Singularity (10 page)
“Hey, guys,” Don said as he approached.
“Hey, yourself,” Barry answered. “You look tired, my friend.”
“Yeah,” Don said.
“So what did we come up with?” Sullivan asked.
Don pinched his nose between a thumb and forefinger, which pushed his glasses onto his blank forehead. When he settled them back into place, Sullivan saw something he had never seen on the examiner’s face before: disquiet.
“Not that this is something to talk about over lunch, but I’m starving and so are my guys. Can we eat?” Don said.
Sullivan glanced at Barry, and both agents agreed that they also could use something in their stomachs.
“Good,” Don said, as he turned and began walking toward his two waiting techs.
“Nothing like a good murder scene to get your appetite up.”
The commons was much busier than when Sullivan and Barry had eaten earlier that morning. Close to a hundred prisoners sat at the long tables, shoulders and heads hunched down over their trays of meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and gravy. Only a handful of prisoners looked up from their lunch when the five men entered the room and gathered food from the lunch line. The techs had stored the evidence bag containing Alvarez’s remains in a guard locker beside the interview rooms. When Sullivan asked Don why the bag looked so light, the older man waved the question off, his eyes saying,
Not
here, not now
Several armed guards stood watch on the main floor, and Sullivan counted three more above them looking down with disinterest from the wraparound balcony. The group picked a vacant table in the farthest corner and sat at the very end so that their conversation couldn’t be overheard. Again Sullivan was struck by how quiet the room was, as he settled down with his tray of steaming mush that did not resemble any type of meatloaf he had ever laid eyes upon.
Don scooped a heaping pile of the stuff with a spoon and shoved it into his mouth hungrily. After chewing for a few seconds, he tilted his head to one side and shrugged. “I could get used to this.”
“Jesus,” Barry muttered as he picked at a dissolving heap of mashed potatoes.
Sullivan took a sip of water and looked across the table at the forensic head. “Spill it, Don. We’re at a slight loss here without your expertise.”
The balding man chewed another mouthful of the meatloaf, and then sat forward a little, his voice lowered. “Weirdest fucking thing I’ve ever seen, boys. And this
ain’t
my first rodeo.”
“You sound like the sheriff,” Sullivan said.
“Yeah, well, he and I are on level ground, then.”
“So you found the rest of him in the pipe? Shoved down there like you thought?” Barry asked.
Don merely closed his eyes and shook his head.
“You’re kidding,” Sullivan
said,
the surprise evident on his face as he fought to control the volume of his voice.
“We extracted the head from the drain, and I was hopeful since there was some blood and tissue in the pipe when we shined a light in there. But when I looked further, there wasn’t anything substantial. It looked to me like the blood stopped after a few feet.”
“That’s not possible,” Barry said. His tray was shoved into the middle of the table and he looked to be avoiding eye contact with it.
“Like I said, guys, never seen anything like it in my career,” Don said, resuming his meal.
“Could someone have washed the pieces down the drain?” Sullivan said.
Don considered it for a moment. “Yes, I suppose if the chunks were small enough and the suspect had enough water pressure. Sure, it’s possible.”
“I didn’t see any fire hoses in that cell, did you?” Barry said.
“No, just throwing out ideas,” Sullivan answered. The table fell silent and the only sounds in the spacious room were the occasional clank of silverware and the connection of a plastic cup with a tabletop. Sullivan closed his eyes and reviewed the cell in his mind. He turned in a circle, as if studying the layout of the room in a 3-D rendering on a screen. The head in the
drain,
blood everywhere, bits of bone and flesh clinging to the walls like a psychotic’s interpretation of a Pollock.
“Murder weapon?” Sullivan asked finally.
“Not sure on that either yet, but I’ll say this, a cutting instrument was used, and not just one.”
“How many?
Two?
Three?” Barry asked.
“I’d say closer to thirty.”
Both agents squinted at the forensic specialist for a moment, and Sullivan wondered if Don was actually having fun with them. But when the older man merely looked back and forth without smiling, Sullivan spoke.
“Thirty? You’re joking?
Thirty different knives?”
Don held up a hand. “I didn’t say knives, just instruments.
And yes, at least that many different weapons were used.”
Barry’s brow furrowed in disbelief. “How can you be sure?”
“From the lacerations in the flesh of the victim.
Each wound was fairly unique and the pieces of tissue that were on the floor and walls also held definitive incision patterns. Whoever did this also bashed him hard against the walls, like we thought earlier. I haven’t determined if he was cut first or bludgeoned.”
Sullivan shook his head. “We have a real psycho here,
fellas
.” Suddenly the interview with Nathan rose in his memory, and he explained the details to Don, hoping that something would click with the older man.
But after a few minutes of thinking, Don unfolded his arms and leaned his elbows on the table. “That doesn’t make sense either. You say the guard saw Alvarez’s eyes?”
Sullivan and Barry nodded.
“Well, then my only hypothesis is this: the killer either must have been still in the room when Hunt looked in or was very nearby. As soon as the kid leaves, the killer cuts the remains to ribbons and batters the head down into the hole with some type of blunt tool, then makes his escape before Hunt comes back with reinforcements.”
“That’s a ballsy play, if you ask me,” Barry said.
“Yeah, but it’s the only one that makes sense, right?” Sullivan asked. “So what does it mean? The guy’s already dead, why go back into the cell or spend any more time trying to shove his head down a drain?” Sullivan stared around the table at the watching faces. “To send a message, that’s why. That’s the only reason the suspect would take a chance like that. He wanted to make a statement, loud and clear to everyone.”
