Page 4 of Manner of Death
McKay sighed. “We’ve got the warrant, but I want to have a look inside the house before we turn you loose on it.” He shot Doran a pointed look. “Make sure we’re not wasting police resources processing an accident scene as a homicide. Especially since I have to agree with the judge that an entire criminal investigation contingent might be, if you’ll pardon the expression, overkill.”
Before Doran could speak, Bashir said, “Uh, actually, I do think we’re looking at a homicide here.” He needed to stay as unbiased as possible, but he still had to be realistic, and the sooner a scene was investigated as a homicide, the less critical evidence would be damaged or overlooked. And in this case, with at least one of the detectives already preemptively ready to dismiss the death as accidental, he wasn’t about to take chances.
McKay eyed him with annoyance. Villeray’s expression held nothing but interest.
Bashir motioned toward the house. “I thought it was an accident, too, but the evidence is telling a different story.”
McKay raised an eyebrow. “What story? That the killer tossed a tree through a window while the homeowner was carving a turkey with a chainsaw?”
Huerta was clearly trying to bite back a laugh. So was Villeray. Truthfully, Bashir might’ve too; it wasn’t that he was irreverent or disrespectful, but a dark sense of humor was part of what kept a lot of people sane in this line of work. You grabbed whatever you could find to anchor you on this side of the abyss.
The only reason Bashir wasn’t laughing this time was that McKay’s joke was at Doran’s expense as well as Bashir’s own. Bashir could take it. The kid needed to know he could trust his gut, and catching hell from the veterans when he did would make him doubt his intuition.
Bashir narrowed his eyes. “Tell you what, detective.” He again gestured at the house. “Why don’t you and your partner go inside and have a look. See if anything seems…” he paused for effect, pursing his lips as if he really needed to consider his choice of words. “…out of place. And if you come back out here and tell me that looks like an accident—one you’re willing to put your signature on—then we’ll call it what it is.” He showed his palms in mock surrender. “I mean, unless the autopsy gives up anything that says it’s a crime, and then you’ll have to find your suspect without a proper crime scene investigation, and—”
“All right, all right. We’ll have a look.” McKay rolled his eyes and yanked some shoe covers and gloves out of the box Huerta had put out. “Come on, Sawyer. Let’s go see what the Dr. StrangeDeath found.”
Villeray again suppressed a laugh, and he offered Bashir a look and a shrug that were equal parts apology by proxy and dark amusement.
Then he followed his partner.
As the detectives disappeared into the house, Officer Doran timidly asked, “Do you think they’ll call it an accident?”
“If they do,” Bashir said, watching the house, “they don’t deserve their badges.”
Chapter 2
Going into the house felt like stepping on stage. Sawyer had never done much theater—his parents had always been more focused on getting him into movies—but the little he’d done had left a lasting impression, one that followed him all the way into his late thirties and a whole new career.
The detective gravely steps through the open door. It feels somehow like he’s stepping inside of a corpse, not a home. He looks down at his feet—no blood yet, but a long sniff confirms that there is a very badly mutilated body in here somewhere.
“Jesus fuckin’ Christ,” Kurt muttered, waving at a fly buzzing close to his face as they made their way to the kitchen. They both stopped at the door and stared in silence for a long moment at the body…and the scattered parts of body. “No wonder the newbie freaked out and decided this was a homicide.”
“We don’t know that it wasn’t.” Sawyer breathed through his mouth as he took in the scene. The décor was…interesting. Unusual, he might go so far as to say, for a single man in his fifties. If Sawyer had seen a set dressed like this, he’d have presumed the house belonged to a grandmotherly character. The blood and viscera, juxtaposed with the ceramic waterfowls and 1970s-era linoleum countertops, seemed like the perfect set-up for a horror film.
“Look out for clowns carrying balloons,” he murmured under his breath.
“Huh?”
“Nothing.” Sawyer took another step into the kitchen, looking for whatever it was that had convinced Dr. Ramin that this was a murder. The only sign of forced entry he could see was the one the tree made through the window, but…huh.
He bent down to inspect the chainsaw itself. It was a corded electric one, not gas-powered, and lay a few feet away from the body. Something about the angle of it…Sawyer followed the cord back to where it was plugged into the wall.
“Oh, don’t tell me you’re taking the doc seriously,” his partner said with a groan. “God, this place is giving me a headache and we just got here. We should—”
“Yeah, it’s definitely a murder.”
Kurt heaved a sigh. “Wanna tell me why you think that?”
“Look at the end of the cord.” He stepped carefully to the left and pointed to where the chainsaw was plugged in. “See the droplet here, on the bottom of the plug?”
“Just cast-off from the body.”
“No. Look at the counter beneath it.” Sawyer waited for Kurt to make the connection between the blood spatter on the countertop—complete with a strange, skinny void—and the smear on the plug.
“Oh, damn it.”
Sawyer nodded. “The chainsaw got unplugged at one point, and the cord fell into blood that was already on the counter. Then it was plugged back in by whoever did this.”