Split Second

He scraped a hand over his head, and Maggie wondered if the buzz cut was recent. His dark eyes slid down her body, and again she was reminded of her inappropriate attire. She glanced at the other two men. One was in uniform. The other, an older gentleman—who Maggie guessed was the medical examiner—was dressed in a well-pressed suit and a silk tie held down by an expensive gold collar bar.

“Are you Detective Manx?” she asked the buzz cut.

His eyes shot up to hers, the look not only registering surprise but alarm that she knew his name. Was he worried that his superiors were checking up on him? He looked young, and Maggie guessed he was close to her age—somewhere in his early thirties. Perhaps this was his first lead in a homicide.

“Yeah, I’m Manx. Who the hell called you?”

It was time to confess.

“I live down the street. I thought I might be able to help.”

“Christ!” The same hand swiped over his face as he glanced at the other two men. They quietly watched as though observing a standoff. “Just because you’ve got a fucking badge, you think you can barge in here?”

“I’m a forensic psychologist and a profiler. I’m used to examining scenes like this. I thought I could—”

“Well, we don’t need any help. I’ve got everything under control.”

“Hey, Detective.” The yellow-tape officer from outside walked into the room and immediately all eyes watched him step into the puddle. He jerked his foot up and awkwardly stepped back into the hall, holding up the dripping toe of his shoe.

“Hell, I can’t believe I did that again,” he muttered.

Just then Maggie realized the intruder had been more careful. The toe print she had seen was worthless. When she looked back at Manx, his eyes darted away. He shook his head, disguising the embarrassment as disdain for the young officer.

“What is it, Officer Kramer?”

Kramer looked desperately for somewhere to place his foot. He glanced up apologetically as he rubbed the sole on the hall carpet. This time Manx avoided looking at Maggie. Instead, he shoved his large hands into his jacket pockets as if needing to restrain them from strangling the young rookie.

“What the hell do you need, Kramer?”

“It’s just…there are a few neighbors out front asking questions. I wondered if maybe I should start questioning them. You know, see if anybody saw something.”

“Get names and addresses. We’ll talk to them later.”

“Yes, sir.” The officer seemed relieved to escape the new stain he had created.

Maggie waited. The other two men stared at Manx.

“So tell me, O’Do

“O’Dell.”

“Excuse me?”

“The name’s O’Dell,” she said, but she wouldn’t wait for another invitation. “Is the body in the bathroom?”

“There’s a whirlpool bath with more blood, but no body. In fact, we seem to be missing that small detail.”

“The blood seems to be confined to this room,” the medical examiner told her.

Maggie noticed he was the only one wearing latex gloves.

“If someone ran out, but was injured, you’d think there’d be some drips, some scuffs, something. But the house is fucking clean enough to eat off the floors.” Manx swiped at his new hairdo again.

“The kitchen’s not so clean,” Maggie contradicted him.

He scowled at her. “How goddamn long have you been sneaking around here?”

She ignored him and kneeled down to get a closer look at the blood on the floor. Most of it was congealed, some dried. She guessed it had been here since morning.

“Maybe she didn’t have time to clean up after lunch,” Manx continued instead of waiting for her to answer his question.

“How do you know the victim is a woman?”

“A neighbor called us when she couldn’t get her on the phone. Said they were supposed to go shopping. She saw the car in the garage, but no one answered the door. See, I’m thinking the guy—whoever he was—must have interrupted her lunch.”

“What makes you think the sandwich was hers?”

The three of them stopped simultaneously. Again, they exchanged looks, then stared at Maggie, like foreign diplomats relying on each other for interpretation.

“What the hell are you saying, O’Do

“The name is O’Dell, Detective Manx.” She let him hear her irritation this time. His blatant disregard was a small but familiar and a

“Maybe she was interrupted.”

“Perhaps. But there’s no sign of a struggle in the kitchen. And the alarm system was off, right?”

Manx looked a

“That’s possible.” Maggie stood and let her eyes take in the rest of the room. “If he did interrupt or surprise her, that didn’t happen until they were up here. She may have been waiting for him, or perhaps she invited him up. That’s probably why there’s no signs of a struggle until we get into the bedroom. She may have changed her mind. Didn’t want to go through with whatever they had agreed to. This spatter pattern here on the door is strange.” She pointed to it, careful not to touch. “It’s so far down, one of them would need to be on the floor when this wound was inflicted.”

She walked to the window, feeling the men’s eyes follow her. Suddenly she had their attention. Through the sheer curtains she could see the backyard, similar to her own, spacious and secluded by flowering dogwoods and huge pines. None of the neighbors’ houses were even visible, all hidden by the foliage and trees. No one would see an intruder come or go back here. But how would he maneuver the steep ridge and the stream? Had she overestimated the strength of that natural barrier?

“There really is not much blood,” she continued. “Unless there’s a lot more in the bathroom. Perhaps there’s not a body simply because the victim left on her own.”

She heard Manx snort. “You think they had a nice little lunch, he beat the shit out of her because she decided not to fuck him, but then she left willingly with this guy? And in the meantime, the whole goddamn neighborhood didn’t notice?” Manx laughed.

Maggie ignored his sarcasm. “I didn’t say she left willingly. Also, this blood is much too congealed and dry to have happened a few hours ago during lunch. I’m guessing it happened early this morning. She glanced at the medical examiner for confirmation.

“She’s right about that.” He nodded in agreement.

“I don’t think they had lunch together. He probably fixed the sandwich for himself. You should bag the sandwich. If you can’t get a dental imprint, there may be some saliva for a DNA test.”

When she finally turned to face him, Manx stared at her. Only now his frustration had turned to wonder and the crinkles at his eyes became more pronounced. Maggie realized he was older than her initial assessment. Which meant the clothes and the hair might be part of a midlife crisis rather than a youthful indiscretion. She recognized Manx’s stu

“Mind if I check out the bathroom?” she asked.

“Be my guest.” Manx shook his head and waved her through.

Before Maggie got to the bathroom door, she stopped. On the bureau was a photograph. She recognized the beautiful blond-haired woman who smiled out at her, one arm wrapped around a dark-haired man and the other around a panting white Labrador retriever. It was the same woman she and Tess McGowan had met the first day Maggie looked at her new house.

“What is it?” Manx asked, now standing directly behind her.