The Face of Death by Cody McFadyen Page A

Kingsley. Callie and Barry have followed and look at me with their eyebrows raised.
    I point at the bodies. “No marks on their wrists or their ankles. You have two adults. You get them to strip naked, you put them into a tub, one at a time, you slit their throats, one at a time, bleed them out, one at a time—does that make any sense?”
    “I see what you mean,” Barry says. “They would have been fighting back. How does he get it done? I don’t think saying ‘Take a number, I’ll kill you next’ would’ve cut it.”
    “Occam’s razor,” I reply. “The simplest answer: They
weren’t
fighting back.”
    Barry frowns, perplexed, and then his face clears and he nods. “Right,” he says. “They were out cold. Maybe drugged.” He makes another note on his pad. “I’ll have them look for that during autopsy.”
    “You know,” I say, shaking my head, “if that’s true, then that makes three bodies he had to carry, including one he’d had to have moved up the stairs.” I look at Barry. “How tall would you say Mr. Kingsley is? Six feet?”
    “Six or six-one.” He nods. “Probably weighs one-ninety.”
    I whistle. “He’d have to muscle Kingsley into the tub, drugged…” I shake my head. “He’s either tall or strong or both.”
    “Helps.” Barry nods. “We’re not looking for a little guy.”
    “Of course, there could have been two of them,” Callie says, glancing at me. “We know about tag teams, don’t we?”
    She’s right. Partnerships in murder are not uncommon. My team and I have chased more than one twisted coffee klatch.
    “No visible evidence of sexual violation,” Barry notes, “but that doesn’t mean much. We won’t know for sure until the medical examiner gets a good look at the bodies.”
    “Have them check the boy first,” I say.
    Barry raises a single eyebrow at me.
    “He wasn’t gutted.” I point to Michael’s body. “And he’s clean. I think the killer washed him, postmortem. It looks like he combed his hair. It might not have been sexual—but there was something going on there. Less anger at Michael, for whatever reason.”
    “Gotcha,” Barry says, jotting in his notepad.
    I gaze around the room, at the streaks of blood on the walls and ceilings. In some places it seems splashed, like an artist had tossed a can of paint onto a blank canvas. But there are intricacies as well. Curls and symbols. Streaks. The most obvious thing about it is that it is everywhere.
    “The blood is key to him,” I murmur. “And the disembowelment. There’s no evidence of torture on any of the victims, and they were bled out prior to being cut open. Their pain wasn’t important to him. He wanted what was inside. Especially the blood.”
    “Why?” Barry asks.
    “I can’t say. There’s too many possible paradigms when it comes to blood. Blood is life, you can drink blood, you can use blood to tell the future—take your pick. But it’s important.” I shake my head. “Strange.”
    “What?”
    “Everything I’ve seen so far points to a disorganized offender. The mutilation, the blood painting. Disorganized offenders are chaotic. They have trouble planning and they get caught up in the moment. They lose control.”
    “So?”
    “So how is it that the boy wasn’t gutted and Sarah is still alive? It doesn’t fit.”
    Barry gives me a considering look. Shrugs.
    “Let’s go see her room,” he says. “Maybe there’ll be some answers there.”

11
    “ WOW,” CALLIE REMARKS.
    The reason for this soft exclamation is twofold.
    First, and most obvious, the words written on the blank wall next to the bed.
    “Is that blood?” Barry asks.
    “Yes,” Callie confirms.
    The letters are large. The slashes that form them are angry, each one a mark of hate and rage.
    THIS PLACE = PAIN
    “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Barry gripes.
    “I don’t know,” I reply. “But it was important to him.”
    Just like the blood and the disembowelment.
    “Interesting that