A Killer's Mind (Zoe Bentley Mystery #1)(5)

“Dead?” Tatum frowned and looked at the image. The girl looked very lifelike. “How—”

“She was embalmed,” Mancuso said. “The medical examiner says she’d been dead for five to seven days before her body was found. She went missing two weeks ago, according to her pimp. She’s the second victim to turn up that way. Because of the public places these girls are left in and the way they’re posed, this has become a very public case. The Chicago PD is under a lot of pressure to find the killer. Enough to ask for our help.”

“What’s the Chicago field office saying?”

“The bureau’s field agents in Chicago have their hands full at the moment. A large arrest of Latin Kings members is about to take place soon.”

Tatum nodded. The Latin Kings was a huge street gang with bases of operations across the country. The top brass of the Latin Kings were located in Chicago.

“While the Chicago field office would be interested to help in the matter of this killer, it has been decided that their resources were better allocated elsewhere.”

Tatum’s bullshit decoder decrypted the sentence to “Someone on top decided that they should keep their nose out of this. They are shitting themselves in rage.”

He sighed, looking up at her. “What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to go there tomorrow. Talk to the lead police detective, see exactly where the investigation is going, and report to me. Then we’ll decide how to move forward.”

“Do I report to the Chicago field office as well or . . .”

“It would be best if you let me handle that.”

“Okay,” Tatum said. He would be happy to leave that political tiptoe dance to someone more capable. This assignment would mean a weekend in Chicago, but he didn’t mind. He’d never been to Chicago before.

“Agent Gray, the FBI is there to consult. I don’t want to hear that you took over the case or in any way behaved as if you were in charge. We’re working hard to get the police to trust us enough to ask for our assistance in future cases. Got that?”

He nodded. “Got it, Chief.”

“Anything else?”

“No,” he said and got up. “Nice fish.”

“Yeah, you want one?”

He looked at her, confused. “You want to give me a fish?”

“I can spare one for your new home,” Mancuso said, glancing at her aquarium. “But I’m warning you—he’s a bastard.”





CHAPTER 4

Zoe unlocked the door to her apartment automatically, her thoughts far away, sifting through crime scene data. She had spent the entire day reading and rereading the cases of the eight murders Mancuso had given her, the two folders of suspects untouched. She should have been faster, she knew, worked harder. But something jarred her, preventing her from carrying on. Some of the details didn’t mesh, and she had pored over the evidence trying to home in on them, figure out the problem.

The case had hounded her on her way home, and she had nearly missed her exit off I-95. It was a constant buzz in her head, and she already knew she’d have a hard time falling asleep.

She stepped into the apartment and immediately tensed at a sound from the kitchen.

“Zoe, is that you?” a voice asked.

She relaxed and dropped her shoulder bag by the door. “Hey, Andrea,” she called.

Her sister’s smiling head popped out of the kitchen’s doorway. “Hey,” she said. “Are you hungry?”

“Starving.”

“I made pasta, so I hope you feel like Italian,” Andrea said and disappeared back into the kitchen.

Zoe wanted to say something funny, something about the kind of Italian she wanted. She tried to frame her witty repartee: Sure, if it’s an Italian man with a sexy body. But it didn’t sound funny at all, not even in her mind. Like most of Zoe’s jokes, this one died an early death in her head. Wit was something that happened to other people, and if it happened to Zoe at all, it was usually three hours too late. “Yeah, pasta sounds great,” she finally said.

“Awesome,” Andrea said happily.

Zoe stepped into the kitchen, then paused. “Holy crap, this is amazing.”

Andrea had placed two plates on the checkered tablecloth that hid the ugly square table. Each one was layered with green basil leaves on which a serving of yellowish-white spaghetti was placed. On top of the mouth-watering pasta lay a small slice of salmon with a garlic-spotted light-brown crust.

“I don’t deserve this magical meal,” Zoe said weakly.

“Sure you do. Come on—dig in. I brought a couple of beers as well.”

Zoe sat down and took a bite of the salmon. The crust was paper thin and crispy, and the fish practically melted in her mouth. She closed her eyes and inhaled. It was the first time all day that her mind had emptied completely, and she savored the pure physical joy of eating a wonderful meal.

Andrea placed a bottle of beer in front of her, the glass perspiring, a slice of lemon on top.

“This is like eating in a restaurant,” Zoe said.

“I suppose you meant that as a compliment.” Andrea smiled at her and swirled her spaghetti around her fork. “So . . . how was work?”

The eight dead girls flooded back into Zoe’s mind.