The Cutting Edge (Lincoln Rhyme #14)(8)
Next. The hard part.
She had saved the bodies till the last.
Because, if they didn’t need to be processed first, you just put it off for a little bit longer.
The image that immediately seized her attention when she’d first entered and that touched her still was the fingers of the couple whose throats had been slashed. The hands had been tied behind them and at some point they’d moved close—most likely just before the end—and interlaced their fingers. Though they had thrashed in pain from the knifing, their fingers remained intertwined. In their death throes they had found some small comfort in the grip. Or she hoped they had. Sachs had been a street cop, then a detective working Major Cases, for years. The heart hardened, as it must, in this line of work. But details like these could still summon an urge to cry, even if no tears swelled. For some cops this never happened. She thought she was a better officer for it.
The owner of the store, Jatin Patel, had died from a slashed throat too. One difference, though, was the torture. The medical examiner’s office tour doctor, a slim Asian American woman, had pointed out the slices on his hands, ear and face. Pistol-whipping too. The wounds were all premortem.
Neither Patel nor the couple seemed to have been personally robbed, though Patel had no phone on him or in the shop. At least, the usual take remained: Wallets, purses, jewelry and cash were intact. She photographed the three bodies from all angles, rolled for fibers and other trace and took hair samples for exclusion later. She got fingernail scrapings, though none of the victims had apparently fought the unsub. Alternative light source scans of their skin, near where the lamp cord bound their wrists, revealed no fingerprints. She hadn’t expected any; throughout the scene there were so many cloth glove prints, some in blood, that she knew, almost to a certainty, the unsub wouldn’t have left his own.
“Sorry,” came the voice from the office.
Sachs walked to the doorway.
The evidence collection technician, whose belly tested the zipper of the overalls, said, “No hard drive. I mean, he took it. And no backup.”
“He…how’d he get it?”
“Must’ve had tools with him. Easy—Phillips-head screwdriver is all you need.”
She thanked him and walked into the corridor, nodding to the ME doc, who’d been waiting patiently and texting.
“You can take them,” Sachs said.
The woman nodded and radioed down to the bus. Her technicians would bring gurneys and body bags and transport the corpses to the morgue for full autopsies.
“Detective?” A young, compact uniform, out of Midtown North, approached from the elevator. He stopped well shy of the door.
“Scene’s clear, Alvarez. It’s okay. What’ve you got?”
He and his partner, an African American woman in her late twenties, had divided up and begun canvassing for witnesses and looking for other evidence that the perp might have shed as he’d arrived at or left the scene. A search for wits wouldn’t have been particularly fruitful, Sachs had guessed. Many of the offices in the building weren’t occupied. For Lease signs were everywhere. And today being a weekend—and the Jewish Sabbath—the other businesses on this floor were closed. Alvarez said, “Three offices on the second floor, and two on the floor above us’re open. Two people heard a bang about twelve thirty or twelve forty-five but thought it was a backfire or construction. Nobody else saw or heard anything.”
That was probably the case, though Sachs was, as always, a bit skeptical. The crime had happened around lunch hour. Employees coming and going might easily have gotten a glimpse of the perp but it was very common for witnesses to grow deaf—and blind—from that malady known as self-preservation.
“And something here.” Alvarez was pointing into the hall beside the elevator: a security camera mounted to the wall. Sachs hadn’t noted it when she’d first arrived. She squinted, gave a brief laugh. “Painted over?”
He nodded. “And look at the trail of the spray paint.”
Sachs didn’t get it at first, then realized what he meant. The perp—presumably the perp—had started spraying paint toward the camera while still behind it, and then hit the lens from directly underneath—to make certain he wasn’t recorded for even a second. Smart.
Like taking the hard drive.
“Cameras on the street?”
Alvarez said, “Maybe good news there. The stores to the right and left of the entrance to this building, they’re copying their .MP4 video files for us. I told ’em to preserve the originals.”
Copies were fine for the investigation; the original drives would be needed for trial.
If we get to trial, Sachs thought.
She turned back to the shop, considering the first of the three questions romping through her mind. Number One: What had he taken? She’d done a thorough search, walking the grid, but, of course, that wouldn’t necessarily give her any insights into what wasn’t present any longer.
She scanned the place once more. Patel Designs wasn’t a jewelry store like most. There were no display cases for a smash and grab. The operation consisted of three rooms: a front waiting room, an office directly behind and, through a doorway to the left, a workroom filled with equipment, which was used, she guessed, to cut gems and assemble jewelry. This last room was the largest of the three, containing stations for two workers—large turntables, similar to what potters used to turn vases and bowls. Some battered industrial equipment, one piece apparently a small laser. This also served as a storeroom: On shelves and against the wall were piles of empty boxes, shipping and office supplies, cleaning materials. Nothing valuable was kept here, it seemed.