Visions In Death

"Employed O'Hara's Bar and Grill, Albany Street. Walking home from work, weren't you, Lily? It's not very far. Saves the transpo fare, and it's a warm night. It's your neighborhood.

You'd walk through the park, and then you'd be home." She fit on goggles, examined the hands, the nails. Death hadn't yet leeched all the heat from her body.

"Looks like dirt, some grass. We can hope for fibers or skin. Broken wrist, looks like a broken jaw. Multiple contusions and abrasions on face, torso, shoulders. Did a number on you, Lily. Appearance of sexual assault. Some evidence of vaginal bleeding. Contusions, abrasions on thighs and genital area. Removing some fibers into evidence." She worked meticulously, plucking tiny fibers from the body, never flinching as she took them from the genital area.

She sealed them, tagged them, logged them.

And if part of her system revolted, much as the rookie's had, if part of her wanted to scream at the visions of rape, she refused them, and continued on.

Still wearing the goggles, she leaned down into the dead face and studied the bloody holes where the eyes had been.

"Smooth, clean cuts, similar to those inflicted on Elisa Maplewood." "Dallas." "Peabody." She didn't look around, and thought only briefly that she missed, for some reason, the telltale clomp of Peabody's uniform shoes. "We've got the kill site just south.

First on scene is Queeks. Verified that scene's secured." "Crime scene's right behind me." Take part of the team with you, have them start looking in a direct path from that scene to this for impressions in the grass. But don't let anybody mess with that scene until I've seen it." "On that. Uniforms found her?"

"No." Eve straightened now. "Celina Sanchez had another vision." Eve finished her exam of the body and the dump site, then walked to where Roarke stood, just behind the crime scene sensors Queeks had set up.

She'd remember that, she thought. Remember that Officer Queeks worked quick and quiet and didn't a

"You don't have to wait." "I'll wait," Roarke said. "I'm in it now." "Guess you are. Well, come with me. You've got good eyes. Maybe you'll spot something I miss." She took a wide circular route to the second scene. If he'd left impressions in the grass again, she didn't want to disturb them.

She nodded to Queeks. "Good work. Where's the rookie?" "I got him out securing the entrances with a couple of the guys. He's okay, Lieutenant, just green. Only been on the job three months, and this was his first body. It was a tough one, too. But he maintained until he was well away from the scene." "I'm not writing him up for hurling, Queeks. You see anything I should know about other than the body?" "We came in the same entrance as you. Got one on all four sides. We headed south, intending to make a circle. Saw her pretty quick. Didn't observe anyone else. Not in the park or on the street. We were just coming out of a double D on Varick when the call came through on this. Some street people out, some die-hard LC's trolling, but no one that fit the description we were given." "How long have you worked in this sector?" "About a dozen." "You know O'Hara's?" "Sure, Mick place down on Albany. Decent place, food's tolerable."

"What time does it close?" "Two, earlier if it's slow." "Okay. Thanks. Peabody?" "Some blood. Some of the grass is ripped up, some's tamped down. Got a couple of small scraps of cloth. Might be from an article of clothing." "I can see all that, Peabody. What do you see?" "Well, I think he took her just inside the south entrance as she'd started in to cut across the park. Could've grabbed her outside, but more likely she cut in. He took her down here, assaulted, overpowered, tore some of her clothes in the struggle, though there's no indication she put up much of a fight. Raped her here. I haven't examined the body, but it looks like maybe she dug her fingers into the grass. As it appears to be the same MO as Maplewood, he would have strangled her at this point, taken her clothes, then carried her to the other location where he could pose her and remove her eyes." "Yeah, that's what I see. Inside, though. She cut through, shortcut home. Patrols go by here regularly. Park stays pretty clean. Safe. He'd have to work fast, but that's no problem for him. He's got the routine knocked now. Time of death was oh two hundred, almost on the dot. First arrived two hundred twenty minutes. You factor in the time it took him to undress her, carry her, pose her, mutilate her, he cut it close this time." "He could've still been in the park when they arrived." Eve glanced back at Roarke, lifted her eyebrows.

"He could have heard them. Car pulls up, doors slam. He moves off, out of the lights, behind any number of trees.

Wouldn't he, if he could, enjoy watching her be discovered?" "Yeah. Yeah, he would." "He'd only just finished with her. And wouldn't he need a moment to pat himself on the back for the fine job he'd done?" Unable to help himself, Roarke glanced back to where Lily Napier lay on the bench. "He hears someone coming, and nips back. He'd kill them if he had to, that would be his thinking. But how gratifying it must have been to see cops find her, so quickly, so fresh, with him able to see. Then he's out, the opposite direction, with a nice bonus to his evening." As she'd speculated along the exact same lines herself, she nodded. "You're getting good at this. I want a thorough sweep of the entire park, every blade of grass, every flower petal, every tree." "He seals up, Lieutenant," Peabody reminded her. "We don't have his DNA, his blood type, his hair, nothing to match if they could find anything in an area this size." "He seals up." Eve held out a hand, turned it over so the smears of blood shone in the light. The, too. We're not looking for his DNA. We're looking for hers." Again, she stepped back, but this time she gestured to Roarke. "Let's take a little walk." "You're hoping to be able to see his direction. Where he moved, how he moved." "Anything that adds a line to his picture's good." She needed to get away from cop eyes, from cop ears, and kept going until they were out of the park again, on the sidewalk. "I think, geographically, he's closer to home here than he was with Maplewood. But it doesn't matter to him. He'll go where he needs to go." "And you didn't come all the way out here to tell me that." "No. Look, there's no point in you waiting. We're going to be at this awhile, then I've got to go into Central." "Deja vu." "Yeah. This guy likes night work." "You haven't had more than an hour's sleep." "I'll catch some in my office." She started to wipe her hand absently on her trousers, but he caught her wrist.

"Hold on." He opened her field kit, took out a rag.

"Right." Cleaning the blood off her hands, she stared back through the stone arch. The park was brilliant with light now.

The sweepers, in their protective suits, moved through it like silent images on a screen. The media would pounce soon hey always did and would have to be dealt with.

Before much longer, lights would go on in the windows of surrounding buildings. Some would glance out, see and wonder. Then civilians would have to be dealt with.

She was going to shut down the park. So the mayor would have to be dealt with.

The fun never quit.

"What's on your mind, Lieutenant?" "Too many things, and I've got to start lining them up. I'm going to be calling Celina into Central, get a detailed report of her… vision. I'm going to have a couple of soft-clothes cops escort her in. Eight hundred." She stuck her hands in her pockets, pulled them out again when she remembered she'd wiped off the blood but hadn't cleaned off the sealant. "Here's the thing." When she said nothing else, only continued to stare into the park, Roarke cocked his head. "And that thing would be?" "She said she was home in bed when she contacted me.