Karen Rose: Silent Scream

New detectives, on solving their first homicide, were presented with their first fedora by the squad, their peers. Kane had presented Olivia’s to her, but she’d felt a little silly wearing it. Her hat sat on her desk back at the office, adorning the head of a Grecian goddess bust she’d found at a yard sale.

But Kane, he liked his hats. He must have had a dozen. Kane liked to look good.

At the moment, Kane looked perplexed. Olivia made her way up the hill to where he stood over a gurney, a uniformed cop at his side. The ME crouched next to the body, bagging the victim’s hands, and Olivia’s heart started to pound, her stomach lurching dangerously. Not again. Not again.

Look at her, she told herself harshly. She’ll be… whole. Olivia drew a steadying breath, forced her eyes down, then let the breath out as relief washed over her. The victim was indeed intact. Flesh covered her bones. All of her bones.

The worst was over. Now I can do my job. The girl looked about sixteen. Her waxen face and long blond hair were streaked with soot and grime, as was the faded, thin T-shirt she wore. Her jeans were tattered, by design versus genuine wear. Her feet were bare, her soles burned badly. Her toenails were painted bright orange.

Fighting the shakes that always seemed to follow the relief, Olivia waited until she could trust her voice not to tremble. “What do we have?”

“Caucasian female,” the uniform said. “No ID. Was found on the fourth floor. She was already dead when the firefighter got to her.”

“Cause?” she asked.

Isaac Londo, the ME tech, looked up from bagging the victim’s hands. “Probably smoke inhalation. I didn’t see any recent injuries. She’s got older ones, though.”

“Where and what?” Kane asked.

“Finger appears to be fractured, and there’s a twist burn on the right forearm.”

Olivia’s eyes narrowed. The last vestiges of her panic were receding, replaced by cold fury. Runaway, her instincts told her. She’d made working with runaways a personal mission over the last few years, since meeting her two half sisters. Mia was a decorated cop, but Kelsey was a convict, having been a runaway first. The signs were crystal clear. “Someone put their hands on her.”

“That’s my guess.” Londo sat back on his heels. “Your other guy? Different story. The guard took a blow to the head with a blunt instrument, then a slug to the chest.”

“Where is he?” Olivia asked.

“On the other side of the building, by the lake. Dale and Mick are over there now.”

Dale was Londo’s partner and Micki Ridgewell was the CSU leader. “And that guy?” She pointed to a fortyish man in a jogging suit who paced behind the crime scene tape looking very worried.

“Sammy Sothberg,” the uniform said. “He’s the construction manager. Sothberg said the guard’s name was Henry Weems, age fifty-seven. He’s local.”

“You talk to him yet?” she asked Kane.

“Yeah,” Kane said. “Briefly. He’s shaken. Has an alibi. We’ll have to check it out. He gave us Henry Weems’s personnel info. We’ll need to inform Mrs. Weems.”

And what fun that always is. Olivia looked way up and saw a large hole with jagged edges in one of the picture windows on the fourth floor. “She came from up there?”

“Yeah.” This answer came from Micah Barlow, the police department’s arson investigator, who’d walked up to join them. Immediately Olivia’s hackles rose and she had to choke back what would have been a hiss.

“Hell,” Kane muttered, loud enough for Barlow to hear. “Not him.”

“Kane,” Olivia rebuked under her breath and was rewarded by Kane’s long-suffering sigh. She and Micah Barlow had gone through the academy together. They’d been friends once. Now, not so much. Because Barlow was a meddling, arrogant bastard.

Barlow looked from Olivia to Kane, then shook his head with exaggerated patience. “Let’s just get this done, okay? The firefighters saw her handprints on the glass. It’s impact-resistant, so they had to cut their way in. The guy that brought her out made sure they cut the far side of the window. He wanted to leave her prints intact for you.”

“Forward-thinking of him,” Olivia said mildly. “We’ll want to talk to him.”

“He’s still inside. I’ll bring him to you when he comes out.”

“Fine,” Olivia said, shrugging off the annoyance she felt every time she was subjected to Barlow’s presence. “How did the arsonist set the fire?”

“From what we can see, they opened several cans of carpet-padding adhesive, spread them on the first and second floors. Sprinklers were rendered inoperable. Somebody cut the chain on the OS and Y and closed the valve.”

The OS &Y was the outside screw and yoke valve on the line that brought city water to the sprinklers, Olivia knew. “Are any bolt cutters missing from the toolshed?”

“Don’t seem to be. We’ll get a full inventory, but it looks like they brought their own.”

“They came prepared then. Incendiary devices?” Kane asked.

“Nothing yet, but we haven’t really been able to start looking. I don’t think they used a simple match. After dumping an entire can of adhesive, the fumes would have already been hanging in the air. If they’d dropped a match, they wouldn’t have made it to the door. That stuff is incredibly flammable.”

“Had the carpet been laid?” Olivia asked.

“No, the construction manager said that was going to be done tomorrow. Well, today, now. The carpet, padding, and cans of adhesive had been staged on the first three floors. Floors four through six have mostly hardwood floors and were finished.”

“Somebody knew those materials were there,” Kane mused. “Surveillance tapes?”

Barlow frowned. “Cameras were rendered inoperable five minutes before midnight. The guard would have come outside on his normal beat at five after twelve.”

“Inside job,” Olivia said. “Or at least inside information.”

Barlow nodded. “We’re getting the personnel list.”

“Where’s the control room?” Kane asked.

Barlow pointed to the closer of two construction trailers. “Up until last month, they had a man in the trailer, monitoring the camera feeds. Budget overruns cut staff. They were down to one guard per shift. The trailer was always the night guy’s first stop.”

“You’re sending the used adhesive cans to the lab for prints?” Olivia asked.

“Already gave them to CSU,” Barlow answered. “The manager seems pretty ripped up. Weems was his friend, and he was working two jobs to send his kid to college.”

Olivia sighed. “We’ll check his financials anyway. Somebody profits from the insurance. Maybe nobody was supposed to get hurt.” She looked down at the gurney, at the girl’s lifeless body. “I guess something went wrong.”

“Check out her hands, Liv,” Kane said. “Some kind of gel.”

ME tech Londo held up the victim’s left hand and Olivia could see that whatever covered the girl’s palms had already smeared the plastic bag. “Accelerant?” she asked.

“No,” Barlow said. “We ran a sniffer over her. The gel didn’t register. Nothing on her clothes either, so if she was involved in spreading the carpet-pad adhesive, she was careful enough not to splash any on herself.”

The sniffer measured the hydrocarbons in accelerants, so Barlow was most likely right. “Did the firefighters find anything with her?”

“Nothing yet. They just finished knocking the fire down a half hour ago. They’re up there now, checking for any other vics. We’ll give you and CSU the go-ahead as soon as we know it’s safe.” And he would. Obnoxious as he was on a personal level, Micah Barlow did his job. As do we. So do yours. Look at her, Liv. Really look.