Little Belle Gone (28 page)

Each line that had been redacted in her file provided him with pain and remorse. The crime scene had contained far more brutality than Elizabeth knew and he wondered, for a moment, if he could hide the file from her. Prevent her from seeing the horrible details now clear upon the page. When he reached the specifics of her attack he had to close his eyes. The descriptions of her injuries and the violation that she endured rent his heart into a thousands pieces, each one simultaneously aching for her and writhing with the need to seek revenge.

When a particularly graphic description of her stab wounds became more than he could bare, he looked away from the file just in time to see her return. His heart began to flutter wildly as her small, wonderful body, came into view. He rose out of his chair and met her in the middle of the room. When she started to speak, he motioned for her to wait, leading her quickly down a far hallway. She followed him unquestioningly as he moved around a few corners looking for the one room in the office he knew they could be alone. Turning the knob, he slid her into the broom closet, following behind and pulling the door closed, plunging them into utter darkness. Fumbling in the dark for the pull cord, he almost pulled it out of the ceiling as she wrapped her arms around his neck just as he moved to tug it on. He had brought her here so that they could talk, but it was quite clear that she had followed so that she could be close to him. Matt sighed deeply as he buried his face into her wonderful hair, allowing his arms to fill with the soft strength of her tiny frame. He closed his eyes as he squeezed her tighter, allowing all the apprehension and confusion to wash away. She still loved him.
Of course she did.
The second he made the realization he felt miserably ashamed for ever having doubted her.

“Oh, Matt, I’m so sorry I said those things. I just couldn’t stand to hear
him
shout at you anymore...not
him
.” He could feel her shutter and he tried even harder to pull her into him, to swath her in his embrace until she calmed. Her words echoed in his ears, they way she referred at Moreano, as
him.
The tone was exactly the same as the one she used whenever she spoke about their killer. Unable to come to terms with the allusion he had found her phrasing, Matt pulled back slightly, tilting her head so that her face turned up into the swaying light of the bare bulb above them. She wasn’t crying, but her face screamed unease and fear. Unable to speak just yet, he bent and kissed the corner of her mouth tenderly, lingering over her lips, appreciating their soft fullness.

Lifting his head again, finding her stormy green gaze waiting for him, he asked, “The way you talk about Moreano...what’s wrong?” He could see the unease in her eyes, feel her body tensing in his hands. She didn’t want to answer him, seemed afraid to. Lifting his brows, he continued, “Liz, you know you can tell me anything. Has something happened? Are you okay?” She seemed to sway a bit, but after a second, her eyes cleared and she nodded slightly.

“Matt, this is going to sound crazy, trust me, I think so too, but I think...well, maybe...I think Moreano might
be
our guy.” She seemed to cringe away, as if expecting him to lash out at the ridiculousness of the suggestion, and part of him almost did. Moreano was an asshole to be sure, but a serial killer? The idea seemed absurd, but as he turned it over and over in his head, he kept coming back to the same singular thought.
Elizabeth is no fool, she must have a reason
. His faith in her was absolute. When he didn’t rail against the idea, she seemed to ease in his hands, turning the consoling embrace into something more dangerous, something leadingly intimate. He needed to be serious...this was serious.

Squaring his shoulders resolutely, he asked, “What makes you think that?” His voice came out far less suspicious than he felt and for once he was glad of it. She seemed to be on the verge of an anxiety attack as it was and he was certain that doubt from him would send her over the edge.

“Little things...
lots
of little things. The way he talked about me, like I was a prize that was his, the tone of his voice, his body type is a match...and he has a cut on the back of his neck, about the right size and location for the mirror shard.” He listened to her as the information barreled out at ninety miles and hour, wondering just how badly she had wanted to tell him from the moment she had begun to suspect. Smiling sadly, he tilted her forehead against his and stared into those grass green eyes of hers.

