Jefferson Bass - Cut to the Bone - A Body Farm Novel

Satterfield slipped the Mag-Lite into the pizza bag and pulled the pistol from his waistband. Hanging the pizza bag from his left wrist by the nylon strap, he took tender hold of the doorknob and twisted, his thumb moving as slowly as the second hand on a clock. The door opened inward, into the stairwell—much better for him than if it swung outward, into view. He eased it open an inch, then waited and listened. “Bill, have some more salad,” the woman said.

Another careful inch.

“Thanks, hon, but I’m not really hungry.”

A foot this time.

“I’ll take some more,” the boy said.

Satterfield swung the door fully open.

“Please?” prompted Brockton.

“It’s okay, Dad—you don’t have to beg me.” A half second later: “Hey, come on. That was funny.”

“No, not really,” Satterfield said, taking two quick steps—through the doorway and then around the corner, into the kitchen. “Who wants pizza?” Their faces, startled and stupid with surprise, swiveled toward him. Four startled faces, not three. A girl. Who the hell’s the girl? Brockton, seated at the near end of the table, started to his feet, the look of surprise on his face giving way to anger and fear as his gaze shifted from the Domino’s shirt and pizza bag to the face of the man. The face of Satterfield.

Satterfield swung the pizza bag sideways by its strap, the heavy rectangle slicing through the air and smashing into Brockton’s face, the weight of the heavy flashlight inside adding to the force. Brockton toppled backward, knocking over his chair as he fell, and then struggled to rise from the floor. Satterfield kicked him to put him back down, then took a step back and waved the pistol. “I’m sorry to have to break it to you,” he said, “but I lied—I don’t really have pizza for you.”

CHAPTER 46

Decker

DECKER KNEW THAT THEdetective and the forensic techs didn’t want him there—he was lurking and watching, radiating anguish and rage—but nobody wanted to get in his face about it; nobody wanted to be the jerk that told a guy whose brother had just died to get the hell out of the way. The detective, Kittredge, was squatting beside Bohanan, the senior forensic tech, who was kneeling near the feet of the headless corpse, using tweezers to pluck filaments of wire from the floor.

“Detective?” The voice came from behind Decker—from the direction of the kitchen, where one of the junior forensic techs was taking photos—and floated past him, into the living room, to Kittredge.

“Yeah?” Kittredge looked up, past Decker, toward the kitchen doorway.

“You just want pictures of the garbage? Or do you want me to bag it up and bring it back to the lab?”

“What’s in it?”

“A bunch of pizza, mostly.”

“How much pizza?”

“A lot. Looks like a whole pie.”

“Uneaten?” Decker saw Kittredge frown, furrow his brow, reach up and rub the stubble on his chin. Bohanan glanced up, too, his tweezers poised in midair.

“If it were eaten, it wouldn’t be here. You hungry, detective?”

“Hang on. I’m coming to take a look.” Kittredge didn’t head straight to the kitchen, though; Decker watched as the detective detoured to the near side of the den and squatted beside a battered Domino’s box. Using the tip of a pen, Kittredge lifted the lid. Decker leaned in far enough to see what Kittredge saw: that the box contained three ragged pieces of pizza crust. Kittredge picked up one with a gloved hand. On his way into the kitchen, the detective edged passed Decker, avoiding eye contact.

The tech was right, Decker saw when he followed Kittredge into the kitchen—there was a lot of pizza in the trash. Enough to feed everybody working the scene, and then some. The detective plucked one of the slices from the can—a slice that had no crust—and held the fragment from the box alongside it. The edges fit together perfectly, like pieces of a puzzle. “What the hell?” he heard Kittredge mutter, and then: “Oh shit. No, no, no. Please no.” Drawn by the stir of activity, Bohanan joined Decker in the doorway.

As Decker and the two techs watched, Kittredge reached into the trash can and fished out a navy-blue magic marker, along with a thin piece of cardboard stained with ink. The cardboard had been delicately and precisely incised with two stencil patterns. One was a bird—an eagle—its wings spread, its talons clutching an anchor and a three-pronged spear. The other stencil was a snake with a broad triangular head.

“We’ve got a problem here,” said Kittredge.

“A big problem,” said Bohanan.

Decker didn’t say anything. He was already gone, sprinting for the front door.

“LIEUTENANT!” DECKER HEARD CODY’Svoice from the direction of the SWAT truck. “Hey, Lieutenant! Everything okay? What’s going on in there?” Decker didn’t stop to talk; he didn’t even turn to look; he just lifted a hand and kept running.

As he’d hoped, the keys were still in the ignition of Kittredge’s unmarked Crown Vic. You’d think a detective, a guy who’d probably spent years investigating robberies and auto thefts, would be careful with his keys. Or maybe, Decker thought as he slid across the ripped upholstery and cranked the balky engine, he’s hoping somebody will actually steal this piece of shit. Jerking the gearshift into reverse, he smoked down the driveway, nearly backing over a startled uniformed officer, who was half sitting on the hood of the patrol unit parked in the street. Decker gave a brief wave of apology and roared away, his right hand reaching for the radio as soon as he was traveling straight. “Dispatch, this is Lieutenant Decker. Can you give me a physical address for Dr. Brockton? Bill Brockton—William, maybe? The UT bone doc?”

“Stand by, Lieutenant.”

Decker was hurtling north, which was the only way it was possible to head from the dead end where Satterfield lived. In less than a mile, though—thirty seconds, at the rate he was going—he’d reach an intersection and have to choose: west, toward downtown and UT and most of the Knoxville suburbs, or east, toward Holston Hills and Seymour and Strawberry Plains. “Come on, come on, ” he muttered as the stop sign loomed a hundred yards ahead. He considered stopping at the intersection and waiting for the answer, but if he was right—if Satterfield was alive and gunning for Brockton—there wasn’t time. Guessing, Decker took the left turn in a power slide, aiming the car west, envisioning its eight cylinders firing like the barrels of a Gatling gun.

“Dispatch to Decker.” Finally.

“Decker. Go ahead.”

“That address is 3791 Clifton Drive. That’s in Sequoyah Hills.”

“Can you give me directions from Kingston Pike and Neyland?”

“Stand by.”

Decker was less impatient this time; it would take five minutes to reach downtown, and another five from there to Sequoyah. By the time the dispatcher radioed back with directions, the Crown Vic was wailing along the river on Neyland, past the stadium and the basketball arena and the sewage plant. He killed the siren and the blue lights when he turned off Kingston Pike on to Cherokee—not out of respect for the fancy neighborhood’s peace and quiet, but to avoid announcing his arrival. He was swooping down the curving boulevard toward the riverfront when the dispatcher called him. “Lieutenant Decker, do you need backup? Is there a situation at Dr. Brockton’s residence?”

“Negative,” he replied at once. Backup and bureaucracy were the last things he needed. “I just need to drop something off. Hey, is there a patrol unit posted there?”

“Not anymore. Was, anyhow, till a few minutes ago. The watch commander pulled the plug once they got the ID on the suspect’s body.”