Shadows in Death (In Death #51) - J.D. Robb Page 0,15

tunnel with its air filters trying—and failing—to completely mask the scent of death. She was making her way down to the chief medical examiner’s doors when she heard the clomping echo behind her.

Peabody had her dark hair with the strange red streaks in a short, bouncy tail. The clomping came from striped pink-and-white gel skids—likely chosen due to feet still aching from dancing shoes. She wore her pink magic coat over brown pants and a brown blazer with pink trim. And a shirt Eve suspected was cream.

She stifled a yawn.

“McNab went straight to Central to finish the security feeds, and to do a search on the vic’s ’link.”

“Good. I’ve already put in for a warrant for the electronics at her residence—Tween’s included.”

“He won’t like that.”

“Which only gives a lift to the start of my day.”

Eve pushed open the doors.

Morris stood by the body just completing his Y-cut.

Peabody turned a little green—perhaps celadon—and turned her head to stare hard at the wall.

“Bright and early,” Morris remarked, and ordered his music—Eve thought maybe Italian opera—to mute.

Under his protective cape he wore a sharp suit of bold blue, a shirt of pale yellow with a tie that played both colors in slim stripes. His long braid fell down the back of his cape with yellow cord wound through the black.

When he efficiently opened Modesto’s chest, Peabody made a soft gagging sound.

“A lovely young woman,” Morris began as Eve stepped up to the slab. “Excellent muscle tone. No visible signs of body or face work. I’ve sent blood and tissue samples to the lab for tox, but see no signs of chronic use.”

“What can you tell me about the wound?”

“Quick and vicious. The blade entered here, the hypogastric area, deep.” He turned away to take a gauge from his tray.

Eve could see the gauge slide into the abdomen on-screen, but bent over as Morris did to judge it in the body.

“Six and a quarter inches in, and the width … point seventeen.” Grabbing his microgoggles, he leaned in again. “It’s a spear point, so I’d say a stiletto-style blade. After the entry, the blade was drawn up and into the umbilical region. Effectively gutting her.”

He straightened again. “So many internal organs live in the belly, and others connect. The damage, the shock, the blood loss would have killed her within a minute or two, and she’d have been, blessedly, unconscious before that.”

“She’s got some slight bruising at the impact site. Hilt?”

“Yes, I agree. So the killing blade will measure those six and a quarter inches.”

Though the screen showed the body, the wound magnified, Morris bent over Modesto with his goggles.

“He drove it in, up to the hilt. If you find it, it should be a button-release type. He shoved the hilt to her belly, flipped the switch to send the blade into her, then dragged it upward.”

“Efficient,” Eve commented.

“Yes, brutally efficient. Two seconds, and the job’s done.”

“The fucker she was married to knew where she’d be and when.” Eve stepped back from the table, paced around it. “We’re going to find communications between her and the man she went out to meet on her ’link. He knew about the affair. He knew she’d broken things off, but that didn’t matter to him. He hired the hit, passed the information on.”

She looked back at the body. “The killer gets there early, waits, sees her come in. He just walks over. If anybody happens to notice, it just looks like he’s heading out through the arch, bumps into her, keeps walking. But in that two seconds, that bump, the knife’s in her, ripped through her. He keeps going, she staggers a couple of steps. When she goes down, attention’s on her, not him.”

“He went out through the arch.” Though mostly recovered, Peabody kept a discreet distance from the slab. “McNab caught him a couple times, still in the black hoodie. He walked back in before the first on scene arrived to secure the scene. Red jacket. He didn’t go near the body, kept walking, circled around the fountain.”

“You’ve already identified him?”

“Yeah.” Eve turned back to Morris. “We know who he is—a pro. We just have to find him, and his six-and-a-quarter-inch stiletto. Something like this.”

She flicked and twisted her right wrist to release the blade she wore.

Though his eyes widened a bit, Morris stepped to her to examine it. “Yes, something like. Is this new investigator wear?”

“For this one it is.” She retracted the blade. “Her husband—Jorge Tween—may contact you, make some noises about coming in