“Okay, so how do we confirm this suspicion of yours? Have you got a plan for that?” She smiled too quickly, too broadly, and he knew she had not only already formulated a plan, but acted on it. Fear consumed him. If she had done something rash, even with good intentions, she could lose her job, or worse, be charged with a crime. “You’ve already done something, haven’t you?” His mind raced and without warning, the image of her tripping as she left Moreano’s office swam at the front of his brain. She was far too graceful to trip like that. “You got his D.N.A. under your fingernails, when you tripped in his doorway.” She nodded against him, and he could see the pride swimming in her eyes.
Why?
His mind flooded with horrid thoughts of her facing slander charges, the sample being thrown out of court because she had no warrant to collect it, of her being handcuffed and hauled away on assault charges. “Elizabeth, that was a bit rash. Have you thought about the ramifications if you are wrong? I suppose you already took it down to the lab...your elevator ride?” She nodded again, but this time she wasn’t smiling.

“I didn’t tell them who the sample came from, just that I had a John Doe sample under my nails and that I wanted it compared to the sixth sample we found. I figured that if I was wrong no one ever needed to know where the sample came from. But if I was right, we could go to Arrons, tell him about everything and he could get I.A. to compel an official sample for comparison.” He had to admit she had thought it through, but he knew something she didn’t.

“Liz, every officer was asked for a D.N.A. sample for the system, like, two years ago. I’m sure Moreano was already in C.O.D.I.S. If he was a match we would know already.” He could see her heart sink. She had been so sure. Sighing deeply, she frowned, marring her lovely ivory brow with a deep furrow. He kissed her forehead lightly before reaching for the doorknob again. “Come on, before we are missed. We have to be extra careful now, considering he believes I’m not your type,
at all
.” His little tease seemed to lift her spirits as he felt her small hand squeeze his bottom, tightly. As they left the closet quietly, he tugged the light off, deciding that, if necessary, this room could be quite handy in the future.

As Liz pulled her chair around to the side of his desk, Matt settled into his seat and pulled up close. He looked down at the five reports fanned out across his cold metal desk, searching the short labels on each one. Starting with the oldest hit, he lifted the case file of Angelica Marshland and her parents. Opening the folder, the three page summary report spread before them. Elizabeth leaned in to read with him, the wonderful floral smell of her soap enveloping his senses. His eyes lolled back into his head for a moment as he allowed the wonderful memory of her lips, her body, to rippled over him before he forced himself back to the moment. As he sighed and opened his eyes again, he found her staring at him, her gaze drifting lazily over his face, with a look of bemusement tinting her smile. It took all he had to keep from pulling her to him and he felt a sudden pang of dread. She held such power over him, an obsession he longed to cave to. How was he going to work so closely with her without faltering to his need, for however long into the future?

Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, he whispered slowly, “Don’t look at me like that, Liz. I’m having a hard enough time controlling myself already.” She smiled wickedly for a second, and he felt the edge of her knee press against his, fleetingly. His mouth went slack as the touch sent a wave of desire through him, unfettered and blissfully powerful.

“Why Detective Barrow, is there something wrong? You look positively troubled.” Her voice was silk with a slight rasp he only heard from her in the bedroom—music. He felt his body tense, every muscle straining to hold back the raw desire she was sparking from running over his conscious mind like a wild fire.

“Elizabeth, seriously, I have very little self control when it comes to you, and I really like my job...please...” His voice cracked and his hand traitorously slipped under the desk. Out of sight, it landed high on her thigh and squeezed the flesh hidden from him by a pair of dark gray slacks. He swallowed hard. Her eyes flashed before she cleared her throat and nodded. Shifting away from him slightly, she squared her shoulders, so Matt followed suit. Focusing his hot, swirling thoughts on the file folder in front if him, he started again, “Okay, our oldest hit is a cold case, 1979...wow... from Anaheim, California. The Marshland family, father, mother, and daughter, Angelica. The hit was on a sample pulled from the daughter...oh, god, only thirteen.” For a second the feeling of nausea that flared in his abdomen overwhelmed him.
Thirteen! This guy is truly sick
. He could feel Liz tense, and he was sure that she was imagining the exchange, reliving the horror all over again. Cringing, he looked past the file in his hands at the four still waiting, dreading each in turn.

“Are the other aspects the same?” Her voice was small and strained next to him.

