The Night Is Alive

4

Once again, Abby Anderson stared at him, her frown intense, her manner completely unnerved and highly irritated.

“What the hell are you doing?” she demanded in a harsh whisper, coming up to him.

He arched one of his heavy dark brows and felt the spirit gum on it tighten. “You said you thought it was important to be on the ship. So I thought that it was important, too.”

“You were supposed to be investigating the murders—seeing your friend, David Caswell, and finding out what’s going on.”

“I did see David,” he told her. “I met him for coffee at eight. Weird situation. He’s investigating the murders, but the other detective—the man you met last night—has been assigned the missing-person situation. So he’s asked that he be paired up with Ben Peters. All the stations and all law enforcement officers in the area have been alerted about the murders, but my friend David is the head of the task force. I learned a great deal today—before boarding the ship.”

That didn’t seem to make her happy. “Why are you in this ridiculous getup?” she asked.

“I’d met Dirk. I didn’t want him to know I was on board, observing.”

She turned around and started walking toward the end of the dock.

He followed her. “Hey!”

She spun on him. She made a good wench, he thought. A pirate hat with little pearl strings attached sat over her forehead. She wore boots, black leggings, a long-sleeved blouse, fitted red vest and frock coat—male attire, which certainly might have been chosen by a woman who found herself sailing the seas. She had long shapely legs and the boots added to her height. The color of her eyes was so rich and deep a blue that it was mesmerizing, especially when framed by the near-ebony darkness of her hair. He was surprised to feel something stir in him. But she stirred more than his senses; she seemed to touch something deeper than the simple lust that biology and nature dictated. She had passion. She seemed to breathe vitality.

“Do you enjoy sneaking up on me, playing dress-up?”

He cast his head to the side with a small, amused smile. “I often worked undercover when I was in New Orleans and, quite frankly, I used disguises in my work as a private investigator. As a matter of fact, Jackson Crow actually mentioned that some members of his unit have found their acting talents to be of use. In a way, acting is part of human behavior. I’m sure you’ve learned that criminals, especially psychopaths, have a tendency to act incredibly sane and rational. We need to be able to play certain parts, as well. And while you’re busy commenting on me, you might take a look in a mirror. I think you’re dressed up, too?”

“Not to make a fool of anyone,” she muttered.

He frowned. “I wasn’t trying to make a fool of you, Ms. Anderson. I was trying to take a ride on the high seas—or river, as it may be—and get a take on the man who owns the ship. A man you might not see with open eyes because he’s been a friend for so long,” Malachi said.

Abby gasped. “Dirk? You think Dirk could be guilty of...this? Of...of anything?” she asked.

Malachi caught her arm and walked her down the dock toward the street. “Ms. Anderson, as I told you, the first thing I did this morning was meet with my friend, David Caswell. And I discovered several things about the deaths. The victims had marks at their wrists that indicated they’d been bound, probably with heavy rope, according to the medical examiner. They all showed signs of blunt force trauma. In other words, they were hit on the head. But in all three cases, the actual cause of death was drowning. So, Ms. Anderson, it looks as if they were held captive, knocked out—and then forced into the water. Water...hmm. That could mean a ship. Look at it this way. They’d been bound and—metaphorically, at least—forced to walk the plank. That kind of implies a ‘pirate’ might have wanted them dead, or they might have met their end off the deck of a pirate ship.”

Abby stared at him. “Oh, no! All right—maybe. But they could’ve gone off a rowboat or...or an oil tanker just as easily.”

“Yes,” Malachi said, “they could have. But how likely is that?”

She shook her head. “I’ve known Dirk most of my life. This is his livelihood. Why would he suddenly go insane and start killing people off his ship—especially without any of us seeing a change in him?”

“No one ever really knows another human being,” Malachi said simply.

“Oh, I think I would’ve noticed bodies popping up in my city over the years!”

“People sometimes crack, Ms. Anderson. Strain, pressure. All the same, no one completely understands the human brain. It’s the most wonderful computer in the world—but just like a computer it can short-circuit. And I didn’t say your friend was the killer. I merely thought it prudent to investigate. Under the circumstances.”

