The Juan Doe Murders: A Smokey Brandon Thriller by Noreen Ayres Page B

“up here.” She pointed to irregularities on the bridge of the victim’s nose and under both eyes. “My guess is he was held tightly, very tightly, by some sort of binding. He could have been cuffed too. We have faint red at the wrists.”
    “Nothing like a belt or cuffs at the scene,” I said. She just shrugged a shoulder and said she’d snap off some shots for me and bring them into the autopsy room, which was my next stop.
    I said thanks and went on. The techs and docs were at their stations. Lenore was not among them. Trudy wasn’t there either, whom I half-expected although it is not a requirement for the forensic jock to attend.
    The San Juan Creek Doe was as Trudy described. Haircut. Young. Hispanic. Dr. Margolis was the examiner. Good. I asked if he saw similarities in any of these cases. He pointed to the hole in the forehead and said, “Other than that, no.”
    When Mona brought in the Polaroids, I asked him what he thought caused the marks on the face and ankles of Doe Two. “I’d guess it’s a contusion from a leather belt,” he said. “See this?” He spread his gown to show a brown belt with lacing top and bottom. “Something to think about,” he said, then turned back to his work.
    At a Fifties-style diner a few blocks away I ordered a bagel and cream cheese and coffee. Dishes clattered, voices screeched. I looked out at the blue, blue sky and had a sudden feeling of disassociation, as if I belonged nowhere. I watched people come and go, their conversations heard yet not heard.
    A belt, I thought. Okay. Victim restrained, brought to that hill in Nellie Gail by the water tanks. No. Victim on that hill, then restrained, because he was carefully set against the tree, and it would be too hard to lug a bound body, living or dead, up the hill. Why there? What about the coyote bites?
    I ate my meal but still sat there, tapping my finger on the side of my cup, unwilling to go. Then I had it: The boy was shot while restrained against the tree, and left for dead. An animal came by. It chewed on the boy’s ankle, maybe trying to pull him down for better vantage. Perhaps the boy moaned. Perhaps the killer, still nearby, heard the moan, and came and sent a second round through the same portal as the first. But why, then, did I not find a second slug? No. The boy was shot. He did not die. Coyote came, sniffed. Bit. Boy, though unconscious, kicked. Coyote fled. Boy died. Coyote waits. Simple.

    I left a message for Stu that I was going back out to Nellie Gail. I was glad he wasn’t in because he would say there’s no point. A crime scene opened to the public can no longer deliver anything to serve as evidence for prosecution. But I went anyway, to satisfy myself. This time I brought a magnifying glass to more closely inspect the bark on the opposite side where the body leaned. I thought I saw faint impressions but could not be sure. It meant nothing. Nor was any shooter hiding in the bushes. No one to throw his hands up and say you got me girl, I surrender.
    Joe wasn’t in his office when I got back, but later I saw him involved in conversation with a detective at the bench by the microscopes so I didn’t go in. He left a message on my office voice-mail about getting together, and I left one for him. When I didn’t hear again, I figured maybe something came up with David.
    Late in the afternoon a colleague came by and told me she’d just come from a scene involving a starved and beaten child of four. The child was alive, the mother wasn’t; she finally did the world a favor and drank strychnine. My colleague broke down at my desk. I held and comforted her. Then she said, “Fuck. I’m getting out of here,” and left.
    On my way home I kept switching the radio on and off. The sky was dark with threatened rain. I stopped to mail a letter and rent a video, and when I filled my tank with gas I kept an eye out, watched the shadows, saw in every car or crowd a killer.
    Fifty. Five-O. Is it old? Is it