Chaos in Death (In Death #33.5)(2)

She took the female first, hunkered down on her long legs, opened her field kit. “Female also suffered blows to the face, knees. Hard blow to the knees,” she murmured. “Pipe, bat, board—take her down—a couple punches. Manual strangulation.”

She ran the victim’s prints.

“Female is identified as Jennifer Darnell, age twenty-four. Current address listed on West Sixteenth. Got a sheet, including juvie. Primarily illegals busts.”

Peabody came back in. “The Whitwood Group bought the property about seven months ago,” she said. “From what I can tell, the building was condemned a little over a year ago. Permits for rehab pending.”

“Okay. So the killer or killers took his ear, his eye. Isn’t there a saying—what is it? Hear no evil, see no evil…” Carefully, Eve opened Jennifer Darnell’s mouth. “Yeah, speak no evil. He cut out her tongue.”

“Jesus.”

“Work see-no guy, Peabody. I need ID, TOD.” Eve fit on microgoggles, engaged their light to peer into the victim’s mouth. “Clean cut, neat and tidy. She was either already dead or unconscious when he took her tongue, and he had a good, steady hand.”

Struggling to find her own good, steady hand, Peabody opened her kit. “Taking the body parts, those particular body parts, do you think ritual?”

“Possibly.” She looked up at the message on the wall. “Mostly, I think he likes to joke. Real funny guy. He did what he wanted, took what he wanted, now he’s telling us to clean up the mess. Dr. Chaos.”

Eve looked around the room. “That’s what this is. The middle guy? The killer took him out where he lay. Uses a knife, or a scalpel. But he doesn’t use it on the others, except for the removal. He switches to bludgeoning for the other male.”

“Coby Vix, age twenty-six,” Peabody told her. “There had to be two killers, maybe three. One for each vic?”

“Maybe. It’s a lot of work for one man. But only one takes credit?”

As Eve had, Peabody studied the bloody message. “Dr. Chaos. It could be the name of a group.”

Eve considered it while she used the gauges. “Yeah, it could. TOD on Darnell, two hundred thirty-eight.”

“If there was only one, why didn’t she run like hell when he’s stabbing the bejesus out of that guy or beating the crap out of Vix?”

“Took her out, blows to the knees. Shattered kneecaps. But yeah, it could be more than one. Three distinct methods of killing.”

“Vix, TOD two hundred twenty.”

“So, he took some time with Darnell. Enough for rape.” Eve lifted the hem of the short nightshirt. “No bruising, bleeding, tearing I can see, but the ME will determine sexual assault.” Eve lifted the cheap, thin chain around Darnell’s bruised neck. “She’s wearing a ninety-day chip from Get Straight.”

“Vix has sixty.” Peabody held up the chip.

With a nod, Eve rose and moved to the middle victim. “Hear-no has thirty. Wilson Bickford,” she said when she’d run his prints. “Age twenty-two. That same precision, surgical removal on the ear. Dr. Chaos may just be a doctor, or at least have medical training. Hmm, TOD two hundred thirty. Didn’t die first.”

She sat back on her heels, tried to see it.

“He’s the biggest of the three. The killer went at him first,” she continued. “I bet your ass he did.”

“Hey, bet your own ass.”

“Defensive wounds, hands, arms. Bickford put up a fight. Take it a couple ways. Say three killers, one for each vic. Teamwork. One stabs, one beats, one strangles. But this doesn’t look like teamwork,” Eve said, scanning the room again. “It looks like…” She gestured to the message on the wall.

“Chaos.”

“Yeah. Could be the team just went to town on the place. But I’m only seeing one type of bloody footprint, and it’s too much to swallow they all wore the same size and type of shoe.”

“Missed that,” Peabody muttered.

“Maybe there’s more, and I’ve missed them. Or maybe the others were more careful.”

“But you don’t think so.”

“I think that’s an interesting gap of time between TODs. I think the same hand did the removals, an experienced hand, steady. We’ve got serious overkill on the two males, and manual strangulation—which is personal and intimate—on the female. The destruction of the scene is over the top, and that reads rage. But the message is jokey, which reads control and intellect. It could be more than one. One with a cool head, one just batshit crazy.

“Let’s get them bagged, tagged, and transported. I want to talk to the nine-one-one caller.”

Katrina Chu hunched in the back of the black-and-white, her face white as death, her eyes puffy from weeping. One of the uniforms had gotten her some water. Her throat clicked on every swallow. But to Eve’s relief, it looked like Katrina had cried herself out. Her puffy, pale green eyes stayed dry and focused on Eve.

“I need you to tell me what happened,” Eve began.

“Jen didn’t show up for work. She volunteers on the breakfast shift at Get Straight. The one off Canal. And she and Coby and Wil, they go to the meeting after.”

“You worked with her?”

“I’m her sponsor. I work at the free clinic on Canal.”