“And you knew I was on that ship.”

“I’m not trying to fight you, Ms. Anderson. I’m not trying to go against you. Look!” he said with exasperation. “I’m here because you wrote to Jackson Crow. I’m here to help you.”

“If you’re going to stalk me, you can quit calling me Ms. Anderson. It’s Abby,” she said. “And—”

She broke off suddenly, blue eyes growing large as saucers as she stared past him.

“Abby?” he said.

She didn’t respond. She was still staring.

“Helen?” she whispered, her voice thick.

Malachi spun around to see where she was pointing.

She was looking at the water, to the far side of the dock. They’d done a good job in the past years, cleaning up the river, but it was impossible to stop a certain amount of natural growth and unnatural garbage from cresting the water and drifting up against the embankment.

There was sea grass or fungus, a plastic soda bottle someone had tossed away and a few cigarette butts. Oil slick covered the water right at the docks, creating little curlicues of blue and purple on the water.

And caught there, just by one of the pilings for the dock, was a body.

Facedown, it appeared to be a woman—long strands of river-sodden hair fanned out from the head. And it appeared that she’d just washed up.

On the slim chance that she might be alive, Malachi took his phone out of his pocket and let it fall on the deck before he dove into the river. Surfacing by the body, he quickly turned her over.

It was indeed a woman. That was all he could really tell as he looked at her face.

And she was dead. River life had already been eating at her flesh. The tip of her nose was gone and her flesh was icy cold and a grotesque shade of gray.

He looked up the five or six feet from the water to where Abby stood on the dock. She was almost as gray as the corpse.

“Call 9-1-1,” he told her.

Despite her pallor, she was functioning. “I already did.”

“Is it Helen?” he asked her.

“I wouldn’t begin to know,” she said, “she doesn’t even look...real.”

An hour later, the corpse was in an ambulance bound for the morgue, crime scene techs were scouring the water and the embankment, and police divers had been dispatched to see if any evidence might remain in the water. Shaken, Dirk had canceled his afternoon and evening pirate cruises, rescheduling or refunding the money of those who’d bought tickets. Abby sat with Malachi Gordon—who had cast off all vestiges of a costume—at a desk in police headquarters.

She liked Malachi’s former partner from the get-go.

David Caswell’s desk was surrounded by others. There was a fair amount of activity at the station. A hooker was arguing with her arresting officer and two other cops were trying to deal with a junkie on a bad trip.

David had arrived at the dock soon after the initial response team had cordoned off the area and plucked Malachi and the corpse from the water. About six-one, sandy-haired, green-eyed, he was serious without being somber, smart and probing without being aggressive or demanding. Abby thought he had to be in his early thirties. He spoke with a slow, smooth Southern accent that matched his steadfast but easy manner.

Maybe he didn’t have to be demanding; he knew he’d get a straight story from Malachi, no matter what the story—and there really wasn’t much of it.

“Your statements are being typed up. You can sign them and get out of here for now,” Caswell told them. “I figure you want to attend the autopsy?” he asked Malachi.

Malachi, hands clasped in front of him, nodded.

“It’ll be scheduled for later today. I’ll call you when I know the exact time. Before I let you go, can we run through what happened? Ms. Anderson...” He paused, looking at Abby, and smiled. “Or is it Agent Anderson?”

She smiled. “I just realized it is. Agent Anderson. I am official. But please call me Abby.”

“Okay, Abby. So you were working on your friend’s pirate boat because his usual actress is the young lady reported as missing. Helen Long.” He studied her. It wasn’t that costumes and pageantry didn’t abound in Savannah. But it could also be a very conservative, old Southern city. She was hardly dressed as a respectable young local in her plumed hat, frock coat, breeches and boots.

“Yes, I was being his wench for today. He’s very upset. Dirk is a great employer. He provides sleeping space when his people need it. He takes on part-time help so his employees can go to school if they choose. He really cares about Helen,” Abby said.

“But...he couldn’t say that the girl we found in the water was Helen, right?”

