Tess Gerritsen - Body Double

“Just that door up there, to the kitchen.”

“Which means the bolt doesn’t make any sense. Unless…” Rizzoli’s beam suddenly came to a halt on the far wall.

“What is it?”

Rizzoli crossed the cellar and stood staring. “Why is this thing here? What would anyone use it for?”

Maura moved closer. Felt a chill clamber up her spine when she saw what Rizzoli’s Maglite was shining on. It was an iron ring, lodged in one of the massive cellar stones. What would anyone use this for? Rizzoli had asked. The answer made Maura step away, repelled by the visions it conjured up.

This is not a cellar; it’s a dungeon.

Rizzoli’s flashlight jerked upward. “Someone’s inside the house,” she whispered.

Through the pounding of her own heart, Maura heard the floor creaking above them. Heard heavy footsteps move through the house. Approach the kitchen. A silhouette suddenly loomed in the doorway, and the flashlight beam that flooded down was so bright, Maura had to turn away, blinded.

“Dr. Isles?” a man called.

Maura squinted up into the light. “I can’t see you.”

“Detective Yates. CSU just got here, too. You want to take us through the house before we start?”

Maura released a sharp breath. “We’re coming up.”

By the time Maura and Rizzoli emerged from the cellar, there were four men standing in the kitchen. Maura had met Maine state detectives Corso and Yates the week before, at the clearing in the woods. Two CSU techs, who introduced themselves merely as Pete and Gary, had joined them, and they all paused for a round of handshakes.

Yates said, “So is this some kind of treasure hunt?”

“No guarantees we’ll find anything,” said Maura.

Both CSU techs were looking around the kitchen, scanning the floor. “This linoleum looks pretty beat up,” said Pete. “What period of time are we looking at?”

“The Sadlers vanished forty-five years ago. The suspect would still have been living here, with her cousin. After they left, the house went empty for years, before it got sold at auction.”

“Forty-five years ago? Yeah, this linoleum could be that old.”

“I know the carpet in the living room’s more recent, only about twenty years old,” Maura said. “We’d have to pull it up to check that floor.”

“We haven’t tried this on anything older than fifteen years. This would be a new record for us.” Pete glanced at the kitchen window. “Won’t be dark for at least another two hours.”

“Then let’s start in the cellar,” said Maura. “It’s dark enough down there.”

They all pitched in to haul various equipment from the van: video and still cameras and tripods, boxes with protective gear and aerosol sprayers and distilled water, an Igloo cooler containing bottles of chemicals, and electrical cords and flashlights. All these they carried down the narrow steps into the cellar, which suddenly felt cramped as six people and camera gear crowded in. Only half an hour earlier, Maura had regarded this same gloomy space with uneasiness. Now, as she watched the men matter-of-factly set up tripods and uncoil electrical cords, the room lost its power to frighten her. This is only damp stone and packed earth, she thought. There are no ghosts down here.

“I don’t know about this,” said Pete, turning the bill of his Sea Dogs baseball cap backward. “You’ve got a dirt floor here. It’s going to have a high iron content. Could light up everywhere. That’s gonna be hard to interpret.”

“I’m more interested in the walls,” said Maura. “Smears, spatter patterns.” She pointed to the block of granite with the iron ring. “Let’s start with that wall.”

“We’ll need a baseline photo first. Let me set up the tripod. Detective Corso, can you mount the ruler up on that wall right there? It’s luminescent. It’ll give us a frame of reference.”

Maura looked at Rizzoli. “You should go upstairs, Jane. They’re going to start mixing the Luminol. I don’t think you should be exposed to it.”

“I didn’t think it was that toxic.”

“Still, you shouldn’t take the chance. Not with the baby.”

Rizzoli sighed. “Yeah, okay.” Slowly she headed up the steps. “But I hate missing a light show.” The cellar door swung shut behind her.

“Man, shouldn’t she be on maternity leave already?” Yates said.

“She has another six weeks to go,” said Maura.

One of the techs laughed. “Like that woman cop in Fargo, huh? How do you chase down a perp when you’re that knocked up?”

Through the closed cellar door, Rizzoli yelled: “Hey, I may be knocked up, but I’m not deaf!”

“She’s also armed,” said Maura.

Detective Corso said, “Can we get started here?”

“There are masks and goggles in that box,” said Pete. “You all might want to pass those around.”

Corso handed a respirator and a pair of goggles to Maura. She slipped them on and watched as Gary began measuring chemicals.

“We’re going with a Weber prep,” he said. “It’s a little more sensitive, and I think it’s safer to use. This stuff is irritating enough on the skin and eyes.”

“Are those stock solutions you’re mixing?” asked Maura, her voice muffled through the mask.

“Yeah, we keep ’em stored in the lab refrigerator. Mix all three together in the field, along with distilled water.” He capped the jar and gave it a vigorous shake. “Anyone here wear contact lenses?”

“I do,” said Yates.

“Then you might want to step out, Detective. You’re gonna be more sensitive, even wearing those goggles.”

“No, I wanna watch.”

“Then stay back when we start spraying.” He gave the bottle one more swirl, then decanted the contents into a spray bottle. “Okay, we’re ready to rock. Let me snap a photo first. Detective, can you move away from that wall?”

Corso stepped to the side and Pete pressed the shutter release cable. The flash went off as the camera captured a baseline image of the wall they were about to spray with Luminol.

“You want the lights off now?” said Maura.

“Let Gary get in position first. Once it’s dark, we’re gonna be stumbling around here. So everyone just pick a spot and stay there, okay? Only Gary moves.”

Gary crossed to the wall and held up the spray bottle containing Luminol. With his goggles and mask, he looked like a pest exterminator, about to squirt some offending roach.

“Hit the lights, Dr. Isles.”

Maura reached out to the flood lamp beside her and switched it off, plunging the cellar into pitch blackness.

“Go ahead, Gary.”

They could hear the hiss of the spray bottle. Flecks of greenish-blue suddenly glowed in the darkness, like stars in the night sky. Now a ghostly circle appeared, seeming to float in the darkness, unattached. The iron ring.

“It may not be blood at all,” said Pete. “Luminol reacts with a lot of things. Rust, metals. Bleach solutions. That iron ring would probably glow anyway, whether there’s blood on it or not. Gary, can you move aside while I get this shot? This is going to be a forty-second exposure, so just stand tight.” When the shutter finally clicked, he said: “Lights, Dr. Isles.”

Maura fumbled in the darkness for the flood lamp switch. When the light came on, she was staring at the stone wall.

“What do you think?” asked Corso.

Pete shrugged. “Not too impressive. There’s going to be a lot of false positives down here. You’ve got soil staining all those rocks. We’ll try the other walls, but unless you see a handprint or a major splatter, it’s not going to be easy to pick up blood against this background.”

Maura noticed Corso glancing at his watch. It had been a long drive for both Maine state detectives, and she could see he was starting to wonder if this was a waste of time.