloved,” she said.

Lauren went to speak with the man, and Holly walked around the rental car. She didn’t see anything new.

Lauren came back. “You want to work the marina with me?” she asked.

“Sure,” Holly replied. “Let’s see if we can find the boat.” They walked across the parking lot and down the dock, then down the hinged ramp to the pontoons. “Let’s look for a small boat with one or more outboards. You take the south end; I’ll start from the north, and we can work our way back here.”

The women separated and began to examine the small boats moored there. Holly was nearly back to the ramp when Lauren called out.

“Come take a look at this,” she yelled.

Holly trotted down the dock to where Lauren stood, looking into a Boston Whaler, a flat-bottomed runabout of about eighteen feet, with a 75-hp Japanese outboard engine. She walked along the dock for the length of the boat, then back. “Looks pretty ordinary,” she said. “What caught your eye?”

“The keys are in it,” Lauren said, pointing to the ignition under the wheel.

“I missed that,” Holly said. “Good going.”

“If the owner habitually leaves the key in the ignition, then anybody could have taken it.”

“You’d better get that Forensics guy back here,” Holly said. “This boat is going to need a good going over.”

Lauren got on her cell phone just as a young man in shorts, a polo shirt and a baseball cap walked up.

“Can I help you ladies?” he asked politely.

Lauren held up her badge as she talked.

“What’s your name?” Holly asked.

“Tim Pooley,” he replied. “I’m the day manager here.”

“Can you tell me who owns this boat?” Holly asked.

“It belongs to the marina,” he said. “We use it for towing or whatever.”

“Are the keys always in it?”

“Pretty much,” Tim said. “I mean, the night guy may lock them up; I don’t know.”

“Is there somebody here all night?”

“No. He shuts the gate at midnight and goes home. There’s a combination lock, so customers can get in if they’ve been out late.”

“What are your working hours?”

“Eight to six.”

“How many of the boats in the marina are based here?”

“Well, we’ve got eighty berths, and sixty-six are rented by the month or the season. We get a few transients just about every night; they’re mostly alongside the outer, long pontoon. Once in a while, if we know a local is away for a few days-out to the Bahamas or something-we’ll rent his berth by the night.”

“How many live-aboards among the locals?” Holly asked.