“No. I couldn’t tell you, either,” Abby added. “And I knew her. I’d met her several times,” she said. “I don’t think it was Helen. But I can’t be sure. The body...” Her voice trailed off. She had to be better about things like this; she’d been through an autopsy, for God’s sake. She’d passed the academy with flying colors.

“Hey,” Malachi said, looking over at her. “No matter how long you chase the bad guys, death can still tear you up. And if you get to where it doesn’t...then you need to reassess what you’re doing.”

“Yeah, thanks,” she said huskily.

“So you were working on the ship, the ship came back in to berth, you were walking down the dock and you just happened to stop and see the body,” Caswell said.

“I was behind her. I’d called out to her,” Malachi explained. “It was while we were standing there talking that Abby saw the body and...”

“And you dove in,” Caswell finished.

Malachi raised his hands. “We could only see her from the top. She was facedown, but the pirate ship and some small boats had just come in, so—I doubted it—but...she might have been alive. Better to try than to find out you might have saved someone.”

“Always,” David murmured. “Now...this may change things,” he said, leaning toward them. “The powers that be wanted to handle the situation on their own, but now with another murder...I think they’ll ask for federal help, if you want to give the right people a heads-up.”

Malachi nodded in acknowledgment. “Anything else you can tell us?”

“When you sign the statements, I’ll give you a copy of the notes I’ve compiled. Then do me a favor and get out of here. I don’t want any resentment if we do go official—or if we don’t. You know how cops can be—I don’t want them to think the feds were snooping around before they were asked in. Some officers take it to mean they’re being judged, that they weren’t considered competent at their jobs and therefore the federal government had to step in. It’s not conducive to constructive work and everyone does need to work together.”

“What lines of investigation are you working on right now?” Malachi asked.

“Searching for Helen? We’ve got her computer and we’re following up on the online dating angle. That was Peters’s case,” he said, and hesitated. “It might be mine now. We’ve gone through the cell phone records on the others, tried to figure out if there was someone they were meeting. We’re retracing their steps. And we’re still waiting for lab reports from Forensics, although the autopsy procedures have been completed on Ruth Seymour, Rupert Holloway and Felicia Shepherd.”

“Do you have any suspects?” Malachi asked.

“No—not a one. We have our tech guys working on tracing the men Helen Long met through the online dating service, as I said. That’s it. We don’t have anything solid. Ruth Seymour checked into her B and B, and no one remembers seeing her after. She was a tourist, of course, and wouldn’t be known by locals, but we’ve had her picture all over. Same with Rupert Holloway. He was due at a meeting at a restaurant on the riverfront. He never made it. Felicia Shepherd left her apartment, presumably to go to class. She said goodbye to her roommate—and that was it.”

“They disappeared on foot, right?”

“Yes. Felicia’s car was in her parking space at the complex, Rupert Holloway’s was in the garage at the hotel, Ruth Seymour’s car was in the drive at the B and B.”

Ten minutes later they left the station. They were in Malachi’s car heading back toward the Dragonslayer. He drove an Explorer, and while the interior was clean, it looked as if he’d driven on some rough roads.

“So what now?” Abby said, flipping through her files.

“First, I’m getting dry clothes.”

“Oh!” She’d forgotten that he must be sodden; he hadn’t had anything other than a towel provided by one of the crime scene techs. “Yes, you must be miserably wet.”

“I’m almost dry but I feel like my clothes are glued to my skin. If you don’t mind, we’ll stop by my hotel. I’ll only be a minute.”

“Where are you staying?” she asked.

“The 17hundred90 Inn and Restaurant,” he replied. “Hey, it’s supposed to be one of the most haunted in Savannah.”

Abby nodded. “I love the bar area and the restaurant. There’s a great fireplace—nice to sit around on a chilly night. The house was actually built in 1820, but that was a disastrous year for the city. A fire wiped out half of it and an epidemic of yellow fever killed whole families, so I guess someone liked 1790 better and used that year to name the place. The ghost of Anna haunts it, you know.”