“And what is it?” Don asked.
Sullivan shrugged. “Fuck if I know.” Don and Barry huffed laughter and the two techs just stared. “But we’ll find out.”
Don finished eating and wiped his mouth with a napkin. Sullivan wished he could have eaten something, but the food and the quiet in the vast room were so unsettling, he really didn’t feel hungry.
“What’s next on the agenda?” Barry asked, pushing his tray even farther across the table.
“Well,” Don said, as he rose and his two techs stood with him. “I believe it’s time to unravel the mystery of Mr. Alvarez and cut what’s left of him open.”
Barry made a clicking sound in his throat as he swallowed and threw a disdainful look in Don’s direction.
Sullivan just smiled wickedly and reached across the table to slap Barry on the arm. “Since leaving right now’s not a good option, I think I know just the place.”
==
The day was cooler compared to the last time they’d been outside, and Sullivan squinted at the hovering clouds, trying to discern if they were breaking apart or only amassing for another attack. The rain had dispelled
somewhat,
and now only a mist enshrouded the wet grounds as Sullivan led the group out from the canopy near the front doors. Barry followed close behind, his thinning hair already beginning to stick to his scalp. Don and his team came next, the last tech carrying the black bag containing Alvarez’s remains. Dr.
Erling
trudged after them, bundled in one of the customary prison-issue ponchos, her head tilted toward the ground and her expression unreadable. Last
came
Mooring, his eyes burning holes in anything and everything he looked at as he stalked several paces behind the doctor.
Barry quickened his step and fell even with Sullivan, and he nudged his friend in the side. “How the hell did you know that the mental facility would have a better medical ward?”
Sullivan’s mouth twisted up at one end in the semblance of a smile, the mist coating his face in a light sheen. “My grandfather worked at a state mental facility for a while. My dad used to tell me stories of when he would visit him at work. Dad mentioned a couple times how terrible the sick room smelled, like formaldehyde and shit all mixed together. But even back then, he said it was big, with lots of beds and equipment. I suppose
there’s
more injuries and attacks at mental facilities than at prisons.
Just a guess.”
“Did the warden seem irritated that we asked to use the room at
New Haven
?” Barry asked.
“Maybe a little.
I think he sent his golden boy back there with us just to make sure we don’t walk off with some gauze and Q-tips.”
Barry smiled.
“And the good doctor?”
“I think she’s just curious,” Sullivan said. Then he snorted. “Morbid, if you ask me.”
Barry barked laughter, which died in the suffocating mist around them. They followed a trail that had been concrete for a while but soon gave way to gravel, which in turn became mud that they all tried to avoid without much efficiency. The trail led down the side of the prison and away from its rear, into a copse of hardwoods. Sullivan could hear drops of water snapping from leaf to leaf as it made its way to the ground, searching for a river or stream that would eventually carry it back to its mother sea. Off to the right the cleared yard fell away, and Sullivan could make out a drive of sorts, or what he assumed was a drive. Water had stretched up from the nearby swamp and reclaimed the area for its own, and all that remained was a cleared path through the trees that twisted and turned around several corners. A few boulders poked above the surface of the water and an unseen bird called a lonesome cry that sounded like it was in pain.
The trail curved through the overhanging trees, and after one last bend to the left, a
chainlink
gate came into view. Razor wire adorned the entrance and Sullivan could see the corner of a building through an opening a few hundred yards on the other side of the fence.
Sullivan’s phone chimed at almost the same instant Barry’s did. Without looking, he reached down and pulled the slim device from his pocket. “Benny must have come through with those videos.”
The words had barely left his mouth when he felt the phone slide from his grip. The black case pirouetted once in the dim light and then landed face-down in a large puddle.
“Fuck!” Sullivan cursed and bent to retrieve the phone. When he picked it up, he already knew it was too late. Water coursed out of the bottom connection point and he could see moisture beading beneath the screen. In his peripheral vision Sullivan saw Barry shaking his head and wagging his own phone back and forth.
“Good thing one of us played college ball. Never dropped a pass,” Barry said.
“Fuck your college hands,” Sullivan said as good-naturedly as he could, but the irritation of ruining his phone was maddening. He pushed the on button a few times, and when nothing happened, he slid the wet paperweight back into his pocket.
Mooring had caught up with them by then, and he walked by, shooting daggers at both agents. Without a pause, the officer strode up to the control box on their side and slid an electronic keycard through a slit in the device. A motor hummed nearby and the gate slid open before them like a starving man’s mouth accommodating a large bite.
Mooring waited for the group to clear the gate before closing it with the matching control panel on the opposite side. Sullivan tried to read the man’s face as he watched the steel fence slide shut. Pronounced frown lines hung on the outside of Mooring’s mouth, and Sullivan noticed the officer’s gaze glazed over when he thought no one was looking. The gate snapped closed and Mooring glanced up, into Sullivan’s probing eyes. A look of surprise surfaced and submerged on the guard’s face.
“Something in my teeth?”
Mooring sneered.
Sullivan shook his head, smiling. “Not that I could tell.”
Mooring scowled even more deeply as Sullivan began walking toward the opening in the trees. Amanda fell in step beside Sullivan and he looked over at her. Her face was covered by the edge of the poncho, with just the tip of her nose poking out into the afternoon mist. A strand of her hair drifted in the breeze.
“How long have you been here?” Sullivan asked after a moment.
He saw the poncho tilt a little and then face back toward the building ahead. “Three years this fall. I did my residency at the Mayo and came up here after that.”