“This isn’t a detailed case file, but the info it has is pretty good. The cold case department put in all the signature aspects, looks like. Bound with duct tape, stabbed in the back, daughter...violated...Oh, here we go, there was a message carved in the wall. ‘My Angel lies over the ocean.’ Says the family was found in the study of their home, on top of a rug made to look like a globe. That’s just messed up.” His voice trailed off. Elizabeth slid away from him and around to her desk. Matt watched as she opened a search engine and typed in the year and victims’ names, looking for any articles or details that the report didn’t contain.

“I knew it.” She didn’t sound excited, in fact, she sounded quite tragic. Rising, he moved around to look over her shoulder at an old newspaper article spread across her screen.

“Angelica Marshland, child singing prodigy, was raped and murdered along with her parents.” The head line hit Matt as hard as it had hit Liz. “So, she was remarkable, too. A collection. That’s what he said to you, right? Ten to one, every victim is remarkable somehow.” Disgust tinged his words as he sighed and looked down at her. Her face was pale when she nodded. The stormy gray color of her eyes had come to represent fear and pain and he longed to hold her, but he couldn’t, not here. Straightening his back, he moved to the board and emptied a large section. As he started to add details of the crime, she joined him with the file. Once all the information that mattered was up, he took the file, closed it, and returned to his desk. Liz resumed her place at her computer, ready for another horribly tragic internet search on a brilliant young girl ended too soon.

“Ready?” He waited for her to nod before he started reading the next in line. “Danielle Clark, and her parents. 1985, Red Wing, Minnesota. She was sixteen.” He listened as she typed the information into the search engine. He read the crime scene description quietly to himself. This one was far more detailed than the last. This cold case squad had even included a couple of grainy crime scene photos. The eerie similarities tied his guts in a knot.

“She was a virtuoso pianist. Of course she was. Lovely girl, too.” Elizabeth’s voice had become angry. Contempt and rage coated her words as she skimmed the articles about the girl’s terrible murder. “This guy has
always
been a monster...a
sick
monster.” Matt sighed as he stood and moved to the board.

As he wrote the details down, he filled her in on what the file had revealed. “They were found in the kitchen. ‘Someone’s in the kitchen with Dana’ was carved into the parents, like our two crime scenes. The kitchen walls were tiled. He must carve the bodies when he can’t carve the walls. That would explain the M.O. shift. I mean, the gym was cinder-block and the lobby of your old building was marble.” Behind him, Liz sighed deeply.

“Do we have a map? So we can put a pin in each one? We can see if there is a pattern, or a trail to follow.” Matt thought for a moment, then turned and pointed toward the supply closet along the far wall. “Okay,” she said, as she rose and went to retrieve a map. Matt turned back to the board to finish with their second file hit. When she returned he watcher her tape the map to the wall beside their board. After placing the two pins, she returned to her post and waited patiently for him to give her the search information.

A horrible staleness had settled in the air around them. The anger, fear, and disgust swirling in both of their hearts was becoming a cloud suspended overhead, blocking out any joy they might have been able to find in working together so closely. He wanted to enjoy the feeling, but he just couldn’t, not this time, not this case. “Next we have a murder from ‘93, the Marcos family. Daughter, Phoenix, was fifteen.” This file left much to be desired. No details, just names and dates.
Why would they bother entering the D.N.A. into the system if they weren’t going to give enough information for an investigation to move forward?
He puzzled over this thought.

“Where?” Elizabeth’s simple question broke his frustrated concentration.

“Oh, um, New Mexico. That’s all it says. I hope the internet gives us more because this file is pathetic.” He tossed the sad folder aside and joined her at her computer. She opened several web pages and found that, in this case, the media was definitely more thorough than the police.
The Las Lunas Gazette
had apparently never heard the phrase ‘less is more’. Some of the details they revealed to the public made him cringe. The news outlets had even released the sick little nursery rhyme that marred her scene, ‘Phoebe had a little lamb,’ adding that the family owned a rather large sheep and cattle ranch, as if that justified the allusion of the phrase carved into the wood walls of the barn where the victims were found.