“Anna, who threw herself from the window when her lover deserted her,” Malachi said. “In my room—204. Hey, I knew I was staying down here. Might as well go for an intriguing room.”

“Have you seen Anna?”

“No, not yet,” he told her. “Well, other than the fact that the owners have a fantastic sense of joining in with the city fun. There’s a mannequin of her in the window. I pass her every time I come in and out of the room.”

“The tour guides love it when they go by,” Abby agreed.

Malachi managed to find parking quickly. Abby went into the bar while he walked up to his room. As she entered, she realized that she was still in pirate attire—a number of stares came her way, and before she could get far, a couple of children asked to have a picture taken with her. She complied and finally entered the bar. A friend of hers was bartending and laughed as she explained that she hadn’t had time to change. She noticed that a lot of people were talking about the situation in the city in hushed voices. The media was broadcasting the fact that another body had been found by the river.

Abby ordered a cup of tea to sip while she waited. Locals frequented the bar and met visitors to the city there.

She didn’t particularly want to become involved in a conversation right now and took her tea to one of the plush chairs near the fireplace, the folder with notes from David in her hand. When she looked through them, she discovered the autopsy reports on all but the newest victim. The women, she saw, had engaged in sexual activity before their deaths, but whether it had been coerced or consenting, the M.E. had not been able to determine. The bodies had been too compromised. No fluids had been recovered, so DNA matches from semen wouldn’t be possible.

She frowned, reading that. If a serial killer was a rapist as well, it seemed strange that he’d chosen a male victim. She leafed through the next report, and learned that the male victim, Rupert Holloway, hadn’t shown any signs of sexual assault.

But if her grandfather had been a victim of the same killer, was he surprised by him in the tunnel to the point of having a heart attack? Or perhaps forced to move quickly in an attempt to escape and that had brought it on?

She looked up. Malachi had reappeared. He’d evidently taken a shower because his dark hair was damp and slicked back. She noted the clean scent that emanated from him and the color of his eyes and the way he stood. And, as she’d told herself before, he could certainly appear intimidating.

He was wearing jeans, a tailored shirt and a lightweight taupe jacket. She saw that he wore a shoulder holster and suspected that he was seldom without his weapon. She was without hers. Pirate wenches didn’t run around with Glocks. But in the days to come, she had to remember that she was an agent, which meant having her weapon available at all times. She’d asked for help that had turned out to be Malachi, and if she wanted to carry her weight, she had to behave like an agent.

He could disguise himself, too. First, he’d caught her unaware from out of the shadows. Then she’d spoken to him on the ship and not even known who he was!

“Ready,” he said lightly. “I’m assuming you might want to change? But maybe not. That pirate garb is quite fetching.”

She took a last sip of her tea and rose. She was glad she was fairly tall; in the pirate boots, she didn’t feel short against his height. Abby wasn’t sure why that mattered. But it did, probably because she felt that she’d been taken in by him a few times. Of course, maybe he really hadn’t meant to make her feel like a fool. Maybe he’d just accomplished the feat by accident.

“I think I will give up the pirate attire for now,” she said. “Shall we go back to the Dragonslayer?”

During the short drive, Malachi asked Abby if she’d seen anything in the files to draw her attention. She told him what she’d read, and then realized that he must have known the cause of death—and the fact that the women had engaged in sex, which was most likely not consensual. He would also know that the man had not been molested. After all, he’d spent an hour with his detective friend.

“Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?” she asked.

“If there are two killers?” Malachi asked, glancing over at her. “I don’t know. My guess is that the murders are being done by the same person. The disposal of the bodies is what makes me think so.”

“Yeah, I agree,” Abby said thoughtfully. “And cause of death—drowning—is the same in each case.”

When they arrived at the Dragonslayer, Dirk Johansen was at the bar with Bootsie and Aldous. He’d obviously had a drink to calm his nerves.

Macy met her at the door. “He’s pretty upset,” she murmured. “But then, from what I understand, you found the body. And it might be Helen Long!”

“I don’t think it’s Helen,” Abby said softly. She saw that Macy was studying Malachi. “Hello, there. You were at the funeral, right?”

