What Lies Behind

“That’s what it looks like. Keep going.”

Sam stepped carefully, avoiding the bloody trail of shuffling footprints that smeared down the hallway. She hugged the wall, edged into the bedroom. Things were worse in here, the meaty scent of the blood intensified in the smaller space. She could see where Souleyret had bled out; she’d crawled across the small bedroom floor until she bumped up against the base of the bed. The rug was stained crimson, with a small, nearly bloodless impression in the middle. Sam could see the girl, curled up against the bed, arms around legs as she died. The bedclothes themselves were rumpled and stained with blood. The wall behind the bed was decorated with cast-off spatter in a morbid Jackson Pollock–esque pattern.

“Where was Cattafi found?” she asked.

“There. Other side of the bed. Like he fell off.”

She moved carefully to the other side of the room. There was a lot of blood on the floor here, too, similarly spaced, with a bloodless impression. “He was half on, half off?” she asked.

“Yes. Three great big wounds to his torso, the knife in his hand.”

“Photos?”

“Plenty of them. But first, tell me, what do you see?”

She shut her eyes briefly and let the scene coalesce before her. Heard the screams of Souleyret, tried to envision the step-by-step that led to the great gouts of blood spread throughout the apartment. A bottle fly bumbled drunkenly past her ear. She opened her eyes, swatted at it. Amazing how the food chain supplemented itself. Less than twelve hours in and new lives were already springing up.

“Conventional wisdom says Cattafi stabbed her in the living room. She managed to get away and dragged herself into the bedroom. He followed her, administered one last cut, then stabbed himself in the chest three times. He did leave a note.”

Sam was already shaking her head. “No. That’s not it. Look.”

She pointed to the floor, showed Fletcher a scrape in the trail of blood. A fuzzy footprint, barely discernible, with the heel and toe in the wrong spot to support his theory. “He was backing in here. Blocking whoever had attacked them from getting to Souleyret again. He was protecting her. When the blood’s run, you’ll find his is in the living room, too. There was definitely a third party involved.”

Fletcher was looking at her like she’d just conjured water out of thin air. He knelt down, looked closer at the footprint. Walked it off mentally, stood with a grunt.

“You’re right. Damn it. How did you do that? You saw the whole scene.”

“I...” She stopped. He was right. What the hell had just happened? Was she suddenly psychic? Able to discern from the scene what had happened just by its proximity?

A feeling of dread ran through her. No. She wasn’t. And she wasn’t reimagining the crime scene, either. She’d seen it before. Or one that looked damn close to it.

Chapter 10

SAM WALKED THROUGH the crime scene once more, tracing the backward steps of Thomas Cattafi. Everything was muddled; the blood had dried in streaky brown swooshes, but now that she knew what she was looking for, she could clearly see his steps. It went that way sometimes; when the blood was fresh, it was hard to see exactly what had happened. That’s why it took so long to release crime scenes—good homicide detectives would come back two or three times to see how the scene changed as it aged.

She thought about the files on her coffee table. The Hometown Killer stabbed several of his victims. Could he have struck again, so soon, this time in Georgetown? And was this the reason Baldwin wanted her on the case? He sensed yet another co

No. She was reading into the crime scene, projecting all the horrors from the files she’d been reading the night before. It was all in her imagination.

She dragged her attention back to Fletcher, who was visibly upset. “This is staged to look like a murder-suicide. The note, the blood being dispersed, everything. But it’s a setup. How did we miss this?”

“Sometimes a zebra is a zebra,” Sam said. “And sometimes a zebra is an elephant in disguise.”

He cocked his head. “Huh?”

“Occam’s razor. Your team went to the most logical conclusion because that’s what the scene was meant to present. What exactly do we know about Amanda Souleyret?”

Fletcher caught the tone in her voice. “Not much. We just took her body out of here an hour ago. Why?” he asked slowly.

“Do you know where she’s from?”

Fletcher’s dark eyes were troubled. “We don’t know much at all. Just the basics. It’s early days in the investigation. I figured her family can fill us in.”

“I’d like to be there. To talk to them, I mean.”

“Sam, what aren’t you telling me?”

Sam ignored him. She bent, looked closer at the small breakfast bar. “Here,” she said quietly. “It started here.”

Fletcher nodded, ran a hand across his chin. He hadn’t shaved and the hairs rasped against his palm. “That’s what my blood spatter analyst said, too. First strike left that lovely castoff.” He pointed at the ceiling. Spots of blackened blood speckled the white. “I’d say whoever killed her was in a rare temper.”

Sam could envision the knife, gliding silver through the air, an overhand arc. Landing with a thunk into the woman’s neck, the arterial spray shooting. Souleyret’s screams, if she had screamed, would have been cut off as quickly as they started. And then he’d stabbed her again and again, driving her back into the bedroom, where Cattafi had tried to defend her, had put himself in the killer’s path.

She admired him for it. It would most likely cost him his life, but at least he’d die a hero. A waste, either way.

“Tell me what you know, Sam.”

“I don’t know anything, Fletch. For a moment, the scene seemed familiar. Just to satisfy my curiosity, when we finish up here, let’s stop back at my place. I’ll take a look at my files, see what’s niggling at me about this.”

He took her word for it. She tucked the odd feeling of familiarity away. She’d look at it later. There were other questions that needed to be answered. Most importantly, what was an undercover FBI agent doing in the apartment of a Georgetown University medical student?

She took a deep breath, trying to clear her head. Smelled something off, something close. Deeper than the tang of blood and the effluvia of dead bodies. Sweet, almost flowerlike, but not. She couldn’t place it, had never come across the scent before. It wasn’t pleasant, and it wasn’t a natural part of the crime scene, she was sure. It smelled a bit like overripe honeysuckle, but sharper, with some mint, perhaps, both scents overlaid with a sickly rot that made her gorge rise.

Where was it coming from? She saw nothing unusual, or out of place, except for the copious streaks of blood.

“Fletch, come here. Do you smell anything?”

Fletcher breathed in deep. “Blood and gore and carpet cleaner. Maybe some old pot smoke. Bacon grease.”

“Nothing flowerlike? Like old flowers left to mold in a vase of water?”

“Like the way patchouli smells? I’ve never liked it, but I can’t say—”

“No, that’s not it.”

Fletcher came closer, sniffing. “Ugh. Yeah, I smell it now. What the hell? It wasn’t here earlier.”

Sam edged to the breakfast bar, wrinkled her nose as the smell grew stronger. She looked closer at the bar. Ru

“Do you have a Maglite?” she asked.

“Sure,” Fletcher replied, handing her the flashlight he’d stuffed in his jacket pocket.

She shone the light on the edges of the counter, then down into the paneling. In one small area, about twelve inches across, the blood dribbled into nowhere, just plain disappeared. There was an edge here, a break in the wood. It was almost indistinguishable from the other panels—it looked like a normal seam where the pieces met. She reached out and pressed the edge, and a panel popped open. The scent gusted forth, and she stepped back, gagging.