Abby made the introductions. “Macy, this is Malachi Gordon. Malachi, Macy Sterling.”

“How do you do, and yes, I was here yesterday,” Malachi told her. “I’m a friend of a friend of Abby’s at the agency.”

“Oh, oh, oh!” Macy said. “A fed.”

“Technically, I’m more of a fed than he is,” Abby couldn’t resist pointing out. A smile of amusement glimmered on Malachi’s face. He didn’t say a word. She sensed that he wasn’t being polite, he really didn’t care if he was an agent or a detective or an investigator. He was interested in the job, not the title.

“Well, we’re glad you’re here,” Macy said, shaking his hand. Macy liked him, Abby thought. Or, at least, admired his appearance. She had that look she wore when she found a man attractive.

“Thank you,” Malachi said, bowing slightly.

“I’m going up to change,” Abby announced. “Malachi, come on up and you can wait in Gus’s office.”

“It’s your office now,” Macy said.

“It will always be Gus’s office,” Abby said. Macy seemed a little stricken and Abby quickly added with a smile, “Okay, let’s call it Gus’s and my office. How about that?”

Macy smiled.

Abby strode over to the bar. Aldous glanced at her and nodded at Dirk, who was staring down into his drink, then shook his head sadly. Abby set a hand on Dirk’s shoulder. “Dirk?”

Dirk looked up at her. “That could be Helen,” he said. “That could be Helen. That blond hair... Helen has blond hair that streams around her like that.”

“Dirk, you couldn’t really tell if the hair was blond or not,” Abby told him. “The woman we found was light-haired, but...I know Helen, Dirk. I don’t think it was her. I wouldn’t lie to you.”

“I’ve been trying to contact her family,” he said. “The police have been trying.... I have no idea what to say to them, but I’ve got a reprieve. They’re on safari in Kenya. It’ll be another week before they can be reached. Oh, Lord—I pray we find her, alive, before then.”

Malachi’s phone rang and he excused himself to answer it.

“This is horrible, so horrible,” Dirk moaned as Abby tried to comfort him.

Malachi came back over to them. “That was Detective Caswell,” he said. “The medical examiner’s office has the young woman cleaned up. He says she’s still pretty rough to look at, but they’ve gotten all the river gunk off her and he wants you to come down and see if you recognize her. I told him Abby could probably come make the same identification. He suggested you both come.”

“I’ll change first,” Abby said.

“I’ll go.” Dirk’s voice broke. “She worked for me. I owe her.”

Aldous and Bootsie each set a hand on his shoulders. They reminded Abby of the Three Musketeers—one for all, and all for one. It must be nice to have such close and steadfast friends. She didn’t lack friends but a friendship like theirs, like the one they’d shared with Gus, was pretty special.

“Be right back.” She ran up the stairs, stopping to throw the file folder of notes David Caswell had given them into the bottom drawer of Gus’s desk. Something made her hide it beneath a stack of other papers.

She paused, looking around the room. “Blue?” She waited. “Gus?” she said hopefully.

But she spoke to the air.

Leaving the office, she hurried to her own room to dress. She put on one of her white tailored blouses and lightweight blue pantsuits. She was going to the morgue. It felt important to dress properly.

Malachi found a perch on the bar stool next to Bootsie. Sullivan asked if he wanted anything; he decided that if he was going to sit there commiserating with the tavern’s intriguing trio of barflies, he should have a drink so he ordered a light beer.

“Sad business,” he said. “But, Dirk, this might not be Helen. Abby doesn’t seem to think it is. Still, it’ll be best to know for sure.”

Bootsie turned to him. “Yeah, I guess so. I mean, you can hope the girl just went off on a whirlwind romance, but...”

“Helen was responsible,” Dirk said. He lifted his glass. “Ah, Helen.”

Dirk might be a little too far gone to recognize anyone, Malachi thought.

“Dirk, did Ms. Long have any tattoos or birthmarks? Anything that might help if her face is too...damaged?”

“Damaged?” Aldous repeated with a shudder.

“Um,” Dirk said thoughtfully. “She, uh, did say she had a tattoo. But she never said what it was—or where it was. She liked to tease her pirate cast mates aboard the Black Swan. Make them guess. They were a phenomenal group of young people to work with—Helen, Jack and Blake. They got along so well.” He shook his head. “Blake had a major crush on Helen. She liked him well enough, but said she wouldn’t date anyone she worked with. Would that she had!”

“We don’t know that it’s Helen,” Malachi repeated.

“And if it’s not—then where is Helen?” Aldous asked. He stared at Malachi and, in turn, Malachi stared at him. He was definitely unique and hard to miss, a big, powerful man with his shiny head and gold earring.

“Hopefully, alive and well somewhere,” Malachi said. He gave Aldous a smile. “Sir, do you work on the pirate ship now and then? You’ve certainly got the look.”

“Hereditary baldness,” Aldous told him. “Sometimes—say, around St. Patrick’s Day—the city gets crazy busy and then I work with my friend here.”

“You’re a captain, as well, though? Different kind of ship, if I remember our conversation from before,” Malachi said.

“My family’s been in the shipping trade for generations. We were bringing goods back and forth from the Old World before the colonies became a nation. I own Brentwood Shipping. We have ships all over the world. My dad was old school. I started work as a deckhand on a nine-hundred-and-six-foot container vessel. I’ve sailed on almost everything known to man, but these days, I mostly use my little fishing boat. She’s a thirty-three-foot Boston whaler with a fine cabin and a galley. I can take her out for a few days on my own when I feel I need the water beneath me. But, yeah, there’s fun in playing a pirate. I’m still on the company board, but I already put in my time. Now, I do the world a favor and give people jobs to keep the company afloat.”

“That’s a good thing. We all need jobs,” Malachi said.

“What about you? You spend a lot of time on the water?” Bootsie asked.

“I spent some time with friends on shrimp boats down in Louisiana,” he answered. “And I’ve been on a cruise—does that count?”

Dirk managed a smile. “Hardly! You’ve got to have the wheel in your hands, really feel the power of the water, even on a river. Feel the wind whip around when you aren’t sure you can fight your way back to the docks. Now that’s being on the water.”

“Hear, hear!” Bootsie shouted as he thumped the bar with his fist.

“Then you gentlemen have it all over me,” Malachi said, smiling. “What about you, Bootsie?”

“Hey, I’m living on borrowed time here. I’m nearly as old as Gus! But, yeah, give me a chance and I’ll be a pirate!”

Just then Abby came back down the steps, out of her pirate attire. She was now in a customary business suit, the kind worn by agents running all over Quantico and D.C. But there was no way to tone down her beauty or inner vitality. It might have been her coloring—or it might’ve been that she had a passion for life. She had dearly loved Gus; that was plain. But she loved her city, too. She’d made that clear when she’d told him so enthusiastically about the inn where he was staying.

She looked at him, then looked at the beer in front of him. He’d barely touched it. He raised his glass and saluted her, showing her that only a few sips were gone.

“Want me to drive?” she whispered, coming up beside him.

“I think I’m fine.”

“You shouldn’t think. You should know.”

“I swear—two sips.”

“I’ll drive,” she said. “Dirk, let’s do this, okay?”

They walked outside and Malachi headed for his SUV. She was headed to the parking lot. She frowned at him, and he grinned and lifted his hands. “Okay.”

Amused, he followed her and Dirk to the car, choosing to take the backseat.

“Hey, big man, you can take the front,” Dirk said.

“It’s all right. I fold well. And we’re not going that far.”

When they reached the coroner’s office, Malachi found that David was there, waiting for them.

“Dr. Tierney has the case,” he told them. “He wants someone to come in, rather than just viewing the remains on the screen. She’s really ripped up. An identification might take some time if we have to go through dental records or DNA.”

“You okay, Dirk? You can do this?” he asked the man.

“I can go in alone, Dirk,” Abby said.

Dirk shook his head and squared his shoulders. They were led down a hallway and into a pristine autopsy room. The smell of chemicals was strong, but as they approached the gurney, so was the smell of death.

Tierney was a man of about fifty, medium in height and weight, with brown eyes, huge spectacles that made them appear bigger and a mask over his mouth and nose.

“We’re ready,” David said.

Tierney lifted the sheet that covered the corpse.

Malachi found himself thinking that the poor girl now resembled something that might have been created for the final scene of a horror movie—a mermaid beaten and destroyed or some other creature brought low. He shivered, remembering what he’d felt when he’d turned her over in the water and realized that hope had been gone for some time. She’d hit a propeller somewhere in the river, it seemed, since chunks of her flesh were gone. Her face had been attacked by fish and crabs. Very little remained of her nose or lips.

He wondered if even the girl’s mother would recognize her.

“Oh, God!” Dirk exclaimed, and turned away.

David looked at Abby. Abby was white and pinched, but she didn’t turn away. “Can you tell?” David asked her.

To Malachi’s surprise, Abby nodded. “It’s not Helen,” she said.

“And you know that because...?”

She pointed to the corpse’s left breast—in relatively good condition. “Helen had a tiny clover tattooed right there. She told a bunch of the girls about it one day, as long as we swore not to say anything to the guys she worked with. She liked to tease them, telling them she had one somewhere, but they’d have to guess where, and when she had all their guesses, maybe she’d tell them. And the hair...I don’t think that’s the shade of Helen’s hair. She was almost platinum. This girl had a manicure and Helen didn’t manicure her nails. She always said wenches didn’t use polish.”

“Okay, then.” David let out a sigh. “We’re still looking for Helen. And we have to find out who this poor girl might be. I’ll get them started on missing-person reports back at the office. Thank you for coming in.”

Malachi didn’t want to leave yet. He walked closer to the table and stared at the dead woman. What he saw now might help him later when they were further along in the investigation. “Death was by drowning?” he asked.

“Her lungs were filled with water from the river,” Dr. Tierney said. “They’ve scraped her nails, searched for trace evidence...but I don’t know. She was in the river about a day and a half to two days, until she washed up near the dock.”

“So, she died around the time Helen Long disappeared,” Malachi said.

Tierney glanced at David.

David shrugged. “That timing sounds about right,” he said.

Malachi didn’t want to act like a ghoul but he wanted to touch the body. He moved closer and leaned over her, trying to study the remains of her face. He touched her arm; she was cold and he felt no sense of her. But he noticed something he hadn’t seen before. Perhaps it was a detail the medical examiner’s office and the police had wanted to keep quiet.

Her hands were darkened and curled at her side but there was something odd about her left hand. Malachi raised his brows at brow at Tierney and touched the icy hand. He looked at Tierney.

Tierney returned his look with a fierce frown.

Malachi straightened. “May I see the other corpses?” he asked.

Tierney swung around to face David.

“He’s one of my old partners, Doc. And now Mr. Gordon is a consultant with the FBI. I would appreciate it if you’d help us.”

Tierney hesitated and pulled back his sleeve. “It’s late,” he muttered.

“Please,” Malachi said.

“Can I... May I get out of here?” Dirk pleaded.

“Abby?” Malachi asked.

She wanted to stay and help—that was clear in her eyes—but it was obvious that she was the one who needed to be with Dirk.

“I’ll take you home, Dirk,” she said.

“I’ll take Mr. Johansen for a coffee across the street. We’ll wait for you,” David offered. “Abby should be here since she just graduated from the academy. She’s an FBI agent now.”

“So I’ve heard,” Tierney murmured. It didn’t sound as if he was impressed. Malachi made a point of grinning at her. Learn to live with it, he told her silently.

Whether she understood his message or not, she handled it. “Thank you. I believe it’s important that we see all the victims.”

David left with Dirk.

When they were gone, Malachi spoke to Tierney. “She’s missing her ring finger. It wasn’t gnawed off, it was cut off,” he said.

“We’re not letting that information out,” Tierney said curtly.

“I understand.” Malachi nodded. “Is it the same with the other corpses?”

“Yes.”

Tierney walked over to a wall with numbered sliding doors and placards in little slots. He went straight to drawer nine. A handwritten name tag read Ruth Seymour.

He pulled the drawer back and gently removed the sheet from her face.

Ruth had fared better than the unknown girl they’d just seen. Most of her face was intact. Malachi saw the mark of some kind of bondage that had been described in the autopsy notes. He also saw that the ring finger on her left hand had been severed at the knuckle.

“Head injury is here,” Tierney told him, pointing.

She’d been struck on the back of the skull—one solid blow.

“It would’ve knocked her out?” Malachi asked.

“Probably came close to fracturing the skull, so, yes, likely she would’ve been knocked out. But if you look at the wound closely, you can see there’s healing. So she regained consciousness again—a day, a few days?—before she was killed,” Tierney explained.

That made something cold curl up inside his gut. Dead was dead—but he wondered what torture she’d gone through before death.

“What about Rupert Holloway?” he asked.

“That was different. As far as I can tell, Holloway was knocked out and killed soon after. Maybe a few hours later, somewhere in that time frame, at any rate. Both young women were kept alive longer. I assume you’ve read the reports. Although I can’t state it definitively, I believe both were sexually molested, and killed later. I don’t think they were in any condition to fight off the rapist. They were probably knocked out and held until they annoyed their attacker—or he tired of them. Ms. Shepherd was the last victim found before today. She’s right here.”

She could have been anyone. “How did you ID her?” Malachi asked.

“Fingerprints. They were on file at her school. It’s a safety measure taken there.”

“She’s missing the ring finger?”

“Yes.”

Malachi looked at Abby. She was stoic, watching, listening, betraying sorrow but allowing little else to show on her face.

Tierney went over the young woman’s injuries.

Malachi moved closer to inspect the corpse again, touching the body. And again, he had no sense of anyone remaining.

“Mr. Rupert Holloway is the last of our recent victims. You don’t want to visit the entire morgue, do you?” Tierney obviously wanted to be on his way.

“Just these victims,” Malachi said. “Mr. Holloway, please.”

Rupert Holloway was in nearly the same shape as their Jane Doe, and his head wound was worse; the skull had been fractured. “He might still have been out cold when he was tossed in the river,” Tierney said.

“But he’s missing his ring finger, as well.”

Tierney looked uncomfortable. “Yes. Taken while he was still alive—as with the others.”

“Any other marks on him?” Malachi asked.

“Just one. On his back. Help me roll him and I’ll show you.”

He obliged; Rupert Holloway had been a big man.

Low on his back there was a wound, which was sharp and broad.

“Not serrated,” Abby commented.

“No, it was made by a smooth blade,” Tierney said. “Now, if that’s all...”

“That’s all, Dr. Tierney. Thank you so much for your time.”

He led Abby out. They removed the scrubs they’d donned and left them in the appropriate receptacles.

“Definitely a serial killer,” Abby said. She shuddered and looked at him apologetically. She was ashen, although she’d held up well. “Why...why the fingers? Is there a significance to the ring finger? Are they trophies?”

“Possibly. And I can’t begin to fathom if there’s a symbolic reason of some kind for the ring finger. Does it have anything to do with wedding or engagement rings? Holloway was married, but the others...” He shrugged. “I don’t know.” As he spoke, he watched something come alive in her eyes.

“I’m an idiot,” she said.

“Why?”

She flushed. “I mean, there is a symbolic reason for the ring finger. Pirates used to cut off the ring fingers of their hostages specifically to steal their rings. Blackbeard supposedly cut off his own ring finger as a warning to others to leave him alone.”

“Then it is symbolic,” Malachi said.

“Yes, I believe that has to be it. But still, the killing of Rupert Holloway was different from the others. The injury on his back is completely unlike the injuries on the women. What do you think the blade was?” Abby asked. “And why that mark left there?”

“At the small of his back?” Malachi mused thoughtfully. “A pirate sword, Agent Anderson. I’m willing to bet that wound was made by a sword.”